good afternoon Welcome to the board of health meeting of April 7th 2025 Please note this meeting is being recorded and will be available shortly hereafter for scheduled and on demand viewing on any smartphone or tablet device If anyone else is recording this meeting please
notify the chairman Pursuant to Governor Healey's March 29th 2023 signing of the acts of 2023 extending certain CO 19 measures adopted during the state emergency suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law until June 30th 2027 This meeting of the Chattam Board
of Health is being conducted in person and via remote participation Every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings as provided for in the order A reminder that people who would like to listen to this
conference to this meeting while in progress may do so by calling 508-9454410 and the ID is 655404419 pound or they may join the meeting online via Microsoft teams through the link in the posted agenda
While this is a live broadcast simal cast on Chattam TV channel 8 and 1072 despite our best efforts we may not be able to provide real-time access We will post a record of this meeting in the town's website as soon as possible I turn the meeting over to our chairman Dr
Noble Hansen Uh thank you It shall be the policy of this board to conduct its meetings under the open meetings law so as to encourage public participation whenever time permits and as part of agenda item discussions So we have two things on the agenda tonight but first
let's establish a quorum And when I call your name please say present Carol Boyce present John Beckley present Ron Bowman here Ron Wiser present Noble Hansen I'm present And then our uh alternate today is Joanna Kale present Okay good Uh so
first we have uh on the item is the transfer station information Carrie Purcell who's present today is the municipal assistance coordinator Mass D and uh CC cooperative extension
uh commercial refuge hall of registration She basically is the county solid waste municipal assistant coordinator So she's going to give us a little some information and then we'll have a chance to ask questions Absolutely Can you hear me okay Is that Yes Okay Perfect So yeah I'm with Mass
Epsil County's Cape Cod Cooperative Extension I've been in my position for over eight years now Um and I work with the Capeen Islands uh Dukes Nantucket and Barksville County 23 municipalities on solid waste and recycling diversion
Um I am basically everything that is not too toxic to trash Um we had just hired somebody uh to take over Collip's position who is the household hazardous waste environmental specialist His name is Anthony and I've been working very closely with him since he was hired on
uh March 19th So we had our first hazardous waste event in Barnesville this Saturday and uh we have another one coming up on April 19th in How'd he do he did great Very proud of him Uh he's in Oregon right now at a hazardous waste
conference So wow We pulled him in and then we shipped him out for a week Nice Um so it's giving me a chance to catch up on my work Um so talking trash Um so I'm pretty familiar with all of the um transfer stations what the towns are
doing the town resources how they establish grant funds um and how well um we provide reciproc you know reciprocity uh between my role and the role of the municipal uh transfer stations and trash
programs Uh Chadam uh participates in the household uh boat shrink wrap recycling as a depot Um they also do the holiday shrink wrap or the holiday strand light program So Chennham does a lot for the community and is willing to
open up their transfer station during seasonal periods to allow non-stickered residents to participate in specific programs which is really really special because not all transfer stations have the space or the capacity to do that And so that's one of the things that I'm
pretty proud of as far as the town of Chadam And I'm also a resident here I live right down the road So um I I have specific vested interests in the things that are happening here Um so that's really neat and fun So we have a current solid waste crisis happening here in the
Commonwealth Um I don't know if many of you have heard of the solid waste and recycling master plans Uh that comes from the DP We started in 2010 to 2020 and now we have the 2020 to 2030 They have very um uh strong goals to get to
2030 and 2050 So we want to reduce our trash and one of the reasons are because we don't have a lot of capacity here in the Commonwealth um for all of the things that we throw away Um we have a limited amount of landfills and we also have a limited amount of waste to energy
facilities uh where we incinerate the trash and we create energy from that incineration Um we used to have nine waste energy facilities but now we only have five and there's a moratorum on expanding that capacity or building new capacity So
we're limited there The only landfill that's being permitted for expansion is the town of Bourne It's not to say that landfills couldn't be permitted or expanded for the existing ones here but they are closing at a rapid rate which means we have to haul uh via train or
trucking our our waste out of state In some instances the Cape's trash could end up in Alabama uh in Birmingham because they are expanding their transfer station by you know thousands of tons per day But when you look at the economics of the folks that live around
that landfill they're making on average about $17,000 a year in an annual salary So if we think about our trash winding up there it's it's kind of discouraging Um so you know we looked at cost benefits back in 2020 2021 Uh the
commissioners and and um the county paid for um a feasibility study to look at what that cost benefit analysis is where can our trash potentially go as well as our recyclables and what local resources can we utilize Um we also have volatile
recycling markets and that is the same way you look at a stock market and there's sort of these things that are out of our reach out of our ability to control and it kind of eb and flows So we can think of recycling as a commodities market One day they might have a value the next day we might be
paying for the dis disposal or the recycling of some of those items food waste and collection composting here in Barnsville County It's a desert Um currently I've been working on a Cape Cod coastal community composting program
proof of concept uh with jointbased Cape Cod and the upper Cape Towns And that'll provide some means for composting uh to happen here on Cape Cod so that haulers are not coming over our bridges picking up this valuable resource and then
shipping it out of here at a cost Um we want to try to keep these things localized um at at this particular moment if we were able to get you know shovel in the dirt and build the facility Um Chadam not would not necessarily benefit from that at this
time because we're focused on the four upper Cape Towns under a general permit with Mass D Um there's specific permits that you have to go through when you increase the amount of residue that comes through What do you mean by composting desert meaning we don't have
infrastructure here to compost on the Cape So really residents and businesses and it's mostly residents can go to the transfer station if they have a sticker and bring their waste in small quantities But if a commercial entity like a restaurant a hospital a business
has more waste than the waistband threshold of 1,000 uh pounds or more per week they actually would have to call a hauler to haul it off Cape because we don't have the infrastructure built here in Barnsville County at this time Well is our transfer station composting
there's all that piles of leaves Is that compost yep So that's organic compost I'm I'm mostly referring to the food scraps We have bins We have plastic bins Yes With flip lids that people can bring in their kitchen waste and they can
dispose of that Oh yeah So we we lack infrastructure for largecale composting Yeah Uh but almost every single town has a program like the town of Chadam does as far as residential being able to come into a transfer station and individually drop off their kitchen
waste Um so again I mentioned the solid waste master plan um it does not address financial implications but it does have very stringent and strong waste reduction goals um that we're looking to follow Um so you know we kind of started
to look at what's happening on Cape Cod Are we doing better as a district as a re uh as a region and when I say Cape Cod I really do include the islands in a lot of my data Um even though sometimes I neglect to mention them those poor guys out there
Um so I mentioned the waste energy facilities So they're managing about three million tons of solid waste Um active landfills 1 million 1.5 million tons of waste that includes ash and sludge So they are at capacity Um and
the 2019 solid waste master plan when they went through um the um waste audit we realized that about 5.7 million tons of solid waste were disposed in the Commonwealth annually Um in addition we have 1.2 tons of C and
D which is construction demolition You also hear ABC which is asphalt brick and concrete Um and then contaminated soils So when they're excavating for land there are you know super fund sites contaminated soils Um and in some cases those do reach the born landfill And
right now there's no new proposals for expanding Um and we can't expand with a moratorium for waste to energy uh waste to energy facilities Um so right now again it's the Bourne landfill that's looking to expand capacity for the next 20 years Uh I do believe that Nantucket's
landfill will continue to exist but they will probably be only servicing Nantucket I don't think they're going to be importing or exporting much um as far as the island goes Um so we're just you know we're limited in decreasing solid weight management Um waste combustion is
at full capacity Uh landfills are closing there's a decline in the capacity with the landfills here in the Commonwealth Um we have extensive transfer capacity although the issue is is with our rail lines Um there is some questions about who owns them and
maintenance you know maintenancees them uh who keeps track of them So you know we say that if any one strong weather event and it doesn't have to be localized to us uh but it could be anywhere on the rail line from here to Alabama Ohio New York Pennsylvania um
etc where our trash could wind up um a strong weather event could really put us um in a crisis where it would bottleneck and we wouldn't really have anywhere to take our waste Um and that could be you know a really really staggering issue and it would bring up the cost because you have to have supply and demand in
