good evening we'll uh begin the meeting of the planning board for uh April 8th at 6:30 p.m i have an announcement to make first about to open meeting recordings any person may make a video
or audio recording of an open meeting or may transport transmit that meeting through any medium subject to reasonable requirements of the chair as to the number placement and operation of equipment used so as not to interfere
with the conduct of the meeting any person intending to make such a recording shall notify the chair forth with all documents referenced or used during the meeting must be submitted in
duplicate to the director of community development and planning person to the open meeting and public records log all documents shall become part of the official record of the meeting is there anyone here obviously other than the
city recorder I see or hear no one so we'll move on we begin at the senative site plan for city of Gardner with U stephen
S here make a presentation how you doing guys i'm Steven Senny and Greg Roy is the engineer on the project and he'll walk you through it okay and I'm more than happy to answer any questions that are that want to be directed towards me but I'll let him handle the the technical
side of it first and we'll go from there all right thank you thanks Steve thanks very much folks my name's Greg Roy with Doulson Roy Civil Design Group um some familiar faces here um but I haven't had the pleasure of coming before you tonight which is hard to believe because I've been around a while but it's nice to see you all and be acquainted and as
Steve said uh Steve retained um retained us to prepare the site plan uh for the project as well as to prepare the filings with both your board and I wanted to just uh put it in context with the larger perving effort um we have also um concurrently filed a special
permit application with the zoning board of appeals which is on their agenda for next week um what we're proposing uh here is six units um on the property at zero Emerald uh Street um we are uh
which is allowed by special permit from the zoning board appeals which is why we've of course filed uh jointly and also requires site plan approval uh with your board so effectively um the site is approximately just over 21 or 22,000
square feet in size so it's a fairly small piece of property um we're proposing to ultimately subdivide the property into two parcels um once we get through the process with you and assuming we have a favorable outcome both with your board and the zoning board of appeals we would come back to
your board with an ANR plan u to do that subdivision but we didn't want to put the cart before the horse uh relative to that um so we're proposing a three-unit building um on each um on each lot um the uh access to the to Emerald Street
would be sort of a conventionally um designed driveway system um with direct access uh for a garage for each of the units um so we're effectively providing uh two two parking spaces per unit one would be
um an an exterior space in front of each garage and of course one space uh within each of the garage uh units um we've also designed uh a storm water system for the for the project um I know Rob may have had the opportunity to
review that may have some some uh some insight into that but effectively we're capturing all the runoff from the impervious the proposed imperous um portions of the site it's a vacant site now um so it's a um a site of you
know with some with some slope to it as it as you come from Emerald Street down to the to the uh uh Tony Boulevard in the back so there's quite a slope there um but there's no impervious cover existing so all the roofs all the driveways we'll be adding uh will be new
so we proposed to capture that in a storm drain system uh we'll capture the roof areas as well as some uh field inlets here which will capture the runoff from the driveways and infiltrate them down into a a storm uh underground storm um uh drainage system that we have
designed on the lower uh portion of the site um I don't want to say too much u we're really we're going to take advantage of the uh of the grade we're proposing a walk out um on the low side so we can take advantage of the uh of the site uh grading there is quite a bit of grading that needs to occur on the
property um so you know this this site uh plan that you have in front of you is the grading uh grading and drainage plan that we prepared um we're proposing a retaining wall to catch the you know the lower portion of the site which we'll need a um which we'll need to you know to make sure we can keep that grading on
the property um other than that I wanted to keep it pretty brief um by way of my introductory comments and I'm happy to take any questions uh from uh any of you folks or any any anybody else that's in the meeting for that matter so thank you
what is the elevation from the proposed houses to Emerald Street itself thank you great uh so we're proposing um actually we're setting those up a little bit higher than the street so the driveway would effectively pitch back towards Jumbl Street so top of
foundations on this uh three plex here would be uh 1,027 almost 1,028 and the existing grades down here are roughly 1,026 so 127 so we'll put a little bit of a pitch there same thing on this door when I first heard the presentation
I don't don't know if it was for the development review or not i don't remember it was a question about having six access primary access to the edge of the road like how is that going to be
cleared i know Bob Rob you had a question about that if I may sure um zoning for residential uses allows a single access driveway um it's in my comments okay um I also commented to ZBA
it this has happened on other projects for this kind of project um so you probably have to deal with them on that issue okay um but brought brought it out i believe that came up at development review as well um because because I remember yeah just because
knowing that's how this would want you know to have driveways um so that's all and I I noted the zoning section in my comments okay okay does anyone else have any questions got a couple questions about the storm water management um have you done test
pits to confirm adequate separation to groundwater and bedrock at the infiltration we have not we have not done that to be fair so and as far as the operation and maintenance of that system is that going to be like shared among an HOA or how's that going to be assigned um yeah well so we did submit I
I believe anyway u a storm water uh report with this uh which does include storm water on and m um I would since it is a shared system I would anticipate yes a shared agreement that would be in place there totally private though or not you know all of this would be intended to be on the lots not impacting
the city not not on the city to to operate and maintain it so yeah I was mainly asking just cuz when you separate the lots I don't know with one of the properties or the other yeah I think we need a shared agreement because this you know this the run up from here would be discharged on that property so we're definitely going
to need to put some uh easements and agreements in place for for clarity too typically on smaller projects like this for us we will tie tie the onm the onm to either to an HOA or to the association so that it is tied by deed
right to that okay so there's no nobody can say in 10 years we didn't know about that right for exactly for I think probably for exactly your your point so so this project's going to be condos
