recording in progress. and we'll begin in 5 4 3 2 1. Good evening. I'm Bernard Green, chair of the Brooklyn Select Board, and this is the regular meeting of the select
board for August 5th, 2025. First item of business is I move that select board go into executive session for the purpose of approving executive session minutes and discussing strategy related to a litigation matter. The
litigation matter must be discussed in executive session because an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the litigation position of the town and the chair so declares an executive session therefore to be necessary. I
want to mention that we took the real property matter related to 16 William Street off of our executive session uh agenda because there are no further issues that require uh strategy discussions by the select board. Uh we'll have a full discussion of issues
from residents uh aired when the matter comes up on our regular schedule or regular calendar. So, uh, I move, uh, I've already moved that we go into exe executive session. All in favor, please indicate by saying I. Uh, who's first?
John Bencoyak, I. Uh, David Pearlman, I. Michael Rubenstein, I. And chair votes I. The select board will reconvene in open session following the executive session. Thank you. Heat. Heat.
Heat. Heat. Hey, hey, hey. back in five, four, 3, two, one. Good evening. I'm Bernard Green, chair of the Brookline Select Board, and this is the regular meeting of the select
board for August 5, 2025. Let's start off with announcements and updates. I'd like to uh mention that um myself uh David Pearlman and Michael Rubenstein uh spent the uh late
afternoon at the national night out event uh which is a police community relations uh event uh held across the country to get uh engagement between communities and the police. I mean, it's a two-way street. Uh both the community
uh understanding and appreciating the work of law enforcement, but also equally important law enforcement recognizing the role that the community plays in crime prevention uh and safety. Uh you can't have uh a safe community
without the community itself being an active participant. And in Brooklyn, our community policing model uh recognizes that uh and with some, you know, exceptions has been very successful. Unfortunately, a few weeks a few years
ago, uh we ended some of our community uh programming, the school resource officer program and the walk and talk program in public housing. But despite that, uh we still maintain a community policing model that uh works with uh uh
community members, particularly youth, in ways that uh help to uh keep our crime rate really low and um to the benefit of all of our residents. So, uh that was a very enjoyable evening. meet
met a lot of people um and uh something to do before our town our select board meeting. So any other updates or comments? John? Uh a quick one but I think worthwhile um to draw attention to
this. Uh it takes a lot to sort of get me off let's say off my douff on a summer's evening and go out to a program um that is uh for our education and educational benefit. But there's one coming up that I think a lot of people
will want to attend. Um we owe um a debt to the Indigenous People's Celebration Committee for putting this together. Uh it's going to be August 19th at 6 PM um at the Brooklyn Village Library, you know, right here next to town hall. Um
August 19th, 6 p.m. And it's um titled Trump, Andrew Jackson, and Tribal Sovereignty. So, there's something in there for everybody. Um, the presenters are, um, Kaylee Bennett, um, who and
Paul Mlan, both of whom are from our, uh, Brooklyn Indigenous People's Celebration Committee. Um, Kaylee is also of the Cherokee Nation. Um, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation. Um and it's going to be conducted as a con
conversation and um I think the public will learn a lot from this and should come um you know prepared with some questions for these two very interesting speakers on a great topic um Trump Andrew Jackson and tribal sovereignty. It's called a community conversation
August 19th at 6 pm. Great. Thank you. I think it's going to be interesting. Uh you know anything about Andrew Jackson? Well, you'll learn a lot if you don't. Any rate. Okay. Any other updates or comments?
Okay. Let's move on to um next on my agenda is introduction of town's new poet laurate. Allison Adair. Are you Allison Adair? Allison's online. Alison, online. Okay. Yes. I've promoted you. You should be
able to start your video. introduce yourself to us as our new poet laurate and your plans and maybe two. Thank you for having me. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay, good. Um, thank you so much to the
select board. Thank you first of all to Tiffany for organizing everything and helping me get on get onto the uh Zoom tonight. Um, thank you to the select board and also to the Brooklyn Commission for the Arts for first of all having the poet laurate program which
writers feel and agree is very important um to stay rooted with the arts in town. Um, and so thank you um on behalf of artists in Brooklyn. Um, I am very excited about this post. I um am happy to receive the mantle from uh Jenny
Barber whom I know from the poetry world and who I know has done a great job as poet laurate in the past few years. Um and I think maybe some people in the room have read a bit about my plans for projects in town. Um, I've been already working with some schools um over the
last few years to um proceed with um po poetry on the spot, typewriter poetry projects and helping them develop their own arts skills and writing skills. So, I look forward to doing that as well as making sure that um the arts and poetry
remain a a big part of Brooklyn's identity. Um, I myself have been living in Brooklyn proper for 15 years, maybe 16 years I think at this point. Um, and I taught for 10 years first at BEu and now
I've been at Boston College for um, I think 13 years now. Um, and so I've been in the area for a long time. Very invested in the arts and writing obviously. Okay. Um, you have a poem you'd like to read?
Sure. I did hear at the I thought that was be part of the Yes, it is part It is part um I did hear the discussion at a previous meeting about um the delight that people took in finding out that um at a at a recent event someone read a poem and it kind of
went viral and um I too am often heartened by people being surprised that poems can move people. So, I have just one poem I'll share. Um, and it's called if I can't write this as a love poem, a litany, and it is I chose it because it
is about trying to cultivate the the energy of youth and trying to remember that fire that we once all had in us to kind of do good and uh to seek out the best in the world. So, this is, if I can't write this as a love poem, a litany. Let us praise the parched
throats of the young, the oceans of water they swear they'll drink. Let us praise chance swish of ponytail and subway car. The way knees bend to absorb its slow shuttle shift for the improbability of kissing another's mouth
into thirst unrelenting. Let us sing all the new prayers. Chant gratitude, gratitude as if wanting, as if longing could be anything other than ecstatic. Let us remember in middle age this tiny fire of yearning.
Let us tend the altar we once built to smokeless burning to what felt like need. Recall even saints kneel at the sight of a flame swollen heart. What else raptures St. Teresa caught in her marble sigh enough to let her head fall
back toward the sky, eyelids shut tight. Not heaven, never light. This is a secret smolder. Let us shoulder its bellows be its heir. Thank you. That's uh very um relevant to
many of us uh who are well past our youth and should remember back to how we thought and felt uh in those days uh and maybe inform our current thinking in in some ways. Thank you Allison.
Thank you. Any other thoughts on our poetry reading this this may? Yeah. Yeah. Uh Allison uh thank you so much. Um and uh looking real looking forward to uh your reign as
our poet laurate. Uh that's a great title to be conferring on a person and and uh you've already if if you had had shared nothing but that one poem I would feel like your appointment was already more than more
than justified and uh u it proved the wisdom of of the choice. But um I also want to just add for people who might might not be aware you know Brooklyn does have um a significant place u in American poetry um if for no other
reason but that and there are other reasons but if for no other reason than we are the birthplace of Amy Lel and um I don't know whether that's going to be a topic that sort of enters into your time as our poet laurate but I I think
um the occasional reminder of poets's past who have called Brookline their home or who have had a different kind of a connection to Brooklyn uh would be very welcomed by by me and I think by a lot of people who um you know
there's all Brooklyn is is a place of constant sort of discovery and it it always feels good to to discover yet another aspect of Brooklyn that is well worth knowing about and well worth celebrating. So that that's just a wish that I'll express um now that we've met
you and and it's been a pleasure. Thank you, John. I think that's a very good point. Um thank you. If I could just add, um, in my work with, um, Grub Street that goes back to 2002 since I've lived here in Boston, um, I was one of the people who
initiated the Literary Boston tour with Grub Street, um, to highlight Boston's literary history. And that's something I would love to do in Brooklyn as well, not just with explicit career poets, but also the writers and poets who have intersected with various politicians and
so on and so forth. So, I think you're really right about the lineage and the history in the town and how exciting it is to remind people of that and get people excited about revisiting it. So, thank you so much for that. And thank you. And make sure that you uh
send your poem to um to Tiffany so we can make sure it's included in our minutes because I think more people should uh have the opportunity to read it. Thank you. Okay. Let's see. Um,
uh, where are we? Okay, before we begin, uh, any other comments from the select board? Before we begin public comment, I understand that there will be a number of people who want to speak on 16 William Street tonight. and I will set aside 20 minutes when that item comes up
on the agenda for comments. And like public comment, if there are people who are not able to speak during the 20 minute period, the select board will stay around for their comments after the meeting. So, okay. Next, uh miscellaneous items. Question of approving the minutes from
July 29, 2025. Any correct? Yes. Are we taking public comment on other topics? Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. Good one. Excuse me. Never mind. Good. At least someone's awake here.
Okay. So, um uh that was actually an introduction to the public comment uh section of our agenda. Uh Tiffany, could you read the broader rules? Yes. Thank you for joining us for public comment. This is an opportunity for us to hear your perspective on the issues
in Brookline that matter to you. Each person speaking tonight is limited to three minutes. You don't need to use the entire time, but you may if you like. Once 15 minutes has been met, there is an opportunity at the conclusion of the select board's business for additional comments. Members of the public
sometimes raise questions during public comment. We may be able to provide a quick answer to a question, but are more likely to work with staff to get a more thorough answer and respond over email. The on-screen timer will flash orange when you have 30 seconds remaining and red when your time is nearly up. Please
conclude your remarks at that time. If you have more to say, you are welcome to send an email to board members expressing your thoughts in greater detail. Any person speaking tonight should begin their comments by identifying themselves with their full name and either their Brookline precinct number or street address. Um there were
no individuals who signed up for public comment in advance unrelated to 16 Williams. Um are there any individuals online um who wish to speak during public comment at this time? If so, please raise your hand using the raise the hand feature or if in the room, please make
your presence known. Okay, we have 21 individuals online, 15 in the room, and no one is indicating their desire to speak during public comment. Okay, thank you. So, now um meeting minutes from July 29,
2025. Any corrections or edits to those minutes? Okay, seeing none, I move approval of um the minutes for July 29, 2025. All in favor, please indicate by saying I. John Vanco, I. Paul Warren,
I. David Pearlman, I. Michael Rubenstein, I. Chair votes I. Uh, next, I'd like to take item 6B. It's six, right? Seven. Seven. Okay, we changed the numbering here. uh 7B through 7E in omnibus
fashion unless a select board member would like to pull one of those items out for for more detailed discussion. Uh seeing none, I uh move approval of items 7B to 7E. Um all in favor, please indicate by
saying I. John Vancoyak. I Paul Warren. Paul Warren. He's getting a thumbs up. Okay. Uh David Froman. Hi. Michael Rubenstein. Hi. Chair votes. I Okay. Next our regular calendar.
Um we have uh two noise bywall bylaw waivers. These are public hearings. uh question of approving a noise bylaw waiver from National Grid for work to be completed overnight from August 11, 2025
to November 30th, 2025 at the intersection of Boilston and Fiser Avenue. Um and secondly, question of approving a noise bylaw waiver from the director of capital construction, LAP
Yan for east coast masonry masonry and repair to conduct work as needed depending on weather for the demolition of concrete and repaving of sidewalks at Brookline High School during various Saturdays as early as 700 a.m., August
8, August 16, and August 23rd. Do we have someone to uh discuss that in greater detail? Yes. So, for the first item, uh is Mary Maloney in the room? Could you approach the podium? And then we also have Sam DS
um with DPW online. So, introduce yourself and tell us about this uh project that needs a noise bylaw waiver. Um good evening. My name is Mary Malone. I'm here on behalf of National Grid. Sorry, could you move the mic to yourself? Thank you. I didn't want to blow you. I talk loud.
Anyway, um my name is Mary Malone. I'm here on behalf of National Grid and um we are looking for noise variance um to be passed here this evening for we have a state permit already issued um from Mouse Jot. The location is Boilston
Street and at Fiser and we're putting in a regulator station there. So, um it for traffic and for safety, um they will only issue the permit for the evening and it's been discussed with um the Brookline um public works commissioner
and I believe it's being supported by him as well. So, or it was okay. Are you currently working at that location? Something's going on up there. Yeah, correct. Um, there are leaks that that
are on Route 9 and we're actively fixing them and finding them, but I, you know, when this is replaced and repaired, um, it might play into the the actual leaks that are in that section of Route 9.
Any other questions? Just for clarification, this this is strictly a vote on waiver from the noise bylaw, right? Has nothing to do with, you know, granting the permission to do the work which is, you know, under state control,
right? Yeah. Correct. That's my understanding. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Michael, and since you mentioned the leaks, I just wanted to ask um are those leaks that have been reported to the town in
any capacity as the town tracks gas leaks across Brooklyn. We wouldn't report our gas leaks to the town of Brooklyn and we don't report them to any town. Um there's a website you can go on and and look at where gas
leaks are, but no, they're put in our system. We're mandated by the state and we grade them and we respond to them accordingly. Thank you. You're welcome. By the way, um maybe Chaz can answer this. I thought we did have a requirement of some type of notification
uh of gas leaks. Oh, if we're going to work them, we do. Okay. Yes. Chaz, were you about to say something? That's That's correct. Yes. Okay. So, so you do notify us of when you're
working the gas leaks. Oh, absolutely. Yes, we have to get police details and so forth. We notify um town of Brooklyn Engineering, public works. Yeah. Okay. Any other questions?
Okay. Um, I guess I move approval. Uh, that's public hearing. Oh, I'm sorry. This is a public hearing and um it's open to uh the public for comment. All right. Now that the chair has opened the public hearing, if there's anyone that wishes to speak on the noise bylaw
waiver request from National Grid, please raise your hand using the raise the hand feature if online or make your presence known in the room. Okay, we have 22 participants online, 15 in the room, and no one is indicating their desire to speak. Okay, then I'll close the public hearing
and move for approval or move approval of the uh noise bylaw waiver uh for National Grid for work um on Boston Street and Fiser Avenue. All in favor, please indicate by saying I. John Vanco, I. Paul Warren,
I. David Pearlman I Michael Rubenstein I chair votes eye. Thank you. Thank you for your time everyone and have a good evening. Next uh noise bylaw uh for work at the high school is Lapanne on um
online. Yes. I am on uh for some reason my camera is not uh hold on there we go. Can you see me now? Yes. So um thank you very much for uh considering this noise waiver. Uh about
a month ago I requested u noise waivers for Saturdays um for this work in the at the high school uh which you granted me. Thank you very much. Uh unfortunately we uh we need additional Saturdays to uh ensure that we finish the work on time
so that school opens. Uh so far we have not had any complaints. uh no one is really we've I've instructed the workers to to do as much quiet work before 9:00 as possible. Uh so with that said, I do
have a slight presentation if the board is interested in in the progress of the work. If not, uh I I I'm free to answer any questions, but basically this is a uh a request for a noise waiver for Saturdays so that we so that we have the Saturdays in hand if we need to work on
Saturdays. Uh, you have a short uh presentation. I do have a short presentation if you're interested in the progress of the work. Are you going to pull it up lap? Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't I didn't hear they they wanted to see it or not.
Yes, they do. Okay. I do. Maybe others like No, I I definitely do. All right. Can you see my screen now? Hold on a second. Can you see the screen now? It's pulling up. It's up.
All right. Good. So, uh I really didn't go into too much uh detail last time when I presented to the board for the noise waiver. I go a little bit more into detail uh on what the actual work is. The work is done on two level. One, this is the plaza level. If you um
Greenall Street is this area over here. These are the two big gates that lead into the uh what we call the the tunnel area. And this is the courtyard over here. The work consisted of de demolishing all this concrete sidewalk, taking out the stairs, putting flashing
and water rewaterproofing everything in here, pitching this concrete so the water drains away from here. We found that um the this was the area where we had the most water infiltration and this is where we had the most damage to the uh to the down to
downstairs in basement level. So these are just a couple pictures. These were taken uh at the beginning of the project when we just we busted up the concrete. You can see the black stuff here. That's basically the hazardous material. Uh it's it's basically an asbestous mastic
which at that point they thought was waterproofing but really has not served us well. This area has been cleaned up a lot. You can see uh after we got rid of the asbestous material uh and you know we're preparing it to get waterproof
now. So these are recent pictures uh showing uh this is not so recent. We took down the stairs. If you remember last time I showed you there was some asbestous containing material on these pipes going down. Those have been taken out. We since reset the stairs and you
can see this black pitch tar here that's flashing and waterproofing on the sides. Uh tomorrow we're scheduled to put the main waterproofing on the floor. If anybody wants to come take a look at it, feel free to come take a look at it. It's a exciting time for construction
from uh from a construction manager's point. That's the main type of work we're doing. We'll take your word for it. I will take some more pictures if you guys want to see it. Uh here's some more pictures. And this was taken uh Monday. You can see this is what we call metal
flashing. This is aluminum flashing so that when the water comes here, it doesn't infiltrate the brick. it floods uh it flows out of here. Again, there's going to be a more of this black waterproofing material on the entire floor area here. But this has been the
main bulk of the work. We just we've taken out a lot of the uh brick uh where it waterproof the edges because that is really the area where most of the water will infiltrate and go down into the basement. Uh again, this is more of the stuff. So tedious work, but it is uh
stuff that uh is probably needed to make sure that the building stands forever. Right. So any questions so far? John. Yeah. Um a lap. Thank you so much. Um when was the the work done that is being
redone? Uh I'm I don't quite understand your question. What do you mean by that, John? Well, well, um, you know, work that was done, um, was apparently, um, not done according to a design, uh, that
was, it was apparently a design that was flawed and maybe it was execution of the, uh, the construction that was flawed. But when was that design work done and the construction work done? I I don't have that information for you. I can try to find out for you, but you're talking about when was the
existing asbestous containing material laid down on this floor? It would have to be decades ago because we stopped using asbestous as as uh as early as 1970s. Uh yeah, that's good to I mean it's it's useful to know it's very necessary to
know about the asbestous part of it. But uh is the asbestous part of it um the most recent of the work that was done or or is some of what is being replaced work that was done post you know the time of asbestos in construction? Uh I I
would I would venture to say it's probably about the same time frame. Okay. So this really has a a deep history and isn't recent work that calls into question whether work was um uh not performed according to um the design or
the design itself was flawed. Yeah, I I could not answer that for certain, but my if you if I had to get a guess, that's probably a correct statement. Yeah. All right. Thanks, Lab. All right, so going down the basement level, which last time I showed you some
really spalding concrete and really bad deteriorating uh rebar. It's really three areas. This is the corridor. Uh the corridor was was my main concern because this had all the HVAC piping, uh domestic water, all the stuff that feeds
the uh the new portion of the high school. Uh without that, there's no cooling in that portion. there's no water. Uh there's no there's it becomes an unfunctional space. Uh so I I asked the general contractor to focus on this
area, repair this first so that we could get the water the the water lines back in way before the school begins. This is the sprinkler uh the sprinkler room. Uh the the I say the green areas, that's where we outline where that that's the
deteriorating concrete. And this is the equipment room where all the sports teams get their equipment. Again, more areas of uh Spalding concrete there. Uh I'm gonna show you some pictures, some more pictures. I I think we get get the uh gist of
this. Okay, so this is what happened before. This is the equipment room. Uh they patched this. This was the area where it was probably the le the the most accessible and the least damage. Uh you can see they patched the areas right
here and they painted over so it looks good. Um yeah uh this is that corridor area and you see remember looking at the first picture they show where this is all the concrete that was delaminating from uh
from the main structure. Uh this was midway through the project where they had stripped all the concrete. You can see the rusted rebar. And this is a recent picture taken yesterday where they had used a special Sika product which is an epoxy grout. Uh so they they
covered it. Now I mean it it they didn't just cover it. They had to scrape all the rebar off. They've coated it with another epoxy on top of that and then they pour this like really hard grout. There's a 10-year warranty on it. So, obviously hopefully it lasts a lot
longer, but uh at least that that's where it is with the the 10-year warranty. Okay. Uh Lab, could we focus on uh what is going to be uh do happening uh at the site that's causing a need for a noise bylaw waiver?
Sure. So, uh, we we're we're we're we're pouring concrete hopefully, but we may have to scrape and use, uh, use hand tools that that would create noise, and we want to have a Saturday just in case.
Uh, more than likely, we may not need it, but I would like to have these Saturdays just in case we have to do some noisy work on Saturdays. And the workers begins 7 o'clock. Uh they're union workers and that's the hours of operation from 7 7 to 3. That's a normal
working day. Okay. Um and and the noise is going to be jackhammers. They could be some jackhammer. Right now it's probably more confined to grinders. Uh which you know if they have to grind some joints out to to install some
brick. Uh as let me just try to show you an area where they where they could work. If you see right now here that there's no brick here uh as well as on the other edges of the floor uh of the area, they may need to grind out the
grout here uh put the brick and re and uh reorder it. So that's a possible noise issue that they could have. Um, plus if they get late and um and they have to put that they're using a burner for this area and the burner creates a
lot of noise. Uh, cuz this is hot. This a hot Anybody seen like these hot asphalt rs? They have this big gigantic burner and it just creates a lot of noise and and they have to have this thing hot dur before it be before
they can install the product. So, that is I'm hoping not to use it, but I would like to have it just in case. Great. Thank you. And the burner, does that emit um pollutants into the atmosphere? I mean, it it is it does use oil to burn
it. Uh but it has a muffler on it. Uh and it is at it is OSHA uh safe. Okay, good. Um, any question other questions from the select board? I have one. Yes, Michael.
I just wanted to confirm this is on three Saturdays in August. Um, and the minutes say August 8th, which I believe is a Friday. Um, and August 9th is the Saturday. So, I just wanted to make sure which date it is. It is a Saturday.
So, it should be August 9th, I believe. So, hold on. Thank you for catching that. No, you don't want to vote the wrong day. Oh, you're correct. Yes.
