##VIDEO ID:bJUxhJ9IYW4## evening Littleton and welcome to the January 22nd Board of Health meeting this is Kevin Davis acting as the vice chair this evening and I'd like to welcome everyone to the Board of Health meeting our first agenda item for this evening is the public hearing for eight Dalia drop and we're going to have Kirk from civil Solutions present that so is Kirk promoted yes it looks like I'm sorry I think you might be looking at the wrong agenda oh am I I'm sorry it's the continued hearing for nine Aspen got it 9 Aspen Road you're right thank you so much uh corrected it's the 7 P.M uh agenda item is the continued public hearing for nine Aspen Road and so we have Dana mcneel from Integrity building and design thank you Megan hello um uh my name is Joe kid I'm the homeowner at 9 Aspen Road um Dana mckel from the the uh the Builder is also here on the zoom call okay do we want to is he the DMC Ki person that has checked in yes he is okay all right uh why don't we go ahead and uh bring us up to speed sir on where we were from the last time to this time okay um so in in the in the last call there were two primary uh action items to to be following up on uh by various different folks um the the first was a suggestion by that uh we look at into the design diagrams for the septic system as built and confirm that it it uh what what the actual flow rate is um from that it should be correctly uh captured as a two-bedroom septic and um we with we did look into this um it is unfortunately uh exactly design designed as a 220 gallon system not as a 330 so the the the two-bedroom definition is a correct framing of the design so there there there's no Silver Bullet here to help us get around this okay and what was the second action item that you had um Mr Wason at the end of our item had suggested that he wanted the board to have some conversations with Jim gy and then from the nooba board to look into the history of how Littleton has dealt with two-bedroom septic systems uh under the the guys that you using a multiple of room counts does not is uh provide some scaling difficulties as compared to four and five-bedroom houses when you're looking at a two-bedroom house yeah so we met with uh Mr won met with Mr G and uh we got the lowdown on the history of what Littleton does for all of our septic sizing and things like that and we use the strict room count um sizing for our so it's basically you count the rooms you divide by two and round down uh we do that for all of the houses and correct me if I'm wrong Mr uh Mr graffy that's that is the conversation that you had with uh Mr Wason so when I talked to Mr won that was essentially what happens we have a lot of small houses that have been torn down and rebuilt um and so in those cases when the original permit indicated that it was a two-bedroom and they were replacing the system but couldn't replace it in full compliance meaning they needed variances like this plan had they were limited to essentially five rooms for a two-bedroom house that has been the general practice okay and and that was the case here deed restriction was you know required to be placed on the property because the system could only be designed for the two-bedroom um as an upgrade okay so right now so that means the current house as it is let's take a look at the plan let's make sure that everybody on the board agrees with the existing plan um do you have any I also understand that uh some pictures were turned in or something like that about the living room on the uh living room dining room so there's one two kitchen is three that's on the first floor is that what everybody is seeing is that right is that what everybody's seeing on that floor yes yes okay all right and then if we go to the second floor we got four five office the office is under 70 square feet so that doesn't count yeah yeah yeah so I'm just counting the bedroom and the master bath bedroom I'm sorry bedroom and isn't there another oh master bedroom sorry yeah okay good yeah know so those so that's five rooms right there so five so that meets your two so that means um yeah that that meets the qualification of the room count that I am I doing my math right there uh board fellow board members divide by two round down so if we have five rooms it meets the letter there it is so that means um and make sure I'm doing my math right um yeah okay so that would meet we're right where we're supposed to be with the room count that we're at right now right with okay so the we already have a deed restriction saying that it is a two um uh a two-bedroom septic system so I think that's kind of where we're at is that does everybody agree with that count okay I may I yeah sure yeah yeah yeah uh I believe in the past we've allowed and uh Mr griffy correct me if I'm wrong but we've allowed one additional room with the deed restriction So in theory uh as precedent has been set uh we we could or should allow a sixth room oh okay so if I could this is kind of an unusual one typically you're seeing a plan after the system's been installed and they want to expand the existing house and you're asking to have a deed restriction put on this one's kind of it's different the approach is different only because this had a pre-existing deed restriction before they came to because of the system size uh because of the septic system so it's a it's a little different animal and and that policy as Mr Baker describes it is in place that you know one additional room the board's generally been okay with the deed restriction right okay I wanted I wanted to make sure that that was okay all right um Mr Kane do you have any comments um I I I think we've kind of got the answer that we we had that we kind of started off knowing that the house was under a deed restriction um we tried looking for the Silver Bullet of a oversized system which unfortunately didn't turn out to be in place my guess is the deed restriction originally was in place cuz that was the biggest system they could squeeze into that little space um I think today we're really down to you it looks like we have the same plan before us so it doesn't look like there's been any changes now that we have this information that we want to the request is to go from a five room house to an eight room house on an existing deed restricted two-bedroom house so I septic system excuse me thank you so I I my guess my question is um was there any changes in plans to be presented is so basically all we've learned today really different