[Music] [Music] Thank you everybody for coming to this water quality management committee meeting.
Um, just a quick reminder of some of the ground rules. If you want to speak, we'll let you speak. You have to step up to the podium or to the microphone over there. You do have to identify who you are and
uh you do have to stay on topic. Okay. Uh, first item on the agenda tonight is an update on where the urine diversion project is from Brian Horsley, a mass
alternative system test center. You good to go? I'm good to go. All right. Yeah. Thanks everybody for having me again. My name is Brian Horesley. I'm a project assistant at the Massachusetts Alternative Septic System Test Center. I think as everyone here knows, we've been assisting the town
with a project to look at planning for a urine diversion pilot project. Uh so I'm here today which is just about the one-year anniversary of starting this project. So I think it's a great time to provide an update. So thanks for that opportunity. I'm actually going to come
back to that one. So uh we're working uh with a intermunicipal agreement between the town of Falmouth and the and the septic system test center which is a division of the Barnstable County government. I just mentioned the project was initiated in May 2024. Uh we're working with a team including our staff
at Mass TC. Uh we've subcontracted with a consultant team who are experts in the field of ecological sanitation which encompasses urine diversion and composting toilets and things like that. Uh we're also working with members of the town, the water quality committee and the freshwater ponds committee as
well. Uh so our scope of work in this uh intermunicipal agreement uh is intended to answer some of the questions that came up early on in the project here uh about the feasibility and efficacy of how urine diversion uh could function as a watershed um nutrient management tool.
Um so currently we're preparing and planning to um you know be prepared for a pilot project. Uh so that's the work we're doing right now. Uh the targeted completion of this planning work is September 2025. So coming up pretty quickly. Uh and the the reason for that uh targeted date is so that we're
aligned for the November uh town meeting in the case that we're prepared to go. Uh I believe we'll be looking at uh asking for funding potentially for the pilot project in November. Um so I'm just going to pop back. So this is sort of an overview of um the vision I think for for the
overall uh urine diversion strategy in Falmouth. So right now we're we're engaged in number one um planning and preparing. Um if all goes well, if we achieve all the goals in planning and preparing, the hope is that we will initiate a pilot project roughly around
spring 2026 uh following, you know, securing funding for that. Um and the goal with the pilot project is to install uh formal urine diversion systems in 50 homes uh throughout the town. could actually happen in other towns as well, but really we just need,
you know, 50 systems installed and we need to monitor those systems for a period of three years. So that's that's number two. And then following a successful pilot project after three years, um we are hopeful that we could be aligned so that the town could then implement urine diversion as a strategy
in watershed planning to help remove nutrients and meet TMDLs. So, a little background. I think everybody here pretty much knows about urine diversion, but I thought I'd just back up a little bit and and just answer, you know, why are we looking into urine diversion? Um, and I think uh
number one, I think there's a real efficiency benefit uh with urine diversion given that uh around 80% of the nitrogen and around 50% of the phosphorus that enters residential wastewater uh comes from urine, but it only accounts for about 1% of the total volume. So if we can you know address
the majority of the nutrients in a tiny fraction of the volume of wastewater uh that that's a very efficient approach in my mind. Um also looking at uh cost is another benefit of urine diversion. Uh we've had some preliminary estimates from a local plumber uh that that have
found that uh urine diversion installation in a residential home will range from around five grand to around 15 grand. Um, and the reason for the range there, uh, is that, you know, a very simple urine diversion system can include one toilet being installed on a
first floor with a urine storage tank in the basement, uh, versus a larger home where there might be multiple toilets replaced potentially on a second floor and also potentially with underground storage tanks. So, that's why there's there's quite a range in costs there. Um and so the the pilot project once we
move past the planning phase uh the intention is that we will get uh even you know more accurate cost data when we actually you know go out and and install some systems in homes. Let's see. So another benefit of urine diversion is uh presents an
opportunity for nutrient recycling. Um, you know, basically if if we're pulling urine out of the waist stream, uh, it allows us to process it and and make it into a fertilizer product, uh, that would other, you know, the nutrients in that fertilizer would otherwise be pollutants requiring treatment, uh,
either in on-site septic systems or at central wastewater treatment plants. Uh, and lastly, um, I believe there are a lot of business opportunities associated with developing urine diversion at a larger scale. And we've already seen it a bit where there's there's at least one company in Massachusetts right now uh
that is collecting urine and making a fertilizer product out of it. Uh and I've heard interest from others around town as well that you know there's there's interest in in doing this. So those are some of the reasons we're looking into urine diversion. Uh again sort of more background. How does urine diversion work? This is just a really broad
overview. Um basically you separate urine from waste water at the source uh using specialized toilet fixtures and urinals. Uh from that point it drains down to a holding tank either in the basement of the home or underground outside the home. Uh once the urine is
is stored in that location uh it can be pumped out by a septage hauler or potentially town or county staff uh and brought to a central storage and treatment facility. Um once we're in the process of pumping out, we would get an accurate measurement of volume and and sample for nutrients. So we would
understand that the total nutrient content that was diverted. uh and then we could actually report that uh nutrient load diverted to the mass DP uh toward watershed TMDLs. Um once once the urine has been diverted and and treated, it could be
distributed to a fertilizer manufacturer uh for processing. Uh and then the resulting fertilizer products uh could be applied in accordance with local and state plant nutrient rules. So that's sort of an overview on the whole concept. So where are we now? This is
the reason I'm here to give you guys an update. Uh so most of the the focus and the reason this has taken a year uh already um is that we're working with basically three different regulatory bodies and I think everybody here understands how that can take time. Uh especially given that we're doing something you know really completely new
that you know hasn't really ever been done before in the state. Uh so first off we're working with the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection. Uh so far we have confirmed uh and engaged with the approval process through the innovative alternative septic system program. Uh the D has
advised us to file a provisional use permit uh which which we're currently engaged with. Um D has also confirmed the ability for the town to uh basically account for the nutrients at the watershed scale which is uh pretty big
news. That was a pretty big accomplishment of the team. Um given you know really the alternative is is trying to account for the nutrients on a on a house by house parcel by parcel basis like we do with septic systems um the the real benefit of the watershed scale accounting is that we can you know cumul
cumulatively account for all the nutrients removed you know per watershed area. So we can basically say that you know we removed you know x number of kilograms you know in in x watershed uh and then report that to D in the the watershed permit reports.
Um and then lastly on DP, uh we're we're actually we actually just had a meeting last week that was a very exciting meeting for us. Um given that the DP basically determined that the recycling and reuse of urine as fertilizer fits
nowhere in their existing regulations. Initially they were looking at the bioolids program which is how they manage the recycling of bioolids from wastewater treatment plants. We had some concerns about regulating urine through that same pathway um for a variety of reasons, but during this meeting just
last week uh the D confirmed that it was not going to apply that program and basically that they were going to pass the jurisdiction off to the Department of Agricultural Resources. So essentially what D is saying is that urine once diverted from the waist stream and processed appropriately is a
fertilizer product. So that was really really big news from from mass DP. Uh and so that relates to the second regul regulatory body there, the Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources or MDAR. Um so we have identified the pathway to register urine derived fertilizer products. Uh and in fact
there is now one uh urine derived fertilizer product that's registered in the state. It's called we bloom uh manufactured by the company Wasted. So that's actually available for purchase and and reuse in the state right now. Excuse me. Um yeah. Yeah. And so
and so we have a next meeting with between D and MDAR on May 27th where we'll be, you know, sort of working out the details of that to sort of transition from DP's regulation to MDAR's regulation uh with the the urine product. And then the third regulatory
body we've been working with is the plumbing board. Um it's actually called the board of examiners of plumbers and gas fitters. We just call it the plumbing board. Um and so we've identified two different pathways for the approval of the urine diverting toilet fixtures. Uh the the number one
choice is to get general acceptance. Um basically meaning that you know each individual fixture gets a registration number with the board. Uh and then could be essentially installed anywhere in the state. uh if we can't get that acceptance um reason being that a lot of the the toilet fixtures we're looking at
are manufactured in Europe and so they don't have the the you know certain specifications that the state plumbing board is looking for. So in that case we can apply for a variance uh for the purpose of the pilot project. Um we uh also in this process
we've learned that the application for acceptance of plumbing fixtures meaning the toilets and urinals um should come from the toilet manufacturers. So rather than you know applying for that ourselves, we're basically working with the toilet manufacturers and trying to facilitate that process of getting
approval. Um in addition to the toilet fixtures, we also have to get approval for the whole plumbing system and the storage system. Uh so that's something that that we can do because that's not a proprietary system, right? It's just it's piping and storage tank. Uh so we've hired an engineer and we've had um
the preliminary plans that we developed updated. Uh actually I just got them yesterday. Uh so we're currently reviewing those with our team and plan to submit those to the plumbing board uh as soon as we can and we're expecting to get a formal plumbing board review on those um plumbing and storage system
plans in June. Uh and then once once we have those plans in hand, that's really going to facilitate the approval of the toilet fixtures as well because the plumbing board is going to need to know where does the P go once it once it goes through that that approved fixture. So once we deal with this uh all the
regulatory details uh these are kind of next steps moving forward. Um we need to determine you know again planning for the pilot project. Um how you know the town can subsidize the installations of these systems and how that subsidy would be managed. Um we need to update a
participant agreement. We already have a draft that we've developed. Um but that participant agreement will you know lay out all the details of you know what what the different responsibilities are uh for the pilot project. Um we also need to conduct a preliminary assessment
of uh potential participants. We currently have a list of about 200 people who are interested in participating. Uh so my plan is to submit basically a survey uh to them. not not necessarily going in homes yet, but but surveying them to understand, you know, how many toilets they have,
whether they have two floors, how many they'd be willing to replace, and things like that. So, I'm hoping that that'll sort of cull down the list of 200 to, you know, some of the like basically the best uh the best sites for the project for the pilot project. Uh we're also continuing to explore uh the disposal
option at the wastewater treatment plant. We've had ongoing conversations with Amy Lel uh on that topic. Um obviously the you know in our mind the the um preferred method is recycling as fertilizer but if we you know either can't get that or can't manage the whole volume that way we'd like to have you
know the the wastewater treatment plant as a backup option. Um we are you know continuing with ongoing efforts to look at alternative funding pathways. Um you know the the preliminary quote for the project was around 1.7 million. Um, so
we're we are trying to find ways to supplement that. Um, and then as I already mentioned, we're aligning, you know, we're our timeline is basically aligning us for November town meeting to hopefully move forward with the pilot. And then so this is sort of a a
preliminary pilot project concept. So assuming we complete the planning in time, uh, we, you know, get funding in place, uh, a spring 2026 would be an excellent start date, I think, to target. Uh at that point, I think then we would be ready to start doing inhome
assessments. So we'd have that, you know, sort of culled down list of of priority sites. Um and that's when I think it would make sense to to invest in actually going in the homes and um you know, getting the information needed to uh select what types of toilet fixtures could be installed and what the
plumbing and storage system might look like in that home. Um at that point, we would be getting sort of more accurate uh cost numbers uh together for each one of those individual sites. Um after that we would sign those participant agreements that we're working on
uh complete the system design and permitting uh get the installations in. Again we're looking to do 50 systems for three years. Uh the reason for that is that fits within DP's approval framework. Um once we do all that monitoring we would we would provide a
report to DP uh which would hopefully confirm like the nutrient accounting approach. Uh and then if all goes well, uh we'd be looking to um you know work with the town to figure out how to integrate UD urine diversion into town wershed planning.