order for things to move Um neighboring states have limited capacity So in some cases uh they're they're closing down their landfills to out of way out of state trash as well So we have to go further and further every time we try to look for places to take things Um and
then again like I said the rail you know the rail hall is age resiliency um any type of closures that could happen peak volume poor weather Um so we're we're really struggling to find those disposal outlets I I remember a story years ago about a
garbage barge that was wandering around the East Coast trying to offload tons of Yep and it it kept getting rejected and I'm not sure do you remember that story i do remember that story I believe it
was out of New York State Um I don't know exactly why they couldn't find an outlet for the waste Um and I honestly don't know what actually happened with the waste Um because when you think of uh international waters I believe a lot of the time it's three miles out or
further once you get into international waters And if there are different waste laws potentially you can just dump in the center of an ocean Okay Carrie So you're mentioning landfill capacity but
um we ours goes to the seamass or is it seam mass now y world Y yeah Um is is there concern that we wouldn't be able to re-up our contract with them or that they're going to go away or you know not at this time
I haven't heard anything Sometimes you hear rumors of that stuff and currently the Rochester facility seems to be continuing to be active and so right now there's no concern over contract negotiations or where um you know current capacity for those contracts to
continue to expand those contracts and to continue it that way Okay Thank you Is that trash going now did you say it's a waste to energy plant in Rochester Mass which is just over by Wearham yeah It's just across the line from Wearham So the the the the big trucks from
Chadam go to Wearham Yes Okay Landfill Uh no a waste energy facility So And it gets burned Yep It gets burned and then turned into energy and that energy supplies energy to about 75,000 households And then does the town pay to dump that stuff at that facility sh Yep
There is a tipping fee for the usage So there's a transportation cost and a tipping fee for the town right yep So this is a privately owned facility that enters into contracts with um communities who want to outlet their
waste Yep Okay And it would be the same for a landfill So if you were trucking your trash to a landfill there would still be a tipping fee for that as well So it it it doesn't matter where it goes necessarily There's there's no free outlet for where is away for our garbage Okay Are there landfills on the Cape
where commercial trash haulers can bring their trash directly uh the only one is the town of Bourne Um and other than Bourne and Falmouth uh municipalities do not use their landfill Um but some commercial entities work with the town
of Bourne for tipping Say that again So other than Falmouth or Bourne no other municipalities are using their transfer station but private commercial entities do have contracts with them Uh and Borne also takes the fly ash from Seamass Covent uh which is again now rebranded
as Reorld right so So can a commercial trash you know somebody that goes around and picks up can they bring the trash directly to one of those facilities and not to a town transfer station they could Yes And they pay a fee They would pay a fee How's Yeah We can get into the
fees later but yeah Nope Um so I know there's a couple of local haulers here that use the Chattam transfer station um to tip their stuff and then Cadam charges them and then takes that waste to the waste to energy facility and the recyclables go to specific outlets as
well that come in from commercial haulers that service the town So this is 2022 I probably should update the map to 2024 um because we're in 2025 Uh but Chattam is actually pretty red here and that's
not a good thing However the reason why Chadam is red is because we only want the data for residential waste and they were um attaching commercial waste to that number meaning the haulers that you were just asking about Um we don't we don't want to know what businesses are
doing necessarily It's a separate department than what I'm tracking And you know even though the haulers are picking up residentially you know when somebody calls you know one of the haulers and says "Hey I want curbside service." Um we only want to know what the trash numbers are for the first
sticker holders that purchase an annual sticker that goes into the transfer station Um now you are green I've been working with the town and the transfer station Um so you're actually more in that light green color of the 750 or less pounds per household for trash um
which is a good thing And we tend to call this a map of pride So the lighter you are the more happy you can be The darker you are We call it the map of shame We shame people Um but this is just a demonstration of where folks are And again that's based on the municipal
program So anything that's white it just means the town does not offer any paid services and people are on their own um to hire a hauler to come through their home Really yeah So um we call them washed hands communities Um and it's just again it's because there's no
municipal trash service within that um town Now there's a white spot there in the Cape Is that uh what's it looked like orleans or something uh there shouldn't be a white spot on the Cape Okay I think it's yellow It just looks
white down around East Yeah So we're completely covered Um all 15 towns have a municipal trash program here on the cape Um what do you mean by municipal trash program so it means that um it's a it's
a it's an offering of the Department of Public Works It's a public works service that's either based on a sticker price So when you go and purchase your annual sticker it pays for the service or um it could be part of a property tax base So for residents to bring trash Exactly
that but that doesn't commercial haulers picking up stuff that's a different that's a different that's yep that's a private entity that does that unless the town pays for it but uh one of the things that stimulated our interest is Mr Uh Failey Rob Failey yes told us that
the town of Brewster does not allow the commercial hollers to um dump in their transfer station So the you know like a Nickerson or a can't use the Brewster transfer station Correct Which raised we
raised the question okay well where is that trash going they're hauling it off Cape Mhm You mean so Nickerson or NAZA will drive their truck off Cape and they will or they'll choose a different transfer station that accepts it like Haritch for example Um they actually
make revenue by letting commercial haulers tip at their um transfer station Oh Haritch is running like a regional uh transfer station Yep In a way trying to make money for commercial Yeah For commercial East Ham does the same thing They allow commercial haulers through
their transfer station as well So where you see a gate house there's usually a scale right next to it So the trash trucks come over um and then there's a record of of um weight and then when they come in the trash is weighed and then that tonnage is charged through a
tipping fee and the town charges that to those commercial entities very much the same way that Chadam does it for your local haulers So each town makes their own decision on what's best for them in terms of whether they accept out of town
generated waste or not Yep Exactly Okay Now now is there a way for the local town to actually know uh where the waste is coming from say or um when you So boards of health are typically who permits the haulers to
come through here So you can provide regulations and verbiage that articulates where you want the waste to come from So you might be able to say you know to your haulers town of Chattam trash uh and waste only Um you can also
do waste audits when they come in and they tip I mean the best way to know this is whether or not somebody's bringing in mail with addresses from Churo Um so you you can kind of actually do waste audits at the tipping floor you know when they you know in the blue building they call it here Um so you can
look and see where the trash is being generated from We we do have regulations that limit it can only be from Chadam and we're going to be discussing a way to have them um have like an attestation that they're not bringing in anything
from other towns So Yep But do do the local transfer stations actually have the ability to go in and rumage through the trash and look at envelopes and see where it's coming from and actually do that Yeah Yeah We call them waste audits or waste characterization We do it in chat Uh I'm not sure You would have to
check with the transfer station probably Rob over at the DPW to see how often they he told us he didn't have the manpower to do that Yeah it it's probably true I'm a lot of municipal programs have a big gap in their their staffing Um so everybody's sort of
cross-trained and doing much more um because it's it's hard to hire especially in an area like ours because it's so seasonal So you know maybe in the winter a few staff is is sufficient but then once the seasonality happens and you have a lot more people visiting our public services like the transfer
station then you need more staff to be able to keep up And so to pull somebody aside to do that is is definitely it's time consuming and for the staff and the town Yeah But you you certainly could say "Okay you know hold on Nickerson We're
going to hang out for a minute and see where this came from." You you certainly could In your opinion do you think any commercial haulers from other towns are illegally dumping trash in towns that they shouldn't be
um I I think there are enough resources here um for them to go where they're supposed to go Um and you know hauling takes staff It takes you know wear and tear on the vehicles as well as gas Um and it is an expense So I think haulers
are going to do the best they can to stay in the areas that they're supposed to stay in and not travel too far So I know with the local haulers here they're not necessarily going too far So the likelihood of the materials that are supposed to be coming here are
originating from here I would I would guess but you can do a spot check fairly easily to affirm that if you wanted to You could Yes And simply the word getting out that there is an occasional spot check inspection I think would go a
long way towards um keeping people honest right as well as having a form that they y uh declare very clearly when they come in they assert and sign off affirming that this
product they have came from Chattam Yeah Was generated in the town And then the generator the the routes have got to not they've got to avoid mixed mixed truckloads too you know Question Do they would They go to several
