[Music] [Music] [Music] hi it's Brandon from cran Appliance since 1983 our goal as a family-owned company has been simple to give our
neighbors on the cap and Islands a great shopping experience rest easy knowing our professional team will listen to your needs and help you pick the perfect appliances for your home at crane Appliance we know how difficult Appliance shopping can be our team is here for you crane Appliance we call the
cap and Islands home Carlson printing 508 548 7303 our email address is Carlson printing aol.com Carlson printing for all your printing needs needs John's Liquor Store 729 Main
Street fouth 508-5474 2025 at exactly 5:30 and at this time I would entertain a motion to go into executive session to discuss m General Law chapter 30A section 21 A3 to discuss strategy with respect to
litigation fouth southernly LLC where discussion in an open session would have a detrimental effect on the litigating position of the town of Falmouth and Mass General Law chapter 30A section 21 A3 to discuss strategy with respect to
litigation P product liability class action where discussion in an open session would have a detrimental effect on the litigating position of the town so move Madam chair second okay I have a motion in a second any further discussion amongst the board seeing none
all those in favor by roll call please zalinsky I brown I Goldstone I Taylor I and I expect to return to open session at 6:30 good evening and welcome to the meeting of the fouth select board the
select board is returning from executive session it is Monday February 24th 2025 it is exactly 6:30 and as we get started I'm going to ask you please silence your cell phones and double check that they are indeed
silenced and if you are making either an audio or video recording of This open meeting session thank you please notify me as chair and the placement and operation of the recording equipment should not interfere with the conduct of this meeting and I would ask you to
please join me for the Pledge of Allegiance I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and
justice for all thank you any recognitions from the board nothing special this week NOP okay any announcements from members of the board for the good of the public Miss Goldstone um as uh Black History
Month draws to a close we've got a a few more uh events this week There's a free author talk slavery and abolition on Cape Cod um at hi Highfield Hall and Gardens at 5:30 on Thursday and then uh on Friday at 5:00 down at MBL in Woods
Hole is uh the community harami um celebration again that's free and open to the public um and then I also wanted to note uh two other upcoming events uh uh farming fouth is going to be screening uh a movie food and Country uh this Friday evening and on Saturday at
the mash P Middle High School um there's going to be a talk on the rights of Nature and knowing that we adopted a a rights of nature declaration last year um an opportunity to learn a little bit more about that excellent thank you any other announcements from board members uh Mr Brown I have on my calendar that
there's a meeting at the mass military civilian community council meeting um February 26 at 5:30 at the Welcome Center building and I believe that's to talk about the composting possibility it's on the
agenda yes yes great thank you any other announcements public comment is there anyone here for public comment okay public comment may be made on routine matters not on the agenda this
evening comments are limited to 2 minutes please introduce yourself and since the matter has not been included on the agenda the select board will not participate in any discussion or debate of your topic please thank you my name is Katherine Jansen I'm the chair of the Falmouth
bicycle and pedestrian committee I'm also on the board of friends of Falmouth bikeways and on The Advisory board for vision zero Cape conod I offer you a small selection of hits July 27 second an 18-year-old running on the shining
sea Bikeway hit in the crosswalk on Locust Street August 1 2023 a Main Street couple after their dinner at a Main Street restaurant hit in the crosswalk going to their park car September 3rd a pedestrian in the
crosswalk at manat almost hit by a motorcycle grazed the guy wasn't hit simply because the motorcyclist chose to lay the motorcycle down and take the hit themselves December 20th Main Street in the crosswalk at post office Road
pedestrian hit and on January 12th of this year A 73-year-old man was hit and killed on Dillingham and gford in the crosswalk Our Town needs to protect vulnerable Road users because humans will always lose in car versus
human so far town has resisted things like speed tables due to cost worries about plowing concerns about them becoming widespread the speed table but I ask what is the cost of a life and what is the cost to our town once we get a reputation of not being
safe for walking walking around downtown it's not the sole responsibility of DPW I have tremendous respect for Mr mcconnery his team and DPW but it is not their sole responsibility it is part of a strategic
plan for Public Safety in this town and furthermore they need significant get funding to do this instead of one by one different intersections being identified then you got to scramble for funding then you got to put it all together so I'm asking the select board to act on
Public Safety starting with your strategic planning process thank you thank you thank you anyone else here for public comment okay we are a little bit early so I am going to skip over to the
consent agenda and I will read through the consent agenda and if there's any uh item that needs to be held please notify me as the chair okay uh administrative orders consider a vote to approve the petition Petition of NSTAR Electric Company doing business as eversource energy and
Verizon New England Inc for permission to install one new Jo poll on tur hu and drive to be labeled 57-45 approximately 80 ft west of an existing pole 5 74 this pole location is
necessary for a new underground cable line from ever the eversource station 933 consider a vote to approve the petition of NSTAR Electric Company doing business as eversource to install along Redwing Terrace two new manholes
100014 d035 and 1 0114-011 section of direct buried cable along Pebble Lane and Redwing Terrace and install fault indicators consider a vote to approve the petition of NSTAR Electric Company
doing business as eversource energy to install on pebane two new manholes 1 01455 and one11 14-651 buried cable and install fault
indicators consider a vote to accept a donation in the amount of $500 from Joan tewell to the cultural Council donation account for music at the table with our thanks and appreciation consider a vote to accept the amendment to a water easement and
drainage easement of 64 Technology Park from Falmouth edic hold thank you Mr Mcall consider a vote to opt in to early voting in person for the May 20th annual Town election okay and our last consider a
vote to approve the solar rooftop leap lease with select energy Development LLC for the water treatment plan 650 gford Street Madam chair staff is requesting the select board hold that item we have some more work to do we'll bring that back on a future agenda okay so you're
asking us to take that off the consent agenda okay thank you so I'm looking for a motion to approve uh the consent agenda a through D so moved I'll second it okay I have a motion and a second any further
discussion amongst the board seeing none all those in favor I opposed okay it's unanimous uh I'm going to go to F uh consider a vote to opt in early voting in person for May 20th annual election
motion move approval thank you could I have a second I'll second it all right I have a motion and a second any further discussion amongst the board all those in favor opposed unanimous okay e Mr Mcall uh just that I need to abstain
from this matter as I'm a member of the edic okay so we can move to approve if I could have a motion Madam chair I'll uh move to approve item e on the consent agenda uh with Mr Al's exstension I'll second that okay I have a motion in a
second any further discussion amongst the board seeing none all those in favor I I opposed abstain thank you all right and we are still early so let's look at review and vote minutes to
approve the minutes of the public session October 25th 2021 Doug you're all over this one you and I get this is it you have to vote it right just I do that's it yeah I think it was in order I I thought it was okay as well to slip
through the cracks so would you make a motion sir I remove approval of the minutes of October 25th 2021 okay and I will need to second that motion so we have a motion in a second any further discussion amongst the board seeing none all those in favor I all those opposed
or abstain AB abstain thank you we do two approvals and three extensions can we do Tom manager report no I'd rather do number four do it later number four you like to do it number okay can do number four let's look at
number four I'm sorry I'm all over the place we're taking these out of order but because we have published a public hearing you have to do it by time we want to do the fem 10 meeting Oh I thought we did okay you guys distracted me all right go ahead I thought those were in order as well unless anybody has
comments okay I would move approval unless there's any any other edits there were uh a number of minor capitalization issues that could be reviewed in those minutes but I would second a motion to approve the minutes will you send those
edits forward I can do that yes this gostone that would be great okay we have a motion and a second to approve the February 10 2025 minutes with some edits provided by miss gostone all those in favor I opposed okay motion car is
unanimous thank you all right we're going we're still a little bit ahead so we're going to look at number four yes uh discuss and consider the approval of a letter to the Cape Cod Commission concerning a conservation restriction for
4159 and 48 theater drive and zero boxbury Hill Road attorney O'Keefe I think we're sending this one over to you sorry is this item four yes okay so um before you is a request from
um pure Sky solar who has submitted another application to the Cape Cod Commission for the um large scale ground mounted solar array that will be placed at the um Cape Cod Country Club so be uh something that the Cape Cod Commission
is very interested in hearing from this board is that their concerns about plac in a conservation restriction um have been heard and that the this the select board is interested
and is hopeful to be able to place a conservation restriction on the property there was there was some testimony before the Cape Cod Commission the last time that they were um that the applicant was before the the CCC um that there were concerns about
how the conservation uh restriction would be le legally structured um because one of the Visions for this property is to conserve part of the parcel uh under a conservation restriction and then save another part
of the parcel for possible Municipal purposes somewhere down the line after the decommissioning of the solar array that would require a different kind of restriction um for affordable housing and usually what you do is you subdivide
a lot in order to clear clearly place a restriction on one parcel and then a different restriction on the other parcel but if you try to subdivide this lot it impacts the economic feasibility of the solar array because then the different Parcels have different setbacks and that would mean taking some
of the solar panels away from the project um long story short we've figured out a way to put different restrictions on the parcel without having to subdivide it it took some negotiation with the land court but
working with Council for Pure sky and with representatives from the land Court we we've figured out a way to do that so the Cape Cod Commission is simply asking for a letter from this board um showing that not just continued support for the
project but also acknowledging that um the town has found a way forward to uh conserve um the property not just for affordable housing but also for conservation purposes so that's the purpose of the letter questions from the
board Mr zinsky so so does that destrict or that that um that order from this board will that continue in perpetuity after the the ground lease for the solar or is it does that end at the end of
that ground lease and gets re rediscussed or reworked the conservation restriction would be in perpetuity and that that was the real focus of the concern for the Cape Cod Commission they want to make sure that the amount of acreage that um is on the table right
now to be conserved uh for conservation restriction will be secured in perpetuity it's about 10 acres right now um the uh it is possible that there could be an affordable housing restriction placed on the property which
could possibly be in perpetuity also but that's still a negotiation um my recommendation would be just to hold the rest of the parcel for municipal purposes to allow the town to have more leeway with whatever the town wants to
do with it in 30 years thank you thank you madam chair questions from the board I'm going to go to miss Goldstone and then I'll come back to Mr Brown attorney O'Keefe I'm wondering if you could just say a little bit more about the mechanism that you've worked out with the land court for actually accomplishing um the conservation
easement because while I fully agree that it's been the intention of of this board to accomplish a conservation easen I'll I'll say I'm a little uncomfortable with sending a letter vouching for that without understanding what the mechanism for accomplishing that actually is when as you say a lot of it is still under
negot the other specifics around the partial are still under negotiation sure but I mean the part about figuring it out with the land court is is settled all that needs to be done is drop the plans and what the land court has has agreed to accept is that we will have
detailed plans delineating the areas of the various restrictions so instead of officially parceling out um the property into different deeded units it will still remain as one deeded unit um or
that that it will exist as it is with the existing Parcels with no further subdivision and will'll just show um very clear lines on a plan um and submit
that for approval with the land Court Mr Brown so originally I thought we had agreed that we wanted to delineate some areas for affordable housing that we wouldn't wait for 30 years that would be available like the Ranch Road section can you refresh my memory about what was
the outcome of that I don't know that we've really been struggling just to to resolve this conservation restriction issue um my understanding is that the we don't have specifics about the affordable housing yet that that hasn't been determined with any with any
certainty it's still part of the conversation and a vibrant part of the conversation but we're focused on trying to um figure out the 10 acre conservation parcel right now okay that that was part of the developers original
pitch was that there was ancillary land that was coming under their ownership that wasn't needed for the the solar array Ranch Road in particular and it it's still part of the conversation absolutely and a and important part and that would be under select board
jurisdiction as well then yes okay cuz I I got the feeling from the description that we're putting everything under conservation I I didn't I didn't really understand so there 10 acres that's going to be select board perview is that
10 acres will be under a conservation restriction and it's undetermined whether it will be under the select board jurisdiction or under the Conservation Commission or maybe the 300 committee we haven't gotten that far really the point of this letter is that the the Cape Cod Commission wants to
know that the select board's on board for that 10 acre conservation restriction parcel that's what they want to hear from the select board right now right but I I don't really understand what I'm on board with honestly that we're going we're we're focused and amenable to conserving the 10 acres
under a conservation restriction how many in total uh I don't I don't know off the top of my head okay Mr mcll did you have a question just just a couple of questions and or edits and I did share these earlier with the
with attorney o'keef and first I want to compliment her for working with the applicant and the Cape Cod Commission to uh to make this happen uh I just thought that uh that in the first paragraph where it says uh at the end and now
offers additional details concerning the proposed conservation restrictions I I don't really see the details uh I I think we have a general indication of support but uh again it's just word smithing but I don't think we're really
offering any additional details uh and then in the um in the last sentence uh towards the end uh where it says the select board has been informed and wishes to convey that the
