Speaker 1: Good evening everyone. It is 6:35 PM on Monday, September 29th. This is the meeting of the Natick Select Board. We have a quorum present. Ms. Pope is not feeling well, so she's online and everyone else is in person in the room. We had to move this meeting because of the holiday on our normal Wednesday night. However, we cannot hold, could not hold that meeting in town hall because the ZBA is using the room that we're normally in. So that's why we're here at the Liebowitz
room and the library. It is being recorded on Zoom, but is not live streamed on Pegasus. We will have it on the recording available in a couple of days so that people can watch it online on Pegasus. So we are first going to talk about going into executive session, and this portion of the meeting is not open to the public, and there are two items. Item A is pursuant to MGL chapter 30 a, section 21, A three
to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining if an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining position of the public body and the chair. So declares Deputy Fire Chiefs Association, local 1 7 0 7, international Association of Firefighters and I So declare item B pursuant to MGL 30 a 21 A three to discuss strategy with respect to litigation if an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the litigating position of the public body and the chair.
So declares DEC versus Dana Cadel ca number 2 2 4 8 1 CV 0 2 4 0 1. Middlesex superior, and I so declare. Second moved by Mr. Sidney and seconded by Ms. Slager. It's roll call vote. Ms. Pope will go online first. Aye. Ms. Coughlin? Speaker 2: Yes. Speaker 1: Ms. Wells Fargo? Yes. Mr. Sidney? Yes. And I'm a yes. So we expect this will take about half hour
to 40 minutes, so tune back in at that time. Thanks. Very welcome back. We're at 7:28 PM we've left the executive session and for those people in this room who can stand, let us stand for the Pledge of Allegiance, Speaker 3: Pledge of to the Republic Nation under God, indivisible, Liberty and Justice for all. Thank you everyone. Okay.
Speaker 1: First up is announcements and first is the ratification of New England Benevolent Association, local 82 Contract. Mr. Erickson. Speaker 4: Thank you. This is just regarding the ratification between the select board and the Superior Officers Union, also known as the New England Benevolent Association Local 82 contract. Basically, this is a collective bargaining agreement, the terms of which are available on the town's website. This will be further ratified by town meeting through the appropriation of funding to cover the contract. That's pretty much it. This is just a required part
of the MGL process where we have to announce that it's been ratified in open session. Speaker 3: Perfect. Speaker 1: Thank you. Do you, next up is the select board is having a Johnson workshop that was rescheduled from earlier in September to now be held at October 7th, 2025. It's changing a venue. Initially we wanted to have it at Johnson School, but we're unable to do so because of a DA compliance reasons, among other reasons. So again, October 7th, 2025, Kennedy,
excuse me, Kennedy Middle School information on it can be found that natick ma.gov. Does anyone else have announcements, Mr. Sidney? Speaker 5: Yeah, I want to announce that the, the grant for our gun buyback has been issued and we are on, on October 11th up at the Hartford Seat Presbyterian Church hosting a gun buyback event. We'll be advertising this more. This is, I'm not, this is me as a private citizen. It's not a board sponsored event, but it is happening
and if you have guns in your attic that you would like to unload, feel free to bring them by. It's completely anonymous. Speaker 1: I don't know about the word unload. I'm a little concerned about that one, but, well, Speaker 5: They have to be unloaded and in the trunk. Okay. Speaker 1: I just, that was just a quirky observation by me. I'm sorry. I I have two announcements. One is that the Memorial School Building Committee visited a elementary school in Lexington called the Hastings Elementary School, and it was very, very beneficial visit.
We, we took a great tour of the facilities. They were particularly interesting since they're doing geothermal heat pumps and we learned a lot about it. The, the pros and cons, the things to look out for, and also just touring the school. The school was opened, I believe, two weeks before COVID hit. So they, they did a lot of remote the first year, but it's a very well designed school, A lot of light, natural light coming into the school.
A really good example for us to visit. So that was helpful. Second is the Morris Institute Library. Seems like I've been here for like 72 hours straight. I had their book sale this week, past weekend, and it generated $11,453 and 63 cents for the library programs that the friends of the Morris Library supports. So kudos to everybody who was involved in that. Did a lot of hard work over many months. So thank you to all. Next up is public speak.
Any individual may raise an issue that's not included on today's agenda and it will be taken under advisement by the board. There is no opportunity for debate during this portion of the meeting due to the requirements of open meeting law. This section of the agenda is limited to 10 minutes and any one individual can is limited to three minutes. Is there anyone here or online who wishes to speak in public speak? Sorry for you to go up to the podium, please. Speaker 6: Sure. First of all, I'd like to start out by thanking you for your service.
I I think it's a wonderful community, my wife and I. Can you speak really close to the mic please? Speaker 1: Or lift it up? Maybe? Speaker 6: Let's try again. I'd, I'd, first of all, I'd like to thank you for your service. My wi wife and I, we moved here from San Diego actually about a year and a half ago. We have come across a problem. We purchased a home. It's on the, the end of four Beacon Street and there's some recent paving that went on to repave the road. And so what they do is, is they remove the curb and then they paved it. And then twice now my basement has been flooded and the, I had the town engineer out twice
and he said, well get some sandbags or something like that. And so it, it's getting a little old here, so I was hoping for your help or, or perhaps advice. We had said, well, you know, I, I spent two weekends, now it's, it's happened twice. Clean out my basement. We approached the city and said, well, hey, can we at least get reimbursement for sandbags? My wife had submitted that and they said, no, it has to go through the subcontractor. Well, I'm not a lawyer,
but Google says that that's not true. That has to go through the city. The subcontractor isn't responsible. The bigger picture, however, is that I'm concerned that this flooding issue might be a permanent problem. My old curb was, it was very wide and then the sidewalk went up. It handled a lot of water, about this much water. Here I can get measurements if it's really important. The new curb they put in will only handle about this much water. The the literally, if you look at the road, it
slopes towards my house and on these big rainstorms, there's just no way that that's gonna handle the water. So I'm hoping to work with the city and try and get this resolved. I wanna make sure that there's a permanent solution, not something that I have sandbags for the rest of the time I and I live in the house. Do, do you see my dilemma? Speaker 1: Yes. Again, we can't comment on this. So what I'm going to do is ask the town administrator to follow up with DPW and see what we can
Speaker 6: Do. Yep. Speaker 4: I'll, I'll Speaker 1: Work. You could, Speaker 6: My name, my name is Phil Bigs. I'm at four Beacon Street. Okay. And there's, there's only about like three or four neighbors that are affected right now. Temporarily. The mud has been coming onto the sidewalk, but I'm the only one that's because of the way my house goes all the, it just makes a right turn and goes right into my garage and basement. So I'm just hoping for, I'm looking for someone I've worked with the town engineer. I was looking for somebody else to, to work with.
Speaker 4: Yep. I I'll, I'll have either I or my DPW director will reach out to you tomorrow or the next day directly. Speaker 6: Sure. I can, after here I can give you my contact information if Speaker 4: You really wanna stay that long. That's great. Speaker 6: I would just, yeah, I, I'm, Speaker 4: I'm, I'm just kinda new to all this. Speaker 1: So I would send an email to select board@natickma.gov org, I'm sorry, dot org Speaker 4: Select board@natickma.org. And that'll get to, that'll all of us, including myself. My name is James Erickson or Jamie Erickson. I'm the town administrator. You can also get my email
off of the town's website. Wonderful. Thank Speaker 1: You so much. Thank you. And welcome. Appreciate it, Nadick. Sorry, it's a wet start. Okay. Anyone else on in the room online? Anybody? Jamie, have we got any? I don't see any. All right, let's move on to discussion and decision. The first thing we have up is a water and sewer abatement appeal from St. Mark's Church, if you would come forward and talk to us about it. Speaker 5: Mr. Chair, I should note that we got a late a advice from
the deputy town administrator that the, an abatement has been issued. So just so that, that may be even St. Mark's doesn't know about it yet. Yep. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 7: So yes, thank you. Yes, we are here. We did some microphone, oh, sorry, I'm it shorter. Okay. Yes, we are here following up that abatement request, which we very much appreciate was granted to a degree to reduce a water and sewage bill that was exorbitant due to a pipe burst, which had happened in the basement of one of the homes,
which thank God deacon eventually discovered and gathered together a whole bunch of volunteers to dispose of the water that was there. But we're still carrying over approximately a $5,000 bill, which is a very hefty for non-profit. And so we were hoping that if possible, the board could help us out somehow with maybe even just, you know, waving the sewage on that because we didn't use the sewer system. We disposed of the water as the group of volunteers, like I said. So we were just hoping you could help with that
or anything you could support in that regard would be very much appreciated. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 5: So nine. So the original, the original bill was 14,959. The abatement that was issued was 9,000 9 85 69, which would've basically taken all of the higher tiered charges down to the lowest tier. So you have to pay for the usage. Yes. And you're paying at dis abatement as you're paying for the usage at the lowest possible tier.