is that the system is 220 versus 330 and we knew the DED restriction was there is there any changes to what's being requested because this is like I said looks like it's going from a five to an eight on a house Au already deed restricted I'm I just wonder is there any new information that we have to really look at so um by by my count the original plan that we submitted uh uh some weeks ago would move from a a five room to a seven room count um the the additional rooms be that are over 70 square feet and non-bs being the office space in the upstairs and the family room in the in the downstairs um I think the conversation that we have just had here is suggesting that uh uh moving to rooms above the the existing uh space is is a bridge too far it's not something that what really fits within the precedent of of what we'd accept um I think we'd like to Repose an alternate design that would move from five rooms to six rooms um in in the in the lower level the family room would still be a separate additional room in the upper space it would be restructured to just ex expand the size of the existing room but do nothing to create create any additional space do nothing that allows any any uh uh any traffic pattern to be to to allow this to be you you turned into an additional space and just add some additional square footage to to be used in the existing room well um I I think what we're going to need from you is then as to resubmit some plans um I I'm thinking uh that you know with the board we could um as the discussion has kind of gone this evening look at going from five rooms to six rooms with the deed restriction and absolutely making it so that there is only six rooms um and so before that happen um you would need to resubmit some plans and get that all turned in and that way we can look at what those plans are and make a decision based off of those plans okay um based on the the question that I heard earlier of of uh room counts um and I i' I'd like your assistance in checking my math for rooms um um youir that that in the original uh um Repose set that this office space was in the original plan the additional added added space and this this family room so this would have moved four to seven as drawn and that we and that that that is beyond the the precedent that we accept and and we need to submit a plan that would potentially go up to a six room space is that correct so yes you would need to submit a plan that shows um that that first floor um change as well as the second floor change so that way we can evaluate that my apologies which first floor change you're not including the family room on the back side uh no the um I'm proposing that this family room is the one added room okay um so then see the confusion is is there so that's the reason why we would have to see what your plans are to submit them and to kind of work through that sir absolutely I'm we're happy to to to draw this up um I I'm I'm my only ask for clear verification is that the the plans as submitted does the board see them as a seven room space or as in eight room space as I thought I had heard earlier so Mr Baker you raised your hand you can answer the question Mr chair please oh okay hold on one second I'm trying to get um that to work um so the way I look at it on the as submitted plans so on the first floor we have I see a family room on the first floor that's one kitchen's two dining rooms three living room is four is that what everybody sees on the first floor of the newly submitted plan right so we got four on the first floor okay and then on the second floor I see bedroom of the submitted I see master bedroom the submitted and then I see this other room off to the side so I count three rooms on the second floor is that what everybody else is seeing on the submitted plan so I count seven okay well I think he's looking for feedback on whether making his master bedroom into a suite would be an acceptable solution U that makes it more into one usable space rather than two separated I mean I know we have looked at that before can't really speak to it that much maybe Jim could we go ahead Kevin Baker you know I I think that we've only uh discussed uh you know I just I get what he's trying to he just wants to take down the Walls you know and make it one big room and we don't have a a regulation in place uh stating that you know a room over X size is consider two rooms so you know uh the board doesn't really have a leg to stand on until we do what we have to do on that so I think Mr kid would actually like I should just say that you know what by just knocking down those walls uh your master bedroom there is considered one room uh and then he can move forward with the whole thing and not have to uh you know come back to us and you know in in the uh effort to just save some time uh you know until we have a regulation in place you know I don't think I don't think there's you know and the and would agree with you I would agree with you uh Kevin Baker that we've done that in basement plans before where we've had extra walls and we said if you remove that wall and make it one giant space and all that kind of good stuff then you know you would have a deed restriction to say that there's only six rooms and Davis still a two-bedroom septic so yeah yeah and we see that as a design with master bedrooms having a suite these days particularly with people using bedrooms as offices and whatnot so certainly and and I guess as I look at that we you know things that concern us about separate units particularly in the days now with adus is you know separate set of stairs going to it this doesn't have that you know um an area that can be kind of closed off this doesn't have that it's all contained within the one room it's not a walk out basement so you know it it truly seems to be what it is uh just one uh caveat I would make is no egress window uh in that new office they're putting in there's a window on the end it looks like yeah um I just note just make it not an egress window I think so it doesn't you know turn into turn into an in-law Dan do you have any other comments um I don't I was doing a little bit of math on look like that divider wall but I think I don't have open that one master bedroom up to one large space I think it gets our room countdown to six I think that's technically in compliance um I think the knee walls also help kind of right restrict what you can do with it it's a slope ceiling on both sides yeah Gino do you have any comments Gino can you