Please note this meeting is being recorded and will be available shortly hereafter for a 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 29, 2023 signing of the acts of 2023
extending certain CO 19 measures adopted during the state of emergency suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law general law chapter 30A subsection 20 until June 30th, 2027. This meeting of the Cadam Board of Health is being conducted in person and via remote
participation. Every effort will be made to ensure the public can adequately access the proceedings as provided for the order. A reminder that people who would like to listen to this meeting while in progress may be a may be may do so by calling the phone number
1508-9454410 conference ID 9445779 pound or join the meeting online via Microsoft Teams through the link posted on the agenda. While this is a live broadcast and simal cast on Chadam 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. And I'll turn it over to the chairman. Uh thank you. This is the uh June 2nd meeting of the board of health. It shall be the policy of this board to conduct its meetings under the open meetings laws so as to encourage
public public participation whenever time permits and as part of agenda item discussions. So we have uh four items on the agenda today. But first let's establish a quorum and when I call your name please set please say present.
Harold Boyce here. John Beckley present. Ron Bman here. Richard Edwards present. Noble Hansen present. That's our quorum. And then Joanna Kale is our alternate. Present. Present. Okay. Um, first on the agenda is
u a modified definitive subdivision plan review for Susan Shepard and Barry Payne, Evergreen Lane, Clark Engineering LLC. And Mr. Clark is here to present the case for us. Uh, good afternoon.
David Clark, Clark Engineering. Um on behalf of Susan Shepard and Barry Payne, um there was a subdivision, a re-ubdivision done on uh Evergreen Lane uh 22 years ago, and all it did was create one more lot on in that
subdivision. At that time, the planning board uh wanted road improvements uh including widening the road to 16 feet and and uh and uh and so the lot sat there without those conditions being
fulfilled. Uh Susan Shepard and Barry Payne purchased the property. Uh in order to get a building permit, they have to satisfy the planning board conditions of road construction. So they've gone back to the planning board um informally uh about reducing the road
construction requirements and that's what the modifications all about. Um so it it is basically uh reopening the subdivision public hearing process with the planning board to modify their approval to include less road
improvements. So, uh, we're going from 16 feet of pavement down to the 12 feet that's there now. Uh, and some drainage improvements have to be put in. So, there's no changes to the lot. So, the number of lots in the subdivision, um, it's just road
construction requirements are are changing and pursuant to the subdivision control law, uh, board of health gets, uh, a copy of the application as as with any standard subdivision. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. So, the board of
health approved the subdivision in 2004 and you said none of the lot lines have changed. No lot lines have changed, right? So, it's all road improvement and there's no changes to the board of health requirements that the lot has to be served by municipal water. Um, so
um there's really no changes from what what the board of health would see. Are these vacant lots right now? There's they're all developed except the one lot that was created um okay and uh back u 2002 2003
something like that. Does that uh vacant lot does that have a stub on 28 or are they going to do it? It does. It's the only lot that does have a stub on 28. Okay. Um, but I've been informed that in the next five
years, I think the town is trying to the DPW is trying to include this entire subdivision uh in one of the next phases because it's so small. Okay. Um, and so hopefully uh before a house gets built
um there will be municipal sewer. So, do they anticipate to connect on the 28 side or will they add another stub when we have off of off of Evergreen or Evergreen? Yeah. So, there's there is a T off the main uh the sewer main on 28
that goes into the road and stops. Uh it just needs to be continued all the way up the hill to service all the lots. Okay. Um to take advantage of the stub that was provided for this lot means that we would have to
disturb probably almost 300 ft of forest just to put a sewer line in connect this lot. Uh and all the other municipal services will be coming in from the panhandle portion of the lot. So it doesn't make sense to to utilize
that stub for for this lot unfortunately. Yeah. So, an additional stub will be added when they go down and all that work will be within 100 ft of the wetland. Okay. Is there an anticipated time frame on the evergreen or is that going to be next building for the sewer? Yes. Um could be three years,
could be five. Five. Okay. So, it's in the it's in the design period. Okay. Um so, uh lot 1A that that home that's built already has its own uh septic system. Yes. In place. Uh and then uh when we approve if we approve the
subdivision then you'll be coming back for the septic system plan for the house construction on 1B. We it would just be a standard filing would be uh so you unless they ask for an additional bedroom. Um I think it's a 30,000 foot
lot. Um so they they might ask for a fourth with IIA but um or it'll go to Judy Health Department. Yes. And then I just had um any other other questions on the board. Right. I I the lot line for 1B
it it goes from the apparently it goes from the road, but does it go all the way back to the to the uh abandoned cranberry block? Uh no, that's all town own land. Um so there there looks like a lot line from this one uh uh concrete
concrete uh uh block there post. the the westerly property line of lot 1B runs perpendicular to Route 28. Right. But it looks very very narrow. Is that going to pardon me? It looks very very narrow. What you see uh it it's a
panhandle lot. So the building the buildable portion of the lot is behind lot 1A. It's not even shown on the plan. Right. Because what you can see on this block plan it doesn't look buildable. Okay. I understand. Okay. Um yeah, Judy has uh reviewed this
and recommended for approval and um the septic system will come back for the health board anyway. So any other questions or uh comments? And so we're really uh just affirming a definitive sub approved in
2004. So maybe I can get a a um so I'll move that we approve this uh modification of the subdivision. Ron a second and then any input from the uh public. Nothing online. Okay. Um and then I'll
go ahead and take a voice vote. Um all in favor say uh yes. Carol Boyce yes. John Beckley yes. John Bowman yes. Dick Edwards yes. Noble Hansen says yes. So that is uh approved. Thank you. Okay.
