that even for a minute we have a quorum if for no other reason then uh we can approve all the minutes so they don't keep appearing on the agenda with longer and longer series of minutes
um but what I want to do because I um I I Chief Dan Baldwin uh Fire Chief Dan Baldwin is here but can only be here for I think he told me uh the first 15
minutes or so and I'll explain why he's here and um Mark Rasmus said he could be here the first half hour and in the agenda if you look besides approval of
the minutes we have uh a climate resilience report update which um uh um unfortunately uh
uh uh Jeff Canton has put Yan's work on and we distributed it with the agenda and the minutes and you'll see uh it's quite different than the last time we looked at it but Jeff can't be here uh
this uh meeting um and so i' I'd like people to take a a look at it Mark rasmon is next now uh with us um I Mark uh has said that at the bottom
of the agenda it suggests the next meeting date be May 22nd and that's the annual meeting of the Buzzards Bay Coalition and Mark as president of the Coalition feels that he needs to be at the annual meeting I don't know why he feels that but uh I don't know where his
priorities are but uh so perhaps if we that's also Memorial Day weekend that Thursday is the beginning kind of a Memorial Day weekend so um if we pushed it another we uh
Thursday that would be May 29th and Mark was saying that he could have uh you know the the culmination really of the three-year study on gooseberry
uh presented to The Climate resilience committee at that may meeting so uh it if we take the last item on the agenda first and uh have that date be May 29th
mark would uh that date work for you it would be great thanks John everything you said is great and I'm I'm sorry to not be able to do the 22nd but totally great findings everybody yeah uh is that
date I also I hadn't realized that uh uh the 22nd is also uh Memorial Day weekend I mean the beginning of Memorial Day weekend is is the 29th then okay with folks all right we'll uh make that to
29th can I can I just say one thing um we have we always Met has this committee always met on a Thursday it seemed to me we used to meet no we always we've always met on a Thursday at five
o'clock okay well um it is my understanding I think we've got some conflicts going on with Thursdays um I believe is so what who's what is going on on the
22nd of May is that when the oh God what is it uh the is there a barrier Beach committee on the 22nd of May something else is going on that's kind of important well we're not going to be on the 22nd we'll be on the 29th well my
question is this it's like we're also trying to you know that's that once a month is when we also schedule the offshore wind advisory committee meetings and um I'm you know we we generally do it one of the last two
Thursday days of May um but there's something else maybe the 20 I I don't know what it was okay well maybe I'm wrong on that maybe the 22nd hasn't been taken the 29th is fine I just um it we're getting some conflict with there's
there's so many PE you know there's only so many people that are interested in what we do you know with here with uh with the uh CRC and uh which has to do of course with the environment and with the beaches and all that and then now
we've got this barrier Beach committee which is great but you know it's the same people that would ALS that are also interested in the offshore win committee and everybody's meet seems to be meeting on Thursdays or something so um it's uh
I I just want to point that out and um but okay fine yeah yeah well we've been going for three or four years on Thursdays and so if other people are in conflict with us maybe they can move their
meetings did you note that Kim has a note in there about the wara has something on the FR night yeah shed alliances um uh speaker series is that night at five o'clock
what would it work to move it to Wednesday for that one time I also um John I'm not sure if you know this and maybe Michael knows this better um but the remote meeting um is ending it is going yeah that's correct
it's going to end at at the end of March um I think the a lot of folks are anticipating that there will be another extension or at least the last minute um change in the open meeting law legislation but that remains to be seen so as of now at the end of March we
cannot meet remotely anymore good all right so um is your preference the 28th or is your preference the 21st of uh May either preference for the 28th but I
could do either you're probably gon to be busy on the night before let's do the uh let's do the 28th of May 28th May May 28th Wednesday 5:00 and it'll be in person and Michael will figure out
where to do it um uh but it'll be in person which uh constant and uh someone else I can't remember it's in the minutes had suggested at our last meeting okay uh has anyone else arrived
D yet and where will it be in person I I said Michael will figure out a place and we'll let people know okay uh as the chief uh said he he had uh
uh uh he could only be here a little bit I wanted to mention that uh I you know we'd all watched with um anguish as fires consumed a lot of Southern
California and I'm sure a lot of you heard or read how uh people said environmental reasons contributed to those fires how there was a wet spring
and uh that promoted a lot of growth in the spring and it was followed by a drought uh during the summer which cooked all of that growth and then uh lightning and other things set off
the fires and lots of people lost their homes belongings savings you name it and so wet spring followed by droughts s an awful lot like our year last year and so I met with uh Chief Dan Baldwin and his
deputy and said so could that happen here and uh he said uh basically yes and uh um uh we have some of the same conditions and I asked him I told him
about our uh committee and asked him if uh he might be interested in putting together uh in his Department a small tiger team about would there be things the town could do would there be things
that individual property owners could do whether they are businesses or homeowners to become more resilient and uh he didn't kick me out of his office right away he thought
about it and uh I invited him to come to our uh meeting and lo and behold here he is uh so uh Chief uh any thoughts uh further thoughts on this um sure thank
you for uh inviting me here this evening uh as you you stated my name is Dan bald and I'm the Westport fire chief I've been on the department for close to 30 years um don't claim to be an expert but I know what I've seen working uh on the department and in our area um obviously
coincidentally California had their issues and as you all know uh Massachusetts had uh an unprecedented Fire season in the fall uh with numerous brush fires throughout the state uh I will add that some of those fires many
of those fires were um the result of an arsonist taking advantage of um extremely dry conditions conditions that we hadn't seen in quite a while conditions that um may or may not be a factor of of climate change which is
what Jo committee is is here to discuss um in Westport you know we've seen some some growth as far as neighborhoods go and development and things like that so obviously every time a new home is built there less Forest um available to burn uh but it ALS which is can be a good