hear us he's on mute can you hear me now yes do you have any comments Gino well the comment will be that for some some place they will say well well put you can put a a regular bedroom there is the space but if the regulation says well two I think it's going to be difficult but I leave it up to to the board and Jimmy's there and he can give us a sort of a yes or no thanks Gina uh does anybody have anything else that they'd like to add on the board okay hearing nothing um need a motion make a motion I'll make a motion to allow the addition of the family room with the uh combination of the uh attic space to the master bedroom uh with caveat that the room uh that the house not exceed uh six rooms and the two-bedroom de restriction remain in place we have a motion and a second I'll do a roll call vote Mr Kane or any discussion no discussion okay Mr Kane Kane wrotes yes Mr Baker Kevin Baker votes yes Mr Fred alone okay yes okay and the chair Kevin Davis votes yes so uh Mr kid you have your deed restriction in place for a two SE two bedroom septic system with a six room limit and if you remove those walls in the upper Master Suite um you have your six rooms please resubmit a plan with the appropriateness and then we can consider this done good we we will do that and I thank the board for their time appreciate it thank you have a great night okay thank you everybody um it is now 7:25 by my clock and it's time for our 710 discussion on the high school sewage system who would like to start that discussion anyone Mr chair yes Mr chair yes uh I guess there was a report of an odor uh at the high school and turns out there were some fans some odor mitigation fans that weren't working uh Francis if I'm correct uh and we're you know just wondering uh why do those fans need to be there uh was there some what happened in that design that uh you know made that that fail safe and maybe Jim you probably uh can tell us what's going on there I I can provide some background if he'd like yeah that'd be really great so back when the high school was built um it was a septic system that was over 10,000 gallons a day so D required that it have treatment on it as part of the discharge so down in that lower area is drive up to the high school um there is all the tanks for the leeching field the leech field is up in the playing field but the tanks were all down that lower level uh the type of treatment that they use was a fast tank which is a fixed activated sludge treatment I think is what fast stands for so essentially you have the waste water and then it bubbles up through and that provides the oxygen uh for the um the treatment to happen to the Wastewater it also generates a lot of stinky air and when they built that uh shortly after the school is occupied they were started getting odor complaints right away particularly in that lower level of the building um there are univ ventilators the heating system right in the walls of that building and the odor would hang in that lower field and and it end up in the building so the the town worked with a design engineer um because obviously that wasn't an acceptable design and I don't know if there was legal action or what there was but there was a lot of back and forth so they came up with a system where they put fans to draw the essentially stinky air off the fast tank run it through carbon and vent it so that you could move the smell from that lower area throw it through some carbon and um you know kind of cleaned it up um the the vendor that the school has had Martin Edge engineering they maintain the wastewater treatment system there for a good long time and we would get operation and maintenance reports regularly for martinage um and they would report on among other things the operation of that system and and most times there wasn't a notor issue and and again they produced some of the better reports that you'll see they kind of describe whether it was noise in the fan whether they replace the fan whether they replace the carbon and so I kind of picked three or four of those um monitoring reports just to see what the history was in most cases they were replacing the carbon from time to time so they were maintaining that and they were replacing the fans as needed to so it it's essentially a mechanical system that somebody probably needs to pay attention to when the fan gets noisy so they can uh go change it out before that happens when when I talked to the um Sewer Department who is now operating that because that that's going to be connected to the new wastewater treatment plant um so that's all going to end up going to the plant and then the Wastewater pumping back to the high school for discharge up in the field um what they mentioned that it sounded like the fan failed overnight which meant the odor had a good chance to build up overnight until the next morning and that's when the odor was discovered um Mr Baker I don't know was that the only complaint or did you get other complaints in the past I haven't I don't recall having a complaint there since they put that fan system on uh so I wasn't sure if this was this something that was happening regularly or if this just kind of a oneoff so I'm remembering now what was happening a little bit there thank you um if I remember correctly we got a uh email from a resident that was talking that actually has a child in the school and that the school um moved all the people from that area where the odor was to a different area of the school but allowed the school to continue for the day so there was a concern um to a address the system to make sure that things were working appropriately and B that there wasn't an issue with continuing the school for the day so I believe Francis was there after the fact and I guess there was no odor when you went to the school Francis is that correct yeah so I guess for public consumption just so everybody's all filled in so around 11:00 we received a complaint from a parent um concerned that there was an odor situation and that two classrooms had been relocated due to the smell um we got there within the hour of receiving the complaint the smell did dissipate at that time um we talked to the school administration we followed up with the engineering department for the town um who now runs the plant as Jim said um so it wasn't mechanical failure um as part of the discussion we talked about maintenance and in the future what can be done to make sure that this does not occur and if there is some kind of critical failure