Okay. And now second on the agenda is um a discussion of a short-term rental registration uh sort of report and update that um Judy has provided us. Um, and you
should have it in the packet, but basically it's been a year since the short-term rental really got rolling with Karen Shimaza, uh, the inspector and administrator of the program doing the work. And, um,
uh, I won't read the whole thing, but I can review it. So, there are 48 unregistered properties that have been contacted regarding short-term rental registration. And um they've been sent letters
um and what the health department and Julie are requesting is that they get our okay that they send a final notice letter to all 48 property owners with a clear registration deadline. And if they failed to make
that deadline, they would uh be required to appear before the board of health at a specific date. And um I think we can sort of discuss that, but we'll probably go ahead and vote just to give her backup. So these
408 properties have been identified because people have found listings in real estate sites. So somebody's been going through listings for Chadam. Yes. And has discovered 48 listings. Yes.
uh 18 of them uh uh with 2,24 reviews. What does that mean? So that is basically that on whatever website they're on, Airbnb, VBO, that people have stayed there and
left reviews on their stay indicating it's active rental. Yes. And that's that's why Karen separated between reviews and not reviews because if there's no reviews, I mean, it's still an active listing on that site, but you
know, with no active reviews, you don't know 100%. So, two or more letters have been sent. And what did it say in those letters? Did it say you must appear before the board of health? What What did it say?
You've been identified as someone who is renting a property illegally because you don't have a reg a a you haven't you haven't filed a registration. What what did the letter say? That's my understanding. Um we can get that verbiage from Karen who who is the one
sending those out. Any idea what roughly what you said? Yeah. Yeah. Just that they're aware that they are being rented or listed and that they don't have an active permit to do so. And did it and then did it say you are hereby ordered
to get a registration or I what what was the well that final paragraph of the letter when it when it said we have identified that you're renting this you have not registered the property then what did it say I don't
know what that what that previous letter said but I do know that the idea of this is to be able to bring them in front of the board of health. Okay. So that we can the next question is if we bring them before the board of health and we
find that they're in violation that they continue to rent and do not and have not registered what is our uh what are our options in terms of enforcement with that we would have to proceed with town council. We have
council authority to find them. We we can leverage an administrative penalty if we wish. To my knowledge, yes. I believe that was in the the rental regulation because we wouldn't want this to turn into another Milh Hill Road uh fiasco that 17 years later we're still
sitting here saying, "Right, well, we've we've had them here and they said, I'm just a poor person that that rents my my my house and I can't afford these registration fees." And then you know uh a year later they
come back and say the same thing. Uh there has to be some teeth. Yes. Yeah. My question is if I have an active listing but I'm not actually renting it.
Am I in violation of the regulation? Why would be an active listing if you're not planning on renting it? planning on could be different. Somebody could say that we filled in the paperwork. We know we're we know we we're registered to
rent, but we're not actively renting. Now, is that owner in violation of our regulation? Technically, no, because I believe I I we can get this is kind of Karen's expertise. she's the short-term rental um administrator and but to my
knowledge it isn't because if you don't rent it if you rent it for under 14 days a year the state determines that as not needing a registration. Oh really? I believe that's what it is. I think so too. And the other thing is um I know she's come across some that
say they're no longer renting. she requires something in writing from them. So, we can put it in the file saying remove them. And I think there is a um time frame when she sends those letters out um time frame to respond. You have
10 days to respond um and get you, you know, get your registration done, but they're mostly ignoring that. And our our uh uh rule does not say anything about if you only rent it for one week a
year, you don't have to register it, does it? I'd have to double check that. I don't remember anything in our reg. Yeah, I don't I don't know offhand the answer to that question. I know year round. You don't anything under 30 days? But I that's short term, but we never
said you can do short-term rentals once a year without without doing a a registration. I mean, the state may say that, but we didn't say that. In my head, I don't think it's in our regulation. Yeah. But the question is,
if you list your home for rent on a public site and you're trying to actively rent it, but you don't have a rent yet and you and you haven't registered, are you in violation of our short-term rental agreement? That's right. Which I would hope they would be,
but I think that would be a question. But active listings means it's it's one that's currently there. Yes, you can look it up. They're trying to rent for this summer. You can assume that. My inclination is to find is to find them,
but I don't want to lose that on the technicality that they can then say, "Oh, we did the paperwork to lease to rent, but we haven't ever rented it and so we're not in violation of of any
regulation." Yeah. So, uh, these 18 that have reviews. Well, the if they have a reviews, that's evidence. That's evidence of having but I think they need to provide something that they're not registering in order to say okay you don't have to they need to submit it and
say I'm no longer renting it or at least respond to the to the letter and we also have to make sure that an owner doesn't disregard compliance and simply say ah I'll pay
the penalty. In other words, it's not worth it's not worth my trouble. Like if I pay $300 penalty a year, I don't care. You know what I'm saying? We don't want to get to that point where
they can just Yeah. But I mean, it's presumed if they come before the board that one option would be to revoke their ability to get a short-term rental registration and be able to rent it ever. I don't do we have that authority? I don't know. I would think so. But I I
think I think that's when our regulation that you lose your registration and therefore you cannot rent. But if but if you go ahead and rent anyway then the only option is to have the police go out there and evict the people that are in
the that are in the house. We would yeah we would have to proceed with town council on on how to act on that when if I think what you'd end up doing is filing an administrative penalty for each and every day that they continue to you know which make it so that it hurts.
