--------- Cloud so welcome everyone this is a meeting of CRC it is being recorded to the cloud and Our IT department will upload it to the town of ERS YouTube channel later this week or next week and due to suspension of certain open meeting laws this group is
able to meet via Zoom I will now turn it over to the chair thank you councelor Rooney if you want to do a sound and video check of all of your participants that would be great and if you'd like I can make um Dave Zac host we usually we
usually kind of share and co-host here you are now the host Dy so Dave can do whatever he wants okay folks it is February 27th this is a regular meeting of the Community Resources committee um Angela just read off the
pursuance to chapter 20 of the acts of 202 and 21 and extended by chapter two the act of 23 we are conducting this meeting via remote means members of the public who wish to access the meeting may also do so via Zoom or
by telephone there is no in-person attendance of members of the public but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time via technological means we have a quorum and I'll call to see if people can hear us
Pat d'angelus present Kathy Shane I'm here Jennifer to here and councelor hanii present and Pam roone is present uh there are no public hearings today and uh let's see what we have for
public attendance we have an opportunity for general public comment and it is for a period of up to three minutes if anyone in the audience would like to speak you are more than welcome to raise your hand and we'll bring you in
I don't see any hands um I did I did say in the public general public comment meeting that there would also be an opportunity for public comment following the CRC discussion of the solar bylaw which is action item 4A so that would be a different another
opportunity uh I was going to have Nate give us a quick update of the ad and sort of where we stand relative to um our reactions to it and or our tailoring of our own bylaw to the new
changes um but he's not available so we will CH has up Pam pardon Pam Chris sorry I had my paper up yeah Chris hi Chris I just wanted to note that the um material related to Adu
appeared towards the end of the agenda agenda so Nate may have seen that so he may come in later I just wanted to suggest that we should keep an eye out for him that's all okay we'll do that we'll do that I think when I wrote a note to the staff that I said I would
try to put it first so we would just get get that focused on but there's Nate Nate can you hear us I can sorry I I felt like I was interrupting something so I turned my camera off as
well no we were we were actually at action item four and just said that since we expected that it would only be a 10 or 15 minute conversation with you we should have you start are you prepared
to do that I am yeah that sounds good great sure yeah thanks everyone Nate Malloy a planner with the town uh you know I've been a little bit with the planning board on regulations for the new protected use adus uh and so you know we had started a
draft bylaw a while ago and then with the state regulations changing we we hit pause a little bit just to see how everything would end up and so the current thinking right now is to keep our existing bylaw so we have an accessory dwelling unit bylaw uh it has
it defines adus three ways you know being contained within a unit attached or detached and then it has a bunch of standards and conditions and you can get up to 1,000 square feet which is bigger than the 900 Allowed by the state um one
unit has to be owner occupied and then it you know does require a special permit for some so you know that bylaw is in place uh and it could still be used it can you know voluntarily be used uh you can follow those you know those provisions and then the standard set of
General conditions in this bylaw some apply to the protected use adus so you know you can apply what's consistent with the state legislation and the rules and regulations so some of those can be applied by staff the building commissioner or building inspectors um
however the current thinking is we'd like to um add a protected use Adu set of standards and conditions to the bylaw and possibly a definition that follows the state definition so um the planning
board there's a a document that the planning board will discuss next week the housing subcommittee talked about it uh briefly at its meeting this week um looking at what kind of standards and conditions we could apply to standard use ad or protected use adus um and so
they're somewhat different than what's in the bylaw uh you know you can't you can't have certain um restrictions or limitations but you know we are trying to say things like a student home definition so that one of the units could not be a student home uh you know there's some discussion about that um
regulating parking having a a maximum number of parking spaces some design criteria uh and you know there's about a half dozen standards and conditions and the idea would be for the planning board to discuss it next week and then the idea is to send it to the state so the
states asked or they they said that they would review you know draft bylaws or um or legislation local legislation before communities move forward with it so you know I think some of the things staff question whether they are reasonable or
unreasonable in terms of the regulations but some of the planning board members feel like they could all be justified uh and so you know we'll send it to the state you know the state may disagree and then it would become something where the board and the CRC can look at it as a zoning Amendment and would go through
a local process and you know reviewed by KP law um so we do have a you know an Adu bylaw on the books and we can use it but the idea is to have a few other conditions um for these protected use to use you know I will say that the state updated the rules and
rs um you know just a few weeks a week ago or two weeks ago and to me it's they really want adus to be constructed and built and so they really want don't want them to be overly regulated uh you know I think in ammer there's a number of communities where you know there's
exceptions where it's like oh without owner occupancy what is the impact of building these uh you know and so that's kind of the concern you know what what really happens does it change neighborhoods or does it just become investor owned properties that doesn't
really meet the goal of what the state wanted um and that's a discussion that's you know Amis is having and I'm sure other communities is having are having um you know the Cape Cod in a few communities they're not exempt from the
legislation so I think at the planning board meeting or if not the most recent one the one before that there was a discussion about oh well some communities are exempt from this legislation and the only Community that's exempt is Boston so they're exempt from 4A anyways what happens you know Cape Cod
essentially they you know they're in the legislation there's an ability to regulate short-term rentals and so you know Cape Cod assuming most of the adus will be short-term rentals can manage it through that you know that provision in the in the law not that they're exempt from the legislation it's just that they
can control short-term rentals and they think most of the adus will be that so then you know they can manage it through that but it's they're not exempt they still have to you know comply with it so that's that's kind of where we are um you know I we haven't I will say we
haven't had any applications yet for protected use adus we've had a lot of inquiries we've had you know a number of property owners ask questions um and but nothing's actually come in yet so questions um go ahead
Jennifer um I I was going to ask uh when when do you think you would package something up and send it to the state uh probably in the next two weeks there is a webinar uh that you know I think the state's holding in mid-march or March 11th or something to look at a model
bylaw for you know the protected use adus uh we may wait we might wait until then um you know the chair of the planning board isn't won't be in attendance next week and I think another planning board member might be absent so he might wait again and till their March 19th meeting and then send it in
afterward but you know the idea would be to try to um you know have some document by the end of March that would be ready to go to the state seems that this group might have some thoughts or ideas um on how to package it or what to include with um
since we're the ones that would have to bring it to the council essentially to have it voted on right uh Jennifer yes so that's actually one of my questions what is the process it would it go from the planning board to the state and then be referred to the council and to us
yeah so you know it would be kind of a memo format to the state uh you know there's a draft document you could I could I can send after this update um and you know it's not even a bylaw really it's just saying here's what Amor is considering as standards and
conditions you know do you think they're reasonable or unreasonable in terms of the regulations and I I don't know how much you know information they'll provide or if they'll have a you know a reason why they may or may not agree with what we provide and so but some of
it is just to get guidance you know um I think there's still some interpretation to be had between the legislation and the rules and regulations and so some of the standards and conditions that we have might fall under that you know is it you know it's probably you know some
communities might think it's allowed and others might not but I'm not sure how the state will view it sorry no no I'm sorry was I too I might I just okay go ahead well you can go to Pat and come back to me that's fine okay Pat
Pat okay you got blocked twice now I didn't mean that um I guess Nate I wonder if you could clarify some of the areas that maybe the planning board or you as the planning representing the planning department are concerned about or what you feel like you need guidance
on so we have a sense sure so you know in the rules and regulations they say you really can't have occupancy restrictions and then they Define what's a prohibited regulation and what's an unreasonable regulation and so uh you know the the
loss of an owner occupancy requirement a few planning board members think that's you know an issue for ammer and so there's a student home definition that's being being discussed that defines a student home and then you know one of the unit if it would apply to single family homes and duplexes and then the a
Adu uh you know that one of the units couldn't be a student home the other one could and you know staff's opinion is that well that's an occupancy or a use restriction that may not be reasonable and there's a few criteria in the
legislation there's kind of three um standards that have to be met to say it's reasonable or unreasonable and you know you know some of the planning board members think they can argue that it is reasonable and others you know might say that it's unreasonable that it's clearly it's a use restriction I so that's one
um you know most zoning bylaws don't regulate single family homes in terms of parking or design guidelines and so you know the the regulation say you can't have any you know more restrictive say design guidelines than you do for single family homes which is really nothing except in a local historic district and
so you know one of the conditions we have we have it now is something that like you know to the extent feasible the architecture of the accessory dwelling unit is compatible with the primary dwelling or principal dwelling and you know the state will probably could say that that's not reasonable because it's
not objective or specific enough uh and then what does that really mean like who you know how what is compatible you know what you know there's it's it's too subjective of a term um so it's those kinds of things you know even limiting parking um you know we don't limit
parking for uh for single family homes but you know the concern would be that you could put in you know seven parking spaces for an accessory dwelling unit for instance I I mean it's it's an exaggeration but you know and so like we do we do have lock coverage and building coverage in our zoning so we have dimensional standards that regulate
something things but doesn't clearly regulate say where parking could be located so um you know could you limit the number of parking spaces associated with an Adu and then could you also have where they you know where they're located um we have one condition now that people like that the accessory
drilling unit should be um behind or even with the front facade of the principal dwelling so you for instance it couldn't ideally it wouldn't be in the front yard right if there was room you would it would be to the next to or behind the house and that's again
something that the regulations say is probably unreasonable but you know it's something that members are discussing like you know could we have some kind of standard about where they could be located and it you know it's qualified to the extent feasible right so if there's a property where it can't be to the side or behind then it could go in
the front but if there's opportunities then it could and so is that really an you know an unreasonable regulation with a qualification to the exent feasible and it might be well who makes that decision you know that it's feasible or not feasible and so it's you know those are the kinds of conditions
that are you know in this document that may be questionable and so to me it's like the state really is telling people just issue a building permit right don't don't set up permitting for it don't have a lot of hassle um and so you know we ask for a management plan to be
submitted we ask for it to be part of the rental registration but we do for every every rental property right and so to me that's not unreasonable we ask for any rental property to be subject to the rental property by law so to me I don't think that's unreasonable but someone might Nate thank you thank you for that
detail Jennifer I don't have you know it's fine to keep our current bylaw on the books you know and then we have to have the protected use but really why would anybody aside from that you get a extra hundred square feet because you can go up to a thousand with ours I can't
imagine why anybody would use the current bylaw and not the protected use right well yeah I mean what if someone you know they had the option though so what if they would want to have one what would they get from that I mean you can build the 900 you just it's by right you don't have an occupancy
limit no parking require I mean yeah so I can't imagine anybody choosing unless they really wanted that extra hundred square feet but since there's no occupancy limit if that is the case you could have more people in 900 than a thousand yeah I mean it would be a it's a
personal you know you know decision right so you might want the extra 100 square feet or you might say well I want my property to have some owner occupancy requirement in the future and so I'll go through and have a permit on my property that limits that because that's you know how you want to have the extra unit I
right I mean if you're selling the property is probably you'd rather have it not have that anyway right yeah yeah I mean and you know some of it would be to allow the accessory dwelling units that have been permitted to have a pering path they don't become non-conforming but it does allow more flexibility and so we could with our
local B say we call it the local Adu we could say it it's now up to 1,200 square feet we could change that as well to make it more of an incentive to do than the protected use Adu oh thank you for that okay that makes happy
um well I certainly think it makes sense to go to the state so we don't draft something that they're going to turn down um you know that that makes sense to me so just on a if I try to not pay attention to the labels of these um and say okay
there is currently a house on a property that could be converted to two units and they want to build a second building on their property and we call it an Adu and they want all of that to be rented that
would have to come for a rental permit I think yes you know I mean but just you know so I'm just thinking so you you could get three units on a property since two are usually fine and I'm thinking of you
know the zoning area where I live um two is okay because our house at one point had a separate they top took a top floor and made an apartment out of it so so just how does the definition of the thing as opposed to just another building on the
property you know how does Adu interact with what the prime what the bu the existing building has in it um yeah so I think you know our the current bylaw you know the assumption is
that an accessory dilling unit would uh be applied to a single family home or a two- family home the way it's written now with the protected use Adu it it can be allowed on any property that allow in a in a district that allows a single family home that has a principal dwelling so for instance a property that
has you know town houses could have an Adu an apartment building could have an Adu so it's not you know it's not related to it's not related at all to the use or what's happening in the other dwelling units on the property no that answers my question yeah
thanks David there couple of questions for Nate one also I want to be a little mindful of Nate's time since this hasn't been referred to CRC yet I think you know a brief over review is great um I was curious Nate how do you know roughly how
many adus have been created under our our current bylaw yeah so I mean you know kind of a little pulse of them in 24 yeah so you know Amis allowed what we called supplemental dwellings um you know like 20 years ago so they were
essentially accessory dwelling units we called them supplemental dwellings one and two and before that we allowed them as well and then we actually changed the bylaw to call them accessory dwelling so you know I think we there's probably about um with the accessory dwelling with a newer BW that's been in place for
a number of years I think there's um probably almost two dozen that have been permitted and then under the old system there's probably another two dozen so we probably have you know I'm pretty sure at least over 30 accessory dwelling units you know you know kind of air quotes accessory dwelling units right so
these smaller units associated with another principal dwelling so we do have you know a fair number in town yeah good and then I did maybe man was going to speak to this but I I did I think it is important for us to just understand our
process like how is how is this going to come back through our process to the council and then be referred to CRC so I'll leave it at that maybe Mandy's gonna comment on yeah I'll just say you know
right now it's not a zoning Amendment it's really say a topic of discussion that planning board's been having at first we're trying to kind of get ahead of you know knowing this new legislation was going to become effective in February and so you know right now it's been you know at first I'd say we did have a draft bylaw right we're trying to
develop some zoning um but I think the new approach right now is to run these standards and conditions by the state and if if we think that we get some guidance on that then we would act the planning board would then start to craft what would be come a draft zoning amendment I think you know it would be
smart probably in March to come back to you know to you with with you know with some language as well so that you know the planning board and CRC are having some discussions about it before it becomes you know a quote official zoning Amendment and you know who could spons you know the planning board could
sponsor it the CRC could I'm not sure you know where that you know how that will happen but thank you um councilor hanaki oh yeah I got a lot of questions but um I have concerns
that it sounds like the planning board is not intending to revise the current Adu bylaw to conform with the state regulations um I think that opens us up
to lawsuits in particular if the quote local bylaw as you referred to it um includes as part of an Adu definition for the local bylaw um
adus that would be defined and fit under the definition of protected use adus under state law because it seems clear to me that if an Adu meets the definition of protected use Adu under state law under 900
square square feet um of gross floor area um or half or not larger than half the gross floor area of the principal dwelling or 900 squ ft whichever is smaller um that it's a protected use Adu
even if there's a local bylaw that it has to follow the protected us Adu restrictions so I'm concerned that it sounds like we are pursuing an Avenue that would have an 800 square foot
Adu not qualify as a protected use Adu because I think that opens us up to lawsuits um so is the planning board intending to modify the definition for a local use Adu bylaw to meet essentially a
definition of protected use that says adus that do not meet the definition of protected use adus um because frankly our H our thousand square foot Adu definition is not gross square foot square footage it's habitable space which means um it's actually smaller
than the thousand foot well it it it it doesn't work they're two different conversations um but I'm also concerned so so I want to know has the state said that a local Adu bylaw can have more
restrictions on adus that meet the protected use Adu definition as a parallel to a protected use Adu permitting structure because I don't think the state said that um and if they haven't said that you can do that I
worry about lawsuits secondly I worry about all these restrictions that seem to be being talked about with protected use adus that sound on their face as violation of use and occupancy restrictions the new definition of a use and occupancy restriction under the
regulation says that limits the current or future use or occupancy of the protected use Adu based on characteristics of or relations between the occupants such as but not limited to income age familial relationship
enrollment in an educational institution or that limits the number of occupants beyond what is required by applicable state code so how and then goes on and says prohibited regulation a requirement that a protected use Adu be subject to a
use and occupancy restriction so I'm I'm struggling here to see how the planning board believes that a student home definition restricting one of the a protected use adus or the principal dwelling unit to not be a student home
meets this these regulations when it seems clear that that would be a use and occupancy restriction based on enrollment in an educational institution um and it seems like some of the other things you were talking about also I'm not going to go through them
all would seem to right away just violate the state regulations that we must follow for protected use adus so how is the town working with that I I I guess I'm just at a loss to
see why the town would propose something at the state level that in my mind by just a clear reading of it not even being an attorney VI violates the regulations um and why we're trying to potentially keep a parallel track for
adus that fit the definition of protected use Adu versus those that are outside of that definition eight yeah so for the first one the state says you you know back to the our local bylaw the state hasn't said you
can't do it either and so when we spoke with an attorney at KP law they actually said you could keep your local one as well even if it is considered a protected use so there you so there could be parallel um uh you know adus I think that it is something that we're still looking into but you know they
