today is Wednesday February 19th uh and this is the month of meeting of the economic development commission which I'd like to call to order and go around the room again this is Greg Diley Jack Cody Stephen roach correct
samelson Okay so we've got five out of nine that's a quorum we may get one more before we're done here and we're going to start by voting to approve the minutes of our last meeting which everybody should have received several weeks ago are there any revisions or
changes to the the minuts so I move that we vote to approve them second okay all in favor say I I I all that's unanimous we are approved now we'd like to go through and
and I'll mention that I got Communications from Serena had a meeting in Springfield tonight Mark had a very last afternoon meeting was changed to a dinner meeting and no control over
it you've all got to retire so you have more time no that's going to happen um so what we'll do we'll go through our old business which is to review and I'd like to acknowledge Our Guest here and
scani from mic and why don't we start with you know giving you a chance to make you know public comments sure I'm Pani by alve Road um I'm on the master plan
implementation committee and I've been assigned to this commission since I sat on this commission um and I'm really just sitting in listening and you know kind of taking in I feel like you guys have it all together and you're working on the master plan and it's that's
wonderful and amazing and world and I just bring back into information to my committee and then we meet with the select board and the planning board twice a year to let them know how the Committees and commissions and departments are doing I'm just L okay well feel free to
participate at any points you would like and we are trying to collect all of our priorities where we prioritize both those things which we're taking the lead on in the master plan and those things which we're doing the support role we
have 15 lead items and 32 support ones and uh most everybody in this group Jack did you bring your prayer to priorities for the master plan no I did not okay if you could send me those in the next couple days we'll get you know I totally
Miss understood how that was supposed to be done because I thought it was supposed to be like one through there's actually only 14 but one through 14 and so they would all have an assign number 1 through 14 that's correct oh okay that's that's perfect okay cuz I saw
where you did like 1 2 3 four five 1 2 3 four five so I thought well maybe I did it wrong no I'll convert that to to a full ranking to be ranking oh we also have another guest here and I should ask if if you would have a public
comment sou part of yeah you can let's no let's let's do that right at the beginning so I looked at your website I can barely hear you I'm not a business first profession so kind of
just why don't you come and sit up sit right up at the the meeting one I noticed you had on it said columia rway and that's actually the Westfield section South um so we're actually this South rail trail section of what um a
group of all the nonprofits from New Haven to Northampton are working on um we've got endorsed all but one town and um have a committee and have signage um and we just got um phisal sponsorship
through the neotic network so we're working around some economic analysis of the entire benefit of the trail is the next step to try to do in the near future um with the company that's cig Delena who is um been a you know for
decades a leader in rail Trails for the region um so I just wanted to let you guys know that that um maybe want todate that on our website for a town that it says Columbia under rail Trails that's on the town website yeah I think so yeah
when I looked under I think so under you so just under I think South Lake I think I don't I haven't put it into shop Southwick at this point so no there's shop Southwick and then it has something like different things and it has rail trail and that says starts off little
where and says columia oh maybe maybe that's in our yeah we absolutely will fix that fix but I just want let you know where exactly did you see here well not in there go back go to the main menu and
there's kind of like a little blurb go up go up to the that's under shops out of shop go go to about Southwick maybe it's in there no well go back to shop Southwick now at the top click about
Southwick on our this is our website and is it maybe down in here okay that's something Pam set up my fa huh no no big deal
but should be the what exactly well for here I'm sure sou would like their section to be called the sou it's the Sou Trail and we're friends the South Trail we've been existing since 2011 since the second half opened up and we work mostly with with um Park Andre
we're basically a a supplement to them because we're nonprofit so we've done little extra things along the trail and maintain the kiosks excellent and and I have I actually just met couple days ago with David David
very great good and uh talked about several things including something that's on our agenda we're going to put up put some signage on your chos seen that okay y That's
agenda are you C sorry who um oh I just wondered who WS the uh kangam cof that's what I thought yeah thank you you've been great with us I know it's changed over a couple times right on I don't know if I have El but
this is um sry but that's just that is the larger um one where we're working on for the econ benefit for the whole entire Greenway so when we talk about the whole link the whole Link new New Haven New
Hampton Hamp Northampton Canal Greenway yeah and there's a the rail truck in Cy which is the national just did a part about the Connecticut Section but it also has a little blur about working to kind of like and then the sections working up on more they haven't fully
recognized it we've got to work with all FL the dos and everything in other states and get everybody but um but yeah so so yeah it's it's a it's a good thing it's good economic boom for I think um for me for you absolutely I get so much
business from that trail it's crazy I have so many cyclists they come in from from West Hartford they do like I have a group that comes from West har Harford it's a 50 mile run like once a week well not right now but you know yeah all over the place the goal is that New Haven um
that people from New York City will come up and they're building a loop because we are so part of the East Coast Greenway which goes from Cal Maine to um yeah Florida Keys that's they've been building out um so and then there's the ra Trail Conservancy it's pushing for uh the New England Network which would be
the biggest closest U for for all of like we if it gets done fast enough every's kind of New York's been really working hard um but it'll be connected where they're trying to connect all of um they're doing a spin-off um trying from New Haven to all the way to the H
ham Beach um and then they're also trying to connect the loop with the airline from um where it ends in Middle Town I think it is um to Chester yeah and then it goes up into the Masson section drops down goes the tape and
they're trying to connects like all these and then Vermont just opened up um the Moa State and they're trying to connect to the New Hampshire when they're trying but it's it's a it'll be you know it's a good economic moon for um people who
want a bike tour and that's people de bikes as you see more more on the trail yeah so that seems like a huge network of area are there opportunities to promote Southwick within either on or what our goal is yeah so try on Facebook
um and you know trying to get um more on so um trying to get maybe it's uh some bike rides um to kind of promote it and trying to get more um kind of like the businesses CU some people really are begin to brewes if you do biking um you
know and then the food is always an attraction and then like I said New York City people getting weight for a long weekend or coming up for long where they can do parts of it or the big bikers who want to can do 100 miles day crash somewhere do another and do a whole Loop you know like a three-day or you know go
