good evening everyone i'm going to call the city council urban affairs committee meeting to order it is 7:34 on April 7th we have one item on our agenda uh order number
251009354 special permit modification to amend an existing special permit to build and operate a multifamily residential development at 339 Boston Post Road i believe we have Carara Cherelli from the Procopio Company cara
if you want to come and sit up in the well you're certainly welcome to do that if people do have questions for you if I can find it again I'm going to quickly read the the letter from
the sorry wrong agenda item um so everybody should have a copy of the draft special permit the comments from the site managers and the copy of the public
hearing um I will briefly go through the department head comments uh unless Cara has anything that she wants to say beforehand no nothing to add okay thank you so
we received comments from the board of health the building department Marboro fire department Marbor Police Department and conservation they've all responded that they have no comments or objections tom Deersio the city engineer offered the following comments i concur with the
statements of finding number 11 that I had correspondence with Mass DOT regarding they refused to allow the installation of radar street signs in front of the site at this time mass DOT indicated that they would conduct a speed study once the projects this
development at 339 Boston Post Road as well as their roadway reconstruction project are complete to evaluate the need for radar speed signs and I'm in agreement with the revised wording of conditions 8C and the proposed sum of
25,000 to be paid for the possible future installation of the speed signs so I'm just going to get right into going over the decision on the amendment to a special permit i'm going to go through these relatively quickly because most of them I don't think we
need to cover a lot until we get to the meat of this um this is a decision on an amendment to a special permit the applicant is Procopio Companies 35 Village Road Sweet 702 Middleton Massachusetts owner of property located
at 339 Boston Post Road East Malboro as shown on Marble Assessor's Map 73 parcels 24,27 and 28 the site the finding of facts number three has on September 22nd 2022 the city council of
the city of Malboro voted to grant a special permit authorizing the applicant's predecessor to build and operate a 140 unit multif family residential development at the site i believe that date is actually September 12th 2022
um okay that is order number 212217995T the original special permit the site is in a business zoning district with frontage on Route 20 partially within residence A2 zoning um the overall site has 25.7 acres
number six on January 23rd the applicant filed with the city clerk of the city of Marble in application to modify condition number 8 CC C um but I believe in um number three rectangular rapid
flashing beacons it's just the typo in the original special permit it says at the proposed crosswalks over Route 20 in the vicinity of the site um number seven they submitted a certified list number eight they've been
certified as complete by the building commissioner number nine pursuant to the rules and regulations of the city council a public hearing was held and the city clerk for the city of Marble cause notice of the same number 10 the Marble City Council
opened the public hearing on the application on Monday February 24th the public hearing was held at Marble City Hall 140 Main Street the hearing was closed on February 24th number 11 the applicant through its representatives presented written
testimony in the application and oral testimony at the public hearing detailing that the applicant consulted and coordinated with Mass DOT and the city's engineering division of the department of public works in accordance with the requirements of condition 8C
and that the rapid flashing beacons on the proposed crosswalks over Route 20 in the vicinity of the site have been installed further the applicant presented evidence that Mass DOT was unwilling to allow the installation of the requested radar speed signs at
either location on Route 20 at this time which was verified in a June 28th 2024 email exchange between the city engineer and Mass DOT that was included with the application given that mast installation of speed signs on the southern and
northern sides of route 20 in the event mast approves the speed signs in the future or for other transportation safety improvements in the vicinity of the site number 12 at the public hearing no members of the public spoke in favor and no members of the public spoke in
opposition to the requested amendment number 13 the procedural findings of facts specified above supplement those made in the original special permit and we get to the findings of facts a the applicant complied with all the rules and regulations b the city
council finds that the proposed modifications are appropriate for the site and in harmony with the general purpose and intent of the zoning code and we get to the amendment C the city council pursuant to its authority under
Massachusetts general laws chapter 4A and the zoning ordinance of the city of Marbor hereby grants the applicant an amendment to delete condition 8C of the original special permit in its entirety and inserting in its place the following
in addition to the planned improvements to Route 20 the applicant shall in coordination with Mass DOT and the engineering division of the Department of Public Works make the following traffic calming improvements in the vicinity of the
site rectangular rapid flashing beacons and I'm going to change on to at the proposed crosswalks over Route 20 in the vicinity of the site in addition the city wishes to have a radar speed signs
on the southern side of Route 20 to the west of Victoria Lane and a radar speed sign on the northern side of Route 20 to the east of Village Drive despite the applicant's good faith efforts to obtain Mass DO's approval Mass DOT has denied
requests by the applicant and the city engineer for approval to install the radar speed signs within 30 days of the expiration of the appeal period following approval of this decision the applicant or its successors and or assigned shall provide a payment to the
city in the amount of $25,000 to be used by the city council or its designate for the future installation of the radar speed signs by the city if mass dot approves such installation in the future or for other
transportation safety improvements to the vicinity of the site i am going to suggest that we add the following sentence the $25,000 will be deposited into the McGee farm mitigation stabilization account number
83600- mitigation funds that already came in and we set up this account councelor Ducet thank you much madam chair that's actually I was going to ask about that particular fund i know that it already existed um but that was also
how much was that going into that fund originally does anyone remember that i'm sorry how much 240,000 approximately 200,000 okay okay so it's going I wasn't sure this the size of it so I just wanted to know which way it was going to
be thank you for that we transferred 240,000 okay 200,000 for I wrote my notes 240,000 for traffic lights 20,000 for transportation options and 20,000 for recreational trail yep
the rail the trail going over the sewer line and then the 35 for the sewer treatment plant so um to finish up then um all other conditions of the original special permit or signs that at expense
shall record this decision on the special amendment in the Middle Sex South Registry of Deeds so are there any questions comments on councelor Ducet thank you very much manager this
is pretty straightforward i understand the situation we're in um you know we've been fighting the state tooth and nail through this entire process and appreciate the collaboration on that by the way um but this is pretty st forward
straightforward conclusion to an issue that we've been working on for many years and never got out the way we wanted it to so thank you for the help appreciate it but yes enough i think we all just need to be patient and see what happens as Mr depio said once the road
is finished they're they're starting to work on it again now uh to get the lanes organized the way they had designed them and um then as this development is finished we'll see the impact and then move forward
hopefully so if there's any other issu issues motion to approve as amended as amended councelor Det is moved to approve as amended is there further discussion those opposed would be no one all right um I will get this written
up i will ask for a suspension we have a council meeting on Monday this would be referred to the solicitor so that it's all checked out and made sure that it's in legal form and then back on our following a council's agenda to be voted on okay so
um you certainly welcome to come to those meetings but you don't have to we do appreciate your coming this evening to Excellent thank you get this done all right it's coming along we look forward
to opening this fall yeah motion to adjurnn it's been moved and seconded to adjurnn all those in favor 1 2 3 4 5 it is 8:46 no 7:46 that's late
enough don't need to so Everyone I'm going to call the city council open space committee meeting to order it is April 7th it is uh 7:50 we have one item on our agenda order number
25100 9394 a communication from Mayor Dumis with the letter from Priscilla Ryder conservation officer sustainability officer presenting the draft open space plan for public review and comment on behalf of the open space and recreation committee i will briefly
read the mayor's letter dear council president Oing and counselors it is with great honor that I present the attached draft open space and recreation plan for 25 to 2032 for public review and comment this plan along with the attached cover