haven't said you you can't right so it's an option you you'd voluntarily go into the local Adu as opposed to the protected use Adu uh and so that's something that you know we've been told that that could happen uh in terms of the prohibited regulations you
know although um um Mandy read a previous section in the rules and rs then when you actually get down to the prohibited regulations it says you know the statement a municipality shall not subject the use of land or structures on a lot for protected use Adu to any of the
following an owner occupancy requirement minimum parking requirements use and occupancy restrictions unit caps and density relationship to principal dwelling um but under use and occupancy restrictions a requirement that a protected use Adu be subject to a use and occupancy
restriction so you know I'm not saying one way or other in terms of the student home but you know the but members of some members of the plan B said well it doesn't have to be the protected use Adu that's the student home it's the other principal dwelling and so you know whether it's the you know the other side
of the coin or it's you know something so you know they're reading it that you know you could have this kind of student home definition because it's actually not subjecting the protected adus uh Adu to anything it would be subjecting the other dwelling on the property or dwellings on the property to something
and so uh you know and I will say that the housing sub met this week and that some of the members are willing to provide some justification to some of these so they're the ones working on it you know some planning board members weren't all weren't in agreement Mandy like you and so they said well a majority were and they said okay let's
just keep it on for discussion and have the members who support it provide some justification and some reasons why uh and like I said it's still a discussion with the planning board thank you I've got quick one and that is um we have we have occupancy
limits uh right now in single family homes that are limiting us to four unrelated uh adults and we also have parking requirements uh for single family homes meaning that so we have to follow the we
have to follow the bylaw that says you can only Park two cars you know in the front of the yard or between the street and the the front of the building that kind of thing so um having an occupancy cap of X number
of unrelated I would say at least we have that regulation that should apply evenly between equally between our single family home requirements and our Nadu um that's just generally the kind
of thing that I'm thinking about we do have some limitations on our um on our housing today and to expect that none of those would have to apply to a protected Adu doesn't make sense to me so that would
be something to look at um Mandy one more question or so we've kept Nate here longer than we expected he's been on about 20 25 minutes so um we are certainly welcome to write questions to
him yeah I will say the oceny you know you know there's some staff that I think that for unrelated won't you know cannot be applied to protected use adus uh as a protected use under you know mg you you know it's a it's now a protected use in the in the state law and zoning and so
that occupancy restriction we have locally can't override that so you know that's where the reasonable and unreasonable regulations come in it applies to any protected use right like a religious institution or educational and so we can't deny that um say for instance it can go through site plan
review and we can provide conditions that are not unreasonable to something so you know a group home that comes into town we can't say no to that it's a protected use but we can put conditions on it in terms of say screening the parking or a number of parking spaces but we can't really say no or have
conditions that end up making it almost impossible to do and so that's what the state regulations are with the adus right so that's the difference between you know being reasonable or unreasonable you know and I think some of these are questions that'll have to be answered so one you know Mandy you
referenc gross floor area and in our uh in our bio we say habitable space the building code does not um it defines habitable space so in rules and Rags they reference building code but then they say gross FL area and gross FL area is uh is kind of a meaningless term in
terms of building code and so for instance if you have a 900 foot home with a 900 foot basement an unfinished basement is not part of habital space or building code calculation for square foot because it's unfinished but a homeowner could say well look I have
1,800 square feet between my basement and my my first floor I can put the 900 square Adu somewhere on my property it could even take up my whole basement and so now they have two units in what really is only a 900 foot home and they've exceeded half the floor area or
what you know that that provision and so you know and I know some I know on the list serve and I know Rob's mentioned building Commissioners have been talking about this because there's just you know some interpretation how that gross flow area works with actual how the building code works and so because in the rules
and Rags they then mentioned basement crawl spaces and other things which the building code doesn't recognize as part of calculating square feet you know storage areas don't Cal aren't calculated say like closets so you know from a building code perspective if I say a I have you know 900 squ feet of
habitable space that doesn't include my unfinished basement it doesn't include my porches or my outdoor space it doesn't include storage areas or utility closets or you know space below you know like six feet or 5 feet you know under Eaves of buildings or roofs and so
really a 900 square habital 900 foot habital space could be part of a 1500 foot home right that looks like a 1500 foot home and so I think communities are going to be defining or interpreting that differently and you might actually end up seeing you know it could be court
cases right Massachusetts is set by case law and precedent that end up defining that better um because you know some people might take a more conservative approach in how the gross floor area 900 square feet is used and others might take a more liberal approach I don't so
thank thank you um councelor hanii and then we'll wrap it up yeah so um obviously I'm not a big fan of keeping parallel tracks because I think it's very confusing and potentially against the law but if we do keep
parallel tracks how are we if there's no bylaw for protected use Adu which it sounds like at this point there might not be going forward or ever um how do we notify people that there is another option like how how will will people
know that there's a parallel option that is just the state law because it sounds like frankly the town or the planning board is trying to get around the state law that was enacted to build more adus
up to 900 square feet with minimal restrictions and that is very frustrating to me as someone who recognizes we absolutely need more housing and adus are a good way to do infill it just sounds like that the planning board wants
to find any way around having to comply with the state law in a way that quote complies with the state law on a technicality but really doesn't do what the state law wants so how are we actually if people are looking to build
an Adu telling them if we're going to keep this parallel track that there is there is a state law that says you just get a building permit that you don't have to go through processes that you don't need an owner occupancy restriction that you can rent them both out um and that is legal by law how are
we getting that word out if we're not taking our non compliant bylaw for adus up to 900 square feet off the books yeah I mean that so there's two one staff would tell people that right where you
know and and honestly if someone went and applied the building commissioner or building inspector would just you know if there was an application for a land use permit say someone's like oh I have to get a special permit for an Adu at some point whether or not it was say planning staff at some point someone would just say no you don't need that
and secondly I um we've already built out the building permit application in open goov that has these leading questions and it's live already that someone can click through a series of questions to help determine what Adu they're you know they would be applying for and how they calculate their gross
floor area so we've already tried to set that up to help guide an applicant so you know if someone calls to me today and said oh I'm trying to build an Adu I'd say well here's here are your options you have this new state legislation we have an Adu on the books and we'd walk them through the scenarios and so good the I actually haven't tried
the open gov application but I know um the building inspectors had set it up and I think uh it you know the idea is it would you know inform people they you like I said a series of questions and it informs them of how what their options are how they can apply and um good so it leads them it leads them to the answers
um last question Jennifer it's not a question but I thought I guess I'm confused that we were going to have like you know separate sections of the bylaw one was going to be protected use say to you and one was going to be our current bylaw so that would actually
would be written there or have I been misunderstanding that no no you know so that's one idea right so what the what we could do in what the discussion is to have protected use Adu definition in the zoning bylaw right and then a second another section in our article five for
the protected use you know I know um Rob MOA has said as a protected use the state definition and what we can regulate is already set in state law and so I mean it's somewhat redundant to have in zoning unless we have some other local standards and conditions so for instance right now if someone applied
for an Adu the you know the Building Commissioner in the town can only apply our local regulations that are consistent with the state law and rules and regulations so there's maybe like you know a half dozen in our bylaw now that can be applied so you know really
it is it's just a building permit application and then you know if you're a rental you have to do the rental permit you know a management plan and you know you know we have something about like you know Street numbers that are visible for the fire department and a few things so really that's all the things you know we went
through it there's like I think four to six conditions in our current bylaw that can be applied to protected use adus the idea would be if we have this other section and we think there are some other reasonable regulations that can be put in our bylaw then they would be in addition to what's already there um you
know but I like I said I think the state really wants adus to be built and it to me it seems you know we could allow more than 180 on a property and have it be by site plan review or special permit or we could you know make it really you know elaborate and right now the planning board said let's just stick with a basic
approach allowing one Adu you know and maybe in the future we'd want more adus on a property but we haven't really thought about what that means in terms of Permitting or what it would look like um uh so yeah I mean I'm not you know I think we can operate the way it is now it would be nice maybe to have the
definition in our zoning bylaw to kind of to M's Point too it's also to me it's just a point of reference that if someone is looking through our bylaw and they don't realize there's a state definition of an Adu and they just see what we have in our bylaw they might not know and you know it's nice to have something there almost just you know just as a cue right for someone to say
oh look there's there's these options so whether or not we even put a definition in because it's in state law at the very least we would change our bylaw somewhere in Article Five to say you know there's this protected use Adu based on state law and here's the local
Adu and and if nothing more we still have to have some language like that in a few places just to help people know that there's you know a local option and then this state option thank you thank you Nate so there still would be probably a process that goes to planning
board to CRC something gets referred says this is the this is the wording that we're looking at for section or for Article Five whatever like that okay we we've taken up way more of your time than I thought we were going to um but it's it's helping us sort of get a
framework for when this comes back to us and we understand more of what's applicable sure um thank you Nate very much thanks everyone you're welcome to stick around but I think you probably have better things to do
take care bye appreciate it bye bye so let's move to um the solar bylaw um let's let's move to solar bylaw um where we left off last time is that we were going to take a look at Pat's uh
suggestion for a Hazmat um section and we were going to go back and just conf confirm that the red notes from the pr version um were appropriate and we we
adopt them or we delete them and that will kind of clean up the text so next time we don't have to have anything that says you know suggested ads in red Mandy I thought we were going to finish
working our way through the um standards and conditions section that we didn't make it all the way through submitt requirements sorry submitt requirements sub requirements um that's what I thought we were doing
as well we we're working through Chris's list with Chris okay okay I I was thinking we had for some reason I thought we had gone through that and I got a little confused okay um then let's remind us where we left off Chris is
your hand up Chris I think what we said was we would finish the submitt requirements and then we would also talk about P suggestion about hazardous materials because it wasn't posted in time for people to really look at it
prior to the last meeting but now they've had a chance to look at it so that was my understanding of what we're doing um I thought too good so Chris if you could if you could pop your your voice your audio up as high as you can
that would be very helpful I'm not sure how to do that um you can you on my on my computer it's the way up at the top it's F7 which is the the the audio
plus it's like right up against the screen is um is that controlling my voice going out out yeah well I've hit F7 several times and it I don't know if it's doing
anything I can um we'll just be very quiet listen for you I could rejoin you know because I can't have my audio either my I mean my video my video isn't working and I could actually go back out and rejoin the meeting and maybe things
would work would that be um something I should do it doesn't seem to be a real issue um I would just need to know that you've you need to just speak out because I can't see a hand or maybe you I don't know if you can raise your hand I can
raise my hand yeah oh okay so we should be okay Pat I'm just saying that what I did on my laptop I'm not telling anybody is I increased the volume so Chris became louder to me so I you know perhaps you could do that Pam if you're
having trouble listening to hearing that's correct whoa yeah yeah that makes a difference she became very loud my fault okay good I'm
happy okay so I think we had gotten as far as um item 12 in um what is it 17.04 was the submitt requirements and I uh am I'm not unfortunately competent to show
my screen and last time um counselor hany showed her screen and I don't know if she's willing to do that this time and then she also ke kept track of what we said um so is counselor hanii willing to do that again and she also put a big
Arrow stopped here that let's let's get Let's us get back to where we stopped perfect so so we stopped after 12 right we had some questions about training for emergency responders um it
a plan for operation maintenance and annual training and we were going to talk to Chris basy about that but we haven't gotten around to doing that yet and then okay next one is a utility
connection plan and I think we said we had already included that in number four and five which have to do with the site plan right right that's correct we had included it with four and five well we
didn't we skipped over 13 zoning District def definition we included that in submitt as well that was included in submitt I think that should actually be we talked about this last time that should actually be on the plan because some on the existing
conditions plan um because sometimes a site is divided into multiple districts and you want the surveyor to put that on the existing conditions plan rather than there it is so okay so we're good there so we're
deleting number 13 we can take that out of site plan yeah okay now moving on to the utility connection plan and acknowledgement of application from electric utility I think we have something about utility
connection plan in the um site plan which would be number two right or is it just number four no I think it's number four so here's here's two number two is the location of
interconnections including poles and wires number four and five have all of the detailed diagrams and te technical specs number two doesn't uh have the interconnections it has inverters right
no the last one is interconnections sorry there it is okay good so that's the things that are generally speaking offsite right I think that's what you said last week yes
y so that means that 14 is taken care of right I believe I think so so we can delete number 14 the the one part of it
just I'm just double checking is the acknowledgement of the application from the electric utility that they know it's coming is that I'm just double-checking is that I'm happy to put that up above but I'm not sure that piece is there no it's not it's not there and it would not
be on a plan it would be in the form of a document okay applicant would submit a document to the permit granting authorities stating that they had been in touch with the utility and they were in the process of getting so approval so that should still be there so just keep
that piece of it I have a question about that is that something you do and contact the utility for well before you have a special permit in place like is that is it something you start that
early yes okay you know and Mandy in my trying to jump in before I noticed that was also in the 2014 model draft that that this that the utility company was aware this was
coming you know so it does does seem to be a piece and acknowledgement of application from the UT electric utility should we be more specific of what that application is is it an application for interconnection or that's what it is an
application for inter interconnection it's just to um assure the permit granting Authority that the person who is or the entity that is proposing to put this installation on the ground has been in touch with the utility company and the utility company
is um is stating that this is a place where this can happen if it's so far from a point of connection it wouldn't make any sense for the applicant to go through the um the process spending the money doing the surveys and all of that nor would it make sense for the permit
granting authority to go through the process of reviewing the application unless there was an assurance that the utility company said yeah this is a reasonable location for such an installation so that's what that's
about okay thanks okay so number 15 all off-site electrical system improvements and I think that's important because this involves you know
lots of poles going down the street to connect this to whatever it's going to be connected to so um I think that's a reason able thing to have there did we include that in four and five already so I guess one of my questions
was two the site plans include a location of interconnection including poles and wires so I just assumed that's everything needed to interconnect and isn't that the same as what you just said of additional
polls for that or is that different the site plan is usually things that are on the site that's controlled by the applicant um I think that this number 15 has to do with things that are off the
site it says identifying all off-site electrical system improvements um necessary to the electrical grid to accommodate the power from the installation so the utility company and the proponent or the
applicate applicant work together to figure out what's needed off site in order to get this um Power to where it's going so this is this is almost a memo I'm sorry Pat you had your hand
up yeah basically I feel like this should stay here um as it and not be pushed into four and five so I appreciate Chris's reasoning so so we'll get rid of the
little red has her hand Mandy has her hand up Mandy thank you I have a couple of questions with much of this language um the I guess the list identifying all off-site electrical improvements makes sense if you know it at the time of
application but if all you've got is an acknowledgement of an application for interconnection the applicant doesn't necessarily know what the grid system and the utilities going to do or need or
apply for on the public way as to what system improvements they need so I'm not sure that first half is even knowable by the applicant at the time of application so question is is it knowable by the applicant at the time of application so
they could actually do this the second one is why does the planning board or the permit granting Authority care who is paying for the improvements so the second half for this first Clause identification of What entity is paying for improvements why does the permit
granting Authority care is that necessary in the submittal requirements to identify that um and does it does that identification change any way what permit conversation is there
why why do they need that and and all um and identification of the parties responsible for the installation inspection and maintenance of the generation TI line um again is that going to be known and
what what is the permit granting Authority going to do with that information Kathy and then we maybe Chris has her answer I think Chris could answer but um if I flip this from trying to be
protective of resources to trying to make sure the whole system works one of the things that has held up some solar installations Mandy is a disagreement about who does what so uh that ever Source says that's not my problem that's
not your problem so there's been a big investment and then nothing happens so I don't know whether Chris this language is here to say you know if a big big part of land is going to be taken for a large installation you would like to
know that um the connectedness has been agreed to by the utility there's been we were warned on the school for example that ever sour can take a couple years to agree to connect us um so that we should start working now on it you know and we're not a large scale solar piece
because of grid capacity so this might and I'm letting Chris answer this might be there to protect that we're trying to facilitate this rather than um you know uh tie them up in red tape yeah thank you Chris I think it's
uh something similar to um number 14 above which is Assurance to the permit granting Authority that there have been conversations between the applicant and the utility company to know what needs to be done in the future whether it's
all worked out in detail or not um and I would say that all of these submittal requirements are things that can be um discussed during the application process so or during the review process so if
there is a particular item here that for whatever reason the applicant feels like you know we just haven't gotten there yet or we can't get there because X Y and Z then they would tell that to the permit granting Authority and the permit
granting Authority would discuss that with them and see if they really uh you know are able to come up with that information or not so it's all of these things generally speaking are wable