so you'll be sold or rented so myself we sometimes will hold property sometimes we'll sell it it really depends on the market that we're in y right now the market's decent uh things change so you know our intent is to build everything we start we finish we build them we get
them to occupancy and then from that point in time if we sold them they would be sold as individual units and not as a rental property would not be sold as a three family okay you know for rent to an investor okay so it'll be condos so
far right yes yeah thank you for the use on the property like historically is there anything that would need to be kind of vetted for any kind of testing for previous use um I don't know if it was it's all woods all
woods always was yeah i don't I don't know as long as I can remember it's all woods no no no previous use yeah okay it's just been No I'm not saying it's no previous use no there was a previous use
yes i' I've lived in that little square underneath your right hand my family's been in that house for 100 years and I've lived there for close to 71 now so that property was a foundry
and in the 1960s it burned to the ground so that was a foundry and it did um I don't know if it produced metal parts it did work um along with the furniture factories and garden but it was a metal founder
well that definitely predates my that definitely predates me but thank you they ever test the soil in there or what could be left from the foundry we have not done any soil testing that I know of
no nothing's been done so the the cars that parking in there they'll go out onto Emerald Street we'll just continue into the That's correct right i have a question about your
grading you're bringing that entirely up with the level of the railroad tracks um with the level of emerald yeah so the top of foundations would be somewhere close to the level of emerald and that dark green area around the edge is not being
brought up so that's correct that's behind our home then will be a pool uh well it it drains from here to there so yeah but you're right but Right okay okay so behind our house then that's already low line will be a catch basin
for whatever water comes off your property up because that's down low below the railroad tracks that correct so I mean to be clear it runs there now right that's the way it drains now and that's the way it'll drain afterwards about the other end of that right so we
have a swale so we're we do have grading here we have a swale that we're picking up here so as not to drain it that way right um but we're like I said before that's the purpose of the storm water system we designed is to ensure that we're capturing all of the runoff from the the new impervious areas that really
are going to generate additional the additional runoff um and in and and get them down here so that we can infiltrate that and manage the storm water on site so uh we did we did design a system to take care of that on your property correct
okay so that's not going to be draining onto Tony Boulevard correct could you state your name phyis speaking uh both of us okay kathleen Gant kathleen and your address
87 Emerald Street right across the street from the other side and I wear uh at 100 Phil San thank you
just want to get that on record that's all any other questions couple on erosion control during construction um I didn't see an erosion control plan sheet would the plan be to do silt fence and waddle around yes it would the entire down gradient side
absolutely yeah and if it's not on the plan that's a that's on us so would that certainly yes and like extremely nitpicky nitpicky comment but it looks like on the silt fence like plan detail that the straw waddles on the down gradient end away from the disturbed
side of the site yeah you know uh we we get that comment from time to time i find it's better personally as been doing this to put the soil fence on the upgraded side from an operation and maintenance standpoint it's just easier to clean it when you have sediment that so I use the we use the straw to support
the the uh and we find it works well we do get boards and certainly in some conservation commissions that we know of that really don't agree with that approach and like to have it sort of the more conventional way um so we we we're not we're indifferent to that if if if this if if the city of Gardner would
rather have it um on the upgraded side we don't have a problem with changing that but that is intentional okay sort of a Greg Roy thing and not everybody likes it but so if you decide to keep them as
apartments or condos whichever you want to call them who's going to maintain those so there would be an association and it would be it would be a managed association okay because there's a lot of properties in the general area fully they say they're going to
take care of them and then all of a sudden you know it's let go there's a mattress on that property right there on the right a mattress so mattresses will not be allowed well that is one of the advantages of
developing a piece of property like that is you you tend to clean up some of that i think the little trailer that's there that'll go too the little travel trailer that's there yeah it's been there for 20 hasn't moved in over 20 years that's road through it sorry
sorry anything else i guess one of the questions I have is the on street parking and road street's a one-way street and that the whole street's covered in the morning when I leave at 5:30 in the morning you can barely get up the street because people there's no sidewalk anymore they raised the road so
high that there's no sidewalk people are parking where people try to walk if there's no parking in that stretch I don't know you said you had two per if somebody has a guess where do they park and if it's parking lot no you're house
some of these actually uh truthfully that I can't read upside down but these driveways would actually accommodate three vehicles off street parking um this one really would accommodate three as well because we're you know this the the distance between the edge of the the
edge of the pavement and and down here is um you know approximately 35 ft so you can really get a couple cars in there and you have the garage so you really and to do with that also helps snow move in the winter it doesn't seem like there's much space on to to put it
right now that area the plows plow that entire area right in there yeah yeah well I think we'd be using you know utilizing the green spaces you know off to the edge of the driveways um it's a straight push in so it's probably you know if it's a property management
company that if it's an apartment ends up being apartments like Steve um mentioned with a property management company I could see it to be plowed um if it's a condo situ ends up being sold as condos I could see that it's probably a candidate for a snowblower right because it's plowing it straight in like
that is kind of a pain especially with the winter we had with all the sticky icy you know u but you know we'd be utilizing that green space for the snow storage i guess my biggest concern on that on the street itself is the street's not maintained now there's so many potholes on that street and there's
so much parking that a fire truck would have trouble up the street a little ways making it through going towards the bottom of right streetes to main street it's so narrow the cars all park on the sidewalk now it's just a very dangerous street people walking kids going to
school it's It's just got too much traffic i guess that's so to maybe try to help out with a couple of those things for you so I do believe that there is sidewalk on there is on one side of the
