##VIDEO ID:Hz1_ThGHT_A## good chair notes the time is 6:05 p.m. I call this meeting of the ammer zoning board of appeals to order my name is Steve judge as evba chair I want to welcome everyone to this meeting we'll begin with the Roll Call of the zba members imp panel for the two items uh special permit applications later tonight Steve judge is present Mr Craig Meadows Mr everal Henry here Mr Mr Philip White present Mr David sler present the Quorum is present also attending the public hearing tonight is Hilda green balm alternate member John Varner an alternate member David alfeld alternate member as well we also have Jonathan Murray um with KP law who's going to do a presentation on solar and staff of course our esteemed staff Chris brup and jenta Williams are also in attendance tonight pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021 extended by chapter 2 of the acts of 2023 this meeting will be conducted via remote means members of the publish who wish to observe the meeting May do so via Zoom or by telephone no in-person attendance of the members of the public will be permitted but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time via technological means the zoning board of appeals is a quasi judicial body that operates under the authority of chapter 4 the general laws of the Commonwealth with the purpose of promoting the health safety convenience and general welfare of the inhabitants of the town of amist in accordance with the provisions of Massachusetts general laws chapter 4A and article 10 special permit granting authority of the AR amest zoning board zoning bylaw this public meeting has been duly advertised and notice thereof has been posted and mailed to parties of Interest all hearings and members are open and meetings are open to the public and are recorded by Town staff it may be viewed via the town of amherst's YouTube channel and the zba web page the procedure is as follows the petitioner presents the application to the board during the hearing after which the board will ask questions for clarification or to gather additional information after the board has completed its questions the board shall seek public input the public speaks with the permission of the chair if a member the public wishes to speak they should SE inate by using the raised hand function on their screen or by pressing star9 on their phone the chair with the assistance of the staff will call upon people wishing to speak when you are recognized please provide your name and address to the board for the record all questions and comments must be addressed to the board the board will normally hold public hearings where the information about the project and input from the public is gathered followed by public meetings for each the public meeting portion is when the board deliberates and is generally not an opportunity for public comment if the board feels it has enough information in time it will decide upon the applications tonight each petition heard by the board is distinct and evaluated on its own merits and the board is not ruled by precedent statutorily for the special permit the board has 90 days from the close of the hearing to file a decision for a variance the board has 100 days from the date of filing for the variance to file its decision no decision is final until the written decision is signed by the sitting board members and is filed with the town clerk's office once the decision is filed with the town clerk there's a 20day appeal period for an agreed party to contest the decision with the relevant body judicial body and Superior Court after the appeal period the permit must be recorded at the registry of De to take effect tonight's agenda consideration of approval of the minutes from July 25th and August 8th 2024 and a public meeting where Jonathan Murray from KP law will discuss the legal aspects of solar permitting and is a training session for zba members we have a public hearing on zba FY 20253 Amorous development Associates LLC request for a special permit under sections 9.22 non-conforming uses and 3.32 six fraternity or sorority building social dormatory or S similar use related to amoris college hamster college or the University of Massachusetts to alter a pre-existing non-conforming use of a hotel or motel to a social dormatory on the prises located at 3:45 North Pleasant Street map 11c parcel 250 in the RG General residence zoning District this is continued from August 8th and zba FY 20251 YG Chestnut 161 LLC request for a special permit under sections 3.3 211 non owner occupied duplex to change the land use Cal classification from owner occupied duplex to non-owner occupied duplex on the premises of one 161 Chestnut Street map 11d parcel 66 in the RG General residence zoning District following that we have general public discussion on matters not before the board tonight other business not anticipated within the last 48 hours and so the first order of business is consideration of the minutes have people had a chance to read over the minutes from the previous meetings and do we have any um suggestions alterations or amendments to those minutes I found them satisfactory in fact I found them pretty good all right if there are no questions or concerns uh or no suggestions for amendments I would entertain a motion to approve the minutes from the two meetings of um August get that right August 8th and July 25th do I have such a motion so so moved is there a second second been moved and seconded to approve the the minutes from TW July 25th and August 8th any discussion on that motion if not the vote occurs on the motion I vote I chair votes I Mr White I Mr Meadows I Mr sler I Mr Henry I uh the vote is five nothing the motion is approved minutes are approved uh the next order of business is a present ation from attorney general attorney Jonathan Murray I just gave you a promotion there Mr Murray on that yeah um you I know you have a a presentation and I think you have a PowerPoint or some something to share with us you go ahead and share your screen and um what we'll and we also note that we have three of our alternate members in attendance gathering information for um you know because as well as our our full memb so um go ahead and if you wish to share your screen I think that'd be the way to proceed thank you Mr chair and thank you to the members for having me tonight and to the town staff for inviting me um I'm here to talk about um solar permitting some potential legislative changes and just uh some of the case law around it I know we have you know maybe about 45 minutes for this so I will move at a deliberate Pace but if at any time you want to answer a question please just interrupt to me it's your time I want to make it useful for you and so I appreciate you having me um I also will preface by saying I have two screens so if you see me looking off in this direction I'm just looking at a second screen so I'm I'm I'm paying