what kind of fail safes do you have going forward that would address this so one of the things we discussed is um being prepared with additional parts that mechanically will run down over time and that there should be extras in place and especially with the issues that it's had a full system should be ready to be replaced on scene so that's what they have ordered and they're going to be doing going forward so if it does happen by chance just based on routine mechanical failure they'll be able to address it same day like they did and it will not be an issue I mean in terms of how long the smell was there how intense the smell was I wouldn't say that there's any biohazard concern but I would say that you know when it becomes that dense that you're going to have kids who might go to the nurse and that was one of the questions I asked is you know did any students go down to the nurse's office was there any concerns after the fact day after with kids that felt sick day after um there were not um so I don't think it reached a level of concern where we have to talk about indoor air quality it's certainly something we could look into but also consider we'd have to engineer failure to be able to actually study that data in real time to find out that so it's it's something we could look into but do you want to go that far at this point considering that it is going to be replaced in the future near future okay so is the system up and working now isn't it functional the system was up been working within an hour and a half of the notice failure okay um now that the town has taken over one of the things that I heard from Jim was that we were getting reports on the status of the system and things like that and now that the town's taken that over I would assume that means that they're going to have uh reports that are going to be given to the board about the status of the system is that still going to be continuing that's something we talked about as well um just because you know with changeovers and everything like that reports go to different emails so um that's something we will have and we'll be able to review monthly okay so that is still continuing even though the town did take it over yes um I think there was some kind of miscommunication but we will be aware and we will be watching it okay uh Dan um just to clarify that really it's not really the town taking over because it's a town system now at the high school and it's just basically being moved to a larger Town system um still being regulated under D Authority not Board of Health Authority so really we're just uh any reports we get is just a informational really rather than an enforcement piece but obviously it's nice for us to know just like the point or any other larger systems in town just so that we are aware if there's events going on that we can work with the EP to Pro um pursue if needed but just yeah make sure we're clear that it's not it really is just changing equipment it's just a new system but still under D regulatory Authority right that's correct so so one of the things that will happen when you move to the new wastewater treatment plant I would imagine all those tanks that are now down in that lower area will be discontinued um and filled in or taken out of the ground so no longer should you have that odor Source right there adjacent to the building um it moves down the street down to The Interchange and they address it down the street so um hopefully just have lines going back and forth at that point Mr Baker do you have any questions thank you for jostling my memory I appreciate that Mr fralone do you have any questions no question I have I go along with Jimmy okay all right um then I think question sorry go y Jim do you remember when there was a local regulation that said that the local Board of Health uh had to approve any wastewater treatment systems over 10,000 gallons per day I think if they included Food Service permits way back when they used to have that D handles most of those so by the time I was getting into Littleton we weren't really licensing large facilities because DP that was essentially their their responsibility their Authority thank you what was the concern if I may be a little nosy then Mr Baker were are we supposed to license it just said uh no no no uh I I thought that back in the day uh you know Littleton had a regulation just stating that uh any uh SE Disposal Systems over 10,000 gallons a day uh were actually uh something we had to look at and approve not just D so kind of the history of that when when these all you when the code changed and the system size dropped from 15,000 gallons to 10,000 gallons a day there were a lot more systems that were essentially out of the purview of local Boards of health and so I don't know if that was kind of a vestage of that that the board still wanted some control over those systems uh but they still were always the authority DP any other items that people would like to discuss concerning the odor at the high school sewage system going once and twice okay uh then moving on to our it's now 7:37 we'll move on to our uh 720 discussion about the septic system size and room count regulations all right we just went through a classic example of that earlier in this meeting um okay we been discussing this a whole bunch of times and um why don't I open it up to Francis a little bit to see if he has something that he'd like to kind of push forward on this um so I included our last discussion which is just to refresh everybody's memory it's not something that we said it probably wouldn't be feasible going forward um so the document I include in the packet is just to refresh everybody's mind kind of where we're at if we should be looking at a certain square footage um our basement's treated differently as a policy versus adding rooms um and we've gone back and forth um at this point I did send out Jim forwarded something from the lenberg Board of Health because they've also had similar concerns um and I don't probably don't think people have had a chance to look at it yet because I just sent it right before the meeting um but I'll turn it over to Jim to kind of explain what lunenberg is doing it might be a good solution or at least a start of a conversation that I can start researching more and bring something back at another meeting so what I had sent Francis was lunberg was facing a very similar problem with the lake area that had small houses and and if you read the definition of Title 5 it talks