um I mean that might seem odd to you but in the practicality of the matter it is the case I don't know if that makes you feel any better but I think it's really just um to make sure that the parties have spoken to one another and have a general sense of how this is all going
to work I I appreciate that um it occurs to me that it's it's not a bad thing to remind folks like many other requirements it's important to remind them of the things that they need to be
looking for or have ready to be reviewed um if I think of the state coming in and saying you've got 12 minut 12 months to review a permit um you it's it's not the town probably that's going to be holding things up in
some cases this would be 15 14 and 15 would be situations where maybe the the developer you know gets into a little bit of a hiccup and then forces the the remainder of the nine months left to fast forward
every other aspect of the of the permitting um sorry I saw uh councelor hani's hand up and I think I saw Pat's hand up so I just wanted to say that Mandy's hand was up that's all oh yeah thank you sorry when I'm sharing they got rid of the ability to raise your
hand while sharing a screen yeah so move like this I see um okay wable sounds okay but we've been told that other parts are not wable unless it says wable and this up here says are required to comply with the
submitt in addition to the submitt requirements listed below applicants are required to comply with the submittal requirements that leaves no ability to wave anything and more importantly you can't actually formally apply until all of these are met so how
do they get waved because you can't actually file the application until everything's been met is my understanding so where is the waiver ability and how does that happen when in theory the town doesn't accept the
application unless it's complete and if it doesn't have these it's not complete so I I guess I'm not quite getting that Chris as I said that um this isn't a completely rigid process there's a lot
of back and forth um planning staff and the Building Commissioner meet with the applicant the applicant's lawyer the applicant's consultant and discuss all of these things ahead of time and the applicant then has an opportunity to
submit an application with a list of requested waivers so they might uh that might be in the form of a letter from the attorney saying we request a waiver from the specific spe ific requirements of of item 15 for the following reasons
and then the board would have the ability to um Grant the waiver or not Grant the waiver they could say no we're not going to issue this permit without having all this information or they could say we understand why you're asking for a waiver and in this particular case we think that's
reasonable so there's there's back and forth in that regard so it's really not um you know like a straight jacket that you're putting putting on it's more like an a process that you're entering into and there's a lot of discussion about
about things along the way can I follow up sure I appreciate that except when we were reviewing the udrive bylaw we were specifically told unless the bylaw says
this provision may be waved it is unwave and this SE does not say this these Provisions can be waved by the permit granting authori so I guess that's where part of my confusion is now I'm hearing oh you don't need to
explicitly Grant explicitly say certain things can be waved for them to be waved but we were just told in the udrive hearings that you needed to specifically say they could they could be waved for them to be waved versus variances which are different and you're
not talking about a variance here you're talking about waiver of an actual bylaw Chris may I um so I think um councelor hanii is referring to dimensional requirements and there are dimensional requirements that can be
waved by a footnote a special permit and dimensional requirements that can be um well that's really it dimensional requirements but that can be waved by foot note a so I think what we were talking about in the terms of the
University Drive overlay was that there were no dimensional requirements that could be waved by footnote a they were rigidly there um this is a different um set of requirements rather than
dimensional requirements like you know front setback or height of building or you know lot coverage things like that these are requirements of things that you have to submit to the board in order to get your process started so it's two
different types of waivers and in this case the board generally speaking has the ability to wave some of the submittal requirements based on a request and reasonable um reasons for asking for the for the waiver so I I
hope that that's a good explanation that makes sense when the submittal requirements are part of rules and regulations that the board has adopted but these are part of a bylaw not rules and regulations and so doesn't the bylaw have to give the
ability to wave the bylaw because you'd be waving the bylaw that the council adopts so I think that's a good point that we could put another um bullet or number at the very bottom that any of these middle
requirements can be waved or Modified by the permit granting Authority um with a request from the applicant that's pretty Broad not sure I would I'm not sure I would want to state that so so
bluntly well it would require a a decision a vote of the board who was reviewing this I think that's not atypical but I take Mandy's um comment seriously
because this is a bylaw and so we need to have some language in here about being able to wave some of these requirements but okay Jennifer I was just going to Echo what you said I I would be concerned about
that broad a statement you know then you know anything I mean one doesn't know who's on the permit granting Authority from in perpetuity so I would be concerned about that broad a statement
Well I this is not a purpose uh excuse me perfect bulletproof process where everything works absolutely perfectly all the time there's got to be some give and take so we need to find some way of
expressing the fact that some of these requirements can be waved or Modified by the permit granting Authority um by a vote of you know with a request and by a vote of the of the board it's so I'm going to use UD drive as an example that was one of the first
times that I've ever actually seen in writing in within the bylaw that that certain things couldn't be waved could not be could not be adjusted um and typically there is some flexibility it's
a special permit you ask you give you take um it's nothing in a special permit is locked in so to have to say that um um doesn't seem necessary
Kathy um so we we got stuck on this issue because of the specific specificity of number 15 which is what triggered it if if the wording if 15 and 14 Were Somehow connected
acknowledge with the acknowledgement of application and the consideration of offsite improvements da da da da rather than a list specify you know that you've had you've begun that discussion so trying to reward it to rather than
you've come with a list of everyone a consideration the beginning of a discussion because I I agree I don't think they would have all this in hand on day one but but what it's saying is this is what you're going to need to operate this so a
consideration of uh offsite improvements that will be necessary including and then doing these so rather than the list Mandy we we soften the wording was one way of uh them they could they could have a memo that they've had a
discussion about these and details to follow um you know in in their application so I'm looking at a way of rewarding it if it's in the bylaw that then it would also give guidance to the people who are are overseeing the implementation of it so
these are the things we want to have been considered so right now it says you need to have a list and identify but a consideration of these so it's a way of softening this wording to give the intent of what we want people to be thinking about I'm not giving you
specific enough wording but I think that's conceptually what I'm looking for I see Mandy nodding her head I I think that would be the solution here I I'm I'm trying to think how that would be I think you would combine 14 and 15 you know an acknowledgement of application
for interconnection as well as acknowledgments of Poss I I I don't I'm not sure exactly how it would be rewarded because you know right here it's identifying the improvements identifying who's paying and identifying the part party's respons
responsible so it's sort of like I think what I gathered from Kathy acknowledging that conversations regarding what off-site electrical improvements are necessary to accommodate the power um yeah something like that I'm I'm not sure that's where I was going with it
and you know with identification of who will be paying for which improvements so it's it's that that discussion has been uh initiated uh that makes sense to me
good thank you Kathy that's a good resolution okay proof of liability insurance um that's usually something that um is required whether it would be required as part of the application or not um it could be required as part of
the building permit application right rather than part of the um site plan review or special permit application so if you wanted to delete that and just have it be um it could be a condition um or it could be something
that the uh Building Commissioner would require uh as as something that he wants to see as a result of or as part of the building permit application Chris is what you just said is you potentially would move it to another section that they're going to have to have they have to have it but
they don't necessarily have to have it on day one is that what you're saying they don't have to have it generally speaking we don't make this requirement of other applicants for other types of projects um this was something that was suggested by a different bylaw that we
used to model for this one um so what I'm saying is the Building Commissioner requires uh proof of liability insurance from an applicant in order to Grant a building permit but normally we do not require or the boards that I deal with
do not require proof of liability insurance in order to get an application for a permit started so this could be um something for the future for the Building Commissioner rather than um something that we were requireed as part
of the application so I think you could delete this move yeah mind deleting it I was just I don't want to take up time I was just Cur was going to ask why what the reasoning was behind have the person who
suggested having it here but I'm fine deleting it we don't have to well I'm not I'm not as sure that I'm you know these are you know I'll give you a completely different example that um not with this but where there is a potential risk that
the installation is going to affect the surrounding area how of farm so there was a suggestion on this for some Farmland where if a building was put on the Farmland that covered all the land the water run off to the Farmland could destroy the croughs but one way of
preventing it was enough liability insurance that they could make that farm whole you know so that if they thought it was a low risk they can get the liability insurance so I think it goes with big installations like this potentially have an impact which is
different than build a house next to you um no I I understand that but why it sounds like what's different is requiring it at this point not before the project starts well that's what I'm looking for
if it's not at application does it do you just rely on the building commission or do you put it in a um before you get the permit you have to you know if you're almost all the way through you have to have this um so so th this to me
feels different than our normal building permits yeah thank you Chris and and we have not started I don't think we've started a conditions list we I think we did have a we moved okay um but I I just
wanted to say that um every time the Building Commissioner grants a building permit he requires that the um contractor submit a um proof that he has liability insurance so that's kind of
standard so uh we we adopted this bylaw based on a number of other bylaws that we had reviewed one of which was from where but one of which was from pineer Valley Planning Commission and we also looked at the Cap Cod Commission and a number of others so this probably
appeared in at least one or more of those and that's why put it in but I I don't believe it's necessary as part of the application of for a permit but that's up to you to decide whether you think that is necessary or
not thank you uh councelor hanaki so I would delete this from here because frankly they might not know who the operator is yet um versus the owner and you might not be able to get liability insurance but but the question that came
up to me is and I would be fine more with standards and conditions but Chris just talked about sort of cons contractor Li proof of liability insurance so that's for the person building the item it doesn't sound like we've ever required someone as part of a
special permit or other PGA requirement to maintain liability insurance on the property after construction is complete so me as a owner of a house I'm not
required by the town to maintain liability insurance now if I want a mortgage the mortgage company requires me to do it to protect their sort of investment but but is this seeking proof that after construction is finished
there is liability insurance on the property or was the intention given what Chris just said that only during construction those are two to me completely different things that need to be cleared up and couldn't can you even
as a town require a private owner to keep liability insurance just to own property well and Mandy I would ask that because if it was a large Factory next to homeowners I think maybe yes you know we're talking about something that's
quite different than building a house so the liability insurance I was thinking isn't just during construction phase but during the operation phase that you're carrying it so yes I agree with you I mean there's something different about this it's the equivalent of a
large commercial it's industrial it's industrial it's industrial Pat and then Chris well basically I I wanted to ask Chris because this says has sufficient liability coverage pursuant to Industry standards so it seems to me that there
are standards that this property this operator this owner has to meet can you clarify that for me um I I can't really share much clarification about that but I would say couple of things um Banks and anybody
who's going to lend um the applicant alone to um build this thing is going to want liability insurance right so I think it would be taken care of in that way um the other thing is that there are going to be um state regulations with
regard to erosion and sedimentation and things like that if if the uh if the erosion and sedimentation controls don't work and some property adjacent to it is damaged um that's going to be uh taken care of and um so I think you know the
conditions of the permit the zoning board of appeals puts pretty strict conditions on its permits and requirements of the state are going to um control impacts to adjacent properties
as a result of um something not going going properly here so I think Chris Chris if we excuse me if we said proof of liability insurance prior to start of construction yes I think that would be
fine but then it's not a submitt requirement no that's right um does yes so so Chris Chris you mentioned um yeah the the erosion control U meas measures fail and we get
a Williamsburg or it gets you you know we we there's Untold damage from from sedimentation and and erosion um is that covered by liability it it I don't know I imagine it is but um both theit granting
Authority and the Conservation Commission are going to put conditions on the project to um try to prevent things like that from happening and so then the owner would want to have liability insurance if such things
happen to be able to help him to pay for whatever damage occurs but that um I think is more connected to the building process and what the Building Commissioner grants permission for than it is as part of this application
process Dave has to sound yeah I see that Dave I was going to suggest maybe these are all good questions and and I and I think you know I've been listening carefully just in in terms of our
coverage during construction but then what about after it's all constructed and it's producing energy what if something happens then but I might suggest that Chris if you all are okay that Chris seek more information from Rob on this and also
Aaron jock and bring that back to you or she could email you and and then we could kind of you know uh tighten up this section because I I do think there are a number of questions about kind of during construction but also everything goes well during construction this thing
is operating like it should but then something happens is there is there a bond is there you know what what is there to protect the town as well as a Butters you know for the next 20 years as this thing operates yeah thank you
that's great Kathy so while I was listening I Googled and found a paper called property and casual insurance for largescale photo uh solar system so I will just send that to everyone we get off that because it's addressing just that Dave
you know Anna it's a paper talking about what might you want to think and it's got the word casualty so it's liability and Casualty on a once it's operating once it's operating and it's talking about different types of coverage expenses so it's it's a thought piece
rather than a do the following but it's that bigger piece that this is an industrial thing as and it notes these are relatively new so we're having the insurance industry and liability and Casualty industry is is figuring out how to price it um so I'll just share it to
everyone great thank you and that's a good suggestion that we come back to these we just let's not delete right now i' appreciate it if you took the lines out of it because it's doesn't sound like we're ready to delete specifically yeah Miner but thank
you thanks so moving down to number 17 I think I I had made the recommendation that um the public Outreach plan be kept um and that would
be an effort to um notify and inform AB Butters and the town in general um and it's kind of like prior to the public hearing process and um this um condition or that this requirement
suggests uh including a project development timeline um so that seems reasonable but the second part of it where we talk about publishing legal notice in the U paper and um notifying a Butters within 300
feet that's a legal requirement that we do that we have to do um the minute we get an application where the planning board and the zoning board of appeals we always do that it's s a state law and so there's nothing no way we can get out of
it but having um the applicant make an effort to reach out to the public and to reach out to a Butters ahead of time just to say here's what we're doing you have any comments and concerns and of course people would have comments and concerns but um it seems like a good uh
first effort and a good faith effort on the part of the applicant to inform the public so I think this should be kept but just the first half of it and not the second half thank you Kathy no I don't have it sorry my hand just okay okay at one time we had talked about the
word um notification instead of Outreach um was that Chris are you are you suggesting that we that we actually have Outreach instead of notification I think Outreach is good because the notification the formal notification
happens from the town okay and yeah if there was an Outreach plan there's possibility that the developer and a Butters and stuff might actually collaborate together and
come to some solutions before um the uh development actually Begins the proct always hope yep good okay number 18 oh I had a question about this one oh
sorry yep go ahead um is there a similar requirement in the submitt requirements of 40b projects or other any other part of our zoning bylaw to submit to the PGA an Outreach plan and
project development timelines um in any other for any other project in town or for 40b projects which I know are included in my first half no there's no such requirement the only requirement is for marijuana installations that um
that you have an Outreach plan to the public but there's no requirement for another type of project so perhaps it's reasonable not to require that um so that would be my question why why this one and not other like what what makes
this one different than say a 40b or the same as a marijuana I guess like if we do it for marijuana well this is usually a very large installation it's not um it's not like building you know six tow houses or
even building a an apartment building it's going to take up a lot of acreage and it will have you know an effect on um a large area of land in town so letting people know about it I think is a reasonable thing but you may find that
it's not um not necessary it it sort of prevents people from being surprised by things which I think is good but again we don't require that of anything other than the marijuana installations this is this is presumably
a lot more impactful than a marijuana Outlet you want to come back to that later or no I'm okay for now okay um description of financial shity to complete the project and to decommission the project at the end of
its operation I think I had said that this item can be deleted because the requirement is already covered by section 17.16 of the draft solar bylaw um so I think that we could um delete this
here yes it is at the it is at the end it's a requirement number 19 preconstruction photos from the right of way um that is something that we have required in the past for other large installations such as um
Wireless telecommunication Towers um where we require you know preconstruction photos and then we require a photo or photo montage or a a visualization of what the is going to look like in the future so this is really related to what what is it going
to look like and you know some people say that's not something that you should think about or or talk about but others think that it's important so um this is kind of like the existing conditions uh 19 what does it look like now and then
number 20 is what's it going to look like in the future so you can discuss whether you think this is important and whether or not you want to keep these two um two items here and with the second one I think we said
visualization rendering or photo of existing conditions pre-construction and postc construction Solar Development including perspectives from the right of way nearest AB budding Properties or residential structures if access is permitted by AB budding Property Owners
because it's not clear that access would be permitted byting Property Owners so do you want to have a discussion about those two items yeah yes Kathy I see Mandy's hand is up too and I think hers went up before I clicked okay councelor
hanii so looking at your memo Chris you actually recommended 19 be deleted um and then you just read the new edition of words to 20 and it sounds like that addition at least it looks to me that the addition of your recommend words in
20 is so that 19 can be deleted because otherwise they would be the same thing in two different numbers um is that an accurate sort of that was exactly
my that's accurate yes okay that was my people have to look at Chris's wording but her suggested wording takes care of both it makes it simpler and it's a before and after set of photos in her Memo Y is that
something you want to keep yeah but with your wording you know so getting get rid of 19 we delete 19 okay number 21 whereare analysis second are we let's let Mandy get caught
up I think on number 20 we have to do the access so I have more questions with number 20 then um as I read the whole thing um tree coverage so