Okay. So, this is a public hearing. Um, Tiffany, can you open the public hearing? Yes. Now that the chair has opened the public hearing, um, there are no individuals who signed up in advance of this public hearing. If there are members of the um, public who wish to comment online, please raise your hand
using the raise the hand feature or in the room, please make your presence known at this time. Okay, there are approximately 17 individuals in the room and 20 online and no one is indicating their desire to speak. Okay, I'll close the hearing and call
for a vote. I move approval of the noise bywall, excuse me, noise bylaw waiver uh for East Coast Masonry and Repair to conduct work um at the high school. All in favor, please indicate by saying I. John Vancoyak
I. Paul Warren I. David Pearlman I. Michael Rubenstein I. Chair votes I. Thank you. Thank you a lot. Thank you very much. Have a good night. Okay. Uh next we have boards and commissions interviews. Interviews or a
candidate for the preservation commission. Um Bruce you can approach the podium. Oh sorry. Well, you can go up there. I just want to make sort of a comment or a statement beforehand. Um, this is not
directed at you. Um, but I'd like to begin uh with what we should be looking for in candidates for town boards and commissions. Uh, and I I made a similar statement last week with respect to the park and recreation commission. And I think it's something
that we should always be alert or aware of as we have our interviews and make decisions on appointees to boards and commission. Um I think we should be looking for four things. Does the applicant have the skills and background that is required to be successful on the
board or commission? Does the applicant have good ideas and perspectives on the work of the board or commission? Does the applicant bring relevant diversity to the board or commission to ensure that all communities are represented in the work the board or commission does on
behalf of the town? And finally, can the applicant work with work effectively and respectfully with other members of the board or commission and with the town staff that will that will be working with the board of commission? um to make
that to make our decision based on those criteria, we we'll gather information from the application submitted uh this interview and from town staff or members of the board or commission uh in order to uh make our selection there. So, um
will you introduce yourself and tell us why you're interested in being a member of the preservation commission? Sure. Um Bruce Erlick. Sorry, my my my voice the air is killing me today. I'm I live in precinct 8. Um I'm new to Brooklyn relatively. I've been here about a year and a half. Own a
house in precinct 8 with my wife. Um terms of preservation commission, I got intrigued because there were some houses in the area that people wanted to demolish or change or whatever and they started talking about what the commission did and what the requirements were and all that. And um I've always
had a really strong interest in history and if you eliminate history, you can't get it back. it's gone. And it it's really important to preserve preserve history when it you know when it's important to the town. This town is full of history, historic buildings, historic
places, historic people. Um, and I think preserving that is important, but at the same time, you have to listen to people that live here and want to do some things and etc. Um, I'm not clear. I did not grow up here. Like I said, I've been here a year and a half. I'm not clear how the process works here in terms of
um, who approves what. I honestly I don't don't know. Um but I I read a lot. I'm willing to learn. Um and I like to listen to what other people think. So my background, excuse me, my background is in finance.
Um I was a financial adviser for a long time up on the Northshore. Um I'm now retired. Um and just want to volunteer and give back and learn and uh help the community all I can. So thank you. I don't know what else you need to know.
So um maybe Tiffany can help here. Um excuse he would be appointed as an alternate member right because that that the members are required to be within certain categories as I understand it.
Sorry I have to verify that. Okay. I I think that's well let me ask my question which assumes that that's accurate and even if it's not accurate the question still is relevant. I mean what what I'm what what I'm suggesting is that the in the bylaw
u the um they talk about the membership of the commission made up of um members selected by the Brooklyn Preservation Commission. One member selected from name submitted by the American Institute of Architects. one member if possible
selected from nominees submitted by the Greater Boston Real Estate Board and four members who are residents of an historical district um etc. Um there is an a um alternate membership uh who
would be a resident who lives in a historical district. So my question is um do you live in one of the historical districts? It it's it's unclear. Um I've been told because things have changed of
of late in I know my area there are some uh strict requirements. Um I know a house down the street from three houses down from me for example is is in the process of trying to be demolished and redone and they had to go through with the preservation commission. There was a significant history online about it.
It's really kind of interesting. Um so I don't know. Yeah. And and it the in my opinion the bylaw is not very clear. No, it's not on a number of things, but but yeah, so we we'll just assume that you qualify for membership somehow. Okay, that's fine.
Um, so, uh, you've been a resident of Brooklyn for a year and about a year and a half. A year and a half. Yep. So, I take it that, um, you were a financial adviser in the Boston area, right? Northshore. Okay. Um, in your previous town, were you involved in any preservation commission type, uh,
activities? I I was not involved in the town at all and I'm not going to make an excuse, but my wife was a was an elected official and I couldn't I had to stay out of things. There was too much conflict. She was in the state legislature for a long time. Um so there was too much conflict there
potentially and uh I really had to not be involved with town boards at least thing take public positions because that could be attributed to her and that would that would inappropriate. Okay, good. Any other questions from the select board? Michael.
Um I'm curious as to first of all whether you've attended meetings of the preservation commission. Uh and if you have if you have ideas about what are the kinds of things in their process that worked well or things that worked uh that could be improved.
Um I have not attended meetings. What I what I've done though is I've talked to I mean if it matters I've talked to a lot of people at least in my neighborhood about the commission what they think it does what it really does and what I found is that nobody knows what
which I don't think is a really good thing because then you know for example my neighbor that is is trying to get a house redone he said I don't know what happened I don't know what who went through to who and who why this is important and you know there's a whole thing online about this particular house
and the history of it and it's very interesting, but it's really unclear if what's online makes this makes it historically significant or not. That definition is is very unclear and very vague. I don't think anybody nobody I talked to understands it. Um I don't
think it's that complicated to make it clearer to the public. I don't know. um you know the the other boards in town and the historic historical society and everything else they know better than I um in terms of making those determinations but I think the
commission could communicate better because there's nobody knows nobody knows what they did at least that I talked to David thank you maybe this ties into what you just said but in your application you mentioned communication even through the town newspaper would be helpful are you
referring specifically to the function of the preservation commission or something else. Yes, speaking I mean I there may be other town departments that could benefit from better communication too. I don't know. Um and I know the you know the new online newspaper does cover all
these meetings and and everything else. So that's good. You just have to look for it. But some of the the town the town the minutes of uh commissions and things like that are they're hard to find. Um it's sort of when you read it's like reading the bylaws how it's sort of unclear.
So, I don't I don't know the answer to how to fix that. I just know that it is an issue. Um, we're working on it. I'm sure. I mean, you know, like I said, I'm new. I'm new and everything seems to be getting better and people try to improve. People try to improve things
here, which is great. We have our um our um what's it called? A workbook or road map. Roadmap. Handbook. I'm sorry. a handbook on the agenda um to actually address many of the issues that uh are presented
by boards and commissions in town. So, and it takes a long time to get change takes. We have a good person on on the case. Change. Okay. Any other questions? I do have a question. Bernard. Yes. Well, I'm over here. Thank you. Sorry.
Out of sight, out of mind. It's okay. Uh Bruce, first uh welcome to Brookline and thank you for your interest in the preservation commission. And full disclosure, um I do live in a uh historic home within one of our historic districts. Um, so I'm I'm very familiar
with um the preservation commission and all the regulations and stuff, but I'm curious about your perspective on um you mentioned the importance of of our history and our older buildings, but could you speak a little bit about your your thoughts on um our older
buildings needing to become more energy efficient? Uh yes, I'm thinking of things like solar panels and you know currently we require single pane historic glass which I've done in my house. It's not the most insulated but could you speak a little bit about that in your views and how much should we
allow and how much should we pre preserve? Um and that's a fine line like you said. Um I think taking those things are really important. I mean, we moved into a house in that was originally built in 1895 and a developer had done had gutted
it. I don't know what we didn't know her at the time. We sort of came in after the fact, but kept the character of the house, tried to make it more energy efficient. Um, one of the last houses to actually have gas piped into the house, but one of the first things we did, for example, we had gas stove. One of the
first things we did is cap the gas and put it in an electric stove. So we are we are you know I under I understand now obviously I didn't need a permit to do that. Um but I I think it is important to look at the greater world around us and do whatever we can to help in terms
of climate and things like that. Um I don't know what the answer is in terms of uh solar um because you know in a historic district for example you know you're not going to see solar panels on roofs. It just you just don't see it anywhere. Um, I I came from Marblehead,
the historic Marblehead. There's no solar panels on roofs now. They're they're kind of finicky up there anyway. But we have to we have to try to figure out how to make it easier for residents to improve their their homes, save money on heat and electric because those
things are going crazy in terms of cost, but at the same time preserve it. I I don't know. Solar is a tough one. I mean, if you want to, you know, want to dig a geothermal well, it's not going to it's not as not as big of a deal. Obviously, you can't put it up a windmill. Um, but solar's tough because
it's it's a great very efficient way to generate energy now, especially being able to store the energy in batteries, but where do you put the panels? So, so Bruce, the uh just to be clear, the preservation commission only covers the exterior envelope of the building. Um, that does not cover the interior.
Right. Right. But thank you for Thank you for your for your comment. and I think it's helpful. Thank you. Okay. Any other questions? I have a question. John, have we figured out uh what the opening is and you know what we would be voting
um to appoint Bruce to? Uh at this point, my uh understanding is is to an alternate position or alternate uh um yeah position on preservation commission. But before we make a decision, we'll have to figure that out.
Yeah. Yeah. and through town council. Yeah. Um or someone else who really knows this stuff like Tiffany or if I may. Well, I I did have to do some quick searching just to double check a couple things. So, we do have um four alternate member spaces available on the preservation commission right now as
well as well as um one full voting seat. Um the way the alternate membership works on the preservation commission is if there's um not a quorum of members, the alternate alternate can stand in and vote. Um, I from what I can see, there aren't specific eligibility requirements
in terms of the full voting uh position vacancy. And uh I actually had I had to double check. I actually had emailed the staff um to check on Bruce's eligibility before we invited him to interview. Um so we should be all set, but we can double confirm. Okay, great. Thank you.
So um just in case there are people listening and wondering, is there a position open that is other than an alternate? There is one full voting that is not an alternate and there are also four alternate member seats. Yes. And do we know if Bruce qualifies for the full voting position? I think the answer is yes based on
staff's response, but I'd like to also just reconfirm. Okay. Um good. The bylaw does say um let's see what does this say? Does say um um to the extent possible.
So, okay, that's a little bit of wiggle room. I can't believe I mean, if you're on the the exclamation, maybe you can fix the language and by law. The intent of my question, just to be clear, is I I think Bruce has made a
very good presentation and um um I for one would be more than happy to vote for him for, you know, full voting member if we have an opening uh and if he's interested in that position. Yeah. Um, but we're not voting this evening, are
we? No, typically we don't vote, but we'll find out before we Yeah. Yeah. Okay, good. Yeah. So, thank you. Uh, as as I just said, we'll be voting on this at any question. Any other questions? Feel free to through whatever. Thanks.
Thanks. Okay. Now, the item that everyone is waiting for. Okay. So, so before you uh start speaking, Cara, um let me just say that
this item is the proposal by Victory Programs to acquire the property on William Street. Um, and Victory Programs is a nonprofit that has been recommended by the committee that reviewed the responses to our request for information
uh to be assigned the town's right of first refusal to purchase the property. Uh, after their presentation, we will set aside 20 minutes for public comments of no more than three minutes each. The select board will also be available at the end of this meeting to hear any
additional comments that were not able to be uh heard during that 20-minut period. Uh you should know that the select board has received and read comments that have been submitted to us in writing and I can say that all select
board members do read these comments. Um don't be shocked. I we work hard on this select board. Um and most if not all select board members have watched or participated in the meeting on July 30th of the housing advisory board at which
public comments were were also received. We've had an opportunity to to ask questions of town staff and we'll be able to submit additional questions as needed before our final vote on August 19. Many of the issues raised in the
comments will be addressed by Victory or uh any other nonprofit purchaser after the closing of the purchase when they work with the town on compliance with our various regulations governing lodging houses if that is the form that they organize under and our health
building safety and other regulations and approvals that will be needed. Uh, of course, any nonprofit would also be subject to state regulations. With that, uh, Cara, are you going to introduce uh, Victory Programs or
So, I'm going to be very brief just to add it. So, first of all, my name is Cara Brutin. I'm the director of planning and community development. Um, just to add some time frame and some context and what you just went over, uh, Chair Green, back in, uh, 2010, the, um, town
assigned some federal grant dollars, um, to this, uh, property for the Price Center um, in order to help rehab the property. And in exchange for those funding for that funding, um, the town was able to secure a right of first refusal for the property um, as well as
some temporary affordable housing restrictions. Um, as you know, uh, back in June, we, um, went to the housing advisory board, um, and there was a, a public meeting where there was dozens of people in attendance talking about what they wanted to see at that property, um,
including residents who were from a variety, either directly or indirectly affiliated with a variety of nonprofits that service all kinds of different people. Um, that feedback was folded into the draft request for information that we shared with you all in June. um
in executive session we released that request for information process. Um the recommendation uh committee was um vice chair Pearlman uh myself Linda Smith who's here from the planning department and Roger Blood the chair of
the housing advisory board. Um once we did a bunch of outreach um and we had four uh nonprofit groups that were um very interested in in possibly making a proposal um went on sitewalks, ask
questions and in the end two of them dropped out because the property was either too small or too large for their um typical operations and they understood that the town wanted to keep the building that was that was there in large part. Um, we went back, we let you
all know that the uh, recommendation committee um, saw that Victory Programs was um, certainly the higher qualified proposer of the two that that bid Victory Programs in Brooklyn Community Development Corporation, although both are certainly extremely important
community allies. Um, the proposed uses you'll hear from Taylor uh from Victory Programs is for a drug and alcohol-f free facility for pregnant or parenting individuals reuniting with their children. Um, and there would be 24 staffing and support for these
individuals. Um, we also took that same recommendation to the housing advisory board um just last week in July 30th. Um, and they also voted to recommend um that the select board move forward with victory programs. So, that's all I have
to say. I'm happy to get into more detail later. Um, and Taylor Moly, she's here to give a a presentation about what they're thinking about. Good. Good evening everyone. Uh I'm Taylor Moley. I'm the chief operating officer and general counsel for Victory
Programs. Um, so we have a brief presentation just kind of give an overview of who we are as an organization, what the Portis family model is. Um, and I do just want to touch on um a couple of the comments that come out of the community process so far. Um, so with that said,
uh, so um, Sarah Porter is our CEO and president. She is on this call. Uh, we didn't realize when you signed up that it tags your name, so she's on there as Taylor as well. Uh but uh it is Sarah. Um uh unfortunately Tammy Simmon Stixson isn't joining us tonight. She's our
director of housing, has served with us for a very long time um and is very familiar with the operations of Poris. Um Portis family home is transitional housing. Um it is a supportive environment for uh quite often single mothers. Uh it is an allgender parent
program, but in the past 15 years, we've only had zero uh non-s single mothers in the program. And I think there's in the since Victory has operated it in the last 25 years, we've only had one or two instance where you have two parents or male identified parents in the program.
So is a very kind of cohesive uh family group of a single mother with one to um sometimes larger families uh depending on who is referred to the program. Um 16 Williams offers the opportunity to expand it. Uh it would um be a little more than doubling the current bed
count. Uh so right now we offer housing for eight families uh just across the border in Jamaica plane. 16 Williams would allow us to expand the program to 18 families between the two sites. So a little more on victory programs. Uh so we are currently in our 50th year uh
as an organization. We started back in 1975 as Victory House uh which was a recovery home um operating for veterans. Uh and over those past 50 years, uh our services have really expanded to be we can work with somebody uh who is
unstably housed at street level. Um provide them shelter, transitional housing all the way up to permanent supportive housing with wraparound services the whole way. Uh we also have experience and operate family shelters um in contract with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts um as well as day centers
and uh recovery centers. Um, our philosophy of care is really rooted in meeting people where they are. Uh, so um, quite often everything that we do is on a case-byase basis. It's very hard with the communities and the individuals
we work with to establish um, kind of lines in the sands or very hard rules. And so we always evaluate people where they're at in their lives and work with them to provide stability and support. Uh, and so a lot of our outcomes are highly individualized. Uh for Poris families, outcomes are reuniting with
their children in a sober environment and staying sober post discharge into permanent supportive housing. Uh but for some of our pro other programs, outcomes look very different than that. So just a little bit more on um victory programs as an organization and our
successes in FY24. Um we served over 5,000 adults and children across our programs. Uh we helped 117 individuals transition from shelter into permanent supportive housing and we helped a thousand over a thousand adults and children receive
shelter and essential needs through our programs. Uh finally we helped over 550 individuals uh receive critical recovery services and support at one of our six recovery homes. Uh just to be clear, Portoris Family Home is not a recovery home. It is a sober facility for
individuals with six-month sobriety. Uh but we do operate other recovery services including recovery homes. So as I mentioned the Portoris family home is a transitional facility. The average length of stay for our families in the house is 18 to 24 months. Um upon
successful completion. Families are reunited which means again pragmatically it is mom and her children um are exiting the program into permanent supportive housing. We stay with the families uh for around oops sorry I may
be getting ahead of my slide. Um so while in poris um we work with the parents with the children to um reunify the family. We provide recovery support services to help uh people stay sober. We provide housing search and stabilization services through our
programs. We also provide uh case management to help our families access the resources they need in the community. Um, the Portis program is 247 staffed. It includes program director, clinical supervision, case managers, residence assistant, um, as well as
relief staff. So, anytime there's a call out, we have staff that will be in the program. So, there is always a staff person on site with the Poris model. Um, as I mentioned, we do um, housing and case management uh, for our clients in Poris Family Home and we will work
with our clients to kind of mitigate any issues that come up. So, one of the pieces that have come out of the community feedback process is well, would you deny somebody with a felony history? And our answer is no. Uh, because we evaluate on that case by case basis. Um, if an individual were
presenting with a relevant felony or a relevant criminal history that would put them, the family's import risk, we would certainly screen for that and it's unlikely they would be placed. But again, we want to meet our families where they're at. And if you have an older history, we will work with you to address it, make sure you're the right
fit for the program um and ultimately help you stabilize and find a supported environment to move on to the next stage of your reunification into permanent supportive housing after poris. And then um as I alluded to, we do follow our families for 90 days after
discharge. Um in the last two years, we've only had one um family unfortunately um have a relapse within those 90 days. Uh but the program is otherwise highly successful in um keeping families reunited once they uh complete their 24 months.
And with that, I can take any questions that the board may have. So any questions from the board? John, thank you very much for the presentation. Uh uh I I'm curious as to
um whether we can get a handle on the numbers of people who will be resident in in the house because you know I get serving families but is a family one, two, three, maybe as many as four people. Um and is is the house that you
are looking at 16 William Street um set up in such a way as to accommodate um let's say it's four people um how many groups of that size could could you accommodate? So in the current uh Portis family home
the rooms are as small as 111 square feet I think is the smallest room and the largest is around 250. So it is it is a smaller space um that works because it is transitional housing. It's not intended to be someone's final stop on their housing journey.
Uh in terms of 16 Williams, it would very much play out in the same practice. Um so there is a point um depending on the room available where we may assign two rooms to a family. Um so in practice, a larger room around 200 square feet would be for a mom and two
children. Whereas a room that's 100 square feet may only be a mom and a child. Um and if there was a larger family uh four or more children then it may be across multiple uh adjoining rooms. Okay. And what I do we have anyone from
the building department here who can answer whether there's any limitation in Brooklyn as to uh the number of people in the square footage that exists in that. A question for the health department. Uh do we have someone online
from health? Tiffany doy. I don't think we have anyone online from the building department or health. So, uh from health. Sorry, go ahead, Chaz. I don't see anyone um from health. Um but I can say that right anyone who's
using the space has to comply with the requirements of the health department and the building department um with regard to the building code and the sanitation code. And I also see uh Joe Kalan, town council who will probably should chime in here as well. Sure. Thank you, Joe Kalan, town
council. So these uh this uh 16 William Street is a single room occupancy facility. So it has a different type of um you know building code requirement than most other places because they share bathrooms and kitchens. But the rooms uh you know don't need that much
space to qualify under the building code. So um let me double check uh but it's uh typically you know uh it's 120 ft for the first person uh and you know um and 70 ft for the the second
person. I think when they referring to person there they're talking about adults. So a mom and a child could probably, you know, fit into a 120 square foot room because again they are sharing the kitchen and bathroom facilities elsewhere other than just their room,
but but not a a parent and three children. They need they need more space. So So I heard Taylor say that, you know, in a larger family, they would be going out beyond just one room. Okay. My only point in bringing these questions up is I think one of the
concerns of that people are going to express uh tonight um is the the number you know how many people are we talking about because it sounds like it's going to be different than the existing number for that's using the house uh which is not to say it can't be a higher number
but I think we do need some kind of definition of what the allowable number um given the size of that property right is because Joe has just confirmed it as As far as I am concerned, um there are limits in Brooklyn on occupancy and and
space, you know, that is required for certain numbers of inhabitants to occupy uh a given space. And and Joe, are there also state requirements that may um override Brookline's requirements and what?
Yeah, and what I referred to as the building code and there would also be fire code. you know, there there are safety codes that they would have to comply with. And all this would be done before they get a certificate of occupancy. So, they may not be able to know the answers today because one, they haven't acquired the property. Um, but
they would certainly need to have all this, you know, answered and straightened out before they would ever get a certificate of occupancy. Right. Mike, no. Go ahead. Um, thank you Taylor for the presentation and also for your presentation at the housing advisory
board meeting which I and I'm sure a number of other of us uh watched and learned from. Um, I wonder if you can speak to uh the to the parts of your program that deal with uh how you uh
where you source your customers, uh how they're screened before you source them, how you screen them through to the parts of your program where you carry where they uh complete the poris house. Um, and you mentioned that they then go on
to permanent supportive housing. It wasn't clear whether that is uh victory programs, permanent supportive housing, or you work with other people uh or other uh organizations because obviously there are other organizations that provide those services. Um, and I wonder
if you could speak to the to sort of how that process works all the way through. Of course. Uh so the uh the Institute of Health and Recovery is our referral source for the current Portis family home. Uh so they send us a referral for a family. Um that family has to have a
likelihood of uh reunification with the child. Excuse me, Taylor. Is is that a state agency? Uh the Institute for Health and Recovery is a nonprofit agency. Okay. Um so they'll refer to us um and it will be families who are able uh to
kind of imminently reunite with uh their children. Uh so that may be uh documentation from CF sorry DCF. Um that reunification is possible and that there's a timeline to do it. Um there are very few kind of again clear um
screening criteria at that stage other than six month sobriety and the ability to reunite. it then becomes an interview and a um with our program staff to determine that it's a good fit. Um and so that case by case basis looks at a lot of factors. It can be geographically where the support system is, where the
education and care for the child or children is is located. Um where somebody's um job is located, their connections to the community. So, it's it's very individualized to make sure that not only is the client a good fit for Poris, but Portis is also a good fit for the client um so that they're
receiving the services they need. Um, as I mentioned, it's it's an average stay of 18 to 24 months. So, our staff are working with the family throughout their stay at Poris to get them ready for housing. Um, I do just want to correct something I said it could be permanent supportive housing. It could also just
be um housing in the community uh depending on where that family is when they exit the program. It's usually not victory programs housing. Um it is uh housing of other nonprofit agencies or affordable housing or just again um community housing in communities.
