##VIDEO ID:wuiQFnn5PNs## e mics are on make sure your phones are silenced and we'll go ahead and we will open the meeting of January 13 2025 and it is 701 we will start with a roll call Alexander Graham present buad Jonathan Barnett David gayon okay um Dave Dave gin's a little under the weather so he's not with us oh we're good all right so um oh um I do have an announcement um this has been posted online it's a save the date long-term planning Community open house it's at the Kingston collection Monday January 27th additional dates will follow 4:30 p.m. to 700 p.m. KS and collections sweet c18 so anybody can make it in the public on the board please do um we're real happy that we have people that want to that seem ambitious and seem like they're anxious to get things done and move forward and make something of that place it seems like they have a lot of ideas and it seems like they have money um the two things that the last guys didn't have ideas for money so this is a good thing for the town of Kingston now that they have the MBTA Zone they can add that into their planning and maybe we can get some tax money in so our taxes don't keep going up yeah right all right so first thing on the agenda uh we have an appointment for a site plan review and this is a revised plans one Tremont street6 well it's it's yeah it's right on the corner of one Tremont and 163 summer STS properties Scott Brown we have a few small changes that do not require us uh yeah they require our attention but they're not a big deal Val you want to speak to this yes this is um is there somebody online for this too there was going to be sorry um maybe the clock's off too that it's working it was going to be Scott Brown but I I can tell you that a couple two years ago we approved the site plan but at the time um Mr Brown was looking for um a waiver of open space and he had a different configuration of buildings and we looked at this in 2022 and then again in 2023 and we knew that he was getting this variance from the zba so we said that once you work through that you got to come back with your final site plan so we can take a look at it and understand and what's being approved so what you have before you is the revised site plan which tears down the house that's standing on the property leaves the apartment building in the back that's already there and it's going to be two uh six unit Apartments um separate buildings that are separated further apart than what we saw so there'll be enough room for everybody to drive around um and they've got the architecture shown there which is um which is nice and um it's yeah it's going to look I think it's going to look nice and and have enough space and we've done all the testing now we've figured out that all the soils will perk the um storm water which was a big concern at the time so uh we also had a site plan yes in our packet you did get it mail but here's a large St I mean if you're okay with it I'm fine I'm just they're not in here there there are people uh 12 people ENT into the waiting room huh it says it's 12 people oh 12 people sorry there wasn't any well you have to hit the view it's like like Beth Israel pouth all right they all showed up there we go they weren't there when I started no I know that came in at the last moment so but yeah this is the uh Scot on there see I don't see him okay that's fine we just keep going but it's in keeping with what we wanted to see and it's got all the um utilities laid out and they've done all the engineering work this time around and we know that it's all set to go so recomend I'm satisfied yeah and we went ahead and reminded the building department that one of those units is going to be affordable and I I provided Scott with the local initiative application that needs to be filled out through the town to make sure we can count it towards our housing inventory and um good yeah so they're they're meeting all the requirements and it's good to go it's been peer reviewed also and how many affordable one one okay I one should be two shouldn't it should be yeah the zba said one but it should be two so we'll CLE up it's 12 so it should be two I'll make sure he knows that sorry Squad it should be twoo okay um I've looked at this too as well I mean minor changes yeah changes that are better I don't see any problem with it and and Pat Brandon uh reviewed it he's our peer reviewing engineer and he didn't see any problems with it he witnessed the soil perk test foundation in the ground now yeah one of them yeah well that's unfortunate but they got permit right they have a building permit but they should have gone through us first but I think for timing sake this this is where we ended up yeah been expecting anything so so what do we need to do um vote for approval of the site plan as submitted so moved okay the motion is is to approve the site plan has submitted um we have a second second we U Move we get an EO move by Bob second by John Barnett right four times and all those in favor I post extensions all right okay back to our agenda uh 702 appointment uh is uh Peter hail Associates Engineers Plymouth anr to create Cemetery posle at the sisters of Divine Providence land at pings Way Road in Bishop's highway it's map 106 lot 1-1 and map 104-1 this is um an anr around the uh the cemetery who is here to speak to this Peter hail from Associated Engineers uh we were contacted September or October by the attorney Howard calman for the sisters of Divine Providence and uh they wanted to separate their existing Cemetery from a parle land that's approximately 13 or 14 acres um they wanted to make sure that they would have at least enough space to put in 15 additional plots um in the cemetery uh so I've Tak the pl I've taken the lot can we do something about that the echo she's working on it okay thank you it's starting again so uh I have taken the lot and cut approximately an acre around the cemetery um and provided access to the cemetery on an existing paved drive that goes through the property uh leaving about 12 acres I think uh um remaining out of the original parcel so we have about a 12 or 13 acre piece and the one acre uh Cemetery lot yep what members have questions Val you want to say anything about this no they have an AS Peter said an easement that allows access it's small and it's carved out around the existing Graves with a little bit of room for expansion but um access is off of parting ways Road and um it's it's pretty straightforward it says right on the plan that it's an unbuildable parcel set aside just a little Cemetery that's down near the ball field yes yeah look to see if there's anybody okay um yeah so this is a form a we would um need um a motion to endorse the plan as presented okay we need a second I'll second it moved and second it uh to endorse the plan as presented for the cemetery any further discussion any questions all those in favor say I I post extensions support zero and an answer to Pine I'm trying to display the plan on the screen but we're having technical difficulties again I'm working we're working on it thank you that's that