Yes more than the rental which can be $5,000 a week. Right. So the penalty would have to be $1,000 a day. Well, we'd have to look in our regulation to see we we have a a prescribed penalty for first and second offenders and it's
not going to be that much, but but that's what it would have to be. Yes. Um, do we know did Karen send her previous letters out by registered mail? Yes. So, we have proof of service. Yes. Okay. Okay. Well, I think the issue
before us though is whether we want to give our approval to the health department to send a final notice letter to all 48 property owners with a clear registration deadline and with the you know informing them that failure to uh respond means they'll be they'll have to
appear before the board of health and then I think we we can we can work out um a lot of the issues we're raising in preparation for that if they if they're coming and they may not show up then they wouldn't show up. So then then you need to you have to have another sentence in
that if you do not appear for this then you will start acquiring acrewing fines. Um it's like a show cause hearing. We require them to come in and notify us them or a representative present. Um I don't and if they ignore it what
happens? Do we do we have to specify the actual penalty? Mr. McGrath has ignored the show. Can it be by our discretion what we do when they appear here? I'm I'm pretty sure I'm I would check with Judy, but I'm pretty sure it's in our regulation that you have that authority.
Well, well, you add Okay. Before the board of health and some u general clause about uh with with a penalty based on the board's discretion at that time at that hearing or failure to show. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you could go so far
as to say that the reason for this is is to deal with the with the septic system being over overused and if you do not show up, then we will declare your septic system failed. Well, that's all and the house cannot be occupied. Yeah. And just just for clarification, I don't
think I don't think we have enough knowledge of the subtleties here. Yes. To to find our own path. So, I'm going to say that I would make a motion that we um endorse the uh plan set forth in
uh Judy's memo of uh May 28th for her and uh Karen to proceed with their plan to, you know, pursue better compliance on
the part of these 48 properties. Yes. And then we can have other conversations at another day. Yeah. And to dig and to send them out in a timely manner because presumably this will move right ahead. Yeah. Are we assuming that of these 94 letters that have been sent there have
been no replies? Um so to my knowledge is is that the numbers were much higher prior to her sending letters and then she had uh compliance after they received the letters and a lot of people did sign up. And just for clarification,
the 48 unregistered properties uh to my knowledge is also that you know a lot of the people own multiple properties. So it's not 48 people, it's 48 properties which are owned by you know there's some people who own four or five properties.
So, but the big picture is the vast vast majority of short-term rental properties in Chadam right now are properly licensed and and operating within the scope of our regulations and
this represents a small number. and she said, "Well, I would say I would say we probably don't know how many people are renting and don't list and just have repeat renters every summer and they collect the money. I mean,
there there's ways to get around it. So, there's we there there's probably are some that don't come come up at all on the radar, right? And we don't know that the people who have registered are following the rules because I know that
the house next to me has three bedrooms and there were 10 cars in in the driveway weeks ago. That's a that's a a whole different question. Well, I mean, I'm talking about compliance. Compliance means with the requirement registar because I think she is
inspecting and she's sort of following along. We don't really know all of that. I think it's more it's it's more than just doing nothing. She's she's in charge and she's I think she inspects them all. Yes. That's the goal. But she's not going to get to them all in
every single year. She's she's not driving out there to count how many people are in the properties. I mean, if it's a two-bedroom house and they're allowed to have six people, she's not driving out there at 9:00 at night and saying, "Oh, there's 10 cars in the
driveway." Uh these people are are not No. Does she respond to a neighbor complaint? Yes, I think she that would be the most common way for something for some interaction to occur would be a complaint from the neighbor that there are six cars parked in the lawn. Um and
I think she does some of that. She does. And she also goes in in the house too. Has appointments to go in there and does come ac quite a few. But she has to do it by appointment because of privacy and they got to put the bed away and they got
okay. So beds fold into the wall, right? But I think our step today would be to get this process started maybe with an extra sentence about penalties, but does someone want to make a motion and get Well, I already did make a motion
that we uh approve the proposed plan. Anything about penalty or I think we should add about the penalty at the discretion of the board or with the re with the with the additional requirement that the penalty appearance
before the board of health and board of health failure to appear before the board of health will result in a penalty penalties being assessed. We can discuss what it is because these these are people who have already ignored 94 letters right?