Great Paul. Yep. Uh thank you and thank you for the presentation um and the information you provided. Could you speak a little bit about you I think you said the average was 18 to 24 months uh of of a stay um
does that exit what what's the criteria or what are the factors that uh result in an exit is it the time to when they're ready what are the criteria for exit yeah I mean again it is a very case-byase basis um and kind of is is
the family ready um have uh they you know baseline criteria. Have they uh reunited with their children? Is that going well? Um are the issues any issues with uh DCF um resolved and um that they
are able to move into housing with uh a 90-day follow-up from victory programs. Um a lot of it just does come down to the availability of housing. Um an individual's availability to support themselves in that housing whether through employment or through a voucher.
Uh so again, it's a very case-byase basis when somebody is ready to move out of the program. Um some people move much more quickly um and others need that full 24 months. Sure. Bernard, can I ask a follow-up? Yep. Thank you. Um so you had uh Thank you
for that answer. It's what I expected. It's a good flexible program. So the um you had mentioned that you had only one relapse uh for successful completion of the program uh which is which is remarkable. Do you also have statistics
for relapse while in the program? So that would probably fall under um so we do have house rules and program rules. Um again it is case by case. Uh so we work with the family even if we are aware of a potential relapse or there are signs that one could be
imminent, we will work with that parent um to intercede and try to stabilize them and get the support they need to either remain or move on or um become sober again. Uh so in the past two years, we only have had one instance where we've actually had to ask somebody
to leave the program because they violated those house rules. Um and those are again house rules that apply to sobriety um to um following expectations for behavior and decorum um as it relates to the program attending program
um um meetings as well but not being so do and I'm sorry Bernard one more question I'm very fascinated by the subject so the um is being sobery require I know there's a house rule that says you can't be using
on the property but is being in the pus do poor cells. Do you have to be sober? I know you have to be six months before you enter, but if you have a relapse, you're automatically is there a change in your status or how does that work? So, you do have to be sober for six months before entry. If you were to
relapse in the program, um it is not a definitive you're removed from the program. Again, we evaluate um on a case-by case basis with our tenants um and work with them to reestablish sobriety if that's applicable, if they are able to continue in the program. Um
unfortunately, I don't know for that one person removed for rules violation um what that exact cause was. Okay. Um so I can't speak to if that was for sobriety requirements. Okay. Thank you. Great. Uh Michael,
um thank you. Um I wonder if you can speak to um some aspects of the workforce that you employ in order to support the program. You mentioned that there's 247
on site. So um and can you sort of talk about uh sort of how that rotation works? Uh can you talk about the tenure and the training of the people both who are on site and not on site? And if you
can talk about the frequency or the level of direct engagement typical over weeks, months, whatever um of the off-site personnel uh in your program to
execute the program, of course. Uh so just running through the staffing of the program. Um really at the top it is um our director of housing and our deputy director of housing. Um and then we have a program director for Porteris Family Home. Um
historically there's also been clinical supervision that is separate from our program director. Uh but our um program director who's recently taken over the program and has worked at Victory for a very long time is also our licensed clinician who formerly supervised the program. So you kind of have that blended right now um into one position.
uh from and that program director again is a is a licensed clinician um at the moment. Uh if it was otherwise the program director would be somebody who has um multiple years of experience as well as a bachelor's degree in relevant field uh to make them qualified for the position. U moving down from there we
have our case management staff. Um that does require um I believe no less than one years of experience as well as a a BA um or an associates and additional years of experience. And then you have our residence assistants who are um
require a high school diploma as well as relevant experience. And then all of our staff receive um training both uh general training and how you do um uh crisis intervention and deescalation policy um as well as training on best
practices for the program. Uh training on how to interact with our staff. Um I wish I had the list because it's a very long list of all the trainings our staff can have for this program. Um and then beyond that um we have our relief staff who I mentioned is there was ever a call out they're the ones who are filling
that um gap in terms of frequency of interaction with staff staff. Um you know we try to build community in our buildings. So that is you know if you're walking in the front door and there's a staff person who's you know at their desk in that area right like there's
going to be an interaction. Our staff are doing rounds our staff are checking in with clients. um they are, you know, doing the housing search and stabilization work with our clients to help them find housing. They are working and doing case management around
recovery and sobriety. Um so there's a lot of opportunities for interactions. Um again, I I'm going to have to keep using the phrase it is case by case based on the needs of the family and where they are. Somebody earlier on in Poris is going to have a lot more interaction with staff than somebody
getting ready to exit the program. David has a question. Uh, Michael, I'm sorry, David. Just a couple questions. You, uh, mentioned as part of your presentation that you have some locations that are sober homes, others that are recovery
homes. Could you explain for the public that distinction? Of course. Um, so again, Victory Programs works um, uh, kind of in all stages of individuals uh, with substance use disorder. Um, in some cases that may mean um
shelters that have um lower barriers to entry. Um, that may mean our recovery homes, which is people who have taken steps towards um, obtaining sobriety and need a supportive environment uh to continue that journey. Um, versus a sober home where there is a requirement
that you have already put in a lot of work. You are to the point in your recovery um, where you are sober and no longer using substances or um, I thinking of the distinction here better for recovery home versus sober home is is it is to the stage um where
you don't need as intensive um staff interaction to maintain or achieve sobriety. All right. One of the concerns articulated by some residents from the neighborhood is around uh people who might be going onto this property beyond
the residence. So could you describe what some of the rules entail around visitors and who typically is allowed in? Of course. Uh so I did have an opportunity after um last week's meeting to kind of look into this rule a little further. Um so it is visitors coming
into the program are usually um organizations we're partnering with. Um so it is not that guests would be coming into the program. I can't say it would never happen. Um but usually um our rules require like if somebody is coming in the program to meet with one of our attendants or client, it is another um
nonprofit or service provider that's there for a specific reason. Um you know we again as I mentioned we have staff at the building. Part of what there is there to do is to monitor and control the front door of the building. Um so we have our families sign in and sign out.
We establish rounds of the property. We do weekly checks of units to um ensure health and wellness as well as safety concerns. Um and we also monitor our neighborhood. Um we are not an organization that is going to close the front door and say the outside world is
the outside world's problem. Um we will provide phone numbers and emails and make sure that the community can reach us. Um, and if there's ever a concern that somebody is on the bench across the street waiting for one of our clients or is, you know, a potential um, other
parent who's not part of the program, uh, the community can let our, uh, staff know, let the front desk of the program know. And we will do our best to move people along if possible or to ask our clients and alert them that that's not allowable behavior. Um, and go as far as contacting uh, the police if necessary
if there's a concern that um, somebody is somehow linked to our program. uh and is um being or is in the neighborhood when they shouldn't be. And could you describe what a typical day is like for a resident at the program? Um
so I am going to admit I may not be the best one to describe the typical day. Um again because it is so case by case it's, you know, it is the same that it's going to be for any family. You know, everyone's going to get up, children may go to school, they're going to go to
daycare. um the parent is going to go to work, right? Like it is it is still very much people who are functioning in their community when they're able to um and then receiving services based on that schedule. Um so again, it it really depends where somebody is at in their um
where they're at in their life as to what services they're going to be receiving each day. Um but the way to really frame it is, you know, these are community members, these are families, they still need to go to school, they're still going to work. um throughout the day. Is there a particular curfew for when everyone has to be back?
There is a curfew. I don't have the time off the top of my head. Um but early evening is around there. John, um sorry if I seem obsessed with this whole question of occupancy, but it's it's a little bit of a mystery to me. Does anyone have the number as to
the square footage contained within this house? Sarah, do you um have any of that information? I can look up the square footage. It's in the um select board packet, but that would include the common rooms. Um and I think what you're getting at is the number of people.
Yeah. That would maximum be there. Um I'll offer that in addition to the conversation. Introduce yourself to those people in our vast TV audience. Sure. Don't know you. So for the last 15 minutes, I've remained to be the director of planning and community
development. Name is car Brutin. Thank you. Chair drained. I should know better by now. Um so in addition to the conversation that's happened already about square footage, um our uh chief of health, John Klashinski's also had a chance to have a
conversation with Taylor and um talked about the town's desire to have this property continue as a lodging house under lodging house license. And part of that includes regulations under the lodging house locally um that requires
50 square foot per occupant per person. Um and I had a brief conversation with Taylor about this this afternoon and that seems to work well with their program. Um this building was built in 1895. So there are no floor plans in the building department that are, you know,
too scale. there's like a emergency access that shows relative sizes of bedrooms, but when this gets to the right point, um, Victory Programs is going to need to do, you know, a survey, going to need to figure out the operations, going to need to work with public health and figure out how all of
this makes sense. Um and preliminary conversation with the town administrator is that um as we get direction from you all of what the most important thing is um that you want to have as you know kind of bumpers or or safeguards, we could wrap that into the agreement if
you all decide to of um conditions of our of the town's assignment which would be above and before and beyond any licensing that comes later. Yeah. I you know and it's interesting while while this has been going on I checked the assessor's listing on on
this and they don't have information as to as as you said there is no information as to the actual square footage um contain contained within this property and and truthfully um you know I'm I'm looking at this as much from the vantage point of victory programs um you
know as from the vantage point of the neighborhood I'm sure they don't you know want to get into a situation where they are contemplating use of this for let's say 32 two individuals and then it turns out under occ under under our occupancy uh guidelines. Um it doesn't
qualify for that many but maybe it qualifies for 24. I don't know. Um so it sounds like all of that is being investigated which is you know what I would assume but it kind of begs the question is there contemplated the possibility of expanding this property
to to reach what you would be required to to have for let's say 32 people? Yeah. So we don't have sorry uh we don't have any plans at this point because it's so early to do any expansion. Our kind of model across most of our housing
is really in this 10 to 15 unit range. If you look at our portfolio of housing, the vast majority of it um is a smaller setting. It's really where we feel that we can have the most impact with our clients. So we wouldn't look to expand. I would never say never depending on
yeah you know what happens in 10 years but at this point we don't. Um I will say again we want the square footages and some floor plans I think as much as uh anyone at this point. Um and I did have an opportunity we have an architect who we are um essentially ready to press go as soon as it's
relevant to do so and get in there and actually get dimensions and get a better answer to the question of what the room sizes are. Great. That's great to know. Thanks. Great. Any other questions from the select board? Okay. U next we'll have uh public
comment for 20 minutes. Uh under our usual public comment rules, 3 minutes per person and u to the extent that you don't get a chance during this period to make your comment. Uh the select board will stay around late into the night and
listen uh after the regular agenda is completed. So um Mr. Chair, I'm sorry. Um, before we before we go into public comment, could I just briefly preface it? Yes. Um, I just want to um thank members of
the public who are here to speak and just make sure everyone knows um we don't stop people from making public comments unless there is a threat made um or there's obscity or something is
raised that's beyond the scope of the select board. um which means that it is theoretically possible for someone to say something that is discriminatory and we don't have the ability to stop someone from saying that. So I do just
want folks to be aware um that it is discriminatory to discriminate against someone on the basis of being a member of a protected class of having a disability which includes a substance use disorder. Um, it is discriminatory
to deny those people housing. It is against the Dover amendment, which is an amendment to the Massachusetts Constitution to try and segregate where people live in support of housing. So, the idea that we can pick and choose where people live, just not in this neighborhood. That's illegal. We can't
do that. Um, I want people's expectations to be set accordingly on this. Um it is really important to the community as a whole that as we discuss this civily and with um full cander and
transparency that we try and avoid situations where we uh create a situation where the town could be accused of discriminating against someone on the basis of a disability or membership in a protected class. So uh I
hope as we have this discussion and it is civil uh and mindful of that that people are aware that when some if someone says oh you know why do those people have to live here that is not a question that we will answer right that
is discrimination and so we can't do that so I just want people's expectations to be set. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Um, should we try to do it uh procon?
I mean, is that that even makes sense? Let's forget that. Let's just see who see who stands up and wants to talk. Well, I I do have an order because we do have um folks who sign up for public comment at the beginning related to this. So, we'll we'll start with that. Um, so first up to speak is Susan Freed.
Is Susan in the room? You can approach the podium and I'll throw the timer up. Oh, I won't start it until you start. My name is Susan Freed. I'm in Precinct 11 and I live on Winchester Street. Um, we have only heard of this whole thing
last Tuesday and although we may appear to be small but mighty group, we began circulating a petition just eight hours ago. Um, and um, we've already gotten well over 70 people who've responded in support of our plea to walk away from
the victory proposal. um and the victory transitional housing. And I think that um as the the weeks wear on, you're going to find that this will become much more of a wave. I'm not going to restate arguments that we've sent you an email. Um I want to offici I want to really
focus on few issues. First is do no harm. Do no harm should guide us in all public decisions, particularly those involving people's homes, neighborhoods, and welfare. While the intent behind a sober living facility may be admirable and we are not denying the value but at
at all of victory house you have to ask yourselves are we certain that this action in this neighborhood will not create unintended negative consequences if there is doubt costing should prevail community safety cohesion and well-being
must remain our primary responsibility as I said we understand the value of lowincome housing which has been the mandate, which by the way, this is not. This is transitional housing. And to what the gentleman said earlier about discriminating about where people should or should not live, absolutely, we
agree. But it should be noted that 50% of the subsidized housing in Brooklyn are within those few blocks in precincts 9, 10, and 11. 50%. The second point is a lack of clear benefit to Brooklyn. Frankly, it remains unclear how this project truly benefits
the people of Brooklyn. There are unanswered questions regarding oversight, accountability, and the actual support provided to both residents and neighbors. Where's the evidence that this facility would serve our town's most vulnerable rather than simply place a burden on our neighborhoods with little return? And
until these issues are are addressed transparently, there's no compelling case for for moving forward. Um, I have to address the matter of process and trust. Um at the this is a participatory democracy rooted in
transparency, fairness and trust and the structure of town meeting exists to ensure that every member of the public has voice and visibility in the decisions that shape our community in matters of governance perception can and in matters of governance perception can be just as consequential as reality. the
way this has been run through for us, it's really been um you I I feel I we feel that a lot of our trust has been broken. So, in clergying, in closing, I urge the board to think carefully, prioritize the welfare of all Brooklyn residents, and uphold the standards of
fairness and transparency and walk away from this deal, please. Thank you. Thank you. Next up is Terry Meyers. After Terry Meyers will be Mary Ellen Moran. I'm Terry Myers. I live at 48 William Street. I've been a resident for 35
years. Good evening and members of the board. I want to thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight on the current proposal for transitional housing in our community. Um, first of all, transitional housing can be an important resource for those experiencing acute hardship. It is not a
substitute for permanent affordable housing. Our mandate in the shared values of Brooklyn require us to provide stable, long-term, affordable homes so that families and individuals can plant roots, thrive, and become part of the fabric of our town. Transitional housing, as Victory is proposing, by its
very nature, is temporary. It does not address the growing demand among working families, seniors, and young people for safe, affordable places to live. By prioritizing transitional models without a clear path to permanent affordability, we risk missing the mark set by our housing mandate and by the expectation
of the residents. Second, though this is a difficult topic, there are studies indicating a correlation between substance abuse and increased crime rates and lead to public safety concerns. I am not suggesting that all residents of transitional housing still struggle with substance abuse or are
prone to crime. Far from it. But evidence does suggest that transitional facilities can increase not only can increase not only for those housed within but also for the surrounding community, especially in more affluent neighborhoods, as indicated by the Philadelphia study handout that I think
Carrie has. We all want Brooklyn to be a compassionate town, one that welcomes vulnerable residents and helps them stand on their feet. However, we must be careful to pursue solutions that truly address the root issues of affordable housing and public safety. I urge you as selectmen to insist on proposals that
meet our community's affordable housing goals and that come with a comprehensive support framework, ensuring both the well-being of new residents and the continued safety and stability of our cut of our neighborhoods. It is important to have a community input and not a rush to judgement. Rush decisions
can erode trust. If people feel cut out of the process or that decisions are being made behind closed doors that undermines public confidence even in well-intentioned projects, we have an obligation to be transparent and to bring people along, not drag them
behind. Residents often bring local knowledge that improves planning, especially neighborhood dynamics. When we all listen, we make better, more durable decisions. The goal is not consensus, but inclusion. We don't need everyone to agree, but we do need everyone to be feel heard. When people
have a chance to engage, they're more likely to support or at least understand the outcome, even if it is not their first choice. I am not sure we've done this yet. Public input gives us a chance to separate facts from fears. Transitional housing, does it necessarily bring crime? Affordable
housing, does it devalue neighborhoods? I don't know the answers and would like more time and information to find out. Uh, I'm just asking you to reconsider other proposals and find some way to use the property for good. Thank you. That concludes your time. All right,
Mary Ellen Moran. Next up will be Carrie G. Good evening. I'm Mariela Maria and I live in precinct 11. Um I have you heard there's um we don't feel like there's been a lot of open and transparent
communication in the neighborhood about this proposal. Um I'm here to talk specifically about the RFI and it's uh limited outreach with only two proposals. Um, and we read the RFI and we noted that its primary goal was to
explore opportunities to retain long-term affordable housing as well as housing stability for lowincome residents in a sensitive neighborhood context. We listened to um uh the proposal or the
programs by Victory Programs, the presentation at the Housing Advisory Board, and it was very persuasive, but we still have concerns. Um we do have concerns about um safety and crime and even potentially bringing drug use to
the neighborhood. Um, and I think Victory Programs tried to um address our concerns by noting that there's this Poris House family model that they will use at 16 William Street, which
accommodates women recovering from substance abuse who have children or who are pregnant or or both. Um, but I don't think there's any guarantee to that. I think that um
they're they they could anybody could reside there. Um I don't know how how how we would um how we how we there's no guarantee. Um and it's as as we've said,
it's short term. 16 to 24 months is the program. That's uh transitional housing. That's not long-term housing or stability. Um we so we don't think that the intent of the RFI was met and um we
understand that the Brooklyn Community Development Corporation did not score as high, but their proposal was pretty comprehensive because we've read that also and they have a a proven track record um opposed to a substance abuse house where Brooklyn I don't believe has
any exposure or any experience. So I think that um the the proposal by victory programs does not serve the public interest and it doesn't serve certainly our neighborhood's interest in
um particularly a sensitive neighborhood context. Thank you. Thank you Carrie G. After Carrie G will be Robert Moran. Thank you. I'm Carrie Goldberg. I live at 24 William Street, several feet from 16 William Street, the house that we're
discussing. Uh, I just want to underscore that the opposition in the neighborhood is already extremely strong. We started this petition just a few hours ago and we already got enough signatures to more than fill this room
with people who are saying we would prefer an alternative to this proposal. Um I have spoken with several of you quite a bit. I really appreciate the listening that's happened in the last several days. Uh I am now going to speak not as myself but as Dr. Orit Ay Baron
who is a psychiatrist who lives in the neighborhood and who Michael heard yesterday and so he can attest that she actually does sound like this. Um so she says victory program says it does not think a person's past predicts their future. This was something that Taylor
had said before. Um but in clinical practice a person's past behavior is one of the strongest predictors of future outcomes especially in the early stages of recovery. Three to six months of sobriety is considered early recovery and not a reliable indicator of
long-term stability or reduced risk. Relapse is extremely common. According to the National Institute of Drug Abuse, 40 to 60% of people relapse within the first year after treatment. For people with additional risk factors such as co-occurring mental illness or trauma, the relapse rate can be even higher. The
American Society of Addiction Medicine and other leading authorities recommend 12 to 24 months of sustained recovery before high stress transitions like reunification. To be clear, for a mother to lose custody of her children, the situation must be severe. The child
welfare system is designed to preserve families, not separate them. If a mother continues to use substances despite the powerful motivation of keeping her children, this is considered a serious clinical red flag. Studies show that children who've been separated from a
parent due to addiction are at increased risk for emotional and behavioral problems upon reunification, including oppositional behavior, depression, PTSD symptoms. These children need highly structured therapeutic environments, not transitional housing in a residential neighborhood with limited oversight.
This is a very tolerant neighborhood, our neighborhood. It's welcoming to many unusual people. But this proposal crosses a line. It introduces a high-risk population into a quiet, low crime, familyoriented area without sufficient planning or transparency. It
crosses a line not because we lack compassion, but because the risks are real and well documented. And I think that that speaks to what Chaz said earlier. I don't know how you can uh deny that there are greater risks. And that's why one of the handouts shows you
the added risks of when a person is a is a substance user. And another one of the handouts shows you um that this is particularly true in a highincome neighborhood. So bottom line, neighborhood opposition is very strong. It's something that needs to be dealt with and it's just going to get
stronger. So please choose an alternative. Thank you. Robert Moran after Robert Moran will be Michael Jacobs. My name is Robert Moran. I live in precinct 11, less than 1/8 of a mile from 16 William Street. My wife
Mary Ellen and I are homeowners. We have lived at our home for over 20 years. Like like most Americans, our home is our largest investment. As a preface to my comments, nothing in my comments is intended to
stigmatize individuals with alcohol or substance abuse issued. My comments address the effect of the proposed victory facility on residential real estate values in the neighborhood. I will present facts, not bias on this
issue. Other neighbors will speak or have spoken on the societal effects of the facility on the neighborhood, warning of welldocumented dangers of increased crime, trash, and loitering. I agree that these risks are
real and echo these warnings in an expert opinion regarding the effect of a substance abusement abuse treatment center in Kain County, Illinois, which I submitted to the uh board with uh my written statement. Uh
Dr. Benny Waller, a professor of finance and real estate, the author, the expert opinion, concluded that residential real estate in the neighborhood of the center would suffer a reduction in real estate values of between 8 and 17%. He
described this as significantly detrimental. Perception has a strong impact on residential real estate prices. A drug treatment facility has a negative stigma stigma. Any drugrelated use has a
negative stigma and there are real risks large correlation between crime and drug use. Over 50% of residents of sober houses will relapse. That's what statistics say. Many people suffering some from
substance abuse addiction also have mental health issues. Real estate values are greatly affected by public perception. The public has fear and anxiety with a drug treatment
facility or another drugrelated use such as a residence for recovering drug addicts. The public fear the risk and dangers. The key is it is the perception of these risk and dangers which impacts the real
estate market. Potential buyers of residential real estate will not refer to the proposed facility as a sober house. They will associate with associate it with drug addicts. This perception will cause potential buyers.