thing but the bad side of that is it brings the human element into the area and and humans for the most part are one of the biggest contributors if not the biggest contributor to wildfires whether it's intentional um discarding of smoking
material um anything from coals from a fireplace that are not disposed of properly we had that instance occur um several months ago somebody uh doused their coals from their indoor wood stove placed it out in the yard winds picked up and they had a brush fire almost lost
their their shed out back um so the risk is there um in our area you know the Topography is much different than out in California we don't see sustained winds 70 80 90 miles an hour for days on end like they do out there we do have Gusty winds at times uh we don't have hilly
terrain which which is makes a big difference in in wildfires and how you're able to fight them how they spread but what we do have around here is a lot of what we refer to as Leal litter and uh underbrush uh bras Etc all things that um when they're dry can act
as um pretty decent Fuel and then what we traditionally see in our area living on the ocean is an afternoon wind that usually picks up which usually contributes to um most often uh open burning it's we're a rural agricultural
Community as you all know and um sometimes I I say to myself we see the signs around town that say right to farm and I I think right in the underneath it it should say right to burn because the number of people that want to burn or that do burn in Westport is pretty substantial uh we issue hundreds of permits throughout the open Burning
Season which runs through January 15 through May 1st regulated by the D and by the state of Massachusetts um we'll shut it down for example even though we had a fair amount of rain yesterday we're going to be shutting down burning tomorrow because we have winds forast in excess of 50
miles an hour um what happens there people will S A you know a permited fire brush pile and um often times it gets away from them uh over the last five years we had about 30 Acres burn over the last 20 years we had about 80 acres
burn throughout Town um we respond to probably roughly between 1 to 150 uh outdoor related fires a year um anything from an unauthorized burn it can just be a simple small fire that maybe gets away a little out of hand and then you know fullblown brush fires
where we're in the woods dealing with several Acres of of land being consumed traditionally we see that more towards the end of The Burning Season um we're pretty lenient with open burning this time of year because in a sense we we kind of want people to get it out of the way before uh things do start to dry up
before we see those spring winds kick in um what one of the things that we're seeing which you know is most likely contributed to the change in our climate is a lack of snowfall and a lack of snowfall throughout the winter certainly contribut in our area to the increased
risk of brush fires when you don't have that snow pack covering the the leaf litter or the pee um it tends to dry off quickly and one of the things that we do see is fires especially during the fall fires burning deep into the ground and
um we had one fire residents were admittedly Burning uh several days befor hand we had this was during the fall when it was very dry we had the winds pick up and the fire actually followed the root line probably a good maybe 6 8 Ines under the ground and then you know
the wind uh fueled it and fanned it and it sprung up in another part of the property that's not uncommon in our area especially the the portions of our town the wooded areas that haven't been touched in hundreds of years um you know you'll see you'll see the the fire actually dig under burn underneath into
the Pete um in terms of what what can we do I mean you you know open burning as I said in a town like Westport it's it's necessary in many places is um the transfer station does not accept brush so the residents have a which if that's something that you know if you were
asking me for what what can be done on the town side they may want to look at at accepting brush uh I'm sure there's an expense behind that I don't see it as being a money maker for the town like recycling I believe the town profits a little bit on that um I know the town of dth that one time and I don't know if
they still do they had a very large uh very large wood chipper and they would uh chip the brush and I believe they recycled it as mulch mulch in itself can be a can be a danger um in certain areas people tend to you know discard cigarettes into them and mulch catches
fire very quickly um but as far as um giving the residents a place to bring brush they can bring leaves and whatnot to uh the transfer station but last I knew they do not accept brush that might be something that your committee mate want to look at is that might reduce the
the number of Permitting that we have to uh perable fires that we have to allow um people may be more inclined to bring their brush to the dump rather than burn it um we also um you with increased um
brush fires and brush fire seasons and whatnot if you know the climate continues to evolve the way it is um obviously smoke and smoke inhilation and and respiratory um problems are are of concern even the California wildfires or
actually I'm sorry the Canadian wildfires not this past summer but I believe the summer before if everybody remembers there was a haze over Westport it was wild and we were getting calls every day people reporting you know fire in the area and it was it was the smoke uh coming down from Canada so you know
um I'm not sure what the process would be on the town side or the committee side but making sure that people have you know proper ventilation in their homes you whether it be through a you know air conditioners you kind of got to be careful if it's intaking air from the outside in that can create more problems but maybe opening up you know certain
cooling centers or or things of that nature um providing you know the elderly with rides to and from their their doctor's appointments to get medications they may need to help with any respiratory uh ailment that they may have as a result of uh you know
increased smoke Etc from wildfires um we did receive an email from these District firen they're expecting a busy season again the lack of snow cover this uh winter is is of concern there hasn't been a whole lot of rain we're still sort of recovering from the drought last
fall um they do do prescribe Burns in Fall River and Freetown on a regular basis in Westport um the last prescrib burn I think we that may have occurred in Westport was on Gooseberry and that's conducted by DCR not not the town uh most of the private Wild Land and
Westport is privately owned to my knowledge and so prescrib burns on something that you would normally see in Westport um as far as what people can do to kind of protect their homes mulch again is is a is a is a real concern especially with vinyl sighing often
times you'll see the vinyl siding go all the way down to the ground levels people want to you know make it aesthetically pleasing and they trying to hide the hide the foundation or the cement work on the house um then you'll see the mulch buted right up against it um you