And that's all I had. So I'm open to open for questions. Thank you, Brian. Yeah. Um typically we let the board ask questions uh and then we turn to the audience. But if I can I've got several questions and I think I'll start. Um you
said 1% so that's 1.4 14 gallons per day. I just took 140 gallons a day per household typical. Um, how big is the storage tank in the ground? It depends on the house, depends on how many people live there. Um, but yeah, typical 140.
The typical household use is more I've seen between 200 and 500 gallon tanks. Um, you know, an indoor tank need generally needs to fit through doorways. So, I think that's the real issue there. Um, but if it's a bigger household, you know, just trying to figure out, does it get pumped out once a year, four times a year? So, I mean, that's really where
the tank sizing comes from is how often do you want to have to pump it out? Um, so, you know, you guys looking at this, how how often do you think they should be pumped out? I think at most twice a year. Okay. Ideally once a year. Well, thank you. um uh your your timeline to get to a town
meeting. Uh I might put you on the spot a little bit, Peter, but typically there's inside some capital budget a placeholder and typically articles have to be prepared June or July.
No, we have more time than that. You got a little more time than that. Okay. Is is there currently a placeholder any place in the capital budget that you know of? Yeah. Okay. Okay. Um I'm not challenging. I'm just trying to make sure we've taken care of some of the
details. Uh you talked about 200 folks have indicated a willingness to participate. Do you know how many of those are in nitrogen sensitive areas? Because that's what this board's concerned with. Uh I do not. Um although I guess I would say that you know I
think it's important to look at this in in phases. So I think what we're talking about now is not implementation. We're talking about a pilot project to basically understand you know how well the systems work. Are people willing to install them and how much nutrient content is removed. I think you know
beyond you know after the the pilot project I think that's when we really need to make sure that the installations are happening in appropriate areas. I'll express my my preference that the more that are in the nitrogen sensitive area the better. I absolutely agree that would be ideal. Yeah. And back when this
whole issue was more on in front of this board to try to figure out things one of the big things we had and we never got to a final determination was do do all the bathrooms have to be outfitted with urine diversion? Yeah. or
just only one of them have to be outfitted because again from from our perspective and we had this before was you know if I if I'm sitting here being told to spend $40,000 on a more conventional IA and I got three bedrooms three bathrooms
and I can put in a urine diversion toilet for a lot less than that I might never use it and so then it's defeating where we're trying to get to. Yes. So I would hope that you guys get to a policy point on that and I at least I'm speaking for myself I'm not the whole
board but I think when we had this before several of us felt that all all all bathrooms should be here in diversion. Okay. Um I guess you know my response to that is you know that the watershed cumulative accounting approach that that I mentioned earlier would
allow for any level of installation. you know, if you wanted to put in a single urinal in your garage, you know, you could contribute to the total nutrient removal from that wershed. And we believe that, you know, we will get many more adopters if we don't require all
toilets to be replaced andor disabled. And and our goal is to have have people put in an IIA system that makes 10 milligrams per liter of that 140 gallons a day. So that that you've got to be able to show that you're getting there.
I'll give you one minute. Okay. Um, go ahead, Peter. You you you outrank me. I work for you as sort of as a member of the uh the urine diversion working group. Um, I did want to speak to this and you Steve, you
you Peter Johnson style of assistant town manager. Thank you. Thank you. You didn't listen to me when I said at the beginning. Um, so we have been wrestling with this question and uh and it's it's one that
actually I I don't think the working group is going to resolve. So, I'm glad we're talking about it tonight because I think it is important for the water quality management committee to look at this issue and not tonight, but to weigh in with the recommendation before we get
to um funding a pilot project because um what we do know is that if the goal of your committee is to have urine diversion as an option to replace an IIA, um which I think is what you're
getting at, Steve, um then we need to get general use approval. And in order to get to general use approval, the DP has been very clear with us that at a minimum the the households the the 50
households that have to operate for three years in order to get to general use approval, which is the standard, which I'm I'm sure you all are well familiar with. um those households would have to either have all of their toilet fixtures be urine diversion or disable
the toilet fixtures that were not urine diversion. So, we we have at the at the working group, we have talked about an opportunity for folks to install urine diversion toilets and still have a community benefit that
counts toward the um the nitrogen targets that we have for our impacted watersheds, but it would be analogous to oysters, not IAS. And what I mean by that is the way that oysters count toward our water quality management plan and our nitrogen
credits right now is we put a bunch of oysters out. We measure them before we put them in. We we weigh them as they come out and we do the calculation. We say okay this is not guesswork. We can tell you this is how much nitrogen we have removed after the fact. Watershed
scale there's a total nitrogen that's credited for that watershed. So, urine diversion fixtures outside of an area that require sewers or IAS, we could do that same calculation of okay,
doesn't matter. We don't need to determine in advance how households are using their urine diversion fixtures. We'll just measure the urine going out, right? So, we could we could then have a credit in the water quality management plan. This is how much nitrogen is being
removed from urine diversion toilets. That's nice. That's a value and and certainly if folks want to pay for that themselves, that's terrific. But if again the goal is to provide homeowners with a cheaper alternative to an IIA,
then the pilot project should have 50 households that are only urine diversion. But there there are I just wanted to articulate there there you know there is a benefit to other approaches to urine diversion. Gotcha.
All right. I'm going to start John. I'll start at your end. You're in. You're in. I guess uh assuming that this um pilot project leads to uh acceptance by the D. I I wonder if it's time to
start thinking about with our septic tax credit um changes that we're proposing and a little bit further down the road um bringing urine diversion into that mix. Right now it's it's the tax credit can be applied to a connection for a sewer or for a conventional IIA system,
you know, a tank that goes in your uh title five system. But I wonder if we can somehow bring in UD in there and that would offset some of the cost of these or most of the cost of the toilets and make it a bit more palatable for people who want to go down that path and I'm sure someone like Senator Dylan
Fernandez would be supportive of that and maybe David Vieier too. Um but something to think about down the road. Yep, I agree that makes sense. I think you know having it approved as a provisional use or general use IIA system I think would help facilitate that.
That's it. Yeah. Um, nice job, Brian. Really nicely organized. I have a point that I've raised a couple times before. The 50 households. In three years, I wouldn't be surprised if there was 10% attrition.
So, I really, and I don't know what the magic number is, but I strongly suggest 65. God forbid 75. It sounds like you got plenty of people that want to get interested. Uh, obviously raise it to 75, the cost of the whole project goes
up by some significant factor, but I really think it's very important to keep that in mind because I don't know how sticky D would be if say after three years they had 45 households because they've been so specific all the way along about 50 to 50. Yeah, there's that
one. And then to really put you on the spot in a not necessarily warm and fuzzy way of the holy trinity you're dealing with the plumbing board d and and mdar um one by one what's your feeling about their
interest in this is it positive is it passive is the actively skeptical I think we've made a ton of progress and actually we were just talking about this yesterday because you know the folks some of the consultants I'm working with have actually been working on this for many many years and we were just talking
yesterday like what what's changed and they really think it's good you know we've really developed good relationships with the regulators and and I would say the mass DP is very very supportive at this point um the the D I think I mean they see it as plant nutrients like I said they've already
approved a urine derived fertilizer so you know if they're like there's nitrogen there's phosphorus there's potassium there's nothing dangerous in it it's a fertilizer in their eyes uh the plumbing board you know they're worried about engineering plans and you know pipes and and fittings and not leaking and not smelling. So um I really
think we have you know a great setup with the good news. I'm not concerned about it. Yeah. Yep. That's all I have. Steve, right? Steve in connection with and just for for all those who do or don't know that Steve is our representative from this board to the
working committee, right? So maybe I should know the answer to this but I don't. Um the um you mentioned in connection with a plumbing board that you might have to you would likely have to use the variance
uh for the pilot project possibly. We're not sure yet. Well, we'd have to use one or the other. Well, I mean the the ideal at least have variance and if you're lucky general approval for the toilet fixtures. For the toilet fixture. Yeah. I mean, you know, we're targeting, you know, general
acceptance as our top priority and, you know, we will settle for variance if we have to to be able to do the pilot. So, in any case, after the pilot project when you're going then is it required to have general approval?