property so it is our intention to continue that sidewalk you know at least an asphalt sidewalk yes yes along the front of our propert sidewalk of so that until they raised the road so high that No they buried the curb so as far as the sidewalk goes that's something that
definitely you know we were you know anticipating having to do on this one um when I first looked at it I I kind of thought there weren't sidewalks out there then I drove back out after the first meeting and I was like this sidewalk's there so we'll continue those we've had people parking in front of our house in front of our door so we
couldn't even get access outside and the police wouldn't tag them because they said there isn't a sidewalk there it's asphalt from the road evenly with the sidewalk so they paved the curb reveal over time so now it's need a curb
there and then to the second point about additional parking and I I think we would maybe it would be the right place to bring it up in the ZBA meeting you know if they were amendable to having an additional additional parking spot spot to I I would be more than happy to to do
additional spots you know on that for for more additional off- streetet parking for residents who are residents on Emerald Street but don't belong to you no no no for for the for the owners of the units but that entire stretch is going to be lost to off- streetet parking for res which is used now every
day that entire 180 foot stretch is covered every day at all times you don't see it during the day go through there at night after people are you know 5:30 in the morning when I leave his car is parked all along the road and they're all parked on the sidewalk because the
road's so narrow i try to solve problems I can solve i know I can whatever I can do that's the people that park on that side of the street that's their problem but there's only one side to park on they tried to build down there one other time i don't remember how long ago it was and they
denied it but we can't find why it was denied the last time um what the reasons were we tried to look it up but it's hidden there was something about um
not not digging down i can't remember if he's going to fill it we're going to lose an entire green space there's railroad tracks a Hannerford loading dock Hannerford
parking lot over on your left hand side Hannerford loading dock Hannifford parking lot uh ramp that goes up between Hannerford and an auto mach auto um B auto mechanic um Route 68 is right below that
an underpass is at that dark curvy corner um up above the underpass are possibly idling trains definitely moving trains there's Route Two an elevated section of Route Two that you can hear
both ends of for about half a mile in west and east and what else am I forgetting and Emerald Street itself and that curve where my house is the fire department practices taking that curve
for a new fireman it's impossible and your building about 20 ft from the corner of my house and I've had two of my cars hit and run parking in front of my house so I can't park in front of my house other people won't but they'll park this
yeah that that just to just to be clear that dimension there is um 12T 35 ft to our to our corner up to the top corner from that our that corner of the building to our No the top corner of the driveway well here yeah over to the
corner of my house is about 20 ft no your house is driveways are about 20 ft 12 feet across okay i I thought you were talking about the building and there's a stone wall that's there it's a foundational wall and you're going to not build all the way we're not touching that yeah this green space we would not
be touching problem that's a real problem for us it's a It's a problem for not touching the wall that's there yeah any Why is that if it's left it's going to be below you that water will infiltrate my cellar
okay there's nothing else we'll close this meeting i don't have any questions did you say sir that I needed to submit duplicate copies of my list of concerns that you recorded
i don't know oh okay i'm sorry i not aware we'll do that all right thank you i have nothing else we have nothing else nope this meeting's closed not ended closed
make a motion to close all right thank you further reminder motion to make a motion we close the public second oh you can can I just ask a clarifying question here before go ahead so if we're if we're closing the public hearing that means we're not discussing
or continuing it to a future meeting we're closing this and then voting on it later is that correct we're we're not we're not ending the meeting we're just closing it it's a we're on terminology i I I think if I can clarify
you want to leave the hearing open yes the hearing is still open right so you can still take So we're suspending the meetings yes that's the word i'm sorry you're going to want to submit responses and address my comments and Yeah I did not see copies of those i don't know if we were supposed to get those or not it
went out yesterday oh okay just just come to us i did i sent it to Jason sorry i did I didn't copy you all right well it's not like we would have probably been able to address them in a 24-hour period probably not but uh but no I think from the size of it you you want to continue the meeting to the next
so we give us some time to digest and respond to the right we're just suspending it okay so what it be it would be continue it would be a motion to continue the public hearing to the next meeting rather than to close it nice catch yes motion to
suspend the meeting until our next meeting that's correct uh use all Eric and then you all in favor i I Okay thank you very much [Applause]
thank you guys thank you thank you [Applause] the next one is uh decided site definitive site plan west mini storage off of Maker Drive
good evening good evening good evening so for the record Justin McLaren mechanical engineering also with me is Mr al Bander of West Maze Storage so last time we were in front of the board we presented this plan self
storage unit shown here in the brown accessway shown here site to be secure and fenced in we went over the plan we received the initial comment letter from Mr rob Alva we went through that we did
submit a revised set plan strange calcs accordingly to the city for review we did get a response letter from Mr ava i would like to just go through it talk through the points yes please
so the first one states the plans include the phase of the project as depicted on sheet two which was added to the plan set from the last meeting so just this is what the board had seen and we had discussed so your phase one is
here everything down the front phase two would be your middle piece we were having discussions on part of the accurate base would have to be constructed as part of phase two and then the darkest gray shown here in the back would be phase three and that would be the final build
out so from his comment will the project meet the water quality volume and recharge standards if the project is not fully built out for example if phase three isn't completed and the first two phases are done is there enough in the
two accurate basins to meet all storm water rags i did look at it we blow everything out of the water um just for clarification for the board the total recharge volume that is required
for the full buildout is 0.048 acre feet we have.141 between the two acade basins so even between the two acid basins we have more than enough for the entire project
the second comment was pertaining to the soil testing we did provide where we did some of the testing as part of the initial design we did do testing down here as previously discussed when we initially looked at this we wanted to do pods with