So that's the way it was calculated, just so everybody, including the rest of the public is clear on what's going on here. Speaker 7: So my understanding is that a bit over 3000 of the current bill that we are still, you know, liable for, for the 5,000 is, is for sewage for sewer usage, which, so the request here is that if that could be waived because we did not use the sewer system to dispose of the water that had been flooding as a result of the pipe burst. Speaker 4: I think, I think one of the realities though is typically
our fees are based on the amount of water that goes into alos. In theory, the amount of water that comes outta the place. So our charges or our cost to MSBA or MWRA are not necessarily it, it is based largely on that usage number. So we're still paying for that sewage Speaker 8: Even if we don't use it. Speaker 4: Correct. Because, because it's based on the amount of water going in. We don't have a, Speaker 1: It's not a major, we Speaker 4: Don't meter going into a property or into the system, not coming necessarily out of the system. Like, like there's no sewage meter at your property
that let us know how much came out of, out of, out of your property. No property has that, so we cannot guarantee how much sewer did not go through. All we know is how much water went in Speaker 8: Just, we just, we just start like four years in this location, but we never have this problem before. That's first time. And once we lose problem, we fix it. I spent almost like $2,000. I fix the problem and I submit the, could Speaker 5: You speak into the microphone please? Speaker 8: Okay. We never have problem for like four years ago since we started in 1 45 Oak Street
and this first bill and we came to you, we need your favor because nobody live in the house. Nobody's there. We don't use it. Speaker 1: I understand. Let, let me just go through what our policy is because we, we changed it in early 2024. Whenever something like this happens, and it's not the fault of the town, if, if it's the town, you know, if the town had a faulty meter or something like that, it, it's on the town, it's our mistake. If it's a a, a billing error that we made, it's our mistake. You don't pay any. However, if it's a burst pipe
or a spigot that's broken, that's something that is on the delivery to that house. It's unfortunate, but it happens. So to be fair to the rest of the rate payers, we have to charge an amount for that usage and that usage. And the reason you got, you know, obviously you know, you, you saw that $15,000 bill or whatever it was, and you, you know, went, had the understandable reaction that this is crazy, right?
So that's why you got the abatement of $9,000. The reason is we had to charge you something for that usage and we charged it at the lowest possible tier that we can legally charge you. And it's unfortunate that you still have that $5,000 hanging over you, but it really, we really are, as Mr. Erickson said, we can't meet or whether or judge whether you went into the sewer system or didn't because it's not metered. So we have to assume that a hundred percent goes in there.
Speaker 7: So you mentioned you do meter, what's being used? Is there a way to account for the lack of usage for the rest of the year because it's not used? It's a Speaker 1: Test storage. Here's what I suggest. There's an application that is a free application called my 360, and it is a free application available from the DPW and it allows you to, to set thresholds for usage on that. So you'll have your, when you first sign up for it, it'll estimate your daily usage looking at the meter,
you can set up within that checkpoints that say, all right, I want my daily usage not to exceed that. Then you would get an alert that's either by text or email that says, Hey, you've exceeded your daily limit. So if something's up, you know, you might have a leaky toilet for example. So I, I encourage you to go in there. I also think when I'd recommend, when it's not occupied to shut off the water, Speaker 8: It did already.
Okay. And since, since it Speaker 1: Happened, I, I, I know this is after the fact of the burst pipe, but it's, I understand it's very frustrating, Speaker 8: But it's broken by inside the house. It's, it was broken by frozen. Speaker 1: I understand, but that, that is inside the house. Yes. And, and that is not the responsibility of the town. It, it's unfortunate, but it, people do burst pipes and, and we can't abate more than that set policy at the lowest possible rate that we can do it.
It's unfortunate is it's the only way that we can be fair to the entirety of the town. And it, it, it is unfortunate when you have a burst pipe, it's costly. I get that. It, it, and, and, but we're, we're as a, as a municipal water authority, we're going as far as we can legally go to reduce that amount and the steps going forward that I've suggested, I think, you know, neither of us wants to see, ever see a repetition of this.
So doing those safeguards is, is probably the best path forward. So, I'm sorry I don't have better news. Speaker 9: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Happy anniversary. Thank you. Speaker 1: The next up are the full town meeting warrant articles and what I'd like to do is invoke my chair prerogative to take these out of order. What I'd like to do is, is identify people in the room and online who are here for certain articles.
So if we could go around the room first now Donna, you're here for 33 Speaker 9: To what we're gonna do. I don't know who's on the line yet. Speaker 1: Okay. Okay. Jeff, I know you're here for 15, right? Paul, you're here for 31. 31 as long here while I'm here. Okay. Okay. Okay. Anyone else? Anybody on Bonnie? Nine? Okay, thank you. Okay, so what I, Amanda's here too. Who's Amanda? Okay. Is on my, yeah, Amanda's here for 28.
So what I'm gonna do, since Paul brought up five, let's go with five first five, then 10, then we'll go in order, 15, 28, 29, 31, 33 and we'll get everybody on their way except for us. Come back, come back to, can Speaker 9: You repeat which ones? Speaker 1: Sure. I may not get 'em in the correct order, but that's, I can repeat Article five first. Article 10, Speaker 9: NY 10. Now Speaker 1: Because there's, well let me ask you the question.
Is anyone from the school is on, Speaker 9: Oh, they're in a meeting. Speaker 1: Oh, they're in meeting. They have their own meeting, which was, they're in a meeting. So thank you for that. We'll scrap that and we'll go from five to 15 and then it's just straight down after that 15, 28, 29, 31 and 33. And the rest we can go through on a room. Okay, so let's start with article five and, and, and just to set the stage a little bit, this is the last, the select board does put a recommendation in
suggested recommendation in the pin com recommendation book as to whether we support an article or not and or no action or whatever it is. And this is the last night. We can do that before the fin com recommendation book gets written. So that's why we have a lot of these. We've actually made recommendations on several in previous meetings. So without further ado, let's go through stabilization funds. Jim, would you like to take us through that? Speaker 4: Certainly. So this is one of the standing articles
that I believe we have on here, most town meetings. And in the case of this fall town meeting, it is seeking to appropriate new growth basically for the operational rainy day stabilization fund and the capital stabilization fund. New growth was or was soon to be certified. I believe there was a meeting today or tomorrow. Tomorrow, which should lead to then the ability for our assessor to submit the number to the state for certification. So this is anticipating a certified number by town meeting, but given the timing, we move forward with this motion so
that it could be in the FinCon book. We've already told the FinCon members that this has came up at the media of the night. We're gonna let them know hopefully before they publish the book, whether or not we have the certification back from the state. And if we do, great, if we don't, we'll bring that two town meeting to make sure everybody's aware of the final number. But this is based on the current estimate roughly. I'm not gonna go into the exact numbers even though I know the motion shows the exact numbers. But there's roughly 2.2 $0.1 million ish of new growth to just over 2 million of, of new growth.