What makes you think they're going to come? Well, then maybe they just want to have a party. Well, I I actually think when you say you you may have to appear before the board of health, my past experience is that that usually is a stimulus that gets people to call and and set up. We take it seriously, you
know, with other things. Okay. You know, um Okay. It's um would anybody uh second that? I second. Second. Okay. And then any input from the public? Nothing online. There's no public.
Okay, then I'll take a voice vote. All in favor, um, say yes when I call your name. Uh, Carol Boyce, yes. John Beckley, yes. Ron Bowman, yes. Nick Edwards, yes. And Noble Hansen, yes. Okay.
So, we'll get that going and then if and if if Karen and Judy have some further question about what we we can talk about. Yeah. I can get more information on the language and everything. Okay. Okay. Um but the you know the big thing there
is short-term rental registration one year. It's it's going pretty well. She's got like close to a thousand people and we're we're it's wonderful. We've got something going like other towns around us have. So, it's a huge change from before. And I from all I've heard, she's been doing a really good job. Nice. Yes.
Okay. Uh let me ask one more question. If going forward u um we're not happy with some of these responses, if we called um Airbnb. and said, "This is the Chattam
Board of Health. Uh, and you are illegally uh uh listing a property that is not registered to rent in Chadam, and you must with withdraw that listing. What would happen?" She's had
them change the reg change the bedroom count on some of those. I think that was by the owners. Um, I believe some other towns have brought that up. I don't know if they were Massachusetts Town, Cape Cod Towns, what they were. And I don't
think Airbnb will take those off. You don't think they'll take them off? They'll continue to have illegal listings. I I think that's what the answer was, but we can double check on that. Well, the owner is paying to have it listed. Yeah,
that would be a legal thing. My guess is that Airbnb doesn't take responsibility for what's in the listing. That's your responsibility. They just list it. That's probably what they do. But that would be We can ask Judy about that as well. She may have some more information or we can
get a legal opinion, I guess. All right. Um, next. Next. Okay. Uh third in the agenda is a continued discussion and update on the transfer of facilities registration application and uh our
letter select board. Y and so we have a copy of a revision of a of a letter to the select board that we had a copy of at the last meeting. And I had one question. Has Judy sent this already to the select
board? I think she did last week because stated it's stated because it has to be on the June 10th next. Yeah. Was it Did they take it up? No, June 10th. June 10th. It's going to be June 10th, which means next Tuesday,
week from tomorrow. Yes. So, we should all go to the select board. Well, Ken, can Ken, good question. How how many of us can just um be sitting in the audience at the uh select board meeting representing the I mean talking about can we I think you all can can we we does is it does it become a quorum
where it's a meeting for us and all that I I really don't know but I think if you look at the letter and and what's going to happen I think some input from the board of health at that meeting will and I'm sure Judy will be there uh will probably be needed to clarify they
invited you to go Noble as the board chair. Judy probably clearly would be there. Okay. Yeah. And they should be tomorrow. But you should probably go at the least.
Yeah. Right. Okay. But I No, I think I will try to be there. Um because I think because I think it needs some clarification. So now did everyone get a chance to look at this? The so the this letter basically is asking the select
board to increase commercial hauler waste charge up to the level of surrounding towns. It's about half of the surrounding towns. Haritch, which runs a regional transfer center for some reason, is about twice the charge of of
Chattam. So there's a there's a there's a charging fee incentive for for someone to dump in Chattam instead of another town. Yes. Brewster does not accept any commercial hall dumping in their transfer station. Wow. Um Mr. Failyley
is is being bringing a larger proposal before the select board about fees. But one concern I would have is that our interest in the commercial waste hauler fee being increased may get lost in a lot of other things. He he wants to increase fees for appropriately
mattresses and sofas and a lot of things that that a resident would pay for. This is something the commercial hauler pays for. So, it's a little different. Um they may look at it different. I don't know. So, it's worth that clarification.
Um that's but that's the main reason for this letter and for us presenting our our opinion before the the select board. But it also goes on to go over the two other things that we're doing. Um, one is Judy Judy is doing is
strengthening the uh commercial haulers registration form with an attestation section saying that you're not dumping other towns trash at Chattam and you're not mixing it with other other towns. Correct. Um, and has Judy that Judy can do that on her own authority is my
understanding. She can do that on her own authority and that renewal is I think December. Yes. So that's all going to happen and it's like five five different statements. It says that you that they have read the the regulations, the waste disposal regulations which we actually write. Who knew?