out to Boston take the train back to Haven or whatnot so yeah that's great I've done a lot of those sections you mentioned including the airline Trail and the trails around Hartford and the whole One Day Road from Southwick all
the way to New Haven and back the same day and it was long trip we just want to yeah get that out there and um yeah do you have a a card or let me write down your name I can write it I know I do have cards more but
um I can I can write it down for you if you want it's easier yeah yeah agenda I want to properly properly and also to be able to contact
you sure sure and then you can always connect we have a you know the friends of South rail trail has a website you can always send it there too and then we also have a website that's on the nhc.gov actually shows all the link to all the N
all the friends groups does it have the traffic in information the stats on that um the data no um I would we're working on have access to that I know they have I have the data for South on my computer
um because we do the man counts um and then CT Trail counts through Yukon they do great tracking they that may know but they also have would you be able to send me the the data we're doing some things that you know would it would be helpful
to be able to to argue for them by talking about the traffic that comes through yeah yeah absolutely and you guys also I mean should be reaching out to the Appalachia Mountain trailer because you have the New England trail which is on the other side and a phenomenal Trail I have talked
to what is mine um remember her last name but the one who manages the the rising Corner okay trail head there to and she gave me permission fact we'll do that next when done hear permission to put our signage
there which I'll explain in a minute I won't keep on scre no that I so glad that you you came here this is highly relevant to some things we're doing right now I saw that the SS yeah I
kind of read about that yeah yeah and and I put be done the PDFs of those signs on you know if you go to the the web browser can you share the web browser with the PD PDF of the large
sign you a share and then go to the web browser tab [Music] do the the first one initially so this is this is a sign we're going to
proposed to put on six locations around Southwick and this is I actually made a very rough mockup just so you can see the size it'll be this size one foot by two foot
high and that's the final proof and everybody so far as has approved it and I have sent it to all the commissions that are involved like Park and rock and conservation um and Lake management
because the locations we proposed to do the six locations are the two the Miller Road parking the the kiosk at Miller roid for the the bike
trail and the oneoff 57 at the bike trail and then the Grandville Gorge kiosk and then the North and South boat ramp kiosks and then the New England rail
trail Rising Corner those were picking because they probably have the highest total traffic and we want to get the maximum and this will the QR code goes to our website to a specific landing
page on our site um in fact if you got the web browser do you have our website up here on the web browser oh this is actually the town can
you open there it is okay now go to the one called yeah go to the shop Southwick now go to the one called enjoy Southwick top right there and that's this is the landing page they
will come to and on a mobile phone it fits nicely within there so when they go to that QR code it will give them a choice of getting the recreation guide the dining guide or the shop Southwick and if they go to the recreation guide it'll give
them the choices of biking boating camping disc golf fishing and I don't have all of those populated yet but you can click golfing as an example of what will come up golfing well this golf comes up there's one place but back up
and go to Just golfing in the second from the bottom and that'll bring up you scroll down it's all three golf clubs can you click on those then click on click on Ranch Golf Club and it gives you the
address the hours the phone number the website description you know we can put other things in there too you can put any kind of thing but it'll have it really Taps into our hole but I I'll do the same thing for the bike trail they'll have uh
all the information for where to park for the bike trail and we'll have the website the town website has the whole video tour of the bike trail we'll link to that and anything else we can put anything we want in
here yeah there is the bike and there is um one that we just did um it's now on Google Maps you can do the virtual Google Maps like if I don't do want that okay sure the whole thing we can put we want
part that aren here we can put multiple websites and we can put a description of what's in each website and click here if you want the Google Map version click here if you want a video tour click here if you want you know the address of the parking area
uh so because what we have on here is a directory of of 160 businesses in town and that's the shop Southwick one and go back to the enjoy Southwick we'll
show you the one other thing it'll look familiar to Pam you do the dining guide and that'll go specifically to the the dining guide that has all of the the places in town to so you guys
will be the ones to update it yeah we we'll keep this all updated think I need to change the the name of the fusion Bar and Grill is not going to be the uh the it's not Fusion anymore they're they've had a split up
of a partnership or whatever they're changing the name and it's going to be like Lake View Lake View tabern or something I when they when it's confirmed on their website I'll change the name on
here so yeah and then in addition to these six large signs I also will do and and you can go to the last tab the top there I also had
them design and this was designed by Spotlight Graphics had them design an 8 and half by 11 version and this is this sign and it'll be printed in color that
way on a high quality paper and I'd like to talk about how many of these we should print these would be we can do a bunch of these for hopefully we can just give them out to businesses and encourage them to post
them in a in a window and a on a wall in a in a place where people will see them um maybe Pam will even post one in her place I have a perfect place we're good absolutely and what what would you
see as a business owner a high quality paper would you rather have a card stock just a high quality doesn't even matter it could even it could be anything just 8 and half by 11 just something that will will print a nice vibrant color and
and the attention getting and then we could provide people maybe with some some easily removable you know ways to to mount it they have these poster Mount we have mags so we're and people that
don't need it don't need it but we could offer you know these little poster Mount things that are easily to easy to put in easy to remove right um just so that we make it as easy as possible for people to put these up everywhere restaurant shops you know
convenience stores at gas stations you know I'd like to get some volunteers to help do that when we when we get them printed how many do you think we should print throughout some I'm sure the summer El he'll do it he our old rail trail one we can probably
take that how many businesses did you say that there are 130 well yes we have yeah some of them are not ones where you have necessarily people coming in but well we could print a 100 and and
because we can always go back sometimes you get a quantity break though bigger the number the cheaper they go down yeah so sometimes you might find printing 200 isn't much more than printing 100 yeah I'll I'll ask I'll probably you know haven't done it at at a spotlight they they will do the