We budget 1.1 million for the fiscal year. That's our fairly consistent standard for the last many, many years. And so this is seeking to appropriate that delta of about 930 940,000. And so the numbers that are noted in the packet, if people are looking at home, actually, lemme see if I can share my screen real quick. Speaker 10: Oh, Speaker 4: Hopefully this worked Speaker 10: Did great. Speaker 4: The numbers that are noted in the packet online and what was voted on by fin com are roughly $400,000, 400,000 8 0 7
for the stabilization operational rainy day stabilization fund that brings that fund up to target levels. That's why it's so precise. And then the balance 533,000 roughly into cap stabilization for the remainder of that bounce. Speaker 1: Yeah, Speaker 4: The general stabilization is at target, so we felt that was appropriate to, to hold there for now. Speaker 1: Okay, thank you Ms. Questions from the board? Do we want to hear from Mr. Freeze first? Yep. Thank Joe. No, we usually do that. Second. Anyone from the public? Disagree? I'm a town meeting member from precinct seven.
I'm a member of the board of assessors. Mr. Erickson, you know, appropriately pointed out we're meeting tomorrow to authorize these things to be filed and hopefully the certification will come back. I really support this motion because it appropriating the extra new growth tax levy means that it actually gets assessed and so that it can be collected. 'cause we don't appropriate it, it can't be assessed, it can't be collected. There are two things I would ask you to put like an asterisk into your recommendation to town meeting as a follow up to the administration. Over the weekend I looked at division of local services
and our snow and ice deficit wasn't posted. So I actually went to see the comptroller this morning and said, what's the snow and ice deficit? It's supposed to be given to DOR by September 15th. It's an unofficial number. I wrote it down. 277,000 188 96. That's gotta go on the tax recap. It's usually paid out of tax levy. So, but then the other thing I asked was where were, where was the net cherry sheet from what we estimated in the spring to what we may be dealing with now? I couldn't find the final online,
but the initial proposal, the house proposal, the center proposal, the conference proposal looks like we went up about 900 grand. I I don't know what the exact number is, Speaker 4: Not quite that much, but Speaker 1: We went up, so the reason I, I'm put saying, put in a little bit of an asterisk on this is the, the snow and ice deficits supposed to be raised off of the tax rate and if we appropriate all of our tax levy, we don't have that snow and ice deficit, but if we appropriate the extra state aid
into some stabilization account like an operational or a general or something, then it, it'll, it helps with the recap. Let's just put it that way. So I would ask you to put all of these numbers into the mix, so to speak. So if we don't appropriate the extra state aid, we eventually get it, but it falls to free cash in June 30th, 2026. We'll find out about that in November of 26 and we won't be able to spend it until April of 27. So if we, if we know about it now and you just stick it into a stabilization fund,
you can spend it at the next town meeting. So thank you. Thank you. Mr. Grisman Ericson. What do we need to do to Speaker 4: Nothing right now? We're, we, we can confirm those for the purposes of, of the I don't think you need to vote on that. I think it's just an asterisk, like a footnote, but we'll review that. Speaker 1: Okay. Sorry. I move. We recommend favorable action matter. Second move by Mr. Seed, seconded by Ms. Slager. All fla? All in favor?
All in favor say aye. Will You'll call, call. We have to do a roll call now. Kristen? Yes. Catherine? Yes. This er, I, yes. Be more formal Mr. Sidney? Yes. And on a yes. And it's 5 0 0. So now we're moving on to article 15. Sir Alderson, thank you for coming in. Speaker 11: Jeff Alderson, your town moderator and to speak to Article 15, I was at in front of the select board a few weeks ago
because I'd come to the, to the board to ask to co-sponsor the article and, and that was a good outcome from that meeting. There are also a couple of significant changes we made to the substance of the motion based on feedback at the board's suggestion. Notable changes are the composition of the proposed committee being nine members, eight of which are town meeting members appointed by the moderator. Another is representative probably who is in the room. Mr. Yeah. From Natick, Pegasus and celebrating the membership to nine. Another change since you've seen this
proposed motion language before is the source of funds based on some discussion with the town administrator. The, because the state aid came in higher than expected, we changed the source of appropriation to FY 26 state aid. That should be how it's reflected in the motion. Nothing else has changed substantially about the motion. The language is the same as you saw it in terms of a draft motion back about a month ago. I'm happy to answer any questions you have about the proposed language. Speaker 1: Thank you Mr. Alderson. Any questions from the board? It's pretty straightforward. We, we add that very, excuse me.
Very good discussion. Very last time, so I'm willing to take a motion. Move. Favorable Action. None. Second move by Mr. Sidney, seconded by Ms. Walsh lager. All in favor, Ms. Pope? Yes. Ms. Coughlin? Yes. Ms. Walsh lager? Yes. Mr. Sidney? Yeah. And yes, also. Thank you Mr. T. Thank you very much. All right, let's move on to article 28.
Community Preservation Funds. So everybody had a chance on the board to go through each of the motions. There are motions A through G, so we'll we'll talk, we can talk about them individually, which we have to talk about them individually. So we, let's start with motion A. Anybody, Ms. Erickson, do, do you or Amanda want to walk through like an overview of this? Speaker 4: Sure. Gimme one second. Sorry, I'm just gonna, Amanda lined up. She should be able to unmute
and if she wanted to show her screen, I made her a co-host, but I'm, while she's doing that, I will bring, I'll share my screen to bring the motions up, not necessarily the detail. There's a lot of detail on all of this. Thanks to Amanda's amazing project management on the CPC website and almost more information than people can probably absorb in one in one setting. But I'll try to share my screen just so you can see the basic of the motion motions. And Amanda is available to speak briefly
to all this great work that she's done. Amanda? Speaker 12: Yeah. So you may or may not have received the PowerPoint. It's one slide for each of the motions. So motion A, the applicant, which is the bacon free library, is requesting approximately $236,650 for the restoration of the fence that surrounds 56 and 58 Elliot. This would be a complete RERE or complete Speaker 1: Restoration. Speaker 12: A company would be contracted, they would remove the fence, they would take it
to their facility and then they would restore it there and then come back and reinstall this. They have a lot of clientele that are in similar boats. They work with Harvard, Yale, and other communities in the similar restoration. But this is under the historic preservation bucket. It was recommended by the CPC 8 0 0 and this would be one of the first projects that would be moving forward if it does move forward. Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you Ms. Loomis. Questions from the board? Speaker 13: No questions from me, Speaker 1: Ms.
Speaker 13: Er, I just have a comment just for the board's information. The finance committee did hear the article and voted on most of them for A through A, B, C, E, F unanimously. And when we get to D, there was one no. And then they did not have a recommendation on motion G, so I just thought I would let everyone know. Speaker 1: Thank you Mr. Wilson. Any questions or any further questions on a, have a motion
Speaker 5: Favorable action on the subject matter of motion. A Speaker 13: Second. Speaker 1: Thank you. Move by Mr. Sidney and seconded by Ms. Slager. Ms. Pope? Speaker 13: Yes. Speaker 1: Ms. Coughlin? Yes. Ms. Slager? Yes. Mr. Sidney? Yeah. And I May S 5, 0 0 onto motion B. Ms omi. Speaker 12: Motion B. The title of this project is Housing for All. It is a joint collaboration between Natick, affordable Housing Trust, Natick Service Council,
family Promise, and Natick Council on Aging. What this is, is they are have come together requesting a total of $300,000. It would be 150,000 per year for a total of two years equaling $300,000. And so this is a rental assistant and eviction prevention program that they are working to in collaboration to implement. One thing that does get asked quite a bit would be, could this help with the payment of taxes? And the CPA is not able to be used for the payment of taxes,
but it is able to be used under the community affordable housing under support, which is specifically categorized for the creation of rental assistance and eviction prevention programs. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you Ms. Loomis. Questions from the board? See none. Do I have a motion? Favorable. Favorable action. Do I have a second? All in favor, Ms. Pope? Yes. Ms. Coughlin? Yes. Multiplier? Yes. Mr. Sydney? Yes. Yes. 5 0 0 Ms. L. Miss motion C.