Um and uh they'll abide by them and then no trash from other towns. The and that's Judy can do in her own. The third thing is amending a small amendment of our uh waste regulations which and Dick has brought
this up before is that the driver of the garbage truck when they're getting weighed, they hop out, they go over to the gate house, they sign a form that says uh attesting the fact that that trash is all just from Chattam. Correct. Not that we're trying to pin it on the
driver, but the driver would quickly pass that up to his employer and the employer can adjust the roots. That's what Mr. Philly said. They could just adjust the roots to make sure they're doing it right. John, this is based on the assumption, which I think is valid,
that the driver of that truck that appears has just gone around and collected the the garbage into that truck. So he is aware of where the garbage has come from, right? So when he attests there,
right there and then then he has firsthand knowledge of what he's attested to then the pressure is on him to have his employer adjust the roots if it's if it's he's being told to do that. Yeah, it was your idea actually, not Dicks. It was right at the last meeting. So those are that would require public
hearing, a change of the regulation and that process. Um, I think that would tighten it up very nicely. And I, Mr. Faley had some concern that in the summer it might be real busy and having the driver get out and walk 15 feet to the gate house and
check a sheet and then back the truck would be slow things down, but I don't think reasonably it would that much. They have to go on the waiter first though, right? They're that's Yeah, they're right next to it. right next to each other in the new when they when they redo the next section of the
transfer station, they're going to move the the weight thing right next to the gate house so they'll be right there be even easier. Okay. So any that's we're doing but that's also communicated open the window to the truck and they mean
they because they you know a lot of trucks have to pay according to what their their weight is. So, so many places you roll the window, the truck down, you lean out, and the guy's right there looking at the at the at the scale. So, but the difference the way it
is, but how many commercial garbage hauler trucks come into the transfer station every day? I don't know that question for Rob. I think you brought it up last we asked like 10. I think six or eight. It was around that number. I just
don't know exactly. You talking a day? Well, a day. I'm I know we licensed. But the other thing was how many tons if when when they empty their whole garbage truck, how many tons of garbage? But I think it's several. So it's $90 difference between our fee and the surrounding town. And if they're if they've got several tons with each load
and they're doing it five times a week, um you know, for them it's real money. Yeah. That they're saving. So there's an incentive. That's the thing. Yes. So this is June 10th. Okay. Um, also Judy is still working with Carrie from
Bonstable County and Rob to update the solid waste um regulation to to to make them get out of the truck and the attestation. No, any changes in the in the in the regulation, remember she was working with um Carrie from the Oh, some
some more global things. Yes. So when we when we have our public uh hearing to change this one part, there'll be some other things in there as well, right? because um she's involved with the whole cape. Um Carrie Carrie she I call her the trash lady. She's knows everything. So she's working with Judy and she um
and she uh Judy and Rob Philly and um other staff to ch to update that regulation. So, okay. So, this this letter has already been sent, so we don't have to it's all done, but I think June 10th, um I think our input to clarify things
depending on how the discussion goes might be needed actually. And I to me, but you know, we're kind of in in the weeds here maybe. It seems pretty clear that they would they would boost at least a trash uh per ton fee up to the surrounding
towns. That's pretty clear. Yes. Right now it does not even cover the outall cost, what they call the next stage. Oh, okay. Uh any input from the public on the um transfer station um letter? What we're doing there? Okay. Nothing
online. All righty. Any other questions from the board? N I think the Yeah. So are I Are you going to vote to support the letter? Oh, it's already out, but we can vote to support Yeah. Okay. But what can we take a vote to support the letter as written?
Sure. Uh so move second. Okay. And then um I'll take uh I'm supposed to take a voice vote on everything. I mean individual vote. Um when I call your name, say yes. Uh Carol Boyce, yes. John Beckley, yes. Ron Bman, yes. Dick
Edwards, yes. Noble Hansen, yes. Okay. All right. So that's And then we have the the application form's done and then we're working on the public hearing to modify the
regulations. All right. Four, continue discussion and review of a revised bedroom definition. So, this is something that we've been working on not as long as Milh Hill, I don't
think, but um and I'll just kind of review. So, Judy in our had a copy of her um policy for determining bedroom numbers I think at our last meeting. That's right.