about how you calculate bedrooms in houses that have more than eight rooms um and so it doesn't really address those smaller houses uh so lunberg said well we're going to address those smaller houses because those are the ones often that we're more concerned about they're on small Lots they're around the lake so they essentially put a regulation in there Board of Health regulations that essentially gave them the authority to kind of regulate back uh so houses that have eight rooms or last and and essentially it's applying the same you know add up all the rooms divide by two and round down but it just gave them kind of formal authority to do that uh somebody mentioned in the meeting tonight maybe Mr Baker that you know we do this because it kind of generally makes sense with the small houses you do the add up all the rooms round down and and we've generally considered you know two-bedroom system with five rooms but there's nothing codified anywhere it's just kind of you do it over eight rooms we ought to be able to do it the other direction too the regulation would at least codify that process for you so if somebody were to challenge it you can say this is where it is it doesn't really resolve kind of looking at floor plan and and how you want to address those um you know there's some obvious ones and I think some of the board members had mentioned your rooms over garages that have separate stair access always kind of raise an eyebrow uh walk out basements um again depending how they're set up those kind of raise an eyebrow and and again the board has the authority U to grant deed restrictions or to accept a deed restriction so really what I think is important for the board is what you think is reasonable and particularly going through the pandemic and and understanding all what people do in their houses these days you know you know a lot more offices a lot more staying home and using the house more for recreation so you've seen the proliferation of media rooms and playrooms and gyms and all that kind of stuff so again it's it's what you feel comfortable with um allowing I mean I I've said I think I even said to Mr kid I said you know if you came to the board with a 10 room house and said it's only a two-bedroom that's a kind of hard one for the board to go huh what do you so at some point you know what isn't acceptable when you see it it's all that stuff in between um and trying to have some I don't know I say reasonable guidance some guidance so that both the board us as agents um and the public has a sense of what you looking for okay uh Francis do you have anything else you'd like to add to that um I think it's a good starting off point um I think the main difference is I you know the board's had the trickiest part of basements in the past couple years um so I mean spaces and rooms I think we're going to have to treat differently than basements I think we're going have to two two separate policies and originally we're trying to combine them okay um I know Mr Baker you had an idea about you know if it's 300 square feet or more you need to like divide that room in you know count it as two rooms know you had an idea about that so he was one big well that's what that's what our you know the Littleton regulation you know I think it was maybe it was I think it was 2005 because I think thaten out 20 2007 you know through all the the criteria any dwelling with six rooms shall be constructed to have three bedrooms any dwelling with seven rooms she'll have four bedrooms uh and and then none of that applies anymore I think what Jim has sent us uh with the lunenberg regulation is a really good start but it doesn't address our uh our other issue of room count but if we were to add in another bullet point here just saying that any other room other than a Kitchen dining room or living room in excess of 300 square feet uh that meets a definition of a bedroom should be considered two rooms uh you know if we added something like that in there uh I think we'd be covered on on all the issues we face would that also in all the basements like if we had you know I'm sorry uh yeah if we say that it's any other room other than a Kitchen dining room or a living room in excess of 300 square feet should be considered two rooms what about if we so what if uh you a very large house had a 30 by 50 single area for basement and you know it's granted that's what that's 1500 square feet I mean that's that's big let's let's just do thousand square feet for argument sake because you take off some room for Mechanicals and things like that but you would say that that would only be two rooms in the basement whereas logically I would see that as potentially three right Pi a number of square footage that works in today's day and age I mean these things were in in you know a pre-co you know 2007 you know maybe it's 400 square feet maybe it's 500 square feet you know I don't know what the what the threshold is there and that's that's probably an architecture you know architectural question um I'm not sure so I think the foundation size we set on average for new homes in the past 8 years was I think about 14,300 Square fet yeah um and also maybe something to consider is so like when you have a bulkhead versus a walk out door um maybe elements also within the basement that might be considered as part of policy okay Dan do you have anything you'd like to add no I mean I think we've hit the big question the big piece is I I I'm I think I'm in agreement with Francis that we may want to split out basement because they are sometimes it's different let's pick you n ass we just talking about that you know adding that family room in the back and the space over the garage it's probably different than if that entire footprint was one big unfinished basement that they wanted to turn into a basement I mean into one room two rooms whatever we figure out I think that does kind of change you know making the entire basement one big room still has a bigger footprint than all the other construction they were posing so I mean I can kind of I'm just trying to figure out I'm not I I don't have a great answer I do kind of have that big open finished basement space I have one H versus lots of us do that you know how much that number would go towards if it was being done today what would that look like for request versus adding on an in-law apartment over my my back patio much smaller footprint but that would certainly count as one or two rooms potentially where my one big finish