infiltration underneath that's why we did the testing where we showed it we did not end up testing over here and over here due to a change of the design we did have to increase the size of this basin and add this one i did speak to Mr
alva today regarding that and during the discussion we could talk about it but we would be amendable to conditioning that testing be conducted in these two basins prior to start construction and
we can verify depth groundwater material we did poke really the majority of the site the material was consistent so I would expect that testing here and here would give us the same results as what we found across the
site third comment pertains to the electrical service if the board recalls everything's going to be solar powered but we do have gates here and here that would have keypads that the
client would enter their number into the keypad the gate would open they'd be able to enter the idea is that there are solar mounted keypads that can be bought and installed it'd be the owner's intention to install those
for the gates and then the last comment pertains to the stomar permit under the stomar management ordinance i know this is new in the city we did speak regarding how to go about this and as his comment
states we'll request a permit from him we'll submit a letter stating that we're looking for a sonar permit for the plants here other than that I think everything else was satisfactory factory addressed in
the comments we did receive a letter from the police chief and the deputy chief saying they had no issues with this i did reach out to fire i reached out to Mr pz to review the plans to make sure he had no
issues he had them i never heard from him so I would anticipate that fire if they had major issue with the project would have reached out email phone call something or would have reached out to the director and said hey these are my
comments so other than that if the board has any additional questions based on the revised material I'll be happy to answer are you are you saying the uh gates yep run by electricity the solar panels
will provide enough power to run the gates as well yes i believe Mr bander has We believe so we're doing my first one now so I'll let you know if not we'll have to bring the service in yeah so an alternative is in the event that
these don't work at his our site and we have to do real power here there are utility poles actually this boat shows it better there are utility poles on our side of the street that we could tie into so
realistically it would be a riser from the poles run the power onto the site and then from there disperse it to the gates as needed if we can get away with the solar power then we won't have to worry about that and the solar panels are going to be on
the top of the buildings as you build them or are they going to be separate separate they feel the panels the ones we're doing now they have panels for the gate i'm a little apprehensive so I have
a pod right next to my other gate so I'm putting some more panels on the top i'm not going to get caught sharp people call me I can't get in can't get in so we're going to make sure there's more power and put some batteries in there and we should be okay yeah so there won't be a separate solar
field to generate the power for the site if that's where you're kind of going yeah yeah there's not going to be point conversation there's not going to be a giant solar field over here that's going to be used to power every everything will be done i would expect
these couple units you'd put it near it there's a a lifting mechanism like almost like a small transformer pad and it's got a space on the bottom for the batteries and you put a small panel on the fence that's all it's requiring again I'm putting a little bit more just
to make sure we're good and then as you build the buildings and then add the light packs you just extend the electrical system the lights themselves have solar but they're solar
lights and the panel is on the light itself okay so we have to run nothing for that i don't envision more than maybe two or three panels on one of the buildings for the gates it's not a lot of solar it's not like we're covering the whole roof yeah and these aren't
giant like Mr bander said these aren't giant panels that are going to go on it's just smaller ones you probably won't even notice them probably the size of the panel that run the stop sign lights here in Canada
actually that's a good comp yes okay okay anything else any other question got a couple questions just related to the phasing um so phase one it looks like you only have one entrance to the site would the plan be to operate with
just one entrance and exit until phase two begins yes I would say this area here could potentially be incorporated if depend on traffic if there's any issues we could add the second
sight to it realistically as part of this phase one you're going to operate out of the one entrance if you we get to the point where there is an extensive amount of traffic it's probably time to do phase
two and you're going to have enough traffic and these units will be maxed out so you'll have to do phase two and then the second entrance would go we would probably do a turn around a dirt turn around so that people can actually
turn if a fire truck came in they could actually make a turn and go back out they wouldn't have to back out yeah or some sort of whether it's a called set turnaround T turnaround something like that just to be able to get them back out
and then as far as erosion controls during construction for the phased approach would you be amendable to like just doing sections at a time rather than setting up a silt fence around the entire site that you might not develop for Yes years yeah so realistically we want to do the whole
thing that's why I showed the entire limits of the erosion control during phase one we would install the construction entrance we'd run the erosion control all the way back here and bring it somewhere around the back this way up to the road and then again
phase two if we're only doing phase two we'd come around the base and maybe come back up a little bit follow the line here between phase two and phase three so yes it would be incrementally established and then my last question on the phasing is just similar to the water
quality question would peak rates and required recharge volume similarly be met if you were to phase it and stop at a certain phase yeah these are so the way that this is phased out is this area grates down comes back to this
basin this phase two goes to this basin this phase three is underground in each basin is sized to mitigate the pre-post okay so for the privacy fencing that I'm I'm
just thinking of of phase one being complete and the privacy fencing would just cut off at the edge of phase one or would that So I would imagine that the fence along the
edge will be installed yep and assuming that it's temporary and we're just stopping phase one while we wait for phase two there would be some sort of temporary fence same thing come back with the limit of work as part of
phase one still around the the dirt turnound for EMS vehicles that need to be on site and then that would just be removed once the fencing would be completed surrounding the rest of the facility as Yes i had a couple trles of that temp fencing
plenty of it okay yep and same thing and then same thing with phase two once temporary fencing build it out get established temporary fencing if for whatever reason the lanterns decides that we're not going to do phase three and we're just done at two