Speaker 12: Yep. Motion C is titled Study and Design for the Historic Morris Institute Library. This is a request for $115,000 to allow the historic Morris to be reviewed and determine what needs to be done in only the historic portion of the library. So that is the portion that's got more of the historic nature of the library. Basically it was recommended 8 0 0 for the appropriation of funding. It should be noted that this group came forward in the letter of interest process requesting a different project.
However, it was realized that they needed to do additional research and review. So they went back re-scope it based on the comments of the LOI and that is the project that's being presented today. So they can determine what needs to be done in the future for the preservation. Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you Ms. Loomis. Any questions? Okay. Motions. Everyone Second. I could make it easy and just say same. Okay. All in favor, Ms. Pope? Speaker 14: Yes. Speaker 1: Ms. Lin? Yes. Ms. Wells Fargo? Yes. Mr. Sidney? Yes. And I A? Yes.
Amanda? Motion D? Speaker 12: Yep. Motion D is titled Memorial Beach Shade Structure. This is a request for $40,000 to install a third shade structure, which includes the supports and the sale. This is a request by the Parks and Rec or Recreation and Parks department. It was recommended 8 0 0 by the Community Preservation Committee. It should be noted that once the sale and the structure is actually purchased, it then goes into maintenance, which is then required to be maintained by the town.
The town cannot use CPA funding for the improvements to the existing two structures, but those would be in a capital line or alternative line for the repair because they are coming to their useful life. Speaker 1: Yeah. Thank you for that Amanda. Any questions from the board? Speaker 14: I do have a quick question. Amanda, you mentioned that what the funds cannot be used for. Could you repeat that? Speaker 12: Yep. So the funds can't be, once the sales and the SHA structures purchased, the CPA funds cannot be used to maintain. So they can't, if the sales get torn
or anything, we can't use the CPA funds to replace the torn sales because that would be just general maintenance. So it's general maintenance it can't be used for. Speaker 14: Thank you. Speaker 1: Any further questions or Jake? Cody Jacobs. I'm the secretary of the finance committee. Just for a quick, Speaker 15: Very, very small correction, just so everything's completely on the up and up and out there. The on motion D, our vote in the finance committee was actually not unanimous. It was nine to one. I wasn't on line so I support it, but just letting him go.
I did say that. I'm sorry. You said unanimous except for at the last one. No, Speaker 13: DI Speaker 15: See. Okay. I'm sorry. I must have misheard you then. I'm sorry. My my fault. I just, I like to make sure it's all there. Okay, good. Speaker 1: I make sure I do. All right. Do we have a motion? Speaker 5: Favorable Speaker 13: Second Speaker 1: As your regular Too easy. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Yes. Speaker 16: Does fine. F-A-C-E-H? Yes. Good boy does fine. Speaker 1: I think that is a yes. Okay. Ms. Kafa? Yes. Ms. Walser?
Yes. Mr. Sidney? Yeah. And I a Yes. On to motion e Ms. Loomis? Speaker 12: Yeah. Motion E is an exciting project. It is South Natick Park Improvement Design and permitting. This is an ongoing project that has been using M-V-P-M-V-P funds for the everything up to this point. The applicant is the town of Natick. It is for the parks at seven 11 and 23 Pleasant Street. They're requesting $82,500 and this would fall under outdoor recreation,
under Rehability and Restore. And the CPC did recommend this 1 8 0 0. These funds would be used for the design and permitting for this project, not the actual construction. Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you Ms. Loomis. Any questions? Ms. Wall, can you just Speaker 13: Clarify for, for the audience, Amanda, what MVP means? Speaker 12: Multiple vulnerable. Oh, multiple Speaker 1: Municipal. Speaker 12: Oh, municipal. Vulnerability Speaker 1: Planning. Speaker 12: Vulnerability program. Speaker 13: Thank you. Speaker 12: Sorry. Speaker 1: Yeah. Thank you. Any other questions? Questions from the public? Nope.
Anybody on the line Speaker 5: Move favorable. Speaker 1: Second. Speaker 5: And if I'd like to just briefly speak, if I may, you Speaker 1: May, Speaker 5: When we voted years ago to remove the spillway, one of our strong recommendations and requirements was that we find ways to improve the parks around the South Natick Dam and the spillway. And this is a way we can actually accomplish that effectively. So I'm really glad to see we're finding ways to fund those park improvements that are not directly related
to the spillway. Speaker 1: Thank Mr. Sydney. I would just add further that one of the things we promised when we did talk about spillway removal is that we would seek grant funding for a lot of things, including the removal of the spillway, where we got a million dollar grant to do that. So we are continually looking to leverage grants that are available to do appropriate things and, and do them in a cost effective a way as possible.
And the other comments or questions. Okay. Any motions? Speaker 5: Yeah, we have the motion already Speaker 1: In favor? Oh, we do? I'm sorry. Yes. All in favor? Yeah. Speaker 16: Boy. Aye. Aye. CE space. Speaker 1: Ms. Kauflin? Speaker 5: Yes. Speaker 1: Ms. Lerer? Yes. Ms. Sidney? Oh, yes. And I may Yes. Also on to motion F. Speaker 12: Yep. Motion F This one is titled Preserving Natick 1775 Battle of Bunker Hill Muster Roll. This is a request for $10,000.
It falls under historic preservation under preserve. This was voted upon to recommend favorable action by the CPC 8 0 0. And what this is, is actually the preservation of the physical document that was for the 1775 Battle of Bunker Hill Muster rule, which was actually not incorporated in the town or the state documents, but will be once this is preserved. Speaker 1: Thank you Ms. Lewis. Any questions? I just have a comment on that. As my wife is on the historic, our Nat Historical Society
and they're so excited about having the ability to preserve this is, this is a, you know, obviously 70, 75, it's a artifact that's well worth preserving and this is definitely money well spent and it's, you know, goes right to the heart of what the CPC is supposed to be funding. So I will take motions Speaker 5: Everyone second. Speaker 1: All in favor? Please say, aye. If, if I may. Yes. I'm sorry. Speaker 5: Just a, just a comment. Natick has a very, very
long history of bringing soldiers to war for the United States. It dates back to the Revolutionary War preserving this is a recognition of our long history of patriotism to this country. Speaker 1: Thank you Mr. And let's do that vote, which is all in favor. Please say aye. Ms. Pope. Aye. Ms. Coughlin? Speaker 13: Aye. Speaker 1: Ms. Waller Aye. Mr. Sidney Aye. I? Yes.
A on to motion G ms LO Speaker 12: Motion G. Yep. Motion G is five Auburn Street. The request is $750,000. This would fall under basically two buckets, but the primary bucket was affordable or creating affordable housing. And then the second bucket is historic preservation. This one is preservation and adaptive reuse of the historic LEA school for the creation of 32 affordable residential units. The CPC recommended favorable action 6 1 0.
Speaker 1: Right. Thank you. Ms. Loomis questions or comments from the board? No, Speaker 13: I'd just like to give a shout out to my fellow member, Ms. Kauflin, who has done extensive research on the costs of, of funding affordable housing. And you can find this information. She's got a substack, she doesn't know I'm doing this, by the way, and she's also posted extensively on Facebook. So there's a lot of really good information out there for those of you that are wondering why is this,
why are we asking for more money on this project? And I think she has answered a lot of those questions. Thank you Ms. Wolf. Schlager. Speaker 1: Thank you, Ms. Favorable. Hold on. I, I've got, okay. Also got a comment, which is now I think Ms. Lo is hit the nail on the head. It hits two buckets to affordable housing and historic preservation. Both were important factors in the decision that was made by the town. The other facet that I wanted to talk about is this represents roughly 3% of the total cost to
put up these 32 units, which are all a hundred percent deeded affordable apartments in perpetuity. They're one and two bedroom apartments. And some have said, why this, this is too much money. We're subsidizing a nonprofit and I couldn't disagree more. I think what we're subsidizing is affordable housing. And it may not be attractive to people to do that, but to the 32 individuals and
or families that have an a rental that is 30% of the a MI area median income or 60% half there with a preference of at least 50%, 10 NA residents, I think that's a win. And it's not just a win for 10 years, 15 years, it's a win as long as that building is standing, right? So I think that is a win. It leverages $23 million in investment. I won't disagree that financing
of affordable housing is not an easy thing to understand, but I would also say that you can express the value of this project in just numbers. It it, it's valuable to the community. It's valuable. We have a number, you know, if you look around any neighborhood and you see any number of teardowns that are becoming million dollar homes, and if we continue on that track, every time a house that was built in the fifties or sixties gets sold, it's becoming a tear down
of over a million dollars in sale. So if we wanna have people have the ability to live in town and stay below the 10% threshold that every time one of those new buildings goes up, the equation shifts and we'll be under that 10% threshold in a heartbeat. And, and with that and combination with the MPTA Communities Act, you're gonna see buildings that don't have that are what are called unfriendly 40 Bs,
which means zoning is out the window and we have much less sway over a developer in those types of buildings. And all you have to do is look at West Natick at that shopping center. If we're below the 10% limit, zoning is out the window and we could get a monstrosity in that neighborhood. And that's not fair to the residents in that neighborhood. So I'm glad we're supportive of this and I would urge town meeting members to support it. So let's take a vote. Favorable second. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Ms. Pope? Aye.