[Applause] existing tree coverage does that mean the photos have to be taken at a certain time of year I think you can see trees whether they have Le on them or not so rendering or photo simulation
means they could just simulate that coverage but is um is tree coverage even necessary here existing conditions pre-construction and postc construction Solar Development and perspectives do you even need the words and tree
coverage well in one of the other one of the follow on uh there's a discussion about retaining existing trees within the the buffer area and then it says but you could cut them if you you know if they're going to shade your your array
you can cut those and so I think having visuals and we and we've seen some pretty decent aerial photos of parcels that show that we've asked for um vegetation coverage so you can see
what's Meadow what's shrubby what's trees that kind of thing so this is this is just it's actually it's actually in a way it's a little similar to that requirement at heard the beginning in in a way it's part of it's
part of section item one under submitt requirements topography um I have what's can I just ask if we're taking photos before and there are trees won't we see the trees
in the photo yes so then we don't need the words in other words if if there's a forward after we don't need those words if that's what you're asking about Randy basically like isn't existing conditions
covering that so that's why I was trying to figure out what what's that adding is it a specific a specific thing and then and then if that and tree coverage isn't there then the planning board can ask for more if they if you know we sent you some photos and we're we we're not
seeing it very well I'm just saying I don't know what else is going to be on the land but trees houses uh the photos will show you what's there um we have we have item under um number one it's uh
SEC is item D character istics of an extent of land cover type and I would assume that that would show again the types of V variation of vegetation uh if that's sufficient we could hold it at that and
not have to repeat it here but if we're if we're talking about visualizations they want to they want to be able to show they should be able to show the existing conditions and maybe it's similar material so in the um what
you just referred to number is it number two or number one those two have to do with plan View and this has to do with um 3D view or phot photography view um got it it's two
different things got it so I have another question oh the nearest AB budding Properties or residential structures are they meant to refer to in some sense
the same thing or is it meant to say if and what is nearest to budding properties mean right um like like adjacent Properties or with all the 300 feet ones um but also is it meant to be
that if it's if there's an AB budding property that has a residential structure on it that it should be from the residential structure or is it from the property line and the residential structure I'm I'm not sure that that
phrase is clear enough and and of what exactly it's seeking yes so I think this is an effort to um take into consideration um you know what somebody would see from their property whether they have a home on it or whether
they're doing something else farming or it's a park or whatever it is and what they would see um of the solar installation and so it's a it's a kind of a protection for nearest abing
properties in my opinion would be um properties that are like right adjacent although this doesn't say that I agree with that could we say adjacent properties in any residential structures there on yes did you put that in there yep yeah
right are there any other questions about this number 20 um just when we change all the P all of these to PGA do we need to keep this town staff determined too or can I just like you could put the
PGA because St makes recommendations to the boards and so our thoughts are Incorporated in what the board asks for because usually the boards will take our recommendations and then significant
areas or roadways what does that mean because we already have right of way and adjacent properties so you could probably take that out or take or put in a reference to
what is a for afor said or aforementioned or something like that if you put a period about after PGA it's clear that they could ask for more right that's right so just shorten
it so the period goes after PB P pgaa it I keep thinking it's the professional golfing Association but but it's wrong wrong committee wrong committee sorry I got to plug my thing in give me a
second so but may determine additional subit for for review I think it would just be there may determine additional submitted yeah that's where I was you know the PGA May determine it is needed
exactly that's what I was trying to do there were a lot of pgaas in that sentence sorry yeah yeah okay so it ends after the word review is that correct yes okay could you do a quick
uh temporarily accept that whole thing so I can read the paragraph thank you yes don't you don't need to clean up the rest we're just trying to do number 20 no I think that now reads clearly y thanks you thank you
great yeah it's amazing we have you know a quarter of the words when we're finally finished so are we ready to move on y all right um number 21 has to do with a glare analysis and proposed mitigation
if any this I know we've had discussions about this in the past whether glare is an issue whether glare can be measured whether glare should even be considered but it is included in many of the solar bylaws and the model solar bylaws it's
also mentioned I think I sent you links to articles perhaps down below um in a different part of this bylaw to documents that are online having to do with um glare from solar installations
so it is a topic of concern for people especially people who live near them or drive by them or whatever so um it is typical to ask for a glare analysis and if there is going to be a problem with
glare for a plan for mitigation to minimize impact um and that's why this is here diagram to illustrate any glare created by angles of the sun reflecting off solar panels and inform screening need and placement so I think that's a
reasonable thing to keep in but there may be people who um would argue against that Mandy has her hand up thank you Mandy I can't even see Mandy on my sorry um now yeah I a couple of questions um
so so I'm the one that said it's it's more of a reflective analysis or something but I'll I'll skip the wording issue for now um I guess proposed mitigation if any to minimize
the impact is some of that more um not sub I mean a mitigation plan is a submitt requirement but minimize impact on affected properties and Roads
is not really a submitt plan a submitt requirement that's more of a standards and condition part and how do you measure minimizing impact um when you know
like I guess how is that decided and ruled upon during the application and hearing stage if there are impacts of the their solar panels right um and then my other question
is diagram to illustrate any glare created by angles reflecting off well there's glare I I guess I don't quite totally
get what that looks like and what it what it looks like on the paper and how it helps like is that I is the diagram meant to have these angles with arrows pointing
towards various other properties or roads um at what time of day I guess I'm I'm struggling with what would this actually look like and how would you satisfy it is it at all times of day it
help me understand how someone could diagram glare for 15 hours a day right um let let me answer so so this is if it I added it or that was the
discussion right so um the angles of the sun can be marked and they are they can be diagrammed so that you understand at times of day when the sun is shining and reflecting on the panels you you know exactly where those rays are bouncing if
there are if there are areas that uh in their analysis would be directed toward elements that you want some protection for like the neighbors um you
would you would look to in use that to inform where to place your screening your screening vegetation so it it we probably don't have to have the words a diagram to
illustrate um if we just simply say do the glare analysis and propose mitigation uh where it appears that it will be um impactful on on AB budding properties you could you could have you
could you could actually have more impact on you know somebody with a house up on the on the pelum Hills um because you would you would not be able to screen that obviously so um that's that was the intent of this just we hear from
Chris oh I was just glare analysis should be presented and then the board the PGA can decide what to do with it and have a discussion with the applicant about okay you've said glare would affect these locations is there anything
that can be done to mitigate that glare and it could be potentially changing the angle of the panels so that they don't Point directly at whatever the place is it's going to be impacted it could be that you know these panels sometimes um
they don't rotate if I forget what they call it but they move during the day and it could be um moving those panels during the day so that um they don't impact whatever is you know potentially going to be uh impacted so um it's it's
really a discussion but in order to start the discussion you have to have some information and that's why the glare analysis is important you could say proposed mitigation could be um developed during the conversation with
the PGA and so really what you need as part of the submitt is a glare analysis and you probably don't need proposed mitigation to be submitted because that's going to be part of the conversation later on so you don't you don't want to
require the glare the the proposed I mean because they could say it's going to glare at this time and da so we're going to plant 60 foot poppers because they're going to be fast growing and they're going to screen what what we think would be detrimental so we don't want them to come in with that
information well I think that they could either come in with it if they see there's a problem or they could wait for the PGA to bring up the issue and then have a discussion about okay what are you going to do about this you've said it's going to be a problem in this
instance can you give us some suggestions about what to do to make it to minimize that Kathy and then Pat I'm looking at the notes you wrote to us on this Chris so I'm if we said a
glare analysis period and took out all the thing and then added the word um depending on the analysis the PGA can require a proposed mitigation plan yes that'd be great so do you do
the analysis I mean if it's in the middle of nowhere and no one can see it then you say it's not there's a big installation up by Meme and it took away trees but no one can see it it's not a the glare is so the glare analysis the
PGA may require mitigation depending on the results you know or as part of the permitting process and the PGA would determine whether the mitigation is onerous or not the PGA would say well you know in order to really mitigate this problem you're
going to have to spend a million dollars on 20 foot tall whatevers and we don't think that's reasonable so um it's a like I said before it's a discussion that the applicant has with the board about what is reasonable so I think that
um that Kathy's wording is good depending on the analysis the PGA may require mitigation Pat you had your you had your hand up it's okay I can go with Kathy's language thank you
Kathy okay number 22 documentation an acoustical engineer could I interrupt oh sorry sorry and I just want to say that I have because I have people coming over at 6 I have a
hard stop and I'm trying and so we should figure out what's happening between now and six okay let's I'll do a little rundown there are no meeting minutes um the next agenda preview is
solar bylaw we don't need to do an Adu update next time so we can scratch that off so right now we have solar bot and we would I will probably It also says planning board and zba yeah exactly so I think I think uh I may want
to take the time and get some feedback uh we may want to look at interview questions and just have them done and ready but it's not critical it's just you know we've got a couple of months before that's required would are we how much time I'm I'm not looking
at a clock how much time do we have left we have we have we have 15 minutes max I well you guys can stay longer I just want to explain we have to my strong preference would be to see how far we can get along this list I
age anyway so you're not gonna miss much Pat okay let's keep going so number 22 is documentation by an acoustical engineer of noise levels projected to be generated by the operation of the facilities we've
decided to eliminate construction and decommissioning um because it's reasonable to assume that there will be noise during those times but the operation of these things can be noisy um and it apparently has to do with inverters and some installations can be
very bothersome to neighboring properties I understand there was a property up in or project in Conway that really had that problem I don't know what they did to ameliorate it but in any event um having an acoustical engineer analyze what is being
proposed um make sense and present that information to the PGA and then they can discuss what potentially could be done to mitigate if there's a problem thank you that's to me that's that's probably one of the the bigger
imp impacts um so again placement of this of something like this is is key because it could be quite a distance from Neighbors that would be preferable yep any
questions no okay here's one that um we had discussion about last time or we talked about this topic last time location and approximate height and present tree cover on the site at the time of the application filing
um trees with a d diameter of breast height at 18 inches for evergreens and 12 inches for deciduous or greater um is this reasonable in my opinion I think what we should require is that the
applicant outline on the site plan where the area of clearing is and where the area of um retention of trees is and usually they do that by a kind of cloudlike um
line on the plan and I don't think we should require um them to be specific about the location and size of particular trees particularly because these projects are huge and if you
require um such detail about what is there and what's going to be cut I think it's going to be really expensive and unreasonable so Kathy and I thought last time that we had deleted this but maybe
it was repeated twice be we have Manny just showed us including trees is up about you know what you're going to be clearing um instead of the counting of trees I think we had another one but I agree that this you know we we had the
clearing of property so so this can be deleted number 23 yes we have an exting conditions plan that requires land cover type and then we have a site plan that requires showing vegetation
clearing including trees y so I'm I'm going to raise one thing that that we had long time ago talked about the word mitigation and we haven't really even delved into that um I'm not
sure that we are or are not going to talk about Mitigation Of of anything it's a it's a project we don't we don't mitigate for subdivisions that kind of thing um if if we were going to ask for
mitigation measures Beyond just screening with you know Evergreen material to protect neighbors um we might want in fact to understand better the the areas that were going to be cleared but we've we've
already asked for that so I think I'm I think I'm okay I had the word mitigation written into my um copy here may I say something yep so I think that we talk about screening later on in
this document as a whole so that should cover things about buffer zones and what you can see from the road and all of that so I don't think we need to have a discussion of mitigation with regard to number
23 yep I agree okay number 24 is a map and description of all soil types as found on the USDA um website and we're saying we can
delete that item because we've already talked about we' already have it right on the existing conditions right exactly y um number 25 requirements regarding soil's
management and conservation on Farmland so this is where um a solar installation would be placed on farmland and the thought here was that well after the um installation has run its course after 20 or 30 years or whatever um it may be
possible to remove the solar panels because somehow they've discovered a way of you know shrinking the size of panels and have doing it in a much more Consolidated Manner and you don't need all that Farmland anymore to um to you
know take it up with solar panels so we want to make sure that the Farmland is preserved so that it can be used for um to farm in the future so I think that's what 25 is all about and there
was in version 8 um an amendment which I don't have in front of me that may delete may have deleted these things shown in pink I'm not sure so maybe uh cancer hanii has an idea of how that turned
out so I don't know whether that's a version eight or not um a draft I'm working off of that has various changes from me which is a version seven um greatly changes this and I
don't know whether I moved some of it in reading some of this um it it changes it to a soil plan that includes the following um so so it references this soil plan because all of this is like
submit a soil plan right and so then um but some of this I think why it had so many changes and I can put up what what's in here um whatever my changes are some of this is no concrete or
asphalt should be used a lot of this is um actual like conditions requirements not part of a sub submitt requirement right um you know this demonstrate that the
project meets or will meet requirements by submitting a soil plan and then it's these requirements right but the requirements are not a submitt requirement the requirements are sort of a permit requirement of standards and conditions requirement so I I think
we're conflating things in this number between what's required and what should be on a soil plan so I can put up what this redraft I have looks like um which I think just I'm gonna
interrupt just for a second Pat I think we're probably not going to get to your um hazardous materials today yeah I'm not worried about that but I am I want to have Mandy keep going because I don't know whether I'm following or agreeing
with her so I want to hear more yeah what I think is right here's the web soils map that one's already been included somewhere right a soil because because we included that in the existing conditions right um but I think the rest
of this was what does a soil plan include and then I'm guessing but I'd have to go to the rest of my thing that the the some of these that are more prohibitions were moved to later in the
bylaw right if you read this one no asphalt or concrete shall be used under solar arrays except blah blah blah that's actually more of a bylaw requirement not a submitt requirement that's right that's later on I've looked
it up I don't remember what yeah I agree with that and we did move it so I think we moved a lot of these I'm not sure where but um I'm just going to highlight them for
now Mandy and you're saying you're keeping a plan for minimizing soil the what's in yellow what so I'm it's at the bottom of her screen is what Pat I'll page up Item B Item B this this is what my draft at
some point had is as number 25 a soil plan that includes the following I just deleted one that's already in the existing conditions plan the soil types but um a plan for minimizing soil disturbance the square footage and land cover type of each area that would be
disturbed information about proposed top soil or other soil removal a calculation of earthw work operations listing all of that and if material is to be imported th this part is actually more of a a standard
and condition right um and then something about avoids the use of chemical stabilizers um some of these are more standards and conditions but it was what does the soil plan need to include and then move any of the sort of prohibitions or
requirements into the correct section later in the bylaw which would probably be some of this might be this one and and and avoiding the use of chemical
stabilizers yeah although the exported soils a proposed disposal site to identify that would not be so we're talking about moving these to a place later in the bylaw yeah the high
the now commented ones okay so on on Item B on item I'm sorry Chris go ahead oh I'm sorry no I don't need to talk uh Kathy you have your hand up yeah
I my request I like that idea my request for next time Mandy is if you excerpt this into its own page and say a soil plan whatever and show what we're moving somewhere else it's so that we don't lose the um pieces that we're saying is
part of the construction you know just having these need to be moved and then wherever I just um so we can delete then we can go ahead and delete Bast Foundation whatever we don't want but because we know we're moving it somewhere so doing what you're doing now
is fine and I just uh soil soil management plan um when I read this I had no it didn't it looked like it went beyond soil management so I like the change that says soil management shall include the one you just showed us but I
need to see it in kind of a clean version agreed agreed yeah is this a good place to stop these are just all duplicates now we have them but we move them yeah I think 26 is completely
duplicated okay yep it is y yep we we've Incorporated elsewhere the storm water also got moved did moved to the middle requirements didn't it yeah or for um yeah it's right
there it's it's right there storm water management no that's the infrastructure that's not the plan not the plan okay but they always include a plan it's well it should be listed though that where we
want it and it's usually not on on a map it's usually a bulky document that talks about how are you going to control storm water so yeah think we need to keep the management plan because the infrastructure is just what are you
building okay so it's not it hasn't been moved that was my question I don't think it's been moved it's it's 6 PM yeah I'm heading out and I apologize I won't I can longer
bye bye thank you P bye and I need to go soon too yep yep we need to we need to close right now so let's make a note where did we stop we stopped with what number the heck is
this well it's it's uh number 28 it's the the it's the chemicals and so when Mandy comes back with this soil management plan it had chemicals in it and I just want to know does chemicals come in twice um earthw work operations
so it's look I'm just looking for how to make this as streamlined as possible so maybe a couple of the things are going to be incorporated under this the the soil management including well the chemicals have to do
with operations during construction operations okay that's different right thank you operating and then later on during decommissioning so they come in at all different times um so asking for a list of chemicals that are going to be used as
reasonable of P addition time right that had that I'm sorry I there's only Mandy what's your question we're discussing 28 next time not tonight right corre so all I said is we stopped there and I'm going to need to see this whole thing to see
make sure it's worded differently than the soil management plan has chemicals because I don't disagree with you CR so I just think we're stopping Kathy and also look at what um Pat was suggesting right right let me just say that the
soil management plan is particularly useful for Farmland but it doesn't talk about other instances in the forest or you know any other type of land it only talks about Farmland so um is that a is that an
issue and should we be thinking about it maybe but okay that's a reason to retain number 28 even though some of these things are mentioned in management of Farmland yep okay