thanks Peter thanks thank you and you all have in your packets the um Ring Road we getting that Reverb again um ringroad solar at 126 and 137 Ring Road uh there's existing solar arrays that were constructed through permit on the Cranberry Bogs and what came of that um in discussion it's not finished yet but there was some issues with the wires being um a little bit lower than planned a little bit lower than shown and so just trying to fix the screen here go through yeah so I'll jump in the issue with the Y where we were told everything was going to be 10 feet off the bogs and um concern is somebody could be walking around and those are high power lines high power lines if you flood the bogs and it freezes yeah could be two foot higher and turns out that the supports are 10 feet but the wire sags in between the supports and you can reach up and touch the wires and they're high voltage so not the best idea especially with workers harvesting bogs underneath a lot of discussion with between Lanny and uh Steve Ellis the wiring inspectors and also the wiring inspector in Plimpton and um they would call and say well the ppon inspector's all set and then we would call the other side and say other Kingston guys are all set but nobody was all set and so um wires that are within reach have are going to have on yeah they're gonna be wrapped protection and then what we sorry go ahead we we walked the entire site with them um including with the town of Plimpton and the electrical inspectors and and looked at what we're dealing with and what we all felt that it was important that they fence off that cranberry bog because way we see electrical code it should be fenced off because of the access so what you see on your plans there with the red lines is where they're going to add fencing all the way around except for where there's deep water separating the outside from the inside we didn't require fencing there but anywhere else there's a fence required which meets code so there're still going through their reviews and permitting with the building department there's some other issues that need to be hammered out but as far as the planning board is concerned what we're looking at is um for the sake of our review just that they've added these fencing and we need to have you as a as a the site plan View Board um be okay with the fencing it's something that we talked about in the beginning we wanted right um then their engineer said it wasn't necessary and then our engineer said it wasn't necessary but lo and behold I was never happy with it anyway um without defensing and um another thing that they had said well if you look down a car this this these bogs and they don't have fencing around them I look down there and they have Fen in all all over the place so and lo and behold the um electrical code um calls for um fencing or protection and protection why couldn't those wires have been putting conduit it what's that those wires that were hanging why couldn't they have put been putting cond it they didn't think of it ahead of time and they didn't realize that they were that low until until the electrical inspector they just thought and how that happened was they didn't call for any inspections whatsoever during the construction and that's a legal issue that we're trying to hammer out with them now I would think they're going to be covered with something like you see when someone's painting along a house and they have that that that but that's a temporary thing you I don't know but it's something that the electrical inspectors are happy with um the other issue we had was they went through um and put all their underground piping in they put all the footings in they never called anybody for any inspections not the building inspector not any of them I think that's still being worked out is it not B I'm sorry the inspections on the footings and the piping still being worked out we're looking at a performance guarantee through Town Council because we don't know what the foundations look like we've never seen them we haven't inspected any of the electrical that was installed either because once again they it's under State Building Code they're required to have had a a uh construction supervisor review and approve all the work that was being done out there and including us but neither of those things happened that we can tell so we're trying to hammer that out it's a real mess and it's a mess for them as well because they created their own mess because they have millions of dollars invested and and they can't use it um but you know I mean one of the things that's being discussed is having an engineer look at it and stamp it and say that it's done the way that would be logical right it would be but if you can find somebody that's willing to do that unless they start digging them up and looking at them I don't know what I don't know what to say and but that's something they have to figure out yeah and buildings working with them and with Council to try to sort out the best next steps is there anybody online from for them there's a I think there's five or six people there but prti is the main person maybe he could speak to it yeah I'm here Nicholas no which one am I talking to top on the top of the screen for okay go ahead sir yeah sorry what was the question we just were wondering if you wanted to comment at all on the site plan then the fencing or anything else that we've been discussing yeah yes um yeah as Valerie mentioned um first of all I'm with with distributed energy infrastructure uh the the company which is building this job and obviously the jobs substantially built already um again we are here to uh discuss the the fencing we discussed on site with the with all the different departments on where it should go and how it should go um So the plan was presented and then again intention is to get your approval um and then get going on the construction of it once uh once it's approved by all the different departments and same on the building side uh I'm working with the Building Commissioner for uh for satisfying all the needs he has in order to feel comfortable on the on the footings Point uh you all mentioned so okay anybody have any questions do you have any questions for us personally no I mean again we are here for that Fen so that we can check that off uh in terms of all the different approvals we need and then as as as Valerie said said as well that we have the bond in place for for the shity so that we build according to the plans we have presented as well as uh satisfy any additional documents The Building Commissioner needs on his hand is see the engineer yes you're the engineer do do you have any idea why no inspections were called on called for during this whole project we do I just I mean on the electrical side we did the building definitely we missed that and then uh yeah we we just have to rectify based on whatever the requests are no no excuses on the building side pretty tragic to you guys I mean you have whoever has put put a lot of money into this it's like it's really holding it up is there anybody else on the