Ms. Kauflin? Aye. Mayor Walser Fargo. Aye. I think I know it by now. Mr. Sidney. Aye. And I'm, yes. So thank you very much and thank you Ms. Loomis for staying here in a long day. Let her stay for next. Yeah, you's still staying there? Thank you. Okay. Well I tried to get you out the door, man. I'm sorry. All right, next up is Article 29. Please introduce yourself, Heather. Speaker 17: Hello, my name is Heather Rockwood
and I'm the executive director of the Natick Center Cultural District. I came to speak to this board last spring about a frame signage and its important need in Natick Center. So I'm going to start a little bit halfway through because last time I did talk about the drop in sales. And so this time I'm going to start with what the select board asked us to do. So the select board gave us special permission to allow a-frame signs and flags in Natick Center, which they approved until December 31st, 2025, which we are very appreciative
for in good faith that we would work together with the economic development office and the community to create updated signage bylaws with community buy-in. Amanda Loomis, Morgan Griffith's, several business owners, two members of the planning review board and I have gathered together every few weeks and recently every week to discuss these zoning bylaws on signage and advertising devices. Since May, the proposed changes are what we have been working on and the urgency here is three part the challenging economic
conditions affecting retailers. They need visibility more than ever as we grow and welcome many new residents. Visitors, this is important for NACI Center Vitality and economic success. The new train station and future construction projects created new traffic patterns for bike, pedestrian and car. And introducing or reintroducing local businesses to this new traffic is critical. Second story and of vacancies and challenges of awareness for those businesses make this time sensitive. The benefits and goals of this proposal is that the business community will have increased options
for signage, improving their visibility and branding and making the sign approval process standardized with an easier flow of approval. Things we considered were signage that already exists, the buildings that already exist, the current approval process, how businesses may want to use signage, first floor and upper floor businesses, and their signage needs, accessibility and winter sidewalk, snow removal needs and demystification of the process for new buildings and businesses. We believe these proposed changes put the businesses and the town's economic vitality at the center
of responsible planning and oversight by clarifying what is and what is not allowed and more clearly defining roles and responsibilities across the various scenarios. This gives the building owners and business owners the tools to be compliant with the town's expressed wishes while providing more expediency and accountability. Speaker 1: Thank you Ms. Broward. Questions from the board? Ms. Speaker 13: Thank you. Just kudos to Ms. Rockwood, to Ms. Loomis, to everyone that worked on this project.
The board tried to come up with something that one of our meetings and to compare the two efforts, it's, it's not even in the same ballpark. So really appreciate the effort. I did have a couple questions on this one. One is, this is just for businesses. This doesn't prevent the town from placing signage anywhere, does it Speaker 4: C Correct. I think there's a provision in there that if there is a need for a town that may be something that, that would be sort of under this type of bylaw, that it's really false
to the select board for review and approval. Speaker 13: One of the things that I've noticed that Wellesley is doing now in Wellesley Square is they're putting sandwich boards by their crosswalks and their informative ones that you can also read driving by some of them are a little more information dense, but I thought it was really useful. Like their water ban or for like Speaker 4: Town, town items for, Speaker 13: For town items by the town. And you really notice it because you pay attention when you're stopped at a crosswalk. So I just wanted to make sure that if we decided to do something similar that that we would not be prohibited.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Many, many of those types of things are within the right of way, which as roadway commissioners really a fault to your jurisdiction. Yeah. Speaker 13: Thank you. My next question is, and I assume this is a, a technical term about the the walkway and the sidewalk area. I, is that something that's well understood so that people would know where they can place their signage or where not to? I guess Speaker 4: I, I think there's two parts to that. One is, is it well understood that may or may not be the case because I think one thing that I know the building departments and Amanda
and the team have to really work on is ensuring that we ensure our walkways are safe and compliant from that accessibility perspective. That might not be common public knowledge, but it's something that we need to make sure is compliant from that perspective. And then there's the education component about ensuring that the business owners understand what that means. And just as we've seen this fall, there was a lot of outreach with Heather, with the building department to walk downtown to make sure that there was an awareness and understanding from their perspective as well as to what was and was not gonna be able to be compliant from
that accessibility perspective. Speaker 13: Yeah, I I I noticed that wasn't a defined term walkway of the sidewalk, so I just wanted to make sure that there was a, an understanding and maybe with the downtown merchants about where that was actually located. Speaker 17: Part of this will be that the select board will be licensing those sidewalk signs and a-frame signs so that you can determine what is the best placement on the sidewalk for a DA accessibility, Speaker 1: Thank Speaker 4: You again as rotary commissioners because it's within that Speaker 1: Way in my understanding
and just watching the planning board meeting on this, I think the a DA requirement is something like six feet width. Speaker 17: Yeah. The sandwich board signs are about two feet wide. So having a, a three and a half to four feet, I, I don't know the a DA requirement, but having that extra bit of sidewalk will be the open area for walking and accessibility. Good. Speaker 4: We, we tend to design most of our new sidewalks to the five to six foot range because of that potential for sometimes it's utility pole sometimes Yeah.
It's a, a sign or something. Sometimes it's something else, yeah. To ensure that we have the three to four feet of a DA compliance. Speaker 1: Okay. Excellent. Any other questions? Move favorable. Second. A favorable by Rich and Linda. Well in favor please say aye. Aye. A aye had a call and roll call. Yep. I know. I'll get in there. Ms. Pope, Speaker 14: I vote yes on this and I Are we past the point of discussion? Speaker 1: No, go right ahead. Speaker 14: Okay. I just wanted to say that I'm excited about this.
I think this is a great start. We know that we have had some people, business owners who are concerned about that second floor and what they can do for the second floor. And I hope that we will continue to explore this, but I think that this is a great start and I vote yes. Speaker 1: Yeah, thank you Ms. Pope. I neglected to, I'm getting used to this chair thing again, so I just wanted to, in the interest of time, I just will ditto what my, my colleagues have said. This is a tremendous amount of good work
and it, it took many hours of, of back and forth and, and walking around and looking at and examining it with a open mind on both sides or all sides. And and kudos to you for, for coming up with such a good solution. Speaker 17: Thank you. So, Speaker 1: Absolutely. Mr. Joseph, I'm sorry I missed you online. Speaker 18: I guess I still have a face for radio so I I can audio but not the camera on, but good evening Mr. Chair. So I just to, just to miss Pope's comment about second floor businesses
as a second floor business owner that was participating in this process, I think, you know, can't, you've all sung their praises, so I'll, I'll keep this short, but I think the integration of the this team, the representation that was on it and the consideration that was given both for the tenants perspective tenants, but also the building owners themselves. I think we, we were trying, really trying to reach the needs of everybody with this and everything's a work in progress. But the design principle here was to, you know, leave flexibility in thereby not overly defining things
to give the select board and the planning board and the, and the building inspector their respective, you know, authority and latitude to, to use judgment. And that's part of why they need to come to you for the temporary signage still on an annual basis to make sure that people are following the rules and they understand them. So again, I just echo what you said about this being a thoughtful process. I was privileged to participate and can't speak more highly of our current executive director for the cultural district. She's doing great. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you Mr. Justin. Now we've already had Kristen votes now to Ms. Coughlin.