big ones they're going to do the big ones as you all know on an aluminum composit and will be two-sided it'll be printed on both sides and then we'll have the heavyduty metal brackets that attach to a post it'll be on the side of
a kiosk I so we don't have to okay so it's gonna be on the outside of the kiosk in the um right the big ones will be on the outside of the kiosk and these will be heavy duty metal brackets and these will slide in and be
you know they'll be firmly in there but they can be replaced if we need to the and the idea of putting on the outside is we can make them bigger bold or more obvious because the the whole goal is to
get as much attention and as many clicks as possible we are tracking all the traffic from this and we have on our shop South website uh you know it's one of the one of our 10 goals is to maximize the
traffic to that website and we are now up a little over 4,400 unique users and a little over 5600 page views and I think once we get this
campaign going get these signs up that'll Skyrocket catch both the residents and visitors coming through and that's where I'm very interested in the the rail trail traffic and I know I've seen it there on the the
first um kiosk in Westfield going out of Southwick there they actually posted some of those stats so looked at them pack is good about and it's it's like thousands a week practically in some high week
yeah so it's more than some people think it's very busy traffic on nice days which is great to see want something that gets high usage so we've got I think everybody's
approved the design we've got the pricing for the the bigger signs the the pricing is about $400 each for the brackets $70 each for the double-sided Le deposit
signs and then it's not going to be all that much to do one or two hundred of these and I'll I'll get that price um but I'd like to vote to go ahead and and I'll make that purchase I'll
initiate it tomorrow we have a forum here and and you I'll make a motion to take a vote to go ahead with this project that we've been working on for a number of months and I think everybody is any is there
any discussion first before we I'll move so we can have a discussion I'll move that we um approve up to and then we need to have a discussion of what you think it's going to be yeah let's I for
the 400 time 6 is 2400 plus 70 * 6 is 420 uh so you got 2820 I added that right in my head uh and we've got the money in the
gift account and in our we've spent almost nothing this year so between our regular budget and our diff gift account we've got cover this we should just maybe approve up to 3,000 yeah would I would say that would be a good number
that would allow us to do the commodity gift account well that's something we could discuss too because at this point I don't know that there's any difference in what we can use the gift account for than what we
can use for the our regular budget but the difference functionally is if we don't spend the regular budget goes away the gift count is permanent correct but I believe a budget's 2500
correct we have the reports here yeah here's and we've used I think it's 2,000 and we use 300 okay so it's 1700 so I would I would suggest we we split
and use I don't know most of the other account because you might as well use up the one that's going to go away first and then take What We additionally we need out of the gift account is or is
that going to throw accounting off no I don't think going to throw accounting off you just get two separate invoices I believe okay three one for four well I could split it up then and say you know we've got and I'll just think that out I'll split
it up in a way that uses maybe not all of our budget amount because we'll probably have a couple other things we can use that for but I'll use I'll split it up in a way that that applies pieces of it mostly
first to our regular budget account and then secondarily to our our gift account but do it in a way that splits it I know Julie deals with them more than I do I know I don't think they would go for splitting a bill would they I stoed by today but uh Laura was in there so I
have to confirm with her I don't want to take a chance I'll I'll ask for two bills okay I'll go in personally tomorrow and I I'll I'll ask them to give the two bills to me and I will hand deliver them to accounting and explain
it and give them I don't want any slow pay on this I want to make sure we have it exactly right I question so are we G to have any funs available like left after this expense oh absolutely because
we might have some expenses as well for yeah out of 3,000 we've got um 1,700 in a regular account plus 3700 okay and change so we've got you know $
5400 so we're only going to use 3,000 out of 5400 we'll still out so if we did it , 410 out of the regular account which would leave us roughly 300 yeah I I'll I'll have them splited
in way that that we'll we'll use you know maybe 14 to 1500 out of the so then our the regular a motion would be to spend up to 3,000 allocation between operating account and gift account to be
determined yeah second yes second all in favor say I I I anybody opposed okay that motion passes
unanimously we will be able to get one of our items off of our our list and I'm I'm hoping you know the goal all along is to be able to get these signs out
there by March when the weather starts warming up if it does whatever warms up we will get them installed and i' I've already you know made subsequent contact
with with David Dore and and uh you know he will maybe join me when we install it there and and I'll I'll make sure that somebody from each one can join and as I said I've talked to the woman from
Appalachian Mountain club and she's all four putting one on on the kiosk at ring corner so they be responsible for installing or no I'll I'll install them now they want to they want to be there when I install it to make sure that it's positioned exactly as they want I'll
give them that option but I'll just go ahead and install them okay well if you want help maybe give us list of time and yeah now I I definitely will want H help Distributing needs to the
businesses so yeah anybody that that wants to volunteer maybe I'll send an an email out or with with our minuts I will encourage everybody to contact me if they can you know help
distribute because I think the best way to distribute is just go in person but it's it takes a little work because to find the right person you know you often can't find the owner there when when you want you can but I think with these
signs it would be okay to just say well could you pass maybe we should print up a little explanation with the signs so when we when we hand them in it'll have a sheet with it to say here's what what the purpose of these signs are here's
how it benefits your business because your business is is listed in our directory so the more we promote these signs and people have a convenient way to to look you up and say oh well when are they open
well they can just go once they have this website and there nowhere to find it they can within 15 seconds find everything about your restaurant when it's open and the website menus and everything address
so it's a benefit to the business for them to display this and that's you know we as a town our the only thing we're getting out of it is to have an economically vibrant town we want the businesses to do well so our benefit is
to have the businesses and the bike trail and you know everybody involved all the recreational places to to be benefited any other discussion on on this
no okay there's nothing else on here we will work down through the rest of of our [Music] agenda we already talked about well okay on the first item populating all the
tabs to the EDC website we met um Jack and and Stephen and I did a zoom meeting where we reviewed the progress on filling out those tabs Stephen and and Jack are
working on that Stephen has access to the WordPress and is making direct edits to the site and I think they're you know after they presented what they're doing I think they're exactly on the right track of of how to fill it out and make sure all I would just like it noted that