folks okay and 3 Mandy thank you for subcribing for us again really really helpful um we talked about next agenda preview no minutes no announcements
um so is there anything outstanding that that we that Chris you need from us or you or we need from you I have a list of things that I was supposed to do from the last time and I have a few things to do from this time
so I will do those things and the next meeting is March 13 is that correct March 13 right okay all right and that's when we go over the bulletin board notice notices for zba and planning We're not gonna have time to do that we'll do at
that meeting yes yes yes um and I didn't do any public comment on this particular topic and um which I probably should do let's just see if there's if there's anyone uh is anyone in the audience who
would like to comment on this before we close up on specifically on solar bylaw I see no hands so we will not do that um I'm looking for a motion to adjourn so moved
second uh let's go around Kathy yes Pam is a yes Jennifer yes councelor hanii hi we are adjourned thank you very much it is 6:03 and who gets to stop the recording maybe I do Part: 2
go ahead thank you Athena all right welcome everyone um to the our march to our excuse me February 27th Charter review committee meeting um I'm going to screen share the agenda shortly just call on
everybody uh have a nice night Athena um Bernie can you hear and be yep present yes hello great Rafael yes Erica yes Meg yes
excellent we're all here um announcements are I will screen share the agenda Bernie May screen share one document for us to review during the meeting and I'll screen share the Colin Center proposal um another just quick update that I've been asked by town hall to
share with everyone is that there is a cdbg advisory committee hearing on Thursday March 13th um at 7 p.m. and you can join that virtually and check it out on the town website for Community Development block grant funding um so if
anybody's interested in that I've been asked to share it um now I will open this up you all can see my screen um so Athena did not obviously she's been sick so no
expectation for her to but um the she didn't Dan resigned so we don't have the meetings minutes for the 16th she's going to take those um for the 30th and the 13th um Raphael said uh you weren't
able to do the meeting minutes for the 13th um is it uh did you ask to see if a staff person was able to do that and if not I will do that and get them back to us for our next meeting yeah I could do that Julian I shared while
um so I I'll do that you got it okay let me know let me know if you need anything and that can come to our next meeting and then uh I'll look on here the meeting minutes for the 30th uh could we remind us of who Took minutes for the 30th remind
me someone took me minutes for 30 question is who Oh Marcus um he's not here he's not here uh that being said um I can screen share the meeting
minutes um if I can find it yep here we go uh can you all still SC see my screen or not yes great um try and open it here okay
um me open this at full screen can you all see this yep great um doesn't look like much though it's just the uh document Center Page oh you're just on the it's not open
huh um I am trying to screen share the minute that uh Marcus sent to me but they are in a strange document um I'll send these minutes out to you and we will approve them at the next meeting because I don't want to take our
time up just watching those minutes um you all can read them Marcus had suggested he was gonna run the transcript through chat GPT and see what it came up with so yeah that's he sent
me um and it does look okay um I just uh haven't sent it to the whole committee because it wasn't in the packet beforehand so I don't want to move that forward too quickly uh and then my last question is Athena said that I'm taking
minutes for this meeting Bernie you said you are I'm G to actually go and look to see whose official turn it is and could you while you're looking tell us who the next one is yeah absolutely
um it looks like it is Bernie and then me okay yep um so we'll have Bernie take minutes for this meeting and I'll take minutes for the next meeting um and uh does that work for you Bernie
sure great um awesome so I noticed that Samantha's joined us I appreciate it um she's here to discuss social media and how we can reach out for social media I'm going to move to that point in the agenda just so you don't have to spend your entire evening with us um so
uh we can be boring so I will Oh no you're not boring um so the minutes we have all set for the minutes for January 30th uh I'll send those out to the committee memb
after our meeting and get back and we can vote it next time the other two meeting minutes Rafael will bring back and then Athena will bring back and Bernie's taking minutes today um so we'll move to agenda item six which is social media um we have been aiming to
get uh some public Outreach uh happening both at local venues around town as well as in the form of online surveys and alerts for when our meetings are happening and how to submit comment I know there's something on the town website where folks can submit comment
electronically that's pretty great um and so on and so forth uh so we're sort of looking to expand our Outreach into um the different means whether that be the local newspaper or the I know we
have stuff on the town website um but I think Ken may have had some questions about the website itself and then uh and then also like at least my personal interest would be expanding so that we could be seen on the town's uh on the
town's media whether that be Instagram or Facebook or Twitter and so on and so forth I know that um the DPW has been hard at work on our social media Instagram um but yeah yeah happy to oh Meg did you want
to start no I had a want to ask Julian if you could send us the link for where people can send those comments on the town website because I'm getting a number of I've had five or six people send me unsolicited their little essays on what
they would like to see change and I don't I I will I don't know I want to be responsible to those people I will send that to the whole committee when I send Marcus's minutes after the meeting sorry sorry Samantha to hold you back that's okay and thanks for coming Samantha I
appreciate it yeah no problem I mean I'm happy to talk more like overall about things without reach obviously I know a lot of you have been in town a lot longer I just started this role as the communications manager for the town in uh June so last summer and moved to the area so I'm still new whereas a lot of
you I'm sure are connected with groups but um I think we've definitely been successful in doing Outreach for a lot of different initiatives in town um including other committees or departments work and so I know we did do a press release right when this committee launched um that included the
link to your page as well as a link to submit feedback um and I think that was actually mostly drafted by some of the members here today um but I'm happy to I think as you guys are continuing your work and figuring out a good point where there's something more like newsworthy
like events that it sounds like you guys are looking to have we can definitely put together a press release that will have a little bit of an update of like where you're at like a progress report as well as up uh upcoming events to submit or to come to to engage in the
conversation and always put a plug for that form on the website so definitely happy once you have the details for those public Outreach events to send out a press release um which usually always gets put in The Gazette or the indie or the current or some of the other um
consistent articles or news outlets for ammer um and then in terms of social media yeah I think similar for these events we can do uh different postings I'm sure maybe some of you have seen for the district meetings that the town councilors host we post an event uh
graphic for each of those that are coming up and I know some counselors have reached out to me saying that they've gotten new members at or new residents at those events and found out about it from social media and hadn't even known that counselors did hosted those events so definitely happy uh
again once you have those event details to put that together and put it out to social media um I'm not 100% familiar with of where you guys are at in the progress but I know this is definitely something that I'm sure a lot of people have views on and so it's figuring out how the best
ways to reach uh the folks that have views and opinions about it and I know looking at your agenda that you guys have different Outreach lists and Community groups that are you're doing Outreach too so definitely just know that I'm happy to support in any way I can whether it's yeah me drafting the
press release and then you guys can just copy and paste that to those groups or however I can support um but definitely for those events can post to social media um all of our Outlets we are on Facebook Instagram X or Twitter and we
did uh start a blue sky account as well um that we've gotten a bit of a following on um but yeah so press release and anytime we do a press release it also gets posted to our website as a news item which does get emailed to anyone
who subscribe to that um I think those are the main ways that I'm happy to support definitely if you have other ideas or things that you've seen other initiatives in town get uh attention from happy to share how we've kind of shared that out um I think one thing
that might be helpful for me to know is a little bit about um if you guys have a timeline or like a certain point where you're really doing a big push for that form on the website because I'm happy to kind of other surveys that we've done in town do a bigger push through social
media through different strategies um like the housing production plan or the downtown design standard surveys that went out um and that definitely helped get bigger uh engagement or input through those surveys so any time frame for that would be helpful that you
really want to have a deadline for info yeah thank thank you so much Samantha I think one of the things to answer your question about when we're really trying to develop a survey to sort of get residents feedback on the charter and so on and so forth the Outreach
subcommittee is working on that would have to turn it over to Erica to give you an exact date on when uh that committee expects to have that complete by but um we're hoping sometime in the next few months so that
would be great to have as a press release texted and emailed to people on social media Etc um we may even consider like a townwide uh mailer or something for that I don't know if you have any experience
with that um but then it at the very least I think it would be great to have like a QR code that people can click on like someone scrolling through Instagram being like yeah I'm upset about blah blah blah on my town government um take five minutes fill out a survey and that
comes back to us that would be immensely helpful Erica thank you um the um I was going to talk about this a little bit later but the outage subcommittee wasn't able to meet uh in the last round in the intervening round
between our two meetings um but I did want to talk a little bit about uh a sort of proposed timeline but for you Samantha my question is um when we're thinking about for instance having a public event and doing promotion around
that in advance um can you give us a sense of like what is a good time frame for us to be thinking about how far in advance once we've locked in let's say we're doing an event I'm just I'm just throwing this out hypothetical on the
town common and we're going to ask people to come and talk and we're going to take notes and we want to advertise in in advance given your expertise and the channels that you have access to what kind of publicity timeline are do you recommend for that kind of for that
kind of public event yeah so I mean I think ideally like a month in advance is good for people people to have it on their calendars but I know for example um our Cupa Joe events with Paul which are people look for because they're used to
them happening um we're advertised sometimes yeah like two weeks in advance and they get anywhere from like 15 to 40 people showing up um and even the downtown design standards I know the consultant they worked with did some additional Outreach but we shared that I
think also like two 3 weeks in advance and they had a good turnout for their initial launch of events which actually were in the on the town common or North Common um so I think yeah between a month and two weeks like two weeks is Absolut latest that you'd want to get info out about it but I think people in
town are really engaged and pay attention to the news outlets that our information gets posted too thank you and can I ask just to followup Ken before I um the do you do you prefer
just like dates and time or do you prefer some more descriptive material do you prefer having kind of visual material to go with it uh what's the best kind of best practices for us sort of putting together a kind of
campaign what are the elements in that two to four week frame that you're describing so that we can get you stuff that you can do your piece yeah so typically whenever I'm helping a department with an event or a survey or some initiative um obviously you guys
are the experts on the work that you're doing so yes the like details Logistics of the events and then I know on the website is kind of a short paragraph description of the charge of the committee um but I think just yeah just any information that you have and then I
kind of reformat it into the best format um make sure that it's easy to understand and accessible for anyone in the community um so I mean more information than merrier but I wouldn't invest too much time in developing language for it just like what's going to happen at the event what people can
expect whether it's Community conversations presentation I think the format of the event um logistical details and then yeah a lot of the descriptions of the work you guys are doing is already on the website so it shouldn't be too much information to send me and then in terms of Graphics I
typically develop any graphics for Town programs or initiative so you don't need to worry about doing that unless someone was really interested in it um but it just helps keep branding consistent for all Town initiatives for me to do it so I'm happy to do that great that's very
helpful thank you yeah no problem thank you Ken um can you uh Samantha just briefly tell us what platforms that the town is currently active on and maybe not maybe
but secondly what is is the town involved at all do they get to get into next door is that that social media but I'm just curious because that the boundaries of that are not very clear to me so it tends I tend tend to see stuff in
Northampton even though it says it's sort of my neighborhood so I'm not sure how how effective you've found that if you've actually dabbled in it yeah so um just to start kind of what we generally do any Outreach on is yes our website knowing that that's kind of the main place that people look for
information um and then for social media yeah we're on Facebook Instagram um Twitter x uh blue sky and then also on LinkedIn um so those are kind of the main Outreach and then through press
releases often kind of amplifies our message in multiple news outlets including like video uh like Western Mass news and 22 News um and a lot of the other news outlets in town um in
terms of next door that's not something that we've dabbled in um I've like recently met with like Communications Folks at other municipalities in the state and I know they're always kind of going back and forth of whether like the town having a presence and utilizing
that or as an Outreach method or having it just be community members kind of using it as an opportunity to chat um similar to Facebook groups um just an opportunity to chat amongst themselves versus like it being used as a platform for the town to share information um but
I think that's always helpful for yeah folks in town who are involved in the initiative to amplify the message on those platforms whether it be in a Facebook group or being next door um but it's not something that the town has dabbled in now let me let me ask one more followup question as I thought of
it so I I work at UMass and as an employee I can I can find ways to maybe get stuff into the the um whatever the communication circles there that obviously has to do with UMass but if if
the angle was if you live in ammer this is important to you but my question is is that would that be up to us as individuals to try to get something into UMass or does the town have any sort of relationship that you're able to get Town Towny stuff so to speak at UMass at
at the staff level staff and faculty level yeah so I didn't even mention we do like um the like public schools like ammer public schools um I'm in partnership with their Communications person there and get some information put in their like parent newsletter or
staff newsletter so definitely happy to add that to my list of what I can put these on um and then uh I've I'm in contact with like the ammer student newspaper and the um student newspaper a lot of their students do pay attention to what's happening in town um for
example the emmer college student newspaper did an article on an initiative that the Dei department is doing um and really pay attention to how they can contribute I know for the the um housing production plan that the planning Department's been developing a
lot of um students responded to that as a major uh population in town that is impacted by housing um but we do have specific Partnerships with the um university relations department um and so I was just actually on a call with uh
Tony Morales and also Joe something from off-campus housing um because we're planning a townwide cleanup in April um and they mentioned how they'll be sure to put the information on all the like newsletters that go out to the campus I think they were talking
specifically about the student ones but if there's a faculty one I think it can easily be put on there as well and can work with Tony on making that happen Okay cool good to know that thank you yeah no problem see Meg Meg go right ahead
thanks you're muted Meg I didn't want to blow my nose muted unmute um thank you Sam for joining us on an evening when you could be home appreciate it we all appreciate it um do
you have any advice for reaching people who live in the 20 some apartment buildings in town um so I think that's where we kind of go back to the classic methods of uh Communications and Outreach which we've beening doing a bit more but actually printing out some flyers and putting
them up around town um so we have been doing that in like municipal buildings in the libraries uh some things at the survival center um so I think we can put more effort into yeah printing out flyers and putting them in the figuring out connecting with the managers of
those buildings I'll say we don't currently have a relationship with any of them except uh the Amorous Innovative living and the properties that they run because they often are partners for a lot of the town events so we could definitely be sure to get them in the buildings that they run um but otherwise
it may take some extra effort figuring out how to get into the other apartment buildings did you say that Innovative what was it yes ammer Innovative living I'm not familiar with what properties sounds like a good idea that's just so
folks know that is kendri Place One East Pleasant Spring Street oh those uh Olympia and then there's one other behind boltwood near Bueno isano so do they have email lists of their tenants
of their renters do you think potentially but I don't know that they would use I feel like most time like when I've lived in an apartment building they just use it for like maintenance updates or things like that not so much Community things but I think it's worth
mentioning I think it all depends on the place like I don't know I know I used to live in ammer Office Park and they didn't have any email list like that um but I know some friends who live in Village Park or in East Hadley Road and
they have their own Community email lists that we could get into so Village does too depends on the place is sort of my understanding which obviously makes it more complicated for us but yeah Flyers is a good putting up Flyers
is a good idea yeah Flyers definitely yeah related question um do you does the town do you or your office maintain a list of um sort of Civic groups uh to do Outreach
to um we don't I know just like yeah how I mentioned that we're planning the cleanup in town we kind of compiled a list of groups that might be interested there um but I know pretty much everyone in my vicinity in my office has lived in
town for like over 20 years if not more so they definitely know the groups and probably know the people but it's not something that we like maintain but I'm sure we could develop one um to help you as you're developing your community group Outreach list okay that is
something you could help support us with is putting together that doesn't have to be 100% complete but like a uh a list of entities or groups that are active in town I think that would be super helpful I think that like if we're
able to if the Outreach subcommittee were to draft a list of emails um email lists in the apartment complexes as well as like groups to reach out to and then we could run that by all of the
committee members Town staff Etc I think we might not be at 100% but we'd be getting pretty close with the depth of knowledge everybody has especially if they reach out to folks they know um one other thing that I'm
thinking of as we're talking is uh it sounds like maybe you'll have the details for some of these events and whatnot um finalized or like developed by April um so for folks who don't know in April there's lots of events in town
There's the like inaugural ammer Global Village Festival on April 5th so that will be a huge Community event that folks uh you could have a table at um I know like the town uh like me and Angela will be tabling just about opportunities in town like getting involved so we'd be
happy to share that space with you all um and you could have yeah a little handout with links to the survey if you have that all said or links to just the form to submit feedback or even physical like box where people could write thoughts and put it in um there's also
yeah on we'll be having the townwide cleanup then as well as um towards the end of the month the sustainability Festival um which is also happens coincides with the farmers market um so usually gets a pretty good turnout of people who live in town or neighboring
communities including college students so definitely maybe putting those events on your uh calendar to have a presence at and look to get feedback there as well if we could have a survey by that date to share um via tbling those events
I think that would be an excellent goal for Meg Rafael and Erica um to get started on because that's sort of like almost the spring emergence of the ammer residence Meg um thank you so much Sam
again if you could when these events come up just send either Julian or all of us a note this is happening just we keep trying to be sure we're aware but just see us as eager to get your emails that would be great do you have contact
for me Samantha I think I think so yeah I'm sure there's an email that we've been on or I can ask could you just repeat what what the event is on April 5th yeah so April 5th is the ammer global village Festival it's being hosted the department of
Dei um kind of as a one big event focused on all cultural and ethnic communities in ammer rather than having throughout the year for community so right now it's set to have like two stages food trucks um different venders