I mean, urine diversion systems have been installed for many years uh under you know, sightby-sight variances. So, no. Um, it's just a it's a more challenging process. you know, it's a it's a longer and more expensive permitting process basically to work through work through a variance on a
case- by case basis as opposed to having general acceptance of the fixture. Thank you. That's it. The uh couple of questions. the this the step that you've achieved
with DP that they'll take kilogram mass of nitrogen removed accounting and give credit is is huge. That that's fantastic. Um that that's a major hurdle. Fixtures was the big bugaboo when I got heavily involved in this uh
last fall with a working group that was underwater quality management. Um where do you stand with fixtures? Who what fixtures are you looking at? because you know you get estimates for install that's plumbing it's not the fixtures because you need to identify the fixtures what's the status of the
fixture project yeah I mean admittedly I think that's the biggest challenge to overcome at this point um like I mentioned you know most of the fixtures we're looking at are are European manufactured um we are working very closely with basically three different fixture manufacturers to try to
facilitate you know the approval process in the state um I think that's going well but you know honestly I've never worked worked with the plumbing board. I've never tried to get a toilet approved with the plumbing board. So, it's it's all new to me. Um, but I all I can say is I guess we're making progress. Uh, and I'm I'm optimistic.
Um, the I guess the the good news is that we have waterless urinals already approved. So, you know, that that is an opportunity there. Um, you know, to either install waterless urinals in homes and I understand there's a space limitation in bathrooms associated with
that. Um um but certainly in you know public buildings in schools you know in in businesses you know there are many many urinals out there that could be converted to waterless uh urine collecting systems. So as a fallback we I mean we already have that option. Um
you know I think that the the two um you know sitdown toilet fixtures we're looking at are uh urine diverting flush toilets. So they they basically still use water to flush the feces while they they use a smaller amount of water to flush the urine. Um those are the two
that I think are, you know, potentially a little bit more challenging. Uh those are the two that are, you know, um European manufactured. Uh the other option I'm looking into and actually had a call with two different uh manufacturers just today, uh are these um urine only sitdown toilets, which I think is an interesting opportunity
because it doesn't limit to to standup peers only. It allows both standup and sit down peers to use these toilets. Um but it would be in that case a second toilet in a bathroom. So, we're trying to look at all the options that we can. We're also looking at urine diverting composting toilets for people who are
interested in that. So, we're trying to to get as many fixtures approved as we can. Um, but like I said, it's, you know, there specifics you can site. What brands are you looking at? The uh the Lenin Save the Wastman Eco Flush. They also make an Eco Dry, which is a
composting toilet. Uh there's a the Separat Villa uh and the Separette makes the pee only sit down. Uh this the Cinderella is a incinerating toilet, but they also have a P only sit-down toilet. Um so I think those are the top toilet
brands. And then you know there's also American Standard um an Americanmade toilet is in process of developing a urine diverting toilet. Um and they're very aware of the project. We've been talking with them regularly and and they're hoping to have their fixture, you know, ready by spring 2026. That's
fantastic. But I wouldn't, you know, it's it's still under development right now. But that's, you know, that's really promising news. Yeah. The the uh Wman um there was a pilot some years ago, a dozen or so in Australia where they used it, but they found that the urine
product was too dilute because it used too much water. It used a lot more than they thought it did. Yeah. For flushing. So they threw them away. They put 30 odd units in a series of homes and they were going to use the the product to fertilize um a turf farm which I thought
was fantastic idea. So sounds like you're making great progress especially you know the American standard. I know when I spoke to the executive director of the plumbing board last fall at some point, you know, he was receptive to they would consider any toilet that was
approved by a government entity anywhere in the world and say, "Hey, well, at least it's approved by, you know, the Australian or the Swiss or whatever, but none of the manufacturers could come up with that certification. Maybe it's improved over, you know, the past year." Um, couple other questions now.
Um, why would we consider or the committee of yours is considering diverting excess urine that couldn't be processed into fertilizer to the wastewater treatment facility. Um seems when there was a a pilot done by the green center um wasted out of Burlington
was picking up the urine for a nominal fee and if you scheduled the couple of time a year pickup at the houses in the program at the very least it would keep it out of Amy's plant and take it to Burlington or I think they had a facility they were developing in
Massachusetts. it seems like a a waste of the potential resource and a delay of developing that commercial use. So why why not? I completely agree. Um you know the only reason we're looking at the wastewater treatment plan is really as a backup plan. Uh and you know we've been
talking about that since the start of the project. Um and you we've made a lot of progress toward you know urine fertilizers since then. So um I you know I don't intend to see any urine going to the treatment plant. I would prefer not to. Um, we're just exploring that as a backup option in case that, you know,
the urine recycling, you know, process isn't in place in time. That being said, you know, you mentioned wasted. They've called me multiple times and are asking how much pee we have at the test center because they want it and they're they're making they need more urine for their fertilizer manufacturing. So, there
there's a demand right now. Uh, also the Rich Earth Institute, um, they have a for-profit spin-off called Brightwater Tools where they make all of the tools necessary for processing urine into fertilizer. That includes a pasteurizer, a Stuvite precipitator, uh, a a carbon
filter, and a freeze concentrator. And the freeze concentration is really exciting because what it does is effectively freezes out the fresh water and concentrates the nutrient content of the urine, which can reduce the total volume by up to 10 times. Um, so that would really facilitate moving it to
Vermont if if we had to do that. Again, I don't I don't foresee needing to do that because we're making so much progress and, you know, we're really seeing that the regulators be very accepting of making, you know, urine fertilizer in Massachusetts. Yeah, it it seems that at at the out at the very worst case, hey, waste it'll take it.
Yeah, there'll be a fee, but you know, if you schedule bulk collections, I I would think that'd be pretty nominal. La one last point that I know town meeting approved some sum of money uh this spring for a survey of homes to see what
feasibility there is for installing um is that going to be rolled into this project is is that funding you're looking to utilize as as part of your assessment maybe that's a question more for Peter yeah I mean I think ultimately that's up to the town how they how they
manage those you know funds that were allocated at town meeting. But I mean I do think you know that will be you know in my mind that's sort of a first step in the pilot project is to you know so I think we need to do a preliminary assessment now and then I think we we do need to go into those homes uh at the beginning of the pilot project. Yeah.
Well that that's was my understanding that fund was just for that purpose to go into x number of homes and see the feasibility. So maybe Peter can answer where where is that going to happen and who's going to do it? um identify yourself for the people at home. Johnson
style assistant town manager again. Uh so yeah so that is additional resources for preparing um the pilot project and um and even as part of the pilot project um you know it's it's now I guess a
subsidy available to go um to the individuals who sign up. So, you know, I don't know that I wouldn't foresee just sort of going into 50 homes because people are interested, right? I I would want to put that money to good use.