Um and she has in our packet given a proposal which basically uh uses as a template the town of Hangingham guideline for determining bedrooms and other rooms in residential dwellings served by septic systems. It
sounds like that town has the same kind of issues and problems we have and they've addressed it pretty well and she's kind of used that as a template to to put a a a policy for us to uh consider. And um one question I have is
where would this policy be? Would this be a also a um a change in the nitrogen loading regulation which would go through a public hearing? So we have to check with town council. Judy was going to check with them to see if we can move
this forward as a standalone policy or if it has to be its own regulation. Um, obviously they're changed differently whether it's a policy or regulation. So, we have to see if we have the ability to do that has some statement about bedroom counts. Yes. Basically, what what this what we'd
be doing sounds like we would be replacing what's there with this statement more or less striking it and then probably gonna have a regulation change. But anyway, yeah. So probably that we can but I think and this is something that we're going to work on over time. It's not going to be right away but I mean I my own opinion this is
this is a pretty good start um but I'm sure there are questions and and issues um with the whole thing and so I'd just open it up for anybody has input or I have a question. Yeah. I don't like the um open concept
counting it as one room. So, if you have a house that has the open concept and you've got a kitchen, living room, dining room, but it's all open. You're counting it as one room. Then they happen to have four
bedrooms and a family room. So, technically, they only have six rooms. Yeah. So, they should only be allowed three bedrooms, but they have four. Yeah. We we run into that
sometimes. Not a lot. And when we see it, it's typically only dining room, kitchen or dining room. Yeah. Kitchen. Uh well, we'll see those. And then typically there's some sort of separation where the living room where we can count that separately. There is
another town on Cape. I don't know which one it is that will do it by square footage. So, we can look into the way they do that. Okay. If one if a single room is over say 400 square feet they would count that as x amount of rooms.
Um so we can look into that possibility. But so are you talking about the size of a room? No. But you have an open concept an open the great room in the in the in the first floor. You got a kitchen. Yeah.
Dining room or dining area. You've got a living room and there's nothing breaking it up. Right. But you and so you're only counting that as one room. So this gets to not bedroom but the total house room count which can be yesing. But you're only counting it
as one. So then they bring in four bedrooms and a family room and maybe a sewing room or and they they end up with six rooms for the whole house but technically they really have more because of the great room. Yeah. So they
try to address it here. Open concept where the large space has a small sub small dividing wall, half wall, pillars, built-in cabinetry or other architectural features that protrude into the space or obstructs normal movement within the space and produces a
defined visual demarcation shall be considered for title five purposes as separate rooms. So that's kind of a opens up some discretion about when when you say a great room is actually like two rooms. Often times the kitchen will have a counter that comes out, but it
may not. But it may not, right? And and you know, like in my house, the the the there's a a big front to back living room, and there's a little wall that comes in about a foot from each side that se separates it. It's like a living room and a and a and
a and a den. That's considered two rooms, right? You know, if if you didn't have that little one foot, you could argue wall, then you could argue that it's all just one room. So, you could conceivably have a house that has a
great room, a kitchen, a dining room, a living room without any with flat walls, just demarcated by the furniture. Yes. And that's one room. So you could have a a a great room and four bedrooms and it
would only be it would only be a five room house by by by this definition. So, I would think you could put another line in there that says in exceptional circumstances, you know, the board could
determine that even without the physical demarcation, a room serves the function of more than one room and therefore will be counted as more than one room. Well, you reference a square footage
exceedence. Yes. that requires if a room uh is sized greater than x square feet, it will be counted as a multiple room. Yes. In other words, there's some wording that references that. Yes. We
can look into that as a trigger. Yeah. Yeah. You could have a a a 500 square foot room. Yes. you know, with with a with a sink and a and a and a stove and then a dining room table and then furniture at the other end and it's one
room. Right. Right. Right. It would be at our discretion. Yeah. I mean that's a common situation. The great room, you know, counts as one room, but the language where you can do it otherwise something to talk about. Nantucket is a town that has more
specific regulations. They get into square footage 400 square feet over 400 square feet. I think it's it combined with some other things but then they presume it has is two bedrooms certain circumstances. So um they they do have a square footage
thing but I think yeah the great room is is it's an issue. So, and as soon as you make a regulation, they design and the architects will design absolutely to to to minimize the number of bedrooms, you know, number of
rooms max by doing whatever they need to do. If somebody says they want to have a a a five- bedroomedroom house, you know, on a on a, you know, they'll figure out a way to design it that it fits the letter of the of the regulation. What's
really nice about this one, I think, is the line that says that the board will utilize whichever method of calculation produces the most bedrooms. Either the absolute bedroom count or the total number of rooms divided by that's in
here. That's a line that Judy added to clear up the discrepancy that brought up because there's there's two separate things. There's the actual bedroom by definition and then there's the just a room divided by the total number of rooms in the house and that's another
one, right? So you've got to have a rule breaker which one takes precedent and that's what this sentence does. Yeah. And I I do believe we are going to we've been in discussion about striking the heat under a detached structure that serves as a um
and it has the list these three where it says heat, shower, toilet. I think we might be taking heat out just because summer summer rentals they can they plumbing permits without board of health sign off or space heater stuff like
that. Yes. Somewhere, right? Yeah. A detached structure. So it's like a room above a garage that's separate. So, this says if the detached structure lacks any one of the following
things, heat, shower, toilet, um then it would not qualify as a bedroom. So, you could have a detached garage, room above with heat and a toilet, but no shower. And by this rule, it wouldn't be a bedroom. Is that right?