towns Um does does Brewster then have commercial haulers that sort of focus on just Brewster because they don't they can't use the transfer station They have to bring it somewhere else Sounds like they might be bringing it all to Haritch depending on the rates but they could and it definitely depends on the rates
So if if I'm a know for sure exactly what's happening there Yeah I mean the commercial side of it is is more of the wheelhouse of a different department within D I mean locally I I kind of have a pretty decent grasp on what's going on Um you know if you think of say a NSET right they're based in Orleans but they
service the entire Cape So if they're servicing a Brewster resident that calls and said hey I'd like trash service or a business in Brewster they're not taking the waste to Brewster but they could be taking it to East Ham or Harwitch depending on the fee and if they don't like the cost to tip there if they want
to they can drive it off Cape and go to a seam mass coanta Do you think for example a NAZA truck would be assigned to just one town or would they maybe bounce from town to town on a route um I would say a typical route they would probably stay again localized because
they don't want to operate somewhere where it's too thinly populated They want to take advantage of routes where it's a little bit more dense So if if Nasid is going through a neighborhood that trash route is probably within that town right and not you know I don't see
a driver going from you know Province Town to Wellfleet back you know East Ham and then up to Orleans and then circle back go to Brewster and then drop everything off in either you know East Ham or Haritch They're the routes are probably pretty standardized I think there's enough
business that they can you know be in a more dense area and keep the trucks in the same place Not to say that they can't go from like say Truro in the morning and then head down to Province Town in the afternoon but I think their routes are dense enough where they're not doing that as of they're going to
avoid it if they can Do you know roughly what percentage of homeowners take their own waste to their local trans versus what percentage have a truck come by their house pick so the
2020 2021 solid waste feasibility study that I conducted with the Cape Cod Commission showed 67% of households utilize the drop off facility or the municipal trash program Okay So twothirds then twothirds Yeah So it's
under it's under 35% where they're paying for a subscription service And I'm not sure if it's because these are second homeowners I'm not sure if it's because it's a cost barrier You know to hire a subscription service to come to your household costs upwards of probably
anywhere high range of $500 a year to over a thousand a year just for the convenience of it versus paying for a transfer station sticker right which is a couple of hundred dollar really for us Uh the transfer station here in CH I buy the recycling only sticker and I only
pay $30 a year Um so and I utilize in my condo complex I utilize the trash there So okay My waste is very low cost annually Yeah Um but I believe the Chattam Transfer Station charges I think it's under $100 a year I think it's I
think it's 200 Yeah I think it's it's gone up Yeah I think it's 120 So 120 I just saw it I think it's on there I think it's going up Yeah easy enough to find out Um let me ask you about about costs Um so for the commercial haulers to to to dump um do you know what their
fee is to dump in Chattam relative to Harage or some other town um the last time Harages because that's you know open to all the relative rates they charge the haulers Right So I know from what I've last been told Chadam only
allows the Chattam haulers to come through You know the Nickerson the Millie But that's the rule but they can't really check Right So the last time I was told they're paying about $90 a ton to tip Yeah Um that is probably lower than what the town itself is
paying when they take the trash to Reworld to the to the incinerator Um I'm not sure what Haritch is charging you know say a NSA to come through um or East Ham but it's probably around the
same same range M but Haritch does um you know their program is a revenuebased and that's why they do it because Harwitch makes money from allowing the commercial haulers into the facility So do they have a is it cheaper do they
have a cheaper place that they haul the trash to than Chatter Mass uh so Haritch used to take it to um um ABC which was a landfill um and now they're working with Camass Covent or ReWorld Um and so there
really is no inexpensive way to tip your trash at this point Um and mo most towns all of the towns that I'm aware of have contracts to tip their trash where the towns don't have contracts for recycling because
recycling follows the commodity markets So if you source separate your waste like the town of Chadam they can follow the commodities rate and send it to different places that'll take it and recycle it versus if you're single stream or if you have a contract then there's no wiggle room to chase the
commodity market How many years is a typical municipal contract uh so when I came on board in 2017 they were just ending a 20-year contract with Canta Rooster was the only town that continued
at a 20-year um expansion of that contract Everybody else went into like five years with an option um or they switched over to a different um outlet Okay Mhm And that was all done in 2017
2018 Okay Pretty stable then Yeah Yeah 20 years seems like a really long time but when you think of how things are increasing exponentially financially 20 years might be but there's also escalators within the contract Okay So they it might not just stay When I came
in everybody had sort of the sweetheart deal of about $38 a you know a ton to tip I mean we're talking at least 100 at this point and that's up from 2017 So in the last eight years we've seen you know a twothirds increase on that on that
total And there's no reason to think that's not going to keep trending upward Yeah I feel like once things go up they don't really come down Yeah that's what I tend to see So but sometimes you see a plateau you know a period of time where things have
plateaued at a certain rate Um but with the cost of trucking the cost of rail hall the cost of staff you know it all tends to go up I can't believe that some of the Cape Cod waste ends up on a train to Alabama
Yeah some of it does I can't tell you like specifically where it's it's likely commercial waste you know with the haulers and it just it winds up on a train and it just keeps on going Wow Yeah Now now you you mentioned landfills
Are there some existing landfills on the Cape yep Just the Bourne landfill right now Born land So they just dump it in the ground Really surround it in plastic and it just builds up and then they they transfer it somewhere Is that what No it's it stays in the town of Bourne um
and it densifies They have methane flares Um Phil Goddard is the one that sort of runs that he's he he'll talk your ear off about how um the technology there it's like six sixlined layered with all the new technology So even though we think of burying our trash is
somewhat of an archaic way to do it um they they have a pretty sophisticated system to protect you know the groundwater um the community um from any type of leeate that could occur from you know dumping trash into the ground You
go back in time is it a true statement that almost every town historically had their own local landfill yep That probably was not a secure landfill in the sense that it had liners or clay layers or what have you
And then they filled it up to a certain height and then they put the final cap on and then they abandoned it Yeah I mean a lot of them put solar on top as a way to utilize the capped landfills Um I've even heard of golf courses being
built on the top public parks Um I lived in uh Cambridge um when I first moved to the Commonwealth and um the park behind my home was built on a cap landfill H So um yeah I mean again they're archaic and
we weren't as sophisticated in our knowledge as to what was happening when we were putting trash into the ground Um even hazardous materials Um you know now we're a little bit more aware with the EPA um and looking at super fund sites and those types of cleanups you know back in
the 70s when they implemented these like rules and regulations to help protect the environment and our groundwater as well as you know folks that live in the areas of the landfill because leech eight going into drinking water sources can pro you know can cause So there is
ongoing perimeter groundwater well testing around all of these abandoned landfills Yeah they continue to have to test Yes Okay Yep And all 15 towns do have a a landfill Um Chadam's one of them They have a cap landfill here You
know I was just staring at the one in uh Barnstable the other day when I was working at the hazardous waste field and there was a little coyote kind of limping around in the back end where the leaf and yard waste pile was and they have a solar array on top of their landfill Okay Yep Can that cap landfill
just exist there forever or does it have a life it can Yeah there's no shelf life Um the only thing that happens with them which you hear that yes that I'm aware of for the most part are um because the methane continues to build up they have methane flares to get rid of that so that you're not starting an underground
fire from the densifying of the materials that are sitting there Yeah Because it does get hot and it's not enough methane to make it worthwhile to capture it You possibly could but again it's a cost benefit Yeah So um if there
are no outlets or energy credits that are willing to purchase that material then it's not worth capturing it and then utilizing it as an energy source Okay Yeah But you could you could use the methane gas to produce energy
As a land as a closed landfill gets older and older and older does a lot of these things settle down and Yeah Yeah densifies Um so when you think of things as they start to like crush and sit on each other and at some point it'll come
to a rusting point Um but I can imagine the cap landfill over a period of time when it's not being used or filled You'll probably see Yeah Yeah You'll probably see a little bit of like a lowering of the height and whatever organic material may have been placed in
there will biodegrade And yeah the organics will eventually biodegrade but it takes longer because it's densified And to biodegrade something you usually need some sort of air um or you know that type of a source you need oxygen