Meaning, let's let's get make sure we clear all of our threshold questions that we're um that we're willing to proceed. We're able to proceed with the pilot project, which we anticipate to cost well over a million dollars. and and that $50,000 will be used toward uh
completing that process and it may it may be used prior to um you know I don't know what the sequence is in terms of when the town meeting vote is and the authorization um but one of the one of the points that Brian touched on is
participant agreements um with the individual households and that that that sounds you know easy and simple there's actually quite a lot of decision-m that needs to happen before we can hammer out the details of that participant agreement and you know and and the the
financials is is the biggest one, right? What is the town going to contribute to the cost? What is the remaining cost to the homeowner? Um all of that needs to be nailed down in the participant agreement. So having the the additional funds that we have available now, you
know, can be used. Maybe we do, you know, we do a couple of different houses and we do a couple of different fixture types so that we can refine the estimates that we have now of five to $15,000 and maybe the the remainder is used to offset cost of the pilot project
when we actually are signing, you know, putting the details in the individual participant agreements. Thank you. All right, go ahead, Steve. Um I Peter just made me realize that um
I think one of the biggest challenges is a sort of a catch22 in the decision sequence. If if I was a potential urine diversion user, I would look in the participant agreement that you're handing me to see
what is the town promising me. Do I get to avoid an IIA or a sewer? And obviously if the town can make a promise like that, I'm much more likely to sign up. On the other hand, there's what the venture capitalists call
regulatory risk. The town might not be ready to promise that. So then you have to be honest with the participants that you're not promising them anything. You're promising them subsidy, but not
future substitution. And somehow we have to all work together to figure that out. Yep. Yeah, I agree. I mean, that's that's a big decision the town needs to make. I mean, of course, I'm, you know, an advocate of the of this concept. And so I, you know, I I see people participating in this pilot project are
are taking a a pretty big risk. You know, I mean, they're they're putting in a whole new toilet system in their home and allowing it to be monitored for three years. And so I I think people, you know, whether they invest anything financially, um or whether they're relieved from, you know, futuremandated,
you know, IA system installations, um you know, they they have quite a bit of skin in the game just participating. And so, you know, I would hope that the town would, you know, consider that and um what's next? You know, make it uh you know, something people want to do, you know, because we need to, you know, hit these numbers uh to satisfy D. I don't
think we want to make it hard. Uh, you know, we want to make it a a good deal for people who are willing to participate. That's my opinion. Tom has another question. Yeah. Um, Brian, how frequently are the participating households effluent? How frequently is
that going to be monitored over the three years? We don't have like a final monitoring plan right now. Um, so, so we'd be monitoring both the urine removed, you know, to get that number. And that really only has to happen when the tank gets pumped out. There's no point to sample the tank repeatedly. So, you know, it might be once or twice a
year that we're sampling the urine tank. Um, and I think we also do want to monitor the the septic tank effluent to understand what the what the impact of removing that urine is. Um, so that's something we still need to iron out. I mean, for uh IA septic systems, we tend to do it either monthly or quarterly,
right? So, I think that's a decision we still need to make. The reason I'm bringing that up is I would hope there'd be a good chance we'd hit our 10 mgram per liter or better mark and then we can go to the state and say here the UD
system is hitting our preferred or our goal for IAS which again is a I think is a key sort of pinch point in the argument. Okay, Ed. Yes sir. Uh thank you. the uh
two things. One in preparing that uh participatory agreement um a guideline that is worth looking at is what the town had done with people that participated in the eco toilet program about 12 years ago as part of the little
pond sewer service area project. Um at that point there was a small town subsidy. I think it was 5,000 or something. But there was also um the opportunity and the guarantee that you wouldn't have to connect to a sewer if you were in the little pond sewer
service area. So you did not incur that cost which ended up to be a little over 13,000. You also didn't have to run a lateral which could have been anywhere from 3 to 67 $10,000. So you were saving in effect in
the order of magnitude of 20 to $25,000. Now, if the opportunity I think that required some special legislation from uh from the state to allow people on a sewer line not to connect as long as they were in the ego toilet program. Nobody did it. Um I think eight or 10
people did it townwide, not in the sewer service area. And a couple are still doing it. They still have the um I think it might be the Dubletton toilet. I'm not sure which one it was. I think that's the one they used, but
that's no longer manufactured. So, as a uh a starting point in looking at that agreement that is going to be fun to draft, there there's a good document there that was used a dozen years ago. And just lastly, to Tom's question about the testing, I think, yeah, the protocol
in the um provisional approval by D is quarterly testing. So, if we want to get to that IIA thing, which I think is really the goal of this committee and most people to avoid the 40,000 and get a $10,000 approved IIA at for urine
diversion, you'd have to do the quarterly testing. And I think that's important to see how effective, how quickly. I would think there'd be very quick impact at the deb. Yep. Hope it'll happen. Yep. Yeah, I would agree. I mean I think you know to that point I mean you we're we're planning to assess urine diversion systems in you know two ways
and we've already talked about this a couple times but number one is as a best available nitrogen removing technology and that's where likely you know all the toilets would have to be urine diverting andor composting in the house uh to achieve that you know 10 milligram per liter number at the septic tank effluent
but I think there's also the approach that that Peter helped outline where we could look at it more like oysters or more like fertilizer reduction and you know I think I I just hope we don't lose sight of the potential value toward water quality improvement and toward meeting TMDLs, you know, potentially at
a lower cost. And, you know, that in order for that approach to work in the town, it, you know, it's it'll require looking at the watershed planning approach and potentially, you know, allowing your inversion systems in in different areas and, you know, figuring out how that interacts with, you know,
IA mandates. Um, you know, obviously we don't people want don't want people to game the system and and put in the cheaper UD in place of the IIA. Um, but you know, there there could be some real benefit to figuring out, you know, alternative ways to fit this in the town's planning approach.
Okay, I'm going to take questions from the audience, but I have a quick question to you, Kristen. I think I have the draft agenda. Where where do we fit Tom in today? Tom is third. He's third. Okay. Thank
you. Okay. Uh, comments from the audience. We'll take the select board member first. Hi, Doug Brown select board. So, it's true that last time when we had the sewer planning, we wanted to really push the IIA, you know, the composting toilets and really gauge people's
interest. So, we did offer not having to connect to the sewer. I'm not so sure that long-term that's a good plan because if you're in a sewer planning area, you should know that eventually that that house is going to be connected to a sewer. Maybe it's not the best thing to do to offer people urine
diversion in sewer planning areas a pass on the sewer. I think these are really geared toward other areas of town. Personally, that's my feeling. And uh I hope we don't give them false hopes that we're going to allow them not to connect to sewer and sewer planned areas. I think we've previously had a
conversation uh Doug that says if you're in the sewer service area and the sewer goes by in front of your house, whether you connect or not, you get assessed a betterment. Okay. Wow. Okay. Yeah. But we want them to connect. Well, it's their choice. I mean, because there's a cost of, you know, connect, they they
can do things, but given that the but I but at least their choice. No, I don't think so. They don't have a choice. Okay. My my point is if people think I fine that that wasn't my point. My point was if people go urine diversion and the
sewer comes by their house, they're not going to escape paying a betterment. Yeah. But also u to the other point about whether the town would support letting them keep the urine diver diversion toilets. I would think that the select board hopefully would support that as they did in the past with the
Marav Vista sewer planning. So okay thanks other other comments. I could just if I could just comment on that point really quickly too. You know urine diversion can be used in conjunction with a sewer connection or in conjunction with an IA septic system. It would only, you know, it would
greatly reduce their water usage, reduce the nutrient content going to the sewer, make the IIA septic system work better potentially. So, you know, even though they might not get the same, you know, credit for removing the nutrients, it's still beneficial to do your diversion really anywhere. Save money,
right? Hold up. Hild the mangade green center. Um, are you still planning to, this is to Brian, are you still planning to use water uh meters in all your projects? Because as um I think it was Tom who said we should check on the effluent.
Well, you can only check the effent if you know how much water you use because if you use less water because you have waterless urinal or waterless toilets then of course the concentration goes higher proportionately. Does that make any sense? So I want to make sure that
water is being measured. Yes. Okay. Good. Do we need more measurement than everybody has to have anyway for their water bills? Yes. We we've thought about outdoor water usage. should be ideally we would isolate indoor only water usage. Uh so
there's a couple ways to do that. Uh we you know as most of you probably know we we're doing a IA septic system uh project in the town of Barnstable in the Shoel Pond area. Uh and so for all of the 15 homes that are involved in that project they have indoor only water
meters installed. The other way to do that is to monitor outdoor water usage. So actually put meters on outdoor hoses or outdoor showers. Um but yeah, that's I think it's really important. I agree with Hilda on that comment that um you know monitoring the water usage is very important because you're going to see
the probably the septic tank effluent go up because you're you know four out of five toilet flushes are for urine only typically. So that's that's a really important point. Thank you. Good evening. Matthew Hanley from Thomas
Lenners Road. Um I'm really excited about this. I've been, you know, following wastewater in Falmouth for like four years now. Um, and, you know, I've seen all the options that are available and I feel like this is going to be another tool in our tool belt
that's really going to give um, lowincome and our seniors an option and also our summer residents. If you have a summer cottage with two bedrooms and one bath, that's what traditionally what Falmouth was made up of. You know, this would be a great technology because you
don't have the drawbacks of have an IIA system in the winter. So, uh I look forward to this moving forward. I think I think you know there's going to be a lot of ways that this can be used that isn't being explored right now. You know, large nitrogen contributors like schools and nursing homes and stuff like
that. If we can use the waterous urinals and do urine diversion, that's going to cut down on nitrogen. Like how many of our school kids are at school and um you know are contributing urine, just urine, not feces um every day. So taking that
taking that urine out of the system is going to make a huge difference in some of our watersheds. So thank you. You're welcome. Other comments? Just quick ones. Peter Hargraves. Thank you. Uh I would really
like on slide number two where you talked about the watershed scale nutrient accounting because I saw it as a path to using uh urine diversion on fewer than all the toilets because there would be some
credit to people. Uh but I imagine you're not running the test with that because of the scale of the test. You're just measuring what comes out of the individual homes and then
extrapolating to a broader use. So you're not going to be doing a water scale a watershed scale nutrient accounting on this pilot. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, the goal for the pilot test
is to look at both, you know, what's removed from the household and what remains in the household. And so that would allow us, you know, what's removed from the household is what would be um, you know, cumulatively accounted for, you know, at the watershed scale, whereas what's left in the home would
be, you know, looked at on a site by sight basis. So it depends if we're comparing to IAS or if we're just trying to remove nitrogen from the wershed. Ah so for all the accounting in at different stages of the project all the measurements occur on the site that's
being uh studied not out in the watershed per se with samples of the water that's going through to the river and to the estuary that I misunderstood that okay so the other thing excuse me
but I'm an elderly person and I need to hear this twice sometimes You know, I've been schooled that the IAS that are currently approved don't remove 100% of the nitrogen and we get a credit for an IIA for a certain amount
of removal. And that's how Kristen calculated once we put in the sewers, we'll need a certain number of IAS to reach the TMDLs. So, let me stop and say, do I have that right? Yes. And so I
don't know why we would be restricting the testing to only people who are willing to do all of their toilets because in fact I could envisage and tell me if I'm wrong on this that if someone used all of their toilets into urine diversion they would actually be
helping the the uh reduction of nutrients to a greater degree than someone who put in a more expensive IIA. day and in between are the people like me whose house well I'm interested in it and willing to do it under certain
circumstances but I could never accommodate that in every toilet but if those were included in the studies and with our knowledge of the norms for households we could understand how much is likely to be saved if I only use one toilet or if I choose not to use it
sometime it would be data to say well this is reducing the nutrient at least on the level of an IIA because I would be better if all my toilets were going to urine diversion. Please correct me if I'm not expressing a correct
understanding of all this stuff. I'm not going to correct you, Peter. Okay. Okay. But somebody somebody else is willing to. So one thing that's very clear is if if we want Peter if we want the urine
diversions to be allowed as a substitute for an IIA in a and and as I I think you're aware Peter we're um we're looking at creating geographic areas where IAS will be required and the urine diversion will
never be an option with D approval in those areas. is unless we get general use approval. And that's relevant because the D has said we will never get general use approval unless we have 50 households for three years that are only
using urine diversion toilets. So I thought that was a great answer because there was an undercurren because there was an undercurrent in the discussion that unless people capped their toilets or converted all of them, it wouldn't be counted.