know things like spontaneous combustion but for me I'm always more concerned about discarded cigarettes and smoking material uh getting into mulch again up against vinyl vinyl is essentially a fuel once it gets going it's going to rapidly accelerate a house fire um you
know the fire department could assist the the the climate uh Committee in terms of um public announcements we have a a pretty active um social media page uh things as simple as not parking a vehicle on on leaves or Tall Grass a lot
of times people don't realize they Park in a field or what have you and uh you know the catalytic converter and the exhaust is extremely hot and that absolutely will U create a fire which then can spread into our our wooded areas um around town and um we have a new brush
truck on order and that so that actually will be extremely helpful in in combating fires that we we do come across in our town and allowing us to mitigate them uh more more quickly and efficiently um we do have a member of our department that works for DCR on the
forest um team he's actually been out west on more than one occasion to to battle wildfires out there he's certainly a resource one of the things that we saw in the last couple of years um with DCR is actually coming to our town self- dispatching in some ways they
they hear us on the radios and there they're dispatching out which has been extremely helpful they bring a lot of knowledge they bring the right equipment tools uh added manpa which we which we desperately need um so that's always a big help um another thing that we're we're absolutely seeing and again being
on the department for such a long time something I I haven't seen But the Gypsy moth infestation maybe going back 10 years ago now um has led to uh numerous dead and decaying trees throughout town and so one of the more interesting things
that we're seeing over the last couple years is we're having fires actually burning up high up into the trees sort of what you would see I normally see on TV when you're seeing these fires out west again normally most of our fires are ground level back moving we don't usually see them up into the trees the
way we're seeing them over the last couple of years um maybe three years ago we had a brush Barre in drift road we had a call on the bur County tree tree team they're experts at falling trees um trees were actually coming down around our members we had to remove them um from the area uh Highway Department was
dispatched last spring I believe uh to assist us with their bucket truck in in cutting down some of these trees we have to make sure obviously the fire is fully extinguished before we clear the scene we can't just um allow them to burn up into the uh up into the trees but it's something that I personally don't recall
seeing I'm sure things that you know happen in cycles and maybe once upon a time that did happen but absolutely seeing um what I believe is is probably the Gypsy moth uh infestation that happened several years ago is now um you know between falling trees into the
roadways and things like that during storms certainly we're seeing uh fires as I said burn up into these trees hidden pockets of Fire up into these trees uh that we really didn't see before um so you know to that to that effect you know public service
announcement to to Property Owners or encouraging the town with with town-owned property to uh do what we can to try and remove some of those trees limit those those those risks to not only to our firefighters but to the public in general um and and things of that
nature um and that you know that's you know another thing I you know that comes to my mind when we talk about route is as we we know Westport you may or may not know Westport uh only has hydrant in about 20% of the town the Northwest
portion of town typically around White's Restaurant uh we are seeing some added hydrants now on Route six and up around uh gfid road which will certainly be helpful but in the south end of town they they're on none um and uh we have some sisters around town now in the
South End 10,000 gallon tanks in the ground any any new development with three houses or more has to have um at least one system put in for every 800 feet every so many houses so that's helpful uh a lot of the ponds that we used to pull water from i' I've noticed
uh as you know as Property Owners change as things change hands maybe as we rely on uh different sources of water Adamsville Pond we have a dry hydrant there now if you go down um Heading by the I think it's called The Daily Grind you'll see that uh pipe
red and white pipe coming up out of the pond that's a dry hydrant that's actually for our access we can pull water out of the pond so primarily we'll go to those areas now we the days of us kind of pulling up to a pond and and pulling water from it sort of going by the wayside um but you know at the same time a lot of those ponds are dried up a
majority of the Year especially during the drought conditions and access to them especially when they're privately owned I've noticed a lot of these areas have become overgrown um Westport Marine on Main Road I'm sorry uh we used to pull water from there all the time back when I
first got on in the uh late 1990s early 2000 and you drive by there now you can't even tell there's a pond there anymore so you know that that's certainly a concern of us is is obviously water puts out fire and the lack of it um the lack of hydrant in the South End the lack of
of areas um for us to pull water from is always of a concern um we certainly change our tactics and strategy we call for tankers often we call for tankers quickly now and get them on the road um we can always cancel them those are usually coming from outside of our
community um so so we you know we have a lot of resources a lot of mutual a agreements and and very very good working relationships with our surrounding fire departments to help us in these situations um but yeah the risk is real um you know hopefully we you know we we hope we'll never see what we saw on
California on this area I think we're you know can it happen sure it can happen I don't know if it would be as as Grave as we saw over there um again just topography alone with the hillsides and the homes built on the hillsides and piled on top of each other that that makes a lot of uh that you know the
sustain winds makes it a challenge um but we have our challenges uh here in Westport as well as I mentioned um and that's sort of wraps my SP so Chief uh first of all thank you for
uh uh attending and and putting it thought in and sharing uh the wisdom born of experience with us uh you were on the mailing list for uh tonight's
meeting and uh there were a whole bunch of attachments and one of them was the outline of our uh draft report uh that Jeff Canton has uh been
assembling from all of our task forces and it's right now it's about 18 pages but this is still kind of halfway between an outline and a report to the
select board and uh it's uh assembling work of all of our committees in agriculture uh Public Health water uh and so on um and when we start to get
this more fully developed um there's going to be an extensive uh public Outreach with Community meetings and you know anywhere we can find five people gathered together could be in somebody's kitchen
we're going to be talking about this and so uh uh just the 15 minutes you just took with risk assessment and what you can do about it you know if that ends up in this report it ends up in community