And so these are an anorobic type um situation So it could take twice as long three times as long for an organic material to break down when it's all tight and compacted than when it's sitting in an environment where it's meant to continue to biodegrade
Interesting Fun fact scarology Um so again I went over the plan uh with the solid waste master plan Um so by 2030 we want to look at a reduction of 30% of our trash going out
of that five um 5.7 million tons that leave the Commonwealth And then by 2050 we want to look at a 90% reduction And the way that you do that is you have to change the behaviors and the habits of what we're doing Um you also need to look at EPR
um reuse um deconstruction rather than destruction of um buildings current buildings bridges So you want to deconstruct them and reuse materials as you're able to versus just taking it all down and disposing of those Um and then again we want to develop local and
regional markets for things like mattresses uh the food scraps glass textiles so that we're not continuously shipping them out um and sending them to international markets You know when I go to the Chattam Transfer Station I can't
help but observe what other people are throwing in the in the floor on the floor And in many cases they're not following the the prescribed rules I mean you just look
down there and you see cardboard You see things that are on the floor that don't belong there So I guess that's another challenge is how do you educate educate and persuade and
motivate your average citizen to be more compliant with as you throw With what took the words right out of my mouth A you throw Um it's a behavior change and it's proven with data and statistics and I I know Rob is not a fan of it and I
respect that opinion Pay as you throw is a behavior change Pay as you throw Pay as you throw Yeah I I like to call it smart save money and reduce trash Um but what you do with it is pay as you throw means that the local grocery store and
you know Chadam would probably utilize the Haritch uh stop and shop and the Shaws there and you have a prescribed color bag and if you want to buy a sticker to the transfer station as a resident then you would buy these certain color bags that are labeled for your trash And because you have to pay
per each bag it actually incentivizes you to not only think about what you're purchasing but it incentivizes you to not put recyclables into that bag because you're filling a bag and you have to buy a new one because you're filling it to capacity So it's a behavior change mechanism
Yeah So towns with um uh pay as you throw like if you look at the towns that have this smart it says smart communities and they've got sort of those zigzags in them they're a lot lighter on the scale than other communities Um because it
lowers the amount of trash by about 40% that's generated Really are are there towns on the Cape that have pay as you throw yep Sandwich Brewster Wellfleet uh the six towns of the Mar of Martha's Vineyard all have pay as you
throw and their trash rates are lower than some of the other communities on the Cape due to that and the town would save money in terms of how many tons they're hauling to the So it increases the recycling and lowers
the amount of trash Um it's not parallel So it's not like you start here and it goes like this but you'll start to see about a 40% reduction in trash and about a 25 to 30% increase in recycling So for those folks who are not incentivized to do the right thing in the blue building
they're going to start doing it um because they're paying per bag It's like a utility like you know and you can create structure for community members with you know disabilities veteran
status um senior status low income uh where you provide a certain amount of free bags per year to them because there are it's you know it's a utility I pay in my home for how much electricity I use every month I pay in my home for you
know how many gallons of water I'm using through a water bill So it's a utility Trash is a utility And right now through an annual sticker we're subsidizing other people's waste So if I had a full sticker which I don't just because I have trash at my condo complex
and then I buy the recycling sticker to go to the transfer station But if I bought a full sticker then my full sticker rate is subsidizing say a family of five when I'm just one person So that's why we look at it as kind of a utility is what you're paying for what
you generate right or what a household generates So and that's another you know challenge is people come in and they say "Well I have a family of six." Like I'm going to throw away a lot more trash It's like well okay you're generating it You should pay for
it You're probably generating a lot more electricity as well and a higher water bill as well But you put systems in place to help assist uh vulnerable populations right Carrie we have a few questions online but I'm going to hold those to the end
of your presentation I mean I can continue Yeah let's continue and get to the end and then we could ask Has that pay as you go thing come up in Cadam has somebody pushed for it or is it Yes I Yeah I have heard it's come up in the past Um I believe it was prior to me being here so it's at least something
that happened eight years ago uh just now um people are starting to ask about it again Um but again the you know Ron is not necessarily you know a proponent of it right now but who did you say Rob rob I'm sorry not Ron Um you know he's
he's told me that he requires probably extra manpower to monitor what people are doing or it's just for some reason it's not liked by residents and so people feel forced out when they make that
decision It's a really really tough lift to convince people that this is something Yeah that you can show them data statistics proof that this is a behavior change program and people still for some reason don't like it I lived in
Sandwich I loved it I loved my little blue bag But I generate a little blue bag about once every nine weeks So I loved it I didn't care Yeah it worked for me But I'm an expert on what's recyclable as well So that's true I'm
really good about what to put in that blue bag This is called pay as you throw not pay as you go Yeah Pay as you throw or smart Save money and reduce trash Okay Okay Um so I'm not going to go into the
plastic stuff here I mean we know there's a truth about plastic I will say that statistically we we see all of these data points that mention that only maybe 9 to 10% of plastics globally are being recycled We've seen it in the New York Times the Boston Globe we've seen
in the Cape Cod Times And if you were to picture plastics only about 85% of plastic is recyclable because of the content in which it's made up the chemicals that are in those plastics So if I were to put a 100 pieces of plastic
on the ground maybe 15 to 20 of them would be recyclable So then when you look at the fact that say 10 of the 15 are recycled you've got a twothird recycling rate which is actually very high But when you're reporting it and
you're saying only 10 to 15% of plastics globally are being recycled they're leaving out that piece that a lot of plastics that are being manufactured are not recycled or not recyclable So that's just one thing Um but um we do
you know a lot of uh plastic recyclers are starting to import plastics because they need them to continue to stay in operation So it's not for a lack of us trying And I wouldn't have a job if this stuff was not necessary You know um you know everybody says "Oh they're not
recycling anyway." It's like well recycling facilities wouldn't exist if they weren't making a profit Those are for-profit entities Um so thousands of variants on types of plastics resistance from oil and plastic lobbyists you know the chasing arrows
don't really mean a whole lot It's a form of greenwashing Um there's a little bit of mixed messages about what is recyclable what's not Um sometimes the infrastructure in certain areas they can recycle one thing but then in a different area you can't recycle it because of the facility itself can't
handle certain things So there's a lot of variance with that Um so I want to the lowhanging fruit with a lot of things um is uh food scraps and organics because it makes up about 36% of our waist stream So we have
this composting desert that says we don't have infrastructure for largescale composting here on the Cape So we're shipping all that stuff out and I'm working with jointbased Cape Cod to remedy um that issue Um again it's going to help provide services to the upper
Cape Towns as well as the base community Um but if we can provide a proof of concept and expand capacity and or convince maybe the midcape or the outer lower cape to also build a facility we can start to um gather that material stream and make an
impact So you know just talking about priorities cost infrastructure um nimi you know not my backyard I want it here but don't put it next to me Um so there's a lot um looking at recovery for consumption Um the cooperative
extension where I work out of in Barnesville County um has a food access coordinator So instead of looking to just strictly take food and put it into the waist stream as compost uh she's actually looking at recovering and rescuing food for human and animal
consumption so that we're still prioritizing the edible food um in a safe manner I just got off of a call right before uh Judith and I were emailing and I was like "Wait a presentation?" Um and then again we're the we're we're a composting desert because we don't have the capacity to
take high-scale high volume food waste and organics Uh with the exception of the leaf and yard waste piles that we see at the transfer stations um and some of the aggre um aggregate companies you know Brewster Sand and Gravel and stuff they they look at the leaf and yard waste because it's a lot easier of a
stream because it doesn't have that same ick smell factor that food does Um so we've got a lot of programs you know we've we've got transfer stations providing you know um the ability for residents to bring in their food scraps We have a whole lot of different
programs whether it's glass recycling mattresses holiday strand lights boat shrink wrap latex paint the hazardous waste events that we see every single year come through here Um you know Black Earth is looking to expand their capacity here Um that's where the town
of Chadam has their um food scraps picked up and they drive it off Cape Um and you know the the thing of it is is we're really looking at other you know other haulers and opportunities um again to expand capacity and to build
infrastructure Um so this is just more like stuff that's going on with different projects Can we make it easier absolutely um infrastructure funding people like us um that are interested in and can bring momentum to the projects