attention to y'all uh let me see if I can do this correctly and uh can you all see that um yes perfect thanks so um again Jon uh my name is Jonathan Mari I'm from KP law I know I've been in front of um the board before and I've been in front of the solar bylaw working group so you might have seen me in that context but um I assist the town in zoning matters um and so I'm here to talk about solar zoning legislative considerations and just kind of some generals do dos and don'ts when it comes to solar um I will preface by giving the required disclaimer that this is general information that if you have specific questions or a specific application before you you know consult with either me or another attorney in our office uh everything kind of as you know with these types of applications particular facts are are are very important so you know this is good general information but if anything specific let us know and we can help you walk it through so uh I'll start briefly with the statutory uh background behind solar zoning or I should say the solar exemption so as you all probably know 483 contains many of the Statewide exemptions for uses under zoning um you might hear them referred to as the Dober Amendment while not technically correct you might hear 483 refer to as the do Amendment uh the do Amendment really refers to the uh educational and religious uses but those are two of the uses that are referred to in in three are other uses in three such as child care facilities um as uh handicap ramps associated with residents most recently in the past couple of weeks we have as of right accessory dwelling units which I'm sure I might be be back in front of you all or a different board to give an update on that but um as it pertains to solar this is what 483 paragraph 9 says no zoning ordinance or bylaw shall prohibit or unreasonably regulate the installation of solar energy systems or the building of structures that facilitate the collection of solar energy except where necessary to protect the public health safety or welfare so that's kind of our starting point um for the regulation of solar in the Commonwealth and again it's presumed that the legislative goal is that there is a legislative goal of promoting solar energy in the Commonwealth I just say that because um um not a lot of case law on that but it's Pres presumed that that this is a sufficient legislative uh goal uh so just something to keep in mind but so that language shall not prohibit or unreasonably regulate I think it's important to kind of compare and contrast 4 A3 and compare and contrast solar with other uses um so for example paragraph two says no zoning ordinance or bylaw shall regulate or restrict the use of land or structures for religious purpose or for educational purposes um so you simply can't regulate educational or religious uses except for you know some some minor bulk or dimensional um requirements that's not the same as solar so so cities and towns and permanent boards like your own have a little bit more discretion when we're regulating solar uses uh the statute says you can't unreasonably regulate um so it's important to know that there's kind of different tiers onto you know what these exemptions are and the scope of a authority of the town to regulate them but uh solar in particular is not as strict to say religious or education makes sense I suppose um uh just just as an example because it's kind of the the news of the day the new accessory dwelling unit uh statute which comes into effect February 2nd that statute says uh towns may not prohibit unreasonably regulate or require a special permit for adus so they kind of go with the trifecta of legislative exemption language U that's not the same and I'll just F back one side so you can see it again uh the the provision in 483 says no zoning ordinance or B shall prohibit or unreasonably regulate um and so there is still some room for towns to reasonably regulate um I'm going to be talking a uh probably a lot about this case Tracer Lane it came out 2022 um it's kind of the the key case in the past couple years um analyzing 483 paragraph 9 and what cities and towns can and can't do uh but you know to connect the last two slides it provides municipalities uh with more flexibility than the statutory protection for those other uses education religion and child care uh which only allow for reasonable regulations on bulk and height so um again that's just talking about the level of scrutiny or the level of exemption afforded to solar uh so that's Tracer Lane and so any any questions so far I'm going to talk a few minutes about Tracer Lane and what that case was and its impact but any any questions on the exemption itself seeing none um so I if if you do just please interrupt me it's you know welcome many questions but so so Tracer Lane versus city of walam it came out in 2022 uh it's probably the key solar case that we have from the SJC there's been some trial court cases L court and Superior Court after this case which um rely heavily upon it and I'll say the Attorney General's office not that this is U particularly applicable to ammer anymore but the Attorney General's office when reviewing solar bylaws relies heavily on this case so uh it's pretty important um but the SJC held that where whether a bylaw facially violates the section three prohibition against unreasonable regulation is whether the bylaw restricts rather than promotes the legislative goal of promoting solar energy in the Commonwealth and so for those who might have seen my presentation probably a year or more at this point to the the solar bylaw working group we talked a lot about um the goal and intent of a solar bylaw the goal and intent of a solar bylaw needs to be at least according to the SJC and Tracer Lane promoting the legislative goal of um or should say the you promotes the legislative goal of promoting solar energy it can't be restricted with that said so long as the the purpose of the bylaw is to promote solar energy you are allowed reasonable restrictions um in in other aspects so so we'll get to that in a minute but I think it's important um to keep that Duality if you will in mind you know does the bylaw promote rather than restrict solar uh and that's the first analysis point for trial courts and appell courts in Massachusetts to determine whether the bylaw violates 483 or is in Conformity so a little bit about the facts of Tracer Lane um the develop developer actually was seeking to to construct solar in the abing town of Lexington but they needed an access road through walam and walham um that parcel in walam was a residential district and in walam at the time um you could not have solar in a residential district so they denied um the request to use the access road to access the site in Lexington um wam excluded large scale solar from most all of its um zoning districts and uh I know we say in all but one or two% I think there's a specific uh