outreach and public education and as you said recommendations of things the town can do uh and recommendations that people can do like don't pile mulch up against finyl sighting or don't park you
know on brush pretty basic stuff but uh it makes a difference between whether someone loses their home or not uh and believe me I I've had my house burned to to a total loss you don't want to lose
your home uh you don't want to lose your home so um I really thank you and uh uh want you to consider um uh having a a team take just
like the 15 minutes that you just said and saying C can we take the opportunity of what this report is going to turn into in terms terms of a document where the immediate charge is
it's a report to the select board but it's also going to get distributed in any way we can think of to all the people businesses organizations in Westport with
recommendations and I'd love to see what you just said in 15 minutes Incorporated in in this so we'd love to be in touch with you or whoever you say we should be in touch with to make sure what you just
said is part of that because I found that really helpful useful assessments and recommendations Chief thank you you're welcome yeah I I can we definitely continue to work on on on uh
the documentation and I'll also reach out to uh DCR for some of their advice and what they see out out in the field as well as the department of fire Services I'm sure they would have uh a lot of data that I may not have here that would you know just bring some some
light to the risk thank you now um I note that we've had a few other people join Bob dalor and um we're now up to I think 12 people which is a
quorum and before anything else happens on the agenda there is approval of three sets of minutes July 18th September 19th both of which we have discussed in
the past and no one found any errors there and uh December uh 5th which was our last meeting which was distributed I read those minutes I thought they were excellent
I would love to have a motion to approve all all of those uh minutes Mo uh Jim whiton has made a motion to approve the three sets of minutes is there a second a second second Jake mcgan I saw I mean half the
people seconded but I I saw Jake first Jake second any uh discussion uh John uh we we have to just so you know we have to call a roll on uh minutes we have to call a roll on minutes for online votes yeah we have to
call the rooll oh all right Michael would you call the rooll yeah Sean leech yeah you're gonna have to unmute yourself to call a rooll and SE all right here he is John hi hi hi Bob
dlor G to unmute Bob this is the only vote we're taking so okay thank you constant Kei hi Jake mcgan hi Jim whiton hi John
Boward hi Mark resm hi Michael yogman hi Bill Weinberg hi shz I Wendy Nicholas I did I get
everyone I guess so thanks Phil weinberg's here y he said I I am John yeah okay you got it got everyone okay hey we we did that fantastic I think that's the only vote we need to
take thank you uh and I note uh constant put in a compliment in the chat um uh thank you Dan very much for that report it was uh really good and I appreciate
your uh being willing to to add uh now as I said that uh wel uh Jeff has uh and we have distributed his um update on how to take all of the
subcommittee reports and turn them into a single report from all of the committee that would go to the select board and also be used as uh something we can then begin a
public engagement and um what I like about it is I gave him a suggested outline and he didn't pay any attention to what to my suggestion at all uh and I thought that may that that's evidence of a guy who's
really thinking ignore your chair and I thought it was much smarter than my idea and uh uh but this is very different than what we looked at I think at our last meeting and uh and so and I'm sorry
uh this is a busy time for Jeff in his in his business this he can't be here to go through this so what I urge you to do is take a look at it for example the last page has all these greens and reds
and yellows I don't know what really this means in terms of how far along each of the Committees are uh so I think we're going to need to spend some time um with Jeff on uh explaining how this
works but uh read it uh think about is does It capture how you envision this report should be and again it's an
outline uh you all have done more work than what is in here this is conceptual in some ways um and so think about how the work you have done and the work you still
planned to do fits into this and then at the uh next meeting on May 21st 28 20 no May 28th just testing you uh we'll uh we'll go over this more uh with Jeff any
questions on this I don't see any hands up so I'm going to assume uh you're going to look at at this and then we'll have this on the agenda Michael and Dia will you note down this is a fuller discussion for
next week and let's pray to goodness uh that Jeff can make the 28th um all right now um next
uh I uh reached out uh to uh Dean Michael Goodman at uh UMass Dartmouth and said uh uh Michael uh UMass Dartmouth is an incredible
resource in our area happens to be located on Old Westport Road uh anyway that your facility with all its incredible faculty all its amazing students would want to get engaged with
the climate resilience committee and uh he said abs absolutely and um he set up uh first one meeting then another meeting then another meeting and we have uh with us uh Chad
Maguire and I don't see nefi here with us so Chad uh we met with uh nefi uh B Po and with Gavin Fay and with John Quinn from the uh Law School um and uh
to see uh there's so many incredible advantages of the resource that is UMass Dartmouth uh one of them is that climate resilience as we all know has many many
different dimensions well guess what so does you m dmouth you know economics Marine science uh you know uh socioeconomics you name it not to mention uh data
aggregation uh uh uh graphic design they they do everything and uh and so uh uh Dia Michael uh Jeff and I had several meetings with them and
they've got uh uh a a tremendous Grant uh to help work with communities and Westport still with the exception of the city of New Bedford is the only town uh
working on the issue of resilience and so we told them what we're doing they told us what they're doing uh and we're starting to look at hey how can we work together and uh so
they they looked at the outline that uh Jeff has put together that kind of summarizes our work to uh and uh they said uh well here's how we might uh help
and with that I think uh let me ask first of all Michael burus you want to add anything to my introduction before I asked Chad uh to give the perspective of the University sure so you covered some of the
background of it um what we have done is provided UMD with the potential um list of tasks to collaborate on um that was shared prior to this meeting um and so I think tentatively umd's agreed to help
support some of the the or support the CRC in um drafting a full climate resilience report so the way we've talked about that working is that UMD would start this process by reviewing
the existing subcommittee reports um that everyone has drafted as well as the draft report outline that um Jeff has prepared and then they would take that and identify gaps additional data analyses things like that that could