That concludes your time. If you have additional comments, you can send them to the select board. The next speaker is Michael Jacobs. Michael Jacobs is online. Michael, I'm promoting you now. Michael, you've been promoted and you can start your video if you're comfortable and begin your three minutes.
Uh, thank you. U, I'm Michael Jacobs. I'm chair of the Brooklyn Housing Authority and a member of the Housing Advisory Board. Uh, I want to provide some context about transitional housing. Uh the Brooklyn Housing Authority has actually run a transitional housing
program for almost 20 years and we uh receive our res our potential residents from shelters. They're not incentivized as the res potential residents of this uh residents will be
in terms of the possibility of reuniting with their children. They are just uh provided to us by the Department of Public Welfare. Of the 20 years that we have been in business, we've had 132 participating
households. 91% of them have graduated into full tenency after 9 months. Uh casework has been provided by the Brookline Center. In those 20 years, we've had three
terminations. So those folks, some of who have been in Brooklyn, but others who have not, have become full and regular citizens of the town of Brooklyn, uh, and they've done it just with case management, and they've lived in this community in our
public housing next to market rate housing, uh, you know, as they're transitioning. Uh, so there there there is examples of success. We there's not to the best of my knowledge sobriety uh questionnaires or tests that is done
that are done before folks are put in. So we don't know the status of those individuals. We uh we don't know that that's necessarily done by the department of public welfare when they give us potential applicants. Uh but
again, an incredibly high percentage of folks complete this transition in nine months and are now residents of public housing. Thank you. Thank you. The next speaker is Marian Friedman Gerspan. Marian, I'm promoting you now.
I did not get notice until this morning u that people could sign up before, so I don't have written comments. I am a neighbor. I live on 11 I live at 11 Wellman Street around the corner and I
am in support of this program. I have have worked spent my career in human services. I worked for the division of drug rehabilitation for the department of mental health. I was an area director when it was the department of mental health and the department of mental
retardation and then I worked in child mental health um doing policy and planning. This is a lowrisk population. These are whi mostly women. Maybe a father though in that space. I don't know how you're going to accommodate a
male with shared bathrooms and all but um that is motivated to get their to be reunited with their children. There is an enormous amount of supervision. There is more. There is supervision from the
program. These families are also still involved with the department of social of child welfare that or DCF children and families as it's called now. Um where there is oversight. The DCF
doesn't want a disaster on their hand. If there's a risk that the the child will be endangered, the child's not going to be there and neither will the neither will the parent. as to property values. I mean, I think it's first of all, I wouldn't
describe it as the Yeah. the I wouldn't describe it as a high income a neighborhood. There are some high-income houses. I live in a condo. I've lived there for 37 years. And yes, it may be valued at a million dollars, but all I can tell you is it's a third floor walk
up without air conditioning. Um, we've had the economic issue is phony. We've had welfare um hotels right on Center Street next to next to 40 center hasn't
impacted negatively impacted our neighborhood. Um I think I think you're talking about suburban areas. Also, I think we need to be very careful about the data. I'm not naive about
substance abuse and violence, but we're talking about people who've been sober. We're talking about younger mostly younger women. We're talking about people with children. I think you have to look much more carefully not active supervisors. And I will take what the
police chief said that and I I don't know whether she's here tonight or not that she's not looking for trouble. If she she's looked at the data, she's talked to her her compatriots. if if she thought it would be increasing violence in the neighborhood, she would oppose
it, which she's not. Thank you. Thank you. That concludes the time allotted by the chair for public comment. We do have additional speakers who've raised their hand and they are Dr. Charlie Homer, Lynu, and Kevin McKenzie. Um, but as the chair suggested, we can take your public
comments at the end of the meeting. Thank you. Uh any uh questions from or comments from the select board regarding uh this? Yes, I'm wondering if we can ask maybe both Cara and Taylor additional
questions based on some of what was raised in public comment. So one public commenter asked about the benefits to Brooklyn. My understanding is that there actually have been some Brooklyn residents in Victory. Could could you elab could
someone elaborate on that? that and also talk about the benefits of Brooklyn. And I think the issue that um was raised earlier about issue of discrimination uh suggests that uh we're not looking to
limit uh or require you to limit your um clientele to Brooklyn residents. I mean given the history of segregation in in this area that would just reinforce in a certain sense um that segregative
history uh and we definitely will not accept that as as a reason for anything here. So uh so in the past two years we've had two Brooklyn Brook Brooklyn residents in the Portoris family home in Jamaica plane. Um so again that is an eight
family home. Um, it is, you know, not so easy as to say it's eight families over two years, right? So, I don't want to give the misimpression that it's 25%, but it is two families in the prior two years who have a connection and prior residents in Brooklyn. That was a roundabout way to answer that. Um, but
moving forward, again, it it is very much a case- by case basis on our screening. Um, I can't say for sure how many families from Brooklyn would be in 16 William Street under that model. um only that um again the attachment to the community where the child is going to
school where the parent has employment that all comes into effect um when making a decision about um whether the program is a right fit and certainly if we had a program in JP and a program in Brooklyn placement would be based on um geographic connections as well
um to follow up on that on the on the other end do you have any sort of history or track record um as uh Mr. Jacobs pointed out in the BHA transitional housing of what percentage
of residents who come out of the program end up becoming members of the community subsequently. So, uh, I don't unfortunately have the statistics off the top of my head in terms of, um, proximity of where the families stay, um, after they exit the
program, but that's something we can we can definitely get if I'm understanding the question correctly. That would be greatly appreciated. Thank you, uh, Paul. Yep. Uh, thank you, Bernard. Um, and I appreciate all the the comments from the public, uh, both supportive, um, and the
concerns that were raised. Um I I assume we're not going to be uh voting on this tonight, but I do think it would be really helpful. There's there's two uh areas that we can um you know work with uh the program for for requirements.
There's the agreement should we move forward with them and the board were to to come to agreement with the organization. Um I I would hope that we could put some requirements into the agreement. I think the town administrator had mentioned that earlier uh in the evening um were things that we
want to make sure are requirements. Um and then there's also the the licensing of lodging house which I think perhaps John had brought up a bit uh which is the the the occupancy capacity which may be required by not only state law but also our local bylaw. So, I think
there's ample opportunity to um add requirements and conditions um should an arrangement move forward that will um alleviate uh many of the concerns that we're hearing uh from the community. Um, and I do think that, you know, given our
experience with, uh, we've been licensed lodge lodging houses for for many years, um, making sure that we have, uh, full-time uh, 247 staff available on site, at least one person. Perhaps there's more. Um, but, you know, in
general, I'm I'm uh I haven't heard anything that is uh is um, you know, a concern that would potentially wouldn't be able to be dealt with through the agreement or through the licensing process. Uh David, just a couple other questions I have
that came up from public comment. Uh it was also raised by a couple of speakers why the shortened timeline, why not more community engagement? It's probably more a question for Cara. You touched on this in your introductory remarks, but could you explain to the public why we have
some time pressure? Yes. Um my name is Cara Brutin, director of planning and community development. Um yes, the um agreement that we have with the current property owner Price Center um specifically allows us to assign the
right of first refusal to another nonprofit. So it is limited in that way. Um that's just answering another question. Um we are then have a a deadline from the time that they give us a notification that they have another
offer in hand in order to choose the SLboard can choose to assign that right of first refusal and act on the right of first refusal um or or walk away from it. So the deadline from the notification that we were given is um
that effectively a purchase and sale needs to be in place by September 5th second 2nd and um be able to the person purchasing the property needs to be able to close by December 2nd first.
All right. Thank you. And then one other question that's come up today and it's a question I had as well uh previously. Is transitional housing affordable housing? Uh I I don't know of any examples in Brooklyn where there's transitional
housing that is also not deedestricted housing in some way because they've usually received subsidy from somebody either federal, state or local dollars along the way. there um are some programs where the affordability expires. So for example, even with the
um current property owner price center um the affordability restriction that's on the property is not in perpetuity. And so the purpose, the public purpose of the RFI was to identify a property owner who would be willing to have the
property deed restricted for affordable housing in perpetuity, not just for 20 years or 10 years, for example. Um, in the world of affordable housing, there is a spectrum of housing needs. And if somebody needs a certain type of housing
type for 18 months, two years, or five years, um usually affordable housing advocates are silent on on that being lesser than a house than somebody else's house. It's um all of the housing is needed. Um, I can also share with you
that uh this victory programs is um an example of a nonprofit that is part of an ecosystem of the whole Boston area. Um, and for example, Pine Street in who operates a couple properties in Brooklyn, um, has shared with us how
they often when some of their residents are ready to move on to the next stability level in their lives, they are hoping that their resident can be referred to um, somebody like Victory Programs for that next step in in their journey. Um, so these are all groups
that work tightly together to provide public service to um, people that need housing help. You just touched on uh another issue I think is important that maybe you could elaborate on. So Brooklyn already has transitional housing that actually has lower barriers of entry. Correct. And
it's been operating for decades. That's right. Yeah. We um that exact services and exact addresses we don't even have access to because they are protected. Um but we did check in with um Annabelle in the police department um and through records that we do have
access to. I can tell you that there are transitional housing with a variety of services in addition to the housing authority at some of their family housing um properties that Mike Jacobs talked about. Um there is pull it out since we
asked. Um there are properties in Griggs Park um up and down Beacon Street. Let me just get you the list. Griggs Park, Corey Hill, Longwood, South Brooklyn, Fischer Hill, and Pill Hill. Um in addition to the the length of
Beacon. So throughout town, we have transitional housing already. Yes. Thank you. Any other questions? Uh John? Yeah. I I just wanted to um ask if you don't mind if you had to um say which of
the existing houses under Victory programs is most like what you know is going to be um is being proposed for William Street. Would Shepherd House be the one that's the most like that? It it would not. So Shepherd House is a
traditional recovery home for women. Um we do have the ability to h um host infants in Shepherd House, right? Uh quite truly and I don't mean this to sound sarcastic but the close stick example is Poris House is Poris House that has been running for 25 years
under victory programs successfully in Jamaica plane. Yeah. Okay. Um the only reason I bring that up is you know it's inevitable that people are going to raise this question of property values. Um and you know we can all have our own opinions about whether that belongs um in this
discussion from from the checking I have done the the the market in Boston is so strong uh that uh I I don't think there will be that much evidence found that maybe no evidence at all found that any of the
locations of victory programs have negatively impacted property values. Um, I don't expect you to disagree with me, but but does that sound I mean, would you be confident in saying that that you know um it'd be very hard to find
evidence that let's be very careful about that. Yes, that type of discussion. Property values has been historically used to u break up neighborhoods uh when when black families move in. Um it's it's I mean you know it's not the same thing here
but let's just be careful how we talk about property values in terms of the type of people who move in I don't mean to suggest you're yeah no I was doing the opposite I thought you know which is to say the stereotype um is a stereotype and and I don't think
people will find all that a stereotype I don't I don't think people will find that much hard evidence that it bears out in in actual fact, David. Yeah, David, just one last point. I I really
appreciated the public comment from I'm I'm sorry I'm blanking on your name where you mentioned that it's important to separate facts from fears. And that's why I think hearings such as these are very helpful where you have your opportunity to ask questions. You hopefully get answers to your questions
to the extent that you're not getting all the answers. write to us, have more questions and we'll try to answer them because it definitely is important to try to sort out fact from fiction, fear from reality and that's part of why we
have this public process. I'm I'm sorry we yeah cannot have discussion from the audience and and let me just say that yeah we're not having discussion with the audience but you know we we get a lot of emails and we are volunteer
leaders of this town. Um we try to respond the extent that that is that we can but we're not going to respond to a hundred emails that we may get on a particular uh subject to every single
email. Um so but we do read we we do read you know the emails we get. Um you know I've checked and other select board members do take very seriously their uh responsibility to read emails and and be
aware of what uh people in the community are uh are saying and and their views. Yes. I I would just add on to what the chair said that occasionally the same question will crop up repeatedly and so rather than answering individually the
same question multiple times, it can be more efficient to just provide one answer in a public forum such as this. But we do pay attention to your questions. We do read the emails and sometimes we don't have the answers yet and so we're asking staff or others so that we can give you a substantive
response and that occasionally takes time. Gotcha. Yeah. I'm sorry. Yeah. And I just want to add to that the chair has actually asked us on staff to provide kind of a frequently asked questions as part of the response to this and that's what we're going to do. So, we're going to type up some of the questions we get uh and some of the
questions that board members forward us so that the community is uh able to have answers to those questions uh because that is so important. So, thank you for flagging that. Great. Thank you. Any further discussion from the select board? Okay, I think this has been a
very helpful and productive uh um discussion of this this uh proposal. Uh as I said, uh we will be voting on whether to uh move forward on the 18th of August and uh additional comments
that we receive from the community will be taken into consideration. Um, as well as any questions that we have of staff uh that we get answers for uh before then. And Cher Green, just a correction, August 19th. Oh, August I'm sorry, August 19th.
My calendar is not on my computer here. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Um, let's see. Let's move on to the next item of the agenda. Um
equally interesting discussion on a project eligibility letter application for 429 Harvard Street. This is a public hearing um and uh presentation by 429 Harvard Street project eligibility letter
application uh to be uh made by I see a good evening board. Nice to see everyone tonight. Uh my name is Jennifer Depazo Gilbert and I represent the owners of 429 Harvard Street, Oakhill Properties
LLC. On the line is uh the 40B consultant, Lynn Suite, who if she can share a screen will have a presentation. Also online um is a representative of the ownership team, Ash Khan San. And with me to my left is the project
architect, Norberto Leon. Um we are here tonight to discuss the application for the project eligibility letter that is pending. Um this case came before you left. Um and there was a lot of concern
last year raised by the board that um on the tale of adopting the Harvard Street zoning. We were asked to basically withdraw the case and take a closer look at the existing zoning to see if something could be uh built within the
parameters of that overlay district, the Harvard um MS district and we withdrew at that time and uh Noberto and the ownership team did sharpen their pencils and take a look and unfortunately um we are back here tonight. Um we understand
that the town is under the 10% um of subsidized housing inventory and so we once again are applying. Uh I'd like uh Lynn Suite to go to the next page please. So just a few uh things about the
project. It's at 429 Harvard. It's the Old Citizens Bank. It's on a 9,877 square foot lot. Uh the proposal here is for 40 mixed income rental units. Uh 20%
of those units would be for um people earning below 50% of AMI and we have some affordable rent um examples listed at the bottom there. The building will be accessible. There'll be 15 site uh
parking spaces on site with bike storage and a small roof deck for open space. 25 studio units, 10 onebedrooms, and five threebedrooms. And the building will be fully accessible. Um, next slide, Lynn.
So, this is just um a photograph of the existing structure there, again, the old citizens bank. Um, go ahead. Okay. And this is um a map showing where the property is located. It's fronts on
Harvard and then you will see um Fuller and Coolage as well. It's on a it's on a corner lot. Go ahead. Okay. Again, just um depicting the location of where the building would be. Move forward.
And this is the site here on the corner showing the building a location and the uh outside parking. Next slide please. Um this uh is I won't get into this too much but you've had this in your package
and this shows that most of the zoning is met with especially with regard to setbacks where waiverss would be required are mainly um for the height of the building which is proposed at six stories. Currently the underlying zoning
zoning only allows four. Next slide please. And then this is looking um at a radius here quarter mile radius. There's a code at the bottom showing the height of the buildings um in the vicinity ranging
from four stories and also some from 5 to 12. Uh next slide please. So this is a slide that shows some of the 40BS um that are already uh done and permitted on this in in in the area here
on Harvard Street. So uh most of these were my projects. Um 500 Harvard Street uh is a project that is permitted but not yet built. It's at the old Reuben's Deli. There's the U Punjab Indian Restaurant there now. It's right across the street from the uh TJ Maxx parking
lot on Harvard. as you go towards Brighton that is now uh permitted at six stories with the six stories set back uh 24 units and 20% of those units at 50% AMI. We're also showing 450 Harvard
Street, another project that I permitted which is now built that is a fourstory with uh 17 units and some commercial space on the bottom. There's now a coffee shop there. um 429 Harvard is the
site we're talking about this evening. Then you have um 420 Harvard which is a four-story building. And then further down um another one of my projects which is six stories that was the two life communities uh 40B on um Harvard Street.
There are some more projects in this uh neighborhood which I also worked on. Uh there's one at 134 138 Babcock which is 45 units which is now fully built and fully occupied. And then further down um going towards
Brookline Village. I also worked on the 32 Marian Street project which is different because um it was 100% affordable. The Brooklyn Housing Authority that's nearing completion six stories 115 units. And then I also
worked on the 108 Center Street um uh project which is seven stories and 54 units. So just to give you some idea of some of the other 40B projects that have either been completed or not yet started in that area. And now I just want to
turn it over to Norberto to quickly go through the more um architectural details. Uh good evening. My name is uh Norberto Leon and I'm the uh architect for the project. What you're seeing on the screen right now is the uh first floor
street level and the retail is mostly on Harbor Street on your right side there in green. The uh entrances to the units above is on uh Kulage Street on the side there. And then the parking which is at
grade parking the 15 spaces is in in the back in in gray there. Uh next slide please. This is a typical floor plan. Uh second through the sixth floor eight units per floor uh 3 2 1 and uh bedrooms
and uh some studios. Next slide please. And this is the uh roof plan which basically just shows you where we are going to be. There's a there's a deck on on the roof and uh it shows you the equipment that we're going to be
locating in the top left corner of the building. Um towards the side and uh next slide please. Uh these are some axonometrics of the building. uh you see some uh the facades
on on Culage and Harvard are on the right side and the facades in the back of the building are on the top left corner. And what we've done is we've basically set back the building away from the uh property lines to uh be
respectful of uh the adjacent uh neighbors. Uh next slide, please. This is a section through the building and you could see in the top illustration the um uh project uh down
the street from us which is also uh five stories height and uh the building our building is about 72 feet in in height. Uh next slide please. This is a rendering uh on uh looking
towards the corner of uh Fuller and Harbor Street. uh looking towards uh bullish corner and uh just to give you a sense of the the you could see the retail what we're the intent is to basically uh have the
retail uh be very similar to the to the other uh retail in the neighborhood which is lots of glass on the first floor very open and uh inviting to to the public and then the uh upper floors we were breaking up the massing of the
building with a series of balconies and uh carvings and in the facade. Uh next slide, please. Uh this is elevation along Harbor Street and our adjacent neighbor which is a singlestory. It's a it's a
restaurant and uh we have uh as you can see just kind of trying to break up the facade here. Retail on the floor. Uh next slide please. This is a rendering from uh Hulich
Street and uh you could see the uh entrance to the parking at the uh right there and the entrance to the units are is also on this side. And you can see how we are we're setting back the building
right behind the tree. Uh we're you know trying to break up the mass up against the uh uh adjacent properties. Uh next slide please. And then this is the uh the uh back of the building. Uh showing you basically
how we've we've completely set back and there's parking on the ground level and we have some balconies which uh provides further breakdown of the the mass of the building and uh creates a more uh inviting uh space in the back. Uh next
slide. again a rendering at corner of uh Harvard and Bullet Street and uh showing you the proposal. With that over uh so uh we're very early on in the stage. This is just an application of a
project eligibility letter. We know that the town is um close to the 10%. Uh so um here we are and we know if you have questions we have Lynnu the 40B consultant on and um myself and noberto
if you have any questions. Okay, before we open the public hearing, any questions from the select board or anything that I'm sorry is Oh, Paul, anything that Cara Brutin wants to add? Um,
no. Okay. Uh, Paul. Yep. Thank you, uh, for the presentation. Um, uh, attorney, I just want a quick question on the proposal. Is it uh the exact same as what came before or there has there been some modifications based on the feedback from
last time? My understanding is some of the setbacks have been increased. Yes. Could you could you that's helpful. Could you because I know that was one of the big issues that we heard. Uh could you describe the the the extent of the changes on the setbacks, Roberto?
Uh yes, they're they're mostly in in in the back of the building. So we've uh we've further set back on the sides and and the uh back of the property 10 to 20 feet approximately and we've also further broken down the uh the mass of the building in the back.