and performers and um activities so it's supposed to be pretty big so we could either have a table or share your table yeah yeah happy to share our table we usually just have any openings for boards and committees so having a survey or little box or activity to get input
might be more fun to have too I think that would be great honestly if the if the Outreach subcommittee had an electronic survey I'd be happy to print out a QR code and I can make like a little box with sticky notes that people can put stuff in um
and I have a I have a big table at home that we could add to the town's table so it wouldn't be that tricky um awesome well thank you so much Samantha any other questions yeah and I can uh if it'd be helpful maybe I was taking notes kind of
of the different Outreach things that we were discussing so maybe I'll send an email to uh Julian tomorrow with those notes just as a refresher of the things that try to help with that would be perfect thank you so much Samantha I appreciate you uh spending some time
with us tonight when you're off work yeah thank you yeah I might stay on for a little bit just because I'm curious to learn more about the work you're doing but awesome myself so thank you yeah feel free to hang out um or leave whatever whatever is best for you we appreciate it yeah thank you all thank
you Al righty um so on to our next event um I'll bring the agenda back up for us um public comment um would anyone in the audience I see uh two people
um are in the audience uh to make public comment you can raise your hand on Zoom or press the star n feature if you're on a telephone um and I'll bring you in to make public comment for three minutes uh to the committee
um I see two quotes I don't see them with their hands up uh Meg you are saying that you are curious who these folks are no I see them I can see them can you can see them great awesome but they can't see each other
correct um um so that's interest that's never mind you would you like me to share I can I can happily read out I I think it's a town policy not to okay but I think some people wish that we would be able to see I just wanted to make sure you were able to see them because I
know you were time great um all right uh sorry to put you on the spot Folks at home um so our next discussion is the Colin Center proposal so Anthony who we spoke with last meeting for those who
were there was um kind enough to send me a pretty in-depth proposal uh for what the Colin Center would do for us and um I'll let the committee review it um I'll screen share it and I believe it's also
in the document Center um after that uh I'm going to make a motion um that we move forward with the column Center and agree to work with them and that we send this to the town manager um as our uh
supplementary budget request because we have an exact uh amount um that's well less than what uh we expected um so we can send this along um pretty soon it came in at $15,000 so
that um is much less than I think 20,000 that I expect and some committee members even said 25,000 so that's excellent that we got that um and I will screen I will stop screen
sharing and start screen [Music] sharing all right are you all seeing the uh the town website or are you seeing the um seeing a white a white strip okay got it thank you um I will move this
into can you can you guys see that better this the top of the letter yeah excellent great um I will scroll down let me know if I'm going too fast or too slow thank you good right
f oh did everybody get that uh we'll open the floor to questions before I make my motion just questions and then we can debate Ken
um less of a question or request eventually it doesn't doesn't uh get in the way of this right now but I would love to know you know be pointed towards like bies of the people that we're going to be working with that love other backgrounds oh yeah not not
to uh not to evaluate them but just to get a little more depth about who they are I I'm happy I personally looked them up on LinkedIn um so I'm happy to send you along uh a LinkedIn link great thank
you Meg Meg you're muted my camera is off is will someone attend our meetings on Zoom yes um right here it says that they will attend five meetings um whether they're on Zoom or
in person um where is that okay different points right here I've highlighted it so it's not a lot of hours it's 120 hours at 12 5 an hour corre and if you spend and some of them are higher than that but um so if that's
over say 10 months that's 12 is that 12 hours a month but doesn't seem like a lot uh it looks like here are five meetings so that's and we have two hour meetings um so that's pretty much 10
hours um but there's also the hours that it takes them to do support research formal written support General governance guidance and Charter review strategy which I imagine staff in their office would spend um just doesn't
seem like a lot of hours to do all that I'm sort of supporting your note observation that the budget is lower than we thought and I'm observing that the amount of hours the number of hours is low considering that we're planning
to go until November I I agree I also just think that it's worth noting that they can provide hourly extras um needed so if we run into a situation where their hourly rate
is up um at these rates here they can provide additional services so say we used up their amount of time and we're like we really need one more me we could pay okay I believe total of like so
$250 yeah so I'll just note that if we say we're going for 10 more months that would be one meeting every two months so we need to be sure when we're when we know that that we use the meetings that they come to right to focus on the things that they that's are going to be
most helpful because other once every two months that's one every four meetings I'll just say for myself that's why I personally think that it is important that we as a committee can do the Outreach can do the surveys can do
that type of thing by ourself um and get their assistance where it's really needed with drafting language and getting into the nitty-gritty details of that that we as a committee may not be completely able to agree on but that's just my perspective Bernie and then
Erica yeah uh just want to point out that the only place where ours are delineated in terms of their is is their attendance at meetings the other other functions email support research formal written support Journal governance
Charter review strategy none of those are time Fram so um those are activities that will be they can engage in in their office in and and be more productive um so the time that that they've noted is really for um attending
our our meetings for one and for two um the rates below appear to be in this just a quick question to um Mike Ward uh the rates below tend to be uh I think are our indication of what we'd have to
pay if we go beyond um the uh the the times that they they'd be present so that's like scope of expansion those are R for scope of expansion but the uh again you know when
you look at they're going to uh they're provide a pretty wide variety of support um that U goes beyond just uh sitting in at a meeting yeah think some of the hard work
that's going to get done I've seen uh work that the Colin Center has done for a couple of other towns I've been satisfied with how how thorough it is I would just add here that um when it comes to like some of these things like
especially research or Charter review strategy will pretty much give them a job and they'll work on it until it's done to a sort of adequate or appropriate level um and that might take them five hours it might take them 30
minutes we don't dep what they have what they have in their databases exactly and how El chat GPD response but um the Ian the thing the thing to keep in mind whenever you're working with the consultant especially when that's uh
running a clock is to be very precise in what you're asking for and let's not send them on fishing Expeditions we're not trying to you know reinvent a new form of government we are trying to critique critique an existing form of government so I I I think if we
set some reasonable parameters what we ask of the Consultants we're going to get some reasonable answers back in a in a reasonable amount of time and I'm sure that um Mike and his staff will let us know if we're if we're
drifting right Erica so even um I I was able to review uh the video the presentation that they gave at the last meeting even though I wasn't able to be there and one of the things that I remember them talking about near the beginning is what kinds
of um what kinds of changes or what kinds of revisions require might require a special Act like what kinds of proposed revisions to the existing form of government that sort of thing that seemed to me like a key question that sort of has recurred in our
conversations and and we've proposed like legal council and other ways to handle those questions and so the idea that they would be available to consult on those seems like it's going to come in really useful especially in that once we have gathered a lot of information
and sort of how to process that information into preliminary and final um reports and how we how we want to sort of how we want to cast certain feedback that we get or how we want to translate that into proposed changes uh
so that was one part of my comment so that that I think seems like a very useful part of their proposed um Services is that kind of um professional sort of translation of what from the
feedback that we're Gathering how to we uh apply that within our purview within our charge as a as a Review Committee and the other piece that I wanted to just comment on quickly is that um where it says Charter review
strategy and it says offering recommendations on survey use um I wanted to clarify or get the input from the rest of you as to whether you interpret that to
be uh input on survey creation or whether or it's more of a question of whether and when to use a survey to gather input uh because the crafting of a survey is something that we had been talking about wanting input on uh I
remember discussing that in the Outreach committee and also in our in this group and so I wanted to have your interpretation of that that part of the scope of services oh I'll let rapael go ahead and then I'll
give you my personal interpretation which other committee members can chime in if they disagree why don't we just deal with that question before okay sure um I would just say I think that's an and
both um I think we're really we can ask them what we need within um within this and uh if we need help with the substantive language in a survey we can ask them for that if we need help with where and when and how to do the survey
we can help we can ask for their help with that um I so I think that that's really an and both um I would just say given the fact that they won't be able to work with us until early April um I saw March 10th on the March
10th March 10th let me see I may have missed that I saw March 10th under section 4 okay great awesome then never mind I will hold my comment because that's much sooner than I anticipated rafhael yeah I I didn't quite read it
that way Erica maybe I'm I it would be great if there was more clarity it's probably too late right now but I think um I don't know I read it as just use offering recommendations about how you might use right it would be great if we had some guidance um
models of maybe that's in play here in terms of formal written support I hope so that that was my interpretation too which is why I raised the question go ahead my question though was and perhaps I missed it um at some point but is
there process for us in terms of engaging the center um what's our process all these services that they're assisting us with do does this committee has a process when it comes to engagement request um have we determined
that so do we go through Julian um do we collectively talk about our request like where are we in that element and I'm not saying we should discuss it now just putting it on the
radar for us to consider good question um they they mentioned a few things I've been in email conversations with them but that that is definitely a good question um I think it's a really important point that
um that we sort that out in order to make the best possible use of their uh of their good and informed energy right to like how and when we invite them to join our meeting um how
and when we prepare ourselves and um prepare to have them give them tasks or whatever on what timeline and what content um that part of it will be really important and on us mag as a third member of the subcommittee on Outreach I want to
support what Raphael and Erica both said about the survey that we spent quite a bit of time at one of our recent meetings talking about it and felt we needed advice um so but we can give it another
crack if they aren't G to provide that support you master might be I don't know we're just I think I think they would be able to provide that support I just think that the committee it's not that big of an ask to
look at a survey so I think that the committee should have something ready for them that they can look at rather than asking them to do it from the ground up um uh Bernie you haven't spoken so I'll call on you first and then ra I'm just
jul I was just going to concur with the remark you just made these folks are very practiced at this stuff uh they have I'm sure an extensive Library so it would be an easy ask to say can we see some other surveys that other
communities have done can we get your guidance on how extensive a scope it would should be um if we will'll shape some questions and feed them back to you can you then critique those questions um I think that's all you know and again
that's that's going back and forth via email and and not uh not face to face at a meeting and again that's stuff that that I I know they have in their I know they have on
hand thank you Bernie I think you hit the nail on the head and that would be stuff that I would either communicate to them on email with or uh or the Outreach subcommittee chair would do that Rafael yeah I think we could this
discussed that we certainly could come up with a draft survey but I think if I recall correctly the subcommittee's really interested in getting some guidance about what's been done and what's been effective just some support
in that area and models can be helpful but it would be good to get some guidance around like approach forms of questions like like that might be helpful Erica just seconding that saying to say maybe we um when we get to the
place where we're uh structuring or sequencing our work with the colum Center that we might we might prioritize that in the in the timeline so to give us a head start start in in getting that draft revision
final survey work underway since it takes some time okay other questions comments um I'm going to make the motion I'm going to combine sort of two of our issues here and I'm going to move that
we um Engage The Edward J Collins Center um for Public Policy in uh our Charter review process at a cost of $155,000 and that we send um this request
detailing uh their scope of services and the associated costs broken down both lumpsum and hourly to uh the town manager and the finance director for a supplemental budget request and before we discuss this motion it needs a
second second second uh I first heard Bernie so Bernie seconded um and we can have a little time for discussion just noting the hour it's almost 7 o'clock um we can have some time for discussion and then uh
and then vote on this Meg do we want to add anything else for other costs that we might have like the events and we've talked about all sorts of other costs or do we want to say this is our first request and we may have a request for later we do want to add those things um
but we want to add those in the FY 26 budget process after speaking Melissa um this is something we want to engage the Colin center right now so it would be considered a supplemental budget request because it would be within between two f years that other stuff would be happening later in the process so it
could be lumped into the massive FY 26 budget um thank you great uh other questions comments before we vote on this seeing none um I'll start voting
I'm an i Meg hi Erica hi Bernie hi Rael yes Ken hi and Marcus I noticed you joined us thank you for coming I'm too you're and I okay great I'm glad you caught that discussion let me know if
you have questions um so we are that's a unanimous vote um so we've passed uh this I will let um Colin Center know that we've chosen to engage with them and I will uh tell the town manager and
the finance director that um this is our supplemental budget request at the time and this details what it is um thank you okay uh no problem um so I'm going to share my screen on the
agenda and uh we've done Callin Center proposal we've done the budget we've done social media thank you Samantha um dates for media reports we set our date for the final report in November um at our last meeting and we will need
to make reports uh in the mid year before then the question is does the committee want to set deadlines for that or not um and it's totally acceptable if we don't want to as well Erica the idea that uh to set a date for a midyear report just to set a
just to set a deadline to put a to put a milestone in the calendar sort of yeah Ken um sorry I'm not good at math but do we not do we not do it just six months six months prior to that November final I
don't I'm sorry I'm I'm okay at math I'm just being very very that's okay um I'm not doing that in my head I'm checking my calendar so don't don't worry at all um it's May yeah that's May yeah May 31st I guess we could
say Erica um I would propose that the preliminary report would come a little bit later that um
given the timeline of the likely timeline of our public Outreach efforts and giving us enough time to do them that maybe late summer um for a preliminary or midyear report um that then gives us
time through the final report deadline in November to revise and do any additional work with the Colin Center or among ourselves yeah I I would be open to that that makes that makes some sense to me just how the process it's more
backloaded than front loed um I would I would be amable to maybe a June 31st July 1 type deadline that happens to be the transition of fiscal
years M I think think Erica suggested later than that the end of the summer that is what I was proposing sort of a little bit late I don't know I mean if if our final
report is set for November Y and we want to give ourselves a couple of months to revise and work through I'm thinking about thinking back let's say two months before
that through September or August for a preliminary report that which also gives us the spring and summer to really ramp up our public Outreach and our work with the col Center to work out all of the remaining questions that we have about
how to proceed I would do I would be amenable to like an August 1st type deadline I I don't think I could support much later than that just because we would basically be cramming everything towards the end
and not doing stuff currently is sort of what I worry about um almost like I mean maybe this is just the young person in me but almost like you don't want to do your homework on Sunday night at 10 o'clock that might thing um don't we have to do three
reports uh for one and for two just because we have to turn in a set number of reports doesn't mean we can't do anything else in the inum um I would think that you especially we're going to start spending the town's money that by the end of May we should
be able to say this is what we've done so far this is where we want to head here's our schedule this is what we're looking at this is what we're getting for for um suggestions so far I mean there' be
plenty of stuff to to write about then you can go ahead and for the second report dive into or another report dive into what's been found with public Outreach um you know I
I if we're going to end this by we're going to do this by the end of end of October early November then doing the preliminary report in September it just we're we're we're we we need to give the the we need to give the council some
feedback this is what we're doing um you know and this is where this is what we've accomplish this is where we want to head and so I wouldn't put this off too terribly much longer uh so so I'm I'm more comfortable
with the end of May as a as a point than I am with sometime in the middle of the summer or sometime in early fall thank you Bernie um Rafael I I agree with with Bernie in
terms of initial preliminary that initial report just where we are earlier than later and then perhaps what follows that is just initial analysis and then um that could probably be latter end of
summer but I I think getting something out there early in terms of where we are is important I I agree um Marcus yeah thank you I think the issue is people are going to get wrapped
around just wrapped up in the sort of the the preliminary report they're thinking it's more of a an early version of the final report and maybe really what we just doing it's just a status report right early May and then later on it's it's
not it doesn't have to look anything like our final report it just is like hey where we're at so I I would I would be amenable to looking at a uh like June 1st deadline for a preliminary and a um
August 31st deadline for a midyear um and then our final in November how does that sound to some of our other members we can take a vote on it if someone feels more comfortable with that do you want to reiterate that
Julian um that we have our first preliminary report in uh May 31st um and then that we have our final report or that we have our midia report August 31st um and then a
final report later on okay um that's just my thinking happy to vote on it happy to just reach consensus I don't know if folks want to discuss more okay I guess I'll uh we can move on um I
that do we need to vote yeah we can vote on it um you I don't need to vote I just yeah you want to make the motion Meg or make a motion I've remind me of the dates that you said uh I said need to
remind myself May 31st and uh August 31st okay I move that we give reports in May 31st and August 31st I will second that thank you Meg um any questions comments before
I uh approach that Mo yeah I I seconded it I'm sorry you're good um an auto reaction yeah Marcus how do you vote I think I can guess an i great um myself I'm an i Raphael I was that's going to
ask for a friendly Amendment oh okay um could we actually tweak things and be a little more specific with the um Pro could we be a little more specific preliminary on May 31st and mid mid year
on August 31st that I completely accept that friendly Amendment do you Meg yep thank you for the specificity I'll re redo the votes I'm an Hi Marcus hi Rafael uh yes Meg
yes uh Bernie yes Ken yes Erica yes thank you that's unanimous um scheduling a public Outreach event um we sort of talked about this with uh some events in April um but I will pass it off to Erica
to talk a little more oh you did talk about this can you can you summarize that um we I was just mentioning that we spoke about this with Samantha in um three events that we could do in August with the commun or excuse me in April would the community
clean up um okay and the Earth Day sustainability Fest and uh other celebration okay I I raised my hand because I wanted to uh speak about this topic if we could before we move to the
next thing please um because the Outreach subcommittee wasn't able to meet uh some for reasons beyond our control and um but I wanted to I wanted to try to move the work forward just a little bit and
so I kind of I've made a very very rough timeline um on my own this is not the work of the Outreach subcommittee but I wanted to just sort of um propose it
as a working document that I would love to take input on that we could take back to the Outreach subcommittee um especially given what we just voted on for reporting dates and so on and to kind of give us all a visual for where