enhance our existing content and um so then I guess the way this has kind of been conceptualized that the the CRC would um regularly meet with UMD um to work on that project plan and
the timeline and then offer suggestions or wish list items um to UMD uh again this is kind of at a conceptual level right now it's not not like we have anou in place or anything um with UMD but we're we're really interested in um
pursuing this because I think it it will greatly um expand the crc's capacity to get this document um fully fledged and uh and into a nice packaged you know professionall looking document that we
can publish great thanks uh Michael uh so let let me introduce Chad Maguire and uh he's um Chad you want to introduce yourself and then and tell people how
you see this going we're still at the very early stages and uh I want to when you're done I want to ask people for their comments and and see how many people uh want want to be engaged in
this partnership with us sure thanks John and thanks Michael so I think um my name is Chad McGuire um lifelong resident born and raised uh born in New Bedford raised in Dartmouth um I actually was a million years ago the adopt a watershed coordinator for
Westport River Watershed Alliance for about a year before I left for San Diego to go to law school but I'm back here I've been here for a while I'm a professor of public policy um at UMass Dartmouth excuse me I've had a some sort of a cold there that won't go away I don't know if anybody else has had this
fun thing but so excuse my voice as it uh as it flails but so um yeah so I I work at the University I work on environment I'm an environmental science background environmental law um I work mostly in the policy field um I do a lot of coastal resiliency nefi is another
person that was mentioned she's an environmental engineer um she's come here recently from the University of Connecticut um she does a lot of uh sort of help with communities in developing sort of uh plans when communities have
hazardous substances this is her past working with EPA grants mostly um developing redeveloping hazardous substance areas and working mostly in low-income communities mostly in Connecticut that's her past history but now she's in Massachusetts and also New Hampshire so on and so forth New England
area and we also have Gavin Fay so just a quick background um we do a lot of work we have all of the normal things we need to do all of the stuff that the normal we're just individual professors um we don't have a center or something like that in if F has her lab Gavin has her lab I do my work it's mostly I do
like in Miami uh and in other areas of the country um but I've done work here I actually was on the Stewardship Council DCR for about eight years uh so I know uh the local stuff pretty well um here in Massachusetts but we all do our work and the things that we do um we were given
this opportunity with a large Grant the Grant's not for us the grant has been dispersed in a thousand different ways for the University but there was a large grant money uh funded by the legislature to develop the Marine economy the mar you know the blue economy here in Massachusetts and a lot of that money has been spent on a lot of different things or it's being spent on a lot of
different things in that vein um some money was given to uh nefi uh submitted a proposal I submitted a separate proposal Gavin submitted a separate proposal for different things that we do um our proposals were kind of combined we all do different things and we put together as a sort of proposal by Mike
Goodman in the provos office and we were given some money and our proposal now is this idea of this this sort of like um technical assistance to communities um generally speaking for blue economy initiatives but we all deal with Coastal I mean so Gavin's Coastal resiliency for
mess Mass I'm Coastal resiliency from the policy side and uh you know nefeli is working with communities on uh resiliency planning in general um again mostly in in certain context that are a little bit different um but so that we're trying to figure out so really we
were given money to plan to figure out how we could build out the expertise we have at the University and build it into something that could be the sort of thing that was available to community so you know Westport was already happening this is something John contacted Mike uh you know we we're at the very early
stages of our trying to figure out what it is how we can connect connect and do these things but one of the things that nefeli pointed out is these types of reports are something that she does regularly in the type of work that she does for the communities these it's not exactly the same but she does these kinds of reports it's not exactly what I do I do mostly the sort of planning
decision-making architecture uh help people with how they make decisions I try to present some of that I send some to John and uh that idea of like what's the what what's a a good way to do this in a way that might lead to other benefits down the road right so planning it out like how do we want to do this and how can this help us in the future
like not just today but help us in other ways how can it you know kill two birds with one stone terrible saying but you know the idea is you know doing multiple things with one thing um so we're here um I think nefeli and I mostly because Gavin is busy right now doing a few other things but he might
come in later with some sort of implementation help the idea that after a report but I think that what Michael said is the thing that's most right there is a wish list of things there are more things than we can handle we're not the university and there are other resources our University um and we might
be able to get those resources Associated together and some of them might be able to be deployed in this way but just so you understand as everybody understands nobody's nobody's just sitting around at the University waiting for something to do everybody's busy doing a bunch of things so we're trying to figure out how we can make this thing
uh maybe as an example of something we could do uh in helping you do what you're trying to do it's not an easy thing because we didn't start at the beginning you guys have been doing this for years so our the kind of that I could give probably would have been at the planning stage the best help or it's
more at the how do we now use this effectively that's the kind of things that I do um there are things that I can do now I think I can help uh in in terms of drafting the report just what I basically what Michael pointed out this idea of you know looking through I've looked through the chapters we have a
meeting tomorrow with Jeff uh nefeli and I U at you know so we're going to talk with Jeff a little bit more about that I just saw your chapters um and the details and of course there's this outline I don't think the outline has a lot of the chapter material in it but there's that General sort of generic outline of a report it's just one of the
things that's interesting to me is usually there's this sort of unifying sort of and I think you do have generally speaking a framework but maybe it was a little wider at first but you know there's a a unifying you know I I think we can help in a number of ways it's just a matter of the things that we can do is is something that you want you know to help with it's something that