letter has been submitted by conservation and sustainability officer Priscilla Ryder due to COVID related delays the process was extended and we are deeply grateful to everyone who contributed to its development during this time a very special thank you to
the open space plan committee Mayor Vigant for appointing the committee former DPW Commissioner John Galoney and Donna Scalcion for her assistance with editing and formatting please do not hesitate to contact my office or Priscilla Ryder with any questions
sincerely Jay Christian Dum Miss Mayor so Priscilla yes to the committee and you can give us your presentation all [Music]
right so I think you all know me so I won't introduce myself i'm Priscilla Ryder for those who are watching maybe tonight um so tonight I'm going to review the open the draft open space plan and what we're really looking for
is some feedback to make sure that we've got it right and that we haven't missed anything um the plan is the the reason we do an open space plan is it has um it provides us with our
identifying our needs for open space and recreation and natural resource protection and it's uh creates a vision but it's also our ticket to funding so um without the open space plan we don't get any state funding uh and most grants
now say do you have an open space plan is this in it if it's in it then we'll pay for it and if it's not in it it means you didn't vet it and that's not it's not going to happen so that's why we do it and it's uh every seven years we do this plan um of course this one took a little longer because of COVID it
just kind of got on the shelf and stayed there for 3 years and then came back off um during the beginning uh in 2018 we did a a survey of the city and we got about 500 responses so we got lots of good feedback and when I talked to the state and they said "Ah that's kind of
old um we you can't really use that data because there's you know a bunch of years have passed." So uh I said "So how do I get input?" And she said "Just keep presenting this to a lot of different people and getting some feedback." So that's why we're here and also just
because you are the people who have to approve it so we want to make sure that this draft meets muster um we didn't do this alone this is a a 12 member member committee that was a very active committee that worked hard on this and um you know we had like
20 meetings before 2022 20 that happened and then and then we've had a couple meetings since then to to finalize the plan so the people who um helped and because they're all important I want to say their names is who did all of our mapping and there's
plenty of maps and our beautiful maps and they took a long time for us to get them right um Babs Fenby who's in the planning board um I can't see that far um uh Bob Kay's from the recreation department commission meredith Harris um
Amy Ciney who's a a citizen representative um Karen uh Bob Fagone who was he was the chair of the historic commission when we started and um he's no longer that but he's still present and he's actually here tonight too um
Karen Puquin who's on the conservation commission she's actually our trails committee um leader and she uh so so she's no longer on the commission but she's she's definitely part of that uh Dave Ducet your city
councelor um Kyla uh Lacanti and Jim Watson were um members of that they they were part of the scouting crew but they also were interested citizens and then obviously myself and then as the mayor's letter says um
Donna um and then we have a lot of photos i'll just give photo credit so Tammy White has a has a a drone and she does some beautiful um photography and then MEEDC had some good um a drone photographer come out and then we have a
lot of volunteers so just to give them credit so today I or tonight I just want to go I want to do a plan overview i want to talk about what successes we had in our last plan just so you can get a flavor of what it was that we were able to accomplish how we evaluated
um what's what's left um how we established our goals and objectives and then how we came up with our action plan and what that what that entails um and then I have a short group exercise and then we'll have some discussion and I'm really looking for your feedback
tonight and so when when you're when you're listening to things think about what you love about Malboro and think about what we're missing in in this plan so that we're making sure that we're covering everybody so um this plan and I think I'm going to I'm going to walk over here
so I bring the microphone that's a good [Music] idea all right so this plan is really just to give us some orientation about how we are situated with all of our neighbors and to remember that it's not
only just Malro but what our neighbors have that also enhances um our our overall um the benefit of open space on this plan the dark green is everything that the city owns in one way or the
other or the state owns it's protected in some way whether it's conservation watershed or whatever um the light green are our neighbors open spaces so Callahan State Park down here on the um southwest corner of this southeast sorry
east west um is Callahan State Park and then we have the Sudbury Reservoir which is another huge area that goes into Southboro and then in Southboro and Northboro boundary we have Cedar Hill and Sawink uh farm and then in Northboro
we have uh aqueduct and um some other cons some others state um suco trails conservation area in Berlin we have the Asabet River that goes through and they've protected some land there in Hudson they have some land that they've protected that's adjacent to some of
ours and then in the northeast corner we have the Asabet um river wildlife refugee which is 2,000 acres so so you know this this whole complex has is unique and and very um
important for wildlife habitat so just to give you a sense of that it's not just what's what's in the city and then the other two things that um aren't showing on here is the Aset River Rail Trail and the Central Mass Rail Line that's uh going to just clip right
through the desert area um is coming soon so what does the plan entail so the state has some criteria about what we have to include so all of these chapters are all included if you only have a short amount of time to read it
executive summary analysis of needs goals and objectives and 70-year action plan is kind of the thing to read but what informs all of this I is the introduction the community setting who we are where where we where we land on
the in the economics point of view where we you know what we have and then the environmental inventory is really our inventory of all the streams and ponds and lakes that we have all the open spaces we have what are the corridors so
that's it's really an in-depth kind of environmental assessment of the community and then our inventory of lands and conservation interests are really these maps that um that identify all the pro parcels we have that all
informed our vision and then we did our analysis of needs and we set our goals and objectives and our action plan so So tonight I'm again I'm looking for your feedback these are all the pieces of the puzzle that we're putting together the recreation facilities
looking at those natural resources protection um conservation land and trails historic cultural and um community um events and and facilities so what did the last plan succeed in just so that we know kind of
this is this is what we were this was our dream and the great thing is we were able to succeed on on we pretty much filled up we checked off all the boxes um for the last plan of the big projects that we wanted we were able to renovate
um Memorial Beach and again without this plan we wouldn't have gotten the funding i think we got $400,000 to do that our splash pads actually we were we didn't even have the splash pads on the in the plan but we had finished our plan and we called them and said "It's not really in
the plan but but improving um our recreational facilities is necessary." And they did provide us with funding saying "Well it's great that you've you've completed most of your plan." We did um we got some funding for the improvements on
Galoney Park um if you if you were recall we had a huge parking problem there for a long time and and that has been improved and they they changed the circulation and they added a nicer trail and they have planted trees there and then we improved all of our playgrounds
as well so so we did a great great job with recreation um and here are some visuals of our lovely splash pads and the and the walk around Lake Williams and then our canoe launch which I don't know if anybody knows we have a
a canoe uh location off of um Reservoir Street we have a place where you can rent and and use canoes there or kayaks I guess one of the things that we learned in our uh survey was that um nobody knows that we have all these
wonderful facilities in the community and even in the survey it said you know what are we missing and they'd say we're missing a skate park or we're missing a this and we're like we have all of those so obviously we're not doing a good job
getting that out there so recreation has huge amounts of um of facilities and and um opportunities we and uh the pickle ball court was all all of a sudden became very popular so all of a suen so
recreation uh transformed some of the tennis courts into pickle ball courts um and conservation land most people knew that we had one or two but we have about 14 so uh so we're one of the jobs is to figure out how to get more people to
know about all these resources that are theirs to use so conservations our successes were the the Panther Trail was um a vision in that plan and ta we got it the Burough's Loop Trail which is the