we could swap out the temp fence for permanent okay or permanent security fencing so your expansion depends on how fast the rentals go so if you do stop at only two phases I think it would be appropriate for us to
have like two sets of plans of if you were needed to stop at phase two dependent on interest just so we would have an idea of revise the plan yeah yeah and we could show okay this is the revised grading at the end of
assuming we get to two phases right we'll show that okay as part of this now we're going to pull all this grading back the the fence is going to become permanent here wrap around the basin we could submit just as a contingency for us yes in the case where there's not
enough interest in that would warrant a phase I think we'll stop phase two but if we stop phase two we'll go into three okay i mean it's just we're going to be a third of the way there there's enough energy for phase two okay i mean Q Smart
they got a thousand units in 93% there's a demand there's a need did you say you don't think there will be a phase two no I'm saying if we go into phase two the phase three will absolutely happen gotcha i think just for the point of
conversation it's just easy to say we're we're not talk if this never happened exactly the only thing I'd see is the uh phase two where it's going to end and the idea of going in through the first gate and
dead ending without putting the turnaround if you're going to put a turnaround in why not put in the second gate and make it one loop cost them sure but we can do that we could do that we would
so that point we could look at and the reason I did not show it is once you get into this area here this point is all graded to come back and be caught into the structures this is only a little bit pavement so we could probably find
a solution to mitigate that impervious but that's why the phase one phase 2 line is drawn as is because then the final condition of that phase two once you're here this all comes back which then would mean that this base would
have to get built and it doesn't make sense to build this entire basin if you're only doing 20 yes the dry but we could look at options to get that water directed somewhere else while phase 2 is on standby
we could put a temporary base in there to catch the water yeah yep when we do phase two though we're going to want to use that second entrance as a construction entrance to keep all of my pedestrians away from that so that temp
fence again I think my temporary culde-sac is going to come in handy that's what we're thinking i mean we'll open up the other side temporarily and when we come to build I'd like to somehow keep the construction entrance away from the
finished product yeah and if just for the board's knowledge yes I do show the stockpile construction area staging area here obviously that would move as the site is developed
accordingly it it would be encased straw box fence same as you typically do with stock piles of material things like that it was just to graphically give the board an idea of
how we would stage everything okay just to reiterate there's no not going to be any outside storage campers no mattresses there's no extra parking there for that it would be nice but it's not there
nothing on the roofs nothing it's clean i believe you had asked at the last meeting regarding stabilization of slopes okay so I did put the note that our landscape architect gave i'm assuming you looked at it did see it y
Okay satisfactory yeah good i looked up the spec sheet too for the Okay the tactifier and the seed mix that you were talking about yeah and that's like I said the last meeting and that was something that we were recommended to start using and we find this
to work just as well if not better so we've been specking it i've just seen seen blowouts on two to1 slopes with hydra alone but I could I can see that there's clearly like a stronger Yep we've seen too and we've had to tell
certain contractors what are you doing did he answer all your questions Bob yeah the the few that I I had remaining after the revisions um you know I'm I'm fairly satisfied with um a condition upon additional soil
testing being performed is important um typically I hesitate to do that because I like to see that information now um all I can say is it's at their risk if there's a change in the design due to soil conditions groundwater elevations
um they're going to have to come back in because it's probably going to change um their design so um again I I recommend that it get done really early prior to construction so that um you know things don't grind to a halt because of it so when that's done that you know of course
it has to get submitted and we'll we'll take a look at it again but um that's what we talked about so it's their risk not not yours and we're okay with that risk i'll let Rob know when we're doing testing so he can be out there he can
see it like he said in the worst case that it's something completely different than what we expected and it does change the design of the site obviously we would resubmit the revised plan to come in for a modification to site plan
approval and note the changes and why okay I just want to confer with you i think we ought to suspend this one too wait until the testing is done and we get the reported the testing and we can bring it back and then make an
approval of it that sound yes okay yeah we'll we'll just wait um until after the testing results and then we'll make a probably a final decision after the testing okay i my
memory tells me that on the right side and I'll confer with Brian but we tested on the right side i was the guy doing the I don't know why it's not there was testing done on the side he told me that he didn't have any over there i did the digging so we'll have to
just notes yeah that's awesome we can confirm if we if we need to go out we'll definitely go out i would I think that's amendable i would ask would it be possible for the board
to have a draft uh approval for the next meeting because I would assume as we can get out there ASAP well I'm in the middle of doing something so I can't just drop what I'm doing i got to just finish what
I'm doing then I can go over and punch some more holes but it's just on the right side we got to do it so the right side here and then this space in here so maybe a half day if that just to drive around it's not a half a day it's a
whole day or a whole day but I would ask if we could have a set of draft conditions for the next meeting could we add a Could we add conditions
on that before then make sure that's on there add conditions testing approvals they're done well so if the board wants us to do testing
before the next meeting I would say that that condition wouldn't have to be on the approval or if the board's okay with conditioning the testing then I would ask to just make a decision tonight
again I don't see an issue with continuing once if the board's that adamant about seeing the testing i would just ask that when we come for the next meeting that usually testing this is the change that we made or let's just go do
the testing okay we'll take it from there okay but seems fair if we could have a draft just we can have a draft approval perfect prepared just just to help condition yeah with conditions and
Yeah yeah we'll have the approval drafted and and conditions needed ready for the next meeting yeah so when's the next meeting december march 11th march may 11th i'm sorry
sorry may 13th may 13th may 13th yeah plenty of time to get out there so you know I'm on your side motion to