I did a little bit of work initially but sten's done line share of the work yeah we appreciate that um anything Stephen you want to say coming along slower than expected but moving along yeah and I I hope that
in the next month or two we can wrap it up up I really want to get this one it'd be great if we could wrap it up in the next month or so as I was just so everybody knows we'll probably have scheduled budget hearings in March
sometime I don't know what the latest on that is but they did it last year in March and it's a time to go in front of the select board and and justify the budget and here's what our accomplishments are and it'd be nice to
be able to say the website is mostly up doesn't have to be 100% but it can be 70 80% up and it's a work in progress it'll always be updated anyway but if we can have the the key tabs active and make sure all the links work and
nothing's outdated on it and that we have a plan to you know continue to to brush it up and the next goal is to increase the EDC website traffic at 2,000 unique users
we're already over 1,400 going to make that especially with the signage it's going to shoot up easily above 2,000 and over 10,000 page views I think we'll get there too um new business evaluation
process uh the I have completed a property tax uh database and Analysis as part of that um and it actually is works really well I can look
up any in an instant any individual property I can see the sum of a whole street or the sum of a whole development or the sum of all of College Highway it's it's set up so you can filter those
almost instantly uh and one thing and we may I maybe have mentioned this before but I've also put in a revenue per acre metric I would also like a revenue per
feet of Street too I I may talk to DPW if they have a database that shows how long each each of our streets are I could measure it myself and build it up would if they
don't have it I mean measure it on a map on the gis Map There's a measure tool you can just run it down the street and it tells you how many feet it is so it would wouldn't take that long um but those are useful metrics because they
they show the efficiency of different types of development if you can get more Revenue per acre or me more Revenue per length of Street that's a more efficient source of Revenue because those are both
limited resources in any Town your acreage that's available for development and your your streets and then in the case of a de development where you have to create the streets where you have to now maintain new streets it's even more
important because you have to show that the revenue from that development will more than cover the added Main of those streets and that's information next step I would like to do there and and Gan
you're on it but um since we don't have Bill here yet at some point maybe before the next meeting the three of us can get together and talk about this because the next step I'd like to do is talk to DPW maybe to Randy
and and see what information he has if he has a database of streets their length and also a database of the amount they spent on each of the streets that could be a a cost side of the
analysis they spent for maybe for the last 10 years how how much how many dollars did it cost to repave and to fix the drainage and well you also do that for the rail trail and S Trail um yeah it would be
interesting to know that and that that's so their use and how much that would be helpful when things need repair which right and and my goal in doing this my more immediate goal is to be able to
do to have this database you can if somebody proposes a new development you would have a comparable expense and revenue number to to apply to it um you one thing that I found is that
the most profitable developments in our town are the small dense businesses and the dense denser housing like the condo developments Depot square and South View
and Rosewood and Windfield those are are most profitable in terms of Revenue par breaker uh because they're they're denser and you get a lot out of a limited acreage so there's a new
one that may have a groundbreaking as early as spring that's at 42 Depot Street but it stretches right along the rail trail if you go on that stretch of the rail trail you notice a large field to
the west side of the rail trail and that is going to be a a condo type development and it's been in the works for several years now but it's all all approved all the
planning board approvals are are done and um it may be well Diane Gail said she thought it was going to be groundbreaking in the spring I also talked to John Gard about it he said well it might take longer
than but I think once they' have it all approved if they're not sure on cash there's no reason they shouldn't move quickly on that and that would be great because it's I like those developments that are closer to the town center as
well because it helps for our master plan goals of enhancing our town center and building that up and that kind of development and you know something like the Depot Street the depot
Square development is you know very much walkable to downtown and and you know you almost don't know it's there unless you see it from a distance right up in the hill and that's the same thing with this 42 Depo Street
development will be the same kind of way the entrance will be off a Depot Street where that abandoned farm house and barnar they will demolish those and that'll be the entrance they're they're run down
they're open they're deteriorating so that's approved and ready to go just since it's an update so we'll we'll keep going with that new business evaluation we'll try to develop these tools that at least allow us to do the revenue and cost
side we already talked about the fourth goal the designning of those signs uh our fifth goal to rrange meetings with groups of business owners we really need bill here to I have a number of things I want to suggest to him that we
do there things we we really should be talking to business owners about and getting groups together so I maybe Stephens has something to say um yeah once we get um I think once we roll out the website and our new signs as well
watch something to present to them I also think are there any planned events this spring or summer on the bike trail for large amounts of people coming through um I don't think conect get doing the ride the state to have shop this year I think they're being more
east to west because of their goals for things um right now I don't know if the erase that kind of go right through really go through you guys on the road no I have some was in it's not big but
maybe some I just know one decent sized race that came through last year like late in the year and people had reached out to me ask if they could park in our parking lot and then they start their race somewhere and then they end at the coffee shop and they and back their car
and of course I said yes of course and come in and eat yeah informing people of things like that I think definitely have right and we do discussion that there may be a a
bigger more formal dedication of the Granite marker for the now actually yeah that would be nice with Bob Madison do something with him yeah yeah everybody know that Granite marker was
in the news but uh didn't get publicized a whole lot a beautiful Granite marker just near Pam's place next to the rail trail because the canal went through there and there's a section of the canal off of South Pond that you can paddle
for quite a distance right up to pretty much the state line yeah there's a there actually a sign on the state line because you can you can't really see because but he he put in that from his Spong from his book where there is um I think the ducks or whatnot you can't
really see the aqueduct like you can see there's only one that remains in H I think can they have actually house but yeah so he's been going on his one's and that was his big go the marel