33 mile trail that goes from um through four towns Malboro South Burrow West Bro North uh is um also was opened in 2019 we because we were building all these trails and during COVID we had
this great group of people we decided to go ahead and create a trails committee which um is very active and they do all kinds of maintenance for us so thank you them to them we acquired 145 acres of land some of that was through open space
development and some of that we purchased um we finalized a Sudbury reservoir trail we created a community garden that's very successful and we um established a 30-foot buff wetland buffer zone to protect better protect
wetlands on the community side we um we did the museum the streets the then and now on the JS map is a pretty cool thing there's a story map about some of our old homesteads city council approved city complete streets which means every time
we develop a street we're trying to make sure it has a sidewalk and and a bike path um where where it's feasible but making sure that we're looking at accessibility all the time the art um the rail trail improvements we've put in
benches and um and kiosks and amenities along along the trail um we built the trail around Lake Williams including the floating floating boardwalk so that was part of the that was in the vision not the floating boardwalk wasn't the original vision but here we are and
we're we love it and then of course looking at our regional things um the thing that's coming is this mass central rail line that's going to um connect with the Asabet River Rail Trail in Hudson and then we did some climate resil resilience planning which you guys
will be looking at shortly um oh yeah so Malbor has lots to offer um and in this whole planning process the what we as the committee we were all sort of
saying okay so we do have we spend a lot of money on our infrastructure our roadways our sewer our water our utilities and our homes and we need all of those to have a good society but we
also need our natural infrastructure which which comes naturally Naturally we don't spend a lot of time thinking about it but now we're going to start to think about it more because as we develop we may be destroying the very thing that's con that's keeping us alive here so our
water our our waterways our um our ponds our streams our all of our soil our trees all of that is really important infrastructure and it's the other infrastructure so so keeping that in mind and and remembering that so Doug
Talamy is a um ecologist and he's really interested in making sure that as we develop we're not destroying what we have one of his quotes is because life is fueled by the energy captured by the sun from the sun by plants it will be
the plants that we use in our gardens that determine what nature will be like 10 20 and 50 years from now so using that as sort of the springboard the the the committee um was looking at
all the things that we need to do and and determine that the challenge is that the city that um over the next seven years we will we need to ensure that the city plans ahead and saves those parcels of land that are important to the
character of the community that we ensure that the natural systems we depend on stay healthy and that every neighborhood old and new has a piece of tree filled open space or recreation park land nearby and
that there is enough recreation area to play exercise and enjoy the natural world so as our community grows these are the things we want to make sure continue to to survive and so the committee put together these vision statements and I won't read every
every word but um again the so we sort of go from the big picture and each each step we we go get more more detailed so protecting open space preserving our scenic and cultural and historic features and implementing thoughtful
planning strategies for both the built and the natural environment so making sure that we're doing being thoughtful maintain protect and improve the quality of Malboro's critical natural resources maintaining and improving and expanding on public and private
recreational um opportunities for folks of all ages and all abilities uh protecting open space not only for humans but for wildlife and eco and and balancing the um ecosystem and then um
connecting open spaces and recreational resources sort of through not only in the city but looking at our our neighbors as well and making sure that we're creating both corridors for humans and also for animals as part of the process a state
requires us to look at a bunch of maps just so that we're doing the planning that we need to do and we sort of know what our resources are it's kind of like the inventory of our community so we look at our watershed we look at our um our scenic landscapes and features um
you know where are our hills where are our views where are the views to those hills making sure that th those are things that that make a make a community lovely so so making sure that we're identifying those and then and making
sure that we don't destroy them um and then the biio map and the wildlife quarter map is we we combined about three different layers of maps um the state has a biomap that says where are ecologically sensitive areas uh the Sudbury Valley Trustees which is a
regional land trust looks at farmland and ecological balance and and nature corridors and then we had a map of our own so this map is a combination of that and the greens the green areas on this
map are the areas of high ecological value so those would be the areas that whenever we're developing if it's near there we need to look carefully to make sure that those corridors are being protected and that those areas are being protected and in some cases it means you
know maybe we should be buying that property in some cases it means we just need to make sure that a certain portion of that property is protected and this is a bigger version of that but um as an example and many of you were here when Apex was built
there's a a wetland corridor behind Apex and we had to work hard to make sure that that corridor got protected and um you know making sure that understanding where these where these wetlands are wetlands may be you know by protected by the state but I think being more
thoughtful about it when when we're developing things so this map I think is very critical in thinking about our future and then looking at our trail maps and how they're interconnected um I showed you the Burough's Loop Trail the
Asabet River Trail the Central Mass Trail and then the the Bay Circuit Trail is a 200 mile trail that goes from the Northshore to the southshore and we are the outer outer um loop of that and so it's it's pretty cool that it comes through Malboro
um oh and on here uh we've also put the um one of the things are is these are the um walking school bus routes to make sure and and when we were talking to the school department they said "Yeah you know we're going to be reducing the number of buses that we have and so more
kids are going to be walking to school." So making sure that we have these routes that are clear and and identified and then working with the parents to to facilitate that kind of walking to school um program and then uh the state also
wanted us to know you know where's your where what's your demographics uh this environmental justice map is a state map that um is done by the 2020 census that um that shows uh everything that's in in
a color is is either underserved or um English as a second language or uh some minority group that's that's in that um thing
and when you have that then uh the state provides more funding just because you're you're helping a underserved area and then we obviously surfial geology our farmland and then a map that we we created just to see how close do people
live to a green space so everything that's green is obviously protected in some way or the other everything that's yellow is it it would take you a a quarter mile to get to the green space and anything that's in red it'll take you a half a mile to get to the green space so we were just trying to figure
out if there's any blank islands or something and and we're not we're not too far off so so that wasn't such a bad I mean it was a good a good example to go through so then we took the step of so
there there's two two major maps we had to do one is this is what we own all the colors show whether it's stateowned uh conservation land recreation land cemetery land watershed land um whether it has a
conservation restriction on it so the pink ones are not city-owned but we have a a pretty strong restriction on them um and then uh the ones that have the the little red mark are the ones that we acquired since
2011 just to get a sense of what we what we have you know what we accomplished from the last the last time and then this is the unprotected land this is what remains so anything that's orange is
what's what's left that's not developed and so this was the challenge is to look at this and say so what of this is so important that we wouldn't want to lose it what what is it that we don't care if
it if it's lost the things that are hatched means it's not developed today but it has a permit on it so it may get developed or it may it may not and um so and then the the ones that are yellow
are either farmland or they're chapter 61 properties so the city is giving them a tax break because they're not using it for anything besides farming or agriculture or or forestry or golf yeah um and so they're
not 100% we get a right of first refu the city has a right of first refusal but it doesn't mean that um you know they couldn't just pull it out of chapter 61 and then convert it to something else so again this is just a
picture of what's left and the challenge for the committee and for all of you is to look at these maps and say what don't we want to lose and again for instance top on the list is um is uh the South