So what so I'm sorry. So what was it before and what what are the what were the setbacks before and what are they now being proposed as? Uh I I think that mo most of them were about uh 10 feet if I remember correctly and now they're
Yeah. I think the main point on this probably Paul that you'd be interested in is I think before we needed waiverss on setbacks and now uh the setbacks meet the underlying zoning. Okay. So it fits within the zoning that's uh that's there. Okay. That's helpful to know on the setbacks. Yes. On on the setbacks. I know the height is
different and and I'm this is uh you could choose to answer this or not, but um I'm curious about the economics of building on Harvard Street based on the zoning that we passed. Um I know that some have said it's it's maybe not high
enough or the on-site affordable housing requirement um is a barrier. Could you speak a little bit, Jennifer? Speak to it just a little bit. And generally, you know, we've had a lot of calls from owners on Harvard Street. Can I do this? Can I do that? We explain um
the underlying zoning, the overlay, how it works, the four stories. I think one of the biggest things is having um or I should say not having the option to do a cash buyout if you're doing between four and 19 units. That seems to um create
economic difficulty. that and the height um mainly there are some other sort of prescriptive things on the design and the facade and the windows and things like that but in my mind um some minor tweaks to the underlying zoning would would get a lot
more interest from potential owners and developers that that's helpful to hear. Thank you. Okay, Chaz has his hand up. My question was why why don't the economics of the current zoning work for you? And so I think I would appreciate I know you're kind of talking in
generalities, but it would be very interesting to have a kind of write up in more detail of why that um um what what the what the barriers there are so that we can take that back to town meeting and the and the town and have
that discussion with the community. Yeah, if that would if that would be helpful for you, um I will speak to the ownership team and we can probably provide something big picture on why it doesn't work as is. Michael,
thank you very much. Um and I'm going to sort of follow along in sort of different ways uh that I think uh many members of the select board, though I can only speak for myself, are interested in seeing something move forward here. Um, I want to ask the
question about the opportunities and the pathways for friendly 40bs. um you've obviously worked on a number of projects here and and gone through this uh in a and with a number of different results and I'm wondering
whether um you have there is an opportunity for interactions with the neighborhood uh getting answers uh from the planning board and to the point that uh both Chaz and Paul referred to uh
using uh this opportunity um working with the neighborhood to develop some sort of comprehensive permit within 40Bs that uh satis that can meet neighborhood concerns um pass
uh get select board uh support uh and sort of all move forward together. Sure. Um this team would absolutely be open to a so-called friendly 40b. Now, everybody might have a different definition of what that is, but to me, a
friendly 40B is the town hits 10% or more next week, and we don't have the project eligibility letter yet. We would still wait for the project eligibility letter and hope to do a friendly 40B. And we would need to meet with the neighbors. And I always
encourage clients to meet with the neighbors. I've done a dozen 40Bs in Brooklyn. And um I can say that this ownership team, we had a project at 217 Kent Street of 40B and we worked um a lot with the
neighborhood before we even went to the zoning board. Our application was filed. The design was changed to the point where the the town planning division actually got nervous that we had to refile for our eligibility letter. it had been changed um with respect to
design so much at that point but the state said no no no need to refile go forward and then the ZBA uh we presented this new design and of course the CBA also has its own design peer reviewer and we worked through it look there are three goals when you go for 40B
you don't want an appeal how do you not get an appeal you try to work as much as possible with the neighbors number two you need to have a project that can works economically and can be built and nobody's going to build something and lose money before they even get a shovel in the ground.
Um and then again not not to have an appeal. So yes, we're open to a friendly 40b um and meeting with the neighbors. Absolutely. Great. Um, I would I would add my own hope that whether or not we are above
the 10% SHI threshold that the criteria that you laid out for a successful 40B, including not having an appeal, would would allow us to uh to have you working
with the neighbors or for you to reach out to the neighbors in either case. Um, and I would hope that our planning department would be able to answer any questions as well. And of course, um, I and whatever other help that you would need from the select board, um, I would
hope that we would be able to provide that as well in order to move the process along regardless of where we are in the in the SHI level. I I always encourage um, discussions with neighbors, neighborhood meetings. Um, so certainly uh, we'll talk to the client about that. Um, you know, the
other the other thing that might happen is that the zoning might change and we might withdraw the 40B and say, "Wow, we can really build something nice here under this the the slight tweaks that we need we're looking for in the zoning." So, who knows, right? All coming together. Thank you. Yeah,
John. Um, Jennifer, thank you so much for the presentation. Also, thank you to the architect. Um, should I did I get that right? Architect or developer? Architect or both. Um, I think there's a lot of things that people um might not understand about the
40B process. I know that I'm not entirely clear on it. And not to flatter you, but you know as much about this as just about anybody. Um, so some scenarios here. Um, right now this thing they call the window is open, right? That's why we're here tonight, right?
Yes. Yeah. um that triggers um the select board deciding where they stand on whether the state should grant project eligibility to this project. Um regardless of you know what the select
board decides tonight um the state process be begins right and then what happens if before the state has come to a decision on project eligibility the window closes? Does the state immediately cease to even consider this?
No. No. Okay. No, they they continue and they would issue us assume they issue us the project eligibility letter. It doesn't stop the process at all because that project elig eligibility letter could be used. This 10%, as you know, it fluctuates,
right? So, a developer is sitting there holding on to that project eligibility letter and if it dips under 10% they're going to run to town hall with their application, right? Um uh a and how how long can they can they wait out you know the reopening
of the window? If for example, you know, after the submission of the application but before the granting of the project eligibility, the window closed, then the project eligibility is granted. uh but now the window is closed. How long do they h have that and
have the capability to sort of use it should the window open? Yeah. So if the project stays the same and it's not substantially changed and the criteria and the financing all in other words the eligibility uh remains the same. They have three years to use
it and they can ask for an extension and then um so now we I'm sorry. Can I can I can I can I add somebody wanted to add something that sorry hi Lynn sweet LDS consulting group. Um sorry helping us with she put together the
pel. So thank you Lynn. She's on vacation believe it or not but happy happy to be here. I really am excited about this this project. Um so the PAL is usually on its face good for two years but Mass Housing will renew it
one year at a time. Oh yeah. Yeah. Forever. Okay. Okay. Okay. So, I'm sorry if I keep going here. I got a couple more questions, please. Um, so now let's say um windows open, it's closed, it's open again, and now they're going to exercise their, you know, project
eligibility. Yes. Then does the local zoning board of appeals have a role to play in this? Yes. If the if if the if the town dipped back under 10% and we had the application ready to go and got it in on time, it would go to the zoning board and it would be considered a 40B. Yeah.
Officially. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then the ZBA would would would review but under the understanding of 40B which is that um this this is a special permit not required. So So what
do they actually look at in their review that could be different or other than has been approved by by the state? Sure. Sure. So the the zoning board will hire uh peer reviewers and they usually and the developer has to pay for that
and for sure there would be a design reviewer hired an architect and then we have working group meetings with the design uh reviewer and usually working on mass scale, height, number of units for sure. Traffic consultants sometimes
are hired, parking consultants are hired by the town. And so the zoning board looks at all of these issues, health and safety, um, weighing it against the the local need for housing. Um, their hands are somewhat tied and the zoning board,
as you may know, um, because it's called a comprehensive permit, right, they can add conditions, right? Um, and they do many, many of them, uh, but they get feedback from all of the departments, but they make the ultimate decision under all of the
local, uh, bylaws, whether it's the demolition delay bylaw, um, the inclusionary housing bylaw, um, the only thing that they are not allowed to wave, so to speak, or to decide on our state law issues. And and
in your experience, um sorry to put you sort of to the memory test here, but has there ever been a situation in which uh project eligibility was granted uh the review was conducted by the zoning board of appeals in Brookline and the zoning board of appeals at the end of the
review rejected um the the uh comprehensive permit. I I've worked on I counted as I was sitting here how many I've done. It's 12 in Brookline. Um and uh none of them have been denied. None of them have been denied. That's
kind of my experience. Yeah. Two two are under appeal now by Butters, two of the 12. Um and uh one was appealed by the developer. uh for
economic reasons they had asked for a sixth story and the zoning board only gave them a fivestory building and that was appealed and it was settled and it now has six stories although the sixth story is set far back. Yeah. So that that's my experience.
Yeah. Okay. Thanks. Sure. David just a couple questions I have that I can anticipate coming from the neighborhood. So, one of them would be around parking that there just 15 spaces. How do you anticipate parking
spots being assigned or is there potential flexibility for adding more parking? Well, normally um one of the conditions in all of the comprehensive permits is that the parking be unbundled? And in this particular area, it's in a transit overlay district. There's buses and
trains and and we're going to have bike storage. So, we don't anticipate that every person uh is going to need a car. And so it would be assigned on a first come uh first- serve basis is my understanding. Another question I have is around the tree canopy. There's some concern about
environmental mitigations. Can you talk at all about what plans, if any, there might be? Yeah, I don't think we're that far along to talk about landscaping. All right. Uh and then also this might be more a question for Carara. Uh a
component that I really like about this project, the units for at 50% AMI. Cara, could you describe what our current affordable housing stock looks like in terms of 50% AMI versus other levels?
It's quite a mix with all the 40bs that have been recently permitted. Um while the housing authority is certainly on the lower end, um both the mixed um income housing that we've seen through the 40Bs which are either 50% or 80% AMI and it's it's kind of in balance of of
that mixture. There's also a chunk of inclusionary zoning units that were built in the 80s and 90s. Um, and those are tend to be more in the 80% AMI. Um, but there is there is a wide range. I have another question. Um, so, uh,
there's been a project eligibility l granted for the Ham and Heath U development, right? Is that correct? Oh, well, we're beyond that. Hammond and Heath was approved. They had the comprehensive permit and it was appealed by an abutter. Yeah. But the the one necessary step was they did get their project elig and that
was a six that's a six-story project. Yes. And then there's the 500 Harvard Street project which is a six-story project that got project the developer appealed that one and it's now six stories. Yeah. Yeah. And they got project eligibility. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Um the
argument that I I think people sometimes make and and I think it's a reasonable one, but I'm not sure whether it's reasonable in the eyes of the state um is okay, so they granted, you know, 500 Harvard Street. They've granted project eligibility to some of the other
projects, 40Bs that are now on Harvard Street, but that there is a limit to how many 40B projects are are reasonable, you know, for one street to sustain. Um, does that ever get taken into
consideration in granting a project eligibility to to a project? Uh, like, well, we did three already and I'm sorry, this is one too many. No. No, I didn't think so. Yeah. Okay. Especially when the town is under 10%.
Yeah. Lynu has a comment. Yeah. And just um for you know for those that aren't familiar with the PEL process um the state has to make seven um findings when they're reviewing the project eligibility letter. And um one
of them is that it fits in in with the neighbor neighborhood that it architecturally um is complimentary to the neighborhood, but there is no um there is no you know that it it financially is viable, that
the developer has experience um that the numbers make sense and so on and so forth. that there is no um finding that they have to make that there are other too too many other projects in this neighborhood. Yeah. Okay.
Okay. This is a public hearing. So, why don't we open up the public hearing and see what the community has to say about this? Yes. Now that the chair has opened the public hearing, um there were a couple of individuals who signed up in advance. So, first up is Fran Pearllor, who I believe is online. Fran, I'm promoting
you now. and you can start your video if you feel comfortable and have three minutes. Okay. Thank you. I'm Fran Pearllor and thank you for the opportunity to speak today. I speak as a precinct day town meeting member where this project is
located and on behalf of the many constituents who have contacted me. I myself live within 150 feet of 429 Harvard Street and I know the area well. We are not against change or adding more
affordable housing. We are against the massing of this building and it's flouting our new Harvard Street formbbased zoning. I urge rejection of this plan because of its massing. It's more than twice the height of the buttoning residences. I urge rejection
of this plan because there's no consideration of abutters. None of the abutters have been contacted. None of the neighborhood has been contacted. There's no effort to minimize the effects of this gigantic building. Two abiding homes
are occupied by families with young children. Setbacks are at the minimum or non-existent. There are no upper floor sebacks. The roof decks sight lines go far beyond the immediate abuters, eliminating many
homeowners right to a little privacy in a very congested area, especially for their kids playing in their backyards. Isn't that why we bought homes? I urge rejection of this plan because of congestion. 240BS have been built on
Harvard Street within one block of this lot with another approved. Uh, how much congestion can one small section of Harvard Street absorb? Traffic and parking are major problems, especially in the surrounding residential areas. I
urge rejection of this plan because of rodent and trash issues. This property has a history of rat nests. This owner was the only Harvard street business that refused to cooperate with neighbors
in our joint fight against rats. What will an apartment building bring? I urge rejection of this plan because of open space issues. A roof deck doesn't compensate for the absence of ground floor open space.
After withdrawing their 2024 plan, they cut down all the trees, including three mature trees. Because this was done without construction, there was no preventing this destruction nor remediation required under the prior
tree ordinance. One might assume these trees were cut down to avoid the new 2024 tree preservation law. I can go on and on explaining our objections to this project, but I'll stop here. Note that the surrounding neighbors are organizing
at this moment and we will do everything in our power to block this project unless it is scaled back to meet the Harvard Street formbbased zonings. We are not asking that concludes your time.
Just to keep to the Harvard Street form. Thank you Fran. The next speaker is Kata Sidman. Author, you've been promoted and you can begin your three minutes. Good evening. My name is Kathy Seidman. I'm a town meeting member in precinct 2
and a board member of Brooklyn for everyone for whom I speak tonight. We urge the select board to support approval of the project eligible eligibility letter PEL application for 429 Harvard Street because we believe the proposal clearly meets the three
main statutory criteria for PEL approval. First is site suitability. 429 Harvard Street sits within easy walking distance of two separate branches of the Green Line with frequent bus service, bicycle infrastructure, and easy
pedestrian access to jobs, shops, schools, and healthcare. It is difficult to imagine a more appropriate location for new housing, including affordable units. Second, developer capability. Although we are less familiar with this developer than some others, the
developer appears to be fully qualified and we trust Mass Housing, which has the expertise to fairly evaluate this. Third, advancement of housing goals. While Brookline has made recent progress towards meeting the 10% safe harbor under 40B, our underlying affordability
crisis remains acute. The urgent need for such a well-located 40unit development with eight deeply affordable homes continues and chapter 40B remains an essential tool for unlocking such housing. We would also like to respond to other concerns about feasibility and
scale. Some have suggested the 40B sponsor should instead of its six-story proposal design a byite four-story project. But in the past two years, only three units of housing were reluctantly substituted for a larger daycare facility by a nonprofit daycare
developer in rem response to neighborhood reactions. The reality is that although six-story proposals like 429 and Harvard may only mar be marginally fe marginally feasible, they are far more viable than four. We also
want to respond to a claim that the proposed development would worsen urban urban heat island effects and remove mature trees in a climate vulnerable area. We agree that climate resilience and environmental justice are essential. However, we believe that concerns about
renewing or maintaining tree canopy, open space, and site design can and should be addressed during the ZBA's permit process, but not during the PEL review. But as important, there is no evidence that replacing a one-story bank and parking lot with a six-story
building would be more environmentally harmful than the four-story alternative. In fact, taller buildings allow for more energyefficient construction per unit, especially when paired with fossil fuel-free systems. And increasing housing opportunities in walk walkable
transit-rich neighborhoods like this one reduces daily commutes from more car dependent locations, a net win for our climate. Brooklyn for Everyone urges the select board to support 429 Harvard Street's PEL application and allow it to proceed to the next stage of review.
Thank you. That concludes your time. There are no other individuals who signed up in advance of the meeting for the public hearing. But if there are individuals online who wish to speak at this time, please raise your hand using the raise the hand feature. Or if in the room, please make your presence known.
Oh. Um, yep. Maybe let's start on on the very end of the row if you want to or whoever wants to come first and maybe just line up here by the podium. Hi, thank you for having me uh speak. My
name is Marilyn Rosenbomb. I live at 73 Koolage Street, which is two houses down from 429. Um, and I've lived there with my husband for 48 years. Last summer, we spoke against Oakill Properties first proposal
concerning 429 Harvard. If anything, we feel that this proposal is much worse while only holding title to this property for a few years. The developers have shown themselves to be terrible neighbors. Last year, I complained to the town several times regarding
graffiti painted on the sides of the current building. The town passed along this information to Oakill Properties who have responsibility for removing it. It remained there for nine months until the day before the hearing last summer
when they sent a crew to clean it up. This year, Oakill Properties cut down three beautiful mature 50-year-old trees just months before the town warrant article restricting such action uh went into effect. And two of these trees were
right against a butters and would not have interfered with construction. Um now once again we're attempting they're attempting to build a massive six-story building even though last year they agreed to work with the town and neighborhood to
craft a project under the new zoning law which would restrict it to four story stories. Two years ago, and I said this last year as well, we worked with Maria Morelli and the town to help support the Harvard
Street uh plan that was part of the MBTA corridor and it the formbbased uh zoning was something we supported. It was passed in 2023 and we strongly urged the town to
continue to push this forward. Um, Oakill has shown no interest in doing this. We acknowledge the need, the great need for housing in our community and we welcome and encourage Oakill to create properties that conform with current
zoning guidelines. the things that uh this is doing. And I'll just say briefly in addition to what Fran Pearller said, the balconies on this new plan overlook our neighbors who have two young children at the
Ridley School. They play soccer in their backyard all the time. This is terrible. Abutters uh behind them also have young children that are out all the time and this rooftop deck and balconies would
look right over that. It's horrible. And then there's that whole blank wall which they did not show that faces Fuller Street which is horrendous. Um the design is terrible and we really encourage you not to support it. Thank
you. Thank you. The next speaker. Hi, good evening. My name is Kim Ray Kelt and I live or I own the property. Don't quite live there yet. Waiting on my occupancy permit. um at uh 87 Kulage Street and and I just could I'll be very
brief. I wrote you a letter and I'm not going to read it again, but I just wanted to highlight a few of the the main points. Um when the developer withdrew their proposal about a year ago, this is what they said and I quote in their letter to Mass Housing. We strongly believe that this is an excellent location for mixed income
housing development and retail. And our team looks forward to, and I'll emphasize this, working with the town and neighborhood to craft a project under the new zoning. So, it's been a year. Um, I've checked my mail. I haven't gotten anything. No phone call,
no coffee, um, no outreach of any sort to work with the neighbors. So, what have they done? Well, there's the graffiti that Ran mentioned. There's um there's the trees that they took down. Um there's the total absence of any
effort to take care of rats. I don't know. I don't consider it being a good neighbor. Um they were going to work with us and this is what we've gotten instead is essentially the same proposal. Um if it's supposed to look, you know, like it fits in with the the community. I don't know. I live on
Koolage. All those houses were built in, I don't know, 1895 to 1905. They don't look like that. Um, and they don't um they're not six stories high and this in no way fits in the neighborhood. And no offense, but it's it's a pretty ugly
building. That that blank wall in particular is really bad. So anyway, um that was most of what I wanted to say and I appreciate your your attention to all this. Thank you. Thank you. If the next speaker can approach the podium. Hi, my name is Christopher Mau. I live
at 83 Quer Street. Sorry, can you move the mic up? You sure? Thank you. You can bend over or move the mic up. Um, a little bit of both. I live just down the street. Um, I was struck by the uh architect's rendering,
the beautiful color image of the building in which there are no surrounding wood structure houses. Um the building is shown in isolation and it to me it symbolizes the um totally
you know blatantly out of proportion nature of this building. Um it just it would tower over everything. I I think it's a good point to say that the Harvard street is already saturated with uh you know with 40B projects that there
must be some um some way to limit um further sixstory construction. Um everyone in in the neighborhood would welcome a reasonably planned fourstory
uh 40B. I'm also wondering because um you know we're making exceptions to the zoning that's already been done and maybe the solution here would be to re-examine the zoning plan. If people are arguing that fourstory
um structures are unprofitable. I would also welcome more information about that whether it's true or not and and maybe rather than making exceptions and poking holes in the zoning plan everyone agreed to um it would be time to reexamine the
the overall plan. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work. I will also just in the time remaining want to say how disgusted I was with the you know talk about bad neighbors the disappearance of those three or four
uh beautiful locust trees that were on the site and that were preemptively cut down. I think that's to me to me it seemed uh disgusting. Um I think that was a sort of permpter
step taken by the developers who again just not to harp on this but there has not been any consultation that I know of with not only no consultation but the um Oakill properties has has not appeared
in these hearings uh except through um you two and I appreciate your input. Um but and there's been flagrant disregard of the neighborhood, flagrant, blatant disregard. Um so I don't agree that
Oakill Properties is qualified, at least not in this way, uh to construct a six-story building that towers over surrounding structures. Anyway, time Thank you.
Are there other speakers in the room who wish to speak on this item? Okay, anyone else online? Right, it looks like we have 10 people in the room, 19 online, and no one else is indicating their desire to speak.
Okay, let's close the hearing then. Um any discussion of the uh letter that we've prepared opposing um this development? Carrie, you wanted to say something? Just very quick timing. The um comment letters are due after your next select
board meeting. So you don't have to make a decision tonight if you don't want to. Um I'm just offering that there is a draft letter in your packets that you've seen. Um it looks awfully similar to the comment letter from last year except reflecting that the trees have been cut down. Um and an additional argument
pointing out how open space is more than just uh landscaping to be thought of as an addendum. Open space especially in Cage Corner is part of the public infrastructure. And um so the argument in the letter is talking about the square footage per
population that we currently have, how that compares to a national benchmark. It's extremely far off from even the minimum of national standards in addition to the couple hundred more homes that are becoming on top of it. And so that's the argument we're laying out to the state. Mike, uh, David, I'm sorry.