percentage in the case uh later on but you know we'll just call it 2% of the town uh for this for the sake of discussion um and so using that numerical uh value that quantitative value of 2% the court said that waltham's bylaw was uh un the bylaw reasonably restricted solar energy they took the the the position that if you prohibit solar in 98% of your town the land land area of your town and only allow it in this small 2% it is facially on its face unreasonable and therefore violates 483 now I will say as the years have progressed since Tracer I don't I don't know if there's such a a strong emphasis on numerical analysis I think you could have a a percentage of prohibited Land versus allowable land that um you know based on a bunch of different factors could be permissible but I I think it's important to note that we our starting point in 2022 has been this 98 versus 2% and so that's something important to keep in mind um just when we're adopting zoning bylaws is if you prohibit it in most of your town a court might see that as unreasonable um and so speaking more to the legislative intent of for of 483 the solar provisions of 483 the the SJC the highest court in Massachusetts said large scale systems like the ones proposed in Tracer Lane um that are not ancillarity to any residential or commercial use are key to promoting solar energy in the Commonwealth I I point that out to um to raise the point that there was a thought kind of before Tracer Lane that 483 the intent behind 483 was not to allow these large scale systems it was to allow for you know some panels on your roof or panels you know that were accessory to your residential structure the thought being that um in the 1970s when this was first adopted by the legislature there wasn't as high a frequency of large scale systems as we see today you know it was rooftop solar was the was the primary use of solar at the time at least that's my understanding um and so I think it's important to CL the the court clarified here in Tracer Lane no no it it's not just those those solar panels on your roof that 43 protects it also protects these large scale systems U because the the the presumed goal is pro promoting solar energy across the common mouth uh to to solve that or to address the energy crisis um so again uh I I know I said it kind of in the beginning of the Tracer Lane conversation but the court explained that whether a bylaw facially violates Section 3 is whether or not uh the bylaw promotes rather than restricts this legislative goal and so when we're talking about prohibitions or restrictions those expand not only to those rooftop uh you know residential rooftop panels but also to these large scale systems um so we're going to have more categories of solar use I've I've permited now large scale small scale on the roof over parking lots um I was just driving through uh ammer of the UMass campus the other day which I I think some of you know that I attended UMass and I noticed that they put up those roof those uh those uh parking lot solar panels over some of the parking lots and I said oh that's new I been there in a while so you know I'm sure as the decades go on there's going to be all these new categories of types of solar um facilities or or fixtures or you know equipment so something to keep in mind again they they put a lot of emphasis on does it promote rather than restrict may ask a question oh yes please so um I I haven't read this case and I will but did the court um emphasize balance and act in as to where um the solar panels can go to be considered not restrictive did it talk about location in the decision or did it just essentially say if you restrict 98% only allow 2% then it's facially you know flaw yeah so so good question yeah so the case doesn't specifically address the locations within Town um that you can or cannot prohibit it it made the the initial determination which it thought was sufficient that that a 98% restriction in town was facially you know a violation of the statute what we have seen since though is some trial court cases which I'll talk about in a minute and then some attorney general decisions which I I site a few in this slide but I have a list of about two dozen if you'd like them um where we talk about you know where in town can we restrict them so there is there is some latitude on the town to restrict say like in a single family residence District those have been you know passed by the Attorney General to say that that's probably okay um there's also I don't think I've seen a restriction in an industrial or business district but I'm sure if there was a compelling local reason connected to a public health safety or welfare welfare you know basis um that you could also make that argument so I don't think Tracer Lane talks about the location in town it just talks about the percentage but we've started to see cases since then especially through the attorney general and then there's two trial court cases that I've seen seen recently in the past two years that talk about um towns May um May restrict the location in town so long as the bylaw on its face is promoting rather than restricting so so long as you're making steps to promote you know generally in town you do have some authority to restrict um you know reasonably um does that answer the question it does thank you Mr SL has a question yes I have a a more General basic question you've referred a few times to a bylaw what it can and cannot include is the zba involved in actually formulating a bylaw or are we when when you refer to uh to things that can go into a bylaw don't aren't we charged with interpreting a bylaw that already exists we're are we formulating and P and trying to pass a bylaw on this committee uh no Miss Miss breast can give a more fome answer on that um yes hi uh there's a solar there was a solar bylaw working group that um developed a draft solar bylaw and that bylaw is now being reviewed by the um CRC the commity Community Resources committee and that bylaw will also be reviewed by um certain staff members and then it will be sent out to boards and committees for comment um so the Z zoning board of appeals may have an opportunity to comment on the draft but other than that the zoning board is not involved in making um zoning bylaws I think what Mr Murray is trying to do is to give you background so that when a solar installation comes before you you have a sense of the kinds of things you can regulate and the kinds of things that you shouldn't regulate okay thank you umor I have another question yeah sure I I I cannot see hands so I want make sure I'm not jumping over go ahead okay so um people put in solar panels on their houses um I would argue promotes solar panels is is that factored in this decision as the town promoting solar panels or do they mean something different than just people putting solar panels on their [Music] houses um so this case was specifically talking about