town and the are confident and I'm not sure that we're in a position to say what the applicant uh is uh doing or saying so I would modify that Clause to say the select board has been informed
and wishes to convey that the town with the continued support or cooperation of the applicant is confident that the proposed conservation goals can be achieved in a way that will benefit all I'm happy to make those changes thank
you any other question Miss gone yeah given the conversations we've had in the intention to conserve roughly 10 acres of the parcel is there a reason we would not make that commitment in this letter rather than saying that is to um Our intention is to conserve a portion of the land as opposed to it is Our
intention to conserve roughly 10 acres of the land you you'd like to put in the exact amount of the I can do that I just don't know what the number is right now I thought you just said it was 10 acres approximately I I would get the actual
number yes absolutely okay any other questions comments Mr Brown did you have another oh I can't scroll fast enough to get to the letter here took me a while too it's a huge packet that's what
happens when we take things out of order anything else you'd like to add Mr Mcall not today okay I think with the adjusted language I'd be fine with it thank you okay any further discussion would anyone like to make a
motion I guess I would move approval of the letter as with edits as suggested by Mr Mcall and Miss Goldstone second okay we have a motion in a second to approve with the Amendments any further discussion amongst the board seeing none
all those in favor I oppose unanimous thank you thank you okay now we can go to our public hearing um Mr zalinski for the notice please thank you madam chair as provided under chapter 119 of the code of Falmouth a public hearing will be held in the select board meeting in
Falmouth town hall on Monday February 24th 2025 at 6:45 p.m. to establish and promate fees which are effective as of June 1st 2025 to be charged by the town departments and agencies except as
provided by mgl school department planning board Library town clerk Town Treasurer and collector of taxes proposed changes in fees are listed below uh as posted Nancy uh Robins
Taylor chair things should be links that we can okay thank you for the notice and I think we have um our Recreation director Julie Williams tinum here to present you're coming up I'm not doing I don't know how to plug in I don't do I have to plug in what do you need for me
uh Peter will help you okay thank you don't need this oh I don't even need it it was ready though good iing until exactly 645 I didn't know if you so it is a PDF because that's the
only version I had use these arrows to go back and forth not up and down but right left okay I'll try my best we'll start from the beginning maybe that's a good idea yeah thank you for having me I don't know that what we're doing here hi hi welcome so the first the first
presentation is um increasing oh am I that loud no it's not you it's all the way down I don't know always heard that I was loud that was a lot I'll try is um why we need to increase summer our summer adventure
program fees so our summer adventure program has maintained the same fee since at least 2006 that's the far as back as the files that I could find um we did see in 2001 they were a little bit less um but um we've maintained the
same fee since at least 2006 but we do have Rising operational costs increasing participant needs and we'd like to adjust our fees to make sure that we're offering quality program and better supporting our buiness so our current free structure
that we have is $75 a week um we do also charge $25 per Extended Stay per session um and then I added some other towns in here too so you could see what they charge match be 185 Boys and Girls Clubs 195 a week YMCA 38250 a week some of
them are about the one that's closest to us is Brewster which is about $130 a week there um we do have increased I don't know why just scroll down a little bit SC thank you um so what I have Kevin for so
we do have increased costs and this is just one example of a program that we've used since 2006 so our cost for Mad Science in 2006 was $275 and um last summer it was $435 so we that was a 58% increase and we have increased our fee
0% um there's also in inreased staff costs in 2009 the estimated average hourly wage was was hourly wage for our summer employees was 1026 and in 2025 the approximate is 1881 again 86%
increase um we also have an increasing social emotional needs of students this is um data from Desi so we see a trend over time of decreasing students student population in town but we have an increase in our adjustment counselors which is great I think it's really great
that students are getting the support they need um in schools and we need to also provide that in our summer programs as well there's a lot of data here too with ratios um so we have growing needs despite declining numbers in our town
and just like schools our summer our summer or campers our participants have growing social emotional needs so we would like to or we will be adding a head counselor position it's imper imperative to have for our programs we have a lot of um really great high
school and college kids who come and are counselors for us and it would be great to have head counselor positions but addressing the needs and the challenges that we have mean we need more money and I think one of the ways to do that is to increase our
fees so we're going to take we're asking to increase the fees from $75 a week to $100 a week which would still be less than any other of the communities that we've we've talked about so can we ask questions as you're going along sure I
have two one um do if a family a Falmouth family cannot afford the increase or the price is there a way that you offset that for kids yes absolutely we have we do offer scholarships to each of the elementary schools we offer a set number of
scholarships to each school and then as um they if they ask for additional they have additional families that have need we will provide those and we we would continue to do that as well as U families who come in and ask for and I know the getting in is is competitive because you have a lot of applications
and I'm wondering if Falmouth kids come first yes thank you Mr mcell well uh your first question was one of the ones I wanted to ask so thank you but the second question is maybe for for for Peter or uh or Mike where do these fees
go when they're collected do they go into the town general fund general fund so I mean how how do we know that that's going to generate a new head counselor position which I assume would be in the budget for next year it's in the budget
it is in the budget it's in the budget for this year yes okay and the increase fee wouldn't actually fully cover we also asked for a 25% increase in our summer adventure program budget this increase would not would not fully cover that those additional
costs um to your last Point actually um and my first question was are there scholarships given that there are scholarships or a mechanism um to uh assist families for whom the cost is a barrier um given that you're looking at
50 to 85% cost increases to date and only asking for a 25% fee increase for a family that can afford $100 a week they can probably afford $125 a week why wouldn't you actually set that fee just a little bit higher to
cover more of those costs provide more leeway for the scholarships for the families who can't afford it at all that's would be a great idea I have heard historically it's been um it's been a challenging conversation to have to increase fees so we started at a
place where we thought that we're still well below the other communities so I love that you'd like us to ask for even more fees thought this would be a place to start we can reevaluate it Mr Brown sort of a public service and we do have a lot of families that are in need and even
though they might not want to declare it it's still helpful go ahead all right um so this is my last slide so just as far as our next steps for this for this piece would be um communicate as early as we can any changes be
transparent about the funding where the funds will go and we were hoping that the the new fees would be effective for summer 2025 and as you see there increase number of sces as necessary great any other questions on this piece no do are we going to vote
them separately or all together I would seem we might want to vote them separately you I think we can vote them as one that's the way we have it listed but we can certainly if the select board's pleasure separate them out into two separate
votes would you like to make a motion Mr Mcall well i' I'd make a motion to uh to increase the uh fees for the summer adventure program uh as presented second okay have a motion and
a second any further discussion amongst the board seeing none all those in favor I passes unanimously okay fantastic so the um next oh boy is there another one [Music] presentation I think you may have
advanced it too much because I think Venture sale was the second one I think the the first one the adult slides were before the summer slid were the first before this separate that didn't help either it's not it's it's not loaded so
she you should use your laptop want to show the slides you're doing fine somewhere this is the is that your packet yeah there we go there we go are we ready yep
we're ready so the we'd like to Institute program fees for adult sports programs that's our next fees um right now we charge no fees for any of our adult sports program and just a reminder we do charge fees for our youth programming um we also have increased
participation from non-residents and we as we're well aware in 2025 we have growing operational and maintenance costs so this is um a presentation um hopefully to get some fees so we can improve program supplies maintenance and manage non-resident use of town
facilities so um we have rise in costs increased demand due to non-resident participation and we would like to have Equitable cost sharing among participants um there are obvious benefits to doing these things so we have two proposed fee structures for um
adult programs right now again we charge our youth our youth sports program $30 per session which is usually six or eight weeks um we're suggesting that we have our option A here is to charge $30
per session like we do for our youth so it would be um eight weeks and it would be for example we have um women's soccer on Monday night so it would be eight weeks from this date to this date eight sessions that you pay $30 for for
residents 40 for non-residents um the other option is a punch card system which is done through um our software program that we currently use for our Recreation programs so it would be $30 for eight punches so it's eight visits so a session isn't one time
coming to the recreation department for your program it would be a session so usually eight weeks we do six to eight weeks youth any questions on that piece well so is it an I'm sorry is it an option that people will be given or
you're looking for direction as to either A or B well so initially I presented this to the rec committee and provided two options and um was hopeful that they would have some direction and they said that either would be great so if you have I I I think that a punch
card would be a great system for us to use if we had all of the technology that we needed currently in place which we don't have yet so it would be very difficult to manage it would be probably like an oldfashioned punch card instead of a digital punch
card um so for us at this current state if we were starting this tomorrow I would want to use option A for the Mak sense Mr Brown did you have a comment no that was the same question I said I guess I would recommend that we approve it with the flexibility to manage the program as you
see fit as you see fit I'll check it I would agree with that I guess that's a motion unless there's more questions there more to I think more to this is great willing and able get going so um I
just did a breakdown of our average average weekly participation data this is pen and paper so I did the best that I could so for volleyball we have residents usually 10 non-residents 15 our basketball data 15 average residents
eight non-residents soccer five residents three non-residents this is they happen once a week we pickle ball we don't allow non-residents to participate so there's an average about 230 residents um each week um there's multiple sessions of those so we did a
breakdown of an estimated Revenue based on the participation that we have currently Mr mcal with with respect to your estimates uh I worked the numbers and I I didn't come up with those numbers but I don't think I wasn't able
I don't know how many sessions we're we're talking about so I assume that some of those programs have three sessions some might have more or less I mean is that where the discrepancy is so we looked at um we were looking at which sessions run not all sessions run all
year long so some run all year long some run for a certain months so because pickle ball is we only do that indoor pickle ball when um during the winter our participation wanes as as the warm weather comes I mean it it does seem that don't run that year round right but
it does seem that uh pickle ball seems to be the biggest part of this Revenue uh I wonder what type of response if any you've had from the rather vociferous pickle ball community in town
vociferous what's wrong here so we did have some pickle ball folks came to our Recreation committee and spoke up mostly in support they pay in other towns already so okay thank you keep going I won't let them interrupt you
again so it's as if you knew what the next slide was so um we did look Kevin and I were looking at some different communities and what they charge um so we tried to pick some different um different activities but everybody does charge so it was usually four to5
dollars a visit for residents um a little bit more for non-residents so ours would be less for our residents than other communities and about on par for our non-resident fee um I also did a graph just because I don't have to make a whole another slide the one on the right there is I took I took one week
and and counted like what towns folks come from just so you can see for the ones who are coming from out of town where and of wear folks the numbers don't exactly add up to the other one because again pen paper each week they came from different places but I just wanted to show you know how far folks
were traveling to come to our facility and so in closing we'd like to introduce fees and do you have any questions thoughts C curious about the 375 why not just $4 so you going to be
making change all the time we we tried it'll it will be done through our um software program so it's paid online but they um it's it's a session so it's $30 per session which we just for the eight weeks and break down okay we're not going to do the punch card so it's all
or nothing yeah so and even with a punch card you have to purchase the entire punch card so it would be $30 yeah and we just we tried to keep keep that because that's what we charge for our youth programs got it thank you m gostone um same as last time are are
scholarships available either for the Youth or for the adult programs with these fees absolutely we don't want to prevent people from participating but do we need public comment on be hearing well we're going to we will in a minute if the board is
done any other question questions or comments from the board no okay any comments from the public regarding this hearing okay seeing none I'll entertainment a motion to close the hearing so move second okay I have a
motion in a second to close the hearing any further discussion amongst the board seeing none all those in favor I I discussion amongst the board I think it was Mr Brown who wanted to make the motion I would move approval of the fee changes by the rec department as presented I'll second Mr Brown's
motion mad chair okay I have a motion in a second any further discussion amongst the boards seeing none all those in favor well done good luck excellent thank you okay we're going to move into business discuss and consider a draft
charge document and vote to approve establishment of a short-term rental advisory committee Mr Renshaw thank you madam chair select boards um as you all recall uh the January 27th meeting I provided a brief kind of outline summary background of the outstanding efforts of
the planning board uh in establishing a short-term rental working group uh the group started meeting in March of last year uh finished up their series of meetings in August of last year as a result of that great work a uh draft uh short-term rental bylaw was presented to