Yes. But I think Yeah, that tightening up that's probably good. Yeah, I think that's it's Um I hope before I die this is done. Uh but I I do think um the language is
tricky. So we want to do something that really helps and that that they just can't easily design around. I mean they how how hard is it to remove a half wall or pillar? Um uh so that's working on the um detached
structures. the other one. Um, another another aspect and this gets to the room count, not bedroom, room count, and that's a loft. And so, uh, a loft accessed by a
stairwell less than five feet is a separate room regardless of its openness to the room below, I guess. Do we do we count that as a room now? If you So, you walk up the stairs and there's a loft and it's completely open to down below. Is that considered a room, not a bedroom? A room. That's
considered a room, but not a bedroom. Okay. So, that that goes along with what we're saying. Um the the other thing that I I think other questions are and another thing that jumps out at me
um on the first page bedroom and it lists the opening door the six foot you know thing we have but criteria to describe the physical attributes of a bedroom. A bedroom has the last one a degree of privacy.
Now that that's that's how they describe privacy. So the question you make in my mind is okay what does that mean? What what what um because we see a a room you walk up a flight of stairs there's a banister and you go in and we'll say well that's there's no privacy because
the the staircase and the banister is there so it's it doesn't have privacy so it's not a bedroom. We we've said that I think on a plan, right? But but but I think that that's the degree of privacy different than privacy that gives us
some leeway. So if we say that there's a room over the garage and there's a stairway that goes up there and you can only get to that by going down a hall and going up that stairway. Even though there's not a door, even though it's private, it still offers a degree of
privacy. It's off the beaten path. Now, does that is that would that be a change from what we do now? Yeah. Um, it's tightening up on Yeah, it's tightening it up a little bit. We look at that now, but giving us discretion then we just have to be we
would have to if if we start doing what Dick's talking about. Uh, be consistent. We have it can't be arbitrary. Set a president and be say it's at least 30 feet from the nearest but and then in that case we're going to say it has privacy. Yeah. But all right, it's a
slippery slope, but once we start refereeing those, we've got to be consistent. Right now, the other thing that's here when talking about other rooms, uh the second page, the back of the
first page, other rooms on the bottom. Um an other room would be any room with a within a residential dwelling other than a bedroom. Well, maybe that's not um it's it's when it's talking
about basements and she has the asterisk here which goes back to Yeah. here. Bathrooms, closets, hallways, foyers, mudrooms, unfinished attics, and unfinished basements are not counted as
other rooms. But it says other an unfinished basement means an unfinished means no drywall, no finished flooring, no rough plumbing, no electrical, then it's not a room. So if you have a basement that's
drywalled in, it's it's a room. Do we do that now? So we we haven't No. Just because people when they were building houses, part of the way they would get around it is they would submit it as unfinished storage. They would have drywall. you don't need building permits to finish the flooring. So, they would
go finish the flooring. The the plumbing would be roughed in. We don't sign off on plumbing permits. They'd get plumbing permits and then it's a bedroom. So, this is getting around that because now with unfinished, right? Or unfinished room. They need these permits, which we will sign off. Not talking about bedrooms because the basement then you
need egress and windows and all that. But this is just a room. Yes. So, if you have a basement and it's got drywall, it counts as a room. Yes. According to this, which is stricter and probably reasonable. And I mean, I think what
Judy says that they'll sometimes, you know, put in I don't I don't I'm speculating here. Drywall and there'll be some rough plumbing behind it and it'll be the electric will be there so they can come in later and kind of do the whole thing and it's all pre-planned, right? That may be that's the biggest one we're seeing with
unfinished run. You are seeing it. We we have seen it. Yes. Right. So that's real. So I think that is a good change. Um, so, so that would be a room in terms of the total room count. Correct. Yeah, that would work to the whole the room
and then the presumed bedrooms and if the presumed bedroom is, you know, you have a fourbedroom septic, but the presumed room count comes out five, doesn't mean you get an extra bedroom. It means that your house is presumed to be too big for that septic. Um,
so I think there's a lot of things in here that are a big help and it's it's it's templated off this Hangingham thing. The other one to look at though if you're looking I think is Nantucket. I think Nantucket has had some very strict rules and um
I'll take a look at that. So and then and then we have to find out how this is done. I'm guessing that it'll wind up being a change of the regulation which will go through a public hearing and all that in the paper and all that kind of thing. And I my my feeling is
that it's worth I don't want to do the Mil Hill thing, but it's worth taking some time to get some good language in there that really helps us. Um they can't easily be worked around, right? Um and I know Tantucket's been dealing with this because they have a problem that's much worse than ours in
terms of building and Oh, yeah. crowding and stuff. We're making progress. Mhm. I mean, if you look at the total number of variance requests for additional bedrooms from two years ago versus now,
it's fallen off a cliff. Yeah. We used to do two or three, right, additional bedroom variance requests at almost every meeting. Yeah. Right. A lot of it was if you put in an IIA, you automatically got an extra bedroom no matter how many bedrooms you already had. Right. That was a big change. Do
you think that's the the decrease is because of our changes. I do. It's definitely a little bit of both, right? In my opinion. Okay. So, that's good. I think I think um so you can you can taking copious notes and communicate all of this to
Judy. Yeah. Yeah. And um we'll we'll we'll talk about it again uh when she's here and follow up. Other any input from the public and any other comments from the board? But it's worth it's tough. I mean, the other thing I haven't done is
go back to the current nitrogen loading regulation and see what that actually says about bedrooms. But I think what's going to happen is you just toss that whole part out and put this in as the thing. Yeah. Okay. Other comments or questions
or No. Okay, that's four. And so then next we have any public comments, future agenda items request. So, I'm assuming that the bedroom thing will come back. Uh, we did the letter, we did the
registration. So, that's the one. And then we have the other outstanding things. We have um led in the airport. Um, Milh Hill and this Mil Yeah. Milh Hill. Milh Hill is a townwide effort involving legal counsel and it's
and uh Mr. Burman is kind of our uh representative there. That's no updates for today. I haven't had a recent update. No, but last there's Yeah, they're they're working on it. And I think Mr. Burman is um he's representing us and he's trying
to push it, you know, as best he can. But so I think there's I think I think there's a commercial any day now. Solid effort. Okay. Well, it started perhaps decades before we got involved. And don't forget how we remember how we got involved.