suspend this meeting and till the next meeting and after the testing results second that oh you can't do it i make a motion we go to the next meeting which will be at May 13th
second all in favor i I Okay all right thank you thank you finally clear so for the third item
due to uh conflict with the solicitor for the for the um zoning amendment Yeah we're going to have to open the meeting and then make a motion to Oh that's the one you talked about reschedu next
meeting for April 16th at 6:30 or we'll continue then okay okay open the next [Music] uh item 11506 open the next meeting concerning a zoning a zoning ordinance
on chapter 675 submitted by cheer city church and because we haven't got a an opinion from the city solicitor we'll suspend this meeting until the next schedule meeting in
May a motion to approve no it's uh so the solicitor for this zoning amendment specifically the city solicitor is is here with us um this is solicitor um Christine Tree and
then we'll make a motion to just reschedu this public hearing for April 16th at 6:30 okay to continue the public hearing then motion to continue the public hearing to April 16th at 6:30 p.m the hearings all been opened and then
continued yes yes open to continue i'll second that all in favor i nothing else a motion nothing oh we'll continue on to the the regular meeting and just Oh yeah so
we'll make a motion first to Well this is now wrapped with the public meeting make a motion to open the regular meeting and then continue on from there can you just take one second sure just introduce myself i'm attorney Vinnie
Fusetary been in the city solicitor now garden for couple of months and you guys don't give me any business and I like it just like that just keep going the way you're going could I have your name again sir uh Vinnie Brousetary bruce okay
i did pick up actually uh I think there was one appeal from the planning board that came in there was a complaint filed by So you did give me some little bit of business but try to keep it as minimal as possible try to keep it as minimal as possible that's fine that's what I'm
here for if anyone has a question they can certainly reach out to the director for sure all right good thank you i'm so sorry take care thanks okay we close the public hearings
open a regular meeting approve of the uh Can I have a motion to approve the uh minutes of March 11th meeting make a motion we accept the minutes of the last meeting march 11th march 11th
second second okay all in favor i I passed minutes are approved as we've already discussed on the public meetings for the first three items we can move on and we've already
made determinations on those three we can move on to um item 2.4 updates to the flood plane overlay district ordinance okay so if I may explain to the board what this is all about so FEMA is
issuing they've been in a long process of updating the city's firm maps well most of central Massachusetts I believe including um as part of that to keep our good standing with the National Flood Insurance Program um there's been a
review of our flood plane overland protection district ordinance um to a couple of things make sure it's um it's consistent with the state's model bylaw for flood plane protection um and other
general I guess review of it so um starting boy back this winter I started working with um DCR on an update to the ordinance um so it's a zoning ordinance it has to go through the planning board
before uh as with any zoning change um goes through the board first then to city council I believe um so as part of that I've been working with DCR on an update to the ordinance um so what I provided to um Director Stevens were two
things um a redline version of the ordinance basically with commentary from DCR my responses and the proposed changes so you can see from the original ordinance our existing ordinance what's
there what's changing what's being deleted what's being just updated um and then a final draft of it um and which is just a clean copy so there aren't a lot of meat to the changes the the biggest thing in in my eyes is basically we're
replacing all of the definitions that we have in our zoning ordinance and then there's a lot of bookkeeping issues with you know address for the flood insurance program in Boston um among other things but they're mostly small revisions but again they were pointed out by DCR to
conform to the the state model um Eric has has looked at it i know he emailed Jason and I um with some comments um my when I started looking at this when the previous director um Jason's predecessor
and I started looking at it the the goal was to take our ordinance and just make it conform to the the state model i wasn't looking at potential changes to it it wasn't changing the requirements of it it's it's more just the language
um Eric did have some good points that he made um which I I think you you guys should discuss and maybe you should point them out sure um but other than that that's what this is all about and so right now um the the
new firm maps will be issued and made official July 8th um and as part of that we have to have our ordinance updated for that date so that's why we're talking about it now probably should have talked about it a little bit earlier but but here we are
yeah I can talk a little bit about the comments that I had um and these mostly related to language in the existing ordinance so it wasn't things that are proposed to be changed to bring the current ordinance into compliance with
NFIP requirements um I think there's a bit of wording particularly in the permitted use section um about what is and what isn't allowed within the flood plane so I don't know how generally familiar you guys are with flood maps um
they so for a long time most of north central Massachusetts and western Massachusetts has not had digital flood maps um you have these old FEMA paper copies with you know scales large scales and you got to really like overlay them it's it's a pain to actually read them
um but the digital maps are you know a big upgrade because you can just type in an address on GIS and then see what if it's in the flood plane or not um so with that I think there's probably more attention to structures that are actually in the flood plane and do need to comply with these uh requirements and
I feel that some of the way that the ordinance is currently warded um almost makes it seem like you couldn't alter use an existing structure in the flood plane unless you had a special permit or if it fell under one of these very specific use categories woodland
grassland wetland um and I think clarifying that would be helpful because you know if people have structures in the map flood plane obviously they want to be able to use them and you know replace their windows and stuff like that um and the way you
know I've read some of these provisions made it seem like it would require a special permit from the planning board in order to make alterations to an existing structure in the flood plane um or new construction or any development
really um so the NFIP requirement is that you have a a permit for all development in the flood plane and development is defined by the NFIP as basically you know anything from constructing a building to paving to regrading to putting in a fence or a shed um and I think obviously like some
of those activities are minor enough that that's not something you want to have to come to planning board for a special permit for right like we don't want to have to review every shed or fence or driveway reservicing that happens in the flood plane um and so I think just the language