the select board in anticipation of town meeting the presentation date was September 9th of last year um the uh select board as you recall opted to indefinitely postpone that um due to um the consensus that some additional work needed to be
done on January 27th select board uh directed me to draft a uh draft Mission charge document um for consideration um you have a copy of that draft Mission charge in your packets um you also have a copy of the
committee appointment policy I wanted you to have a chance to review that as well um in general the uh the elements the major elements of the uh draft Mission and charge document call for a seven member
short-term or temporary short-term advisory committee to include one member of the select board one member of the planning board one representative of the fouth police department one member of the Board of Health one licensed realtor and two residents um again a copy of the draft
is in your packet I had Town Council review uh the draft mission in charge document she made a couple of uh necessary uh edits to it um it's my recommendation Madam chair and select board that the board approved the establishment of a temporary short-term rental advisory committee and approved
the committee charge and Mission document as presented this evening I'd be happy to answer any questions we've seen this Draft before am I correct uh don't believe so 27th the board directed me to draft it draft it
this is similar framework as what we did work group little more in detail and did any of the board members I don't think I saw any changes or suggestions to this I I I do have a couple of questions
go ahead Mr mcal uh I I guess the first one is that uh it it seems to be a given then that we're looking at a general by law with respect to regulation as opposed to the possibility of a zoning bylaw change
that would deal with zoning issues I mean it seems like we're already making that determination uh in the charge or Mission that we're giving to the committee am I correct in that I'm not making that I this is a draft I mean I
based upon the discussion that we had back on the 27th I recall that being part of that discussion but certainly this is a a draft this says general bylaw and in my mind that that means we're looking to you know regulate uh the uh short-term rentals which
obviously is an important part but it it seems to be foreclosing the possibility that the committee might come back and recommend the zoning bylaw change and I'm just curious as to you know whether my understanding is correct or whether we want to look at the at the draft
charge and maybe indicate some uh possibility of a zoning law change if that's the what the board desires to do then again this is a draft document I was trying to encapsulate some of the discussion was had on the 27th and and and I think you did very well thank you
and then miss and so the working group early on discussed practicality of uh zoning versus uh General bylaw and Zoning it seemed would likely exclude short-term rentals in the majority of the areas
where they exist if you know if you use the the general zoning that we have unless you create a new zoning overlay I I understand all I'm saying is I think that that might be something that this group might might want to consider I
understand what went into it uh you know previously that's all M gostone yeah I would agree and I think um I I think the the mission we need to be really specific in the mission that we need
mechanisms to both regulate the behavior of short-term rentals to ensure that we have that um um that they are sanitary that you know behavior of renters is is regulated that sort of thing and and I feel like that's what um has been really
well encapsulated in the general bylaw that still doesn't get us to um regulation or mechanisms that actually address the economic and housing impact of short-term rentals um in our town and um to Mr Brown's point I think there are
potential changes um to zoning uh just doing a little bit of research finding other towns that have done things like um limiting the percentage of homes within uh residential zones that can be used for short-term rentals or simply um
adopting the the stance that they all require a special permit so I would like to see this Mission specifically addressing the need to find mechanisms for regulating behavior of of existing short-term rentals as well as addressing the
economic and housing impacts and and I think that does require that we leave it a bit more open than specifying um a general bylaw and to that uh and I think it would also be important this does uh say that they'll provide quarterly progress updates I I
think it would just be important that this um committee report back to the board with findings and suggestions before getting as far as actually drafting a a bylaw that comes back to the board it Mr Brown no I was if if I may
with with respect to uh to meetings uh one of the concerns that that had been raised uh the first go around was that although the committee did a good job and had a number of of public meetings or meetings to which the public was was
invited those were all at 4:00 in the afternoon and I'd uh suggest that the that the uh Mission or the charge might be to hold meetings at various different times times and various different places uh possibly in town to uh be able to
generate as much feedback uh from the community as as as possible uh and secondly I will you know certainly second what uh Miss Goldstone said I've I've said all along I think we need to understand what it is we want to
accomplish with these short-term rentals do we want to increase the affordable housing stock or and or do we want to just regulate uh the the uh the system so I think we need to and I think the committee will help
us get to that point but thank you I continue to say that I think that it's going to be difficult to increase the affordable housing stock with the short-term rental regulation I don't want to complicate this to the point where it becomes unmanageable I would
love to see us manage this and then work on a another project like the bail and deed incentivizing ownership incentivizing year round rentals that's a whole separate program so I mean I'm I'm certainly understand your concern and
your comments but I just feel like if we try to make this try to solve all the problems it's just not going to get done I think we all want I think we all want to get it done so I if we keep it simple we can at least get this done if if there need to be something add to it
to make it more palatable I would certainly agree but I don't want to try to make this thing it's going to be the be all and end all of solving our housing crisis I don't think it would be the end all be all but I do think it I don't think there's any one mechanism that's
going to solve that and I think this is potentially one of the mechanisms and it's important to think about as I said both regulating the activity um and also thinking about whether there are and and and really digging into whether there are
mechanisms to limit the economic and housing impact of short-term rentals um through bylaws Mr zinski my fellow colleagues I um I find myself agreeing with with Mr Brown um the whole idea of an advisory
committee is to let them be conceptual and and work these things out and it has to be progression because there are too many different instances that are different if we try to over regulate this from the very beginning I think we're short sheeting ourselves so my my
personal opinion is as Doug I'll reiterate what Doug said we don't want to make it so complicated that you get nothing done so that's my personal opinion that's the way I'd vote it I'm certainly not suggesting that
that we make it so complicated that we don't get anything done you know but I'll I'll mention that our our neighbors and I wouldn't compare us to Nantucket but our Neighbors in Nantucket have been dealing with this issue and have had this issue before town meeting I think
three or four times and can't seem to come to a consensus and the problem just keeps escalating so that's what I'm trying to avoid well but but we need to you know try and deal with it uh you know as best we can that's we we form these committees and we ask people to
volunteer their time and their expertise and different and then we we we box them in we tell them how they have to think and I don't think that that's right not on an advisory committee we still have the final say I I guess I would be Advocate I I I think of it exactly the
opposite way this is an incredibly narrow mission that says draft a general bylaw that regulates short-term rentals what I'm saying is that we need an advisory committee who can look at how do we ensure that the short-term rentals we have that activity is regulated and are there ways to actually limit the
impact of short-term rentals on our community and I think there's um an enormous amount of interest in our community in working on a and I see people in this room who have expressed interest in working on that second problem I'm sure that'll happen on its own within that committee
well but by the mission here that's not part that's not so are we not prepared to vote on this mission statement because what I'm hearing is people want to rewrite the mission statement I'm just going to suggest maybe if there could be a simple edit somewhere that
you might like to suggest that would add to this rather than take away maybe add a paragraph that broadens the scope a little bit or do we wait and you get your edits to the town manager I mean I hate to do that too but
at the same time it there seems to be an awful lot of um sort of disagreement on how this has been written and if you want to redo it then we send our suggestions to the town manager I'm happy with the WR Madam chair could I just make a suggestion I
again I we could if the select board desires we can add in the third paragraph mission of the committee is to prepare draft short-term rental zoning bylaw or general bylaw
make it no don't make it specific I mean again I I was attempting in this draft to capture some of the discussion that I heard on the on January 27th I would agree with I did not intend to narrow us put us in a box so I can simply add that
that that edit in terms of including the zoning bylaw is a potential product of this mam chair I'd move the town manager's suggestion and one other comment um I think it was uh select board member Mcall um talked
about the importance of of having perhaps some alternative meeting times so that you can gather additional public input I think that was one of the maybe the shortfalls of the working group is that it was it was at a time that was not convenient for a lot of people to participate so I we'll have to
craft that language and I've got an example or a recommendation in the uh fourth paragraph committee has conven its meetings at the earliest reasonable time because I do think time is of the essence like I mentioned on January 27 I would not want to wait until the March meeting to come back and with another
draft so let's try to get this done tonight um they are to elect select a chair Vice chair and recording secretary will select an agreeable meeting date and and consider various times during the day in order to um Garner as much
public uh input as possible words to that effect not not Corner themselves into a specific date and time but offer alternative times perhaps and I I'll defer to Town Council is that I don't
know if we have a precedent for that but I think this is so unique and so special we're wanting to try to get additional public comment that maybe that having those various meeting times is acceptable if I may mad I mean I certainly don't want to delay this unnecessarily either so uh and I
appreciate Mr Rena's suggestion what what I might offer as a as a possible edit is if we go to the third paragraph the mission of the committee is to uh report back to the select board
its recommendation uh as to short-term rentals including possibly a general bylaw or zoning law Amendment well it is it's short-term rental General bylaw for
or or zoning event yeah well but I but I think it's even more than that it's it's more their recommendations which might include possibly including a general bylaw or zoning amendment that way we get the whole picture from the
advisory committee okay with that with that Amendment I'd certainly support the mission statement as otherwise presented okay is that a motion I'll withdraw my motion then okay Madam chair I'm s to complicate this but I did I was made
aware of another and this is my Omission um when you look at the second paragraph um I neglected to include Police Department representative um I have heard from uh Chief Lori and uh and again based upon on some of the comments that we've had I think having that I think it's a great addition great addition to I neglected
to include that in the second paragraph So as part of the edits i' insert the representative of the Fel Police Department okay there there is a representation uh with individuals with law enforcement background but yeah okay I mean I would not be opposed
to either of those edits or all three I should say mo motion to uh approve the mission statement as amended with the recommended edit that's right okay I have a motion do I have a second I'll second that okay I have a motion and a
second to approve with the amended edits any further discussion amongst the board seeing none all those in favor I I opposed okay unanimous thank you thank you okay discuss the municipal empowerment act and consider drafting a
letter of support I Believe Miss Goldstone that you had asked to put this on and we should have a copy of everything in your packet yes um and uh thank you for including this in the agenda um I think there are some really important um uh issues addressed in this
Municipal empowerment act um I it one is the making permanent uh the ability of uh Town bodies to uh meet either in hybrid or virtual format and making that permanent and I think for many of our uh committees and the volunteers who are
giving their time to Part Town um that's that's really important um that we make that permanent um and that is coming up against a deadline in the month of March when that um covid provision uh ends um the other things I think are are really important uh that would you know be
really valuable for this board to come back to assuming this uh law passes um are some of the um Provisions for both uh additional Revenue sources and uh additional tax exemptions uh for for uh
seniors in particular but vulnerable populations with our town and I think both of those could be very important in pursuing our um well remedies to our affordable housing crisis um so those are the things that stand out to me as being particularly important for the the
town of fouth in this this bill any qu Mr Mcall no I certainly second what Miss Goldstone said but I'd uh certainly when the letter is drafted I think it needs to be drafted in such a way that that it is generally supportive
of of the of the ACT I mean there are a number of Provisions there that I personally haven't looked through each and every one of them that we may not necessarily support without you know more information so I think uh my sense
is that we submit a letter generally supporting you know indicating some of the you know the the um the provisions that Miss Goldstone mentioned but not come out fully supportive of the act that it's in its entirety because it's
you there's a lot of stuff in there that I'm not sure we're all familiar with and in a position to say go forward with at this point Mr Brown and that's what I was going to ask uh if staff has identified any reporting requirements that might be cumbersome I know there's
a lot of stuff in here that looks like it's helpful but there's a couple of uh requirements for reporting that maybe I would not really know whether or not it's a problem I I think Mr MC's suggestions are good I would do
agree with that as well I think a generalized letter supporting the ACT overall we Mak sense you know indicate that we appreciate the flexibility it provides and we look forward to learning more about it or something like that is that a motion Mr Brown yes with
M MC's suggested edits or or tone concept and tone yeah okay so we have a motion on the floor to um send a letter generally supporting
the empowerment act Madam chair just a question for for my clarity so does the board desire that this draft generally supporting be brought back to the board for review or it's timely right it is I think it is timely I don't think we're making any
specific recommendations other than to just generally support it yeah I think you understand where we're coming from Mr Rena and I think you know I'm confident that you'll capture that sentiment in the letter that goes out could I add one thing though um the
whole make permanent the public meeting piece I know we're going to do it generally I wonder if we should make a comment about that because I think that's really important for people okay well I think you could highlight that andl have an Ask respects for that okay