But I know earlier on I don't know how many lists there are. You said there are 200 people who are candidates. I should be on one or another of those lists, but I'll be disqualified if you're looking for people only who will do all their toilets. But I think Hilda and Earl did
a survey showing how many people would be willing to do this if they had to do or able even if they had to do all their toilets. and it eliminated 75 or 80% of the toilets if if of the households. If
Peter, what you just heard was the D's position as to what they'll accept for 50 homes. You're arguing that the D, you don't like what the D's told us is is the rule we have to follow. No, actually
I'm back to the fairness and the compensation for complying with the state requirements. So, back to the contract. We should be totally transparent with people that they may have to just be altruistic and do this because they want to remove nutrients
because there won't be any compensation in the in the form of tax credits or benefits from the town except if they're in a pilot program. So that that No, I understand. I'm not spitting in the wind on a D. So then they'll have to install
the before. Well, okay. We haven't We're having cross conversations. Yeah. Sorry. So I Yeah, I understand. Uh and that's this is one thing that I stood up for earlier on that unless it was an IIA, it
didn't seem to have much merit. And so if it could be counted as an IIA because the savings uh in the nutrient uh containment was comparable to an another IIA that was approved then maybe it
would have an entry entry point for being more broadly applied at a lower cost. So if we can't do that because of the discussions with D, I think people ought to know upfront because that's what I'm taking away from this. It changes my point of view as a
participant in urine diversion. Thank you, Peter. Um, this Did you want to respond in any way? I I do feel like we're there's a little bit of confusion. Um, so D will allow watershed scale nutrient
accounting for homes that use any number of toilet fixtures, a single urinal in the garage. If you're removing pee from the wershed and it's going to a fertilizer manufacturer, the town can take credit for that. Whether that's after everything gets to general use approval. Not necessarily. Okay. Because
I mean right now the you know one of the best available nitrogen removing technologies, the nitro septic system has provisional use approval, but it's a best available nitrogen removing technology. Once it gets general use approval, the the level of monitoring will decrease, but it's still available
a as you know, it's still available to be installed right now as a provisional use system. So really, you know, what there's basically two things we're trying to address with DP. One is understanding how well urine diversion systems work. And you know
they've recommended that 50 systems for three years will provide us with adequate data to you know do this the statistics on on the results and and get a good understanding of how well it works. Um but also that same 50 system three-year number is also what's
required to get general use approval. If we want general use approval as a best available nitrogen removing technology. I agree with what Peter said that all of the toilets either need to be replaced or or um disabled, but there's still that opportunity that even if urine
diversion Yeah. So, the other the other way to look at is urine diversion could also get general use approval, but not as a best available nitrogen removing technology. If it shows that it's not meeting 10 milligrams per liter, but it's meeting, you know, it's removing, you know, four kilograms per household
per year, that's still really, really valuable. Um and and it you know it would just be you know implemented by the town in a different way. You know if it's not going to be an option to replace an IIA mandate but like I said I mean there still it still could be implemented in watershed plans and have
you know very good benefits at low cost. Tom you had another question. Yeah. Yeah. Brian just mentioned there almost in in passing as as I understand it, you don't have to remove or replace the conventional fixtures in your house as long as they've been
disabled, right? I mean, as long as you can demonstrate that the conventional fixtures can't be used, then I would think that household would qualify. It's not this tremendous expense of paying to have things removed and or replaced if if you shut the water off and there's a
bunch of different ways you can do that and put a seal on it and you know yeah I mean again I don't we've talked about this you know throughout the over the past year, you know, I think you know the the recommendation from you know Mass TC and our consulting team is to
not require that. um to you know to to prioritize the households that maybe only have one toilet and are willing to replace that um or the households that are willing to replace all their toilets if they have multiple. Those would certainly be the priority households. Um but I don't think it should be a
requirement of the pilot project to have only UD happening in that household because like I said there's still a lot of value in people who are using partial UD systems and you know removing significant amount amount of nutrients and I can actually point to the project that the green center did and and we
helped them out with where we um we had 40 41 households I think it was um use these portable you know the funnel with the container on it these portable devices. They had one of those in the household. They still had other conventional toilets in the household. And we saw nitrogen removal at a rate of
like was 4.1 kg per year, which is very very good um just using a portable fixture. So I think it's really important we don't you know lose sight of the value of partial UD systems. Obviously there's a little bit to figure out as to how those are implemented in
the future, but I really think we just need to like do the study. we need to do the pilot project um allowing you know we we want to get that 50 number even if they're not all 100% urine diversion I think we need to do the pilot to understand how well it can work and then we can you know figure out how to
implement it in the town planning after that Doug I'm going to take Jed because he has browns the select board again also uh I was on the working group and we did unanimously determined. I don't know if it was unanimous. We had one to center. No, everybody. It was unanimous. Was it?
I thought so. So, um, we also came to the conclusion that all the urinal, all the toilet fixtures should be replaced because we don't want to risk spending taxpayer money on a project and not have the best possibility of success. If we spend $2 million and then we allow
people to only replace one fixture and that house underperforms by 50 or 60% compared to the ones who do replace all. And if the ones who do replace all are a minor fraction of the 50, I don't think we're going to be very successful with our results and we're going to go to D
and we're going to fail and we're not going to get the approval for the urine diversion to be the replacement for an IIA. So that's the goal of the project is to have this become accepted as per general use or at least provisional use for long term till it's really
certified. And I don't want to set ourselves up for failure by saying let everybody just do one if they want to because I think that'll be a problem. Jed I got you got you Jed
Goldstone member of the board of health but not speaking as a member of the board of health just speaking as a a parent. So um some practical considerations just because I have to run. Um uh one thing is um a human pees
out about 1.4 liters of pee per day. Um so uh you you probably look this up and just but um I think you should think about pumping quarterly rather than um just because like you take a family of five and you're going to hit a big tank
pretty quickly. Um so that's sort of the main thing. I had another thing and I can't remember what it is. So feel better. Uh I'm gonna let Hilly go and then Kim and then uh Maggie. Maggie.
Then I'll take a motion to adjurnn. Hild the man gay green center. Again, thank you Brian. an accurate approach of having people do as much as they can but not necessarily all because we need the data and we need as much nitrogen removed from the waist stream as quick
as possible. Ultimately, it's more important to get the water clean than it is to conform to some kind of regulation that the D is sending to us. So, I think it's really important to get as many um UD as possible to get as much urine out
as possible. And one way we can incentivize also is if you say to people if you're if you can show no matter what you do in your house you can show that you're affluent is the same as an IIA no
matter what you do eco toilets your version then you have achieved it not just only what you have removed because some people are home hardly ever so you can't just measure the volume that you take and say okay you only did this
much. Um, we just want to look at the affluence. So, measured before and measured regularly behind afterwards. And what we noticed in the last project is that within a short amount of time, I don't remember George might remember if it was three months or six month. It was
very stable. We did it for we measured for a long time, but it was pretty stable after a while. Um so that we can kind of say oh after half year we have seen that the effluent is let's say 10 milligrams per liter that's great now we're going to measure you every year at
at some time and we will give you that credit as if you're an IH that might make it a little bit more flexible as the way you say you know we can use as many toilets as you want or as few in the comp pilot project we did we had the the least
um preferred basically way of capturing urine and it was about 80% of the urine was captured that way. Um and it wasn't just only four kilograms per household. It was only for a few people in the household. So right now it's 2.7 people
on average 2.5 2.7 and in our studies was a little bit more than 1.5. So we used we we got a lot of nitrogen out with the very volunteer approach of using this little urinal. So, it's definitely worthwhile to have people
have the flexibility and get as many data as quick as possible. Yep. Kim Kim Kmart, Famouth Pond Coalition and a member of the uh UD working group representing the freshwater pond advisory committee. Just a a few points.