would be useful to you um but there are definitely things that we can do at the very least like at the end with um you know if you need help with preparing the report making the report look really nice you know look like a Prof you know that kind of thing with nice pictures and nice graphs and some information um but again we'll be talking with Jeff a
little bit more about that tomorrow and I think there should be an ongoing process as much as there can be with time on both sides to try to sort of refine that but that's so this is think of it as a very organic thing like a first date like we really don't know we're trying to figure it out but you know hey we both like these things and
maybe we could be helpful to each other mostly we could be helpful to you I think the university um and that way and then um it could be it it could be just helping you draft the report something that you can then use in parlay I think you already have a serid I think Mike in a previous email you identified you
already got partners with the Watershed alliance with serid with moving forward maybe with some grants and some community outreach in that way and that's great and that's perfect baton has passed on the relay continues you move on and that's great but we're always there maybe um as a resource as a potential resource um but it's a matter
of sort of matching and because we weren't here just so you understand because weren't here at the very beginning when you first started it's hard to sort of know how to best help at this stage based on what resources we might have that sort of thing so there's a lot of sort of like unknowns at this moment at least from from my end and
from our end but I think nefi is adamant about the idea of at least helping in the drafting which I think is something we can definitely handle and basically what Michael outlined but I think we can do more too I just don't know thanks Chad very much uh any questions of of Chad or Michael or me on
this uh uh beginning partnership constant you've got your hand raised um yes well Michael uh burus was nice enough to send me I'm trying to find it now to send me a sort of um
proposal I guess that uh collaboration topics um that I guess the the UMass Dartmouth had given um suggested and I just want to say that uh Chad um I mean
I'm not sure I'm a the number three um I don't know if anybody got this except for me to look at which was it was helpful because it gave me a little heads up before the meeting I I'm not sure who else has read it but
um the uh item number three makes me a little bit uh nervous and I just want to let Chad know that in item number three in case you haven't read it is um assistant developing a cross cut cutting
chapter presenting best available I'm having a hard time reading it climate change indicators and projections for Westport to be reference throughout the report I think that there has been for a
long time a little easiness and a little um uh disagreement within the committee in terms of uh I think a few of us at least me I'll just speak for myself um
doesn't want to see this climate resiliency report turn into yet another climate um change sort of I'm just going to say it outright
sort of fear-mongering using the most extreme data and this is all going to happen to you if you don't do this and that so I'm just hoping that um that that piece of it will uh be something that is based on uh on numbers that make
sense and also doesn't just sort of take over the report Constance let me uh reply to that because we talked about that exactly in one of our first meetings and Jeff has been very strong
about this as well uh which is that we want to put the emphasis on resilience not on climate change that and let me give an example uh and I think Bob dalor who's uh with us as well and his head of
the infrastructure uh Team uh feels this way and I think a lot of people do uh that that it's much more important to talk about things as an example uh if if we know sea level is
going to rise and therefore uh low-lying roads that are evacuation routes uh should be elevated or strengthened uh then that's an issue of resilience that when you have an
opportunity or you have funding to strengthen or Elevate low-lying roads that are evacuation routes that makes a community more resilient uh now that's putting the
emphasis on resilience saying that sea level is going to rise X feet by 2025 or 2050 that's uh putting the emphasis on
climate change or you know getting into arguments about uh projections and that's when you get into arguments over um what whose projection should you use and I think it's better
for this group to uh Focus the discussion on things that make us resilient and to just keep that example elevating low-lying roads that are evacuation routes just make sense
because sea level's going to rise somewhat somewhere and it's more you know it doesn't really matter whether it's in 25 years or 50 years elevating low-lying evacuation routes makes sense when you have the resources you should
do it rather than arguing whether it's going to rise a foot in 25 years or 50 years does that does that make sense to you Constance uh yeah and I I appreciate your um uh elaborating on that it was
very interesting at the barrier Beach meeting last night where they were talking about the possibility of uh raising East Beach Road and a couple of people were talking I think one woman from the state and and somebody else from uh I guess it's the woods ho group
we talking about that that wasn't always a very good idea it seemed like it would be but that often that the front piece of that would would it that anything that was along like a body of water like
the ocean that it might actually um make uh the what do I want to call it the wash out or the um the worse that it might actually have exactly the opposite uh effect that you think it's going to
have with a with a elevated road so I mean all that can be talked about but I found that fascinating because it seemed like such a you know such a well yeah you elevate the road and that helps keep it from getting flooded but um I don't know so there's a lot to be learned here
and uh um that's why I'm kind of fascinated with the barrier Beach committee I think it'll be a very interesting well my point is I think we want to put the emphasis on resilient what makes a community resilient as opposed to projection so yes I hope so thank you
okay any other I put this in in the chat but I I just wanted to say that the list was developed by Jeff Canton so I I think we have um an understanding with withd that um they want to help us with the priorities that we're setting
through the CRC and not vice versa so I just just wanted to to throw that out there that that that came from um from the the CRC via the Outreach and engagement subcommittee Jim whiten has his hand up Jim yeah I I think that uh Jeff's
um uh draft is really going in the right direction and I think most of the things are focused as you say John on resilience and not necessarily just on climate resilience and I just put into the chat
a link to what serpent has been doing uh for a regional resilience plan uh it's very interesting to read it takes a little different tact than than ours but it may be informative so I hope