around um what is required in terms of permitting um would be would be good to clarify and it doesn't necessarily need to happen now because obviously this has been in the existing ordinance for a while um and right now we're just trying to get the mandatory changes through to
make sure that the city's ordinance complies by that July deadline um but if not now I think in the future it would be good to clarify um some of these provisions um you know the you know having a special permit from planning board for
renovations to an existing structure would just seem a little overly ownorous um and so that requirement to have a permit for everything most communities satisfy that by having a building permit or a conservation commission permit because a building permit should cover everything that's interior to a house
right like window replacement roof replacement that kind of thing should be covered by a building permit so that would be your permit in the flood plane and any exterior stuff like regrading paving driveway replacement that should be covered by a conservation commission permit under the wetlands protection act because the flood plane is regulated
under the wetlands protection act um so I think there's just opportunity to clarify some of the permitting mechanisms that apply to these different types of development um but again you know that's not necessarily something that we need to push heavily on now if
the city just needs to get the current ordinance updated to incorporate the new maps in time for the effective date of the new firm i guess it's a silly question but would this affect uh homeowners insurance or this is just uh so the the the ordinance
itself shouldn't the actual FEMA maps do so when a structure is mapped within the 1% annual chance flood or the 100red-year flood plane um any property that's financed through a federally backed mortgage is required to carry
flood insurance um that's a mandatory p it's called the mandatory purchase requirement and that's at the federal level um so the map changes should unless converting to digital maps makes it easier for lenders to figure out which structures are in the flood plane
there shouldn't be you know there shouldn't be you know people who are already in the flood plane who now have to pay flood insurance that they weren't expecting before but if your structure if the maps change and the extent of the flood plane is changing which they are in some places and your structure is not
currently mapped in but then the map extends to cover your structure when those maps become effective those people should be expecting letters from their lender saying you have to get mandatory flood insurance um so that's not an ordinance thing it's
a federal Yeah federal thing i can hear screaming i heard some already so I guess what are you looking for us tonight as as the planning board what are we looking for as the board I
believe at some point you have to take a vote um on the on a proposed final ordinance before it goes to council i believe do you have a joint meeting yeah with the city council on the zoning change um so I what I would suggest is
prior to the next meeting um it gets on your agenda as a a hearing item so that you can take a vote on it um and move it forward to the council so if there if there are changes you want to see made um I suggest you take a look at it um if you want to incorporate some of what
Eric is talking about um I think we have time if if you wanted to i mean more than happy to work with you on it if if the board's you know if that's what I'd like that yes i could I could just take a redline draft of that word document and send subject some suggested edits to
Rob and Jason and then maybe that could be incorporated into something for a future meeting that we could look at right away get that off take a look at it should we I had an a thought as well like I was just reviewing and due to the stricter criteria for some of the
variances non-financial hardship no increased risk things like that like should we provide some examples for guidance for typical cases where a variance might be granted with some of the new language
i I don't think that's really the function of the ordinance um because that's a case by case basis um when when it's reviewed or as they come in um but I mean we can certainly talk about if
you have other thoughts on Yeah on variances in there in that section variances from flood plane requirements and building code are pretty much never supposed to be issued okay um so if I heard you
correctly you're saying that when the flood plane maps are revised and they're going to be digital that doesn't matter and if a current res uh
structure ends up to be on the edge of the flood plane and if it happens to be mortgaged then the lender of that structure loan lender of that structure requires the owners to
buy flood insurance correct so how will the lenders find out about these changes do they continually monitor the mortgage i'm sure that they're aware that FEMA is updating the
maps for their you know where where they have um mortgages outstanding um so I wouldn't be surprised at all if we see properties that end up in the flood plane um I did a cursory review i mean it's the whole city so it's it's
difficult to pinpoint i didn't see any egregious you know expansion of the flood plane um but that's not to say as Eric said the old paper maps it was almost impossible to accurately say and you would get banks that would tell property owners they're
in the flood plane and they dispute it and it was very difficult to to do that with the digital maps and there's even a a tool in those maps where there's a slider where you can on your screen you can go from the old map to the new map and so you can see vis visually now you
can kind of see where the changes happen so um I I I mean I would anticipate that some residents are going to get letters from their mortgage companies obviously we have no control over that anyway so I mean once this has to be done it has to be done so so we have no control over that part unfortunately not but the
calls will come in and and I'll have to explain to people when that happens we're on TV now so we have no control yeah no and it's it's a really it's too bad it happens but it will um I I can't tell you the number but I'm assuming I mean in the opposite you may get some
people who no longer qualify and and can get rid of flood insurance it's true so there's some good with it can work both ways yep is this something that's going to be statemandated by July well it's FEMA mandated for the state fema for Worcester County FEMA for federal
government fema if you if you don't update your ordinance in time for to incorporate the effective maps your community is suspended from the National Flood Insurance Program and you can't take out flood insurance policies through that anymore until you come back into compliance
dad if you do Dan if you don't the other question I had was uh you're saying that if again if a structure ends up in the flood plane and the homeowner or the owner of the structure wants to do modifications to
it they have to make an application to the planning board for a special permit for anything that was that was how I interpreted the existing ordinance whether or not that's how it's been administered I don't know but that's that's how I read it because it it seems
to me to basically say to you know construct a new structure or alter an existing structure and there didn't seem to be any any leniency but it's also not super clear exactly what form of permitting is required it it the language is a little