Val that wants that you know that here to speak on this unless someone else volunteers I think that's it we have a question from Pine can I go ahead yes go ahead Pine hi thank you very much I'm I'm sorry that I I don't I'm not oriented as to exactly which which location this is so I don't know if this is the the uh the bog that included the battery storage along um along the brook there yes so so um can you tell us um in terms of the battery storage what kind of battery it is whether it's the U the lithium ion or the lithium Ferris phosphate I'll let the engineers respond anybody have an answer for p yes it is lithium ion it is what lithium ion so what are you doing in terms of fire protection I think when we had first talked about this in the planning board a year or two ago we we suggested um that it be um that that The Battery area be completely encased with uh concrete so that the water if there's a fire breakout could be contained and the fire suppressed rather than destroying the brook um as a result of that um what what kind of um what kind of work has been done to achieve safety over there I'm not familiar with the with that discussion like we came in obviously after the planning board was planning board approval was met for the job um on our end it's based on the fire suppression uh mechanism we had in the containers itself uh there's nothing separate plan can you speak to what that is I don't I have no idea what that is I don't know I can submit for it um I'm I'm not technically um supervised in terms of like explaining to you exactly how how the fire suppression works but it does come with an approved uh system we have excuse me would you all be willing to have a tour for Pine so she can ask these questions at the site with someone who does know the answers abely abely again thanks very much B we'd be happy to do that thank you terrific I we'll put you guys in touch after this meeting great okay so is this a are we voting on these changes or we yeah you're voting on the um the fence the fence okay so the motion would would include U adding fencing um all the way around except for where there's deep water which is a Reservoir in the back couple different reservoirs where the fence will go up to you see the red lines on this plan Mr chairman yes hi this is Greg Samson I'm with Sullivan Wester Council to the the contractor um so I just just wanted to there was one other question about whether the fence had 6 in of clearance I just wanted to confirm that it does um so it is lifted six feet off the ground and then I just wanted to confirm that yes our request is that um the board see the addition of the fencing as proposed on the plan as not a material modification to the project that doesn't require any further review from the site plan approval I think we've already determined that right yes this does not require more review this is the review this is it so clarify requesting by the vote and obviously if something else comes up we'll have to address those things uh but right now this looks like this the only thing that is before us the the wir inspectors have their own requests that are outside of this vote we're voting on the fence thank you okay I have a question yes you talked about deep water and no why can't the fence be a go across the top of the bank I I haven't seen it visually but what if somebody came in a boat and or on ice on ice and and wanted to access it that way uh it's it's not that likely I mean I guess you could argue that that's a possibility I didn't I yeah not visually looking at what we had was hunters and and uh the electrical inspectors and everybody agreed that you know with the trails and everything that the way people would access the bog would be over the bog roads it would be unusual because you're very close to the bog roads to then decide you're going to cross over the ice but I suppose they could well if it was frozen they definitely could yeah I mean if if I own this I would want it there anyway just for vandals yeah um but so if if you want the fence to go all the way around um we should say so so looking at the plan where there's like three exceptions um wrapping around the the bogs uh where there's no fence and that is where there's deep water most for most of of the extent of the project there's fencing so if you look at the first page on the plans that you gave us that lower bog the small one yeah it's got no fence along that leftand wall side well that's because it connects to the bog um going in that direction because this is also on the town line so it's a little bit confusing but you don't see a fence on that small bog on page one from the gate to where the line is proposed so you could say I want to you know extend along the bog Road the fencing so that it's all the way around the entire uh sets of bogs you can see on the second page when you look at the top right again there's it's a it's a wetland that's um it's it's one of their ponds then there's no fence along where they've got a gate at each of the entrances where normally people would come in on the bog roads and then there's deep water so they didn't propose a fence along that deep water edge I mean I mean I I I know because I was a kid once you grab that pole you swing around it you're inside M to Bob's Point personally we don't know why the whole thing what's your decision could I just offer please um you know this was discussed with all the inspectors from both towns and we were you know we walked this was based upon an on-site you know walk where we determined where the access was you know required under the code and that was I just want to make sure that's clear that this was based upon I think we had five or six of the inspectors from both towns out there to evalate I was there and it was a kind of a general eyeball discussion looking at the deep water it wasn't based on code it was based on protecting the wires from the public possibly getting harmed well it was based upon their interpretation of where it was required well what's required is fencing in the code yeah and unfortunately um for your argument um the inspectors don't vote on this we do I hope how many people like to see that penc I I have a question on on the areas where it meets deep water yeah um we have a dyke that goes all the way around those sections if we put do we have enough room between the high water and that that dsection to put a fence and still have access around there it's going to vary from yeah it's going to get narrow yeah it's to get real decision was that while while we were out there discussing it with the electrical inspectors the discussion was is it likely that someone's going to come in this way well I wasn't there so um I'm gonna I think I think I think it's no I wasn't there either I was there representing us but I I I I see your point I see it very clearly it might be a move Point too I don't know but I'm just asking the question I guess the the question is liability here too yeah I mean the thing is if there's ice there it's just like walking in with no fence yeah how many how many kids I