you know and creating a culture of waste reduction And I know that's hard I don't have children I'm in my 40s and I can only imagine what a parent goes through when the latest and greatest is coming out or a new brand or fast fashion or the second generation of whatever iPads
and stuff that that you know people want Um so I I have a little bit easier of a time honing in on my generation of trash but I'm also an expert on what shouldn't go into the trash can So that's my information So anybody that's watching
this or that will get the minutes Just one quick question Absolutely At the Chattam Transfer Station do they collect food waste separately yep They have a they have a source separated food waste um program and Black Earth comes and picks it up Well where is it it's in the recycling center So when you go in there
when you drive down you know the bins that say Discovery Books and you can take textiles right there It's right off to the left hand side right in front of um not in front but kind of a in front of the swap shop right it's kind of on your way down to you park in the
recycling area You walk to the left Yeah Yep It's right there And and you and it and you're heading down towards where you would take newspapers Yep New It's on the left side Mhm It's right there Big big plastic bins with hinge Put plastic bags full of uh food waste Uh
compostable BPI bags You can otherwise just dump it in I don't think that's pro is well known actually I could be it I don't know if you're aware but Chattam Recycles does a weekly column in the Chronicle or bi-weekly and we often will
um put information about the local composting um as well as some of the other reduction programs that we do like our book swap and we um we work with the library and do a fix it clinic every year again to keep things out of the waste not just throw them away and buy a
new one Um we've had two of those We're going to have another one next fall So we are doing things regularly to promote um reuse and recycling here in Chadam Um and also um about 10 years ago we did do a solid
waste We had a solid waste advisory task force that you were on Were you on that was I on it i don't know I don't remember I remember track if it was um SWAT Yeah our SWAT team SWAT team and we looked at pay as you throw and other um
solid waste you know disposal options and presented it to the select board That report is available and I can provide it for all of you I have a feeling one of our talk our question people is going to bring that up as well Carrie how large are the bags that you
use for the uh pay as you throw uh most I think most communities start with a an 8gallon 15gallon up to 33 gallon bag So those are large bags but the towns typically like to give um a choice to
residents and they usually come uh 10 bags per bag when you buy them Yeah And all of that would be would is decided by the town when they set up the program What the cost of the sticker is going to be what the cost of the the bag is going
to be the size of the bag and as Carrie said you can um also decide who may get discounts or help with doing that You see that at the AM not the AMP the stop and shop Yeah those are for Haritch right and they're color The yellow bags
are Brewster Brewster Okay And I've seen them and I wonder you know do you pay do you pay for them i don't use I don't buy them because I live in chat I do Yeah They're usually they can be you know I think the large bag a couple dollars a piece So if you have a bag of 10 you're
paying $20 for you know 10 bags but those are the large scale size But again because you are paying so much for that bag you're really thinking about what you're putting in there So it's encouraging you to recycle because you don't want to put things that you shouldn't be throwing away in that bag If you have a hefty bag you're just
going to put whatever you want in there Okay that's great Not always I don't want to say that everybody just willy-nilly throws everything away That's great information Let's take questions from the public and online You want to go first board questions uh I as you know uh when Rob Fley was
here I had suggested and I still believe it that we have become a regional transfer station and that's because uh the commercial haulers we use there's three of them they not only pick up our trash but they bring trash from Brewster
Orleans Haritch and other surrounding communities Uh Rob Philly actually said now tonight we hear that Haritch accepts you know trash uh from their commercial haulers but
apparently they're bringing it to us because they said that otherwise it's expensive for them either to take it I guess down to Bourne or across the bridge So they're bringing it to us and that's why we have so much garbage Um
and I think what was interesting that I heard is that Chadam appeared on the map as red and that was the map of shame until they separated out those of us who have permits to dump Yes So I would
contend that we went from whether it's white or yellow which is good to red And the red is because of the non-p permit people who are the commercial haulers They are bringing in not only garbage but construction material into our
tipping room our tipping building And that concerns me because we're going to be spending $4 million to redo that place you know in the phase two I don't know how much is going to the tipping floor
but that is going to be temporary Unless we change our policy about who can dump what from where Uh I would also contend that probably if it was really just Chattam residents that are dumping their construction materials and garbage here
we wouldn't need to go to that pay as you go or whatever it is because I think Chattam full-time residents know what they're doing They separated out There are boxes in there but it's corrugated boxes that have to go in the recycling not just a regular small box Um if
that's changes fine But right now I think most people are following the rules I I think also some issues take place with summer renters You know we have a massive increase in the summer and I don't think they follow the rules
they get a temporary permit for the summer which I believe they can buy or they pay the you know as they go they dump their trash and they they're not following the rules So I think those are the people that need to be educated this the summer renters or whoever hauls and
the commercial haulers I mean this is getting out of hand that Chadam has become a regional transfer station and we never voted on that We we had built this and tried to maintain it It it used to be a lovely transfer station It really was It was great you know with
those seagulls you know chirping to keep away all kinds of stuff And it's not anymore And it's because of the odors that are created by the massive garbage that we are receiving by the commercial haulers from all the surrounding towns
including Haritch So they may promote it that they are um accepting it but they're not taking it off cape We are Yes And it's pro it's because it's cheaper So with that so um keep going Elaine Yeah Um Elaine it's noble Um how
do we know that other towns are bringing their trash to Chattam i I don't think Mr Philly really checks at all but how do we know other towns are coming here it was interesting to find out that Harage is actually open uh as a business to bring to bring their trash there
Um how do we know it's coming from other towns what what is where does that come from because the three commercial haulers that we have Okay Yeah Uh that haul garbage and are also the commercial haulers for the surrounding towns Well
doesn't mean they know that they're not supposed to bring it here So just because they haul in other towns does not mean that they bring it to Chadam We don't know that they do You're just assuming that But I I don't I I think
that the general feeling is based on the amount of trash that is coming from them into our transfer station is not all from Chadam It's construction material and it's tremendous amounts of garbage
and they have not denied that when they go around to different towns and pick it up and Haritch has said that it's it comes to Chadam because it's cheaper I mean that they appear that's what Mr Fail said So the commercial haulers are
bringing it but that's what he you were going to put in place or M uh Fa said some way of making them sign something to confirm that their loads do not have any commercial
uh or uh construction material or garbage from any surrounding towns that it's only Chattam and then to do the spot checking to make sure That's the only way we're going to find out for sure But I would suggest that Chadam of a town of 6,000 even though we have
summer residents cannot possibly produce the amount of garbage that's in that building on any given day Um they just we simply can't But we're we're a very small town So it's coming from somewhere and the commercial haulers and Brewster
sends it somewhere because they don't allow anything from commercial haulers So it's coming to us Yeah Yeah Well I think one of the purposes of what we're doing now is to try to beef up the application form to uh uh try and address that issue actually of trash
from other towns Uh and the other thing we can find out is the cost differential is not I don't think we know that it that Chattam is necessarily cheaper We don't actually know that but we that was something that we could find out actually Should we go on to I think Mr Failey did mention once about raising
commercial trash fees and I don't think it was just to make money I think it was to make get it on par with other towns It's incentive Yeah Like he did say that Haritch it's more expensive for them to haul it themselves off
Cape So I mean I I think we can conclude that that's why it's coming to Chadam from the commercial haulers And we've never said before you cannot bring to my knowledge until this discussion this year commercial haulers cannot bring
waste from other communities into Chattam So clearly that has probably been going on And I think it's worthwhile to tell them they can't do it and that there will be audits Uh because we can't be doing that We're gonna have to redo that tipping
floor in another five years because it's not going to get any better if that continues Yeah Well I think um the old application form was was I think weak in in that regard as to dealing with trash from other town So that's that's going to be beefed up But
u we have another question Yeah Um I'm just saying the fact that we were white with the permit people and were red without it means something's coming from somewhere Okay And it's not us Yes So we're only asking for data for residents