large scale ground mounted solar and their city ordinance their zoning ordinance prohibited large scale ground mount solar in 98% of the town the city uh and so they said the the the SJC said that that was an unreasonable prohibition because uh if I go back to uh 782 here this first bullet large scale systems not ancillary to any residential or commercial use are key to promoting solar energy in the Commonwealth so I I think it was it wasn't so much about rooftop solar but it was the a knowled acknowledgement by the court that these large scale ground mounted systems are included in the exemption the intent of the exemption in 40 A3 um and they're the they're the type of use to also be promoted it really I you know I don't I don't know I'm sure there is a case I I'm not familiar with a case off the top of my head that talks about rooftop solar because I think those are just generally there's not a lot of opposition to those what you do see opposition to most of the time are these large scale ground mounted systems so the rule based on large scale thank you so we really don't get any we don't quote unquote don't get any credit for permitting rooftops um it's really we're making a we have to our decision has to facilitate groundbased large scale arrays is that right so right and they're balancing but they we're not going to get credit for the rooftop solar yeah I mean I I would I would preface by saying that your decision needs to be based on whatever the the new bylaw says and then in light of uh the state law that provides this exemption so it's kind of uh two two pieces so I wouldn't say that you're you're required to based off of 4 A3 uh alone to to to to promote something in particular you have to consider each application based off of the bylaw I had was about whether it's promoting or not and it sounds like if the bylaw it sounds like the bylaw has to the bylaw can't wouldn't be sustained or upheld if it said we're going to restrict large arrays someplace because we do so much to allow uh rooftops it sounds like isn't that's not the The Balancing Act for determining whether you're promoting it or not is that right yes no I agree that's what I meant to the question I meant to ask sorry okay all right no thank you sorry for misunderstanding and Mr Varner and then miss bre I had a question about um whether or not there are Massachusetts communities that mandate solar installation over things like new parking lots and commercial buildings I know that's the case in California uh they're even mandating it on residential construction after a certain date uh and what legal impediments would we encounter mandating something like that for amorist in order to expand our uh percentage of solar coverage yeah that's a good question um I know that folks are exploring that possibility I'm not familiar with a bylaw that's been passed and approved yet I think more what we see rather than requiring is encouraging so you might give density bonuses or some sort of other um you know development bonus for those that meet um you know have additional solar or maybe that are are um uh what is that lead certified Leed certified um or meet some of the other requirements um you might run into legal issues with requiring certain um installations but it's going to depend on what the bylaw says and what the requirements are and so I don't know exactly what the town's bylaw will say after you know the committee and the Town Council and planning board you know everyone has a chance to look at it but um I would say what I see more these days is Provisions that promote uh solar by giving some sort of uh development bonus or incentive or you know allow for you know greater height or greater setbacks or something like that so all carrots and no sticks for the most part I'm sure I'm sure there's someone out there that has a stick I'm I'm I'm trying to think think I I don't recall one off the top of my head but um certainly could look into it thanks Miss bre thank you so I just wanted to make a couple of comments um in ammer we don't have a solar bylaw yet but that doesn't mean that solar installations are not regulated they're regulated as energy generating facilities and they need a special permit in any zoning District so that's the way they're currently regulated and I think we've approved five of them so far under that um umbrella so that's one thing um large scale solar I've learned from Jonathan Murray a few years ago um is basically defined as 250 kilow which is about an acre is that right Jonathan Mr Murray yeah you can call me Jonathan yeah it's it's 250 or or 25 megawatts of name plate capacity yeah yeah and that takes up about an acre so anything that size or bigger is considered a large scale solar um another thing I wanted to say is that amist has a stretch code so um the stretch code encourages um any kind of energy saving or you know production of energy on a property so we we have that feature we also have a net zero requirement for municipal buildings so with the exception of the library any municipal building that is built or changed in town um built really is required to have Net Zero so the new school um has uh solar panels in its parking lot the new school will have solar panels in its parking lot so so it is kind of mandated for municipal buildings and I guess that's all I wanted to say so I wanted to just touch on those three subjects thank you thank you thanks Chris so so I've talked a lot about what a bylaw can and can include and as as Chris helped me out there um the the reason for that is so that when you do when when this board or uh yeah when this board is reviewing your bylaws and and and interpreting them you know the basis for you know the statutory exemption and the case law and you kind of have a background of well this is why it is the way it is and now we go into how do we apply it um I'd like to talk about special permits there was a fear at the time that Tracer Lane stood for the proposition that you can't impose a special permit requirement we now know that that's not true uh PL versus where was an appeals court case um that said you could impose a special permit requirement on large scale installations it's a legitimate Municipal purpose um but the court cautioned that said you can't use a special permit requirement as a guise or as a as a you know a backend to prohibit solar in town um and that the way you apply these special permit requirements is consistent with your bylaw ordinance um and that the that the regulations can required for the the issuance of the special permit are connected to a legitimate public health safety or welfare reason um so this is a PL versus wear case I can I I'm familiar with this case because I happened to write the trial court decision when I was at the L court that was all the way back in 2018 so this one kicked around for a long time um but the appeals court found that that it was an appropriate use of