marker so yeah would like to do something after this you all right well on on this goal uh Stephen if you talking to Bill anytime you know I questions start talking about
it because I I would like to get that one going okay and then um the program to increase awareness of AC Town business property Mark and seren are on that and they here but Mark has kept up a little
bit on that um and we've got another one and I'll throw that in here I've got it on the new business update but a couple weeks ago at the select board meeting Doug mowan brought up the fact that that
Jordan healthc care is closing you don't know where that is you know near the the sub Villages medical practice and you know it's unfortunate
they didn't make that go because that looks so promising but what Doug said is if that closes it would be the first first time in maybe 200 years that Southwick hasn't had a local medical practice in
town he thinks we we should do what we can to publicize or recruit he thinks that would be ideal being right there next to the The Villages and you know all the potential clientele it's already
set up for a medical practice it used to be one even before that was affiliated with Bas right it was my my GP was there I used to go there for my checkups and I don't know exactly what happened but I think it was some
kind of dispute with the the owner that they moved out they it wasn't base state that initiated it but they go to Feeding Hills all the way five miles from Feeding Hills which
is not too bad but um and I I've looked up the the owner of the property is some LLC just kind of a generic name of an LLC with an address in polio so I don't
know anything about the the owners of property does anybody have any ideas on how you would recruit ital shortage so yeah I know I've heard stories about
actually talked to Cliff about it he's on on here and he said he knows of places that have had to provide all kinds of incentives for um Medical Practice to come in because there's such a
shortage if you don't have a PCP it can take as much as a year to get an appointment yes if you're looking for one a year for your yeah that's that's a lot I was hoping that mark would be here to discuss that since
he has contacts in the medical field since he works in construction for hospitals and medical facilities and I did send him a notice about it two weeks ago when I first heard it in the selectboard meeting and I've reminded him that I
haven't got any thoughts from him yeah but that was my first thought on someone who might know a little bit about the situ sitation but if you talk to other people think about it talk to people about it
if you can get any information about what what might be possible as as Doug noted and it makes sense to me it seems like a very desirable place for a medical
practice because of the say the retirement condos and all of that right there and plus you know a town of 9,000 with no local medical practice but in a normal Market people
would flood in here but the medical Market is not normal it's very distorted shortages it's I don't I don't understand all of it but let's all give it some thought and bring it up in our next meeting when
Mark is here I'll try to give get some information from Mark between now and our next next meeting I'll have a discussion with him but otherwise with the vacancies we you know Mark's trying to keep up with that and I noticed that we have we're
going to have another vacancy shortly that the Southwick florist is up for sale I think it went on the market or the business well the the the land in the buildings they're not selling it as a business they're selling the the
buildings in the land it's like an acre and a half and you know several buildings there so does the florist own that property or yes oh okay it's you know the Russ Fox and I don't know if
it's Russ and Bob Fox together exactly how the ownership is structured um anyway it is up up for sale it's like you know you can you can look up the listing to see the information about
it it is on the the realtor websites the business websites commercial commercial so that's something that we would put into our our website with as a vacancy and available for businesses
okay then uh next goal about this economic case for enhancements to Our Town Center you know we've we had a set back on getting the crosswalks in there but we will proceed on other fronts in the meantime um it
really ties into one of the things that would be an enhancement is the whole Southwick and Bloom program and I'll jump into that right after because this is all oriented toward making the Town Center more attractive
and more friendly and more walkable and and something that that people would would want to come and and Shop because the whole attraction of having a location in the Town Center is
the uh fact that when you get a bunch of business together everybody benefits people go to multiple places at want so uh Julie would you give us an update on Southwick and Bloom or Craig you can now
that you're here I was um yeah so they the girls been meeting and doing a wonderful job [Music] um logo the Committees come up with the logo and are tweaking the colors before it goes public so we'll have that next
time probably um but we're coming up you know it's going to be quick now so um Flyers a flyer design is being created by Southwoods brick yes I think he's about done there open that email he's got to take off some Banner that he put
on there so um and we'll have that to look at next time uh social media Facebook and Instagram Pages have been created um southan boom.com has been created for communication sign up form has been created and linked to all
pertinent media um on website optimization the event will have its own tab on the shop South site South and Bloom will be searchable on the website QR code has been created to post on media which links to the information and sign up
Pages yeah I I met with Julie week or two ago and we talked about how put that in went through how we can use a Google form as a sign up that's very easy to do and Julie I think it's gonna put that
together yes I already created it already um so to come now we have flyer distribution press yard signs for participants prizes photographers draft volunteers and um maybe a little bit of
funding and so yeah we absolutely have money to put into that okay what what we'll do by next meeting or maybe even before then is we'll hopefully she'll have the budget numbers from Martin we have kind of like just like a estimated
price right now how much we need do you know yeah you, 1500 that's estimated price yeah that's that's that's like the lowest probably that we will need we will have it I mean we will need to vote on on that at some point if you have the
we'll get exact numbers they didn't want to proceed unless we found out tonight that we could have some available yeah this is we've we've been very frugal in our our budget we've spent hardly anything other than now
this signage which is I think a good value because it's gonna last for a long time you know we hope these will go 10 or 20 years so it's a it's a one-time expense that will be out there for a
very long time and they can be upgraded relatively cheaply because the brackets you can put new signs in and the rest of it all background we can print more of the small ones ET so the signs that we want to order we also want to reuse them each year so maybe they will last up to
five years but yeah that's our goal to reuse some of the material identifying signs for the people that are participating yes they will have like a lawn sign who registered to participate so are you going to go door to door to
solicit participants or how's no we're gonna go to probably to the businesses Bud it will be everywhere that's what I mean to the prospects yeah well it Go anyone canate residential as well so that's why we're gonna mostly H probably
the business first exactly sounds really good I think yes this is it's going to be interesting a wonderful way to advance it fits into the master plan some of the goals in the master plan T beautification things you're talking