Speaker 2: Yes. Speaker 1: Ms. Multiplier. Yes. Mr. Sidney? Yes. And honor Yes. So 5 0, 0. Thank you Ms. Rockwood. Thank you. Appreciate all your work. Speaker 4: Thank you Amanda and Morgan. Speaker 1: Thanks you, Kimberly. Go Next up is Article 31 bylaw Changes from the Charter and Bylaw Review Committee Mr. Greer. Thank you Mr. Chairman Paul. I'm a town meeting member from Precinct seven and I'm the chairperson of the charter and bylaw review committee.
The two motions under this article, they're both kicked over from the, from the spring. The first one actually deals with putting underground propane tanks under part of the provision of our bylaws dealing with the approval of underground tanks. It's not your patio tank, it's not the thing you use on your grill, it's the large propane tanks that developers have develop somewhat of a preference for putting them underground. And the director of health came to us
and said they've had trouble trying to regulate them, right? They're not a fuel pollution, you know, concern like an underground oil or gasoline, but they are a concern relative to just the sheer volume of the tank being placed underground and interfering with surface water runoff, creating ponding and also subsurface drainage. So the, the tank bylaw already regulates a whole series of other types of tanks for underground placement.
But most of the, a remainder of the tank bylaw deals with the annual inspection of the tank inventory monitoring so that if it's an oil tank, if it's leaking that the oil is not there. The oil leak is caught before it pollutes too much ground. So if there's a gas tank with a leak, the double hold lining of these fuel and, you know, gasoline and oil tanks. But they, so what the director of health wanted to do was put these underground propane tanks within the scope
of the bylaw, subject them to the main part, which is the underground placement of the tank, but exempt them from all of the other onerous more, if you will, expensive and necessary annual monitoring requirements. Propane is heavier than air, but it isn't going to, it doesn't volute the soil. So, okay. That's what that one is. Yeah. To motion a questions. I Speaker 13: Is that something that we feel like we should be weighing in on? Speaker 1: Frankly, I don't see a need,
but I think we need, we needed to weigh in on motion B, right? So yeah, I'm okay with not not saying anything. All right. So let's move on to motion B then. Okay, so motion B, the CBRC has actually identified this in the spring of 23 of its initial report to town meeting. We brought it up again in our report in the spring of 24 and we brought it finally brought it to town meeting in the spring of 25. There was a wording issue in trying
to get the redlined changes that caused us to say that was not even vulnerable. 'cause there, there was a state a, a wording glitch, maybe the background on what the, on on what this is, what this is not, and why it's necessary. So apparently you folks met about this in the spring, we didn't know about it. But this is not anything more than creating a dedicated expert legal resource who can support every town body if they so choose.
That has to make a decision on zoning. Just not only the drafting process but the review process and the actual voting process. The sheer number of zoning bylaw changes that have been on town meeting warrants in the last 10 years should give people pause. There've been 160 of them 160 zoning articles. The motions are three to four times that easily. I haven't gotten gone through and been able to compile them all because not all of the town meeting minutes are actually online zoning is very, very technical.
It is not something that people particularly lay volunteers understand very well. It takes a lot of time and experience to work with it and it needs to be, when you write it, it needs to be perfect, pretty darn near perfect. You can have a bylaw change or an appropriation change, something you can fix. Subsequently, you make a mistake in zoning and you pass it and somebody builds something, you can't stop them. So you have, it is something that need to be very, very careful about doing. So the purpose behind this is actually to prevent lawsuits.
'cause town has been sued to avoid economic development mistakes and disasters through inadvertent wording to aver, avoid adverse neighborhood effects because of inadvertent wording, averting and to try to eliminate redos at town meeting by how do you do that? By providing the, ultimately it's town meeting, but also the finance committee, the planning board, anybody who is involved with zoning with a consistent expert
that they can rely on to who knows the bylaw and who is capable of looking at wording independently and objectively. And also from a legal, you know, perspective so that we get good zoning drafts. The first time, the, the first time around. As I mentioned, zoning is very technical and, and hard to, hard to write. We've learned some lessons in the past 10 years and I don't know how much time the select board's actually spent going through some of those lessons. Those lessons are one off counsel doesn't work.
We tried that with the first zoning bylaw rewrite and we had a proposal come through that would zone the entire Natick model and the entire golden triangle one away. It's, it's, it's allowed uses. That was just one of several issues in, you know, in inside of that. In the second zoning bylaw rewrite, we actually had a change creep through that would repeal the provision that led to all of the FAR open space money was gone and it was gone
because the cross-reference referred to the wrong section or didn't refer to the section where you could get money. It could refer to a section where you actually had to submit a plan. So the cross-reference was, you know, was the mistake. The other thing that happened in the second zoning bylaw rewrite is the entire criteria for issuing a special permit was reduced. It was changed. So for currently there there are big principles or goals and purposes of the bylaw protecting the town health, safety, and welfare, protecting the value of
existing properties, protecting neighborhoods from adverse development effects. The second zoning, bylaw, rewrite changed all of that to does the project generate new tax revenue? Those purposes, those criteria, those purposes in your zoning bylaw are the reason, the basis on which you make the decision. So we actually, the second zoning bylaw rewrite, somebody slipped it in there, but I think it was the council slipped it in there that says the criteria for a special permit. It's none of this neighborhood protection stuff. It's actually, does the town get new tax money out of this?
If you do, it's, you go approve it. We've also had situations where we didn't have counsel and we've had problems. I can go through a, you know, a list of some of those. We had one or two instances where we actually had special committees that actually looked at zoning. I was actually on one, it was a 22 Pleasant Street zoning study committee, was a controversial proposal for an assisted living facility right next to the ball fields and or in the Honeywell Park in South Natick and town meeting, created a study committee. And part of the provision was that the study committee would have the access to council, who would,
who would have access to town council. John Flynn was the town council at the time, and John Flynn was like John Council dealing with everything else they have to deal with in town's too busy. He tapped Carris North, Carris North, probably spent in excess of 150 hours working on, with that committee, drafting a bylaw that then, you know, that got like thoroughly, you know, vetted from a, you know, from a legal review standpoint. It wasn't a review at the end, after a bunch of citizens wrote a zoning, you know, motion, it was coming up with concepts
and council actually helping mold the words so that it would actually accomplish what the intent is. And challenging on the wording to say, you know, is this really what you wanna do? Because here's a possible unintended, unintended consequence. So without going through, 'cause I know you're kind of trying to get done by nine, right? There are some things we should talk about, about things that have been on the problem list. One was the change of, it was called the disambiguation
of the special permit granting authority. It was done about 13 years ago. We used to have the special per state law requires that a special permit can only be granted by the ZBA, the planning board or the select board. So you would ever like to do that. You should make a proposal and you can add special permits to your list. No, thank you. No, there you go. But, and then you have to be specific as to each district ZBA in this one planning board in this one, or if you care select board in that one. They, the planning board at the time, did a tremendous amount of work
and said all this stuff is littered through the bylaw. And they combed through and they consolidated and said everywhere it was gonna be, naming a particular board would now be the special permit granting authority. Put it in the definition. And the definitions were both the, the district assignments were gonna be on a list in another section of the bylaw. It was almost perfect. The downtown mixed use district was left off the list, which meant as a legal matter, there was the special permit granting authority for the downtown mixed use zone was fired.