don't know if there's access to that little Pond or anything but I know I used to bring the kids fishing and all those little blog blonds yeah you can walk right out there and there's and there's car roads that come through the woods that end up there somebody in a boat or in a raft whatever I'm not I'm just skating yeah yeah yeah it sure it sure seems like it should have fence that goes around there if there's room what I would think there would be I mean if if this thing is somewhat accurate it kind of depicts the edge of the reservoir there right right yep and it would be about the same spacing that you see around the the top of the picture yep it's pretty steep even if you're coming up off the water you're going up a pretty steep Bank to try to get in this one looks like it's completely s y there I I don't know if I gave you all of it but I mean that that red Line's oh yeah this one here the only place I don't see it is here there n here there's none that top left I I might not have given you all four sheets which is my bad see this okay but they're all the same in terms of the issue ends there and ends there this is open this is a bit deep spawn in the Val I thought the explanation was the red lines were fence no why is yours different oh there's no red line there it ends there it ends there what's this that's that's a road and some black line the red lines are outside see yeah the black line there in that spot is a wetland because this is all water here this is all water yeah well we have questions from Ian and from Pine Ian represents them want to let Ian speak he represents the cranberry where is he it's up here oh sure hey go thank you and thanks Val um just just as as you're thinking about just from an agricultural Horticultural crary perspective as you're thinking about the fencing uh I for one was an advocate for not having the fencing around the reservoir because we do regular not regular but every 10 15 years will will will dredge those that the areas of the reservoir and we routinely have to get to the pump house and put our suction boxes in and take them out so um I totally I get it's same as when we were on site understanding the safety Public Safety is is is Paramount um just as you're as you're thinking it through uh that that was a consideration when we were talking on site and just would ask for your consideration of that um as well tonight so just it's we're having a hard time hearing you so I'm just going to repeat it um the Ian is referencing some conversation because we all walked in different spots we have the Reverb too so it's very hard to hear in here um but the there were different conversations going at different points so Ian is saying that he had a conversation with some of the representatives of the two towns about the deep water and that those are ponds that they use that they have to maintain every year so they have to go in and they have to drop materials in and out and they have to get in and dretch so he's saying that it would be very difficult for them to continue farming The Cranberries if we were to fence those in terms of practical possibility of a gate a rolling gate you'd need a really big gate to dredge that's you'd one of the things about bog ponds when they use the water they the things were just just about dry yeah which is another problem y which makes it worse because they they pump all the water out of them were the wiring inspectors at this pain yes I mean if everybody felt at the meeting that this from a safety standpoint this was okay yeah everybody both electrical teams from the two towns and we had bill um excuse me we had uh Paul Armstrong there from the building department and that was the General agreement but it was all kind of based on how could somebody get in so the the question of crossing over ice didn't come up in that conversation if they take care of all the safety issues that we're concerned about the wiring then I'm good what they are doing is they're wrapping everything that could be you know if you jumped up with your hand and reached up you wouldn't be able to touch those wires what's it being wrapped with what type of material do we know uh I don't know offand it's it's a it's an electrical SE something not the electric the electrical inspector for satisfied yeah I think Pine wants to speak again what's that want to acknowledge Pine she's got her hand up Pine you want to go ahead uh thanks very much I I don't want to you know inadvertently uh difficult here but uh you know oh you're never you're never difficult fine I know that I know that but I'm not sure everybody know um I I I feel that because this whole um project type is very new to the town and because of the impact on the natural resources here uh um my my concern is not just about people touching the wires because I know that you will take care of that my concern has to do with the with the technology of lithium ion batteries and the difficulty of creating a safe environment in a not in a natural environment for that and I would ask uh especially because of the difficulty that we're having with the technology tonight that um that we continue this so that so that those of us that are trying to jump back in on this project to make sure that it's something that we really love in Kingston um that is is uh that works with the cranberry industry as well as um Alternative Energy um that that we that we do the best job possible and I'm not you know confident of that right now and I don't I don't have any images in front of me that I can uh refer to that that that makes me feel like you you know yeah this is the way we want the town to go and I I just ask you know that we get a better a better sense of of um confidence in uh this project so that it can stand as a as a um a demonstration project for future efforts in this regard well um the problem Pine is that that battery issue that you talking but it's in Plimpton not in Kingston so we have no jurisdiction over that anyway so so this is not the one that's on on the brook this is part what I mean by I'm not I'm not quite Ring Road I know it's on Ring Road but there's more there was more project on Ring Road far as I remember can you repeat that H I said I know that on Ring Road but I I thought that there were two projects on Ring Road these are right next to each other I don't know of another one they're right across the street from each other well that's what I mean I don't have a plan in front of me so I right really we'll have you meet them out there and then you can further you know Converse but I the fire department does review these plans when they go around when we initially approved these I this is before I got here but the fire department would have already signed up off on yes the lithium ion batteries and the conservation department as well yes so I would say if you want to meet them and and and um express your concerns that's wonderful but what we're here tonight for is just a fence well and and the public is here to see that and we haven't seen it we had it up on the screen for a little while put it up again I all