about are in the master plan proposes a beautification committee at some point which I think would be a great idea yes yeah that and a social committee right and the social committee is a subcommittee off
of you guys I know yeah yeah because we're we're considered a I was told to prioritize those as well us too so it it probably comes off Economic
Development which which is is fine we'll see where that countes you know I um this is probably a good time to say this um because well you want to just are you going to be going over those part prioritization schedules of allight or
no I am not I wasn't planning to walk through it in the meeting but I'm open to comments I I do want to you know have anybody that has questions about I don't want to dril something but I may have to go here a little while so I mean if I may um this is Diane's idea I can't take it
um just like the boom all right yeah so um we were looking at I asked her thoughts about some of these things to I just you know my brain was in a fog and I said I just can't get this jump started as far as prioritization so um she looked at that and she said you
know what we're really missing in town we talk when we talk about the agricultural component so forth is we really don't when you think about it we really don't have anything like a farmers market if we had something like that in this town it would be it would
it would be a game changer and sheim mention this to you that or did you guys talk about no not yeah there there is an item in the master plan that proposes some kind of multi- vendor site in town so agriculture because when we start
talking about our students and so forth and and how do we how do we develop businesses and so forth I mean we've got a you know we've got two schools on over there that we ought to be weaning these people on business but what's really nice about a farmers market and I'll take this to Upstate New York where we
you know have a place there's maybe I don't know 600 people in that town but I want to tell you they come there's not a street light in the whole County you know what I mean but they come from all over all over to these Farmers you know to this one farmers market and it's just
really a place where you know a kid that's in high school can show his you know crocheting or her crochet how often did they have it they um they have it every Thursday I think I'm not talking about frequency I'm just saying this this is this would
be huge as far as putting us on the map and and exposing people toward culture things right we One Challenge is to coordinate it with our farm stands because one objection that always comes up is the the people with the Farm Stand
say you know that's just going to take business away from our farm stand and if we participate in it's going to require twice the labor to man it and blossoming Acres goes all the way up to Adams that's where they go to the farm to
their um Gathering up there so this is where this is the outlet where the farmers do sell these things right so I think we need that in for sure yeah talk but I'm just thinking about the
young kids you know we talk about kids have L AG s or all that kind of stuff just to be able to see them maybe a kid's doing Live Edge furniture or something like that that can you know we need Pavilions in the town things like this and all this is what we really should should start and it's something
that that I I think would would definitely be a partnership between economic and and a committee and we could One Way Forward is to invite Bert
into a meeting to have a discussion or we could go into their meeting and talk about ways that it might you know because he understands more than anyone the the potential conflicts with our agricultural
producers I mean the producers have no problem with it there would be those who have a a Farm Stand now to whether they could there whether would pay out for them there's other things I have idea
like you could do Tuckers and you could do Farm to Table kind of event where you're using the local you know product of your and and having like special dining events like it tuckered a lot the restaurant or something like that where you could do that or yours where some
previous theyve sell some of the local honey or they sell map they sell use maybe certain products that are you know ingredients at restaurants there's that way you could you know yeah there there's a lot of potential there's just
so many different ways to to approach it well think about town center and so forth we really have nothing other than you know re Center Way on out there but I mean now the Historical Society just purchased property right I mean yeah we we have no idea what and one potential
site and I I want speak for my church we do the car show we've done craft shows we have very big large lawn right in the Town Center um you know they would I don't know how big this would ultimately get
but you know we got large lot of parking there and it's right in the town center and it's a lot of that would be a great location because that's where the farmers U the Westville Farmers Market it's near the church near the church in
westfi I always go there it's really nice it's not only they sell different stuff like vendors right across the road you have Roma their large parking lot they're just a takeout now they don't use anywhere near that parking lot maybe in cooperation with them you could have
both sides of the road see I don't think they gry's got anything her ssur do they I don't I don't know they ever seen one gry does I don't know about so I mean we've got such a draw from them down there anyway I mean you know 85% of our clientele is Connecticut so they're
already coming on up here you know I mean yeah I met to draw a lot of people out of Connecticut right yeah what what is the status of of that property met view met metew Farm met View Farms
it's uh in the will for her sons her family to take it over but it's idle and I've been working on on behind the scenes to try to encourage her because we have people who are ready to invest in it and get it back open again I mean
that thing grew in and maybe that's another potential site for a market because they got parking and it's down even closer to Connecticut and that wasn't vegetables that was plants but they did it seasonal it was just yeah the plants and then it was the
ones and things at the other end it was for the kids too they did it wonderful yeah that was really I had proposed that couple of years ago when we were doing the master plan Town meetings said that one of the areas that they could do
is you needed permanent site right with sheds and covers and things of this nature and then you you bring in people and you have it'll bring in Farmers from ktic and all over the place and come in and rais family calib could join in on
it and then when you don't have those functions you could have set them up as a or not R not R sale what do you call it tag sale where people bring out stuff and have tables and uh can't think of
Theology and what craft fair sale yeah exactly typ of things and the idea that you brought in you know with lemonade stands and the different types of goods for the students to have you know dedicated area but people would you know
the farmers would you know lease it out or rent it out that rent out that space would proba lighting and all the r that sort you know and cover and you know the parking but a lot of people had the same objections you're going to take away
from the local firm stands and although if it could become a a place where people could bring their the examples of their very most popular goods and then promote you know regular
visit to you know if they're local say we're just down the road you know come here and we have a lot more stuff like this if you like this you really love what else do we have the only issue that I would saw was was because I've seen Witnesses before and