everybody can see that well that I'm glad you point that out because as Chad said uh we've got I I think this partnership will be you know us and I think one of the
things that attracts UMD to Westport is that UMass Dartmouth has I I wouldn't call it a mandate but an interest in working with communities and uh and communities here
as opposed to Connecticut and um and that Westport uh while it would have been nice for us to in start this discussion a few years ago while we're starting it
now I and uh that if we figure this out uh a resilience and and as Chad mentioned and Michael mentioned serad is involved too and as I joke Jim whiten has been uh uh
westport's uh person on serad since before there was serad uh and uh you know so uh so if we uh if we produce
a report uh I think with the uh expertise uh available with professors like nefi and Chad and Gavin and other
people they can draw on as needed um it's going to be uh a lot better report than if it's just uh us and it's going to therefore provide better service to the people of Westport
but once it's done it's also going to be I guarantee it copied by Dartmouth tiveron you know you name it and uh it's going to be a service to the region uh
and uh and S and sered is going to help distribute it UMass dartmouth's going to help and and it will uh it will spread I was going to say it'll spread like wildfire but I don't know if the chief
is still with us here I I won't use that analogy so the I want to explain the sered piece a little bit so we've been talking with sered about getting their assistance with helping with um community outreach and and engagement uh
in a similar way that we're doing with the MVP 2.0 program but on a much larger scale and over a a longer time frame so we're we're looking at applying for a two-year Grant through the um MVP uh action Grant and I I'll talk a
little bit about that when we get to that uh agenda item I don't want to derail this conversation but um serit is the value and in partnering with them is that they're embedded in the community and there's a little bit of a mutually beneficial relationship with them
partnering with us on this um kind of as a pilot for themselves because then they can take our model to other communities within in the region um and serit is also going to be um they're they're a little bit more affordable than using a
typical private consultant so that helps give us a little bit more spread for the uh for each dollar that we're spending um and yeah I think you know as Town staff I think you all know that uh we're all spread pretty thin and so we if we can tap into that capacity and get seret
out in the community to assist with the community engagement that again I mean we'll definitely be trying to um bring in residents um right now I'm working on trying to bring in students from um from Westport schools there are a number of
students who are going to send me um letters of interest to participate in this initiative later on next year um so we really want to get the community involved as much as possible but sered will be there to be that interface to help you know get events coordinated and
to staff those events and and things like that all if I could just add John if I could just add a little bit about the the link that I just sent around and Michael's going to send it again after the meeting is they are looking for
feedback on their plan as well um and I think in no small part um they started this after we started our committee and we are still I think the only uh municipality within the serid
region of 27 towns and cities that are doing this so I thank you Jim one sec Phil um uh Kim uh uh put in the chat that she was good glad to see uh
UMD uh involved uh I I just want to say based on Kim's uh comment that Kim from The Watershed Alliance has been working uh uh very hard and effectively to
involve the Westport schools and the issue of resilience uh is uh one where the ultimate uh constituency is future
generations and so uh one challenge I think Chad that I would lay out for you and I've mentioned this before is if there are ways that as Kim is involving uh the Westport schools uh for you uh
and nefi and Gavin if you can find ways to involve students as well a at UMD uh that would be exciting uh Phil uh Weinberg has his hand raised um I just
want to Circle back um you know on the point uh that Constance was raised and one of the things that I think um mitigates against the concerns about what she characterized as fearmongering
is that um the charter which I think was also part of the package of the committee was really to focus on um where we'll be in 2050 and if you look at the different models of climate change and where they
begin to diverge it's in the out years in the in the next you know what 25 years now all those models are actually quite close together um and for me when
I wrote the uh um when I wrote the Health Report with a committee it was to me it was really important to look at the quantitative projections which the state had developed in its in its two plans in order to understand what the
magnitude of the risk was that is how many extreme heat days are we going to have in 20 uh you know in in 2050 um to understand the magnitude of the problem and so as much as I agree with you that
we really do have to focus on resilience activities and what we can do I think being able to go through the process of risk analysis and waiting it is really important to you know to come up with the quantitative data and and
try to convince not try to convince educate people that well you may not see that as a problem around but over the next 20 years it could look like this and that's a great Point Phil thank you good point uh other questions if not I want
to move on we're after six o'clock okay uh Michael you have some uh Grant fund in update I will say again as I've said before Michael and his team are Wizards
at getting uh money coming into the town of Westport like no one's ever seen Michael you're on it's a it's a group effort I mean we have a lot of great Community Partners that we work with on different stuff like Buzzard's Bay Coalition and the
Watershed Alliance so um yeah it's not just just us I we we all work as a team here so anyway um uh just an update on our barrier Beach planning grants these are uh it's a coastal zone management Grant and a munus pole vulnerability
planning Grant um that we're now implementing as consant had said earlier we had a really good meeting yesterday with the barrier Beach planning committee uh we just kicked that off with Woods whole group and they're going to be working on developing the existing
uh kind of Baseline conditions plans for for the for the barrier Beach management plans that will will be developing and they've started that through um recently through surveying they're doing some sediment analysis and they're taking all of the many many studies that have been
done in these areas at at Atlantic Avenue Beach Avenue and East Beach and synthesizing all of that um to inform the Baseline conditions of the plan so we're going to have an extensive public engagement process for this it's it's a really quick timeline un unfortunately
we have to be done with um the CDM Grant in July and then the MVP Grant will extend or excuse me the czm grant through June and then the MVP Grant will be extended a little bit through July um our first public engagement for this is