Just procedurally, does the select board always have to definitively opine up or down on a 40B that's presented to us? No, you don't. You don't have to comment at all if you don't want to. You not want to comment? No. If I differences of opinion,
I just have mixed feelings on it. So, I respect the concerns that were just articulated regarding the lack of open space. I respect the concerns about uh neighborhood inclusion, but by the same token, a year has gone by and
essentially we haven't seen any construction uh any permits whatsoever along Harvard Street other than the Dover Amendment project on Washington Street. And that is concerning. And I think that a vacant lot is frankly ideal for some kind of
development given that we might be considering greater verticality in the near future. I'm not sure that we want to necessarily send the signal uh to the state that we are against this project
entirely. Uh, and as this project would go through the ZBA process, there would be additional iterations that do take into consideration neighborhood input. So, I'm not comfortable with an outright rejection for for those reasons, but
similarly, I'm not necessarily comfortable with a rubber stamp acceptance absent some of these steps that have been raised in public comment. Um, I think Michael had his hand up first. Sure. Um,
at a minimum I would I would propose deferring the decision um of whether or not to vote on a letter um to give us a little more time to think about the things that David said. um and also to give the developer and their team um the
opportunity to respond to and address some of the issues that have been raised um by the neighborhoods um particularly the issue of neighborhood engagement. Um that's that's clearly a big concern and
um regardless of the the ultimate path of development taken for this site um I think that um encouraging that engagement and coming to some balanced agreement um or at least the select board providing an opportunity for that
balanced agreement is uh a worthwhile uh emphasis for us to promote. John, um, you know, I I hear where David is coming from on this. It's a little bit of a conundrum as to
what to do about a project eligibility letter that would trigger a development that uh we think um the state is likely to approve. Um uh but on the other hand, we're looking for some way that we can
find an alternative to what the state might approve that is actually um also very good for adding housing and very good for adding affordable housing. And that would would have been captured if the developer had chosen to take
advantage of the formbbased zoning that the town meeting approved. um which I I heard tonight and I think this might be the most important thing that came out of tonight's discussion back and forth and I appreciate that Jennifer um opened the door for this discussion that maybe
there is a way that we can make changes to the formbbay zoning at a fourtory height limit that would in fact solve a couple of the problems that developers currently have that are getting in the way of their being able to pencil out
developments at four stories. Um, and you know, the state is going to say, you know, this sixstory proposal pencils out. It's what the state wants to see happen. I don't think they're going to pay too much attention to our objections
to um the fact that it it should be a form-based development zoning based on a development, excuse me, designed according to our form based zoning code. Um, I don't think they're going to take that too seriously, but I hold out the slim hope that they might. And on that
basis, I think, you know, we should do what we can to say in its current form, we don't find this particular application acceptable for the various reasons we've cited in our past letter. But we do want to see housing developed at this site. We do want to see it
significant. Um, and we don't want um the the uh you know usual uh you know not in my backyard objections to get in the way of this. But we do want reasonable and I've heard a lot of
reasonable criticisms in tonight's discussion to be honored um by the developer. And the best way to honor them is to follow this form-based zoning that we have high hopes for. um we just want to sort of if we have to change it a little bit and get maybe this
developer to be the first developer to actually do a significant um development under form zoning and we'd love to sort of have a chance to pursue that but if it's just going to be full steam ahead for you know project eligibility to be granted that's the for the state to
decide. Paul Yep. Uh, thank you. And I I actually really appreciate the comments from uh from John and and Michael um and David as well. Um so I I have a couple of thoughts here.
One is I'm a little disappointed, probably not surprised, but a little disappointed that the withdrawal of the last proposal had uh stated that there would be active community engagement to work with the neighborhood and that didn't happen. I think that's I think
that's really important. Um that that happened going forward. Um I don't know why it didn't happen. Um but I I think that is building a little bit of distrust perhaps with uh with the with the neighborhood and hope that we could
solve that. But I think there's an there's an opportunity here. I wouldn't I think we should still proceed with an objection through the PEL but and and perhaps signal that we want to move forward with a 40B friendly 40B policy.
This is this is something that we need because it it you know it may be difficult to completely change all the zoning on Harvard Street. That could take quite a bit of time. But this board could work with planning to start
developing a friendly 40B policy that would enable the ZBA to understand and the development community and the neighborhoods what what the parameters are for uh for a a friendly 40B which would essentially be you know massing and setbacks but incentives that would
assist in getting us more affordable housing with an expectation that the project could pencil out. I would I would I would be reluctant to be inconsistent with us sending a for you know a denial of a PEL or a letter for
the last PEL that came in. Um you know I think we we probably need to be consistent. We've we've done a good job at working towards in increasing affordable housing. Um we've been very productive with that. Uh Cara lays out an excellent argument in the letter. But
I do think that this should be um a an incentive for us and some encouragement to go develop a friendly 40B policy um in in in the next several months. Anyway, that's my thoughts. David, I do see a uh and I I respect your remarks, Paul, but I do see a
distinction between the PEL that we rejected with Chestnut Hill West and this project. The scopes are quite different. uh and city realy in the Chesn Hill West context even they very bluntly stated that they don't really
want their 40B to be the proposal that wins out that they hope that they're able to reach some kind of mixeduse solution. Uh so I don't think that even they really wanted the 40B approach in that context. Um but we did send David we did we did send
one sorry just just to interject we did send uh you know an objection letter on Hammond Street. Um so you know this we I'm just suggesting we be consistent and the underlying issue here is um is our policy around a gap in our policies
which is I think a friendly port 40B would would help solve that. I do think a friendly 40b policy would be a good idea to pursue. So I agree there. But I I do think that each proposal is different and we don't necessarily need to take the approach that because we rejected one, we have to
reject all. I think that each proposal is factsp specific. Uh some elements of this design that I do appreciate is that despite being a 40B, it still has first floor retail, which for the Harvard Street corridor is absolutely critical. I also like that the affordable housing
is at the 50% AMI level. It seems that many of these are more at the 80%. So the 50% AMI opens up uh some additional opportunities for another economic class of people which is important but again by the same at the same time the
neighbors bring up very valid points. I would have also liked to see more neighborhood engagement over the last year. It seems like there would have been some opportunities to adjust the design a bit further. So that's why I'm in between here. I don't want us to be
completely tuned out by the state by just rejecting everything rather than being a bit more nuanced in terms of the messages we sent to them. Michael, um, thank you. Uh, I wanted first to
respond to John's comments about the about using the zoning and making changes to the zoning in order to provide a platform for projects like this. Um, I think we can actually walk and chew gum at the same time. Um so
that we can both uh look at our zoning, gather information such as these developers have have talked about giving us about what is economically viable and what isn't to help to help us inform
um what what level of zoning we would need to accommodate the housing demands that we feel are appropriate. it for the town as a whole. Um while we
simultaneously can look at this particular case and um work um give the developers the opportunity to address neighborhood concerns and work with the neighbor the neighbors um and the town
to come up with a a a solution that works for all of this all of the stakeholders. Um so so that's that's one point. Um and I just want to second um David's comment about um how
the policy the the I'm sorry the hell responses that that come to us uh that come for us to provide um do reflect different circumstances. Um and in particular the city realy case um had a
large uh factor of its of the town's desire to use that area for significant commercial development um which doesn't apply in this case. Um so that's an example of differences between different
40bs as they come to us. I mean, 40B is a relatively broad um tool, a very a relatively blunt tool um for providing a different pathways through zoning. Um and the bluntness of that tool, I think,
requires some nuance on our part to tailor our responses to different proposals differently. Okay. So, where are we? Um I I've heard three uh suggestions. Number one, uh don't do anything. Don't app um or at
least three um suggestions that could be could be seen as this. No opinion. Just another question for Cara if I may. Sure. Can we send a statement that's not just a yes no? Absolutely. Yeah.
Okay. Okay. I think it while I'm here it would be helpful to um receive any suggested edits from select board members and let me try to incorporate that next couple and we have until the next meeting the 19th. That's right. Um to to get those in. So people should
you know come up with their proposed uh approach and get it to car and and we'll be able to talk about it uh again on the 19th. Uh the other two options are to oppose which is you know the current status of or current stance of the
letter. Uh and I get guess I also heard a little bit of uh support for you know the project from um Michael mainly um and maybe a little bit from other select board members. So, you know, let let let's u pull those ideas together into
some um uh um material sent to carrot so that we can come up with a um um a position at next meet at our next meeting. Uh Chaz has his hand up, right? Yeah. just gonna say we can, you know, we can put together some candidate
letters for you based on your feedback, but we do really need your we need your help to kind of be the catalyst there. So, we have a we have a no letter and again, if that's there's edits that you'd like us to make to that no letter, we would appreciate those um
so that we can get a red line and mark up to you for in time for your next meeting to discuss. if there is a sort of neutral statement um we would appreciate that as well and then if there's a statement in favor or a statement that you know talks more about the friendly 40b process again sooner
the sooner we have that and can circulate it and and can have that be the subject of discussion at your next meeting uh the better so that you can work from uh you can have as much time as possible to work from those documents and then come back together as a group
and formulate whatever your final um message to the state is going to be and and John and and just make sure that you uh state precisely what generally you want to do, right? No
opinion, support um um uh deny or some combination of the two. Okay, John. I actually kind of like the idea of um a letter that is more of a commentary than
a yes. No. Um because um we can't escape the fact that the gist of the 40B process is the state has certain standards for when communities should have to um allow development by right
and they that you know they wouldn't be taking this up as a project eligibility application unless they thought we're in that zone where you know under the law um we are a community subject to their
decision on on a development uh as to whether it's eligible for the type of housing, the level of housing, the density of housing um that they consider necessary in our community. So, we don't really
have any grounds to say you shouldn't grant this except to say this doesn't even meet your own standards for project eligibility. Yeah. As far as I can see. And the letter says that. Yeah. Yeah. But we but but what we do
have as a partner with the state in this with a mutual interest in seeing housing developed. um make clear as we can in our commentary why we think why there is a history of tackling this issue in
Brooklyn that led to a consensus opinion in the in the town that was as clear as any consensus opinion gets that what Brooklyn wants on Harvard Street is formbbased fourstory um development and this isn't it um the
state can decide whether they think um you know they will bow to our interest in having more time to perfect our you know fourstory formbbased zoning. But uh I I can't I don't think we can talk them out of granting project eligibility by
simply saying um we don't you know we don't want this. Um I think we have to offer them an alternative. Uh, David. So, what I'm hearing is I think it sounds like at least three of us prefer the idea of not a b Well, I won't speak
for you completely, Michael, but I think that three of us are saying we would like there to be a narrative about what we want to see happen as opposed to a binary yes. No. Yeah. Is that fair? um that would definitely be preferable to
the to the letter that is currently on the table. I'm not I'd have to think about whether that is ideal, but that's one of the reasons for it. But is that at least an approach? It sounds like you would prefer that approach to an outright yes. No. Sure. Okay.
Yeah. Okay. Get your comments in. make clear, you know, what you want to do and um we'll go from there and and in soon so that we'll have time between now and the next meeting to really uh digest and come up
with uh um have a discussion at the next meeting that will result in a final letter. And I hope we take up Jennifer's suggestion that there are things that are worth discussing that that you know could be done to our current farm zoning
that might get a better result in terms of developer interest. And but that's a long-term Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. I I guess one of one of the questions that I have in terms of the timing of this um is that you know I I
would be interested in hearing from the development team in terms of their responses to um to the the neighborhood concerns and uh their capacity to engage with the with
the neighborhood um in the context of this PEL because um we could find ourselves in a situation where the concerns of the neighborhoods just simply within the timing of the PEL application are not
necessarily addressable um which might lead to a different response, but that response might not be um permanent um based on activity after the PEL application goes through.
Um I I guess in in particular in particular um do you have any sense of the timing for neighborhood engagement relative to the PEL letter or would the PEL letter just sort of go as it is your
PEL application go as it is and then neighborhood engagement and all the other things would follow? Um, I I I really think we need to first figure out if we have a project that we can file for. You know, if if it's not if it's not going to move forward with
either a PEL or some changes to the zoning or a friendly 40B, then we're we're back to the drawing board. So, it sounds like we have a bit of a chicken and an egg ball. Yeah, I am going to encourage this
ownership team to meet with the neighbors. Okay. But it would be premature until we get the PEL in hand. In other words, if the PEL is denied for any reason, then the project isn't moving forward. We're wasting everyone's time, including the neighbors.
So, what I hear you saying is that you don't think that the PEL that you're applying for would be modified based on interaction with the neighbors or anything like that because you wouldn't have that interaction until after the PE. That's right. That's right. Yeah. Okay. Thank you.
That's important. Okay. Uh let's move forward. Yeah. Any f I assume there's no further discussion. I won't take any further discussion. Okay. Uh next, our social media policy. I think no the alteration of premises for 30
Webster Street. Oh, you changed the uh sequence of items. Okay. My notes are always behind apparently or frequently behind. Okay. Alteration of premises 30 Webster Street. Question
of approving the application for an alteration of licensed premises for an inholder all alcohol license for Wagner Restaurant Group. Uh the alteration of premises is to add 600 square feet of patio area in front of the premises with
seating for 20 people. Um conditioned on the closure of the outdoor space by 10 p.m. as agreed upon by the applicant during the licensing hearing which was held a couple weeks ago. And it's uh Jennifer Depazo Gilbert again. Yes. Thank you. Jennifer Depazo Gilbert
here on behalf of Wagner Restaurant Group LLC. And with me this evening is Wagner Kinttonia who runs the hotel and also Jenny Freriedman. Um the Iris Hotel opened for business in 2024. It has 119 guest rooms. Um it's dispersed amongst
seven floors. It's an extended stay hotel. It primarily caters to uh business traveling business folks also long-term uh patient treatment at the local uh Longwood Medical area. Um it has a food and beverage service. It has a restaurant that has greatly uh
compleimemented the guests and all in all the hotel is has been successful for an independent hotel. It uh brings in over $500,000 just in real estate taxes alone to the town. That does not include the meals and the room taxes.
But to be competitive um in this in this time, there must be some outdoor seating. It's really popular. And what we're asking for here is uh five tables. Uh they're shielded by bushes. It's an outside patio area that has been there
since before it was a hotel when it was the nursing home um when it was leased to the um Ridley school when the Ridley school was being renovated. There's an outdoor patio there. And so the ask is to put five tables there to seat 20 people. Right now there are 73 indoor
seats for the restaurant. Uh the capacity there is 119. So, this would add 20 to the 73. Um, this was part of the original application back in 2024, but the board uh suggested to open the hotel and open
the indoor restaurant, see how things go, see if there's any issues. So, we waited. There haven't been any issues. Things are running very uh smoothly under Wagner's expertise. And so, we are here asking for five tables, 20 people
outside. Uh Tiffany, do we have a Okay, we have a picture of the of the uh site which I think is very we had submitted uh the plan. I have it on screen. Thank you. And we had it signed and stamped by the architect so it's okay
official. And you can see um in the upper right hand corner the area there where the five tables are four seats at each table and that is um screened by some some bushes there. Now, u could you uh indicate where the adjacent
condominium is is located? I mean, it's Do you want to do that? The condos. It's not fronting on on that property. No, no, it's not fronting on that property. It's down the street a bit. I mean, maybe you don't have there. There are other pictures in your materials that that do show that.
Oh, I'd have to download those. Sorry, Chaz has his hand raised also. If you again looking Tiffany will pull up the other stuff, but if you go to the basically on the left hand side of that document is where the condo is and the
garage is before there. Um, one of the comments that we received from members of the public that we wanted to make sure that the hotel was in agreement with was that there had been complaints from that condo building about folks smoking at the garage entrance. Um and that given that outdoor seating sometimes leads to folks smoking outside
that we would just ask the hotel to be sure that anyone smoking um be limited to the space out front or on the alleyway that ab butts uh the Marriott the courtyard as opposed to where the um where the condo building is.
Yeah, that's no problem. Yeah. Um the other uh comment from the neighbors uh which you I'm not going to evaluate was was uh concern about noise from the patio area. Um
it doesn't look like that would be a problem but I think we're also asking uh for sound deadening uh measures be taken. Um well so that you know there's no question regarding uh yeah I don't know I don't know what you mean by sound deadening mitigation but
there are um many restaurants in the area like Hamilton's and um what's the one prairie prairie fire that has outdoor seating um and I think even music that we're not asking for music outside so um I don't know Wagner if
you've thought of any sound mitigation Wagan if you can speak into the mic. Thank you. Hello Waganita. General manager for that is hotel boss at 30 Webster. Um the noise level that we expect from those tables those uh five tables will be
conversational would be about 60 to 80 dibels which is doesn't really call for a any sort of um sound barrier. If there's any suggestions, we're welcome. You know, if that becomes an issue, we
had originally we had speakers on that area and we're asked not to use the speakers and we're not using those speakers. I guess music could somewhat, you know, deafen conversation. Um, but I don't see a need and we could
do a sound study. We could measure sound across the street and have some people sitting on those tables having just a natural conversation. You know, we're not going to throw parties out there. We're not going to have many events, per se. We're just going to serve food and
drinks. Yeah. And that that sounds that makes sense to me. I just want you to be sensitive to the fact that some of the neighbors think that there that is a problem. Absolutely. If they're wrong, that's that's fine. But if there is any um any um sound that
you know they can hear that is causing a problem once I'd like to have your commitment that you address. Absolutely. And I'll be very open to see the suggestions on regards to any kind of um and sound protection that we can make.
You know there's some bushes in there, some trees. Um the restaurant down the street the prayer fire they have seats outdoors and I just drove by there today you know I stopped and I didn't hear
um noise level they'll be um interfere somebody's inside their apartment but if they are any complaints uh I can make you know the hotel is open 247 there's always somebody on the phone I can make myself available So in the event there's a noise complaint, we
address right away. Okay. Prairie fire didn't have any houses around them. Right. They have a across the street from so Pra Fire faces Harvard in the back of the restaurant. There's a parking lot, right?
And they have a few tables there. I believe four or five maybe. And there is that same building that goes down the street, you know. So there's neighbors right there. Um from from me I just you know really trying to have those spaces available so
I can serve my guests and people do ask my um guests do ask to eat and drink outside and right now I'm not allowed to. Uh I would like to see what can we do to provide that service without disturbing the neighborhood. Okay. And we're not no uh playing any
music that would be extra level of noise. It would be just people talking. Okay. And we could measure that noise level and see what we can do to mitigate. Uh the main thing of course is the smoking though and and you you you addressed that.
Um any other questions from this? Sorry, Chair Green. Can I just comment real quick on the noise? Um, I also want to note that at the licensing u panel hearing, Tiffany Oliva, assistant town administrator for operations, I presided at this licensing panel hearing um we did note for um attorney budro at the
time and also for the applicant um like they mentioned their application doesn't include any um temporary entertainment outdoor um music but if they were later interested in doing that they would have to come before the select board again uh with the temporary entertainment license application. Right.
Uh John, I think I I have a question about smoking. Uh um you said something to the effect of we've we've dealt with that. What is the status of the smoking? Is that allowed on the patio? Well, Jazz, do you want to mention talk about
smoking is not smoking is not allowed where food is served? Uh but it's you know what we say to folks is we've said this with Arcadia who has a similar setup, right? that they have a hotel that butts a commercial street and a residential property. Um, when we
renewed when we were looking at their license, we asked them to move the designated smoking area on the public way from the residential buildings and towards the commercial part of the um of the neighborhood and they agreed to do
that. So, this is the same request. Can you please make sure that people are not smoking in the entryway of the garage which is right underneath where the condo is? People are complaining about the smoke there. Okay. But but do we allow smoking on this patio? No, it's it's not.
No. Okay. And so that'll be regulated the same way as it's not allowed inside the restaurant. This is hotel or any public. This is the patio part of the restaurant. It's not allowed there, right? But the complaint was that smoking garage area was
Yeah. And we're not allowing music. Yeah. Uhhuh. Okay. Uh, and um, I actually walked by there today. The tables are already out, so I don't know whether that's just to kind of get ready, but um, uh, it's a nice patio. I
mean, I got to say, I mean, it's actually, you can't tell it from the drawings, the design drawings, but it's ele elevated. Um, and so there's kind of, you know, a nice way of a nice flow from, you know, the entrance and the and the restaurant to the patio, but the patio itself, you know, would have to be
accessed by somebody sort of walking past it, walking towards the entrance of the hotel and then entering it that way. And um, it's not huge, you know, five tables, four people per table. Um, so I I do know I have heard that the neighbors would like to see um there be
a 900 PM outside limit to uh use of the patio. Um, and I just wonder what the other board members think of that. They've already compromised down to 10 p.m. But but Michael, yeah, my hand's been up for a while, Bernard. At some point you can look up.
Okay, I took it up. I put it down. I put it up. Uh, I just wanted to follow up on this timing question. One of the questions that ca that I read in the letter in the Sorry, Michael, can you speak more into the mic? Sorry. One of the questions that I read in the in the um one of the public
comment letters had to do with this 10 p.m. closing. And I just wanted clarification on what a 10 p.m. closing actually entails in terms of, you know, when does service end, uh, how long do people typically remain at the tables
past that closing time? Uh, and how how much, uh, work there's done after that point. Sure, I'll let Wagner speak to that. So, um, right now our local license goes, you know, up to midnight, right?
And that's inside. You talking to the mic? No, sir. Sorry. Just listen to myself. Um, our local license goes until midnight inside indoors, right? Yeah. Um, by 11:30, we we have room service. We close the restroom by 11:00 and you
know, 11:30, we were still catering for the room service. By midnight, there's nobody there. That's inside. That's right now. Outside, if granted at 10:00, we stop service at 9, 9:30 food service. And then we let folks know that they can
move in, right? We have to close the patio and that we can do that with signage as well. Good. Good. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Oh, yeah. Bernard, that was the issue I was going to raise is what I've heard is the shutdown time. Um, and what we've done in St. Mary's for a number of
restaurants is they have I forget the exact time but let's say it's 10:00 they need to be cleared by 10:00 not starting to you know one of the issues is if they start clearing at 10:00 you're hearing the dishes clank and everything and the conversations it would be better to have
the the outdoor cleared by 10 o'clock. So as he said you know you stop serving at 9:30 you set an expectation that they're going to be out off off the patio at 10. Maybe we can put that as an addendum to the license Jazz if it's not in there. Usually, usually what we say in these situations is if 15 minutes before the
official closing service needs to stop, tables need to be cleared, everything needs to be bust and put away by the closing time. So, um that's not a problem for 10:00. Um we can say you
know 9:45 service stops everyone inside uh you know patrons inside tables bust everything away so there's no clinking of classes and so forth by 10 o'clock we've been offered 9:30 as the uh time
when uh service close ends well if if we set a limitation on by the it has to be cleared by 10 you know They oper I think they would use their own best judgment as to what that means in terms of telling people
I'm sorry we can't serve you food. Yeah. Okay. This is a public hearing. Why don't we open the public hearing now? Yes. We had um two individuals who signed up in advance. Uh first is Bruce Leven and um Bruce provided the pictures that
were at your place. uh uh Bruce Lean. I live next door to the hotel. We have a petition which we've already filed uh about 40 uh families who are strongly against it. Uh
I passed out some photos. The first one is Prairie Fire. Notice the difference. We were talking about New England poets and there's one that said good fences
make good neighbors and uh we have no problem with uh Prairie Fire. It's muted. They uh they don't have to look at me. I don't have to look at them. Keeps everything nice
and quiet. uh in my packet you can also see uh the on on center street Hamilton's and uh even Barino to go down the street uh think that's a very nice frontage and
it is on a uh major street. The problem next is if you look at the whole there's there's nothing there. It's it's open. There are not fl There are a
couple flowers. Uh there are no bushes. You can see they uh cleared the trees out front and it makes a lot of noise and uh there's been no neighborhood engagement. By the way, on another
picture, I show one of their vendors parking in the only handicapped part of this handicapped space. But what's more gling is the sandwich board that is clearly prohibited by um Brookline
zoning bylaws. I think it's 7.0. We're getting a lot of noise. And what's uh if you could see it lights up at night like Disneyland uh which taste is always uh questionable
but the tree up front is a town tree uh and uh that they would go and waste the energy and uh do visual pollution like that is uh very very very
disturbing and certainly not necessary. Um it was uh besides no engagement in the thing, it's just catching a lot of noise and I see absolutely nothing to uh um
mute it. Meanwhile, there has been uh incessant smoking and they have made no effort to do anything about that. Um, also notice that there's no parking for the trucks. Uh, the space next door,
they could have struck a deal with the Marriott, but for whatever reason, they didn't. So, we uh have uh Crux uh causing the problem. Thank you, Bruce. That concludes your time. The next speaker is Jonathan
Davis. Jonathan, I actually wasn't 100% certain. I know you sent comments, but I I didn't know if you wanted to speak at public comment for this hearing. Well, why don't you approach the podium first? Thank you.