another location down south where uh the farmers market came in and the local grocery store didn't sell any produ so they ended up suing the the site and they had to move it and then the county came in and erected a huge
farmers market and it all the traffic flowed out there so it's well worth it it really is but where do you put it you know and how do you fund it and get it going and get the word out to all the farmers out there you know it's up for
it and yeah and like you say how many people go 600 what you say 600 people 600 people are in that town and how many people come into the town for that thousands thousands oh yeah there you go right there that's just confirmation what I said two years ago but I ran
across the same objections and then the funding could I would maybe check with the Westfield and how they run it because Debbie and who is from South like I know she rent it for years um she would probably you talking one at the church
yeah that was in West maybe and I would talk just set up just space basically and there's like pizza truck and coffee truck like everything have like huses there even though
they're not a Northampton business yeah have just yeah i' prefer not to have any any infrastructure right that's why I say as long as you have a a large field field you know lawn um and parking or
even a parking lot a large parking lot that has room for for stand air space in front for for something like this the what they is it used to be called the American name but what is it the village now the Village
South Villages didn't they offer their property out front for something like this I I really like your idea of the but I like your idea down yeah that's not a that's got parking issues if you're there and traffic issues because you don't have any turning lanes and
Center thing and whatever it's it's difficult even when they have those big events at at the brewery place the Big Barn right it's a lot of traffic they have to deal with but yeah
I I think our our church should be very open to those kind of events a lot of visibility for them yeah we like to get in I mean the car show is a boost to The Daily Grind is that's what it was
started for is based on the The Daily Grind and it's it's a draw it's popular and we've had craft fairs there too where people come and set up their tents um but again I bet we could we
could rope in even Roma some of their area and parking if we if you need it have have somebody allowing people to get across the street safely we don't have crosswalks I love that idea I would love to see Farmers
marketing Sal for sure well a farmer and any kind of called like that produced Goods so it would be the kind of you know the things there's vendors in that yellow bar bear Market it's a multivendor place that
that would come there to get more visibility you all those kind of things jellies and candle it could be anything really yeah but called the farm Farmers Market because you're going to have fresh produce and you know meat uh and
I'm thinking Northampton and they have a guy who does who sells meat there and yes sand we've got local honey local honey of course yep oh yeah I just bought some of the their honey fin I bought it from Big Y but but
it's there it's good it's raw honey pretty slow yeah good bring up I I should maybe I'll call B and talk to him invite [Music]
we're thinking to have more discussions because it is right in the it's one of the items in the master plan I think the only thing that would be of concern to the to the Farms is that now during that farm day that we have here in town a lot
I've heard that they have a hard time um with like who's going to service who's going to do this so that would be their only concern so if I'm going to have a f market now I'm going to have to find somebody who's going to you know sell my products there and set up in that would probably be the only thing
that back your mind lab issue and and maybe there could be how can help with that well you talked about getting the high schools involved that's perfect and on the farm day we had a lot of high school volunteers groups that would come in
right and that would be like a workshop that would be at work you know and maybe be enough to get a minimum wage yeah and experience it's a weekly thing yeah I mean I think it's
great okay good idea and so we've done that we talked about the library the library information please send that directly to Stephen if you can send any links and
Library information directly to Stephen we'll get it in you know as soon as possible okay I'll grab your contact at the end got it and Jean I'm not going to be any help on that I am in overload right now for about four months so this
was on the I know my name is Library oh the library yeah yeah yeah no problem I'm working with her on other ideas too to promote but uh some new ideas I get life back here in a few months but now I understand I don't want to hold you back yeah no problem
but you know part of our website is this job development and whatnot and uh because they already have the staff there for doing it I it's done for us There's the link right there and then the the last one we'll
cover here quickly see 75 uh reviewing the town zoning map and possibly recommending changes that's also in the master plan and uh I have been working on that
and that's part of that ties into this property tax analysis too and looking at at all the places and and it also as I study that zoning map I see
several additional places for either Condor dense housing that are near the Town Center that you maybe we can start talking to to the people that own that property
because it looks like it was set up for potential Housing Development and I can show you on on the map I don't want to go into it here in the open meeting but I want to get pull together a meeting I hear uh with with you and Bill on that
because I've got a very simple simplified one where I've sketched out all the zones I've sketched out the developments the housing developments and I've highlighted some areas that I think are open for
potential development just right all within walking distance of the downtown and there's a couple others that are already zoned in what I think it's the multif family zoning category up off of yeah up
off a City View you know that could be developed velopments like Rosewood and Windfield Circle and the ones closer in could maybe be developments like Depot square and and the new one at 42 Depot and and
South View which you know as as you say are some of the most profitable things for the the town and you know I don't think would incur that much incremental cost to the town but could be you know I estimate
this 42 Depot Square would be several hundred, in tax revenue per year based on a compar or the 42 Depot Street because uh Depot square is is 300,000 something in tax
revenue and South View is close to that and that's with very little I think incremental cost of the town there be some maintenance if we you know take over maintenance of the roads but it's
it's good dense return um better than some of the bigger businesses we could bring in that would be more disruptive you know we don't have to rely you know part the other piece of doing this analysis is to
compare the revenue from businesses to the revenue from residential in general the revenue from business is only 7% of the total six to 7 % of the total revenue for the the town personal property tax from
businesses almost nothing except for Well there's almost a million dollars in personal prop property tax but 70 80% is from utilities it's it's from the because utilities have infrastructure that can be
taxed whether it's the well anyway Comcast is and and gas pipelines those are majority of the personal property tax so our bigger potential is is the
right kind of of residential development and that if Done Right can fit into some master plan housing things may talk you know with housing people do we have a housing person in town new