basement would only count as one I'm just not quite I want to make sure that we are fair and consistent and that it's um that we are able to apply it consistently to different things because I I guess part of me is like going yep if I'm putting in three 100 foot rooms that's clearly three rooms my th foot B or whatever it is is one or two or three I don't know you know with no I'm I think I'm I'm I think we need to look at it slightly different look at each differently I know I'm rambling I'm trying I'm talking it through I apologize um I I think I agree that you know basement may be looked at differently with the caveats of a bulkhead versus a walkout the stairs going up to an over garage or a second floor second second external egress um you know I'm not maybe try to codify that as well that a walk out basement does look different than a bulkhead I just don't know how to put into words I like lunenberg basic principles I think it makes sense um I'm trying to apply what they have here to our discussion tonight going okay I'm seeing two rooms I apologize my my count for N9 ASP was actually off because I was doing the math quickly on my head for that small in between room between the master space and the larger garage space that yes that smaller space was 69 square feet one foot under good math by the architect but in my head I did a quick math going yeah it's seven and change times not almost 10 that's about SE it's 69 but um this would count towards our room count and be reasonable I like Mr Baker's approach of going a big kitchen or a big living room is what it is it's that new new construction space finishing the basement picking that square you know making the exclusions for a kitchen dining room family room I think that's a great idea um off the top of my head kind of think through the wh ifs would be oh well our current living room is now going to be part of our dining room and my 900 foot basement is now going to become a f become the living room so therefore it's excluded from the requirements because it's a living room it's not a family room or other space it's now my living room and now excluded so I'm trying to play The Devil's Advocate of how someone could go I'm simply going to rename this space to something else it's now my dining room and now I've got a 900 foot living room therefore that's excluded from your criteria we've had the same we've had the same discussion uh just to continue on with that where we've had a kitchen and then we have an Eden kitchen and we considered those two rooms so yeah we've had that too where we've had because it's on the plans as a eaten fac eaten you know eeden kitchen like my kitchen would be considered an eating kitchen because of the way that the plans are drawn even though it's open Mr Baker Davis just interject a little bit here when we look at uh kitchens and dining rooms if you had a kitchen with a kitchenette or a Nook or whatever you want to call it and then a dining room typically I would view that Nook as part of the kitchen uh as long as you had a separate dining room if the Nook was big enough and because I say to people what is the real what did The Real L list the house add did they call that a dining room CU sometimes people will argue with you about the size oh I could barely get a dining room table in there it's like how was the plan and this is if you didn't have the Nook there if you just had a sometime again this is where looking at the design I tell people we try to use as much judgment as we can um obviously if you had a Nook that was I don't know 20 x 20 that's an awfully big Nook but again one of the things we see is a lot of very creative kitchen designs these days too um where they're entertainment centers more than anything else and so again you try I always tell people I I don't doubt how they're going to use the space we just have to think about the space for the next owner because it goes with the house and the system yeah and because I'm drawing on a plan that we had maybe a month or two months ago where we had the kitchen and then on the plans it had kitchen at or dining dining room or whatever that was in there and they were arguing that they could barely fit a table in there with chairs around it so was it really a dining room or not because when you open up the oven door you can't have a chair behind it and all that kind of good stuff so it was marked on the plans as a dining room but right one other thing for the discussion and something to think about um the state has this new ad Adu law accessory dwelling units and they're essentially done by W and so one of the things that uh they can't really set aside but will come to you as a board of health is Title Five so again that's how you're going to deal with an Adu as well as a room count um and so you really do want to think this out as somebody's coming whether they're adding you doing the basement into to a separate unit adding over the garage um we're already starting to see designs um come in in some of the other towns where people are trying to put adus in and and again looking at the counts and looking at how you might consider the number of rooms we often tell people if you even an efficiency apartment maybe three rooms total a kitchen a living room and a bedroom again there'll be a lot of kind of judgment calls I think made in looking at these plans so an Adu is guaranteed by state law by right is that what I'm hearing yeah up to 900 square feet I think it's by right and what is the minimum rooms that they need to have in the Adu to be considered an ad that that I don't know but typically when we see like an old in-law usually had like a kitchen a living room and a bedroom sometimes they would kind of combine the living room and bedroom depending on how it's attached to the house and that oh a bathroom doesn't count in that design so you and you absolutely have to have a kitchenette in there somewhere what you're saying um not I'm not sure the law about what actually has to be in it but what we see is typically the in-law Arrangement where you got a kitchen separate kitchen you people who want to have their their parents move in with them or move to their property or have their kids come back to the property don't want them in the house they want them to have their own separate space and so often you get a whole separate unit with a kitchen a living SL bedroom area in there and again how they do those it'll be more opportunity for bedroom count and interpretation so just to