So it was artificially high because we were getting all of the data when we only wanted household information So that's what really happened Um if you wanted to see the difference between now because at the gate house they keep track of that So you'd be able to ask
Rob for residential figures and then ask him what the commercial loads are every year that come through that scale and see what the difference is Great idea Yeah you can you can ask them separately because they track it separately They were just reporting both Not
understanding I didn't want all of the information I just wanted the residential information So it made it artificially high Right Yeah But you can ask Ron what's the commercial numbers Yeah because that that that we're actually receiving it So we are red but
not for permitted household residential Yeah So when you I think we want to get that red down Yeah When when you look at 2024's map which I should have updated this um you can actually see that you're now green on the map and that's where you want to be
Okay Okay Thank you Elaine Yep There's another question Pette Uh hi Paul Failig Recycles Um how about we talk to the hollers uh maybe the board Can you speak up a little bit for us we can barely hear you I'm so
sorry Can you hear me better now yep A little Is that better that That's as high as mine goes Can you hear me now yep Go on Plet Okay Um Cadam Recycles Um Pette failing Um I I suggest uh Board of Health and
Judy talk to the the haulers and ask them where they're picking up from before they come to Chadam And and you know these are these are people we know These are families we know I I think they'll tell you the truth And if not you you get a you know something in writing saying what you want them to do
Um not only corrugated cardboard uh is not allowed in the blue building Regular cardboard also like like cereal boxes and things Um I think that if you want to try to get pay as you throw it through uh the last time we didn't have this capacity situation and I think it's
critical and I think that uh if people know that our trash from Massachusetts is going to Alabama they would have a whole different view of pay as you throw Um let's see what else Pansy throw is passive motivation instead of something
of kind of hardcore like mandatory recycling because it's basically telling the the uh user that they can save money if they want to recycle If they don't want to recycle they won't save money Um people always have trouble with change That's why one of the reasons why pay as
you throw is so difficult to pass But usually when it passes well always when it passes it saves money and it increases recycling and it decreases trash Uh let's see I think that was it Oh Oh the um the energy and climate
action committee is also taking a look at pay as you throw um because the Cape Cod Commission has advised it as a way to address climate change And that's it Thank you Uh yeah Paul did you did you say you were representing a certain group or
just a resident well both but Cadam Recycles Um I was the chairman of the spot committee back in 2013 Chatam rec Yeah Yes sir Yeah 11 years ago Thanks for great Thank you very much Thank you both Sure
All right Carrie Yes Excuse me Carrie Wonderful presentation That's an awful lot of great information Thank you Oh you're very welcome Thanks Pette I think that's it for questions Okay then we can take it back to the board Um any follow-up thoughts or
questions that while Paul um Harry is here and then we are we going to talk about one of the handouts we got that had suggested wording on the application Yep We can do that Um if you just want to if you have any more
questions for Carrie otherwise we can dismiss her But we do have solid waste rags here in Chadam Um they haven't been updated in many many years Um but they do say that um commercial waste uh has to be only from Chadam Okay
Resation was kind of but the application did not have anything that clarified that really attest to the fact that that's what they were doing We're going to make it there's no penalties attached to it Okay So there's no fee schedule So that's one of the things that I can help do I help communities create
comprehensive private hauler regulations that levels the playing field for haulers that service your community Um and by doing that we can get more grant points through the town because you have those comprehensive regulations that D recognizes as above best management
practices Well I that's good We can we can look at that Do other towns um assign fees uh penalties if if they if they're not if they're found to not comply with the rules i mean they typically start with a you know a verbal warning a written
letter and then they start going with if you do it this many times then you can't you can't we'll cancel your permit That would be written down in the regulation so that it's up there up front Yeah Yep Ultimately at the discretion of the board or something they could lose their license Yep Absolutely Not that you want
to do that but I mean but I Yeah I think should be in place I feel very strongly that there ought to be very very clearly written wording uh that the haulers are required to
certify and check off Yeah that's what this is Yeah Before they what Carrie is saying she can prepare that document for us Right Right Right We can work with her Yeah I would I would have to sit down with Carrie and maybe Rob and look at our existing solid
waste rigs and go through them Um and maybe we could That sounds like a perfect solution It does But but in the meantime I think doing this to get because it's not going to happen right away for us to create new rags It's going to take time I would like to get
something like this at test station that for an application but then aren't we creating confusion because we're going to get this and then a month later we're going to give them something new Well it's not going to be a month later I mean to to create new rags it it well
could take I just think it ought to be in capital letters maybe even red Mhm I mean it ought to be very bold right on in a way that every is the driver that pulls into the scale going
to be asked to initial on the spot or is this a an application this is an application Yeah Okay I'd almost go to the start with Yeah where you ask a driver to get out of the truck and initial something that that attests that
he is bringing make if he wants you just make him declare the truth I mean I don't Yeah we'd have to talk to the the operate I would do it by load I would have him I'd
have him if he wants to perjure himself Right I mean and we catch him then that's a serious there is no penalty in this either there is uh where is there a penalty I don't
think yeah there was no penalty no penalty but one thing is so this this is part of an ongoing but they could yeah um one distinction is that the application is as I understand it you correct me Judy is something that Judy can change on her own right that's an
annual If we change our regulations which might be required at with more information that requires a public hearing and a and a you know public notice and it's a and it's a process It depends on the town charter Some towns the board of health can just go in and create an addendum um to the regulations
and then in some towns they require an open meeting as well as the approval of a select board So it just depends on the charter within the town Yeah just like rental But I've sat with towns where they changed their regulations and a couple weeks later they were posted But I mean
every hauler every truck driver that pulls on that scale knows where he came from to fill that truck And if we can get to the point where there is a here's a you hand him a clipboard and you have the guy sign his name and check off the
box and attest to the origin of that load with the understanding that if he you know he better tell the truth And then you then you notify the business he works for at an earlier point in time beginning a certain date The town of
Chadam's pro procedures will be changed in a way that every truckload is will be required to certify the origin of what is in that truckload
And then and then it's not hard once that truckload is dumped on the floor to to have somebody just look at it with a that's the manower I mean you well but I as I understand it we would have the
owner of the hauler sign this the annual Okay But then in addition to that have a clipboard for the driver That's what I would do I can't see how difficult that would be I mean you got a clipboard you write your name and a test and you put a
check Exactly I think that would be very Let me ask you one question Um is there a renewal date for the haulers one date in the year when they sign their application um or is a calendar year calendar year Is it is it a renewal date yes it's it expires December 31st So
they start renewal So we have until December 31st then to make a change Yep Because we can't change it until the next application comes So yeah we don't have to pin this down today I think there's a lot of questions I mean I can ask Rob you know we can I can definitely
work with him about having somebody sign something at the gate Tell him this is this is something the board of health would like to be looked at and and we'd strongly like to have his uh support on it Yep Should we let Yeah Rob has a lot
of great I mean he's he's great I mean honestly we just have a difference of opinion on pay as you throw but again that's respectable Most people follow you know Rob's sort of fine So I don't want to make it sound like he's not doing what he's supposed to be doing He's great I love working with him and okay we do grants together and he's
definitely working on you know improvements as we go This is just a really tough I mean I'm not asking anything I don't think the board is right now either of anybody but pay as you throw and private holler regulations are the best way um to be able to to
lower your trash rates Your pay as you go would that would be a big thing because a lot of people receive as regulation But changing the um application form making it real strict with an attestation part where they pledge to follow the rules and they know what the rules are That we can do and do
it before December Yeah you could probably do that in probably not get it done today Yep We probably put it on the agenda for next week Dick Edwards will be back He might have something to say about it Okay A penalty We can add that We'd have to change the regs but I think we have enough time Yeah we can we can
I'll work with Carrie Well Carrie and I will have a discussion and um see what what the best way to move forward would be I could show her what a comprehensive rig would look like and then you can discuss if that makes sense for the town Okay Now have you done regulations for other towns in on the Cape yep So