planner well that's still definitely in the works and just as an update on that John G was going full-time at DPW so he only worked like 16 hours a week on as a planner but he's that's going away but they are working now to recruit somebody
they already have it funded somebody that would be maybe 70% planner and 30% Economic Development which we think is is great because there's too much more than we can do as volunteer group right
and to have somebody on the town staff would be great that we could partner with get more done so that covers the old business the new business we
mostly covered uh you know updating the priorities of a master plan do you have anything else Craig in terms of priorities uh or anybody have any questions about the priorities what I'm planning to do is consolidate all those in the right form at as soon as I can
get the last couple and send them over so that our part in in that is done the format is is they wanted to get a list of all of them have the individual ones for each of us by name so that but I
didn't want to I I'll put that all together it won't be that hard to put them together once I have the input from everyone I mean some of it seemed like it was a little bit frous and all but wasteful but well put it in the low priority I the way that I know what I
mean as far as just the exercise in and of itself I mean it's just what are you going to assign somebody depending on what they feel is our priority I mean well I think I I don't think I would have prioritized that way I probably would have just said you know put a one two or
three or most one two three four five right and then you would you would just put the ones to the top and the fives to the bottom but this is okay to this is the way they wanted it and I that's why I said don't spend more than 10 or 15
minutes on it it's not worth well should this be a two or a three don't don't worry about that what we're looking for is like the top three to five your top you know five priorities that you really want to dig into in the beginning I
think it's a lot more abstract something like this can yield I mean it's just it's not really this really isn't that meaningful to me you know when you look at their because you were just doing an analysis on you know per acre I mean there's other things that really fit into this
culturally into this town is the business good maybe it doesn't yield a whole L break but maybe culturally it's a wonderful thing so there's a lot that's St spoken to when you do things like this and I I think it's very unfortunate but yeah and and just to to
address your concern there I totally share that concern the purpose of doing the per acre is not so much to to eject something that has a low per acre unless it's something that's undesirable I understand the point is that I mean we
had a lot of you know my motivations go go back to the carvana thing yeah nobody did was a criticis nobody did an economic analysis of carvana and you know what was the the revenue what was the incremental what was the revenue per
acre is using a lot of prime acreage and there's no comparable and we want to be able to say well if this is something we don't want are we going to take it just because we think it's profitable and if you do it perak you can say well actually if we
put that in residential it'd be more profitable that was the the goal it was it was a metric to use as the input because we did this whole new business evaluation thing and everybody
said well if if if it's not exact and if it's if it's kind of an arbitrary judgment you know that's going to be objected to and so we're trying to get some real solid metrics and comparables I would didn't mean to be
critical I wasn't being oh no but I that I want it to I want people to criticize it because I want I want people to think that we're going for things just because they're more profitable but a lot of things there's a a misunderstanding a
lot of people think well small businesses are not that profitable actually they're more profitable for the town because they tend to be denser and and having things in the Town Center is actually better for the town course
maybe once we outgrow the Lutheran Church there then maybe that'll be our field out up there for the farmers market there there are yeah there are other known options that's still sitting there right I mean you know the north town there I mean
well it's John W owns it well now who knows what end will be right it could be it could be residential it's town with on it all who knows sure that that would be an option but I would rather see it either of those either residential or
farmers's Market than to be a big ugly car processing center that generates a ton of truck truck traffic right right in the middle of our town you know anything would be better but yeah that's part of the Town Center I
consider town center is right up to Tannery because that's where our sidewalks go and we have some other ideas not ready to talk about yet but I think there's a lot of potential enhancements to the to the town
center um I already mentioned the budget hearings that part of what I want to get some of these goals done is for that and and to get get these spending things done and uh we talked about the closing J in
healthcare and again I'll remind everybody to think about that to network about it uh any any ideas I know that it can be challenging at such a tip might okay anybody have new items we should
put on a meeting next month if you do send them to me you know by I like to do the agenda the week before early in the week the week before meeting it will be the third it's always
the third Wednesday of the month so whatever that I I think because this is 28 days it'll again be March 19th is there anything we have a folder for meetings that stuff gets
tabled do we have anything in the taable folder well we put most of those in the goals um but there so there's nothing in there I don't have anything that I'm carrying in the table other than at some
point we're still we want to bring up this idea of a printed destination map that we can distribute and we decided to hold off both because we didn't have the manpower to do it this year and also because we wanted to start the the
actual meetings with people in business to see what they would like to see before we did a a printed map this printed map is the idea of having a I don't think I have my example but it folds out and has the whole map of the
town with the businesses in place and you pass it out as a brochure so sell ads okay so any other comments from our guests
and a quick comment before we wrap up so in this meeting we talked about obligating some money I just want to make sure I think they're very viable um things that I think we should fund I just want to make sure that that we're not deficient so we had $3,000 for sign AG right and roughly about, 1500 for is
unfunded for um South Lake and blue so yes about $4500 does that be in budget right we've got about $5,400 as we as we said in between our gift account and our our annual budget which the annual
budget goes through the end of June whatever we don't use then goes away we get refunded uh you know the budget here and I put in the proposed budget at this level funding of 2000 for next year so
that that was what I submitted um you know can you um and just thinking through this can you what do we have in the non- gift we have 1,700 left I was just wondering if you ought to just take
everything out of the gift and have just one invoice so that they don't go through the same thing and having have two voices split when they go to different accounts well if if I run it to use most of the regular account yeah
then they will go 100% gift okay that's fine and I don't think Spotlight will have any trouble splitting up the invoice okay especially if I tell them that I'll personally walk it in and make sure it gets pray paid
properly and all right I'm good okay anybody want to move to adjourn move okay okay all in favor of adjourning V vote I okay we adjourn thank you thank you
than