I think that and the other that I would uh love to see called out is the um flexibility in tax revenue options for for towns that it provides I would agree with that so a letter that is basically a general
letter however highlighting those two issues that that this board sees are important to F understood okay so I have a motion do I have a second second oh I was a motion I'll second okay sort of your motion though a motion in a second any further on
first okay are we ready Mr Mcall yes we are yes we have a motion in a second any further discussion amongst the board seeing none all those in favor I I unanimous thank you thank you for bringing that to us y okay
um discuss and consider a vote to send a letter of endorsement to the executive office of Housing and liberable communities for the affordable housing project at 48 Benjamin n is Lane in North Falmouth welcome Kim we're checking we're
checking to see if those were pre-loaded we we had I I did it earlier you're you're amazing let me just this any reasons I just want to in introduce I'm Kim uh fish the housing coordinator for the town of fouth and this is noren brown
the new director of land acquisition for Habitat for Humanity and she'll give the Pres presentation to you great thank you welcome hi you might want to pull the mic towards you a little bit thank you
is that better yes um Habitat for Humanity of Cape Cod is proposing to build 14 new affordable homes on a 7 and a half acre parcel of lands Benjamin 48 Benjamin n Lane in North Falmouth Habitat for Humanity plans to permit this project through the Massachusetts
chapter 40b through a friendly 40b lip local Initiative Program process habitat cap of Cape Cod is collaborating with fouth 300 committee land trust to execute this project We Believe together with our efforts Max to maximize the use of the property for
long-term public benefit conserving 48 acres of land ensuring future Public Access and the construction of much needed community housing we have our team here today we have a Moren Brody our permitting attorney Bob Riley our director of
construction Kurt raber our Architects and from the 300 committee Jo Roto Ken foran and Leonard Johnson so we're here today to share a brief overview of the Habitat for Humanity of Cape Cod review our current plans for the proposed North Falmouth Woodlands
community housing project including home and site plans and move our local initiative project application forward requesting your cure and support we thank the select board for your time and considering our application Habitat for Humanity of Cape Cod partners with families in need of
affordable homes fostering stability self-reliance and a strong sense of community for those of you that have been on a habitat build The Sweat Equity program has the homeowners working alongside volunteers for 250 to 500 hours getting more involved in the
community and engaging with their neighbors the habitat program offers homeowner education to prepare our homeowners for home ownership these homes will be deed restricted at a affordable prices determined by the
Department of Housing and Urban Development the homes will be priced between 60 and 80% of the AA median income which averages house prices between 173 to 247,000 am I not talking again no oh oh I'm not switching yeah
sorry there we go that's good sorry um these homes will be protected um in perpetuity as affordable and they'll be counted on the town subsidized housing inventory the town has requested local
preference which would offer 70% of the offering to go to um residents of the town of this is um the um approximate prices of the homes recently for the the 2024 um air immediate income for barille County the new rates will come out in
probably 2025 um around April around April 1st shows the gross maximum income allowed to earn for the families that will qualify for these homes so habitat from un of Cape Cod is known for its commitment to Energy Efficiency we work with Catalyst
Architects to develop well-designed well bit well-built homes that are solar powerered and energy efficient we're also work uh Habitat for Humanity has been recognized by res resnet in May of 22 forther efficiency rating and
certification for building the most energy efficient Habitat for Humanity home throughout the United States we're also working to implement a sustainable Wastewater and storm water design in our project through the horle Wht group and with resilient roots
to educate our homeowners on landscape design and organic land care see at 48 Benjamin and I we're proposing 14 single family homes we've been awarded 1.5 million by the fouth affordable housing fund toward land acquisition and
construction of these homes there will be a mix of three bedrooms two bedrooms and a four-bedroom home of capes ranches and a colonial here's some of our homes two Benjamin Orleans
roero and site plan of the projects so you can see where the 7 half acres up at the top here is where we'll be building the homes and the area here is going to be protected under the 300
committees Land Trust so last October we had a couple of family meetings we um neighborhood meetings we offered the neighbors an opportunity to preview the site and this shows the uh original site on the right side um and on the left side is uh the
revised plan as we address the neighbors concerns along the right side of the property some of the neighbors were concerned about the trees and the property being so close to their neighbors so we took the 30 foot protected buffer and increase it to 45
you'll see that on the left side here we originally had the sewer treatment system in the left corner here see there's a gray area just on the lift and we push that over to the other side of the street we adjusted some of the home s sites moving
driveways and the homes and changed the floor plans from ranches to capes to um reduce the amount of excavation of the land so oh I should mention at our meeting we had about a 100 neighbors um attended
and shared their comments over the two um two meetings that we offered and these are some of the changes I mentioned the 30 to 45 moving the treatment facility I had a question on that slide one back no the one that you're on okay
where you say increase the no disturb buffer from the property line at Cameron Road from 30t to 45 ft also reduce some Lots on the Westerly side of the property to increase the buffer but you don't say by how much so I'm curious
about that I'll just say if what's the question I think there's one plan that shows I think it was just the house here you mean the the house here Corner where's the West here that would be great thank you sir
so this this house here on the end we push we swwa the driveway you can use the cursor as a pointer oh where's that the mouse the keyboard mouse oh I see oh sorry gotcha okay
perfect so that's that's the old one right let me see that's the old one let me get the new one that's the orig okay so over here is where they increase the buffer that's this side the neighbors that were concerned see that over
here right there's another do you have the side by sides are the same those are the same oh I see one okay I get you those there we go okay yeah so this is
okay oh here it is to answer your question right cor yeah this is the this is the increased buffer zone here this was 30 this is 45 you can see on this particular lot here on this plan it just goes like that
we just took that line and straighten it out things like that so we did that so that's a little bit more than what's over here it was this house here we flipped right didn't you move the see that house got f so the driveway's closer and the
foundations small things like that was there was another place we did that looks like there's a couple on the the Northwest yeah lot up here yeah they're on the west side on it that got straightened out over here so it doesn't
have a point to it anymore it's just a straight Mar points like that and up there we just took that out and made it a straight line from one one car a little a little addition okay but it doesn't it doesn't tell me how many feed or anything like
that like it does in the previous sentence so I was just curious okay I can get back I'd like to know that that would be great thank you I have a question was moved in if I could I have a question about your site plan also it seems like the folks that live in this
neighborhood are going to want to walk right out into the Woodland how would they access the Woodland area will they have to go out the driveway and walk around to a public access of the 300 Club hi I'm Joan Maro president of the
300 committee Land Trust uh as part of the conditions of the land grant we have to provide public access to the conserv ation portion of the parso and currently we're planning a small parking area that
will go on Quaker Road um opposite uh uh this proposed affordable housing development uh the idea is that the public access to the conservation area will be on the western side of the parso
and the intent is not to direct the public um to go into the affordable housing parcel in order to access conservation parcel for privacy reasons so that's the intent um there will be a small trail from the affordable housing
um Development Area um into um the conservation parcel that will join the trail but that's not intended to be the main Public Access right I don't I'm not proposing that it should be I'm just curious if there's a provision between a
couple of these Lots where there will be a path it seems It's Only natural they're going to want to walk right out into the woods rather than go get in a car and drive away there's going to be one small designated uh trail from the
subdivision into um sorry to join the conservation Trail so that not every lot will have its own foot path we want to avoid that and those two I just thought there would possibly be a a place in between a couple of those lots in the
center portion where where would that trail be answer is yes uh it's on the North there's no fence west side of the 7.5 acre par so and between two lots so here's the overall
plan I I believe it's going to be between two of these Lots over here that's what I was expecting but I just don't see it there so it's curious it's not on the plan yet whatever okay it's not on there but it will be yes okay thank
you so what's next so should it be approved our goal is to get the uh local initiative application submitted to the state they'll take 30 days they'll send a letter out um to notice the town and allow comments on any of the applications submitted they'll perform a
out visit and offer some project analysis on the project and then they'll issue the project eligibility letter which is what we will need to submit a zba application the goal is to have the application in Spring and um this year and then start our zoning board of
appeals process in January 26th post permitting we will close on the property start infrastructure in March of 2026 this will be two phases the first phase will begin of seven homes in March and April of 20 27 and hopefully certificate
of occupancies in August of 28 and the second phase will begin in September with cosos available in 2030 questions from the board Mr Mcall will'll start with you yeah thank you uh first of all I want to uh you know compliment and congratulate the 300
committee and Habitat for Humanity for for this project uh it recognizes the uh need for affordable housing in the town of fouth but also uh substantially conserves uh natural resources and we appreciate the efforts
of both organizations uh I just have a couple of questions one of which is there was referenced that the board of habitat might be uh increasing or changing its policy with respect to
uh re uh sale of units to families at 100% Ami or more has has that happened yet or is it still in the works or it's been decided not no the board is meeting Tuesday night and I believe oh tomorrow night yeah and I believe they're
discussing it at that meeting to consider um I believe what would that do to this application if they should change their policy to allow 100% Ami we would make a minor modification before we sent it on to um
hlc okay uh and then maybe a question for for Council the local preference is 70% as I understand it well we request 70% it's it's the most that we can get you you you need to come up to the
podium and introduce yourself please my name is Warren Brody I'm a board member of Habitat for Humanity of Cape Cod also will be Council before the zba for this development um also a fouth resident um
so we ask for 70% that's the most that we can get and so I guess my question was you have 14 units yeah 70% is 9.8 why why AR you have to round down Asos to yeah it's round down and it's
not just residents it's people who work in the town or have children or okay and then one one final question and it's kind of getting into to the weeds but I had never seen it before but on resale you say that resales will be to only
families at 80% Ami why isn't it 60% for some of them that were sold originally at 60% and 80% why would it all be just at 80% just wondering it's an excellent question I mean we're wrestling with the
100% aspect but traditionally um qualified units are the rec price was always 80% of Ami so whether it was 60% 45% whatever the resale the first resale could be at 80%
up to 80% mean just always been done that way is that a habitat policy or is that coming from the state as far as that no from the state and seem to make more sense that that you could sell it 60% if they were originally offered at 60% it would help
increase the supply of affordable housing for for for more people possibly if it was allowed for people at 60% Ami just a just a thought I I think the real issue is going to be what do we do with 100% yeah do we do we have resales at
100% and does that qualify for uh um keeping them in Peru in perpetuity that's why I kind of asked that other question I mean I'm not sure how big of a you know the change that will be if the if the board decides to do that as far as your application is concerned
yeah no we'll we'll have no more about it tomorrow but good luck these are all issues that we'll be discussing thank you Mr Brown well I'm thankful for Mr Miss scy bringing that up I gotta say I'm I'm very excited to see that we have 60% Ami on some of these units I've been
asking developers to to try to get to that and nobody in the private Market's been able to do that and with the town providing its assistance in the 300 committee with the land this is like the only opportunity we're going to get right now for the 60% Ami so I hope that
doesn't change and you know our I think our letter of support is reflected on what's described here so I hope this project won't change from the 60% right no it'll be 60 um it'll be what which two go to the
100% I think they said if they did pass the if the board does pass the alotment for 100% of Ami probably one from each would come off to go to 100 % whether it's the 60 or the 80 but I mean we're giving you a letter of support for this the way it's
presented so maybe this project could be exempt from future board decisions because it's being made today I don't know seems like it's a fair question I'd hate to see it get changed from what we're writing a letter of support from excuse
me right now all we have to talk about is 60% and 80% right so tomorrow there may be another decision made but but right now that is the program well I'd feel differently about the project if the numbers changed I mean
I'd still support it I don't want to say I wouldn't but I'd be disappointed if it was changed but to your board well to to lose the 60% I mean like I said this is the only opportunity we've seen yet to have that and there's a real need in Falmouth for this
so maybe that's comment for the board for your discussion tomorrow well historically we kept our limits at 65% of Ami for a long long time we struggled to get the 80% and we've remained at 80% for some
time but now I mean we have the realization that it takes what 225% of Ami to afford the median house in town so what is what is 100% really do for the community I understand so but these
people have been waiting for a long time with this that are in this bracket thank you m Goldstone did you have a comment or question I you know I I I guess I would respond to what you're saying uh Mr Brown just in that yes it
would be one fewer unit at 60% and one fewer at 80% and every unit does count um but I think it's in recognition of the diversity of need in the town and is um a move that has come I believe with support from the affordable housing committee right we we need homes at all
of these levels and I think this project um just it not only accomplishes it it really nails so many things that we're looking for in affordable housing I mean the examples that that were shown of Habitat homes right these are really