Street swamp um shoestring hill area and again it's 80 acres most of it's wet maybe a portion of gets developed and the rest gets protected maybe the whole thing gets protected so you know those are the kinds of those are the kinds of
decisions that have to happen in the next couple years so um again and then everything that's red is what was developed since 2011 when the first plan was came you know when the the last plan was so it just shows you how you know
where development happened and uh the orange is 5 acres or more or combined five you know combined par parcels that are five acre you know collectively 5 acres or more um we did talk about pocket parks and maybe small you know
looking at smaller spots in the future but um for this exercise and and if that's something that people want to see then we can make that as a comment and add those and then just remembering that we are part of this regional thing this is a so this is Malber and here and these
are all the trails that the state and and MAPC is working on this is the central mass line that will be that's already live to Belmont and will go all the way out to um to Clinton um and then uh MAPC is looking
at uh making a connection from the um the end of the bike path to uh some side streets and we actually rode it and there was only two or three sections that you know were kind of hairy that to to to ride on so
um so then we we developed a we developed goals and we uh de um defined a goal so so one one the first thing was to create a plan that had measurable with that we could have measurable results with so that's you know the plan
that we provided making sure that we're protecting and enhancing natural resources again this is sort of repeating but you know becoming a little bit more detailed um protecting biodiversity uh providing quality recreational facilities and adequate recreational
opportunities for all city residents preserve the character historic and cultural resources of the community promote and develop regional open space and recreation and engage and educate community citizens about protecting you
know why why is it important to protect because I think the more you get more buy in if you if people know why and then um just promoting the public and private recreational resources and events that the city boasts the city has some some pretty cool uh
recreational facilities like the Apex Center our skating rinks and our and then we have a lot of festivals and Labor Day parades and music festivals and we we realized in this open space plan that it was good to just make note of that i mean we don't have a master plan so this is a good plan to put a lot
of information in just so that it's it's there and people can find it so then each goal has objectives that that get um expanded on and then so the big so
here's kind of the the the concluding pieces what did we recommend and this is where we need your input too to make sure so recreation obviously the the landfill creating that into a a park is is high on the list and is is in in
progress now but um finalizing that and getting that done is is a pretty high on the list uh frisbee golf came up a lot on our on our survey so that's on the list too um and then improve improvements to a lot of the facilities
we got a lot of comments about that and the recreation department has also gone gone through all of their facilities the biggest thing is building a shade pavilion at Galoney Park Feral Pool and Ward Park so on these hot summer days and and these weird storms we have at
least there's some shelter for people um Galoney Park and Richard School have some and Burns Fields need some grading upgrades um Stevens Park uh need some batting cages and snack shacks at the lower at the lower
baseball field um installing some lighting systems so that we can have more time on our on our you using our facilities a little bit longer um at the high school track at Colon Park and at Kellerhurfield and then renovating the stands at
Kellerfield and the high school track um and then making sure that we're we're looking at playgrounds and where they need it and um obviously once we have those the plan is to to look for funding
for for um implementing these ideas for conservation i mentioned that we're looking at um some of our biggest parcels so uh the South Street area the Robin Hill
Street area the um Fort Meadow area there's quite a few uh remaining parcels there those are our big ticket items that we would like we also have some some few remaining farms we used to be a big farm community and
now we have just a few left so how do we work with those farmers how do we see if we can keep keep some of those farms and then making sure that we're looking at uh corridors and and wildlife corridors there's a whole area between Elm Street
and um and Berlin Road that is a is is a huge wildlife area um and then there's some other spots that that make connections and then with natural resource protection um making this is sort of getting down
to some of the nitty-gritty is tosses and so making sure that we are um planting native and we've we've had some success recently in the back of city hall we took their landscape plan before they planted it we we vetted it with
some some of our expert um native plant people and we were able to switch out a bunch of those plants so now the what's behind city hall is much more pollinator friendly than the first the first round we did the same thing at the library and we're able to take that plan and swap
things out and then the library um trustees said I think we should that lawn in the front needs you know shouldn't really be there so that's going to be converted to much more native of planting in the front and a few more trees there too
so we also did this over at at at the um Alta project is we took their landscape plan we vetted it and we swapped out a bunch of those plants so at some point we I want to have a or we want to have a um a guide right so one
of the one of the goals is to have a guide that we can hand to the con the the consultants and say the these are the plants that we want you to choose from but again just like um the other quote this is another quote from um Doug
Talamy that butterflyies used to re no ifs ands or buts if we do not butterfly populations will continue to decline with every house and project that is built so I think the message that the
committee wants to convey is that we need to change some of our rules and regulations and and make sure that we're being thoughtful about how we're developing and that we're replacing the very things that that we want to be supporting um birds and I can go on forever about
that but I'll stop um so and then uh just working on invasive plants some there are some areas on the city that um like Colona Park we've had we've done a lot of work on removing bittersweet that's killing a lot of the trees um and
then and then looking at planting more trees and shade trees making sure that u we are investing in tree replacement when trees die on our city streets to improve our shade capacity and our carbon sequestering capacity um wetlands
and waterways protection making sure that we're keeping up with sort of the new science and making sure that we're doing the right thing in protecting what what's what we have um and just recently we did a huge restoration project over at the desert where it's a pitch pine
scrub oak forest which is fire dependent and we uh got some funding from the state to to um to restore that and we we just set 40 acres on fire um but it's all um the state it's all to to there's
a lot of um endangered species that like in that need that habitat in order to survive um and then uh just a small little blurb we have the spotted lantern flight has
been found in Malboro it's a very aggressive fly or bug and it it will it sucks apple trees bear and then all kinds of our fruit trees and blueberries and grapes it likes so
we're we're all kind of nervous about it so So I'm going to be sending a bunch of before the historic commission they said "Oh can we add some stuff to that list?" And I said "Absolutely." So uh we may have some additional things to to add but we do have a dog park we're looking
for a dog friends dog parks friends groups in order to open it because every successful dog park has had a friends group that has managed it um in all recreation did a pretty good uh research of all the dog parks in the state and um
so we're we're if people are interested they should uh contact the mayor's office um complete streets continue continuing with that and adding sidewalks continuing to improve um trail connectivity um the walking school bus program as I mentioned before um and
then improving on how we're sharing our our city's history um we are going to have some signage on the new uh Lake Williams boardwalk that's going to both be natural history and human history that is should be up this spring it's going to be pretty nice um has some
really cool information um and then just continuing to to promote the things that that we love which is the farmers market and and our parades and festivals so and then the last part uh section nine is is really just a chart
it's a little hard to read but it's it takes the the goal it takes the objectives and it puts something that we can check off right so the first item is establish an open space and recreation committee that meets a couple times a year and these are the people that should be on it or the kinds of people
should be on it item number two so that would be something you could check off item number two is meet four times a year item number three is um updating the plan in 2031 for the next round and then making
sure that these maps or some of these maps and this is where I need some of your input is which of these maps do you need you know so that you can see them all the time so that when as you're making decisions you can figure out where you know h how how to that gets