municip Municipal Power to require a special permit um but I just raised this case to you also uh just for for the thought of special permits can't be used as a as a means to prohibit all solar um that doesn't mean that there aren't instances where it is appropriate for the board to deny a special permit but keep that standard in mind is that it can't just be used to deny this use which has a special protection um so that's again what PL said quoting Tracer um uh and the land Court upheld the denial of the special permit for for the solar energy system um and then I think there was a there there definitely was a question a minute ago about locations and um you know are we are we are you coming up with a BW are we just interpre it I I think this case sunpin energy uh is helpful or informative to that point so this was a case where the bylaw required a solar special permit and the board in support of its denial and in and relying on its bylaw gave these reasons adverse impacts on natural and working lands placement in a residential area negative impacts on property values um require a significant cutting of trees and um it would adversely affect habitat W for wildlife recreational opportunities and a sense of place for people um and so not to say that all of these reasons are reasons that this board could use but in um I say this just to say that when you're looking at a special permit application or any sort of proposal going back to your bylaw to see what are the purposes of this bylaw and what are the the interests that it protects um are important especially where where there's a denial and there needs to be a rationale for that denial um so there was a a case where the court upheld the denial because the Bo cited specific reasons reasons were supported in their bylaw and those reasons were supported to were uh based in public health safety and Welfare reasons um you know impacts on land impacts on you know the trees uh environment those are all based in public health safety and Welfare um again you all don't particularly need to analyze this this is probably more this was a carryover slide from the solar bylaw working group but just in case you're interested or you want to see what other towns are doing here's some four examples um and we have probably a list of two dozen at this point since 2022 um happy to provide those or happy to provide the link to the AG's website where you can search for these by category um but just maybe if you want to read through a couple of these descriptions um they're informative on kind of what other towns are doing um so and and then I'll conclude how am I doing on time I'm doing not terrible time you're doing well um so there was when the when Chris first contacted me a few months ago part of the request for this talk was potential legislative amendments regarding the local permitting of solar and I will say that I'm sure you read it in the news that the legislature kind of ended its session and there was a lot of these bills that important bills that didn't get addressed and this was one of them um but just a back up on why there was a bill and um what the bill said uh Governor Healey established a commission on energy infrastructure citing in permitting um and in March of this year this commission put out a report which is available on the State website I'm also happy to forward it to you um their recommendation was a larger energy projects um be under the the jurisdiction of the energy facility sighting board and smaller projects remain under the jurisdiction of the town uh the threshold between large and small is that 25 megawatts of name plate capacity um to be honest I don't know from an engineering standpoint what that means but from my permitting aspect uh you know it's generally for the most part usually put on about an acre um I think they can do it sometimes smaller sometimes bigger depending on site features but that's my understanding but um that was put in the bill that was the threshold between small and large um the ACT specifically was Senate Bill 2838 it was passed by the Senate on June 25th it was passed by the house with amendments on July 17th and then referred to conference committee the next day um but no formal action was taken before the formal legislative session ended um so it's not passed it's not law uh but it is something maybe to keep in mind is that there may be um should the legislature decide uh this change in procedure whereby larger systems bypass the town and go directly to the state and smaller systems um go through the town um you just see here yeah so so these are some of the recommendations that got incorporated into the bill so it would mandate a Consolidated permitting process at the local level and give cities or towns 12 months to issue a final permit decision that contains all necessary local approvals within one Consolidated permit so I know my colleague I think Carolyn Murray is meeting with you all next week on a potential 40b it it it might be helpful to think of this proposal like a a solar 40b if you will that um it would require one hearing by one board and um it would require you know all the permits to be Encompass in that one public hearing and the permit would have to be issued within 12 months um as it pertains to large scale systems the bill would propose reforms to the energy facility sighting board that would expand its membership to include Municipal Representatives um and then their Consolidated perming process would have to occur within 15 months um so I'll repeat that none of this is actually law and we don't really know if the legislature is going to take that back up but um I figured I'd throw it out there just so you know kind of what the discussions are at the state level and know that there might be a possibility sometime in the future that you guys might not even need to consider special permits or any other zoning relief for large scale systems um those might go to the state but small scale systems uh we might need to come up with either bylaw amendments or policies and procedures or something to effectuate this proposal of a Consolidated permanent process um but as last I checked nothing has occurred I know a few bills have gone through since um July 31st but I have not seen any movement on this one so um I think that's kind of it for the moment I also wanted to to just talk about any questions you might have when you're considering a application for solar so if there's any specific questions you have about that or or anything you want to know about solar just happy to talk about it I would just if you have any questions about a about this topic in general please make sure you phrase those topics about in phrase those questions in a way that do not specifically reference the special permit that we have before us so you can talk about it generally but let's but I want to avoid speaking about the special permit application we have for a