attractive energy efficient homes um they're designing not only the home but the landscaping and the neighborhood um with environmental principles in mind um and working with the 300 committee for the conservation around it um if you
look at the the density um of the neighborhood compared to the surrounding neighborhood it seems very inke keeping um and I love that you've you know done that um community outreach already with neighbors and made adjustments um to um
to accommodate that and it has the the local preference I mean I think it just it really checks about as many boxes as you could on on an affordable housing I'm not knocking the project I certainly think it's a great project I'm just pointing out that when we have a public private
partnership partnership like this it's the only opportunity to get that 60% the private developers are going to do the 80 and the 100 we've seen that repeatedly and they've explained to us that they can't do the 60 so that's why I don't want to miss this
opportunity Mr MC maybe and following on that I guess the question back to to Habitat is uh is there any way the project is viable with the if if the project if the board goes for 100% is
the project at all viable taking away the uh the affordables and just keeping those at 60% and taking the excess out of the 80% if if it's still viable in other words keeping seven units at 60%
which is what Mr Brown is suggesting I don't know if it's viable or not but it's you know would be something you know for for the applicant to consider let me just address that you know mathematically if the resale price is
based on 100% of Ami habitat gets more money at the sale so it's really easier for us to raise the prices well but but you would then be selling one unit not at six one less
unit at 60% one less unit at 80 so if you do go to 100% could the units stay at for 60% 7 80% five and two at 100% I think that's
what Mr Brown if there had to be a change yeah that would be if it's if it's viable I don't know but if it it's it would certainly satisfy my colleague's question um you talk about viability of course we're not a for-profit developer every time we sell a house we lose hundreds of thousands of
dollars it has to be made up through fundraising so um viabilities we have a different way of looking at that I suppose thank you madam chair can um can I ask a question yes um
so I'm just wondering if there can be an an understanding with this longtime Community partner that this is an agreement based on the current policy and the current application which is at 80% not 100% and and 60 very importantly
and 60 right um and that if there is a policy change and habitat wants to change the mix of a affordability that before submitting the comprehensive permit to the zba it would come back to
this board again for approval and that's not something that would be legally required but I think it could be a you know a re EST that habitat honor that that request of the board and this is an an entity that I think you know we don't
normally operate on trust um but in this circumstances if I had to trust anybody it would be them right now I agree I'm not I'm not going to project hostage either I just just want to emphasize the need can I just make two comments one is um I just want to thank um Habitat for
Humanity because all of their projects that have come before us provide hand handicap accessible and visitable options and I think that is incredibly important and that doesn't happen all the time with applications that come in front of us so thank you for that my
second comment is I do want to know what the size of that increase is on that buffer on the Westerly side so I certainly don't want to hold it up either but um I would like to know that that number to clarify are you looking for
the amount of square footage of the lot reduction cuz they said it's going from 30 to 45 ft wide right it's also reduced some Lots on the Westerly side of the property to increase the buffer I want to know what that number is I see that's what I'm asking okay Mr zinsky did you want to say something I I'd like to move
this motion uh to endorse a spp application uh of a Habitat Humanity cape card to construct 14 single family homes for ownership to be deed restricted as affordable at 48 Benjamin NY Lane North Falmouth by sending a
letter outlining their approval to the executive office of Housing and liable communities and by signing the lip application and I dare anybody to challenge that dare would you dare us to Second it bring it I'll second that thank you
okay I have a motion in a second any further discussion amongst the board can I clarify whether in that endorsement we are endorsing as proposed and they would have to come back for Amendment or whether we are allowing any FIB my motion trusts the fact that if there is is a change they would come back to us
thank you for the clarification okay any further discussion okay we have a motion in a second any further discussion amongst the board hearing none all those in favor I I thank you thank
you okay Mr renar we're going to vote article recommendations for the April 2025 annual Town Meeting thank you madam yes we are uh Madam chair and select board included in your packet are the uh eight draft article recommendations and
explanations for which select board will submit formal recommendation to town meeting as you know these recommendations are to be printed in the town meeting warrant book which will be distributed to all town meeting members the finance committee submits recommendations for financial articles
planning board submits recommendations for zoning articles and the community preservation committee submits recommendations for funding from the community preservation fund Madame chair and select board the eight articles falling under the select board's purview to be included in the April 2025 town
meeting warrant and consider tonight are articles 4 19 20 21 39 40 41 and article 42 as I mentioned included in your packet are drafts recommendations and explanations which have been prepared by staff for all eight of these articles
subject to discussion and approval tonight these recommendations and explanations can be amended based on input received from the select board this evening during our discussion as you know the recommendations must be voted by the select board in order to be printed and submitted to town meeting um
importantly uh March 3rd is the date where these uh the town meeting warrant book is scheduled to be sent to the printer so that is a date certain and why this is time sensitive uh our next meeting is March 10th so getting these completed tonight and to the printer on
time is important what I'd like to do Madam chair is go through um each of these and talk a little bit about the recommendations and have that discussion um starting with article four uh the recomend which is to see if the town will vote to amend the town's
position classification plan the recommendation is to see uh to vote the amend the town's position classification plan as follows there's a table in your uh packet um in terms of the explanation there's two um new positions that um I'm
recommending uh be created and the reclassification of three positions I'll start with the two new positions that we're proposing to be created the deputy Building Commissioner this is a matter of importance in terms of succession planning um the new position is needed to provide support to the Building
Commissioner in the oversight of the building office when The Building Commissioner is out but as I mentioned succession planning is a huge huge Factor um it's been pointed out to me that years ago when we had this Building Commissioner position vacant it was a challenge for us to fill it having a
deputy uh position created through this reclassification um is going to allow us to have that succession planning already in place the D the deputy Building Commissioner duties would include uh those of the assistant zoning compliance officer and the budget for FY 26 does
not include funding for any additional position we're uh basically um anticipating that the new position would be filled via internal promotion which again I think is important to the succession plan the second new position that's being proposed is the creation of a community
development director um this is also there's kind of a multifaceted reasoning behind the importance of creating this position um number one better coordination and oversight of the staff um in the upstairs portion of the building and as well as downstairs the
building and conservation uh offices and health um the in the 18 months that I've been here as Town manager I've noticed that um there's a there's a a leadership and a guidance and support managerial support um void I believe the creation
of this community development director position would um provide um that leadership and management and direct day-to-day oversite and quite honestly um it would um increase the efficiencies and effectiveness of the Community
Development Department and reduce my direct reporting uh from 16 to 12 typically um 7 to 10 uh direct reports is kind of the the span of control that's considered ideal um right now um the town manager position supervises
directly supervises 16 so the creation of this position in addition to increasing enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of that important function Community Development it would also um allow my my efforts to be um more focused on on a reduced number of direct
reports um so it's my recommendation again that uh the town meeting support this recommendation for the creation of this new position the reclassifications um again I'm looking at the electrical inspector plumbing and gas inspector and local inspector all in the building office um huge challenges
uh traditionally historically for the town to fill these positions to recruit uh to fill vacancies and also it's it's become a retention issue so the recommendation is to um adjust the classification for these positions uh is
provided for in the chart any questions on article four what's being recommended and the explanation Mr Brown just to to clarify so would the town planner then be the person that would be in community director position we've not decided
honestly we've not decided um it would be an internal position that would be that would uh uh be placed into this a promotional opportunity we've not decided um internally yet where who that where that would come from um probably aware that we've had this community director brought to town meeting like
three times previously more of the last efforts to have it created yes yes um you know my here my my um my recommendation is that um we not we not backfill a position I understand last time perhaps this was brought to town
meeting there's concern about perhaps um uh adding another supervisory layer um and and not having enough uh boots on the ground um doing the work um my my recommendation If This Were to be approved would be not to backfill a
position and again we haven't landed on a decision as far as who would fill this um we're going to have some more internal discussions but it would not be creating a new position it would be creating a community development director but the incumbent the position that that would be promoted into would
continue to maintain their his or her current responsibilities in addition to uh these new responsibilities as far as oversight and Leadership of the of the new Department of Comm community development I would say we're going to need a a structure map of how it's going to be done and who it's going to be and
you know it's got to have to be really clear that it's a different presentation than in years past because it was just the feeling was that we're topheavy or it was at the time that we were topheavy in management and town meeting is you
know fiscally conservative so understood again I just in terms of uh providing more focused leadership guidance in management of that really critically important function is the town a lot of the discussions we have currently with regards to to housing um I think it's
just important that we have that that guidance and Leadership that position in the hierarchy in the organizational chart so we will put together some some diagrams and some some some visuals to kind of show what that's going to look like I recall in the years past it wasn't that anybody thought it wasn't a
good idea they just didn't want to pay for it they were just like you know just do more with less and just get it done it was kind of the the sentiment right so one of the points that we want to emphasize is that the budget has zero new positions right so we're asking to
create this new position fill it internally with no budget for any extra positions that'll be the key to success yeah exactly thank you okay you're welcome uh moving on to Article 19 I I believe the petitioner for Article 19 is here and
I'm not an attempt to uh to go through the uh the petitioner did a fantastic job with the presentation but as you all recall um uh this is in regards to uh amending uh chapter 191 solid waste of the code of fouth by adding the section prohibition of the sale and release of
balloons inflated with lighter than air gas again the petitioner did a fantastic job with uh the presentation when we last met on February 10th the recommendation is that the town vote Article 19 as printed and you can read with regards to the explanation um
basically the uh the intent is to reduce the number of lighter than air balloons that litter quite literally the environment after intentional or unintentional release so again Madam chair select board it's uh our recommendation the town vote Article 19 is printed thank you any questions on
that we'll move on article 20 article 20 um again the recommendation is that the town vote article 20 as printed um this is an act uh the explanation is an act honoring empowering and recognizing our service members and Veterans uh the hero act as we referenced back on February
10th which was adopted in 2024 by the Commonwealth creating a new local option that municipalities May adopt to increase the real estate tax exemption amounts available to certain veterans um it in effect this doubles I believe the the exemption amount available to um to to veterans in the
community and again it's a recommendation that town meeting vote to approve to vote article 20 as printed any questions on article 20 no that's good article 21 um the recommendation is that town vote to authorize the select board to release portions of the
following town-owned Parcels for some up to 30 years for the purposes of the article uh you have included in your packets that table indicating the uh particular uh town-owned sites with regards to where these um leases would be uh in placed the article authorizes
select board to enter into a lease agreements with solar vendors uh for a term of up to 30 years specific terms of the lease would be determined by the town manager's office and subject to select board approval the town's actively pursuing as you all know
opportunities to increase implementation of PV installations across the town the listed sites have been already evaluated and are expect to deliver uh significant cost savings to the town be happy to answer any questions on that article
21 do you anticipate U having like rfps for these or competitive bidding do you think these will go is that yet determined good um so we'd like to give you a good lengthy explanation of how we evaluate the pros
and cons of ownership and PPA and what the process is um this will be coming before the board at the next meeting relative to that consent agenda item but very briefly there is a a Consortium called power options which is a
nonprofit institution that does um bidding for higher education as well as municipalities and health institutions so that's the bidding process that we anticipate using for power purchase agreements good thank you any other questions on article
21 moving on to article 39 the recommendation is the town vote article 39 as printed um as you see in your packets the explanation is this refers to a donation of a very small about a fifth of an acre uh piece of land being offered by the owners to facilitate work
on the upper kunam messet river restoration project the town requires this access to this privately owned land in order to carry out Wetland restoration work um as indicated in your packet um approval of this article would require a two-thirds town meeting
votes any questions on article 39 oh it was nice of them to donate the land donate if no questions I'll move on to article 40 recommendations the town vote article 40 as printed um this article would authorize the select board to draft and submit a home rule petition article to
amend the Falmouth Town Charter to establish the Falmouth licensing commission the commission would be tasked with the issuance of all licenses to sell alcohol and all common victualer licenses for restaurants throughout the town the commission would be charged with enforcement of the laws and