influenced um and then we did a final our final map is um is our 10 year our seven-year app uh action plan and uh what I'm looking for people to do and we can just put it on this table here is to
come up and mark off put three check marks on one on each of three different things that you really like that you're excited about on this plan just so that we get a sense of what what's what's exciting to people and then um and again
we're just trying to illustrate everything that I already said i mean protecting farms so the farms are in green everything that's in yellow is is recreation uh so Keller her field upgrade the Bolton Street landfill um the pink is like where uh the the
properties around um Fort Meadow that we should protect or or South Street Swamp um and you know different trails that we should be promoting and and uh so so we're really just trying to illustrate
on a map what is written in the in the document um and so you can do that but I I guess I'm ready for opening for discussion everything that we um looked at is
online so the open space plan uh the draft plan is online you can go to our conservation website and go there the maps are there and then on this part please provide your comments here there's a place to you can you could submit your comments and we are we are
looking for some feedback cuz on the final plan we need to include the comments that we've received and how we address them and then a plug for our cleanup day um it's April 26th
uh which is a Saturday and uh it every year we pick up maybe four four to six tons of trash so um the group lots of groups come and help and we're I that's just my shameless
plug um so questions comments all right thank you Miss Ryder for your presentation i should have started the meeting I guess introducing um urban affairs members i know there's a lot of city councilors here but the urban affairs I'm the chair of councelor Naven
I'm sorry urban open space committee there are three members of open space from the city council so I am the chair councelor Naven is the vice chair and councelor Presiato is our third member i'm going to open it up to questions from them first and then I will open it
up to any other counselor who has questions um going from there so Council Presci is turning pages you have questions you want to go first Councelor Naven thank you Madam Chair um thank you
Priscilla this is awesome um thank you for not screaming at me over the past however long amount of time when I would routinely call and ask where this is coming from or where this when this is coming um it's great um it's super exciting to see this i think we all
notice the work that it took to go into it um and I think we all thank the committee um for the work that they've done we talk a lot about development here right we spent a lot of time discussing the need for development and the things we need to put in our pipeline um which can seem counterintuitive um to the process that
we're talking about tonight because we do need to find ways to pay for and to continue to reinvigorate our city um what I think some people don't always see is that like this all fits together like a puzzle and that you if you just overdevelop we're just going to become
one big business park and the city um has done tremendous work to kind of grow the part that people want to be for their part right the whole live work play you know everything else that we want to do here so um thank you very much for the work that you guys have been doing here I think it is true I I
like to think that I do know a lot about the different parts of the city I clearly don't because half the things that you talk about here or that that that you hear from people um I am constantly stunned by the amount of trails that we have in our community um so um I think that is probably one of
the number one things to do is to get the word out um one of the questions that I had is and I noted it in one of the early pages in there um you noted the aqueduct trail connection um over through the shameless plug through through the MWR aqueduct program um that
cuts through the Carol Water treatment plant um I didn't see it on any of the maps either and I know a lot of the other communities have um have already opened their part so I think it'd be helpful to put there i think that's an oversight i think maybe the layer that Nat has trails program in
this section of the Commonwealth um Malboro has author will you officially open yeah I think it's open uh so you're right it's it's it's right here it connects the Burough's loop trail comes through here and before we were avoiding it because we didn't have permission but
now since then we've had permission so now that the Buroughs Loop Trail also connects this way through through there so and when South Bro is open um that will now go from the Berlin Town line all the way to the Bay Circuit Trail Connector um when North South Bro is
done so um Northbrow is working on the connection over the Hudson Street Bridge and that they're completely open um they have a workaround and then Southro is working on it where that will cut around the DCR peninsula um and then over through the MWA
property and then connect over to Bay Circuit so um that's an awesome trail network that Yeah and I think in the plan it says uh explore additional trails through aqueducts etc you know or other utility corridors um other
questions um when you were talking about the um when you're talking about the invasives and the work that we have done do you guys work with DPW on controlling some of the like eradication for some invasives cuz every summer it seems to be that like when the Japanese notweed
that has come and grown everywhere um I'm thinking specifically of like Steven Street and whatnot um and it's obviously it spreads so easy couple of grants to do stuff at Galoney we've we've tried to do some bittersweet cut and and dab with herbicide with an you know
a we can't do it ourselves because we have to hire somebody to do that um and so we are looking behind the fire station we did a lot of um notweed control it used to be like 100% notweed and now it's they've they've been mowing it well enough and
keeping it under control so that was kind of their their test run like what can we do um so I think I think we're going to have to make a better plan um and now that Chris White is gone and we're sort of in the interim we're we're still we we're the learning curve is
still we're working on that but Okay all right um can we have a Panther Trail Marathon i mean you made it 26.2 miles like we definitely have to do that we I think we were just waiting there was a two sections that we were still putting
bridges in and we've just put them in so we're we're we're really close to to making that happen so yes I think we should do um as much education and and promotion of of that cool thing and the
cool part is that it's so this is almost half a marathon and the whole thing is you know the whole thing so so the Aset River Rail Trail kind of cuts it in half and you get right back to city hall right here and that's where these two
pieces connect so it's such a cool thing an awesome thing we bring a lot of people here a lot of people want to go out and eat in all our restaurants right after that i think um the guide that you mentioned for developers about um native plantings I think just would be an awesome thing to have if we could figure
out how to put it on our city website um my thumb is nowhere near green but when we do try to put plants around the house right it would be nice to actually know like what you should be planting versus So we do have a demonstration garden at Galoney Park um in the middle and where the two the soccer fields are there if
you between there's there's two ponds there's one so if you go on the right pond uh there's a a a a sunny um example part it's a it's a native pollinator garden there and then the garden club
has up in the woods a a shade a shade native garden so we have both and we're trying to promote them um and uh I don't think I have the page up yet on our website but it's going to be all about pollinators and where Oh we do have a pollinator garden
um on our web page it's it it's there so we just need to promote that more and we are getting some little signs that say this is a pollinator garden and we're putting it at we're going to put it behind city hall and also at the library so people kind of make a connection oh
these plants might be specific so it just so the idea is and at the library they're labeled the plants are labeled at times you know 40,000 people is a pretty significant impact so that's awesome it's not not bad all right awesome my last one I did the my check
marks are um the Blazewood A parcel um at the end of Blazewood between Blazewood and the Asabet River Rail Trail um well I I did the B the Aqueduct Trails cuz I didn't see it and I checked it off um and then the Conquered Road Sidewalk Project and the what the
Conquered Road Sidewalks oh yeah yeah okay okay i'm done thank you for your indulgence Councilor Prosiato thank you so much for being here uh thank you for your presentation uh we've all been very excited to hear and see um
so we're very grateful that it's finally here um I do have some questions for you um I'm very interested in the school safety routes um would there be any possibility of adding um some bike routes to those
very few i know there's some those rental bikes you can get as well the city might not anymore never mind but uh it would be interesting to see back rentals might be a good idea it might be i think quite a few people did use them i didn't really see them um very full uh
when they were there but um but uh besides the point um the pocket parks I'm very interested in as well i know Main Street has quite a few little sections in it that are just kind of three-ways um but it would be