inconsistent between provisions um towards the back end of the ordinance there needs to be more clarification for when a special permit's required versus when a pro project may continue by right as well as and nonconforming existing non-conforming
um uses and whether they're whether they're allowed to expand or not we have a lot of that both of those yeah and the the the the reason why there is like a need to review alteration of existing structures is because there's a requirement called
substantial improvement where if you put uh over a 12-month period if you put if you do renovations to the house that equal or exceed 50% of the structures value that's considered a substantial improvement so not you know the land and the structure just the structure itself
so if you have a $200,000 valued structure and you put in $100,000 worth of work into it over 12 months you have to bring that house up to ex to current flood code so if that were to happen to a house within the flood plane after July 1st of this year they would be
required to fill in their basement to grade and then elevate the first floor 2 feet above the base flood elevation oh my just as an example for residential structures so that's why like that's why reviewing alterations of existing structures is important so that you can
track to make sure people aren't exceeding that and try to like let people know when they're proposing work that would trip that because then you're required by building code to make those changes very good and then for recreational vehicles as
well i just had a question on like how we're the 180 days required to comply with any elevation and anchoring um existing within the flood plane uh districts like I'm just curious how
we're going to monitor to make sure that that that's adhered to is there Yeah I I I know it's a hard I I don't know that you do or or you put that I just thought it I I mean that would go probably on to the the building department and you know
Yeah I I can't speak for them but I'm sure it's not high on their um their list of things to do it's just something I have to ask yep okay so we uh I think the plan was to uh suspend
this public meeting until the next meeting for a decision well Eric and I will work on um some updates that we both think could just be made just a warning you just updating
some warnings yeah like we said the clarification on special permits versus proceeding by right i guess that maybe that's a good conversation to have now though does it make sense for a planning board to be special permit reviewer i mean for like I I could see it for like a new structure in the flood plane maybe
but not for like Yeah that's a great question um so you asking we should just vote on it tonight is that what you're thinking well no it's because it's not there are a couple minor changes we could still make in its current form um based on
some things that Eric had brought up that I think are important um I think the question is is the current ordinance makes the planning board the special permit granting authority for these um in in I agree in some cases it
makes sense if someone has a property they have a vacant lot in the flood plan they want to build a house okay so maybe it makes sense that special permit goes through the planning board but on some on minor alterations or other things um you know there's even a question
should it be a special permit and that's a great point you raised and um in in Eric's experience some communities just have a general permit that's not a special permit it's a flood plane permit or whatever you want to call it um just so that you can review
and track um projects and applications for any work that's going on in the flood plane um and and I I think our ordinance is somewhat outdated in in those terms and and could probably stand
um updating to clarify who's reviewing what um and I I mean we can we can make it anything you want so you're probably alluding it could be the conservation commission or it could be the maybe the
zoning well not so much the zoning but conservation or the planning board building or building department or the building i mean the requirement from the NFIP's perspective is just that it gets a permit a permit generally it doesn't
have to be from one board or another so I guess it's kind of up to the individual municipality to figure that part out so what we're saying if it's if it's a general building permit for a renovation or addition or something then
at least it's a there's a form of record right and that would that would cover what the NFIP requires for a permit so it just needs to have something um there's a lot of stuff in town built without permits
yeah well I mean there is from both sides there's it makes sense to keep everything in one place um so I I think the important thing is at the moment we we get our ordinance up to compliance um and maybe it does make
sense to revisit it um down the road um I mean you know when was the last time you saw a special permit come through for work in the flood plane district i mean they don't happen it doesn't mean we shouldn't have a strong ordinance for it for when they do but um I I I don't
think it hasn't been a hot issue in the past i haven't seen any um so maybe for the sake of these revisions just trying to like keep it simple and get it across by the deadline we could try to modify that as little as possible and just clean up language that
clarifies differences between simple and clean it up yeah I think so maybe just for the sake of time and in making sure we're July yeah and we meet that July deadline that makes sense yes i will make a motion to continue this on
the agenda we make a motion to continue this uh present public hearing on the flood plane on the flood train flood plane so one comment Mr chairman this is not a public meeting on this right this was
under new business oh new business well okay so it'll just be continued to next continue the discussions at the next meeting i think you have to zoning ordinance so you have to advertise it and repost it anyway right next meeting
so maybe maybe to schedule the public hearing at the next meeting then yeah yeah okay thank you we're all learning as we go yeah so I guess you need a motion then to move this to a public hearing then so a
motion to correct move the discussions no public hearing move the discussion till next meeting but there is a public hearing i think as a public hearing to have a public hearing the 13th on the 13th to have a public hearing hearing on
the zoning ordinance for flood plane manager okay you you concur with the motion i concur with the motion however before we start okay I won't be here on the 13th next month so there are you want to
move dates around one week or the other um I won't be available that might be better to do well he should be Eric's all set right uh yeah I got sworn in today so so we have Yeah you got a quorum three yeah we'll have a quart i'll be able to make it on the
13th unless I fall drastically ill between now and then i mean I mean I'm all set to um if there's any issues then we'll just do what we did tonight with the historical zoning i mean I am all set to move it on 13 week then I'll make a motion on the
floor that uh we continue the uh updates of the flood plane overlay with the public hearing and the next meeting of the regular meeting of the planning board 13th i second yes okay all in favor i passes i just want to you know my
phone's still screwed up make a motion we adjourn I guess is that You want to make it sure i'm sorry all made a motion to adjourn i'll second that okay all in favor i
passed rob thanks for You got a wallet this time