regulations pertaining to such licenses commission would be comprised of members appointed by the select board additional licensing responsibilities could be added either through the petition or by the enactment of a bylaw by town meeting or both and again the purpose of the creation of the commission is to
alleviate some of the administrative and Regulatory burden uh on the select board any questions on article 40 looks like the way we discussed it we have talked about it yet moving on to article 41 the recommendation is uh the town vote
article 41 as print is printed this article AU authorizes select board to lease property for parking in the downtown area if approved the town manager would issue a request for proposals or RFP to solicit competitive proposals from Property Owners within walking distance of fouth Village the
town's previously leased parking as you all know from Martha's Vineyard Bank behind 84 Main Street with with access from Katherine Lee Bates Road um if approved uh this article would require a two-thirds meeting vote for approval any questions on article 41 one question I
do have is we have voted previously a article similar to this and the town manager previous Town manager did as you mentioned the Martha Vineyard lot I thought it was a a standing vote is this when we vote this today this should be
going forward you'll have this opportunity won't you or does it have to be voted each year did it expire to the current vote yeah you want to take that is this for the bank yes yes so the last time that this was put before town meeting it was um described as a study and it
was temporary um it was intended to see if it was a good fit to try to lease some property in the downtown area for parking and um when the RFP went out um it had a maximum length of three years
it was a successful relationship and it was a successful Endeavor and so now the town is looking to um res establish that and make it a more permanent situation uh to lease something in the downtown area for additional parking Mark that will be at
the Town manager's discretion we won't have to vote it again unless it changes right well at least us have a maximum term of 30 years has to vote the Le I won't have to vote it again you might think so you're
around but just to clarify the lease will um the lease will have to be approved voted by the select board right so this is town meeting authorization to to authorize to go to authorize lease and then if I'm not mistaken the lease would come back to this board for
approval yeah it's an a town meeting has to authorize the board to enter into the lease and then you will be authorized to sign the lease thank you thank you if no other questions we'll uh conclude with article 42 the
recommendation is town the town vote article 42 as printed Madam chairman of Select board this article is a companion to article 26 which is a funding piece to construct a designated safe access path to the shining sea bike path from Church Street through the Church of the
Messiah property the article grants the town and access easement which allows the public to use the access path constructed under article 26 last year I recall having conversations with representatives from church of the Messiah and as you all likely know um
their concern is uh f folks trying to access the bike path cutting through the property uh through the grave section graveyard section of the of the Church of the Messiah so this would alleviate some of that concern by giving this access and allowing a path that does not
uh uh cross through the grave of of the church um and again town uh the recommendation is Town vote article 42 as printed any questions on article 42 no so Madam chair select board it's uh my recommendation that the board uh vote
to approve the April 2025 town meeting article recommendations as submitted this evening so Madam chair I I move that we uh approve the recommendations as printed do I have a second second okay I
have a motion and a second any further discussion amongst the boards seeing none all those in favor I I unanimous thank you okay update and discuss non-compliant soils at John Neil baseball fields Mr Renshaw thank you
Madam chair I I can honestly as I sit before you tonight uh and after having been here for 18 months I can honestly say this is the last matter um that I anticipated having to discuss with you um a lot of a lot of what we're going to talk about in terms of the overview
background has already been presented um via uh some press releases um I I do want to uh provide kind of a brief overview um but let me preface my comments by saying this our primary focus
um has been and remains um the health and safety of the community as we kind of work through the um number one the the further research and identification of the issue and then ultimately uh developing a remediation plan um health safety of the community remains our
number one Focus folks please come in quietly and have a seat as you all know uh during recent construction and installation of the lighting uh the musco lighting at the
ball fields um there was discovered some unsuitable fill material um containing glass and metal objects uh within the uh the excavated uh fill um the removal fill material was stockpiled properly um on site and had
been covered with plastic as we were closing out phase one of the project which again amounted to the installation of those musco lights um the DPW um reached out to the uh engineer of record and inquired as to the how how that
spoil material from the pit was from the pits were was to be removed um rad which was the subcontractor doing the construction excavation um explain that you know because of the materials that were obviously in the material that have
to be disposed of um properly DPW reached out in late November um to uh a license professional um arcadis to uh have the material kind of analyzed to develop a plan for the REM
removal again of the spoils uh that had been uh the result of the excavation of the light standards back on December 11th um there was um an inspection uh via backo of the soils in that in that um spoil uh
pile those spoils uh samples were sent to a laborator um in accordance uh with the Massachusetts landfill disposal parameters during the sampling of those spoil materials spoil pile materials again um the uh the examiners identified
broken glass bottles and metal as has been reported um some additional investigation was done by Town staff and the LSP arcadis uh we identified that um is is common knowledge now that the baseball fields which were um initial Construction begun
in the 1977 time frame the uh land on which the baseball fields uh were constructed was a municipal waste um operated in the 40s and 50s there's currently an ongoing investigation and work being done but I want to number one tonight provide an
update on um the uh the the 14 soil borings that were taken um again um back in December December 19th and 20th is when arcadis the LSP conducted the the 14 borings sent the uh the uh the result of those borings offer
analysis and um as part of a risk assessment report which has been recently released and the select board has given copies and it's now posted on the website um it was identified um that um there were uh elements of lead arsenic zinc and
pcbs um importantly the lead exceeded the mCP or Massachusetts contingency plan standards um for lead in the soils and is you can see in your packet there's a copy of a of the risk assessment which includes I think importantly a two-page summary which kind of uh provides a good overview of
the findings of that risk assessment um in particular uh the L is he concern um a short and long-term exposure concern for um for young people particularly um the standards um that were discovered on field one um or the
the the threshold was well above the state uh threshold for l um in fields two and three um the standards were um below the the the state uh mCP standards for S S1 which is
basically um kind of the the residential standard uh for for exposure um and for for a reference point um on fields two which was considered by the uh LSP as a field which did not represent an
immediate health risk the um the parts per million or kilogram per per milligram per kilogram uh findings for situ borings were about 190 parts per million where the state threshold is 200 parts per million so although it was
less than again the state mCP threshold of 200 um the the readings were close um uh field three um was much lesser I believe 45 to 50 uh parts per million in field three
the reported concentrations of lead arsenic zinc in the pcbs um were uh exceeded the thresholds and and require as as has been explained um in the report uh notification to mass d uh it kicks in the 120-day mandatory
notification period um importantly selectboard I we're working with arcadis our LSP to develop a plan for remediation um we had a a very productive preliminary call back in in mid January January 15th with
the representative with mass d uh so Mass DP was kind of made aware preliminarily of the results um the next step is to submit working with uh the LSP submit this risk assessment and have further discussions of mass DP to further develop that remediation
plan as I mentioned the safety of the public Remains the the town's primary concern um importantly when we we first were told of the results of that initial um soil testing and some of the findings with regards to the l lead arsenic zinc
and pcbs um back on January 9th um I directed that DPW close access shutdown access public access to the fields um that access has been has remained uh secured uh since January 9th the Department of Public Works and
my office continues to work with our LSP to have the stock stockpiled soil again those spoils from the initial phase one uh light Poole uh borings properly removed and disposed of in an offsite permitted facility the most recent update we
received just late last week from the LSP and and this is significant um Next Step um we're the LSP is going to be conducting a geophysical survey of the area to definitively delineate the kind of outer boundaries of the landfill in the results of the survey we anticipate
are going to be available in early March based on the results of this geophysical survey um I'm being told that the LSP will con conduct additional soil boring soil borings and monitoring Wells uh the installation of these monitoring Wells
are important uh to determine how the underground water the hydrology is Flowing uh from the former landfill um the direction of that that underground water flow um we anticipate the results of that monitoring um uh
to be completed on about March 11 and March 12th but we'll continue to provide the select board and the public with updates as we receive them with regards to the next steps staff is currently working with the LSP as I mentioned to explore site remediation options uh to include some
rough cost projection estimates for both the full remediation of all three fields and completing uh previously planned field and facility improvements um what we do going forward again uh remediating and making the fields safe are our
primary concern but as we do that and as we enter into the planning for the remediation what it's going to look like it's also going to be very important that the town plans for the addition of the phase two improvements because once we close this site and and and implement
the the recommended closure and Remediation it would require additional permitting and LSP involvement to dig basically into that you don't want to lay down barrier if that's the solution that we agree to um in 2025 and only
have to come back to make the additional improvements for the ADA compliance and some of the bleacher work later on so my point is when we do this we need to do it be all inclusive um properly close the landfill uh complete that remediation process and plan and
construct the improvements at the same time so we not if you can go back after the fact and having to um penetrate that that that barrier Madame chair select board um importantly and this is the big discussion that I I wanted to have with both the select
board and and and and the community um although the report that was recently released the risk assessment report prepared by arcadis our LSP um again um they they did a fantastic job and were very responsive and provided us the results as quickly as they could um
although um the uh the the recommendation or the the the the findings of the LSP indicate that concentrations of the lead discovered within two of the three Fields field two and three the southernmost Fields uh do not exceed the Massachusetts Department of
Environmental Protection health risk uh thresholds um again that 200 parts per million um threshold I believe is Town manager again um with the knowledge that the public health and safety are our primary
focus and should be I believe that a decision to maintain the use of one or more of those fields um while remediating field one um is is problematic and and here's why um I feel that's going to be important
and and and Peter mcconner can speak to this I'm going to ask him to to come to the podium and talk a little bit about this um one of the issues that I have and included in your packet is kind of the aerial photograph of the of the ball fields as they as they lay um field one is the field based upon the
findings of the LSP that needs to be shut down immediately there's to be no play on it it was Fields 2 and three that the LSP suggested may be played on in 2025 for a 12-month period but then they need to be shut down it's my opinion and staff's opinion that again remediating all three fields and getting
the remediation process underway as quickly as possible um is going to be the safest route it's going to be in my opinion very uh challenging for us to um manage and oversee keep people off of
field one when a ball a Fly ball is hit from one field into the field one it's going to be very difficult for us to kind of manage keeping people off that field um the other issue concern that I have is that the southernmost parking that borders Fields two and three we're
being told by the LSP um require some additional borings the data set is incomplete and we suspect that there may be some higher ratings so the LSP is recommending that if um the town were to consider um its findings and allow play on fields 2 and three folks would have
to park adjacent to on the northernmost field which is adjacent to field one um that's problematic because field one is the hot field that's the field with the highest level level levels of lead concentrations and again managing
that process is people are dropping their kids off and parking adjacent to field one the hot field and having to walk to Fields two and three to play would be a challenge I feel um in terms of the timing of the remediation and getting the needed necessary phase two improvements completed um the cost of
mobilizing a contractor um I think it's it just makes sense uh for the town to close all three Fields um and and initiate the remediation process as quickly as possible um we have identified working with fouth youth youth baseball
association we've identified um three fields that we could make improvements to um that would be alternative Fields uh for the 25 20125 season likely 2026 season because this remediation is going to take some time to complete is it
ideal no um that we have to utilize these these three alternative Fields um it's not ideal and I understand some of the concerns of the fouth Youth Baseball Association a lot of Pride and rightfully so and a lot of Sweat Equity that's been placed in those in in the
John Neil ball fields um but I think because we do have optional fields and we've identified working with the parks division um those fields and they could be made ready for play for the 2025 season and because of all the sit the uh concerns that I've outlined with regards
to the use of fields two and three I think it makes sense um and it's in the Public's best interest that we just shut down all three fields and and initiate that remediation um with that I'll I'll be happy to answer any questions you might have have but again this was intended to be an update um and uh in a
briefing kind of on where we're at and uh and next steps questions from the board Mr mcal I'll start with you can you identify what those three fields are Mr RoR as alternate Fields Peter you want to talk real quickly about where we're at and I think Julie Williams
tinum our Recreation director is probably going to help us out with that as well um I know um Peter can you speak to the three fields that that Jeremiah is working at currently yeah so uh a couple of weeks ago we had a uh meeting with the fouth youth baseball and um our Park superintendent Jeremiah Pearson was
in attendance and he had talked with the coaches um about uh alternate fields and also that they have a container on the field down on the lower area of the field to be relocated the following day I believe it was the following day or the day after that our Park