I saw was a solar array I didn't see anything else and it shows a red line where the fence would go there's no context to that that's like you know that that's all there is though but no it's in a context it's in a natural environment so so you need to show the rest of the area that is affected by what is happening there correct so I would suggest you meet with them and you can express your concern and then we can we can vote on the fence tonight is that okay I have no idea it doesn't it doesn't make me feel like there will be any uh you know any any uh um serious acceptance of anything that I have to say there but well it's it's up to you I understand what the predicament is it's already been approved and constructed yeah appr I understand that thank yeah it's been approved it's been constructed I will I will say if you have major concerns they might be able to be addressed because as you know you might have heard earlier they never even call for inspections on any of this stuff so um we can discuss whatever we want as far as I'm concerned at this point so but tonight we're just here for the fence and then if we find out those other issues we'll we'll bring them up to them okay yes thank you okay thanks Pine all right so um what do we want to do about the fence you want to do it according to what the inspectors all did when they went out there than all right so the motion would be to accept this the bensing on this plan as discussed anybody have that motion you're you're on it tonight we have a second second there and second by Alex any further discussion here and none all those in favor say I I I against that would be I abstain no what say 31 thank you very much I was in favor of it I voted against it I get no I I I wanted go I if everybody else agrees with that fine I just wanted to just let my opinion be known without without it being denied see what I'm saying I could have done that started [Music] it okay defense is approved as they as presented okay moving on wow thanks I'm just scrolling through the plans from previous this is the uh Tremont Street with the two buildings in the front and the architecture oh that's good for the viewers and then this is the cemetery parcel it's very small uh the sister's property and then I was going to jump into the planers report and try to be brief um I promise I don't think you're sharing your screen any longer we're not seeing that on on the zoom it's showing on the screen for the town oh no nobody else in the chat can see it either okay pack TV is looking at it I mean the local scene is looking at it let's see if I need to do a share now can you see it yep little zoomed in but yes thank you okay there's the cemetery parcel from the sister's property and that's the site plan for on tront it's next to the Royal Garden this is the existing building in the back and then the two new buildings that are going in the front the planers report so there's three things I want to talk about and I'm going to show you a powerpoint of the townwide traffic assessment that was done this was presented to the selectman last summer because we wanted them to um determine what they wanted to vote on in terms of the projects and so um first I want to just give everybody a quick snapshot of where we are with exit 20 which wasn't part of the townwide plan this is the exit that's between Duxbury and Kingston where it's going to turn into two roundabouts and clean up you know reduce all the accidents that we have there um so it's going to be the two small roundabouts and construction is hoping to start in 2027 what what's happened is there's been a couple of changes by mass do in terms of their requirements and at this point we've asked the state if they can fund the additional engineering that's going to be needed above and beyond what was projected based on the number of years this thing has been in the tip but we're still aiming for 2027 construction if that agreement gets worked out so that's that and then um we worked with environmental Partners who's now Apex and they're on call engineer that we used in our highway department and what we gave them was all the information we have for the town including the survey that the selectman did um I think it was two years ago where they asked for everybody's input on what's going on with the roads and sidewalks and so forth in town so we asked them to do a full overview of existing conditions proposed projects that they would recommend um the criteria we hammered out and I'm going to walk through those and then they recommended some top priority projects which the selectman accepted and we broke it down into two separate sections one being uh local roads and the other being state-owned roads which we don't control or maintain one of the things we talked about and we continue to bring to everyone's attention is that um Kingston owns a lot of roads that are its own roads it has almost 80 miles of roads that it maintains but the chapter 90 funds which pay for the work that needs to be done unless we can get grants um or uh some other capital investment in our roads um level funded for 10 years now and costs have gone up exponentially so our pavement conditions are not as good as we'd like them to be townwide for that reason but this study isn't about our pavement condition uh townwide this study is about safety um both pedestrian and vehicular including bikes so the idea is to put us in a position to be able to apply for Grants and to have looked at this in a comprehensive way so what we did is we we uh had them map out all the existing networks and gaps for vehicular connections uh pedestrian connections um bicycle connections all the safety concerns we know about and that included all the information from the open space planning that's been being done by the uh open space committee and conservation folks so we had a lot of information that was public input already as we looked at this in terms of the survey that the selectman had done all the studies that we've done over the years by Old Colony planning Council any traffic engineering studies that have been done we gave them all of that information and we had them compile it so the existing conditions that they mapped out they showed us where the state owned versus local roads are then they went in and they showed existing bike trails and existing trails and Trail heads and this is important because we're trying to figure out what's the best way to rank these you know um and then we looked at what places people might want to go to so these are called points of interest and I'll see if I can make this screen a little bit more condensed I don't know if I can but um these little black dots are points of interest where it be a store or a post office or town hall or um some trail heads that kind of thing so we're trying to Mark out where we're trying to get to as we do this plan and this is a heat map of crashes which we can see follow along the main roads where they intersect and so that was important as well you say that again that's what it's called a heat map it shows the number of