nice to see something more communal in those areas i know I'd mentioned it I believe I mentioned to you or um previous conversations but um I think uh Main Street would uh really thrive with a bit more communal spaces that are you know out in the open um we have a lot of
concrete around here and a lot of parking spots currently um and um your natives map to um council neighbors point would be great to have um for for uh developers um maybe something um to put online as well on
the city just so residents have a list you know that they can also look at um and the uh proximity to green space map I think was really eye opening to um in terms of you know knowing how far
people have to walk how accessible green spaces are to them and and um you know what kind of green spaces are available to them as well so I think that was very important and that really helps to see where we really need to preserve our areas and and maybe further develop
areas for for more communal activities more recreational activities um so that would be great um your uh um native gardens and and and pollinator gardens and all that stuff is great um any ideas
on how to expand engagement with like the garden club or or even just the trails committee so the garden club is very very interested and very active with us so so and they're they're kind of taking this on too so that's it's all good
um other engagement I I'm I'm all ears i mean I think you know we the garden club is obviously natural thing but how do you go beyond that and get um you know the homeowner to think twice
about what they're doing i I do have a a Boy Scout two Boy Scouts um one who has planted a a um a native meadow at at um Felton Conservation Land we mow most of it but there was a section we weren't mowing and so he he planted a whole
bunch of of plants there and so now we have another Boy Scout who also wants to do that and he's going to do one in front of the community garden that's going to be a native plant thing so that we so that's an area but again uh the Boy Scout was cute he said "My dad was was is not convinced that I should
change the lawn you know to to all of that but you know he was willing to to give us give a little up." So you know it's it's it's all education and and we're you know I think we just have to un I guess do a better job of
communicating that what you put in your yard besides grass is is important exactly um and to that point our whole yard has been ripped out of any invasives and we've only planted natives and pollinators and we've created a
milkweed patch and expanded it over the past 6 years we have designated our yard as a monarch way station as well um so we're very excited to continue this throughout the city um so it's very exciting um I have one question about the wreck
facility that you are planning on and on top of uh the new wreck facility that you're um that was on the map I believe so this is um the landfill yeah the landfill wreck facility what is the feasibility of that and and any like
potential healthc care effects that we should be worried about i think it's pretty I mean we we we we got money for it and then we realized we had to cap the landfill so we had to pull that out and then um so now we do have a plan that the landfill has been capped and it
um I think I we we're waiting for DP to approve that and then I think the the overall plan is to have two fields there and a parking lot and then a walking a walking path that'll connect to the bike path so I I think that's in the works and it's I don't know what the deadline
date is does anybody know i don't know i think it's a maybe this year or next it's It's not far off gotcha thank you um and I checked off community gardens South Street Swamp and uh complete
streets including create bikeways and bike lanes and roadways what was the last one complete streets create bike lanes and roadways and sidewalk connections all right and thanks again for being here all right uh I'm going to just throw out
a couple things quickly before then I open it up um I also had a question on my sheet about the old landfill so I I know I've been watching it as I walk the walkway they're they're getting there but it just it's taken forever um
so I'm curious i don't think the council was ever given anything to turn it into a field once it was capped so hopefully um that is coming back to us for something yes we can talk to Tom yeah I think the original plan is probably not
going to happen with the fancy no not with that and field and all something small and simple would would be welcome I'm sure i was curious if you know anything about Hager Pond i know you noted it in your um the dam specifically
working with neighbors is that still ongoing we are working with the neighbors we are looking for funding we're waiting for to hear from FEMA we are submitting an application for the seaw wall and uh the dam and seaw wall grant uh that would be a matching funds
for the FEMA stuff so that would just be for the study and and and the and the fin and the plan but not the implementation okay because I know there were some state and federal dam grants i don't know what the status of those are these days but hopefully we're all
waiting funding would be wonderful um you'd note in your somewhere in this detailed report um that parcels of land found to be municipal parcels with no city department head officially designated to manage the property need
assessment and a vote of the city council so there weren't that many that I could see on the map but are there There aren't that many and the the um the inventory uh I'm I'm the spreadsheet got all mixed up so
I have it's not up yet but um No I think it is so I think it's section four and five so that that uh chart is there they're they're listed we we on the last plan we were able to clear up many of those and now we're you know there's just a few stragglers that we still need
to work on so that is something the council can look forward to getting from Yep yep and then I also note two potential sources of income uh you said that there were used to be a vote to set aside a percentage of the building fees
into the open space account so we used to do that and then when I was writing this up I called Diane Smith and said "Are we still doing this?" She goes "Huh we did it for a while and then it just we're not sure why it stopped but it was
a useful tool." Right so every a certain a small percentage of the building department's permits went into this open space account and I I guess I'm not a I don't remember that happening since I've been here so maybe it was before but I
it would be interesting to see how we could make that permanent we legally look into it or again it's on the list of things to do and when I found out that it wasn't we weren't doing it still I was like oh well that was a useful
tool if if everybody's agreeable then we should reinstate it right and then the other one is the community preservation act which I think in mobile used to be a we never did it we we did apply we we um it was it was a vote and and it never
carried uh I think there was um there was a a feeling on the city council at that time that we had enough money in in you know that we we could generate enough money to do it ourselves without creating a tax um and it was you
know it is an additional tax on on the So maybe we can think about that going forward is is something that would be more amendable to the current city council i know reading what other communities are doing with their preservation act and getting uh
both open space and then also affordable housing on some of that space affordable housing and and also historic historic preservation so you can you can you can gather the money um you raise you raise a certain amount
and based on what you raise the state through the I believe it's through whatever happens at the registry of deeds um they that money uh and and it gets smaller as as every community adds
on it's it the the payout is a little bit smaller but um but it's it's it's It's what a lot of communities have been using to to advance their open space historic preservation and housing so we can think about it all right i my eyes have been focused here so I'm going to
shift to this side of the room to see if anybody over here has a hand they want to raise councelor Fchillo thank you Madam Chair and thank you Conservation Officer Ryder appreciate the uh presentation tonight i do have a couple questions try to keep them brief i'll probably be following up with a few
emails and calls too after this so um and you can always make comment online at the on the comment dispo dis whatever to call it i'll be sure to share it on uh on Facebook too hopefully we get some people out there who are trying to you know have their voice heard in this the
first question um really just a recommendation i know with the recreation fields um good to see that Stevens Field is going to be done over um played many games up there and it's you know about time that that we get on top of that one another one that I'll advocate for is the middle school softball field at Wickham um I know I
talked to uh Director Thibo and um talked to Commissioner Scott about this one and we've we've made some minor improvements but something that I'd definitely like to see done um considering that we did do over the football field in the back there and we we did the baseball field the softball field out front um most certainly has
kind of been lost in the shuffle over the last few years so um there's that the other question I had was about the Boston Scientific um parcel not not the one we're talking about at Blazewood um but it looks like it's Sheep Falls Brook Trail is that