we stand in the year um of our work would that be okay yeah go go right ahead sorry great I was giving a thumbs up okay I'll just share my screen oh could would you mind thank
you go right ahead I allowed you permissions so this is again very rough just a sort of sketch of where we are in the year and what we how we might think about starting to plan events I'd really love to do deeper work with with the
with the uh subcommittee on this but I wanted to have a sense of where our efforts uh stand right now in terms of Outreach and so what you're looking at is kind of like a week by week um where we are some of the things that we've initiated some of the things that we've
talked about this is a sketch not anything locked in um these are the sort of interview efforts that we've described wanting to do uh this is the survey that has sort of VAR sub pieces of work around it that
we'll have to work out but the way I'm thinking about this is that we set Milestone dates for when we want to launch things or have events um uh I was very interested in what Samantha was saying about tabling for
instance and that we could put some of those tabling events or potential tabling events on this calendar as well uh and then give ourselves the appropriate amount of time to to ramp up to those events prepare our own
materials also give uh Samantha and her office enough time to publicize them and give ourselves enough time to collect and compile Whatever We Gather there so what I guess I would like input on that I can take back and work with
the Outreach subcommittee on um is in the various discussions that we've had about having public events without taking over the meeting to talk about what all of those are
um the idea this is a sort of proposal to say to stake out let's say three public events that could coincide with the kinds of events that Samantha described or could stand alone um but the idea of having
three um three public sessions uh in April May and how that lands with this committee and I'd love to take input on that this makes sense to me my only
question or comment here is could you explain what the um what this blue the blue summarize what's the difference between the green and the pink here with the publicize so for instance the way to read this is if
we're talking about having let's say some sort of some sort of public um a public session where we invite people to come for a general kind of uh a listening session of some kind or some kind of event I put a pink date a Pink
Spot on the date where we would land that event and then I'm just being realistic that we need a little bit of time to sort of prepare for that event um to publicize it and then I gave a little blue Mark for time to actually
take what's gathered um just as if we were compiling minutes from a meeting uh is sort of making sense of what we've put together making it um legible so to speak for whatever notes or summaries are going to have to go into a
preliminary or a midyear report this this all looks good to me my only concern is the community survey looks to start at about the same time that the publicizing for public session
one starts um so like it might be better to have the community survey be done by the 31st um and then uh sorry if you guys can hear my cat
um but basically if we could get this done by the 31st then it would allow us to sort of work on the publicizing public session one um separately so we're not like publicizing public session one on
Instagram on social media um without a survey that can be affiliated with it okay the survey the the spot that I put here is a kind of a a launch date with the understanding that that kind of thing is sort of you know after it's
launched stands out in the world and can continue to gather um info not not like a single event um but if we if we I'm completely fine with moving it up but I think what I was trying to take into consideration what
we were just talking about with the Colin Center potentially helping us having input in drafting the survey um and a survey that we feel really strongly captures what we want it to capture uh if we feel like March 31st is a better Target date for that launch
I'm happy to move that up yeah I personally do but I don't know what other folks think Marcus yeah thank you I I'm actually wondering if we shouldn't push the survey back a little bit right use that first public session as a
um as a an awareness you know hey because if we if we start putting the survey out early I I just worry that it's just like you were saying Eric it's just going to sit there and nobody's kind of going to really remember it or know about it whereas if we tie it in
with maybe launching it after our session yeah we can use the extra time to really hone it nicely but also use that session to publicize it so we get some good feedback into it or I mean but
then there's the flip side of where you know doing that everyone's just going to kind of turn up to it and just vent on it versus if we slip it out early maybe the more anyway yeah yeah to Marcus to your point that the way that I SK sketch
this out and again this is just a draft is that this lines up sort of with the publicity part leading up to okay yeah yeah first public event in other words surveys is launched go here go to this link to take part in the survey and also
come to the event either or or both that kind of thing so thank you yeah thank that that was the thinking doesn't doesn't have to stay that way I'll just make my own comment um of why I sort of disagree I just think like if we are
publicizing a public Outreach event on social media um and in the town website and in the newspaper and someone is like oh look at this event I want to organize my thoughts before the event or I want I'm not able to make this event but I still
want to submit my feedback it would be nice to have a survey to accompany that at the same time where you could say if you're unable to make the event you can send us your thoughts via this survey or if you're you don't feel comfortable commenting in a room of 50 people you
can send us your thoughts via the survey Etc um and I also then think um even more so is there'll be people at the event who say how can I document my feelings how can I um how can I sort of
continue uh engaging here um and we could guide them to the survey as well so it just doesn't it really doesn't make sense to me to have a public Outreach I'm completely open to moving the public Outreach back a little and keeping the survey where it is or moving
the survey forward a little and keeping the public Outreach where it is I just don't want members of the public to feel confused or like their opinion is being suppressed so to speak Bernie yeah um
question for Erica you said this the the uh little purple plot there um is the launch date how long do you see the survey running I mean I I would think if we consider if we consider April May June
the sort of hottest part of our public Outreach efforts that I would I would I would it makes sense to me to leave it up for for a couple of months with occasional re-ups on the publicity that it's just a standing it's like a
standing web page or a standing link that's available for uh for comment and maybe the word spreads through public events um but that refer back to that same survey so perhaps this is deceiving I really mean it to be something that
kind of stands and lives um over the course of our efforts as opposed to something that is a oneoff mmhm yeah well that's what I was hoping uh that it was going to go on and then I I think given that uh it makes good sense to
launch it when when you're suggesting it because it will cover uh uh all three events will the survey will be available through all three events so that people can uh feel you're not feeling compelled
to answer it right away and then not do anything else so I think it's a it would be a good idea and helpful on your chart if you just extended the uh keep it going keep it going extended it out to where you you you see an endpoint for the survey when we say we've got enough
data and and and I think when you look at it that way you've covered all the bases and I think you have a good idea thank you uh I saw two people put their hands up now they're both down so went it went
it went down sorry okay um Marcus did you have a comment first no I I Bernie covered it okay great um Meg and then I have something I'd like to say that's more of a question than anything I agree with Bernie and Marcus
oops um I will uh I would just ask one other thing which is and if we're not looking out this far that's totally okay Erica my question is where so we'll start working
on the charart and we'll have drafts and we will say um let's change this to that and this to this and here's our proposed language here and here's something we'd like to add and here's something we'd like to take out then the public will see that and be like look at what they're doing and may want to say oh no
no no don't take this out or no we want this language changed to this or actually we wish you considered this other thing um is there a time that we can engage the public at that point through public Outreach sessions and maybe a revised survey um and if that's
not here do you have any thoughts of where you would like that to happen or if you would like it to happen do you mean um this do you mean sort of repeating the same survey kind of later
in our process to okay no so what what would people be responding to that what I mean is we as a committee will be proposing edits to the chch we'll be proposing things to take out we'll be proposing draft language we'll be proposing things to add and the nature
of those things may get people from the public who are interested and concerned about them um say for example if we edit um if we make an edit about the uh transition and someone is saying we and
folks want to say no no we want to keep this transition segment ction because it uh helps us for whatever reason um where will be their time to say that if they
haven't put in their public uh Outreach now but they see us do something and they want to react to it where is their time to have that input it sounds like you're describing something where we would publicize a a
draft of our findings and then and then invite public input onto that draft exactly and I I don't have an answer only because we haven't talked about it as a group that as as part of our process um but it's an interesting question to pose to the whole committee
got it it's something that I think will be important in um August September November time FR um Rafael you'll just frame your question a little differently
so may we get some insights via survey and other mechanisms about Town's response to Charter we look at that data information midyear report comes out I think considering like an additional
push in terms of like what have we learned what do we want to know more about and maybe a consideration of launching another survey after midyear report could be on the table so what did we we learn do we want to get make an
additional push during those final months before the final final that time before the final report is something that we'll need to to talk about make sense or no am I being clear I'm not sure I think you're you're saying that
we should consider a kind of a another survey during the during the the draft that we come up with after this data Gathering period yeah I'm saying like down the
line it would be great for us to see what we have from survey one and maybe on the table later on after the midyear report we consider launching another survey perhaps slightly different that attends to some things that we want to
know more about get more information about yeah yeah that was well said Rafael thank you um Ken um I think Julian your initial I sure your original question was the way
I took it at least was if we publish this draft and people are like okay what is this thing and oh my God I got some questions now that I didn't I could never have thought of before but now it's it's my my um I now
want to uh now want to give input yep redesigning a survey that just sounds like a ton of work to me um like getting a survey going is a ton of work and then redesigning another turn uh survey we also have this open-ended
email and ways which people can just drop their thoughts and not have to design a survey to do it so I don't know that we're I don't know that we need to make these decisions right now I just think a survey is going to be a lot of work and we can say hey we got this
draft drop your thoughts at the email and then we all get our emails and our in our secret secret mailboxes that we've all created in Gmail so they don't clog up our um our inboxes so that's just my thoughts about redesigning a survey it seems like a lot of work yeah that that
makes that makes a lot of sense I was thinking more along the lines of maybe also scheduling additional public Outreach sessions um at that point rather than a survey um and seeing if that might be appropriate
uh I don't know if you'd consider that more or less work it depends on who you are yeah Marcus yeah I just like to remind us we have public comment too as part of this meeting right I mean people having questions and
everything they compose those we can't necessarily respond to them directly but we can use that as a feedback method too so yeah that is true I would just note that no one has commented and um we are
also not doing much right now right so I just figure once we start messing with the uh the good stuff this amamos is a reactionary Place once we do something someone's G to start talking that's true I would just say the people who attend
these meetings and make their comments are sort of folks first off we haven't gotten many comments period and secondly they are a select group of people um who have concerns and not to minimize their
concerns but they are not the only group um who resides in town is and is affected by our decisions Rafael yeah I want to Circle back to Ken's point about a lot of work I think it's great that the Colin Center is in the mix it's great to have writing
support from them it'll be great to do some work in terms of response rate and has been shared what ways are working for the community and I think that'll determine our next steps I know many people that launch various surveys I do
um it just with the support I think again these decisions don't have to be made now but we'll have to be sort of thinking about engagement where are we getting great information or useful information from and that should sort of determine our
next steps um but I think the subcommittee had some work to do yeah I I had the subte yes that's rapael the subcommittee does have some work to do that's part of why I wanted to make this
um a kind of visual reference so that we're all at least kind of on the same page about um the Rhythm and timing of what's ahead um and so we can in the subcommittee flush out a great deal more Det detail on what each of these Milestones
might look like yeah thank you Rafael do you still have your hand up yeah but but I will say Erica like the Colin Center support I think is critical that's why I asked about like process and I think in it's great that they're in a mix March 10th because they could provide us with
resources I hope that inform our process have this so instead of Reinventing a wheel these folks been there done that I think we're just Guided by um so I'm looking forward to working or getting some support from
them I I agree all right thank you for presenting this Erica I appreciate it um I think there's more work to be done but it's a it's a good start um so we have our public Outreach we've done that um
review elected uh officials Outreach list um and I'll pass that over to Bernie um I know you didn't get a chance to edit that's perfectly okay um we all get busy in fact I'm busy right
now well these haven't the lists of of folks to be interviewed haven't changed since the last time I showed them so I can share them let's see I okay this is the list of elected to be
interviewed I can send this this has already been posted this has already been approved this is that's fine we're just looking at the staff the staff is the only one that we haven't point this is the new rotation
of who will get to talk to who um given that we're now an eight person committee so we just shifted names got shifted around got it if folks want to look at that we can that would be just so that we know who's talking to
who that's helpful I can I can simply you know I I I can this this has already been posted right and uh Athena has a copy to post to our uh um as well so I can I can in good
conscience send this around to uh um oops I can send that list around to the committee to look at people will get it for tomorrow the gers um in related staff this is also a
list that's been posted before um these are basically uh department heads or or key staff um who uh
uh who can be and we don't have a list of questions for them yet I need to give some thought as to uh how we want to ask people or what we want to ask people um don't ask there's a space there need
remove that but U that's the list I can send this along too because this has also been posted uh without any changes and the third thing I have um let's see if I can get rid of this Meg did you have something you
wanted to say I'm sorry well I just wanted to after you finish okay I raised my hand before but I'll wait finish I'll lower it and then I'll raise it again let me see there I lowered it this is the interview format this has
been this has also been posted so I'll send these three documents around to everybody to take a look at now the last time uh we spoke uh the committee wanted the Colin Center to look at these questions yeah
um I really in good conscience can't ask Anthony or his colleagues to look at these questions until we have a signed contract um but people can U people can take a look at the questions and you know provide me with feedback as to uh
uh what they uh what they may think yes thank you I'll get that out to the committee okay thank you great no raise my M can we then just go ahead and start scheduling these that's what I'd like to
do just go for it the ones that were assigned I have not added in um contact information so I'd like to be able to do that so you don't have to track all these folks down I didn't list contact information on the
uh public version of this because there are some folks who are no longer in and and there people in office who may not want phone numbers I mean yeah but some of them I I just know them that were on my list and I just wondered do we start
going for it or what's the process for making this happen I feel like sorry I'm cutting the line go ahead Bernie there two things one wanted the col C to look at the questions which is fine and secondly Erica had made the
suggestion which is a good one that we have some kind of way to containerize use I don't think I don't know if that's your phrase or not but um you know what was the phrase again containerize containerize good one so we have a format so when we record these
responses we can then sort them out and um uh and make them more usable we also had a long discussion about whether or not we wanted to record them U which I'm not I'm
frankly and probably wouldn't engage it you have to transcribe I be more than happy to send notes back to whomever I talk to and ask them to critique the notes but um I I having done scans of
interviews and um you know I just don't see that recording them right recording uh is a is a is useful yeah I agree I I would agree
Bernie I think that's that's true the other thing I would just say is sorry to chime in here but my only other thing is we need to have standardized questions and standardized um sort of Meth methods for
summarizing the information that we receive and thus that's why I would sort of recommend or advise that we not start interviewing people yet you can start scheduling interviews or talking but I wouldn't I wouldn't actually conduct the
interviews yet um I'm going to go in the order of hands Rafa or Raphael then Erica then Marcus yeah I was just going to share some things that you did in terms of clarity about question question s process I think Bernie did too checking
in with the Colin Center I would like to talk more about the recording piece I'm not sure we're all on the same page I think we talked a little bit about having the raw data raw the the information from their their interviews
as they shared I think I don't want to transcribe or take notes I think there are lots of tools out there to help with this process and for me it's good for folks to have a chance to read
review the interview collection whatever we I just think we need to talk about process a little more um and be clear about the approach yeah I agree Rafael we need a formalized way and a streamlined way to
record the responses um that decreases subjectivity whether that is recording or transcribing or having some of our members um fill out like a form during the interview or after the interview that
records positions on certain issues we care about that records other things they say Etc we need some way to promote um sort of level service and expected outcomes from the interviews um to come
to the committee rather than sort of hodge podge situation Erica um couple of comments um the the idea of the having the questions reviewed by
Collins yeah I'm saying yes and that that speaks to the um idea of standardizing and that if we get if we get input and feedback and then lock down a set of standard questions I think we've gone a long way towards that
issue uh the idea of a container for interviews yes and that's something that I can I can make up and provide um so that we have a a tracking mechanism for interviewee interviewer and contents of
the interview um but the biggest question is this one of recording and what we're doing about that and I think that um while we're Outsourcing the review of these questions to the Colin Center hopefully soon maybe we put on the
agenda for the next meeting meeting to finalize this issue of uh recording and transcription um if we have transcription tools that we want to recommend we should bring that to the meeting and say this is what I suggest
would work well um because I think we did have the conversation already about the value of recording um not to sort of catch somebody and something but the value of recording as data to be included the
future report as a sort of you know it's its um you know first uh primary source material um to be included and if we have if we if we can share with each
other best practices and Tools around that than interviewing somebody over zoom and just having a transcription tool that can take care of it that just answers the question and we don't have to De debate it if we if we value if we've already decided we value the raw
data then we can just talk about tools um but the question the the I question of a container I can I can work on that tool if that's agreeable to everybody um that's I think fairly simple for me to do but I will I will need the question
answered about what form of those transcripts going to take and where they going to come from yeah thank you um I'll put that on the agenda for our next meeting I agree it's an important discussion to have Marcus yeah so as we start talking about
recording and things I just started do we have I mean I guess we need to talk to someone in the town hall as we start talking to Star uh Union considerations to make um do does the union require
that we provide them with a copy of the questions we are going to ask prior to so that they can get feedback or if is there a blanket ban say on recordings of interviews with staff I don't know I
don't know I don't know any of the local concerns I I agree I think that's a good question to ask I think it's very important that we talk to the um different unions whether that be the Teachers Association or the DPW workers
or the firefighters or police or whoever but each of these groups have their own unions and their own Union Representatives that I think it's important we speak with um their leadership about their concerns um yeah I was just saying it's you know talking to