kind of be aware of yeah one of the other things I want to bring up too uh on this discussion was the old regulations like you said when it was more than this it was six bedrooms you know blah blah blah had a size for it and all that kind of good stuff um I can say that I think my house falls under that old regulation so I have a six-bedroom septic with a four bedroom actually house in it so I'm not going to complain because that means I can have 13 rooms in my house uh with that lovely deed restriction and I don't have anywhere close to that right at the moment so I'm good to go when I want to you know take my basement and make it into a micro sections of of something um so we're all good with that but I guess I guess that's the other thing is that if we had some regulations like that in place I'm not saying now I'm just if we had something again for new construction or something that was like that that you had those things in place uh that it might alleviate some of these issues that we're having currently with some for our four bedroom houses I don't like I'm sorry but you have a four bedroom septic which means you're supposed to have nine and then your basement you can only do this um another thing before I get to Mr Fred alone Mr Fred alone do you have something you'd like to add you're on mute gin what up there you go do you have anything you'd like to add to the discussion about room counts no the conversation was very good okay uh one last thing I'd like to interject about a walk out basement I think we need to also think about when the basement is a walkout uh versus um a bulkhead the walkout basement and things like that I think it needs to have a certain amount of front footage to kind of go out to there are certain houses that have a walkout basement that have maybe 20 or 30 usable feet and they consider that a walkout basement but it's really not that some have a very large yard that they walk out into so I think we need to think about the whole if we're going to start looking at that that's the usability of what that walk out means and what it's providing um so I think we need to consider that as well into our discussion we can discuss it another time the question is we have to make sure there going to be on regulation and Jimmy he can gave you that answer other the way okay anything else make a motion to adjourn I we have a few more items on the agenda but we have a motion on the floor to adjourn yeah do I have a second hearing no second I'm going to continue with our agenda unless somebody else has something like to add about um that discussion item Mr chair yes sir I was just taking some notes uh during our discussion and I put um some items on uh in addition to what Jim had sent us I'm just going to email it back over to Francis and Jim and then they they can circulate it to the board and then we can you know add it to an agenda in the future I think progress yeah yeah really think we need to get this nailed down and we also I think we need to come up with some sort of Regulation I don't think a policy or just something like that I think we need to have some sort of formal regulation that we pass to so kind of like make it enforcable so Francis how does that sound uh yeah we'll play with it get S to next meeting all right so let's have something then uh Megan maybe put something for do we want to do two weeks or four weeks H give me four okay so let's do a four-week continuance on this item discussion item please thank you so much all right um not hearing any other discussion items and just close that down I think we'll move on to our 7:30 ID discussion support to um our normal person Mr Wason would be here to discuss that did anybody receive the ID support to for Mr Wason for this evening I didn't see anything um so we've been having some one drive issues um okay and I was working with him on today we do not have it for this meeting but we will have it ready okay I also saw that um we may have some issues uh getting some of the data uh I think there's some going to be some new processes at the federal level that how data gets released so there might be some delay in getting some of the data from the CDC um so I think we're going to have to rely more on the state's infrastructure to get some of the Wastewater data and things like that um Mr Kan it looked like you had a comment you wanted to make yeah I obviously don't have the uh ID decision support tool I do have some some of the basic numbers for fluence Co that'd be great if you wouldn't mind presenting that'd be awesome yep no problem so currently uh we're at state level for moderate risk for flu uh percentage of hospital related visits regarding U flu like symptoms was about 5% it's down from about 5.8% last week the previous week so slightly less but still at a moderate risk 3% of Hospital admissions were for flu so a relatively High number but still down a hair from the previous uh 38 deaths regarding related to flu this season as far as covid we had 1957 new cases for last week which is the last reported week 24 deaths is actually up quite a bit it's been mid- teens for quite a while 24 is the highest in a week that we've seen since beginning of October so again compared to old numbers it's not large but 24 was still a pretty big number in the big picture um we're at here in Littleton like we've had 109 confirmed cases since uh for the season so it's I believe it's been since summertime since July 1 I think is when they they're using the season July to June so 109 confirmed cases here in Littleton but um there's no risk I've not seen the Wastewater data but cases are still out there for flu and for covid be safe be smart if you're sick stay home our standard everyone knows get vaccinated wash your hands get vaccinated wash your hands if you're sick stay home okay norovirus cases I've also heard um they're escalating as well um around the area um so definitely wash hands on the Norovirus I heard that uh hand sanitizer does not support the eradication of norovirus if it's on your hands so you definitely want to use that soap and water for 20 seconds um I also heard RSV is kind of having fun um I haven't heard Dan if it's been stable going up or coming down um my my quick peek uh just before the meeting I did not see RSV numbers at all so I can take a look as we continue on yeah okay um does anybody have any other information on that oh H five and one I know we had a concern about that as well um the last meeting uh we yeah go ahead Francis