There was nobody, we have three buildings in the downtown mixed use zone that went to the ZBA, who still thought they were the permit granting authority. Went through the process, got their permits, but the permits are actually were actually technically invalid for up to six years. One of the property owners almost sued the town because of the concern that it was gonna blow up his financing. Right. One little omission, I talked about the zoning bylaw rewrite the first time around the two, the transitional overlay option plan had a, had several in it,
but the biggest one was that the density calculation for an individual project wasn't gonna be the land area of that particular development. It was the land area of the entire district. So when the district was enlarged, every time you added the land to the district, the original development could do an addition far in excess of what anyone was thinking. Just because it's a, it was, it's, it's the wrong wording, right? Fortunately, town meeting didn't vote it.
The marijuana bylaw, we used one-off council. One-off council had no idea how our bylaw was structured. Didn't look at it, wrote a zoning, wrote a marijuana set of, you know, zoning provisions that were, that there were internal inconsistencies, but they actually didn't fit within our bylaw. We wasted two nights at a special town meeting trying to fix the 27 mistakes that were the, that were the result of that. We had a historic bylaw that was passed. We didn't have counsel working with us when we passed it. A developer came forward at 55 Pleasant Street, proposed something with a different interpretation of
how it would be applied. It was not what anybody had anticipated. The council of the town then said, no, that's actually, now that proposal complies with what you voted. These people ended up suing us. We assembled for $300,000. We must have spent several hundred thousand dollars on a lot of time and volunteer effort in legal fees. We had to repeal it. We had to have an article to repeal the historic district, and we had to have an article to redo it. We did the same thing with the cluster. We rewrote the cluster. We had to have a moratorium to freeze the cluster, and then we had to repeal and revise the cluster. Two springs ago we rewrote the special permit definition,
the special permit process inside of our bylaw. There were two glitches inside of that there. These are things were caught. Some of these, some of these were not caught by anybody. Some of these were caught at the last minute by town meeting members. We took our special permit bylaw, and I know that the staff, the planning board people put in dozens about hundreds of hours writing great stuff. But the criteria, the wording in the proposal that hit town meeting floor, it was in the FinCon book, was the criteria for issuing the special permit shall be in section two. In section two. It's only definitions.
So the only criteria, if we pass that the only criteria for issuing a special permit was using the right words. It's like all of these other protections, this wouldn't have been there. It's like, who checks this stuff? You know? There, there are some others that, you know that I could go through and I know you're tight for time. You want to finish this by nine. This is not about creating competition to the planning board. It's like, who, what we, we, we do so much zoning. We've been writing so much of this stuff that we, we, we, we should have somebody that, you know,
the select board could have been, you know, and I think you, you, you, you should just appoint this annually anyway. Hopefully somebody who's affiliated with our town council that can just, that can actually just be a resource and they don't have one, go out and hire one so that we actually have this and on a, and on a consistent basis so that staff has somebody that they can call. They don't have to take a, a deli number to try and get in touch with townhouse who's busy with other stuff. They got a dedicated resource that can give them quick service while they're drafting. The planning board can do the same thing,
focus on the concepts. They have an independent third party looking at what's being drafted. The finance committee who has to hear all of this stuff anyway and probably doesn't know anything about zoning, has somebody they can ask questions of and get an answer. And the same thing is true for town meeting, who by and large has to approve them all by two thirds vote. That's what this is about. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Speaker 5: Eon. Speaker 1: Mr. Speaker 5: Yeah, I have a couple questions. Mr. Erickson, typically when we appoint counsel, we appoint a firm, not an individual. Is that correct? Speaker 4: Correct. Speaker 5: Does Murphy
Speaker 4: For our current bylaws, yes. For our Speaker 5: Current bylaws, does Murphy Hessey have somebody that could be assigned as a zoning specialist that we know of? Speaker 4: I guess one thing is to define zoning specialist. Speaker 5: Well, somebody that would meet the criteria that's proposed in this bylaw. Speaker 4: I would want to discuss that with, with our representative there. In my experience in working with many different legal counsels in zoning, it, it's, it's definitely a niche. And I think any, there, there's probably a, a
couple different people at Murphy Hasi that could potentially meet that criteria. But I'd have to defer that to, to Karis. Speaker 1: You gathered your belong. Speaker 5: Okay. I'm still go, I'm just waiting, I'm waiting for the announcement end. So I, I'm just wondering if now, when the planning board or Amanda staff needs assistance with zoning are, are they able to get it through Murphy Hassey when they need it currently? Speaker 4: Yes. Yep. They work closely all the zoning articles
for this town meeting, for example, Amanda worked closely with Caris to review. Speaker 5: Okay. Yeah, those are my questions. Thank you. Yep. Speaker 1: Any other questions? Can I answer that? Speaker 5: No, Speaker 1: No. Oh, I can't answer the question as I disagree with the information provided. Okay. No, duly no ruling on small slide. Speaker 13: So I actually have a question about the Part C on this, about the planning board, about the appointment 60 days prior to the fiscal year, we're supposed to make this appointment and we don't typically make our appointments
until the very last minute. And if, and if we are going to be, let's say under this proposal, if we kept with town council and appointed the special zoning council as a member of town council, this timeframe does not work. Okay. So that is very much a concern of mine because we, we can't appoint our, the special zoning council in advance of appointing our town council that they, they should be on the same timeframe. So that I, I don't think that works. I don't have an issue with the, if we somehow don't do it
that others can appoint it. I think that, you know, makes us do our job and has a fallback if for some reason a select board does not. But I think it should be on the same schedule as appointing town council. Speaker 1: Thank you. That's an excellent point. Further discussion. Speaker 13: I just have, I just have a little more, I mean, as, as Mr. Greer referenced, looking at Article 22 is something that did come before the select board the spring, and now I don't know what the plans are of bringing it forward again, but we, we do realize that this is, you know, something
that does need looking into, so I'm not gonna speak for my fellow board members, but yeah. Okay. Speaker 1: Anything else? Ms. Pope? Speaker 14: Excuse me. Thank you Mr. Grisman, for what you shared with the board. I, I think my concern is considering how many zoning articles are brought forth, I, I don't think the town, we don't ever wanna be sued. We don't ever wanna be in litigation due to his zoning article.
However, it does not sound like litigation is the norm when we are dealing with zoning articles. That feels more like an outlier. And unless there is a, unless it seems as though we are not able to obtain counsel as it relates to advisement on zoning, I guess I, I don't necessarily see the, the dire need, but, but I, I agree with Ms. Slager in terms of this needs, you know,
this definitely needs looking into. Speaker 1: Thank you, Ms. Pope. I just have a couple quick comments. I would agree that there are, you know, in, you know, seven, eight articles to come before us in each each session. So I looked up what had been done from the notes from each of them in fall, from fall 2021 to fall 20, actually Springtown meeting 2025. Many of these were voted in a single night. There was only one instance where it was multiple nights.
That was spring 2024. Many of these decisions were votes with the great plurality voting for them. So I don't think that town meeting was confused by it. I recognize and acknowledge that we do need more expertise sooner rather than later. And so I think we need, we do need to discuss that at a town meeting, but I think it should be through our, our existing council. I, my last point is, so in this complex, and we do need counsel,
but the last attempt that we tried to, to rewrite zoning bylaws with an outside expert was totally disastrous. And it, and it, and it just made things worse. And the community and economic development team has been chipping away at correcting zoning bylaws and making sure they're clear. But you, you know, it is like boiling the ocean. You can't just do it all at once. And that's why you're seeing all these things. So over time, I would expect, you know, that, that
that's not one of CD's, hobbies or planning board's, hobbies to introduce as many zoning bylaws as they can. They're trying to chip away to lingering ongoing problems. So I think Tam meeting beats the weigh on on this. So if anybody has motion, I do, I have a motion. Speaker 13: I just have a little more to say. I, I recognize the time and we don't have a lot of time. I'm very much in favor of the spirit of this. I and I, and I really do think that we do need more dedicated special zoning.