what you're referring to here what is the status of that now does Boston Scientific allow for us to have that trail there or or what is Yeah we have an easement uh we negotiated an easement last time they did it's a large development there and we negotiated an easement to pass and repass across that
trail for a long time they were actually maintaining the trail we were like "What?" And then and now we're maintaining it it's fine it's it's it's a great little trail and it goes around the along the the um stream there they had I don't know 10 15 years ago some
plans for a couple more buildings there so the idea here is to I mean obviously you could we could protect the whole thing but or or just make sure that the that stream corridor and that trail corridor is protected gotcha okay thank you good to good to
know and I guess coordinating those the mayor's office is supporting that yeah sounds good i know I've sent a couple names up i've had a lot of people in the community asking about it but we'll just tell them to raise their hand and then we can open it absolutely all right sounds good that's all I have for now but thanks again and thank you Madam Chair all right we'll switch over to
this side councelor Vital thank you Madam Chair uh Sheep's File Brook might be the best waterfall that's where Mr oing and I used to live and there's actually a waterfall there it
might be the best waterfall in Marro it would it's well off of the of the trail you're talking about um but that if you follow that brook all the way down it's a beautiful hidden gem that's would be wonderful if we ever did have some some trail that went out directly along the
Anyway when I was a kid and running around marble like a nut I used to always stop and say "Look at the predential center look at how beautiful the credential center whether it was Mount Ward or Mount Pleasant or back on Fry Hill where where now is Boston
Scientific we used to call that Fry Hill we on clear day we could see the Predential Center are there any more places in Marble that you still can see the Predential Center on a clear day um I don't know maybe the the hill that's on I mean it's but it's developed
the um the one on Simono Drive campus drive the one seat that that building's tall enough you can see it's something to think about whether I don't know how many trees would need to be cut down on wood Mount Wood or something like that
but as a kid it was always something of awe to say how look at how beautiful this is just somewhere in town that we could say is we can see all the way across i'm sure we can figure that out and then we can figure out where that location is and and and how to make that happen view of Boston i'll write down
where yeah that's right that's about and again the way time flies it might have been 10 years it could have been 20 years ago but there was some controversy in town where we cut down some trees along West Main Street and there was some there was some discussion about having some of the thoroughares that
came into the city be lined with trees but I don't think that project ever took off did it we did replant some trees on on West Main Street um I know uh we got a grant to do that we planted some there and also at the um Boys and Girls Club but
uh that is a fine goal um to re realign um our streets with trees is I remember even as a kid again Pleasant Street had had a ton of trees along it still has some but a lot of it has been taken down off of Pleasant Street too i mean some of our older streets were pretty much
lined with tree big giant you know maples and so forth and elms that died and right so real and now unfortunately our beach are dying so that's and now one last comment um and it may be out of your opice but you may know as well now
that we have a a soon to open um laboratory at the end of the rail trail I suspect more and more families will be feel comfortable going on the rail trail now that they have a place uh that they can take a pit stop is there any progress on bringing it getting through
Stowe and getting it all the way out to West Actton and then connecting to all over the state at that point yes that's one of the goals on in in um chapter 9 is make sure we continue to work with the rail the Aspet River rail trail to
connect it through Stowe so um I know that um the conservation agent and the one of the select board in Stow is is looking at that more closely and they're working with the Aset River Wildlife Refuge to see if that connection could work through through that but that's now
working with federal um issues so we're we're they're they're still they haven't put it to bed they've definitely they're definitely looking to connect i hope so thank you thank you Madam Chair councelor Ducet thank you very much Madam Chair um excellent work Priscilla
with everyone in the team um it was honor for me to be part of the group to review the process that was involved in this she's been amazing in getting as much feedback as she can uh I missed the planning board meeting but the conserv the u uh disabilities commission meeting
I thought went extremely well uh so I I think it's been very open and transparent how you folks have been doing this um and I think as far as the the general comments um one of the things that I've
noticed is that if you actually go through the desert area path on the opposite side of the rail trail there's a path north that goes to the Asabet uh National Wildlife Refuge and from there you can pick a trail that can get you to
the Aspid River Rail Trail north of um Honeypot Orchard which is the issue so if if you want to redirect in a in a convoluted way you can get there through existing paths i discovered that actually last weekend um so great trails
by the way um I think if you're looking for feedback uh sidewalks on conquered road I think would is you know something sidewalks would be good actual bike you know safety bike trail for conquered would be would be be an
incredible asset for the community um because that's also connectivity to the rail trail you know the aspect river rail trail because it it plugs right into that um the um the other part is the uh property that's now owned by
Boston Scientific i we got to buy that um and get take that from uh you know off the market cuz I we've had enough issues trying to get someone trying to get that one developed um and uh overall it's just um it took a
while for it to come together i think the end product is was well worth the all all the work so thank you for that all right anybody on the side of the chamber councelor Brown thank you Madam Chair and thank
you Priscilla for coming and making the presentation i know these plans take a lot of blood sweat and tears from you um I am I feel like a lot has already been shared so I'm just going to share the
areas that were of interest to me um I'm most familiar with the downtown area in my ward 4 and the way west side so um as far as downtown was concerned I was very excited to see an idea for a community garden space downtown i love
that we have the community garden already but um I just feel like to have that accessibility for people who may not actually have transportation to get to where the current garden is and not
have the space to do any gardening where they live that is the one I'm most excited about um the others that just caught my eye and I'm excited to see more proximity to where I am and where I
represent um a trail around Milham Reservoir i think that would be great i see people um going around that area anyway so to have a defined space I think and the Robin Hill
property of course um that is um very intriguing to me it's something that comes up um from time to time with interest to be developed and I know that it such a special piece of land i've
talked to former counselor Ed Clancy about it and um that is something that I know it it's a special piece of land in the city so I'd just be interested to see what um ideas conservation might
have for it thank you any other counselors actually thank youish uh thank you Priscilla um I was impressed with the with the mapping system that it did outline the chapter land properties in the city of Malbor um so I'm hoping and
I'm I'm sure that you're always communicating with the assessor's office um when some of the properties may be you know coming out of the chapter land uh or some other properties that you may be kind of looking at there's a possibility you know obviously if they're over five there u but very
impressive and looking forward to that so thank you thank you Madam Chair and councelor Rosie thank you Madam Chair uh again Priscilla well done the probably the good news is I don't have to pest you anymore is when the open space plan is going to be done so I don't have to worry about it all the time so no nice
job by you Council Ducet Robert the work that you and the committee's done uh it's a great plan the the one we had last time again it's an excellent road map uh I'll start with the editorial comment it's probably because it's not the final version but if the table of contents the
section headers the maps the um uh the and they kept changing and I was like I'm just going to wait until the end and I and I thought in the final document definitely will have page numbers no question because that'll just make it but I appreciate that and I
figured that was the reason why and again I guess I don't need to remind the counselors but uh on the community preservation act it it's it look closely it is a tax on the residents and the match that every the state promises
isn't there all right because it's all based on funding and as Council Roi so eloquently stated the more people that participate in it the the lower the amount of money the state's allowed to dish out to all the communities participating but it is a
tax on the residents so ask yourself is that what they really want you know you'll each have to answer it but when we took it up back 20 years ago it didn't go over so good all right and I think at that point we did we did I think that's when we started to