individuals often requires going through the Union first right exactly I I so I think it's important that we we sort of space that out in a way that's that's comfortable and approachable for them um
and uh Meg and then Bernie thank you Julian I tend to agree with Bernie on the taping um my concern is that it becomes performative and people are uh it's harder I think maybe it's not to ask
followup when you say this did you me this or that or could you say more about this would the tape record every single sentence that everybody said um I just worried that it would become performative people would want to read
the transcript and edit it I would think I probably would did you know did I say something I didn't mean or could I have said that better I'm not I'm not sure taking notes and typing them up is more accurate but I just worry that the
taping as another layer of performance and people wanting to edit you then you know I can just see if we each have 10 or 12 or 15 or 20 interviews we have to go back and back and back with editing and take this word out change that word I don't know but I'll go with whatever
the group decides of course Julian you're muted Bernie thank you yeah um couple of things uh you know when I've when I've participated in uh organizational reviews U um organiz you
know they I I've interviewed you know dozens of people um and I used my notes I didn't go back and share the notes with them um I also had the advantage of saying you know your your response is
because this isn't a public I was what I was engaged in wasn't a public matters so I could say you know this your response to me is your response to me not gonna share it um I I want to
understand we may be creating a set of public documents um and what they the implications of that are when we start doing some kind of formal recording and formal you know this uh I agree with Meg about
performance uh you know I've never found it necessary and again what do I know I've never found it necessary when I've been interviewing people to give them copies of what their responses were uh regardless of what that um those those
conditions were the other thing about the unions I think Marcus point but I don't know that we are going to be interviewing the unions as a group any Town
employee um all the town employees on the list of people we identified to uh to to interview or at least the list that I prepared that people identified to interview none of those folks are union members so there's no there's no you
know there's no constraint there um I think what we need to be concerned about is if we're calling them and interviewing them on public time and that's why I suggested back then that we share that list with Paul bamman because
they all work for Paul uh to get his permission to take some of their their public time um or we got all send him an email saying what five things did you do last week um you know pork in the
road um you know unless we're going to sit down members members they're going to get a survey as an individual uh Amorous resident or are we intending to
interview any employee of the Town whether they live in the town or not whether they're impacted by the charter or not and we have to draw some bright lines here so I I I think the uh uh concerns about the you know union membership for now are can be set aside
because we're not gonna at least we haven't discussed going to the unions going to a union meeting and having a uh uh a an interview with them or or getting formal feedback from them these
are going to be questioners are going to be floating around I'm assuming that there's the opportunity for the questioner to be anonymous although we prefer that people give us a name and an email address so we can question them later if we contact them later if we choose to um you know so I don't see
where that's going to be a that's going to be an issue um Rafael Erica I'll just say one thing first I would say that um obviously it would be it would be extensive to speak with every single
Town staff person um given how many there are but there are union stewards union leaders Etc who may be able to bring forward stuff to their unions or have um perspectives that are widely shared among A specific group of town
workers as related to the Charter and I think we'd be missing something if we don't speak with sort of the actual workers of the Town not just the management because the management shares one Viewpoint and the workers may share a different one that is equally
important that's a that's a that's a real that's a presumptuous assumption that you you know you I I can I can tell you that folks who work in town hall don't share the same set of beliefs completely or you know it's a
myth that they there there's some monolithic block of drudges who toil away u in that building that's not true and it's it's it's terrible to to it's really unfortunate to characterize people that way I mean there's a bunch
of very talented independent thinking individuals that work for the town and they're not going to give you uh not gonna they're they're not going to just mouth uh something they've been told this is sort of my fault because I did not call on myself and raise my own
hand but let's remind everybody to raise their hands and go in the order um I have would I'll follow up on that but Rafael and then Erica yeah I think you raised like we should definitely return to this interview question in terms of process
later um but I'll quickly share that it would be great to hear from the Colin Center their advice there are other towns in this state that do have the raw data available for people to read I too have done interviews for processes like
this where for us what matters is accuracy in avoiding misrepresentation so some people actually respect and appreciate like the raw data being shared and having a chance to review that It's Tricky when
it comes to misrepresentation and misquoting folks when that's not in play um so again hopefully we can talk about this at some point in the future hopefully we can hear from the Colin Center um but but I think think that
respect for accuracy and avoiding misrepresentation is important and I think reporting these things can be helpful thanks Erica yep I agree
um yes just wanted to add add to that um the value of recording uh as I understand it I my part of my background is as a documentary filmmaker so conducting interviews and having access to raw material
material um is has a sort of intrinsic value now what how we choose to do our data Gathering and interviewing um and record it doesn't
mean that that recording the video recording needs to end up as part of the archive of this ultimate report a transcription of of words a transcription of a conversation um
can uh can be can be generated and included and we can make a decision as a committee as to whether or not we want to create um big uh feedback loops of giving people opportunities to revise
their words and and edit and perfect them we don't have to engage in that right it's like a it's a it's a open question um and so especially if we've gone through the work of having a set of standardized questions that were all
asking to various people and then we're kind of collecting that and then doing what we will with it so I just wanted to say that um add my two cents that there's a there to me there's an intrinsic value in in recording things the way that people
said them um and then that we have freedom to choose as a committee how how we want to work with that material I I I completely agree I'll just add that I think
being quote unquote recording the conversations um I'd be uncomfortable if we as a committee decided to just have people report back to the committee on their conversations with these elected officials and have that be it that allows for just too much
subjectivity um because folks May misinterpret what someone says they may say oh so and so said this when in fact they were actually concerned about this other thing um having a standardized process for the
interviews doesn't necessarily mean shoving a camera in someone's face we can um audio record we can uh have a transcription going um that sort of summarizes the process um or we can have
some sort of survey at the end that um everyone fills out that has a specific line of questions I don't think it's appropriate to just let people report back on their interviews um because we
don't want folks just reporting back on what they interpreted from the conversation we want folks reporting back on what that um specific elected official actually believes uh Bernie so does that mean that after
each of us conduct six interviews we need to then share those recordings or share those transcriptions with the committee uh along with our input so that there's agreement that whatever
those six people said as as recorded by say me is in accurate I mean that's going to be that's going to be a mess that's going to be time consuming to the inst degree for one I don't think it's necessary and for we also have to
consider that we're you know you're creating public documents you're creating public documents so if you know if someone knows that there are audio recordings of all these interviews what keeps them
from requesting copies of all those interviews that's a question we need to have answer you know again I I appreciate people wanting to be careful with this we all want to be careful with
this but I think we're going a little bit too far you're gonna have what I hoped would be a semi somewhat informal relaxed conversation with someone who has lived
with the charter has function under the charter and get their opinions on and it's easy enough when you're you're getting someone's opinion to say I heard you say this is that what you meant and they can say yes or they can
say no or they can say here's the variation on the thing but I can tell you right now we're not going to get very far if we start layering requirement upon requirement upon requirement on these these conversations
and I don't know uh you know again I'll I'll be H more than happy to ask the folks at the col Center and waste their time um asking them how many towns have have done these have done interviews and have gone through a process where everybody's been recorded and then
transcribed and the feedbacks been given and so on and so on so on I don't think we're g to find many at all so uh again my concern is the amount of time involved uh how are you going to ensure accuracy if if because subjectivity is a
given so the only way you can how can you ensure how can you say we're going to have transcripts to ensure accuracy unless they're reviewed by the committee and then those transcripts in the recordings then become public Arles and need to be preserved so let's think about it and
move this to the next meeting um um go ahead yeah thanks I I was kind of getting yeah I'm concerned on the the security aspect too of all that sort of
stuff but um one of the things I mean if we're worried about you know what misinterpreting people just send everybody in you know I kind of I guess my presumption was we would be doing these interviews in pairs right so
there's two of us sitting there talking to somebody so that we can have different you know we can pick out the different angles of it and that's how it's that's that's fine and I'm just saying that that was my kind of thought and obviously I was out of date
for that but yeah it's proposed individual interviews so I don't I don't know what that how that changes it but it that's how it's proposed Rafael yeah burn feelings are clear I'm
on the other end of the spectrum hopefully we address this later get um Callin Center input and I'm just going to say like I don't want to be in a position where I'm with folks who
like this is interviewing processes I think it's important if they're clear and I think there's some people who respect like I said this um I don't the interpretive element in terms of me sitting down and
interviewing folks and Reporting back what I heard is just tricky um but I don't want to deal with that too much now hopefully you can address it later but that makes me really uncomfortable Julian thank you Meg then
Ken very briefly I'm I'm uh convinced more by the people who think we should record it than I was I would like to be talk about this more but be sure that we're these uh recordings are like notes that
we take on a notepad like this that are not public information I'd like to figure out how to do that but I can understand uh the subjectivity of interpreting it um I'm not sure quite how to do it because like Bernie I've done a lot of interviews where it say back and forth did you mean this you
know what about that but I assume we could still do that and our questions and back and forth would be part of the transcript but we do need to discuss this again I think I just wanted to say that I'm changing my mind a bit on this or maybe a lot sorry Bernie the two
older people in the whole committee like no I don't want to record it I mean someone will have to show me how to do the AI thing but I've I've learned things and I mean I'm not going to type listen to a thing and type it that is for sure zero chance that that would happen
you know zero minus zero less than zero like I run screaming out of the room 10 thanks ni well you've all seen my minutes so you know that I'm a little crazy about that um pretty detailed if you recall um
I I don't believe we should record them either I have I I didn't share the concern with Bernie until he sort of mentioned it about the public the public document thing which does bother me um the only person that can that can um
verify the facts in the interview is the person you're interviewing so in in my experience you interview them you take notes you transcribe them on to a way that you can share with them they realize it's going to slow down the process
they confirm what you've said what they've said I I also interview people on my job and this is how I do it when I write an article um they review it um these are these are co-workers that do it I'm not a
journalist um so that's my my two sents I think recording it is tricky and you let the person look at their their comments to make sure that they were understood properly I quick quickly Julian I'll go right ahead and then I have I'm going to
say we haven't decided like how this data will be shared with the wider public but I think for our committee um again I don't want to be in a position of I I think there's a subjectivity
element that we really need to think about I might be really interested in and I I guess I trust folks here but I think there's just an element in terms of like I could cherry-pick what I want to share in my notes and I'm concerned
that so that's I Ken I think even if it's just for us to be able to review and the people being interviewed no like we're going to keep it for us I just think it helps us in terms of like
accuracy I'll I'll just add in one thing here and then um can you still have your hand up intentionally no okay um and then I'll call on Bernie and then I'll call on Erica what I was going to add is and I'm sure there's someone on this
committee who has a law degree or a PhD in this but one thing that I very clearly remember from my journalism AP uh journalism class um in high school that I took with one of our great
English teachers was that we were always told to record um when we were doing articles for just the school newspaper because it made sure that the journalist didn't make a mistake and that the journalist wasn't adding in their own
bias and it's not that I think that either of those things would happen consciously as much as I think unconsciously it's easy for any journalist anyone doing an interview to miss what someone says to um to sort
of put spin on what someone says and we want to make sure it's accurate even if that's just for our own purpose is it possible that someone makes a public records request for all 30 recordings that we do yes but we should cross that bridge when we come to it and in the
name of transparency and accuracy have some sort of transcription we don't need to make hourlong recordings of each meeting but if we have an AI transcription going in the background that produces a document that
we share amongst the committee I think that's perfectly acceptable in this situation Bernie I'm just gonna say how are how are people expecting this information is going to get shared I mean my thought in doing this was that
we were going to survey folks and that we were then going to say um among the counselors not to be named individually but among the counselors these were opinions that were voiced by more than
one individual I don't intend to say that councelor ABC said this I mean I I'm I don't think we need to look for information like that I think what we need to do is to look for Trends and
things and that um you know that if we um if we do that then it doesn't become did counselor soand so say this this way it
becomes five of the counselors expressed the belief that the rules set up we're not in encouraging additional discussion and debate that's what the intention is here not to say counselor so and so said
this counselor so and so said that counselor so and so said this it's not going to be point counter point that wasn't that wasn't the thought the thought was we get impressions from people we compile those Impressions and we see what direction
they head it if somebody has a specific set of concerns then they should be able to put them in paper we've had one counselor who did that very thoroughly and could serve as a model for anybody else on the council who wants to respond
to this St so um you know I think we're going you know we're we're going a bit far here we're not making a documentary film we're not we're not forging stre um you know we're uh we're not doing that
we're we're we're a humble Charter and we got to get some opinions from folks who have to have lived with the charter for the last two to six years so that's what we're gonna that's what the intent behind the interviews were yeah folks want to make a bigger
deal out of it you're welcome to do that to be clear I'm not suggesting that we are making a documentary film uh by any means this process would be wildly different if we were um and I'm I don't think having the
discussion of um the substantive discussion about how to conduct interviews and whether or not to record them and what to do with them is is a big deal because it matters right it matters because it's data Gathering
and whenever you're doing data Gathering how you do it matters because you if you're if you're sloppy about it or if you're inconsistent about it you get poor results so I think that this is a really interesting conversation and I think you know part of part of the
issue to my mind is that we're not just going out interviewing somebody getting their sense of the story and then a couple days later kind of putting it together and putting it in the Gazette to report on a piece of news a a Jour a
sort of Journalism approach right we're doing a a kind of a wide field Gathering of information and the the the complexity layer is that we have eight different journalists so to speak and
they have really different relationships to the people on this list Frank some of us have lived here a lot longer some of us have personal relationships with some of these people I trust Bernie that you did the rotation in such a way that you're not always interviewing your best
Pals but you know you probably know more people on that list than I do and alphabetical order alphabetical order and and my my point is we can't like rule out it's just there
so by recording you have a record of of the kinds of things the other the other piece to consider you can eliminate all of this if we decide we want to do a written questionnaire that's really tailored to
people who currently or have formerly worked for the town and you send the same thing to everybody and give them time to write thoughtful responses just like you identified somebody has already submitted um then it's just their own
words they have time to think about it they're not engaged in um quote unquote performing or or editing their answers in real time in conversation with someone who they may or may not be familiar with across the table that that's the advantage of a
written questionnaire disadvantage is you can't do the the you can't do a certain kind of Engagement that you're that's conversational that you're describing Bernie but it's that's the procon I Rafael I have a comment and
then I'm gonna move to it's also 808 yeah that's why Raphael you're muted sorry you're muted muted I'm going to take quite a lively discussion I felt like I was in a
research methods class but uh that said I do think I'm no journalist and maybe someone are might be a little wary of recording stuff but I think it helps us like on those days that I'm tired and I'm not a great journalist that
recording will help um and I don't think we're overthinking it Bernie I think think like being clear about a process before we enter it is important we had this conversation here part of it hopefully continues but um I think accuracy is
important I I I would agree I think even here's my Logic for recording I can think about my own life um which is uh if even if Bernie set us up with all my
best friends if I were to interview my mom and dad and go up to shsb interview my two me two best friends and I were to come back to this committee and tell you what they all said they would still tell me that I got something wrong um that something wasn't said correctly that I
Mis phrase something they said guaranteed um and I think that's why a recording is so important in this situation is because we're trying to synth Sy synthesize wow I cannot pronounce anything after
8:00 um what people are saying here and we want it to be as close to Accurate as possible and I think that often times that's hard to get when we're just relying on folks
memory uh Bernie Qui Erica Erica Sol the problem yes she does so frequently we'll just turn we'll give people a written questionnaire we've got the the five questions they framed can be answered in
writing or they can be verbally um we can give folks the opportunity to say if they want to talk to the committee they're welcome to come in and talk to the committee but we can save ourselves a huge amount of time and and I really enjoyed this discussion and you know for
the way I'm a historian so by by training I'm I'm a cynic and uh you know so uh the best way to do this is to have people put their thoughts in
writing send it to us it's an easy document archive and we there there there may still be arguments about well what I meant was but at least we have a solid written statement so my proposal
would be for the next time we talk about this we just look at um a particular questionnaire for counselors previous counselors uh ammer school committee members and Library
trustees and Survey those folks in writing ask them to respond and then we we' we've solved the problem I I think that's a great solution Bernie thank you so much um than I are we gonna are we going to
revisit this topic or yes of course we are going to I didn't think there was a motion about no this topic is far from over um I'm I'm I'll be making quite a few things in my next agenda about this um and we'll
have a few other things that we discuss as well uh I'm going to make a motion to adjourn all we're missing here is um the creation of a short description for the survey that Meg was bringing up and fut
agenda planning um do we have a second for my motion to adjourn I will of course great I will of course bring those two issues plus um the other things we spoke about tonight I'm gonna bring it to the subcommittee because we're gonna hopefully meet before
excellent and I'll bring we already I'll bring those four things to put back on the agenda for next week so uh all in favor of adjourning um I'm an i Erica yes Roney yes rafhael yes please
um yes please I like that please please um Ken yes Marcus all right all right have a great night everybody good night everybody as contentious as this