Thank you very much, Jonathan Davis, town meeting member, precinct 17. Um, I just have a uh I wasn't expecting to make some comments, but I I do want to say that um the uh situation with the uh
Iris outdoor seating area is I think quite different from something like the Hamilton uh even something like the the fire uh the the the fire whatever it is down fire. Perry fire. Thank you. Perry fire. Thank you. uh
down at the at the end of uh of Webster Street because uh the uh uh uh apartments that the apartments that uh look out on Webster Street are a very
very short number of steps from the seating area. And these are these are bedroom these are bedrooms that look out uh on the back at uh at at the iris. And so, uh, any any kind of sound or noise that comes at nighttime, uh, is going to
be quite disturbing. Uh, think of yourself as trying to get to sleep at 10:00 because you have to get to work in the morning. Um, so I think, um, I I think that it's very important uh that u if there's going to be uh a 10 10pm
closure that it really be closed up. that uh I don't know how uh Wagner is going to persuade uh guests to uh or customers that they that they got to leave and and be out of the uh out of the seating area. But it uh I I hope
that that he will be able to do that. The other thing really is that I I think it would be helpful if you looked at the at the photographs uh that there be some sort of of of sound baffling or uh whether it's in terms of of of some sort of a fence or whether it's in terms of
some additional trees. Uh anything to help in terms of keeping this the uh the noise down. Thank you. Thank you. Um there were no other individuals who signed up in advance for this public hearing. There's anyone online who wishes to speak, please raise your hand using the raise the hand feature. Or if in the room, please make
your presence known. Okay, there are four individuals in the room, 15 online, and it looks like no one else is indicating their desire to speak. Okay. Um, so any further questions? Otherwise, I'll move approval of the um
of the alteration of licensed premises. I don't see any. Will it specify under the condition that there be no activity on the patio area at you know right at 10 at 10 p.m.
that condition and the smoking u condition that uh Chaz mentioned. Yeah. Um, if I if I may just quickly, I think it's important to emphasize for the owner and and others too, a violation of prohibition on smoking uh
uh would be just as serious if the smoking was on the patio as if smoking was in the restaurant, right? Yes. I mean, we have we have to treat that as, you know, really serious violation and would have consequences. So, I I would
just recommend to the owner, I know it's there's going to be a temptation on the part of a lot of your customers to go outside to smoke. Uh, but it better say out there, you know, smoking is absolutely pro prohibit prohibited. Excuse me. And and the restaurant could
lose its license if if people ignore the prohibition on smoking on this patio. Something like that. You know, I know you want we've we've we've dealt with this a lot. We've also dealt with this in terms of vaping, right? you know people using vape pens or other you know devices and saying oh it's not smoking it is smoking
under the law and you can't do it um you can't even do it outside whether people are eating so we are serious about enforcing that right okay um then I move approval of the application for an alteration of licensed premises
uh for the Wagner restaurant group uh subject to the conditions with respect to smoking and to um closing at 10:00 or wrapping up uh all out all outdoor activity at 10:00. Uh any
um adjustments to that motion. Okay. Can I ask one one question that I think we uh that we haven't addressed yet? Is the sound deadening or some way to abate the maybe the the sound carrying? Is there something we could add? not asking
them to put up a 20- foot fence, but is there some shrubbery or something in containers that could that could aid with that? Just based based on the I'm sorry, I want to Oh, that's okay. I'm curious to hear what you have to say. I I think generally what we ask of
folks, right, is that they abide by the noise by the the noise by law. Um, and that in the event that there is a potential violation of that or there's disruption, um, that they work collaboratively to handle that. um we don't for example require sound testing
for some of these other restaurants that were mentioned and so can't require it of them here but what we can do is say in the event that these issues arise um that we want to be proactive in addressing them. So we would just ask them to be proactive in doing as they have said, you know, if there needs to
be a sound study, they should conduct a sound study. But we can't proactively say to them because we don't proactive. I'm not I'm not Yeah, I'm not asking them to do a sound study. I just think it would be um it would be a gesture of good faith and neighborliness, I think,
to the to the neighbors if they were to make some effort to uh to put up some shrubberies or something in containers that would just just aid uh and still, you know, be attractive to the space. But um that's that's my suggestion. I
think we have a commitment that um you they will respond to neighbors um complaints about sound. The way the setup way it's set up, it doesn't seem like that should be a problem, but you know, they they have committed to um addressing any complaints that come up
um in whatever way is appropriate. Um I mean, if they fail to do that, I mean, we we do have some uh tools in our toolbox to to u deal with it. I'm sure we'll see some folks during the renewal of the license when it comes up next year.
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Um I'd put the motion on the table. All in favor? John Vancoyak. I Paul uh Paul Warren I. David Pearlman I. Michael Rubenstein I. And chair votes I. Thank you.
Noing Bruce. We I'm sorry we can't do this. Thank you. You of course can send your comments into the select board. Okay. Um is social media policy next?
Marijuana retail. Well, when is social media policy after marijuana? Okay. Oh, I should look at the most recent Virginia really wants to get to that social media. Okay. Um Okay. Marijuana retail establishment license transfer.
Um, who's going to talk about that? Jonathan is online and I think we also have um several representatives. Sabrina Aet with Sanctuary is also online and I see a lot of movement in the room.
Okay. So, okay. Um, speak. Thank you, uh, Bernard. I uh Oh, I'm sorry. Thanks. Go ahead. Uh, yes. So, Jonathan Simpson, first assistant town council for the town of Brooklyn. Uh, I'll be very brief. Uh, we
are here, uh, one of our marijuana retailers in town Sanctuary has, uh, gotten its license transfer approved by the CCC and intends to transfer it to Diesel Cannabis LLC. So, they're here to
explain um about that transfer, answer any of your questions, and uh at the end, we'll have a vote to uh if you're so inclined to approve the transfer and delegate to the town administrator the um authority to sign an amended host
community agreement, which will reflect the new party uh in all respects. There's no there's no other uh substantive changes to the agreement uh other than you know swapping out sanctuary for a diesel where appropriate as well as some of the the whereas
clauses have changed to reflect the the new situation that they're taking it over from a former former license holder. I'll pass it off to Briana now. Hi, good evening Brianna Adet. Uh I work with Jeffrey Allen at Lost and Whitson.
I'm here on behalf of Sanctuary tonight. Um, I did just want to thank Jonathan Simpson. He worked very hard with us over the last week to quickly draft an updated post community agreement and get that executed and before you for consideration tonight. So, thank you
Jonathan um for working with us quickly to get this before the board um as quickly as possible. I do believe in the room we have David Julian who is council for Diesel as well as Mike and K. uh potentially Mike and Kim who are the new
owners. Um there may also be some sanctuary folks online as well, but I would defer to David for any questions from the board and I'm certainly happy to chime in as needed. All right. Thank Thanks, Briana. So, um
members of the board, um my name is David Julian. I'm an attorney at Vicente LLP on behalf of Diesel Cannabis and joined here by Mike and Kim Laramie who are the owners of Diesel as well as Michael Kaine who will both serve in a management type role. Um, as Briana and
Jonathan mentioned, we um have had approval from the Cannabis Control Commission on July 10th for this transfer. We've also uh worked through an amended host community agreement that um has been signed by Diesel Cannabis. So, um, happy to answer any questions,
uh, that the board might have. So, thank you very much. Okay, any questions? Uh, John, uh, does Diesel have other, um, storefronts built in the area? Uh, no. This would be the first uh, and only retailer or cannabis facility of
any kind uh, in Massachusetts. How about in in Massachusetts? How about other states? No, no, no other states. So, this is this is this the very first for this particular Oh, correct. That's great. the interesting I will say the owners have been involved in the cannabis industry for many years.
Um they um operate a um HVAC um mechanical engineering company that has worked on many different cannabis facilities in the Commonwealth including dispensaries. Uh so they have been involved in this industry for a while but this will be their first um cannabis
facility that they will actually own and operate. A a and what what will be the street name of this operation? What will be visible from the street? So the company name is Diesel Cannabis. Um I don't believe there's a DBA of any
kind at this time. So um as of right now the the sign will say Diesel Diesel Cannabis. Diesel sounds like a cannabis name. I like it too. It does kind of. But I I I hope the applicants and the attorney are aware
that, you know, Brooklyn has a a way of not wanting its marijuana establishments to scream, you know, marijuana establishment, you know, get your pot here. Um, you know, New England Treatment Associates was our very first.
Sanctuary was our second. Neither of those names says anything about cannabis. And I know it it sort of puts an imposition on the business to to not be very upfront about, you know, the the business, but we we do want it to to to
be done in a way that um people who are have a lot of concerns about um teens have a lot of concerns about people, you know, getting um unfortunately into medical situations that stem from cannabis use. um you know will tolerate
you know h having open sales of cannabis in in the community and one of the ways you can do that is is just through your branding and and through your street presence you know so absolutely yeah don't don't our uh regulations uh
govern uh signage and and um related things to uh they do the issues that you're concerned with. Well, they they very much do, but we don't yet know what this this storefront is going to say is is the product being sold in this store, you
know, um and and how they're going to make that apparent. Have to follow our laws, our regulations, I'm sorry. Um Paul Yep. Uh thank you, Bernard. Um I just I wanted to ask uh the the principles who don't have any
existing operations have they ever applied for um either under diesel or as individuals for um a license in the past with other another municipality. Yes. So not not through the state um but
there have been um some application processes in other municipalities that they have attempted to apply for um highly competitive uh processes um and were not ultimately selected but um this company has been trying to um operate a
cannabis dispensary for for a while. Can I how many how many have they applied for? uh just one just there there's only been one other application uh and is uh is there any experience with grow for some reason I thought that diesel was involved in grow
facilities or um what what's been their relationship there so the owners of the company have a mechanical engineering company that um works on a lot of the HVAC systems for cultivation facilities around the state so they for the past I think seven years
you've been working um helping to set up these facilities um but they have not operated and don't have their own grow facility. Okay. So I guess I my question for the operators and I appreciate that you're speaking on their behalf but maybe they
could come up and answer um you know as as operators have have no experience running uh a retail cannabis um operation what what how are they going to pull this off? Um really curious this, you know, we've had
this this particular location has had some issues in the past. Um I'm really curious about diversion and um you know, things of that nature. Um what maybe just address that. How you going to run it if you have you never
run one before? Uh hello, my name is Michael Kaine and if uh everything goes well, I will um manage this. Okay, let's speak into the mic. How about if I raise it up? Yeah. Is that any better? Yeah. So, everything goes well, I will manage this facility. And you ask about what
experience level somebody has. Um, so we'll get away from the cannabis part just for a second. For 34 years, um, I managed uh supply houses, retail outlets that had sub uh, actually I had one right here in Austin, Supply New
England, pretty close to here. I operated all 16 of their stores. And in that industry, we also have compliance things. There are products that can only be sold to licensed um licensed mechanics. You have to prove out that they have the qualifications to
take that product away. I know it's not the same restrictions that you'll find in the cannabis world. But um as uh Dave mentioned, we've been I was on the other side of Michael's business. I supplied product to these facilities, these grow
facilities, and everything that comes in. There's a tremendous amount of regulation that goes through just getting the products to him, him installing them. And we made an awful lot of friends in the process over the last seven years and have been very involved with them. Um, socialized with
them and listened to all the things that they um go through. Uh, we've lived uh the life. So even though we've never operated one, I would say um half of our year has been spent inside of facilities. And if we go to work on
equipment inside a facility, we have to go through all the procedures. We have to know where we can step, where we can't step, what we can step on, what we can touch, what we can't touch. So we've lived in this environment for a long time. Okay. So just I just want to make sure I'm really understanding. So you're
gonna you're the manager of record. Well, there's a current manager Okay, there's a manager in place there and she will remain in place there. She does a great job. She's been in the industry for a long time. Okay. But I will be on site all the time and I
hope to um bring my experience in training managers over the last 34 years to bring that store to a level that we need to get it to. So I'll be on site an awful lot. So I think it's uh the proper term would be an alt manager. So you so
you so you've so you've overseen and run a retail cannabis store. No, never said that, sir. Okay. Okay. That's what I'm trying to I'm trying to understand. So you're not just you talked about 34 years of experience. What industry was that?
So uh that was plumbing in that was uh plumbing supply houses and HVAC supply houses. And like I had mentioned, I had one right here in Austin when it was plumbing supply houses, a supply New England uh that I ran and um I have full understanding on how to run those
operations. Everything else is regulations were used in cannabis facilities, right, which require extensive u um ventilation, ventilation and and and other other things, right? Well, absolutely that I mean I provided
those products. I I am very familiar, very skilled and very experienced in running retail operations. The fact that cannabis is being introduced to that is just uh is is just another thing that I had to learn. Just like when I sold products that were excluded products to
homeowners, when I sold anything that was CSST, anything that was underground gas works, uh that could only be sold to certain contractors, there were guidelines on how I handled all that. And I've I've read through a lot of the procedures um put forth by the CCC and I
have a great understanding of how the operations work. And can I ask a question of Jonathan? Um this transfer has been approved by the Cannabis Control Commission. Do they go through
um a evaluation of the ability of the um um company here to uh adequately run a cannabis store or cannabis facility? Uh there there is no, you know, uh licensing exam or or or anything like
that. they they do the standard due diligence with respect to uh the the feasibility of the project, making sure that there's been no, you know, collusion in obtaining the license, that all that all of their um you know, they have sufficient insurance, things like that. But no, there there I mean that's
in some ways by design. This is an this is of course an industry where there is a definite push to get people into into it who may not have had a a long-standing background um in cannabis retail. So no, there is no there there
is no uh at the state level um that I'm aware of any um uh requirement that you have operated uh experience operating a retail establishment before. No, just just just for the record, there is an interview process that we underwent
and you know I provided a resume to the CCC and we had uh you know it's over a Zoom call, but there is an interview process where they went through all of our qualifications. um past and present and why we think we'll uh be able to do this and who
we'll lean on for resources um to make sure that we stay in compliance. Any further question Michael? Well, before I ask Michael, please go ahead. Yeah. So, so um I just I wanted to understand um from the outside what this
uh transfer will look like. So for example, will there be changes in the product mix? Will there be changes in the hours of operation from the current ownership? So So how how will this change impact the community? Uh well, let's start with the hours of
operation. The hours of oper uh of operation are dictated by the township and we follow the guidelines. I think we actually bail 15 minutes early just to stay under the guidelines. There will be no operational changes. Uh the last thing that we're going to do as new owners is to go into and uh upset an
apple cart. The people at work there, they understand what they do. They do their job well. And we're going to follow their leads in certain ways. As far as product mix, that is how we're hoping to um get the additional business that that business requires. Right now,
all they provide are uh sanctuary products. So products main uh grown and manufactured by sanctuary. We have extended an offer to sanctuary. We we work very closely with them to give them a dedicated amount of shelf space. We're going to give them 40% of our shelf
space. Now, when I interview the uh employees there, there are holes in the inventory that people in this area have been asking about, and we lose customers to Neta and um other uh other dispensaries around here. And a lot of
those are u more CBD and three what they call three compound um edible edibles. There are a lot of people who don't just want to buy flour. They're not going in there because they just want to get high. I'm going to stick this in a pipe and go to another world. They want to sleep. They want to get rid of anxiety.
They want things that are oneto ones THC to CBD. and sanctuary just doesn't have a very good offering um for them in their recreational in their medical outfits that they have in other areas they do but just not here and um as far as product mix goes that is the biggest
changes that are going to happen and are you retaining the staff from the previous establishment then yes and uh doing everything in my power to make them fall in love with me because they're very very intelligent people there and um yeah they uh very
very much worth keeping. Thank you. Okay, any other questions? John, don't we have to know the DBA if we're going to approve this? Um, I thought he said that they're going to use the name diesel.
So, all right. So, do without a DBA. Yeah. Well, I I wonder if it's diesel or diesel cannabis. Oh, the company name is Diesel Cannabis. Do have we I I know this. Well, that that's that's might sound very very, you know, uh
limiting to people, but I don't think we've allowed other um operators to have cannabis in their DBA, right, Jonathan? Uh I haven't uh we have comma um we know it's it's a which is a
shortened version of cannabis. Um I'm not aware of any we don't have any current operators uh in any of the categories that that actually have cannabis in their names. Uh but we don't it's not it is not precluded by the regulations and and we refer to those
when it comes to what they can and can't do with their signage. Right. There's no slang allowed. We can't call it the weed joint or anything like that. I mean that's clearly outlined. Cannabis has never been restricted anywhere. Obviously we would do whatever we have to do to stay in
compliance with the town. But we've looked through that and we're not embarrassed about what we're going to do. We're not embarrassed of our services and the help that it's caused people and um diesel cannabis is the name of is is the name of the store. If by any chance there was something that
kept us from doing that in the Boss, of course we would we would follow that. Where does Diesel come from? Is that someone Oh, so that's a great thing. That's a great thing. Michael and Kim, um ah don't do this, Michael. He's going to get very sad. They lost a pet that was very very near and dear to him. a
dopamine pinchion named Diesel and it's d e zle e. So it's not the diesel like sour diesel cannabis. And um since Michael lost his favorite dog, the name has just never lost his head. There's not a day that goes by it doesn't think about her. And this is in honor of a
beautiful Doberman Pincha. Thank you for asking. Maybe that will be the uh the logo, right? Well, and it's funny because we tried to come up with logos and then we said, "How do people think we're nuts? I got a dopamine pension named Do Diesel
and I don't know when people are going to come in our store if we have that." So, okay. Any other questions? But the diesel in your name is spelled D I E S. No, sorry. Eas Oh, okay. So, it's going to be spelled just as you did. Yes.
Yeah. That's how she was spelled. That's how he's That's how this beel. Okay. Okay. um Forever Memorial. Uh I'm not sure whose responsibility it is to resolve this, but I do think we're going to have to resolve what what is allowable as a storefront name, DBA
name. Um given what the imposition we have put on other operators, we've told them they cannot show a leaf, you know. Yeah. But I think Jonathan said that there's no prohibition on using the word cannabis. Correct. Is is that historic five leaves is
well he he said we we allowed can commonwealth Canada to get away with cana but we don't have any operators who have cannabis and we don't don't have any prohibition exists is what what I heard Jonathan say you've also got to recognize that the
change in the law since you were much more stringent about what businesses could and couldn't be called is I would say it's a sea change right state has really stepped in and said localities can't impose these sort of artificial
restrictions on cannabis businesses. Oh, okay. Well, that's important information. Thanks. Okay. Yeah. And and the and Mike, I apologize if the manager the manager speaking is is correct that you are prohibited from using sort of colloquialisms in your name, but it just using the word
cannabis is not prohibited. Okay. Okay. Um but I actually did have a quick question um for the operator. Uh, and I apologize I didn't clear this up ahead of time. Um, the sanctuary storefront has a large street facing glass area.