accidents in it gets darker when there's more accidents than lighter when there's fewer accidents so it tells you where safety concerns for vehicles are Y and then we had them um show um all the facilities that we have in town and it's basically the same as what we had before where's the post office where's the library where the schools um all that kind of information um and then this is we asked them to also incorporate sea level rise the sea level rise maps are a little bit odd um you can see where my mouse is moving that there's almost a straight line where the sea level rise map cuts off and that's literally where it cuts off because the studies haven't been done for Inland but we know that when the sea level rise comes up which is going to happen in the next 10 to 20 years we're going to have uh trouble with flooding along the roads that are adjacent to this so we wanted to make sure we included that too as a safety concern and then uh they started to look at okay well how do we rank projects how are we going to pick those and they said you know we're going to look at pedestrian projects bicycle projects and and Car Projects and then we started look at how do we rank these so again they went through all the previous roadway safety audits uh all the the complete streets plan that we did in 2021 um Ada improvements plan that Mass DOT came up with we don't have them yet but there's going to be a whole lot of crosswalks put in on Main Street um by mast do and all the information we got from the public doing those uh two townwide surveys about um being being able to move bicycles and pedestrians and cars and um information we had from previous studies and we decided on some prioritization criteria and here it is in a nutshell um we ranked safety first we then took some of the key things about access to points of interest Network gaps constructability and project cost and rank those all at 15% because they're all very important um and then we also said if it does it align with other plans and plan facilities we gave that a 10% uh we gave extra points if it benefited both a bike a car and a pedestrian or any combination and another 5% if it had to do with resilience to climate change and then uh I'm going to put this up on the planning website so I'm just going to kind of walk through through this part a little bit quicker but they scored the different things and came up with a total possible points for each one of those pieces of the pie chart so for each of these uh SE sections there's a total of 100 points all together that you could score if you're a perfect project that meets every single Criterion and um they made a matrice uh matrices of all of these things in terms of distance from the school distance to other points of interest whether it's on a local Road uh whether it's uh dead end major minor all of those kinds of things were considered and all of this was funded by the planning boards um public benefits account these are the things that you guys have negotiated over the years we paid for this whole study through the planning board's fund so I want to make sure that you were familiar with it constructibility means Is it feasible you know if it's really difficult it gets a lowerer score because we want to be able to get grants and actually do it so we gave higher scores to stuff that was low hanging fruit and moderately difficult things of like a half of five project cost again if it was cheap it got a higher um higher ranking because we can probably get a grant for it and do it in the near future but um as I showed you in the very beginning we're still taking on the super complicated stuff like the exit ramps we're not ignoring that and then we looked at all the other um the open space and Recreation plan the complete streets plan Road Safety Audits and scored those um and then we created some scoring for multiple travel modes and some scoring for resilience to climate change and that's how they were able to start to rank the projects so for the town own projects you can kind of see these black dots it's pretty hard to see on the screen but these are all the projects ranked in order of their um benefits for safety so a lot of them are right next to where the accidents are and then they rank them all for points of access interest and they're very similar in terms of where they're located if you look at this map and then this map there's a lot of overlap this map is um is it going to link up with planed facilities and the planed facilities includes proposed bike trails and proposed sidewalks and then they ranked the top five so the top five the number one score was Main Street Route 106 and um they just ma the corter here and and talk about that tackling that which is a major major cost is still ranking high in terms of um projects for the town so we put into the capital planning uh request for this coming year um roughly $449,000 to do the um Community engagement and overall planning before we were to dive into doing any engineering so we're hoping that that will get funded um and then that might have to go in the tip which takes a number of years to do because of the costs but we look at other options the number two project was the crosswalk by the library and the found school you can see that there's um pretty high score there and we've applied for the engineering dollars in the capital requests for 2026 um and we've also applied for the grant that would pay for the construction so if we get the Grant and we get the um Capital uh money for the engineering we can do that this year and we're excited about that and we talked today with our Engineers about also including the sidewalks on the opposite side from the library which are kind of narrow as a complete streets Grant application and try to do the whole sidewalk at one time and that would be a really big Improvement for the town the next one was uh we are at pmar Street 27 and Lake Street and station street or in other words the intersection next to the uh High School and that's been kind of looked at for the possibility of a roundabout and um we just made a school zone there to slow everybody down uh because what's happening is is people are not paying attention to the stop signs as they approach the intersection and going right through it and some cases crashing good3 so we put a request in for the engineer dollars to engineer this and then we would use that money to seek grant funding to construct the next one was pemboke Street at Grove Street which is the witz intersection and what's happening there is there's a very long crosswalk to get over to wits and the idea here would be to to make these safer and narrow up the intersection just a little bit to make it a long less Long Long Walk for a pedestrian and that scored pretty well so again we've asked for the engineering in 2026 capital and we've also applied for a grant um as of uh last week to also construct this this year and then we had a the idea of a Lake Street shared path from the high school down to Windgate is still on the table but because the other projects ranked higher