superintendent met with um the coaches and talked about the container and also was working with alternative Fields so the three fields that they had talked about was the M Pawn field was one of the fields that they were looking at the second field that was in discussion was the JV field that is at the high school
and the Third Field is at the uh Lawrence School um at this time our Parx superintendent and parks department is working with the there's going to be need to be some improvements to the fields and there's going to need to be some fencing installed so our Park
superintendent is working with the fix fence company to have that see if we can have that installed in MCH so it'll be ready to go um so those those three Fields should be up and playing I assume the school is okay with that as well my understanding is our Park superintendent had
conversations with the school superintendent and um the conversation was make this happen to allow to get the fields working for the uh the youth baseball go ahead Mr one more question you know the elephant in the room here
is uh is an estimate as to how much this is going going to cost uh I did see uh on the CPC agenda for the meeting on Thursday there was going to be some discussion about CPC funding and I'm
just wondering if this type of a project is really uh appropriate for the use of CPC funding as opposed to being you know a town obligation that doesn't require CPC funding to be utilized so we
consulted with Town Council and and the answer um and I'm going to defer to Mora to give her her her opinion and I de started to put you on the spot Town Council um but yes um Town Council believes that we can utilize th those funds yes um that's true I I did
some research and what I found most helpful was um uh an A A guidance release from the Department of Revenue from 2019 that was a comprehensive overview of the proper use of C CPC
funds and in that guidance um it talks about the different asset categories that CPC funds can be used for and within those asset categories um what specifics the funds can be used for and for land for recreational use and also
for open space it talks about how funds can be used for rehabilitation and um further defining re Rehabilitation it says that the funds can be used for Extraordinary repairs in this context um CPC funds are
appropriately used to rehabilitate land and structures both uh to make them suitable for their stated purpose either as recreational land or as open space I mean that's that's guidance that suggests it's possible the decision has
to come I assume from the CPC ultimately correct madam can I just add to that so to your point about so there's is it legally permissible yes is it a good use of CP funds I guess and you're absolutely right that the community preservation committee will make that
determination I would just also point out that I think many of us in the community want to get this done as quickly as possible and so if the goal is to do it as quickly as possible we happen to have a $2 million article at town meeting that can get us started
it's not going to be enough for the whole project we you know I believe we're going to get into some numbers but you know that may be close closer to half maybe maybe a little more than half of the total cost of all the remediation and improvements so there will be a role I know the
community preservation committee likes to see the town also contribute to these Pro projects and there will be an opportunity for that as well so you would assume this coming up to the floor town meeting when there's a discussion on that particular article depending upon what the CPC
right so we're going to we're going to go to the community preservation committee and ask if they will allow us to amend the application which was for you know specific identified improvements and modify that so that we can use it for this remediation as well
as get started on some of those improvements thank you Mr Brown and in that same conversation are they amendable to additional funding for the improvements that we were originally planning to make right well that you know some of that's going to need to come from general fund
but right that's part of the I I I'm assuming the community preservation committee is going to want some of those dollars to come from outside of the community preservation fund um but yes there may be additional CP funds as well have we identified alternate funds if we have we talked about it internally we
haven't finalized anything yet but that'll that will be part of the discussion on Thursday night okay M Goldstone um one question about near-term next steps and and one ter one about about kind of the ultimate end goal
um you said that um especially with the notification to D of it uh additional investigation will be needed and there may be some additional borings um I'll say when I look at the the uh sketch of of where the soil has been sampled to
date um the sampling is uh quite distributed across field one um it's really only along the northern Northeastern edge of field two I think I've got the numbers right and the samples that are counted as field three are mostly at the edges of fields one and two so it it seems like we don't
really have all the information we need to understand the risks on on those fields and I appreciate your point that all three should be closed and all three should be remediated but it feels like more information is is needed about those and I guess then the the other question on the far end of the spectrum
is at least based on what we know about field one I think what's being suggested in this report but just want to confirm is the senses that is a way to remediate these fields to make them truly safe uh yes Madam chair and select board
member Goldstone um great points with regards to the um dispersement of the pattern of of borings and we had that discussion um a couple of weeks ago when we when we met with arcadis um you know the response was they they've done some
statistical analyses and um they were confident that the location of the borings were representative um but I agree the first time that we saw kind of the layout of where the borings were taken um the uh the uh staff member from arcades that conducted the risk
assessment study or analysis um made a comment about based upon the data set that is available um that was a concern of mine as well um so if we punch some additional holes in fields two and three would that change the the recommendation uh again the response was
that you know um they they did a statistical analysis on on and and they were confident that it was representative um there will be some more borings likely it's going to be in that area uh surrounding field too um in the parking lot area I think there's some concern of that area
um the um the the the the importance of getting the remediation underway as quickly as possible um so that we can have we have a plan developed and we can get the get the work done quickly is importance obviously um and yes based on
discussions that we've had had with the LSP and with uh some of our in-house experts that have have done uh projects like this before we're confident that that there is a solution that will make those fields all three Fields safe Mr Mcall uh what is the uh
contingency in the event that CPC doesn't approve the amendment or the amendment doesn't pass a town meeting where I'm sure there's some funds that the town can access that would be able to to make payment for these
Services I mean there's free cash is I mean so we would need a new town meeting right so we we could look um you know we could look at borrowing so there are you know potentially other funding mechanisms but none that would be
available in April any other questions or comments um having some pretty extensive experience in remediation you very rarely find good news the more you test so I think that everybody should be prepared for the fact that hopefully
this is as good as it gets but it might not be and and getting after it all at one point is the only way to take care of it yeah I would agree with that Mr Brown uh the one uh positive is that
these fields are at a low level and so to cap them in Elevate them with two or three feet of dirt is at least feasible with liners yeah liners and and dirt on top because you got to have three feet of clean fill on top of the
liner right so I'm know so Peter can you can you respond to that just in general terms with regards to the the the grade and and the potential of putting that the barrier down in the two feet of fil yeah so so a typical standard that Master EP likes to look at is 3 fet of
of soil material over a field but there are variations that can um that can change that it's basically the plan of the LSP working with the town that the LSP is going to come up with a plan that that working with the town that the town wants and um the LSP that will be
presented the mass G and that's the plan that will go forward what we were looking at is something Less Than 3 feet a geotextile fabric to go over the field and then another we're looking at a two feet to go over it maybe a balancing of the field to be able to um 2 Feet's a
lot of 2T elevation is a lot of elevation to bring a field up yeah because it comes into what brings it comes into effect is the uh the light poles the fences the dugouts the sports bucks the uh the fields so the the buildings so that's something that needs
to be taken into consideration and you know I think the light poles they're newly installed light poles um I I think we do have a uh a solution for that it's going to be something creative but I think that'll something that work but um and there is room for to raise the road
and to raise the fields when you raise a field 2 feet um you got to start looking at the drainage we have to make sure that the drainage sheds off the all three Fields um and I just wanted to you know reiterate and just ham home that this is not a one-year solution to for
for the access to be able to use these three additional Fields what our Park superintendent is doing right now is he's looking to make these improvements for for several years it's it's going to take more than a year to to REM remediate these these three Fields be between getting a contractor in the
bidding process getting a contractor in mobilize demobilize make the improvements and also make the improvements for the phase two that was going to happen also and inspections too take a long time inspection so it's it it I'd say it's going to be the 25 26 uh
period and we it should be backed in in 27 but I would say with what we're talking about right now uh in 27 when these fields open it should be state of the yart I mean the way we're looking at it is if we're looking at raising the field 2 feet um we're going to be
looking at new dugouts new the fenses we've replaced um additional lighting the Ada bleaches walls um we want to make sure we take everything into consideration because what's going to happen is um the there's going to be a uh once we um remediate these fields
there's going to be a plan in place so every anytime somebody has to go and dig in that field and dig below that twoot barrier the LSP is going to have to get involved so we want to make sure that we have everything that we want on that field so it'll uh so it'll take us into
the future any other questions or comments from the board I will take a few public comments go ahead Susan Augusta a member of the school committee as well as a town
meeting member from Precinct 9 I'm appearing here tonight as a parent and a grandparent and particularly disturbing is in regards to um if any of this was found out last fall why fall ball was allowed
to go on for the past couple of years I've been attending games and following the local teams to other towns um the condition of those fields has been horrendous I've picked up glass I've seen my son my son who has been a
coach picking up glass off of the field prior to the kids playing and watching my grandson and his friends in conditions of this type is just appalling to me especially when I
go to other towns for tournaments and see what is provided for the children there so I'm glad to hear uh Dr door um the school superintendent on the day that this was announced that the fields
had been closed off she reached out to Mr Rena and I can confirm that she's working cooperatively with the um DPW as well as Town manager Etc in regards to trying to come up with something for the boys and
girls ASAP but as a board if you can just look at something that can make this all happen yesterday um I would really appreciate it uh because two years out of these
kids lives of doing things fun for them we can't let that not happen thank you another comment from the public yes sir good evening BR mcken I'm a board member of Family Youth board uh found
baseball I was actually the person who initiated the initial CPC Grant to for the field one renovation so it was very disappointing to see the news come out with the the the status of the fields um but I just wanted to raise the attention
that um in addition to Spring baseball we also play fall baseball and the requirement of fall baseball is to have lights there's no other facility in town that offers lights currently um so this is something to consider we have over a hundred Children of the Town who play
fall ball alone and this is an opportunity that's not going to be existing for them so we'll have to send them off to other towns as a board in order to do that we'd have to request permission from our league sponsorship to allow kids to go to other towns so it
has this has a real Snowball Effect so um just keep that in consideration of of your decisions thank you Mr BR a question about that M McAn uh would one field be helpful for Fall Ball um unfortunately yes but currently uh we have both field one and two that have
lights and during fall bow season which starts approximately mid-september and ends ends October mid October there's two games going on each night on both Fields Monday through Thursday potentially Friday as well because thank
you as a contingency maybe we could consider um putting up some netting along the Route 28 there and use the old uh Administration field it's pretty good field there that's not being used but it would need some netting or something good
suggestion Mr Mcall did you I was just going to ask is there any possibility of temporary lighting at one of the locations i' have to defer to someone who know yeah I would think uh the sports lighting that we're talking about the ones that we installed on on uh
field number one that's musco lighting those light poles are about 60 to 70 feet tall so what you don't want to do is you don't want to have lighting and being in people's faces or when they're on the Outfield trying to catch balls that it's you don't it can't be too low it has to
be something that's high so I don't know what would be out there for something like that but could be an option we could look at it but you you don't want it it can't be too low it has to be something higher I mean I'd appreciate looking into it in any event just to see if there's a you know quick fix to allow
fall ball any other comments thank you I'll take Mr Oliver and that'll be it Recreation Josh Oliver U on the fyb board coach High School baseball here at fouth um certainly you know baseball is
as a whole is a struggling sport like Nationwide um unfortunately it's hit pretty hard here obviously in the last few years a lot of the members on this board went through the years of covid um we kept baseball alive probably the
hardest years of volunteer time any of us ever had to do um I hear all the considerations I don't disagree I think you have to you have to get the fields fixed however we've had some small discussions
and you know knowing that we have some money allocated from the CPC already I guess I would ask is there another uh site in town that we could consider starting over and then do the remediation when you need to do
it rather than remediate put all this money invest it have our kids on hold can we is there another facility or another piece of land uh that the town has that's not being used not being built upon is that something that we
could potentially look at thank you Mr Oliva Mr br could we add lighting at the gas but complex could we add lighting at the gas but comp complex I know it's not cheap but be another then we'd have two fields for fall ball
and gaspa complex is a a uh regulation siiz baseball field it's too big it's a big field yeah right these are these fields are smaller you can't like temporarily modify them it's just too big right you open to anything okay um
certainly but we do I think we really do need at least two Fields right I think we can get by um with two three is optimal but Madam chair could I just address coach Oliver's um so so the the question about could we consider right