Um, that isn't used by the dis the retailer. It had been a an a gallery gallery for some time, but that has since ceased. Are there any plans for that area? Oh my god. Yes, there are. Every single
student that does anything with art or music is going to hear from Michael Kaine. I really really want to show off you the people in this community by opening those curtains. It kills me. It's it's empty in there and there are a lot of people very excited to show off their artwork and things in there and that's exactly what's going to happen in
the front. That's great. Yeah, that's great. A little bit of of that was done with Sanctuary and and it was really a great opportunity to uh showcase local businesses and there are employees who spearheaded
it that are still there and that's what I talked about and they're so excited. They're like so you're going to let us do it again and unfortunately like I'm sanctuary a wonderful job but they're absent owners. There's a difference. I'm there. I'm going to be there every single day so these things won't fall to
the wayside. This is all I got. Okay. Okay. Any other questions? Yeah, Bernard, I have I have I do have one more. Sorry, I didn't see your hand. No, I because I didn't raise it. I just shouted. Um, sorry. Uh, I just I'm I'm really I
am a little concerned that there's no experience here at all. Um, and may maybe I'm just oddman out on this. Um, you know, we've had issues uh with diversion and I I really I just I don't want us to be stareyed with oh there's there's someone here who wants us to
take it over. Can we can you talk a little bit about your procedures and your experience with you know protecting youth? You you've heard I think John raise the issue with having cannabis in the name. That's because you know we're very concerned. We have a large population of young people in town. Um
there's been problems at the high school. Um, we've had a lot of issues with with cannabis and kids. Um, c can you speak to your plans, your policies, how you're going to handle this? Well, there's there's there's no policies that I'm going to invent as the
operator of this storefront. I'm going to follow the policies and procedures that are in place. I'm going to not do things that encourage the intention of children, which is why they say you can't have funny pictures in your logo. You can't have funny names that would encourage that. That's why they don't
allow you to have um flavored cigarettes in this state, so to speak. And I and and I understand that. As far as um as far as what I would do different, I'm not going to do anything different. I've always protected the people around me in every single one of my storefronts. And
I know that it's not can and I know that it's not it's not cannabis. I'm selling other types of products. But you have to remember I have all kinds of people around me in all of these locations. When I had my shrooms, I have small kids running around with parents and I I ran rough and
tumble plumbing supply houses and I had to keep people who maybe didn't check on every single uh every single thing that came out of their mouth and keep them from offending these young children and that in my uh showrooms and I have
children and I have grandchildren. I have six grandchildren. Okay. I think I think the the the um the question that um maybe is being asked is um the experience of the existing staff at the store that you're that you've
committed to keeping uh in addressing these issues. Um so maybe you should talk about that. Um you know who they are, years of experience. Um and uh so I actually can't uh tell exactly what all of their years of experience are to
the tea. I can tell you that the uh acting general manager there uh Lauren, she's been in the industry for five years. I think three and a half with Sanctuary. There's a gentleman uh Alex Papus there. Alex has been there
for three years, but in the industry for six years. Um so how how about the the personnel who uh deal with security issues for example um and oh that's so I I had a misunderstanding too about security I thought security
was a separately certified and um position with it's not when you get your registered card the cannabis card you do all different roles so they rotate so so people don't get stale so that you do a good job at security you're a bud tender
and then you'll roll into that or else if you sit at security just for 12 hours every single day, eventually you're not following procedure. Now, there are a lot of safeguards right in place with that position. You can't let somebody in the door doesn't even open unless the license or passport is recognized by
their ID reader. Um they uh every single person obviously has to be licensed and certified. You wear their they have their badge uh in order to work there. And like I say, I don't have any intention on bringing anybody in. um until all of this goes
through and and I'm on site. There won't be new people, only experienced people. Sanctuary is actually committed um they've been with us through this whole process, but to back us up any way we can. I have a number of resources. Um
I have uh acquaintances who have been very very uh active in the cannabis commission. I don't know. Um, most recently Sean Collins uh and I have been talking to try to just see my way through this process and he was the
acting director of uh the CCC uh actually for six years and his u consulting service homegrown services uh provides uh resources for education in cannabis if there's any gaps in my education. I have other people in the
industry um who also have offered their services but I I am uh I am an educated person in every industry I've ever been in which the for 34 years was just one and I will be equally uh informed in this before I
take their helm and very willing to take any test anybody wants to give me on day one. Okay. you I want you to commit to keeping those people who are there and know the business and know how to run it. Absolutely. That that's Bernard. One of the things I
just want to say about this because you know I'm I'm really uncomfortable with this uh how this is going. Um you know we're about to this is handing over a sign a critical operation that has a product that that needs to be managed well. You need to be very in tune with
with policies and procedures and how to prevent diversion. the security issues if it's not just rotating someone to do a Bud's job or or a counter job. It's it's how do you deal with with being aware of what's happening outside the building as well. Um I I you know
can you tell me what you mean by that? What's happening outside? Right now right now I'm talking to the chair of the select board. I'm not talking to you. So you know I Bernard I'm very I I we should deliberate on this. I'm concerned that this isn't plumbing supplies, right? This is this is not a plumbing
supply store. Um I this I don't feel that that that and I'm just gonna say it. I don't think these folks are qualified to run this operation. Um you know, are they going to be able to retain the people? If they can't retain the people, how do they even know who to hire because they don't have any
experience? I I think this I think this is a mistake. That's my view. I I cannot support this transfer. Okay. What do other select board members think? Well, I I'm not aware that um
that that we can ask for more than than what we've already been shown that they they met the requirements of the Cannabis Control Commission to be operators in Massachusetts. And uh they're still subject to our our bylaws. They have to meet our requirements.
Subject subject to our bylaws. Um, I I I I'm going to assume Jonathan Simpson, correct me if I'm wrong, there has been no impediment offered in terms of the standard checking that goes on for people's, you know, backgrounds and so on and any records that exist um that
might draw concern from local police. Um, is that a safe assumption? Uh, I'm not aware of anything of that nature, John. No. Yeah. But that has it gone through that kind of a review? where the police chief says, "We've checked into this and checks and checks
the box." Um, uh, you know, there's a there's a law enforcement review is at the state level. Um, okay. We don't generally do it. Okay. Um, any other thoughts, Mike?
Um, I'm sort of I'm sort of where John is and I'm I'm I'm not sure. I and I'm literally not sure whether it's um the I I also I take Paul's concerns
seriously about you know diversion and I am reassured by the fact that the staff is being retained. Um, and I'm also reassured by the resources that the new operator um seems to have in place to
bring them um uh bring them to success in this endeavor. Um I'm I'm not sure if it is our role to uh ensure the viability of the business. like I I don't know if you're going to be
successful um because you know business some businesses succeed some businesses fail um but in terms of making sure that the host agreement is in place um understanding the changes and the appearance the changes of the operation
that might affect the community um and and that it's gone through the state processes um and they will continue to follow all of our local bylaws I And as you say, I'm not sure what else what else we should be using as criteria. We can
also, you know, because it's a new owner and and no reflection on on on this particular um ownership, but we can ask local police since there has been, you know, a um transfer of ownership that just as at the very beginning of the
introduction of cannabis to Brooklyn, um there was vigilance, you know, that they were keeping a close eye on whether teenagers were going in and out of, you know, establishments. they were following up. Uh there was if there was a report uh of you know
someone who looked like an underage person um handing off you know a product after walking out of the store. Um that was immediately dealt with and there was you know a lot of a lot of trouble came down on sanctuary over one incident and
and it'll happen to you too if there are incidents of that nature. I mean, the big ones we worry about are sales of illegal product um or sales to people who are not legal to um be customers. And uh either of those could get you
into huge trouble in Brooklyn. Um and you know, I I wish you I wish you well. Um and I don't mean I don't want you to think, you know, that we're, you know, other than well-intentioned and want you to want you to succeed. I'm okay with that. But, you know, we just
want you to know, you know, Bookline is pretty tight when it comes to we want our businesses to obey the rules and and um and I'm I'm I think you've heard that message tonight. I have. And I just want to say really quickly as far as incidents like that
happen. I go there very early in the morning and I look in that back parking lot and the first thing obviously we're doing is taking down all of those overgrown weeds and everything else because I said if it looks like that bad things can happen there. Yeah. It's wide open and the sun hits it,
you're just a lot less likely to have that bad activity. Good. Okay. Uh Dave, do you have any thoughts? Yes. I I agree with uh what John and Michael have stated and it appears that they've already met state requirements, have already gone through the state
background check uh procedures. Uh and I am reassured that they're going to be retaining the current staff that is experienced. So, I'm inclined to support this. Okay. and and I'm inclined to support them too or this too because uh they
like every other cannabis uh uh business has to comply with our regulations and the host community agreement which are very you know specific in terms of what's required um with everything from um you how they sell to to the security
they're required and if they fail to um uh comply in any area we have we have the tools to um to uh to deal with them. um up to and including uh taking away the license. I believe I'm correct on that, Jazz, right? Or Jonathan, right?
Yes. Okay. So, um I would like to uh therefore move approval of uh two things. First, the request to transfer the adult use marijuana retail license and existing host community agreement
from Sanctuary Medicinals to DEL or Diesel Cannabis LLC. Um, actually, those are the two things that uh we're we're approving here. the request to transfer uh both the license and transfer the
host community agreement um and authorizing the town administrator um what was that the authorizing the town to sign the agreement. Okay, so three things authorizing the town administrator to sign the appropriate documents. Uh, all on any
questions about that uh motion? All in favor? John Vancoyak. I uh Paul Warren, no. Okay. David Fearman, I. Michael uh Rubenstein I and chair votes eye. Thank you. Thank you so much.
Okay. Welcome to Brooklyn. Okay. What is next? Now the social now the social media policy. I'm reading the correct agenda. Great. Yeah. Pardon me. You have Christina online. Okay. Hi Christina.
Hello. Good evening. Christina Metaf, communications officer for the town. Um sorry to keep you here till um 1110 and we're used to being here till 11:10 and later. But let's see if we can get this done by the same day we started.
Sounds sounds good. Um the what you have in front of you is uh the question of the approving the social media policy. This has gone um gone under two revisions. Um and I've appreciated all the notes and comments that we've gotten from the previous meetings. Um any all
the suggestions that should have been integrated into the the policy part have been and um anything that was more strategy related and part of the discussions will be part of the social media strategy and integrated into the social media action plan that is not part of the policy but will support the
actions that the policy um will provide. So doing a social media audit and getting all the information from all the accounts and doing a um an account inventory and all of that. So, um I'm happy to uh answer any further questions
um if you have any. Any questions from the select board? No. Okay. I move approval of the social media policy. All in favor? John Dancoyak? I. Um Paul Warren.
Paul, are you still with us? Looks like he said I Yeah. Sorry, I was muted. I Sorry. David Perman, I. Michael Rubenstein. Hi. And chair votes eye. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Final item on our agenda, real property asset board. Question of
appointing a slate of members to the real property asset board as follows. David cher um David Pearlman chair um Carla Banka David Pollock um ranks George Cole Minnie Kuri and Brian
Hawker. Um I I take it uh select board members know all these people in the back. No, I do not. Okay. So, um who can help us out here? Uh may I first raise an issue? Sure. Which I did raise. Oh, I'm sorry.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um so I hope fellow select board members had a chance to read um something I sent around which was um a consequence of the fact that the the process leading up to the item that's on our agenda right now started
in March and it started at a workshop that we had in March that went on for many hours and it was at the end of the workshop or near the end of the workshop after several hours of of taking care of business that we were introduced to this
question of um uh some kind of asset board and uh there was language for a charge presented to us um and sort of a concept as to how the membership of the of the board would be structured. Um and
immediately the discussion uh focused on a a detail of the membership of the board having to do with there should shall be a former select board member on the board. And we tossed that around for a long time as to why was that put into
the as a requirement of membership. ended up after about a half an hour of discussion of deciding that um oh it won't be necessarily a me a select board member it'll be a community member with certain you know skill set or you know
for example a former select board member not not to go into all this ted tedious deal detail my point is that was the only discussion we had um and then at some point somebody said what are we going to do are we supposed to vote on this tonight and very quickly um there
was kind of a rush to agreement. Well, yeah, it said we could vote on it tonight. Let's vote on it. There was no discussion of the charge. And when it finally came back to us, um this is months later um on tonight's agenda, it immediately provoked questions in my
mind. And I I um freely admit I should have had these questions when I first saw it. Um I didn't, nor did anybody else. No, nobody asked any questions about the charge. And I do think we have to have a discussion of the charge and just get comfortable with what we think
the point of having this board is and get comfortable with um questions that I raised in my um email to you um that was shared with you um you know having to do with whether this overlaps with other boards that already exist, whether its
existence will create confusion as to excuse me um who who has the say so you know between the select board, the HAB, uh the economic development advisory board, um the housing advisory board, a
as to um the disposition of properties in Brooklyn or the acquisition of properties by Brooklyn. And those are two things that only the select board can authorize. Um and yet by the creation of this board um we seem to be
um you know walking down a path that could create a lot of confusion in in the world outside um town hall as to if a developer sees a property that they thinks think you know the town might
want to partner with them um and uh making it available for development either through reszoning or through um through an eminent domain proceeding that would end up taking it out of the hands of a nonprofit and put it into the hands of a profitm developer. You know who who do
they talk to about that? Do they go to this acquis this asset board? Uh are we suddenly sort of saying they're the decision makers um in the town as to uh acquisition of assets, disposition of assets because that really isn't there.
that authority belongs only to the select board and um I you know I would like to have us a discussion among the members of the board on that issue and other issues before we go ahead and and appoint the members. Okay. Um I I see this as similar to uh
police commissioners advisory committee in that uh you know they they they help us out but they don't make any decisions. the decisions come back to us by state law really in terms of um you know property acquisition or
dispositions. Um so I I don't see that as a real problem. Maybe need to clarify that the obvious is the case but I I see that as a major issue. Um
Chaz, you had your hand up. Yeah. Yeah. I think I think John raises some really important points and it's good to clarify this um which is the the purpose of this board is that is to ensure that when opportunities arise
you are not in a constantly reactive posture um that you have experts available to you who can provide you with policies and guidance and all of the things that you may need in order to make an informed decision. But the decision still rests with the select
board. There's no question about that. The purpose of this board is to give you the opportunity to have experts develop a policy for you regarding the disposition of property, the potential disposition of property, the potential
acquisition of property, so that when opportunities arise, people aren't scrambling. This came up, this really was developed in response to two separate incidents. One was the rental of the houses in Lars Anderson Park and
the other was the potential sale of the Clark Road property that my monities owned. Um, in both of those cases, the town was encouraged to do something, right, to make a big proactive stand. But the moment was already upon you,
right? There was already, you know, a sale pending, a potential sale out there, a potential offer out there. There was already rental agreements pending and the feedback that we got from the board and from the community was we should really have policies in place so that when these
things happen we know who to go to, we know who to ask for assistance and we know who is ultimately you know making recommendations to the select board so that you don't have the HAB and EDAB and every other committee under the sun
claiming jurisdiction over real property when it is your responsibility And you can have one dedicated policym policy recommending not making body do this work for you on a quarterly basis
when there is no potential acquisition pending. So that in a period of blue skies everyone is you know everyone knows what the deal will be when an event arises. And then when an event arises, you have a dedicated group of people who is actually going to do this
work to then present an option to you. But again, you still have the ultimate authority here. There's no question about that. This is just about centralizing and ensuring that you can be proactive rather than reactive when these things arise.
Well, yep. Uh, thanks Chaz. That that is that is helpful. And I and I I want to thank John actually for for raising this. I do think sometimes, especially late in the the evenings, we we deal with some important things and sometimes they um they get expedited uh to help us
get home and sleep as it's like 11:20 right now. Um but I I want to use some examples, Chaz, to help me understand the the ramifications for this because I do I John kind of caught my attention when he said, "Are we giving away is the select board handing this to somebody
else?" I don't think they are, but um let's use let's use uh 16 William Street as an example, right? Perfect example. Um how would this board would this board have gotten involved in that decision or
that recommendation to us? So that board would have known um ideally that we had this right of first refusal and would have promaggated polic made recommendations to you about policies for how to handle these rights of first refusal that we have right now. I don't
know if the board has a comprehensive inventory of all the rights of first refusal that you have um or what you might do in those circumstances. So they would be able to in advance of something like this arising develop policies for your consideration and then when the
time came um be able to advise you on the best path forward in terms of implementing it. So so let's say that we that let's say that we did this you know four months ago, five months ago and this board was in place but it hadn't gone through the inventorying of all rights of first
refusal. um would would they have somehow been involved in this between us and and what was going on and would that added a level of bureaucracy um unnecessary bureaucracy maybe helpful long term but that that that's my
question. So that would be an example. I know it's hard to know the answer to that. Um but let's take Stop and Shop. Stop and Shop is a major parcel. There's a lot of interest in that. we've carved it out from the Harvard Street uh resoning uh because we we know it's a special place. There's a great
opportunity there. How would this committee get involved in that? So, I think that's a great example of how to be proactive because it's not just stop and shop on Harvard Street, right? It's TJ Max. Yeah, I'm just I'm just using Stop and Shop as an example so we can talk concrete about specifics, right? What I think in an ideal world,
this committee would do is look at large parcels along Harvard Street or in other commercial areas and make recommendations about what generally, you know, what what what generally the community would like to see on this and bring them to you before there was a proposal coming out there,
before the owners of Stop and Shop sold and all of a sudden there was this panic because well, are they going to put a 40B out or what are they going to do? you know, so that you when that ultimately happens, when someone makes a decision to sell or redevelop, you're better prepared for that. But again, the
decision rests with you. It doesn't rest with this board or committee. They're trying to be proactive in giving you those options. Okay. So, yeah, sorry, Bernard. Go ahead. Well, sorry, piggybacking on your question. Um, how would uh this
committee have or what would this committee have done um with respect to 16 uh William Street if uh it was up and running when that uh issue came before us? I think Paul raises a good point. If it if you had staffed this committee 4
months ago, it would be too soon. Um and it would not be appropriate for them to step in when they don't have the policy in place. And again, this is an area where because there was the potential of affordable housing trust money coming in, they have HAB had a role to play. So, it would have unfolded the same way
that it unfolded here. Um, you they may have, you know, you may have appointed a member from that board to serve on the RFI uh advisory group. Um, but they wouldn't have had a you know, they wouldn't have provided another layer of bureaucracy here.
But this is a but this is a public body, right? They're I mean, right. So, I I what I would expect will h would happen um let's say it's two years from now and they haven't gotten all their inventories done. They're going to hold a public hearing, right? They're going to have a public hearing. They're going
to have public comment. All the neighbors are going to come. They're going to give them all the public comment. Maybe they're going to come and speak to us. Then we're going to hold a public hearing. We're the public comment. The HAB's going to all I just I I worry that we're adding a level of bureaucracy here. um where you know
maybe it's a working group and not a an official board. Um I I just I do worry about the added bureaucracy um Bernard's committee, you know, um for for uh Fiser Hill. Fisher Hill would would does it would
they have a committee? Are they going to take up Fiser Hill as well? uh are they gonna then make a recommendation and as a sidecar to what Bernard's public body is doing? How how does this practically integrate into advising the select board?
Let's hear from Melissa. Sher. So I think that you know one of the things I'm hearing is you know this sense that this group is going to get formed and they they're going to go off and running. This is still a select board committee. So you still have the authority to ask the members of the committee to provide updates on what
their work plan is. If they have a policy, they're going to come to you. You need to approve that policy. And you know, the example of the um you know, Fiser Hill or Newberry Study Committee, I think the the thing that this group does ensure is that there are people that understand the town processes and
you know, sometimes when you have these new groups formed, it takes a while for people to catch up to understand the way that the town operates. And you've got people with a lot of institutional knowledge um and people that you know have different areas of expertise that are kind of important to kind in to
maintain that continuity as well and to like kind of layer that onto Fischer Hill. This group would have no role to play once the Fiser Hill committee was set up. This is about setting more general policies. And then in the for the example of Fiser Hill
where we say, "Okay, this is a major investment that the town made and we need to figure out what we're going to do with it." So, we're going to set up a purpose-driven committee for Fiser Hill. Right. Done. The committee for Fischer Hill is set up. This committee is not about the purpose of Fiser Hill. It's
about when should we set up those purpose-driven committees. when should we be thinking about buying property versus when should we be thinking about not buying property because you got to remember Fiser Hill was really almost a matter of luck in the terms of how the
how it ultimately fell into the town's hands right it was a huge amount of work on the part of the people who did it but it was really an ad hoc group of volunteers that made that happen and well made it happen in a way where the town initially seeking the full property only got half of
Um, you know, that's the kind of outcome that we want to avoid. Um, I mean, I'm very grateful for the work that people did to make Fiser Hill happen. It was a huge undertaking, but it would be much better if we had policies in place where if a large parcel comes on the market,
we know what we're doing, have a protocol that we follow in advance of actually dealing with it. But this committee is not then sitting in judgment of that saying, "Oh, we want to inject ourselves into this conversation." They're saying before that happens in general, what should we
do if that if that happens? Yeah. So, Chaz, I I will um look, I and I know that this is this is a new thing and it it it does have great potential to help, but there's also risk. This group will be lobbyed like crazy. I
mean, this is the core assets of the town. Parcels that we have, parcels that we may acquire, parcels that we want to get rid of. It's wrapped up in in in money and politics. Um, there's this this this
committee will be lobbied very very hard by many uh interested parties whether we like it or not. Um, select board is lobbyed. Whoa. But yeah, but I'm just But you know, Bernard, but we're but we're elected. But we're elected.
But we're elected, right? And if they don't like our decisions, they've unelect you. Uh who holds this group accountable? The select board, right? I know. I know. But no, just I'm just I'm throwing up a caution flag. That's all that this group is going to be under tremendous pressure
uh from from anybody who has an interest in in our land and buildings. Well, I mean, that's true of of the variety of committees we have. We're gonna And we're gonna add another one. We're all We're gonna add another one. I'm not saying no. I'm just saying
caution. That's all. And I and I think, you know, to your point, but both John and Paul's point, right? I I do think it's important for this work to get up and running if it's what you want to do. But I also recognize that it's 11:30 at night and these are serious conversations. So, if you want to postpone this and have
another conversation about this, you know, at our next meeting or at your next meeting or whenever is convenient for you, I think that makes a lot of sense. Um, I would rather I'd rather do this right and have the board comfortable with it than have the board
concerned about it and then potentially limiting its effectiveness. Um, I would rather have something that works than something that you're concerned about, John. Well, I I I that's a very generous um statement by Chaz, and I I I hope we
take him up on it. I think we should take more time with this, Michael. Um so, I had I had a sorry, I had several things to say, you know, echoing some of Paul's concerns, uh thinking of other
examples. Um but uh I ultimately agree with John that 11:30 at night is not the time to raise three new issues. And um so uh why why don't we take this up at our next meeting uh between now and then
um if if people can provide uh Tiffany with you know their concerns, their thoughts like John did um I think that would be a good basis for us having a competent discussion early on in the next agenda. Okay,
that okay with everyone. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Good. Thank you. Good. And with apologies to the people whose names have been floated for the committee and I called one of them today and I said you know in fairness I just want you to understand why there might
be a delay in this. I don't know if other board members will agree with me but you know these are great people. they would be a great committee, but uh we never had the discussion of what what really is the intent here behind this committee and are we comfortable handing
off as much of a role to to a committee that frankly I are are things I want to do as a select board member. You know, I want to be involved in those discussions. I want to get be the one receiving the information about properties that we
need to think about or and it's not just acquiring it's deaccessing properties. So right or using properties that we have for for a different in a different way. Yeah. Exactly. Um okay uh with that um unless there is
anyone in the audience or online like to uh make a comment regarding uh uh the public comment period or 16 Williams. No, there are no other individuals online other than Yolanda Rodriguez. But
Oh, God bless you. And I don't think Yolanda's raising her hand, so I think we're all good. Okay, assuming Yolanda does want to make a comment, I will hereby or therefore end this meeting. Good night, Yolanda.