we've pushed this one back in the capital plan we'd rather have that intersection designed and constructed and we've also been delayed in getting the funding for reconstructing the covert that goes underneath Lake Street so we want to time it so that any work we would do for a shared use path would come after the Culvert reconstruction and then there's some state owned projects um again they ranked them the same way they looked at um you know now you're narrowed down adjust the state owned and state controlled roads which is 53 and Route 3A and again we're looking at where there access to points of interest where there's alignment with existing facilities and proposed facilities and so these are I'm not going to get into them in too much detail but the idea here is we will look at these and talk with mot and start to say look these are things we'd like to do and talk with you about and so um there the possibility of making this intersection a little bit safer at Main Street and Summer Street um London Street that's a high high accidents yeah not bad accidents but bad a lot of them yeah so we would hope to work with them and get their Buy in to do some planning to improve that um same thing happens at Main Street and Spring Street now we're going to be meeting with our Engineers this week because we have again the planning board negotiated account um of about $113,000 through the L knife Improvement so we'll be sitting down with our Engineers to see if we can engineer that intersection and then we'll look for grant money or complete streets funds or other funding to try to make those improvements as well uh Main Street at Howland Lane I think everyone agrees there's an issue there it may not be signalized but it might be a roundabout so again try to get the states Buy in and doing something and then Summer Street at Green Street it's just vast now we know that the state's going to be doing a little something there with their crosswalks so we'll want to see what they do um but we also again we want to talk to Masta and start to get their buying and show them how we've studied the town and these are really high priority where this is uh Summer Street at Green Street so oh and then we have Main Street at Landing Road and again we have you know similar problems with that intersection it's hard to get out uh so again we'd be looking to talk to mot and say what can we do you know to team up and so those conversations are happening uh soon you know that and um I just wanted to keep everybody in the loop the other intersection that I'm looking at with planning board money that you've negotiated is we're putting the tarland and 53 and 3A intersection which is when you come off exit 20 and you're heading towards Big Y CVS CVS and Big Y that's going into the tip right now we're meeting our Engineers are meeting with the property owners that that um we can fit roundabout in there would affect the CVS parking a little bit but everybody's open to talking about it and it wouldn't it would just move the parking around they wouldn't lose any spaces but it would make the whole intersection a lot safer and we want to put that into the tip which again takes several years it's going to cost millions of dollars to do this but we want to keep things moving along so we we pushed that into the tip as well and um that's that's the end of that presentation I just wanted to um see if there's any questions let's stop sharing but we're you know we're really trying to do some comprehensive planning I did all of this work with um Paul Basler before he retired and uh you know we all put a lot of effort into this and we're excited that we're applying for grant money already and um if we get the support um in the capital planning we'll be able to do some of this work because as I pointed out we don't have money for engineering in our chapter 90 budget we can't keep up with our roads with the chapter 90 monies that we have so that's that and the other two are much shorter okay okay um I just wanted to um let you know that we did a draft update of our Adu bylaw for Town Council to look at um hoping that if I hear back from Town Council next week I'll be able to advertise this before the new state law goes into effect and that would give our Building Commissioner uh the direction which is to maintain the setbacks that we've agreed on in our updated bylaw and to not have short-term rentals those are the two things that I'm proposing that we would regulate on these State adus we'd still have our ad local Adu bylaw doesn't go away but we're only allowed to do a little bit with these new state ones yeah so we put that up with Council and we're waiting on the state to issue their draft regulations which are actually going to they've issued the draft but the final regulations I think are going to be issued the day that the law goes into effect which is very bad time so um if we're able to advertise though our proposed changes whether these are the final changes or not we advertise them we've got something in place that actually has legal effect unless we don't adopt it a town meeting so that's that um on the housing production plan what happens if you don't adopt a well if we don't adopt this this change then then we're just this it's kind of a free-for-all and you just go with the state regulations for the state adus and the state adus what happens if you don't adopt the state adus you can't not adopt the state adus that was my question okay yeah sorry I mean people are not adopting the NBTA right it's not a choice it's it's zoning it's been already put into zoning it's part of the what they call the Dober amendments and it's like exempt kind of like schools are exempt or um churches or exemp that kind it's fallen into that category so the only thing that we want basic we want to say is setbacks no sh yeah I mean the other the only other thing we could do we're supposed to keep it in line with what we do if somebody's putting a garage on their house we can't be more um we can't put more oversight on that than we already have in place for somebody putting a garage on which is a building permit but we can say maintain the setbacks and that allows the tent the existing buildings being converted and it allows the older setbacks to stay in place for older houses which is what we said in our updated zoning good so that's that that they have to go St has State hasn't answered how that works yet States doesn't have their regulations published those kinds of questions have been asked in the thousands up to the state and the public comment period closed a week ago and in two weeks we'll have a regulation the day that the law goes into effect so the day that you could pull a building permit the state's going to issue regulations that say what it can look like I bet they haven't either no course not what the building commission reting the MBTA stuff now yeah the building Commissioners think that this all going to be um uh Case by casee appeals in the court unfortunately because this is so poorly written but we got to keep going with what the state's handing