uh the survey that the Green Center and the Fam with Pond Coalition did and presented you the results of in November of 2023 uh indicated that there's a lot of uh sensitivity in terms of the subsidy and about 53% of the 91 people who responded
to that survey said that they would be willing to replace all their toilets if they got 100% subsidy. When you went down to 75% subsidy, that number significantly declined. So when you're thinking about subsidies, uh it's going
to make a big difference u in terms of getting all households uh uh a household to replace all of their fixtures or disable their their nonUD ones. Um I've also said to this committee in the past, this is a new technology uh that
involves like the most personal of habits, going to the bathroom. And um I get a subsidy. I got a subsidy. I got a tax credit uh for purchasing an electric car. I got a tax credit for purchasing
an AC split system. I didn't have to uh get rid of all my other cars. I didn't have to disable my other heating and cooling systems in my house. So the idea here is that we want to popularize
a new technology and the more barriers we put in front of people uh the less we're going to get people to try this new technology. I understand that we want to try to get at least 50 households and I
agree with Tom maybe 65 70 households uh to do the 50 uh uh to do the uh complete conversion or the exclusive use of urine diversion. It's one reason that I have been pressing for us to consider other people from other communities. There's a
lot of interest in other communities and participating uh in this in this pilot study. Um, so, uh, I'll I'll just leave it at that. Um, and I just, uh, I want to thank all of you for the amount of
time you have devoted to this topic over the last couple years and Peter and the town and Doug and other folks and Hilda and Earl who have, you know, really pushed pushed all this. So, appreciate it. Maggie. Uh I'm Maggie McGau from WA quoite. I'm
a member of the Felmouth Pond Coalition and Citizens for the Protection of Wait. Um I'm I think I'm I'm sort of echoing what both Hilda and Kim have just said. I do think that the subsidy is likely to
be the key to this question. that the bulk of the subsidy should go to the households that will replace all of the fixtures so that the data will go to the DP. But I think that everyone in the town of Falmouth, wherever they are, you
know, close to the south southacing estuaries or, you know, higher north in the watershed should be encouraged to implement any form of nitrogen removal or phosphorus removal available. So
whether and this goes to uh what Jonathan was saying that the tax credits should be expanded to include um the composting toilets in addition to urine diversion and also blackwater
graywater systems, incinerating toilets. Whatever the mechanism is for reducing the nitrogen load and the phosphorus load should be supported and you know as Kim says you know
you doesn't matter which one you use if you use any of them you should be getting some kind of tax benefit so I think that would be something to really emphasize with Dylan and um the other legislators. Thanks and thank you. I
second what Kim said about the amount of time that has been put into this, the amount of work done by Mass, the amount of work done by the Green Center to popularize this, and the support from the town is fantastic. So, I'm going to make one final sort of
statement um and then we're going to move on. But I was on the phone today with uh a gentleman who has overseen for a number of years Suffach County's uh IIA program. He's recently retired. Um we've often times discussed what is the
concentration of nitrogen in the effluent they use 80 they've measured an awful lot of systems. So just taking for a moment 80 milligrams per liter and using uh the value put out by Hildy that 80% of the nitrogen is in the urine that
still leaves 16 milligrams per liter of urine that'll be in the effluent. So that is going to likely come out higher than the 10 from the best IAS. Just I just wanted to benchmark that so we're all aware of you know 80 sounds like a
great number but we're still going to have something to do. I'd like to move on to the next item. We we're aware that Pleasant Bay is the only location so far, although I think there's might be one or two more that are getting close
to having their plans together. Um, they do have a plan. Um, it covers multiple communities and, uh, John is dug down into their plan a little bit. That's the wrong one, Chris. That's the wrong
one. That's the wrong one. Nice color, though. I was excited. Thought we were further along than we were. Yeah. So yeah, just reflecting on people were asking some questions about what what's it cost to get the plan, what's the cost
of the plan, etc., etc. This is this is going to be a a serious dose of reality right here. Yeah. So this uh presentation was really inspired by Steve Leightton's question at the last meeting as to did it make more sense to go with just IAS to fulfill the nitrogen
or use this hybrid approach we've been talking about that has sewering and a whole mix of um non-traditional technologies. So what I've done is I've taken the Pleasant Bay um watershed plan and run it through some types of analyses. The reason being is it's
really the only um estuary that's uh the subject of a watershed permit that's been approved by the mass DP. And this uh permit was awarded in um 2018. It's interesting only took about three months
for the submitted uh um permit application to be approved and then put into uh into into work. So they developed a targeted uh watershed management plan that combined what they call a hybrid approach of traditional non-traditional technologies. 75% of the
nitrogen removal to meet the TMDL will occur through sewering and then 25% through a mixture of other non-traditional technologies which I'll talk about. Um, as of 2018, uh, 17,717 kilograms of nitrogen per year
was, uh, needed to be removed to, uh, meet the TMDLs. And it's interesting is an alliance was formed between the four towns that border Pleasant Bay, Brewster, Chadam, Haritch, and Orleans to kind of come up with a plan jointly
and enact this together. And from what we've heard, it's been working really well. And in addition um in terms of the parcels that are involved, there's a total of 8,637 parcels uh as of the um 2006 uh um
Massachusetts Esto's project uh study 7,315 parcels were developed and there were another you know um 900 or so that um you know could be uh developed. And the analysis I'll talk about really just treats uh um the
7,315 homes. We're not looking at any buildout. It wasn't really included in their 2018 plans. So um just the numbers as submitted to the D what was permitted. Um again I've talked about this. There's a mixture of sewering which is the the
majority of the nitrogen technology to remove um you know to meet the TMDL but they're also doing a lot of fertilizer uh reduction both residential golf course IAS compose only about 17% of the um of the removal and then they have
PRBs that are proposed shellfish aquaculture and and fertigation so they've developed a pretty robust plan and they're now six years into it. So what I've done is take an approach of looking at three different scenarios. The base case would be the plan is
submitted and looking at the cost of that plan. Um it's not so easy to get the numbers, but I did the the best analysis I could to come up with a a total cost it would take to use those technologies that are in the base case plan. And that's shown on this slide.
The numbers in red show the the cost uh in dollars per town for a total of $351 million to get to this um TMDL. And the first thing you'll notice is that they're actually proposing to remove more than the TMDL. Um and that's due to
the fact that Chadam is doing a systemwide townwide uh sewering approach. So they're taking out more nitrogen from the various subinvants that are feeding into Pleasant Bay. So that's why you have this 26,444 kilograms being removed and
that's um that's the number that was submitted um in 2018 with the permit. So what that works out into basically in a unit cost of kilograms of nitrogen per year removed $13,275. So that's that's what it would
cost by using this combined sewering approach um and also some of the other non-traditional technologies. Now, the second scenario I did assume that we were going to use the same TMDL number of 17,700 kilograms per year and only use
IAS to get to that number. And that's summarized on this slide. And um Kristen provided some information in terms of how much um an IIA system would remove based on the water consumption data that exists for um the four towns. And that
number is 3 kg of nitrogen per year. So that comes out to 5,96 homes that would be required to have that 3 kg per year of nitrogen in their IIA system to get to the $17,700 kg that needs to be removed. And
I use for this analysis an assumption of $40,000 per IIA system. So the total cost comes out to about 236 million or the unit cost is 13,333 uh per kilogram of nitrogen per year. So it's you know almost identical with all
the an analytical uncertainty that exists here. It's basically the same number as the hybrid approach cost but you'd be doing fewer homes involved because you're just targeting that 17,700 kilograms per year. Now, if you
take into account uh buildout, and I think the latest studies from the five-year report that was uh released suggests that with buildout, it's now about 23 24,000 kilograms per year that would need to be removed. So, you would need to involve more homes to get to
that magic number. And then the last scenario I did was what if they hadn't applied for a watershed permit and they took the approach where what the DP is saying that we would have to have all the homes
in that watershed go to the best available nitrogen reducing technology. And for this analysis I assumed it was going to be an IIA. So you have the same um numbers of um three kilograms per household. And it would take um with the
existing parcels um from 2006 7,315 um times the 3 kilograms would give you 21,000 roughly 22,000 kgs per year of nitrogen removed. And it cost the unit cost is the same for an IIA system only. It's still
13,333 kg. So that's what would be if every home had a convert if they did not submit a permit. So to summarize, but there'd be more homes. Yes, that's that's um that's what I've got. Well, I didn't sum I didn't
put the number of homes, but that's down here. Uh the number of homes increases to 7,315 versus if you just did to meet the TMDL, uh the number of homes is 5,96. So I hope you have a slide where for
each of these three scenarios you've got the total cost to the watershed because in principle politically you could divvy it up any way you want. So this is the the table that summarizes that. But before I go to the table I just want to put a few sort of caveats here. There
are uncertainties um in the cost of these especially in sewering. We've seen the cost of escalation that occurred from little pond to great pond. So, um, those numbers will only have upward pressure. Um, no cost assigned to contractors. I think Steve, you had the
question last time, how much does it cost for consultants to put together these complex plans when you're using a hybrid approach? That's not really built into this analysis. That number wasn't available. And then finally, lowerc cost options such as UD were not using this
analysis and and they're not using the Pleasant Bay um you know wershed management plan at least at this point. There's still the potential for adaptive management practices where that could be brought in I guess if we have IAS approved by the D and it's another
substitute uh choice as we've just spent the last you know hour talking about but that's not included in this analysis. Um, and finally, the 2023 Pleasant Bay annual report, which I've only seen a a PowerPoint summary of. I haven't got my hands on the actual report, may have
some changes to the various mixes of um the traditional versus non-traditional um technologies to get at the nitrogen TMDLs, but that's not there. So, the table again shows the summary. So, the cost right now, the existing plan, hybrid plan about $351 million, but
there's a lot of uncertainty in that number. the unit cost is basically still the same. Uh the only model because we're only doing a smaller number of homes that cost is significantly less. And if we were to do um without a watershed permit and require all homes
in the wershed to upgrade to best available nitrogen reducing technology, that number quickly goes up and starts approaching the hybrid approach if you take into account the buildout households, which I didn't do in this analysis because I couldn't find that data. But that that's how it summarizes
you know and um in all cases they are removing the required amount of nitrogen when their plans were submitted but there is growth and and what I've seen is the first five years they've gotten pretty close to what they promised to remove in the 2018 total watershed
management. So it's just another way to view it. This is an existing system. It's a work in progress. It represents the best um sort of um case study we have right now because it's the only case study of a watershed permit on the Cape and we're able to look at some of
their technologies and their costs. So, thank you. Can you read the three numbers? No, I just can you just read the the three numbers in the second to bottom row. The total cost just the first three digits is all that matters. uh 351,236,000 and
293,000 200 million sorry million million. Thank you. Okay, Tom. No, I think that's a great approach and certainly as practical and down, no pun intended here, as down to earth as
we can be right now. Ed, great great analysis. There's there's a lot of numbers there, a lot of words that you know people on the committee, some who are here regularly probably understand and others who might not have any exposure to this are like what in the hell is he talking about?