going to be it's tentatively scheduled for March 20th at 6m at the Westport Library um St just stay tuned for that because like I said we're we're not quite sure if it's going to be um there's some talk yesterday about it being in a virtual format so that might
change but I think we're pretty solid on March 20th but we'll put out a notice um on the town's website for that um and so then at the end of this process uh Conant to answer your question it's it's based on when our contracts with the state are uh for the
grant contracts are up um that's why it's such a quick turnaround and they uh have made it very clear that under no circumstance are we going our grantor or grantee is going to be able to extend those deadlines um so yeah I mean it's just unfortunately it's just what what
we have to work with um so so Woods Hole is going to be preparing the beach management plans that are going to be a draft they're not going to quite go through the whole permitting phase um with D um just due to these timelines um but
these plans will include an Alternatives analyses that's they're going to try to balance various interests at the beaches um with techniques that can slow erosion and they will incorporate cost estimates for these types of projects um we're we're going to really emphasize taking
into consideration the town's constrained Financial capacity to make large scale um Investments and then after all of this is taken together um the town would then need to look for funding sources which will be identified in the plan to advance some of those
projects that will be recommended Ed and um to then take the beach management plans to full pering um so that's a just quick overview of what's going on with that all right so I'll move on to the
next Grant um which is the B Co bank community Assistance Grant I guess this this is actually a fund that bay Coast has um to support different initiatives in in the region and Jeff and I had
applied um to support the development of the C crc's report and we were awarded a $7,500 Grant um a couple months ago this grant is UN unconditional so we can really use it for anything um the only
request from them is that whatever deliverables or and events that we put out we just acknowledge their support of the project um and this grant is you it's small but it's actually going to be pretty impactful for the next grant that I want to talk about because we can use
the $7,500 for match um on the municipal vulnerability preparedness Grant um and this is a grant that we are currently working on applying for right now it is
due on April 4th we will be submitting for a two-year Outreach and engagement campaign um focused on community resilience and informing the develop or the community the engagement will be um in service of informing the development
of the community or excuse me the um climate resilience plan um we had submitted an eoi for this a couple of months ago and uh Courtney Roa who is also on this committee and is our MVP
Regional rep thought that it would be um highly competitive especially given some of the support that we've received from um the Westport River Watershed Alliance the interest from Westport schools and having students participate in in this project um as well as um the potential
collaboration with UMD um so we'll be applying for this in the coming month um fortunately uh and this year they've actually waved the um for Rural and small towns the
requirement that you provide match so the $7,500 in match that we have that in place already I think is going to give us an extra bump in the review process to show that yes we have resources committed to this um we also have
institutional support from places like UMD um we could also uh with UMD calculate that as in kind to further bolster our application so I think we have a really a pretty strong chance of of uh uh getting this getting this grant as
long as we have a a strong application itself so as for a timeline for this um as I said the applications are due in early April on April 4th the pro program is expecting to announce Awards in
probably mid June late June and then the project would have to start in September um and then at which point we would embark on the the um um start start the uh uh the community engagement
with sered is who who we're intending on working with as as I had discussed earlier uh do you need a motion to endorse that uh application uh if the the committee would feel inclined to endorse it that would be great because then we could get a little I think we
should do that is there a motion to endorse that application Bob daylor do you move that yes I I I move that IND doy application is there a second TR seconds now do you have to do a roll call again we do have
to call roll and we also don't have a quorum right now you sure we don't have a quorum yet uh we have 16 people and couple of folks aren't on the committee so yeah we we don't have quum
to take a vote I'm sorry I could you please tell me again I must missed it what is it that we're V what what project are we voting on what is this project the the uh Municipal vulnerability preparedness grant that
Michael just uh described we're endorsing that application but it seems like we're just gonna have to have consensus rather than a vote if we don't have quorum we have 10 people so are we applying for money to help produce this report I'm
sorry to be so dense I'm just like there's we have 10 people we have 10 people here we have a quorum 10 people okay I do not I do not hear a challenge to a qu call a rooll so wa so constant had a question though constant so
Constance this is the Michael the Grant application he's creating he can say that our committee endorsed it yeah and and this grant is to um so as a part of any any uh Community planning document
we want to make sure that we're getting out in the community and talking to people and making sure that we're getting a finger on the pulse of where the community's resilience priorities are and getting them involved with developing Solutions and so the purpose
of this grant is to solely uh be used for funding that public engagement to inform the development of the resilience priorities and Solutions in the climate resilience report thank
you uh any other questions it's been moved and seconded we have a quorum would you call a rooll sure Bob dlor hi conston ski sure Jake
McAn hi Jim White hi John Boward hi Michael yogman hi Phil Weinberg hi Sean leech hi sha AZ hi Wendy Nicholas
hi and that's it so the motion carries okay uh that is the end of the agenda anything else anyone wants to bring up our next meeting date is Wednesday May
28th and it will be in person and uh Michael will uh find a site for us to meet that uh holds 20 people or so John yes John it's Wendy I I just
wanted to let you know I texted Jeff Canton to make sure that he could attend that you that seemed to be kind of critical says yes he may he's available thank you Wendy for thinking brain's working the brain's
working very good all right um if there's no other business uh tomorrow night 7 o'clock the Westport High School basketball team plays at home may be an opportunity for you all
or us all to see the greatest basketball player in the his history of Westport just some information there very resilient uh motion to adjourn so move second no roll call I
don't think all in favor I