solar array currently before the board yes and I I'll just I'll just let you all know I don't know what that special permit is haven't looked at it don't take anything I've said as you know you know speaking as to that application I don't know what that is so again I go back to I suppose my claimer was important this time around it was good yep uh Mr alfeld yeah do you um you you've spoken a lot about solar panels does the 40 A3 include solar storage I'm thinking of Battery Systems um solar such as the site that was proposed up in wendle you may be familiar in any case large scale B yeah no it's it's a really interesting question we're still kind of working through that um I think the general consensus at the moment is that if a battery energy solar or I'm sorry a battery energy storage system is connected to solar or support solar the battery storage is also entitled to the 483 exemption the gray area what we've what we've now learned is that is apparently some economic feasibility to just having battery systems that are connected to the grid um not connected with solar and um I I might be off base but my understanding is that they pull energy from the grid During certain times of the day and then they release it back out and there's some sort of economic um you know you know viability to that business model so I think the general consensus is that towns have more authority to regulate and restrict those types of non solar Associated Battery Systems but when they're connected to solar they're entitled to the exemption as well that's not my phone um if I if I go to another question Mr chair um absolutely yes so the proposed law which has not did not pass in the in the latest latest session for smaller systems below the 25 megawatt threshold would still go through town bodies did the law specify which town body I mean you said it would might be like a 40b which is as I understand it is a zba thing would would it necessarily go through the zba under that law yeah so it I don't know if it would necessarily um it would necessarily go through the zba I think one version of the bill I saw said the chief executive officer of the Town um would be the permanent Authority and then I think there were amendments to say you know entities designated by a bylaw or ordinance so it's unclear which version might get passed if if it gets passed at all um but it could be the case that the law specifies the board or could be the case that each City and town gets to choose we're not quite sure yet okay thank you Mr Meadows I have uh what I think will be one clarification for you um 25 megawatts of solar usually will take about five acres not one AC okay that's helpful yeah uh the other uh you a couple of slides prior to this you had a an example of cutting a lot a lot of trees could you go into that example a little bit further please yeah so my understanding is that the byaw in that case made a point of saying that the cutting of trees and vegetations uh it was a purpose of the bylaw because the cutting of trees and vegetations has an impact on public health um and so that bylaw made a point of pointing out that the cutting of trees um uh um would affect public health and would affect public uh welfare I'll just go back to that uh because they made reference to to say correctly uh because maintaining and so this is one two three four four or five lines down uh cutting a significant number of trees because maintaining trees assists the Commonwealth's energy policy goals because of of the important Water Management Cooling and climbing benefits trees provide so that was the rationale given by the board in denying the special permit um that was also a purpose set out in their bylaw and um in my opinion that was affirmed by the court as reasonable because all of those reasons you know the uh the protect uh the maintaining of trees to assist in energy policy and Cooling and climate um and you know General environmental concerns are based in public health safety and Welfare which is the statuto requirement to reason reasonably regulate solar energy systems thank you are there other questions comments Mr Al um this may be well I think this question is of a legal definition question so on that sunpin Energy Services paragraph you have up currently the third line says uh quote adverse impacts on natural and working lands what what would be what does adverse mean in this context I mean uh you're gonna have some impact presumably if you're going to develop a piece of land so what does adverse mean and perhap general question but well I think it's a general question but it's a good question I mean um I think to your point that any sort of development is going to have impact on lands what is adverse I think what courts are going to require is one is there a definition or is there an explanation in your zoning bylaw and then two when a permanent board is reviewing that we have to have the rationale for adverse so if there isn't um a specific definition you would have to put a the permanent board whether it's this board or any other board would have to put in the reasons why it is adverse so um I'm gonna come up with a ridiculous example so as not to confuse with any you know things but you know say say a solar you know say a solar proposed solar facility would um would I don't know pollute all the trees in the in the the surrounding Forest because of a particular type of device they were going to use the board might say well that's adverse because here here's the thing we had our expert go out this type of device isn't used all the time it's you it's only proposed for this type and um it's going to have this adverse effect it's going to kill the trees it's going to pollute the water it's going to do XYZ um so I think that maybe it's a good question it's General so I can't answer it specifically but I think it goes to kind of what this board's directive is is you know when making these factual findings you know if if it were to find some adverse effect it's really important to put it in your decision why the board found it was adverse the more you can support that with you know specific examples or expert reports or you know the rationale the more likely that a reviewing Court might uphold that as a reasonable restriction on solar thank you so I so I just so I had better understand what from Mr ael's Question question so it the the the court hasn't held that aside from religious and educational institutions that solar large scale solar sighting is more important or takes takes precedent more important than other health welfare and safety concerns such as pollution of groundwater per se it doesn't say that one is higher the other we're still left with the duty of trying to B as a town to bu uh to construct its bylaw and us to interpret it that we're supposed to balance out the pursuit the promotion of large scale solar and the other kinds of things that we have to do to protect