But it's great and I think you know a point I always think of when you look at the IIA versus the sewer is the IIA is this ongoing forever cost of monitoring each site. Um you still got to pump out your your title five tank. you know,
there there's a lot of this re recognizes the initial out of pocket, if I can call it that, investment by the town and the homeowner. Um, you have to also, I think, in that look at what's the ongoing thing, but this is great. I mean, that's a fantastic amount of work.
Well done, Steve. Oh, it's fantastic. What happens when you ask this at a public meeting in Chadam? I have not tried it, so I can't speak to that. You see what I'm getting at? Well, they I mean, they used apparently
the least value way of doing it. Yeah. And they made the decision to go with whole town sewing as um you know, the way it was described in the 2018 plan. So, they're going to remove all the nitrogen and where it goes to, that's another story.
Great job. Thank you. Yeah, I think if you guys if you folks can reflect on when I put up numbers for the intended use plans and different communities that are on there and what they're looking for, you know, Chadam in particular is looking for
quite a bit of money from the SRF. So, yeah. No, good. Good. Uh, questions from the audience. Peter, thank you. want that if you don't want I got so you
know I don't want you to get Peter Hargraves and you know I really appreciate the indepth exploration of all this and I'm I'm going to bring this out again not as critique but because when people see this they may not understand the many layers and the depth
and what they're really looking at and I think I said it when when uh Steve was up here with a work in progress talking about the cost for removing nitrogen between the different systems or maybe among more than two systems and
that was you know this and I think Jonathan's made it clear this is the capital investment for the system putting it in but the operating cost as I've been led to believe to understand
is different and it may be substantial or not I have no idea uh for an IIA system versus paying the sewer fee. It's certainly to the consumer going to be an important part
of the whole equation. Um, and the other thing we haven't talked about when you talk about strategically approaching it is the opportunity with a sewering system to handle contaminants of emerging concern, pharmaceuticals and
other things because once you stick the IIA in the ground, that's what you got and until you replace it or recharge it or whatever the terminology is for the maintenance. And so the other thing I'd like to add to the discussion and I
guess this is maybe a correction to the calculations. I talked to a person who is in the business of installing IAS about the cost for my house which I think would present some unique engineering challenges because of the
system I have. But nevertheless, he said the concrete box on the back of the truck is $30,000 and the installation and the installed cost would today would be 50 to 60, not 40.
So other comments from the the audience. Thank you, Jonathan. Next up on the agenda, uh Tom has got um some information to to pass around
relative to fertilizer. I think it emanates out of uh Did I lose Maggie? Maggie left. Okay. It emanates out of the pond committee. Um yeah, but Maggie's on the pond committee, too. I was trying to acknowledge both of them.
Kim, I'm pointing to Kim. I'm pointing to Kim, but you know the the idea here is I Tom wanted to put this in front of us because it's a little bit of a hot button with the pond committee right now. The idea is I don't want to get
involved in a lengthy discussion about this. He's going to present something. Everybody should have a copy of this and I would ask everybody to do a little bit of their homework to look at it and understand it a little bit better and we'll put it on to the next meeting as an agenda item for further discussion.
But given that it's out there and there's some desire for unonymity between boards about making recommendations to the selectment about what we're doing and where we're going. Uh I I I said to Tom, it'd be great. Put
it up there, give the overview and move on. First of all, I'm the presenter, not the developer or owner or anything else of this particular project, but I've been sitting in for months now, the freshwater ponds advisory committee, and
from the very get-go, of course, we discussed where they should prioritize their efforts and where the lowhanging fruit might be. And fertilizer application is one of those. I mean, it's a very willful act on the part of the property owner. Either they have
done it or they paid someone to do it. And Felmouth had a position of leadership in the Commonwealth. One of I think the very first fertilizer bylaw that was passed in the Commonwealth and accepted by the legislature. And as best as anybody I
know knows it had zero effect in f I don't am my corrector has been zero not a single enforcement effort was very clearly defined by law part of felon's
regulations and um George I think sort of George Hoyfelter sort of took the lead on looking at this and trying to think of how we might at least get started on is tactically it would put the applicators in the spotlight and make
them think about where they're applying the material. Strategically it would allow us to quantify how much nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and other things are being spread on the soil.
Um, and I there's a a page of verbiage leading up to setting the stage for this, but I thought it was a good idea to sort of cut to the chase. And it's pretty much explained in the in the boxes up here, uh, ending up down here
below. Um, and um, the idea is we would end up finally with a data set, but it would be more or less I I don't want to say it's frictionless, but there would be minimum
effort on the part of the professionals in town to register as call them distributors, applicators, whatever of fertilizer in town, they would have to be registered and then when they're
asked to apply the fertilizer to a property in town, they would enter this database online from home from their cab of their truck or wherever they were, go in and say, "Here's the address of the property that I'm planning on doing.
Does it fall under the purview of found bylaws? They would know right away whether or not they were supposed to do it or to do it under what conditions and the rest of these things. And um they'd be getting immediate feedback
and at the same time in effect they're being watched once the data is stored in the in the system. Uh it's extra work. Town's going to have to have a system set up to handle this. There's going to have to be
it and other people um looking at this and um of course there's going to be cost economic cost involved when I don't know what the permit might be priced at, but um I'd welcome any comments or questions first
of all from the committee. John, I I guess a lot of people I know do their own applications of fertilizer. So, how do we treat um the homeowner who's buying a bag of fertilizer and applying it if we want to get to a true number of
amount of nitrogen that's going into the lawns? That's a real weakness in this plan is we're not going after the individual homeowners. But as far as I know, every year, doesn't the town of Falmouth send a registered
letter to property owners that involve in I don't think it's registered, but there is a mailing address mailing. Yeah, maybe not registered mail. That'd be pretty expensive. But it does go out to property owners. So, they've already been put on notice that they're there's one thing about do it. But again, putting on notice versus actual
enforcement are completely different things. I I agree. They're they're very very different things. But this is I think sort of thought of and and George you can speak to this. This was the easiest target first of all and it's a substantial
volume of fertilizers I assume for bread because in my neighborhood it's every day all day long even on Sundays the landscaping trucks running back and forth and all these different things that that go on. But that that's the weakness one of the obvious weaknesses I
guess a followup to that. Tom, is there a way with the um various nurseries around town and distributors of nitrogen to just homeowners to track that how many bags go off the pallet each week or or whatever? I don't I mean there
George, you need to step up to the microphone. Step up here, George. And I'll I'll You can use that one, George. If you want to have a two-way conversation, you can use that one over there, too. Okay. I'm all I need something to lean against.
No, the whole purpose of this was to get some initial information. So, the permitting of the folks who are commercially spreading it, of course, that's tracked through a permit system. I figured we have a
wonderful IT system here in town. It would be worth it. As as a board, we are a committee. We were to make recommendations to the selectmen to do something. This is a way
to track where commercial fertilizers are putting and whether they're putting them in the correct place because it could be linked to the GIS system. The homeowner of course is going to buy tons of this stuff. I just walked by, you know, rows of it in the store. So that
will require anybody who sells fertilizer in the town to provide inventory of what they sell. Now what watershed that goes in, we have no idea. The first column, we'll have a good idea. You'll have at least an idea of
what watersheds are getting the majority of fertilizer spread on them. The other thing through education, we could this will make homeowners more aware because they're going to hear about this regulation. Everybody's going to hear about it and they're going to go, why are we even
doing this? So, we hope that it has an educational value, too, because in the stores, they're going to have to report the inventory and the commercial applicators are going to be telling us where they spread it using the GIS system of the town. Hopefully, to that
extent, be able to tell where in the watersheds are being. And also we know that there are a lot of folks who say that guy's always fertilizing his lawn over there. There's a truck over there at that time t last Tuesday. They did
that. We would like to make it available at least to be able to audit to say we got a phone call about somebody out in 14 Harry Lane spreading fertilizer again. Was it on our permit list? because they'll have to pull a
permit every time. I was not thinking that there should be a cost associated with the permit because it's basically a little it. They're going to punch that in their cell phone or their iPad or whatever they input the data. They're going to say, "I'm at this address. I've
used this much fertilizer. Here's a PKN on it." We could do the best enforcement is the easiest enforcement. You could look at that list and make a couple phone calls just to audit it. Mr. Smith, we see that somebody came to your
house or somebody reported this person at your house. Did they put any fertilizer down? Did they tell you what that was? Do you have a bill for it? And if they don't start matching up, then there's an enforcement capability.
But this is merely just to get the information because someday we might may want some real credit from DP about nutrient reduction in a watershed. This could provide the basis for how we started and of course when the
reductions start being shown we might be able to get real reductions for fertilizer use in the wershed. So that was basically it. There's another thought among the committee of looking at a home rule petition to actually
restrict fertilizer use. But this we thought was a good first step. It's not really regulatory in that manner. It's not highly enforcement. It's just reminding people where they can and cannot spread it in the watershed because we have a
regulation in the town that can be embedded into that whole GIS tracking system. And when somebody goes to an address, it will show up as, oh yeah, that's within 100 ft of a water body and you shouldn't be spraying it at that
time of year. So that's what it was for. Not heavy enforcement, mainly informative, possibly moving forward to getting us some nutrient credits for fertilizer reduction. George, I apologize. I didn't realize you were on the committee when I was looking for people that were on the committee to Oh,
yeah. Acknowledge. I didn't realize. Well, I like to keep that low profile. Yeah, I know. because I'm on the board of health. I should get the short list the committees that you're not on. Kim, do you want to speak? Uh yes, please.