As a longtime town meeting member, I am familiar with all of the things that Mr. Greer enumerated and, you know, that can't continue. I think it's gotten tremendously better, but we still do have issues. The select board does use our current law firm and has specialty counsel within that law firm. So we have somebody that, you know, we work with on litigation, certain litigation, we have our alcohol attorney. So it's, I think it does, I think if we
as a board agreed that maybe this needed to be looked into more and worked with, if we do decide to go with our current town council, understand that there would be a dedicated special zoning resource available. I think that's more of the way to go. This is, you know, that's in, in keeping with how we deal with it. But, you know, we all know that that town council time is very limited. It, it is, you know, hard sometimes to get, I know I gotta get attention. So I'm very much in favor of this in spirit.
Speaker 1: Mr. Sidney, Speaker 5: I have a motion. Speaker 1: You're closing the public comment. Yes, we are. We we need to, Speaker 5: Yeah. We've only got 10 minutes and we got a lot of stuff to get through. So Speaker 1: I, I move that Speaker 5: We recommend referral to the select board and town administrator. Speaker 1: Sir. All in favor? Please? Who seconded that? I did. Who was referral to the select board and who Town? Administration. Administration. How about the CBRC? No, Speaker 5: They're going out of business. Speaker 2: You can cough one out.
Speaker 1: All right. So that was made by Mr. Sidney and seconded by me. All in favor, Ms. Pope? Yes. Ms. Coughlin? Speaker 5: Yes. Speaker 1: Ms. Ser? Yes. Yeah. Mr. Sydney. Yes. And I may, yes. Article 33, Speaker 13: Mr. Chair. I don't know that we have, Speaker 2: I don't know that we have time. We, we, we do not. We have to continue the, the GA gadsby chop house even though they're not here. We do have to continue that and Speaker 1: Get through the consent agenda. Yeah, let's, let's, all right, I've had these people here all night.
You have five minutes to go through Article 34. Well, that's just life or Article 33. That's, that's just the way it is. Donna, you, you'll have your chance at town meeting. So I'm doing the best we can. So, okay. Speaker 19: We'll try out by as quickly as we can to cut to the chase. We have two motions before you, we want no action on motion A. And we would love your support for motion B quite simply, if Dr. Luckman is online and could put up the first slide, that would be really helpful. We're gonna focus this on the first slide.
Quite simply, what we hope to do with this, it's an advisory for a moratorium and moral persuasion is important. You never give it up. And this coheres with our, our goals for net zero and it coheres with sustainability and it opens up the conversation. The conversation needs to be broader. The conversation needs to include medical experts, environmental experts. It needs to be broader. It needs to concern the whole town because the runoff in everything else from the, the field
and plus fiscally, we can't get it wrong. We don't have a lot of money. It's a good time to do it because do we have $2.2 million for a field right now? I don't think so. So we're not up against the wire. We have the luxury of thoughtful consideration. This is the thoughtful pause. And many select boards have been creative. They have come up with town wide task forces to address this. And the discussion has been robust. Am I totally anti turf? No. I just want the safest playing fields for our kids
and for our environment. And it's up there. And Dr. Luckman, who is an amazing DMPH, Speaker 1: Lemme just stop you there. Just in the interest of time, I, I've asked the select board to look at the fin income hearing on this and they all have done so, and they have heard everything that Dr. Luckman said. Everything that Mr. Devereaux and you have said. So what I would like to do at this point is just cut off the presentation and just hear from the members of
what their thoughts are in two minutes. So any any thoughts? I can kick it off if nobody's ready. Right. My thoughts are, I talk to people in the school committee and this, this is one facet of a much larger issue, which is the field use study. And many town organizations need to be involved in this. I agree with your contention that the select board shouldn't nominate a task force to look into this. I will leave it up to town meeting to decide the length of the moratorium.
One of the questions that I have is, what do you mean by maintenance of a existing turf field? Is that replacement of turf? Is that infill replacement? We have two fields. The high school field and the coal center field that are, that are in dire need of replacement. Speaker 19: This doesn't affect replacing that. Speaker 1: Right. But all it says is maintenance. It doesn't define what that includes. And so I will probably develop a motion that says this includes A, B, C
and I'll have a, a motion to do that. So I think in principle, we're on the same page. We understand where you're going from. If there's a motion here, what, what my opinion is we should let town meeting do this. Yeah. Let a, I don't think we need to take, take it on. I agree. Okay. Anybody else? Well that's three. So we, we've passed. So thank you. I apologize profusely for having you at the end and not getting your, your fault allotment of time.
I appreciate you coming. I appreciate your passion on this issue. This is a discussion for town meeting that that will be a much more robust discussion. And I, and I'm not trying to be dismissive, I'm just being cognizant of the time and I apologize Speaker 5: Mr. Chairman, may I have about five seconds regarding articles 11 and 12, which are sponsored by us. I distributed a draft memo to the board. If anybody has any comments, please get them to me tomorrow.
I'm presenting in front of kin fin com tomorrow night for Okay. And I want to hand those over. Speaker 1: Okay. Let's move provisional approval. 11 and 12. Is everybody okay? Well Speaker 5: I think there's a second thing here, which is we'd support 11 and 12. We can move that. And then the memos are a separate discussion. Speaker 1: Right. Okay. So for purposes of what I have to give to town meeting, we will say we support 11 and 12. That's basically the bottom line to move. Second, the well favor, favor, please say aye. Ms. Pope. Aye. Ms. Coughlin? Yes. Ms.
Walser? Yes. Mr. Sidney? Yes. No. Yes. Okay. So let's punt for the next meeting. Speaker 5: And just so you know, edits on the memo. I'll, I'll talk to you tomorrow. Speaker 1: Right? Fine. We'll continue the hearing on Gatsby house to a date to be named. Let's, Speaker 2: I think the email that went to the applicant said October 15th Speaker 1: All. So let's make that October 15th. Don't have to vote on that.
Let's move on to Speaker 5: Consent. Consent again. Hold Speaker 1: On. Article 10. Has everybody got a chance to read that? Yes. It basically has to do with the appropriation for the study coming from borrowing. Is everybody okay with that? Yeah. Can we, can we Speaker 5: Do this next time? Can we call like a noon meeting? Speaker 1: Yeah, we're gonna have to call another meeting. So I'll do, we'll defer 7, 8, 10. We'll do 11 and 12. The rest are done. Okay. Consent agenda. Speaker 5: Okay, Ms. Pope asked me to read it.
Item A approve Wonder HDR holdings application for a Common Vic license. Item B approved transfer of common Vic license to m and L Express Inc. Item C approve United Auto Associates Inc. Application for 2025. Class two Auto dealers license Item D approve Easy way Auto Sales Inc. Application for 2025. Class two auto dealer's license item E approve request from rec and parks for to accept donations. Item F approve meeting minutes for September 17th, July 9th, February 12th and January 22nd.
All of 2025. Item G approved Natick Liquor Corp. DBA Fanon application for an S 15, change of manager and item H, appoint Natick Police Chief James Hicks as the keeper of the lockup for a one year term. I wanna pull item F, which I will explain briefly. Sure. And I move item unless anybody else wanna pull anything. Any Speaker 1: Others? Speaker 5: I also wanna approve move items A through H except F. Second. Speaker 1: Okay. All in favor, please say aye. Ms. Pope? Speaker 14: Yes. Speaker 1: Ms. Coughlin. Ms. Walser? Yes.
Mr. Sidney and Yes. Yes. Okay. Speaker 5: Okay. Item F. There are some scriveners errors. I would like to, I've sent some of them to Billy. I'd like to approve with appropriate scriveners and if somebody else has scriveners, send them to Billy and we'll get them all Speaker 1: Correctly. Yeah, I'll second. All in favor? Ms. Pope? Speaker 14: Yes. Speaker 1: Ms. Coughlin? Yes. Ger? Yes. Mr. Sidney? Yes. Army? Yes. Okay. And administrative updates? Let's go. Let's go.
Blackboard updates. The only update I have is that I'll send out a Doodle poll to say when can we meet to talk about these things? Todd needs his recommendations by Friday. So look for something coming very soon through a theater near you. Speaker 5: Good. Your Speaker 1: Second? Yeah. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. You got a call Ms. Pope? Yes. Everybody else can go. Aye. Aye. All right. Thank you. Speaker 5: And 8 58.