Felmouth just passed theirs Uh Mashp is working on theirs with their board of health right now Eastam Province Town Wley I mean you have like an application a town application for other towns that's really strict for their that the haulers sign Um you don't see that I can
ask them for them because that would be good to get to Judy as information See what Yeah When I work with her I'll show her what what the you know there's an expectation The town can do what they want right but when you want it to hit the threshold that you can earn money
for having comprehensive private hauler regulations that include mandatory recycling for all generators meaning businesses and residents uh manufacturing anybody in the town that you have a bundled price which means your haulers can't say trash costs this
but recycling costs this It's a bundled price and a bundled service and that you have a a fee schedule that says if you fail to do this we're rejecting loads and we're charging you Penalty schedule Penalties Yep We call them fee schedules but it is it's a penalty So and it would make sense for the fee to be equal to
other towns So there's not an incentive incentive to bring things here but we're not trying to be make money off it or be a regional transfer center by any means either right um Okay But that's part of it So okay Well that's great other So what we'll do is we'll let Judy get some
more information talk more with Carrie That's okay I said I said Ron Sorry Rob And see whether what Rob has to say Maybe he'd like to come back and talk to us again but maybe not
I'm sure he will And we'll we'll have it on the agenda for I think our next meeting is the end of the month or whatever So we'll work on it I mean we have till December I think Really right Yeah Yeah So that's good to know Well we have till really more like October And I
think that if we make these changes it would be good to send out a letter to the haulers saying we're tightening up certain very carefully at the application this year There's going to be some more things you have to know about and sign and regulations So
nothing to should you know throw away your business but but just giving them the heads up is always best practice right Yeah letting them know that the changes are coming Great Thank you very much You're great too So any more questions that's great Thank you for coming I don't think ever heard all that
before That's why I invited a ton more Every time I talk to Carrie now you're best friends with Judy So that's perfect Okay All right Check that one off I'm gonna keep going on that All right
So uh number two already to number two review discussion of bedroom definition and Judy sent out some stuff she can uh talk about it I think this
also is something that we want to do tighten up the the language It's difficult There's a lot to it There's no time to train on it So I think to me today is a discussion information think about things and we're going to also work this out over time We're not going to solve this today with the precise
language That's the way I look at it I sat down with Lucas because him and I do as well as you you folks do a lot of the reviews of the plans that come in um including our real estate inspection reports and we have to figure out what's a bedroom and what's not and and you
know we um struggle with the same things you do on a daily basis So we tried to make some changes um that kind of reflect uh what we're seeing and what your concerns
are especially with the full bathrooms um and the um detached rooms and rooms over the garages Um also the unfin what we find with a lot of a lot of times the plans come in and they say unfinished bonus room or unfinished basement and
but what they're doing is they're they're rough roughing them They're roughing the plumbing in and they're um I don't know what the correct terminology is or they're but they're drywalling and not putting any flooring down Well you don't need a building
permit to come back in and finish that the loophole to paint and floor And if the plumbing is already there they get a plumbing permit which I don't ever see Nobody else looks at except the plumbing inspector and he just you know signs off everything So as long as it meets the
plumbing code Um so what we're do what we're finding is we're coming back when these real estate inspection reports are coming in and finding finished rooms over garages that have full bathrooms And we're like well that wasn't approved
by us So we're having to have them take rooms out of other parts of the house take walls down and believe me realtors do not like that You've actually ordered some of that Oh we do it all the time Take out take out barn doors where people put up barn doors where they're
supposed to be sixoot cased openings Okay Um finished occurring Is this real estate inspection for transfers yep Transfer go back and see what was done We require now as of about a year ago I think um that they submit floor plans
with every real estate transfer report and Lucas spends he researches the file and if he sees something that looks off he looks in the building file So this is wonderful That's where we're catching these You're you're going to you're going to learn all the little tricks and
we've learned them that are being and so I tried to reflect those in the changes I put in here Um well the builders and the and the um engineers are definitely building to the precise language of our rules I mean that's pretty clear But let
me ask you you you don't need a bathroom to make a room a bedroom right no no no But what we're seeing is that they're putting 7 foot cased openings in with full baths off of these rooms And then when we go back and look at these rooms
years later all of a sudden that's they have barn doors on them right um and even the short-term rental inspector is seeing that So she's catching those Yeah So we have to be it's almost like a cat and mouse game because you know you have
to figure out what is being done to work around our rags and then how do we plug that if we to the degree we can with the word that's what I tried to get here right um basically red is the change yeah I
mean there's a couple things I just cleaned up and that where I crossed out Um under F or down below F I crossed out loss with one wall that shows up further down again Um did we get two of these did you give Did
you get a I sent you a second one because the first one the one in your packet says Chattam Transfer Station on it So good But the content was okay Content was perfect Okay Okay Um was the same Yeah Um well yeah I think you know looking through it that I mean there's a
number of things First of all this this phrase providing privacy Now we we go beyond that and sort of we have an interpretation of what privacy is We talk about staircases and stairwells and railings and lofts and all that but it's
a lot of that we just do by precedent in in feel I guess right and I I step on that at the end Is there I mean to me this thing of what privacy is you know that's that's a loophole that they're they're using The other thing that I've
seen in another town is and I didn't have I lost which where it was but they have a rule where a room above a certain number of square feet is presumed to be two bedrooms No matter what kind of a hall and what you have it's big enough We saw one plan where there was a giant
room and there was like a front and a back and then there was a entrance in between and it was could it actually they had two double bed They had a double bed in each side But I've seen that on another town that they betrayed their own truth It's presumed to be two bedrooms
And this thing about lofts you know if you have a loft and there's a railing but there's one little staircase up there and it's a railing and it's tucked back somewhere Um who cares you know is that is that privacy or not privacy can can a loft be a bedroom um yeah And what
do you think is uh great rooms yep So you have a great room and there's a kitchen there's a dining room there's a living room and then some is just one room but some have outcroppings They'll have cabinets and they'll have half walls and they'll have pillars and this
and that And this town of Hangingham has has some has some rules that are really good there there sometimes they have language where you presume that there that's three rooms because that's the way it's set up you know and there's enough of a obstruction from getting to one part to
another that it's really functions like three rooms Anyway I think those are those are things that I sort of saw and I'll get out to everybody and Judy um this uh town of Hangingham which I think struggles with the same thing They they've got a
whole document that just has to do with how they're dealing with the size of houses and bedrooms and the use concerning septics and and the goal is an estimate of the total number of people using the place Bedrooms is the big measure but there's other things
that go into it as well So but we'll try and get this out to everybody so they Yeah this is good I'll But I didn't So anyway go ahead I'm I'm just That was my two I mean I if you go through this what I did um at the bottom of the first place it says rooms over freestanding
garages or out buildings meaning not attached to the house that have heat and bathroom I put full or half bath that provide privacy or considered bedrooms rooms over attached garages with direct access to the house that provide privacy
are considered bedrooms right so again the privacy thing is the doorway we've kind of gotten around that by saying cased openings but if they have a bathroom in them we can consider that a
bedroom Well can you if if it's a garage with a little staircase and it doesn't have a bath then then it's not and it's open to below then usually I wouldn't consider that a bedroom because when you a lot of those
you have to come down through the kitchen garage where you can walk into a bedroom or something I don't know And what's to prevent them from putting a door at the top of the stairs well again it's just there's an open stair If there's an open railing and no casement
to put a door on I mean I think the thing that doesn't lie is the bathrooms Yeah Yeah If they really if they locate bathrooms in space even if I mean I that that ought to be a
strong factor to declare that space a bedroom even though it's not part of Well it would be definition but I'm just saying it's particularly if it's a full bathroom Yeah You know then it's like are you kidding me i mean
somebody's got to be living in there and sleeping that comes up in the last one we had right it was an on suite full bath and we we questioned whether this room was a bedroom and the engineer said "What if we make it not a full bath but just a bathroom?"