um so I did create a web page um I want to ask the board tonight is given that there was something more recent in the news and Plymouth there do we want to do some kind of maybe thre liner release directing people to that web page saying you know it's um and not not to scare people but just kind of direct people to the page so I mean the page I should have sent it out for the link but it basically has most of your frequently asked questions that um a normal person would have and question that seem to be the most asked about precautions what to do if you see a dead bird or bird acting um erratically um what's going on in the news what has been any case count deaths um also interestingly they've been talking a lot about pets um being of concern um it's very valid point raw milk raw products for cats I guess has been recalled somewhat um so we have that page up and running but maybe it'd be worthwhile sending something up to the public at this point just saying hey we have this page please take a look okay um maybe having the page emailed around to us and letting us take a look and then we can you know thumbs up it sounds good but yeah I think this is just information I know they um did find a couple of can dead Canadian geese on the um Amherst campus uh I know there's been a few other dead foul that have um been a little bit closer to Littleton um the other thing is I guess we should want to make sure that if people do find like if they have a backyard flock um and they do find a dead bird that they should probably call um the health department to make sure that you know this is being handled appropriately so that definitely there should be a point of contact in there to come and figure things out for that yeah I'll send the link out um we address that so at this point um wildlife and fishery have taken point where they've set up a portal um that we have a link to where you report it directly to them and they're starting to keep case count perfect okay all right anybody else have anything before we move on from that no you know you all set um in the news today there was uh an update that ums Memorial is committed to putting some kind of emergency department in place of Nisha Valley um obviously that road but it is news that is good news so the UMass Memorial is looking at taking over nooba Valley as an emergency they're not gonna take it over I think it'd be too much work you're better off starting from scratch at this point um so I think they were eyed first in August asking if they would step in and they did not commit and as of today they have officially committed to putting something in the area it's a question of where that is though oh oh a new facility brand new facility but I think it's going to be limited Dan probably has a better idea of what the information is Dan may have good idea too I see I think I'm probably seeing the same news reports you have it sounds like um theyve agreed with the nishoba valley task force that they're going to establish a freest standing emergency department with some Imaging capabilities someplace in the nooba Valley area I've not seen a town or a location uh it sounds like it's still up in the air sound like they've committed to doing it at the old MOBA Valley Medical Center campus it's just in the area so but they have committed to at least providing a a point of access for Urgent and Emergency Care in the Sha Valley which is now has a bit of a hole for for that service so but I did not see a timeline Jim do you have anything to add no I just I think putting it on the hospital site kind of complicates that because that property belongs to somebody else who probably Stuart couldn't afford to be there they probably couldn't afford to be there as well okay I did not know that that hospital grounds were leased from different facility when Stuart bought it they sold off all the properties to a separate Hospital trust I forget what the name is yeah that makes perfect sense okay um anybody else have anything they'd like to add to that General discussion anything else going on make a motion to ajour second we have a motion on the floor you can't second phone you can't second your own Gino I'm so sorry uh we do have one more item on the list to go before that do I hear second hearing no second the motion doesn't proceed so let's go to our next item which are administrative matters U meeting minutes approval so if we go to the bottom we have a meeting minut um it looks like we have the January 8th meeting minute that's been attached um does anybody have any feedback on those meeting minutes and hearing no comments or feedback on it i' like to take a motion I'll make a motion that we accept the minutes of January 8 2025 as presented I'll second that uh motion and seconded a roll call vote Mr Baker Kevin Baker votes yes Mr Kan Dan Kane votes yes Mr Fred alone you were absent yes abstain and the chair uh votes yes so we've accepted the minutes okay um uh did I think we're done with all the minutes that are there let's go to correspondence does anybody get any additional correspondence that they'd like to present to the board nothing nothing Mr Kane Mr Baker nothing here Mr Francis did you uh receive any things that you'd like to up to the board um I have but I'm going to say for the next meeting um I'd like to discuss in the next meeting how we'd like to kind of generally handle food establishments that we see are going down a troubled path okay um I think we need to kind of have a now it's fresh and routine I think we need to have kind of a general policy for how we like to handle those types of situations so okay great that would be awesome if you want to put some ideas together together and get it to us so that way we can kind of go through that the next time that'd be lovely great awesome okay Mr fredland do you have anything that you'd like to talk about no nothing at the moment maybe next time all right let's see let's see if there's anybody in our audience and it looks like there are no external attendees um so that uh looks like there's nothing there and no other points for discussion or board member updates anybody anybody okay so that concludes our agenda I'd like to make a motion to adjourn second that I have a motion in a second to adjourn the meeting uh Mr Baker K Baker votes yes and a roll call vote for Mr Kane Mr C votes yes Mr Fred alone yes thank you and Mr Davis votes yes so that concludes our meeting um have a great evening everybody thank you so much for your attending