so we we have um the town planner has done a pretty extensive as you all know um evaluation of of town owned sites I'm not as I'm thinking this through coach Oliver I'm not seeing of those avail able sites for municipal use without restrictions or any issues
um anything of the size that would that would lend itself and then you have topography issues you know having a balanced site I I think the cost coach Oliver would be would be prohibitive um something we could certainly explore you know right now our focus is laser
focused on on on on trying to get these three fields which there's been a significant investment right in in in the John Neil complex um town investment like I mentioned earlier The Sweat Equity and the volunteer efforts on the fields so a lot of investment so our
Focus right now is to try to get those up and running and like uh uh Deputy uh DPW director MCC conery said uh create a state-of-the-art facility um in in a couple of years right once we get the remediation uh complete and the additional improvements that were
planned unfortunately with this uh CPC uh article funding um now it's our hope that we can wrap this up and complete the improvements and remediate make the field safe um as quickly as possible so we'll look into it coach Oliver I just think it's going to be cost prohibitive
to be honest with you thank you Mr Brown I'm going to take him and then you and then we're going to be done with public comment good morning I mean good morning good I feel like morning sleeping good evening um my name is Robert Brown um Recreation Committee
Member for years and seven months which is the exact time I've been pushing a community trying to push a community preservation project trying to push the town of fouth to do something with the fouth youth baseball park and uh just
when I thought it we were at the end it was going to get better we got $2 million from the community preservation which I'm I'm on that committee also I thought this was the end we celebrated we P patting each other's on the back
and uh here we go again um it's uh very distressful and I'm thinking about the I I like what Josh said you know maybe we should start over I know it's a lot of money but I'm also thinking if there was no baseball on this site would we use
Community preservation money to clean it up no of course not I don't think we should use Community preservation money to clean this up that $2 million was put aside for the children handicapped accessibility for for spectators and
most importantly also for safety reasons okay yeah this is a safety reason now um but I think it'd be sinful to just use Community preservation money to clean this up that's not what I believe the mothers and fathers of community preservation when they when they began
that general laws when this town accepted it that they're going to use money to clean up a toxic waste site I mean there must be other money out there possibly state federal I don't know I don't think anyone's looked yet it's pretty brand new but I know there's more reports coming in March uh March 12 and
13th I believe I R in a town meeting packet I mean I'd like to see us come back maybe the the last week the last um Tom um select board meeting in March after those reports come in and have a serious discussion regarding the money
have a serious discussion do we need a special town meeting to get more money to get this done as quick as possible you know it's it's you know the children are aging out they want want to play baseball we hear from the pickle ball players all the time they're aging out they want to get their courts and and they want Community preservation money
too and I understand that and I get that and uh I think that we need to really dig deep and get the money now have a special town meeting after after the Springtown meeting put our heads together and find the money if it's cash reserves if it's uh borrowing the money
also there's a community preservation savings account that they had money for the land bank they saved all kinds of millions and millions of dollars to pay off the land Bank debt early it's sitting in a bank account right now have a special time meeting and has to take one two three million out of
that and we just keep on paying the bond like we did before you know there's money it just takes courage to go get it and we need to go get it as quick as possible because the children are aging out they deserve to play baseball at the baseball fields you'll
see scientists there from we have coaches from whoie we have coaches from NBL we have uh coaches from the steamship we have coaches from the Coast Guard we have we have coaches from every trade uh every profession that come together and play baseball and they
coach their kids and they and it's a great place it's a lot of fun and uh ju just uh last Friday one of our baseball players that played during Co won the science award at uh Family Youth um at Family Academy and um and him and his
sister played little league and the sister used to win used to win the prizes also so every aspect every economic every occupational taxpayer non-t taxpayer renter owner whatever come come to F
youth baseball and and compete learn how to win learn how to lose like ladies and gentlemen and this is a good thing we need to get this thing going as quick as possible I uh I'm just dump founded by all this um
it's pretty sad but um I hope we can uh on next uh the last meeting in you have in March try and figure this out a little bit more and more maybe you put this on the agenda each month until uh until we get the money and I think time
is of the essence thank you Mr Brown one more comment Richard Rogers uh just want to go over some numbers I did the math there are some loose numbers I went up with and I went on the Lower Side just to be safe so since 1980 if you had three teams in the three divisions that
fyb now has that's 12 kids per team that's 108 kids per year for 45 years that's 4,860 kids have played fyb and have been exposed to this toxic environment now let's say on average each kid has two parents at the game that's 9
9,720 fouth residence EXP exposed and let's say on average each family brings one sibling usually younger in the 1 to sixy Old range to those games and now that's another 4,860 exposed and according to the report those kids are at the higher risk
so roughly over the last 45 years 19,44 just fouth residents have been exposed to this toxic environment now let's that's a huge number right so let's think about the teams that have come for tourament ments that
we I did not put into those numbers and back in the late 80s when I played we had 8 to 10 teams in each in the major divisions and then the younger kids also so we're upwards towards 30,000 people that have been exposed over the last 45
years and let's not even I saw a skip here umpires you figured two umpires a night for five nights a week for eight weeks a year that's 80 a year times 45 years that's 3 ,600 umpires that are now
involved the bigger issue I have is the closure date for Mr Renshaw when the press release came out on January 27th it said the town of fouth today announced the immediate closure of the John elneil baseball complex as most
concerned citizens have spent time at the fields we're worried for our health but many of the thousands of kids have been exposed so I emailed Mr Rena on my own to ask when the tests were in his email I have it right here he stated the town's consultant performed the initial
soil testing on the site December 20th that goes on to say the results were provided to the town on December 24th at which the time was decisioned to close the field to the public so many questions is if the results came back on Christmas Eve
December 24th why was the public not notified till January 27th but then in an article in the Cape Cod Times on January 29th Mr Renshaw says in November arcadius was hired to complete 14 test borings so was the testing done in December as he personally stated an
email to me or November as he stated in the Cape Cod Times in the same article Mr Rena States He initially called for the fields to be closed at the beginning of January pending consultation with the state on January 15th so as it closed on Christmas Eve as you stated to me on or
January 27th in his press release or was it January 15th as he said in the Cape Cod Times article that's three dates that Mr Rena has said the fields were closed something just does not add up wait though on the information page now on the John
Neil uh John Neil site on the town website it says it was closed on January 9th that's a fourth different day that we got information for if he can't give us TR the truth about this closure and the well-being of our children's sake how can we believe
anything going forward now on Friday finally the results are released and there are more disturbing than we thought I won't get into the results as I hope most of us know that they were well above the state limit in the Enterprise article he States in September the town was first alerted to
potentially dangerous materials in the soil September right so this means the town knew about the potentially dangerous materials in September and didn't test until November or December I'm not sure as Mr Rena has given us a few different dates the bigger concern is that the
town knew about this and let the Fall Ball season still happen knowingly put Kids In Harm's Way in 2023 before the spring season new lights and fencing were put up in replace of failing infrastructure finally at field one this means the most toxic soils was Disturbed
in 2023 but no testing was done until sometime in 2024 after the busiest season the spring season was still played we need to know who knew what and when thank you is there anything you want to address Mr Bena no Madam chair
okay all right well I just want to make close with one comment and I believe that Mr Rena when you were alerted to the results of the of the um the testing that you close down the
fields and that I don't think anyone can ever fault you for keeping the best interest of our kids and this community I know it's an inconvenience um and I I applaud your efforts
okay we're going to move on to uh Town manager supplemental report thank you madam chair I do have uh three or four quick reports um wanted to provide an update uh with regards to the uh bad marth's noise complaints um as
you all recall back on January 27th we had a uh public hearing to discuss possible noise violations um my update Madam chair select board is that I I have reached out within the past week to the management of bad marus and have a uh site visit planned for March 5th to
meet with uh two managers of the establishment to go over um what they've put in place with regards to so sound mitigation and then future plans to even reduce that sound uh even further hopefully second update is in regards to
Coastal resiliency Specialists that recruitments um I'm happy to announce that uh uh we have 51 applications for the coastal resiliency specialist position just a couple of weeks ago we had 16 so there's been a lot of increased uh attention um and I applaud
the human resources department but the director Susan lumping in particular um she's gone above and beyond in terms of getting the information out to a broad um uh array of of different um sites and trying to um expand um the number of
applications we've got uh firstr interviews tentatively scheduled for the week of March 3rd so I'm hopefully uh going to be able to provide an update with regards to hiring filling that vacancy uh relatively soon um the position the preferred date for application uh closed today so again um
first round interviews the week of March 3rd um I'm really excited to announce that our automated agenda management system the software platform the town meeting approved um we're close to launching that um Diane Davidson the office manager U Phyllis Downey and the
select Board office and I have been working with the vendor to build the system tomorrow we have training for about 40 staff users um select board will get some information too on how to access this new platform um but again it's going to really increase our efficiency and Effectiveness um reduce
um a lot of cases with the typographical errors capitalization and punctuation and whatnot um so excited for Rolling that out hopefully um at the March 24th meeting is kind of the goal um the uh the other update I wanted to provide is
in regards to the comprehensive building condition assessments um that initiative as all recall I gave an update a couple of months ago we selected a vendor um talking to DPW facilities manager Greg Endicott um the uh the vendor that does
the uh visual inspections of each of the Town facilities is on is in town um they're starting this week today actually uh with the school uh Department um uh evaluating the school facilities that'll take four to five days so sometime next week they'll
initiate working with DPW uh facilities evaluating and assessing the town buildings um and ultimately within the next seven to eight weeks we're hopeful to have a system built up that again places condition indexes on each of the town-owned buildings and allows us to
add that information into the CIP so we do a better job um with the preventative maintenance and identifying needed repairs um over that over our 10e CIP um so I think ultimately it's going to put us in a much better position um than we have been over the years in regards to maintaining our properties our assets
and that's all I have okay select board reports nothing me we have our uh Workshop this weekend yes we did get ready uh and that will be here at nine o'clock on Saturday any other select
board reports I don't have a report per se but I just wanted to follow up on an email that I sent about the the size of the packet and I'm wondering if there could be a way that we can put some links in rather than the full body like
um I gave one example in my email I had a chance I'm not I'm not looking at you no you're looking at me I'm like no you're sitting in the wrong area yeah I guess so um like for instance um reports that like supplemental
reports maybe there could be links like all the information about the Habitat for Humanity yeah there was a ton of that get through it that's so it's tabbed now I mean the PDF that you access on the on the uh on the on the website the link that Diane sends out um
when you when you pull that up it's it's tabbed so you can go right to the specific agenda item um this new automated agenda management system is actually going to do a better job of tabulating that but if you if you go to that link I do in Adobe yeah bookmarks is on
the right you hit the bookmarks Tab and it's index so you can jump to different you can jump to the different uh agenda item numbers right and then I've never known that we have here is that it let me check on that I don't think we have it on what we get shut down tonight here
for me also I'll verify that I'll verify and I think well I know Diane has the version of Adobe that she can tabulate that as well but I'll I'll verify that what happens is it it just closes and then you go back to page one and you have to scroll 600 Pages that's time you get done to it not acceptable so we'll
work on that yeah we make sure that the the version that's available on your iPad is tabulated I'm not I'm sorry just the meeting's over what are you here for 00 tell me what is
it we $500 we it and we and we had to and we did it we did take it out of order we took it before for our public hearing so it was approved with our thank you it has to it has to go through yes because of the amount because it's a
a donation to The yes sorry you had to wait thank you so much for the donation that was so nice appreciate that no thank you there anything over $500 anything yep well I made a donation $50 to that
same thing I oh is there no everything well thank you Bob thanks I mean and even I mean even even the notes with respect to it indicated that it was $500 and other donations so
I'm just curious well that's the minimum and then 5,000 there is no threshold I'm being told that any donation has to be accepted for Town yeah now you got under the radar there Mr M G but you can make a motion I'm going to scoop Mr Mcall and
mo make a motion to adjourn thank you would you like to second that Bob sure why not okay we have a motion in a second any further discussion amongst the boards seeing none all those in favor I thank you folks um [Music]
[Music] [Music] hi it's Brandon from cran Appliance since 1983 our goal is a family-owned company has been simple to give our neighbors on the cap and Islands a great
shopping experience rest easy knowing our professional team will listen to your needs and help you pick the perfect appliances for your home at crane Appliance we know how difficult Appliance shopping can be our team is here for you crane Appliance we call the cap and Islands home
Carlson printing 5085 48733 our email address is Carlson printing aol.com Carlson printing for all your printing needs John's Liquor Store 729 Main Street
Falmouth 508 548 2287 [Music]