talk about having the that small percentage of the building permit go into the open space fund and it it was there diane and I could find it we just couldn't we just didn't know when how it fell off um but but the other thing is
as we develop the de the developers are or you know that that building that small piece of the building thing is sort of off can offset you know it allows us to buy some land that would offset some of that impact right so I don't know it it would be up to you guys
to decide but revenue that comes in to offset taxes I mean it's it's it's a trade-off it's it's it's what do you want we have a open space account now It's got about $600,000 in it every year you prove in May the transfer of the antenna or your wireless fees about 20
to $40,000 a year that we put into that fund uh but then it becomes what do you want to do with that fund you look at all those parcels and as I tell you all the time if we don't own them we do not control them now we have a say if they
come for a special permit but they're all buildable unless there's water restrictions or something else i mean it's just a fact of life those people own those properties just because they're open space now doesn't mean they stay open space all right if you want
open space you have to buy it and as you saw from McGee Farm you know $15 million for that parcel that wasn't going to happen folks we you you plan to see what we can protect when developers come in we
should be asking for open space portions of their properties to be turned over or money to go into an open space fund if that's the if that's the appetite of the council but I mean I just I look at this and this is this is a great road map to
go back and look at but unless you own the parcel someone else is going to the only one we really get a swing at is sometimes a chapter 61A piece we get the first right of refusal on it but the the document outstanding you and
the committee got to be uh recognized for well done and it'll serve us well for the next seven years as we go through and navigate as projects come before the council you know where is it in our open space plan so well done Priscilla thank you thank you Madam Chair thank you any further comments
from any councilors council Det no I was thinking those German affairs i was going to say something never mind all right so I think um we have learned a lot tonight we have a lot to think about going forward with some
information that will be coming to us at some point i don't think there's action other than to accept and place this on file which I'll report it out at the next meeting and I think we're trying to record this uh is to make sure that people look at it and make sure that
your wish is in here because the the key is this is our ticket and if it's not in in the book for the ticket um the state says hm hasn't been vetted so uh so the key is it's better to overwish than underwish and to just make sure it's
realistic and something that you know that we haven't missed something you know council thank you man and Bracil is right so so the like the memorial beach to get those grants the splash pads it if you think it's what I for the public watching if you've got an idea of what
you'd like to see put we'll we'll get it we'll get it somehow recognized in the plan because it makes it a lot easier to go back and ask for those grants when we have say "Oh yep it's in the open space plan." So it means the community had thought about it and some portion of it thought it was a good idea and then the
final piece was this yeah this should be filed but Priscilla will send back the final document to the city council for approval i have a couple more presentations that I'm making and I'm still trying to to set up two more so we may go into a little bit of May but um
my hope is that by the end of May we get back to you with a a final plan that has everything corrected councelor Ducet thank you Madam Chair uh talking about plans and ideas that someone had how could we forget uh
councelor Clansancy uh councelor Lander's idea of putting the path around Lake Williams it would not have been there if it wasn't for his idea and that was a you know knock out of the park as far as getting the the uh boardwalk on
uh Lake Williams so you know put the idea have the conversation start that's always a great guess place to go so thank you and councelor Austin did you have three items that you liked so the hood
farm the trail system I'd like to see expanded for bike access but that's just me but if we can make it for bike access a lot of people have been asking that so I think that's good yeah okay no I I think that that is that is mountain bike or road bike well council Ducet and I
will duke out the road verse mountain bike but uh for both so that both can uh survive on there is great yeah um then I don't all the stuff around the water i just think that's the the trails around the water are key because that's
I mean they're they're protected now but to get the access so people can use those because I I realize we're challenged by what's available to be built and I go back to if we don't buy it it will be developed it's it's not meant as a threat it's just people own
the they bought the property they own it they can develop it absolutely they can come before us for a special permit we have a something will eventually be developed there it it it's just it's just how it works i mean right and and we're at this critical point where this is what's left
so we need to be thoughtful about it and the city needs to decide what's important and and then figure out how to how to spend it but the good thing is this ticket um provides us with some pretty good money from the state so um we wouldn't have bought we the the the
previous plan like um the Grove we bought that from the state with state funding on on that that was one of the first ones we did in '93 '94 um but again it was it was in a plan and it was it was there we have the plans from the
1970s and many of the things that were asked for in 1970s are we've done which so so it's very exciting to sort of look at that past and see and even the things that are still that we haven't done yet were the were thought about in the 70s
too so pretty cool and then the Subway Reservoir Trail if none if people love Waterview that's like astounding it's a beautiful trail and it's and it's pretty long i mean and there's a couple places where you can kind of get out but it's it's almost five or four and a half
miles one way from um but anyway we're working and and again working with other comm the state and other entities to make sure that some of these things happen is critical so all right and I can offer my do you want two or three
um uh Blazewood the land at the reservoir um I think it was the at the end of Red Spring Road you had marked as a little colored area and then um I guess I was not I I've never walked any of the aqueduct land and I know the part
in Sudbury is very curious when I drive through and say someday I'm going to go walk this so if I can get there from Malber sunny day that's the good place because it's you get the sunshine and it's Yeah so add those too and with that
I think unless anybody else has everybody got their chance to offer their comments and their points councelor Vital one last comment as I was thinking last week we were just earlier talking about the owl that came
and visited us it'd be wonderful if one of the we have four high schools in town it would be wonderful if one of them had hosted some form of petting zoo slash you know nature um habitat so that that families could come down and learn about
you know some of our wildlife you know animal wise not not plant-wise but animals they and the school could benefit from a huge you know have a class about it and so forth it would be it would just be a wonderful opportunity we have four great high schools here in
town i bet you one of them could host it okay make a make a comment and put it in it's an idea an idea to advance thank you Madam Chair thank you Madam Chair um back to I was going to made made a note about this earlier but um if we want to get word
out as far as what sort of recreational opportunities are available in Malboro just in general um the schools are a huge way to get the word out on that so all grades all schools you know just if come out with the handout and pass you know electronically
pass it out there and throw in some QR codes for more information and you know I think that cuz a lot of people as was said before they don't know what we have i I'm still learning what's going on and I think that's a
huge opportunity so thank you all right i think we've Madam Chair one more question sorry has this uh do you have any plans on u actually sending this out to like uh the school committee and and having them disseminate the information maybe to the rest of the schools yes I'm
actually planning to speak at one of the schools that's one of the ones I'm trying to set up a school schools with with some one of in one of the student groups um just trying to just get it out there to get their input i don't know if they would be willing to email the draft plan and so they would be more available
to add comments to it to you know the students and and parents yeah good good point i could put in the back backpack mail or something i don't know or I think they all have emails that they could easily email the link to the city's web page yep out to parents yep i
mean I think they have electronic backpack mail now so Right right children people with children not I don't have children but councelor Naban move to adjurnn it's been moved and seconded to adjourn is there
discussion all those in favor one two three no oppos so we are adjourned at 913