The town attorney came and told us the easy way to get this done would be if the board of health handled it as a public nuisance instead of the select board, which is the licensing authority for illegal for junkyards, um, didn't handle it. And we said, "Okay." And now turns out it was pretty
hard. Anyway, anything future agenda? Short-term rental the um penalty for not complying at a future meeting. Okay, then we can we can put we can make that an agenda
thing to talk about um penalties compiance what our options were. Yeah. Short-term rental. Yeah. um penalties and the legal aspect section and see whether we can do that with it as written or not. Okay. Other um what
about PAS in the wells have uh any updates on that? We've not seen any reports. I don't have any updates today. I think they've been negative. I think it's non detect I believe. Yeah. Well, we could have um I think uh Tom Bar
handles the um the water. Is it or Mr. Failey? I think it's Tom. Tom. I believe it's Tom. I think it's Tom. And we could have him come in and give us an update on the the wells. Usually we have just enough wells to supply the summer water. Well, if anything happens, wells go down or PAS
or whatever, then it gets to be a problem. We're in trouble. But we could ask him to come back just for a quick update. And we used to get a report showing the testing. Yeah. At least if we can get we can get that pest. Okay. There's an annual report that comes out.
Y now what's the uh what's the current classification of the groundwater table? Are we what are we still now this summer? This summer as we approach the summer where are we in
terms of um water conservation? We're in water conservation. We're in Yeah. Well, mandator declared a a mild drought in on Cape Cod and the the the level of the
water in the test well is down slightly from where it was a year or two ago. No, 10 years ago, you know, it's much it's better than it was a couple of years ago. It's getting better, you know, but you keep hearing all these different
stories and that the what what Bob Duncinson used to say is there's enough water in the aqua aquifer to last us for 200 years. It's infrastructure and and and and the problem is we're not we don't have enough wells to pump enough
water. that the the reason we have all these signs up in Chadam now has nothing to do with the level of water in the aquifer. The quantity solely because we only have two water tanks and we only have a number of wells that that we have
not increased significantly. And then the water department published a decision that they made saying the way to deal with the water shortage is to raise prices on the water. And and so that wealthy people can irrigate their lawns with the water or can use as much
water as they want, but poor people can't. And and and and they and they use that decision to make the decision not to try to dig more to not spend the money to dig more wells. And every year the population of Chattam keeps going up
in the summer. Every year we draw more water. We I don't think we should be talking about this. This should be on an agenda item. Oh, well. Yeah, we This is what we're Yeah. So, we'll put it on. Yeah. Okay. We'll put it on the agenda. Yes.
Um and Okay, good. Yeah, that's right. Um I'll make a motion. I'll make Any other agenda item requests that come to mind? Can we Well, were you going to move that we discuss the the the water sit? Yeah, we'll put
that on the agenda. We can just we can just decide for a next part of our perview to make sure there's enough water in the town. I I think we need to be refreshed on processing plan is finishing sometime soon probably. Okay. I'll make a motion we accept the
draft minutes of May 5th May 19th 2025. Okay. And I'll second just to get it done. All right. And I'll take a roll call vote. All in favor say I. I want to call your name. Uh, Carol Boyce, I. John Beckley, I. Ron Bowman,
hi. Dick Edwards, hi. Noble Hansen. Yes. Okay. So, those are approved. And then, uh, can I get a motion to adjourn the meeting? So, move. And, um, take a voice vote. Carol Boyce. Yes. Second. Yes. John Beckley. Eron
Bman. Yes. Yes. Uh, Dick Edwards. Yes. Don't we have to? Is this a new policy? Every every motion has to I have I have heard I've been told or heard that that we are supposed to take roll call votes for all our votes and not not by
acclamation by unanimous because people have to be able to see who's voting what way you know if it's unanimous but I but that I've been told that that's the way we're supposed to do it. So, okay. So, we are adjourned and the on air sign will go off pretty shortly,
I think.