health safety welfare Etc is that correct I think I would frame it to say that the 483 says towns can't prohibit solar or unreasonably regulate solar yeah but it wants to reasonably regulate solar it must be based it must be based in a public health safety or welfare reason so so Tracer Lane was important because it prohibited in 98% and the court said well that's a straight out prohibition you can't you can't prohibit it in almost all of the town but if we go back to say U plh versus wear plh versus wear said no you you know it might be a reasonable regulation to impose a special permit requirement so that a reviewing board can ensure that those public health safety and Welfare reasons those you know components of your bylaw are met but you can't use the special permit just as a preface preface for saying no we don't want it it's more of that due diligence making sure that you know all of those public health safety and Welfare reasons stated in your bylaw those requirements are met um at the same time there are instances where you might say this this is going to hurt public health safety and Welfare based off of our bylaw and that's where you come back to sunpin um so I I don't know if I would frame it necessarily as you framed it where we're you know know we're weighing the the promotion versus the Restriction I mean that's certainly true when we're coming up with the bylaw but when we're applying the bylaw we would say you can't prohibit them and you can't unreasonably regulate them but you can reasonably regulate them based on public health safety and Welfare reasons and that might necessarily mean that in some unique circumstances based off of certain factual you know elements that a proposal might be denied but you can't use you can't use you can't just have a blanket denial policy I think I did okay on time I'm hoping at 6:59 well you know it's not all it's not all within your control because Mr Meadows has a question and I was just gate you on getting it done one minute early but it's gonna cost you that I'm terribly sorry that's all right obviously I'm confused yeah there does sunpin then the sunpin decision then maintain that it is more important to maintain trees assisting the Commonwealth's energy policy goals because of the important water management Cooling and climate benefits of trees as opposed to the solar benefits of there's a contradiction here and I I I would like to know um if there is something more of a precedent in addition to sunpin in this decision I would say that no the court and sunpin didn't make a definitive this factor is more important than this factor trees are more important than solar that's not what what what's occurring it would would generally occur in a reviewing Court what the reviewing court has to do is look at a board's decision to see if it is you know Whimsical capricious unreasonable based off of the interpretation and application of a zoning bylaw so when looking at say the bylaw in sunpin for example the court has to look at what does the bylaw say what is the purpose of the bylaw what does it protect and then was the board's decision sufficiently supported and based in the the the requirements and P purposes of the solar bylaw and then you know you know was it reasonable in light of the 483 exemption so it's going to be unique and I know this is probably not a great you know helpful answer but it's going to be unique town by Town project by project uh and and how the board applies um so there's no there's no bright line standard of this factor is more important this than this Factor it has to be you start your journey at the exemption in 483 you continue to what your bylaw says and then you apply your bylaw to the facts in the specific application and then you the board M weigh the facts of that particular proposal and then that that that interpretation and application needs to be sufficiently supported by the bylaw and by the exemption um and then it's up to the court to say was that decision reasonable I know it's not helpful to say like you know it would be easy to say oh well cutting of trees is more important than solar but that's just not how the courts the courts give you some amount of difference um but but yeah there's there's no this is more important X is more important than y I wish I could say that your answer was helpful but I think I I won't I won't take it personally I'm sure it is not your responsibility no thank you though Miss BR I just wanted to make this suggestion that if you do um need to review a large scale solar installation that is being proposed that you could ask um the town manager if Mr Murray or someone from KP law could you know follow that case with you you know come to public hearings with you to advise you as you're going along or at least review a decision before it's final um so that your conditions and your findings make sense and you know have a good chance of standing up to an appeal either from people who are against a project or people who are promoting it so that's always something that is available to you thank you is is is that something we could ask for at this point that is something um I could ask the town manager if he would authorize that yes if that's a if you are asking me to do that Mr chair I think we're going to need some help on the special permits we have before us with this um information we got today I think it'd be very helpful okay I will ask the town manager and this is not something that we can impose the cost of which we cannot impose upon the petitioner right this is not like 40b this is something that we the town pays for there's some question about that but um I certainly don't have a clear answer on on the answer yeah okay all right yeah talk to the town manager about that because I think we could use some guidance thank you great well Mr Murray um you still did a great job keeping it right on time on a complicated topic and since we started 5 minutes late you did it within an hour so thank you very much I I appreciate you all having me and the time and um I if you guys have questions feel free to you know send them through the planning uh department and um I'm happy if the town manager authorizes it to to help or you know someone else in my office to help with any of specific questions on specific applications so just let us know thank you can you share the present to read those cases oh yeah do you guys have a copy of the PowerPoint I think it was included or sent to you sent via email I'm not sure if it was included in the package just senta would know that but we can sure get it to you Mr Henry I'm sure thank you yeah all right thank you all good night thank you I just want to note for the record that that uh Building Commissioner Mr Mora has also joined the call or the zoom the next order of business is um zba a continuation of the University Lodge um hearing zv FY 202-3995 two and 3.32 six to uh all alter a pre-existing