us which I we're trying to make lemonade out of lemons well I just think if somebody they can if they come to us for a special permit we as long as we have well we don't necessarily have the ability to do that if they use the state law we won't know until later right now we can right now anybody can do that with us through a special firm the planning board right it's planning board okay okay um housing production plan we had applied for a grant um seven months ago now from the um EA and we don't know why they haven't issued any grants yet and it's going to cost us I think it's 49,000 47,000 to do the housing production plan we already had it lined up that we would contract with ocpc to do that work it's a lot of work um and it's due this year so at this point as a planner I'm saying to the town we really need to do the housing production plan we don't have the grant yet if we get the grant fantastic we'll use that money but my ask is that the planning board allow me to use the public Benefit Accounts to pay the ocpc to do this plan with us so that we get it done in time if we don't have a housing production plan in place even though we have um we're at only 5% uh in terms of our housing inventory out of the 10% that the state wants us to have we want to have that plan in place because we might have enough units getting built in any given year if if production picks up again if construction picks up again we might get those affordable units and we want to have like Safe Harbor for a month or six months or a year depending on what the state will give us and that Safe Harbor is temporary um halt on any 40 BS being filed with the town but the only way to do that is to have our housing production plan in place I think it's between 40 and $50,000 I don't have the number right on top of my head but I'm hoping that the board would authorize me to go ahead with the contract and then hope that we get the grant but um we can't keep waiting for the agency to act yeah so I've I've got three head nods I'll take that as a as a supportive vote oh yeah yeah Tom supp just so okay so I'll go ahead and do that um you all have a copy of the annual report in your uh in your folders yep I would never do that ex I don't think we distributed the minutes so we'll skip that but the only other thing I wanted to touch on briefly is that um in case folks didn't hear or did hear that the the town of Milton uh court case was determined in terms of that MBTA zoning and basically as briefly as I can possibly say it the state said the law is good it doesn't go away but the guidelines are not good they weren't adopted properly and so those go away so right now there's this kind of deep breath of a few days uh where all the towns that didn't vote for it aren't in non-compliance because of timelines all the guidelines have the timelines in them like you have to have it by such and such a date but the state uh housing agency they're going to come up with the emergency regulations they thought by Friday so anytime this week I wouldn't be surprised to see emergency regulations come out that looked a lot like the guidelines that they already had issued so it's almost like a moot point they're going to issue an emergency guideline they're now they're going to issue an emergency regulation because the guidelines that they adopted weren't done administratively approve um properly according to the court okay so they didn't do the job administratively soy emergency regulations regulation and then they're going to have a 90-day public comment period yes it's almost like it didn't happen they'll vote on it they won't even read it no one does anything so we are still um as far as we know we're still in good standing you know we've submitted everything to the state for review before um before Christmas the deadline was the end of the year and um we don't have to worry about it because we've done everything um from Kingston's perspective and we have gotten quite a a few grants uh since like the morning after town meeting vote they were holding stuff up you think uh based on votes so um that's all I have was a little longer than I planned sorry but we haven't talked about the transportation planning effort that's been going on for the last two years and I just wanted to take that time to I also was one of if we wanted to start taking some all this work that we're doing and use this information as updates to the master planer you know we've did all this Transportation Planning townwide that could be the new section for the Town Master Plan um if we wanted to start doing incrementally because trying to take on the master plan for the whole town can cost upwards of $500,000 with a consultant and we're doing a whole lot of work for a lot less than that um and we could start doing you know this chapter I know Marshfield was going to start doing it that way just update chapter by chapter by chapter as we do the housing production plan we could update the Housing section we could update the transportation section with all the work that we've done and um we could update all the demographics and all that information and so we do it on kind of a rolling format so if you guys are cool with that I'd like to start doing it that way rather than try to take on Bight the whole Apple still committee no there's no committee that that was disbanded after yeah once it was finished um I don't there was no implementation committee there was talk of having one but when you read the plan it's really a lot of lists of ideas and it doesn't really have priorities like like what we did with this Transportation Planning was we said these are our top five but we ranked everything these our top five for the state to talk about and these are the top five for us to and we've already started attack those top five so um the idea of having like you know we could take what we've done and articulate that into goals and you know um kind of the overall strategic steps that we taking and then have this as our as our subset this is the this is our rankings but we need to put goals in and um specific things on top of that that make it part of the master so I think we could do that and be updating it on a rolling basis and it would be updated by the time yeah I think yeah everyone I've talked to about the effort that was done in 2017 2016 it was a massive effort there was a whole lot of work to try to get public input there was a whole lot of work done on that plan it's almost 600 pages long and um what what's not there is the Strategic comments like these are the things about us that we want to do and we can do that as as a planning board and have you know open discussion with the public on those things um but taking all the work that we've done including the 2017 master plan and articulating those strategic objectives is What's missing okay your planner is done talking thank you pal okay thanks we want to hang around for another hour or so motion to adjourn well we need a second all those in favor right and then can you please sign that a our plan on your way out just the myar we need three