So we let him go with a we see that's a but on the other hand you don't if you have a room without a bathroom at all it can still be a bedroom Correct I know You can but sometimes these rooms are occasionally you see them that they're so far away from the rest of the living
space They're you'd have to walk down the stairs halfway through the kitchen around the What difference does that make no you know in the olden days right we we lived like that but used to chamber Love it No no no chamber pots anymore Well I think I think but part of
it is we have to understand that the uh the architects and the engineers and I don't begrudge them They're working for their clients uh but they're trying to maximize the house they can build within the rules and so they you know they push them and in terms we did go and ask for
architectural plans although we don't always get real good architectural plans and sometimes we get architectural plans without distances on them you know right so right I have to be really firm about making sure they give us that if you go to the second page under it's the second
paragraph laps or bonus rooms with one wall open to below or open stairways shall be considered bedrooms However shall excuse me shall not be considered bedrooms However any room with a full bathroom adjacent any room with a full bathroom adjacent will be considered a
bedroom if the board of health considers the room to have sufficient privacy Right that was kind of my stab at getting at that problem The board of health considers the room to have sufficient privacy So that's subjective based on what we think you some people will look at it and say that's a bedroom
and then you get into an argument about well why in this it gets it's hard but I don't know what the what words you can use well I mean I think it's I think that's about as best as you can do really well I think we need to look at some other towns because like this town of Hingham has really worked at it I I
really liked I really like the last uh paragraph that you put in terms of you taking the total number of rooms that exists we don't we we sort of forget about Well but the the the worst plans that I can remember seeing came two or
three weeks ago where you know they had a yoga room and an exercise room and a meditation room and on and on I mean there probably were 14 rooms in the house Oh no The best one I saw was a sewing room Yeah Oh you got to have a sewing room And and I think Tell me one
of the new people that have a sewing room Yeah But if you would have applied that definition I think that would have tripped him up or if you have the square footage of the home I think that that that ought to help Can you work this in a way that says
I don't know if I can get this straight but if we look at that decision of how many bedrooms and we work at two or three different ways and we say it's the maximum it's the highest one That's what I've always done and I do usually try
and count the total number of rooms when I'm trying to figure you're kind of doing that now You know if I come up with a number that's higher than what I'm counting in individual rooms then should our I would take the higher number Should our regulation so declare
that yeah maybe maybe we we should say you know the the number of def defined bedrooms shall be determined by the most you know the highest number of these three you know it at least allows you to quantitate a little bit and I think
there's a certain amount of logic associated with it as well and you would certainly get rid of some of the really crazy ones that have come before us Well this is what we want to do when we're sitting here agonizing on a on a dilemma And then we we always go oh we got to go
back and clarify you know but for now we got to live with this You know I I'm actually anxious to really get a good look at this Hingham one and read it because this No I haven't And but they have a whole document that just justifies what they're doing and you know the total amount of use and people
and because we're getting mish mashy here This is Are you going to send out the Maybe you can send that out like I'll I'll find it and send it out to you I could not afford it for some reason And then because it's but there's other stuff out and I forget which town has a square footage thing because we saw that
one really giant bedroom on a plan a while ago It was it went front to back and there was like a why would that be a six foot hallway with a with a stair coming into it and then two sections and the plan had a had a a bed double bed or
queen bed in each side as I think they were going to put a bowling alley in there The the best thing Oh maybe for kids The best thing I have seen kids up there and and have enough beds that would be far more than the best thing I've seen recently was a um a basement
which wouldn't meet the definition of a bedroom because it didn't have egress windows and natural light and ventilation But they had built they called them in the building plan shelves But when we got back when we got it for they were builtin
bunks which is common now like in a submarine what you have in a submarine the hanging point says if half of the base is above ground level they called it then it's the housing code I guess
for body shies and if we count total number of rooms now with the great room that's the kitchen and the dining room and the living room and all of as that counts as one room which is and I did ask the assessor how they count and she said that if it's one open room with
no structure dividing the room she call counts it as one room so if you had a kitchen dining area that would be one room um if what if the it's open to the living room or no I would count that as two I would say it's the functionality
of the space that I guess the family room would be two Um so yeah but the that other town regulation hang if if you have cabinets that come in the room like a counter or if you have pillars or
a half wall they count that as as functionally dividing the room so you can count it as separate rooms Okay So now you know if we make some language they'll design it to that language but still Yeah Um and then Judy has I mean
there's a way that's being done I'm not saying it's wrong but she has a way of making sub subjective things about you know to have sufficient privacy But then when they come in here and they start arguing we have to sort of justify it which gets hard So what the idea I think would be to try and create some it's not
easy We can try regulations that sort of back up what you're doing Anyway and I don't think we're going to solve it today but I think we'll get this Hingham thing out and then people can think about it They can sort of research it themselves I'll try and find out what town has this square footage
thing because I think that's pretty easy and it's not ownorous It's um big enough that it's at least objective Yeah Right Yeah And then um but other questions or comments about how we go about this or I
mean I agree it's hard but I think we should try Yeah Oh yeah And um so this is the um and we don't have there's not a application there's not a deadline I mean we want to get it done but we don't have to do it this month but we have a
meeting at the end of the month And did we not have any variances this month or we just we saved it for no variances well I think since we tightened up on some of the rules not getting the lot size change in our nitrogen loading reg
So okay Excellent That's a good start I think Huh all right Yes Judy I don't know Um and then we have minutes from March 17th Anybody have a What about the number three update update on McGrath
Yeah Yeah Right Oh yeah Yeah Sorry Three We have three update So there was an executive uh meeting that the select board has So some of that is uh you know not public information but Judy is going
to tell us Judy could tell us but she'd have to kill us Yeah Okay Right Um I can't really tell you much because it's still an ongoing legal proceeding The select board are looking at um moving forward in some of the ways we've discussed before Um but right now
there's we're still working out the details the protocol orc have you talked through how do we establish the uh the RFA and how do we measure i mean have you gotten into that stuff we haven't really yet Um okay There's some other
stuff on the table but it's it's all good It's all still moving forward but like I said I can't really discuss it because it's it was How's our current lawyer the town lawyer he's excellent He's very good He's managed he's now helping us navigate through this he was
experiencing this sort of thing and we they came up with some good good suggestions and ideas I felt like so um I I think it's all moving forward but you know can we say can we say that the timeline of when well that's my famous question when it's kind of hard to do
that three months the last time I asked that question the answer was November how many how often is this workg group meeting there is really no workg group I mean town staff that are working on it Okay
Yeah How often is that group convene when there's something to decide i you know um I can't tell you more I don't there is no set schedule for us to meet Okay So as soon as I know something else and there's some some action to be taken we
will move forward Who who's sort of the chairman of this effort or there's no chairman Where is you know it's staff It's community development director myself Greg Burman director of natural resources Um it's got to be sit would be the point man for us at the top there
Yeah Yeah Um and then so is the select board moving ahead with what we're trying to do Are they taken the next step and agreed my understanding is that's that's what they voted on Yeah Is there a select board liaison or does the whole select board the whole select
board yeah is on is at the table I mean well they were for the executive session No not for our our staff meetings Okay Right Right So I think it's important for us the attorney moving ahead with it's the attorney and the staff the department heads and myself Basically
it's important for us to keep pushing on that So I think what I hear it's so it's hard to get your hands off but you were there I know I was there but I don't know what I'm supposed to say publicly but we can uh Greg Burman who's was there and is in and he's up high in the
town Um he would be someone that we can get here to give us an update what's happening and and he can answer it as much as he can and that puts pressure on him and lets us lets him know that we are we're have certain expectations We'll just keep it on the agenda for the next meeting and then we can if there's any updates that we can give at that
time Hopefully there will be because that's towards the end of the month So we should have you can convey back to whomever that the board of health is eager to get updates They know that But yes I will And Greg is the guy that be
will be there be the sort of the top Okay So you're going to do the minutes yeah The minutes from March 17th I'll make a motion we accept the draft minutes from March 17 2025 Second Second
Okay Um all in favors say I I I Opposed none Okay So they pass Uh all right Then we have um public comments future agenda items request any any are there any public comments to come in do you have it on
your No Okay And then um future future agenda items something we need to um bring up or get on We'll get So we'll get back on the bedroom thing We'll get back on the trash thing Yep And um Hill is always there And uh
there's one other thing that we're in the McGrath These three agenda items will be carried forward I uh Okay All right Good Um nothing else i don't think so Any any of the other comments can I get a motion to adjurnn
also move and a second Second All right I guess we're supposed to take roll call vote So I will take a roll call vote Uh Carol voice Yes Okay John Beckley I Ron Bowman Yes Ron Wiser I And Noble I Okay So we are
Dunsky adjourned