So I uh also want to note that the town of Nantucket, if you go on their website, they do require that any company that is applying fertilizer in town registers. Uh they actually have to
uh take a little uh be cert sort of be certified. uh they have these online classes that the applicators have to take uh in order to get licensed in town. They pay $100 for a three-year uh permit to apply
fertilizer in the town. Uh so Nucket's uh you know providing some interesting uh you know precedent for this. Um Kim Kim is that through the board of health? Who who who who's running that over there? It is um the board of health.
This the board of health is the board of health. The board of health. Didn't mean to interrupt you. Yeah, I did interrupt you though. Um, so we're talking about four different things at the Freshwater Pond Advisory Committee in recognition of the fact that we've got this
uh nitrogen bylaw uh which by uh through our discussions with the folks at Marine Environmental Science is they've acknowledged that they're not in there's no enforcement. There's no citations being issued. Uh so it's sort of a just a paper
uh you know it's a piece of paper and people get mailed these letters um it doesn't really make a difference. So we're talking about four things. One is amending the nitrogen bylaw to uh incorporate a consideration of phosphorus.
Uh we are talking about this system that George um has suggested uh which again will apply to commercial applicators and also uh track ideally track sales uh in
stores. Um, we're talking about the um an educational campaign. Um, and we're also talking about uh joining with Orleans and Nantucket which have enacted fertilizer bans and they have home rule
petitions pending uh at at the state legislature. Um there was a I think the uh this we know this is going to be very controversial. We know that there'll be a lot of uh blowback. Um so we see this
as a uh you know not a quick process. Um but this um George and I had the opportunity to meet with a select board member from Orleans who has led the charge on their fertilizer
uh uh ban or you know restrictions and we understand this would be a long-term effort and a campaign. The first water quality management committee meeting I think I ever went to. Uh you discussed uh is when Eric was the chair and there
was a discussion about fertilizer and uh you uh your you decided that we we need to just sort of go the education route. Um and there was no real discussion of anything more than that. Um fertilizer
is a major, you know, contributor to our problems in our waters. Um and as um uh Tom said, it is a an act that people engage in. And so we need to we need to do education and we need to do
some things like this. U so I'm I'm all for this. I'm sort of excited about this and and again, I know it's it's a long-term effort. So what I'm hearing is that there's some concepts
that the pawn committee is going to embrace. We need to talk about at our next meeting and similarly embrace it. Right. Then it sounds to me like it's something that goes through the board of selectmen uh as a recommendation and then
uh if the bylaw changes it's it goes through the planning board. Correct. Yeah. And I'm I'm uh I'll just tell you that I'm meeting with more O'Keefe. I've talked to Mo O'Keefe about this, our legal counsel. No, I just I'm just we get to we get to make advise the
selectman. Yes. And then the next step would be to get get a more more revised by place, right? And it would be great for us to be working together uh and and come to the select board uh you know with u the same
recommendations for this. Um we and we also would I think the board of health has a role to play here too. Can I ask a quick question or questions? Question for Kim or for anybody Kim mainly.
Um, I think it's a reasonable idea. I think it might be helpful to you guys if you did a really rough back the envelope calculation and you admitted that it was rough and it was unscientific and it it's in a way it's not even valid, but
do it anyway of the cost per kilograms of nitrogen removed. Is it a thousand times a It might be a thousand times a better deal than IAS. or it might be about the same.
If it was only half as good, that's not so good. Yeah. Um, you know, for different assumptions about what percent decrement in fertilizer use you think you might achieve, right? Just it might be a good talking
point for you. Yeah. Yeah. I would I I would suggest that this is the sort of thing that at our next meeting we'll have more we can have more conversation. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm giving him a chance to come up with the number before and I think it's a good idea. I will say that the the fertilizer ban that has
been that passed town meeting in Orleans um has not gone into effect because they need approval of the legislature. But just the process of having that discussion and and doing the ban, there is a lot more talk in Orleans than there used to be about the impacts of
fertilizer and the uh the contributions fertilizer is making uh to the degradation of the waters in that town. Um so I think it's just I think it's a good discussion to have even if we can't you know get do the calculations get the
get fine numbers. We're talking about behavior change here. We're talking about education changes in attitude and then changes in behavior. Kristen, nobody from TUS is here today, right? Okay. So I'm just I'm looking at we have 15 minutes left before we all
have to be out of here. making sure that I didn't have to squeeze somebody from toughs in on the agenda. God forbid we for end a few minutes early, right? I I'm I'm fine with ending a few minutes early, but I don't want one pass. Anyway, thank you, George and Kim. And
no, you there is point of information. Yeah. For for folks that are working on this and I think it's a very important thing. The education is probably the the lowhanging fruit of the process to get people aware of what it does and get them to understand that you know that green lawn on the pond or on the
estuary is really a bad thing and you ought to be ashamed of yourself. But in the town of Bourne just this past week had their springtown meeting and article 32 passed and it said determine town to vote to authorize and direct the select
board to petition the Mass General Court for special legislation to establish limitations on the use of nitrogen fertilizer with the goal of reducing nitrogen loading to marine water bodies. Bourne's on board too on board passed it
this week. The bad news is is last night it failed to pass in Harwitch an identical motion but it it it is a battle but as Kim emphasized and I and I think it was Andy Warhol that said any publicity is good publicity right I think it was him that said that probably
other people also so just getting some public attention and get them thinking why would people be concerned about fertilizer inputs among among other things and I'll you better be you better be brief because We've got move on. Got 10 minutes. Good. Because you're setting
up the next meeting, Peter Hardra. You know, I don't know if Orleans has golf courses or agriculture, but the the Massachusetts general law protection of those industries and the fact that they're feeding our worst problems in
Falmouth. I hope that some of these considerations are going to apply to all the sources of fertilizer including those that mass general law protects. Now I don't know do the except does the fertilizer ban include the current
protected restriction. Oh, it does restrict. Yes, the exclusions are for commercial agriculture. Yeah, I'm got I I I'm I'm truly going to cut cut this off to get the meeting done. Yeah, we're we're we're entering into discussions. We've previously talked about fertilizers and
the restrictions on state law and everything else. So, we'll we'll we'll get there. All right. All right. I want to move on to reports of members and staff if I can. Yes. And I've got one that I just want to make sure I get out there. Um within the last week, the town
manager received a letter from the Cape Cod and Islands Water Protection Fund uh notifying us that for the Tassa area sewers, we will get a subsidy of $12,500,000 towards that project cost.
Um with that information in hand, I went and visited with the town's finance director. the article as written has language in there that if the town needed to they could go down the two and a half override path. However, there is no need
for a two and a half override. Uh the entire project can be funded within retiring debt uh and whatnot. So just I want to make sure that everybody understands it's not a proposition two and a half override. That is the question one vote. Although there's
some language in there about two and a half override. It was there when the bill was written. We've got confirmation from the state revolving fund for our funding from them and we've got confirmation of our 25% substance from the Cape Island. So the financing has all fallen into
place. We got a two-thirds vote at town meeting and we get a positive vote uh on the May 20th election. We are lined up to be able to complete our application by June 1st or or 30th. Uh but the
that's the last step in order to secure our financing. Lock it in. That's my report. Good. That's exactly what we wanted to hear because we discussed that before you got here and we had already resolved to go behind your back and force it onto the agenda
during our report. Good job. Any other committee things you want you want to talk about where the legislation is? Yeah, I mean just quickly a quick slide there. Yeah, you can put that up now.
The color. So just a very brief update on where the uh refundable septic uh tax credit bill sits now. So it's moved now to the joint committee hearing phase of the two-year legislative process. It's received a new uh number, bill number
H482, and it went to the joint committee on revenue. So, the next step is that the joint committee is going to hold hearings. They'll have an opportunity to debate the bill and there'll be chance for people to come and talk to them about the bill, but ultimately they can
make uh one of three recommendations. Two of them are basically the bill dies and one which is called the ought to pass means that the bill will go on for continuation of the legislative process. So I think it's important that we have people who can speak to the bill once it
goes to the committee for a hearing because I don't not sure they're going to fully understand all the intricacies of it because the people on that committee are not Capen Island people. So something that we need to touch bases with David Vieira on to see what we can do who wants to be there. But I also
think the Cape Island delegation is well aware of this and they're not unanimous in support there. Everybody that I know from other communities say that they their reps know about it and are in favor of it. So right, but they have to be on with that committee. The revenue
uh they can walk they can walk in and speak to the bill even if they're not. They need to because if it dies there that's it. Okay. All right. the minutes of the prior meeting. Do you have a committee report? I I have I guess I'll call it an announcement. Um
John's not here from uh as our liaison to the board of health, but I think this is important because there's been a lot of discussion here and at the board of health over the past years plus on IIA regulation. Posted last Friday in the
enterprise May 19th at 5:30 at the high school. The board of health will hold a public hearing on mandatory IIA for new construction. That's a significant milestone. A lot of folks, including myself, has spoken at these meetings and
at board of health meetings about it. So, the board of health is now at that point. They have a regulation. They're going to hold public hearings as part of the process to implement said rule. And it is the day before the the voting May 19th at the high school at 5:30.
This is the first cut of mandatory IAS in the town of Felmouth. So, hey, put it on your calendar. Yeah. Good work, Board of Health guys. George, you're already the only one here now. All
right. If minutes of prior meeting, Tom, you want me to suggest they be accepted? No, I mean, you you you marked them up. You passed them along. Yeah, I beat them up. Although I didn't have to do much to them, Kristen's doing a super job and
I'll move that they'll be accepted to be that they be accepted as presented. Second. All those in favor? I say I. I'll entertain one more motion. We can chitchat for six minutes or get out early that we adjourn. I have a motion.
Do a second. All those in favor signify by saying I. Excellent. [Music]