non-conforming use to a social dormatory on the premises located at 345 North Pleasant Street mapy parcel 250 in the RG General residence zoning District this was continued from two weeks ago on August 8th um and since that time I know we had we had questions that we had for the applicant we got some information back um and the one thing I do not have and perhaps jenta you can send it to me is an updated project application report I've had some trouble jint and I were trying to work this through earlier today I've had some trouble on some of the documents and I think it's based on my computer um not your fault but can you do we have an updated project application report in if so can you send it to me sure great but since that time we've got since that last meeting we have a updated lease agreement um we have an upd ated site plan with um identifies parking spaces as well as identifies two locations for um for rubbish bins um we have I know we have cut sheets for lights that's one of the things that I could not pull up but I know that it came in and we have um we had a document that we sent to um Mr REI and attorney REI and his client on possible conditions uh for of approval and requests that we had made it's if I hit everything just or is there anything else that I've missed in terms of uh new submission since our last meeting you haven't missed anything and we actually haven't updated the okay just because the timing of the reception of the documents You' like us to do that we can but also do okay well I'll operate I have the old PR um so I I can operate off yeah one I can operate off that excuse me yes uh I was impanel for the discussion on August 8th as a an associate member I uh I see that there is a full panel tonight I don't understand I don't know if I am to participate in this uh discussion and then I'm out of it for the rest of the evening's discussion or if the full panel is um here and I am not part of the discussion tonight I you know that is a really good question I think what I have listed is Mr judge Mr sler Mr White Mr Henry Mr Meadows but you were at you did you did go to the the University Lodge site visit are you participated I went to the site visit and I also participated in the August 8 uh Zoom meeting exactly and Mr Mr White were you not if that one correct so you do want to stay on you do want to be on that panel and thank you for catching that yes so Mr Varner stay with us thank you Mr chair uh just to avoid any maybe confusion on this I'm gonna obviously stay on the call because I'm on the next uh thing but I'm going to turn off my video like I said just to avoid any confusion with things great thank you Mr White thank you good uh Mr REI do you have um presentation for us I do just give us your name address for the record of course thank you very much Mr chair members of the board Tom Rey attorney with bacon Wilson in ammer here on behalf of the applicant uh six Southeast Street is the office address um and as Mr chair noted we were here two weeks ago we got a list of items that uh we uh were requested to take care of we we believe we did that I'll go through them know high level there was questions about the lighting and so we provided a cut sheet that I'll show you uh questions about trash enclosure location and screening which I'll also show you uh modifications to the lease which we'll talk about uh dimensions of studios and one bedrooms which we'll talk about and then really updated site plan to capture dimensions of parking spaces make sure that uh Ada spaces exist with sufficient uh striping adjacent to them and then some additional site features so I'll probably work in reverse order um and I'll start with the site plan updated just to walk you through so if you can see my screen at this point uh what we've done is just updated the site plan uh to show the parking spaces in addition to and I'll zoom in just just a bit the uh size of them so they're 18t long and then they're 9 ft wide you'll see that the Ada spaces both marked one here one here have additional width same length but then also here is the five feet and then we've got the 8 foot for the the van accessibility here we've also updated the site plan to show the lighting under the porch that was one of the requests uh of the board we've also got um Transformer Pad waterline Birches grass uh parking area deliniation setbacks electrical meters again uh lights underneath the wall light which I'll talk about a little bit more in detail I should go back to here and note that you've got a utility pole here that's going to have a a this is an eversource pole so one of the questions last time was about the poles these are both this one and the one over here are eversource owned poles uh we're told by the electrician that the lights on them are dark sky compliant but but those are eversource poles so we have no control over the fixtures that exist on on those poles um we've also got again grass vegetation shown trees size uh species and location utility lines uh storm water infrastructure none of that's changing but just really we what we wanted to do was update the plans to show you know again you know Planters and a little bit more specificity so if you're able to approve this this evening you can approve it uh conditioned on this being the appropriate plan and so this is this is the site plan uh I'm happy to answer any questions if you want on this um maybe I'll just talk about the two track potential trash en closure locations there was a separate exhibit that we provided no great shakes uh what we did was highlighted this area right here if you can follow my mouse and another area up here uh as potential trash enclosure locations I'll show you in a moment the potential trash enclosure screening so you get a sense of it really is just like a white vinyl it'll be tall enough to screen the the trash and the dumpsters that are there the one that we provided you was like it showed four feet by four feet what we'd actually provide as a condition of approval would in fact screen uh those dumpsters but at least we wanted to provide what we expect it to look like so I don't know if there are I can always come back to it obviously if there are any questions now on this site plan I'm happy to pause and real quickly all the parking spaces are nide from the 8A or 9 fet wide yeah some may be a little bit uh 9 feet wide yes some may be a little bit wider like down here this one looks like they're all least 9et yes okay okay I'll stop that share and just I will move along I will show exterior cut sheet of the this is the light that's proposed for that that wall uh if you recall on the Northerly side of the North Pleasant Street side of the building there was a somewhat Antiquated light this is a dark sky compliant light that um the applicant is proposing and so you've got this in your packet as well as you see dark sky I will show the dumpster enclosure and again this is this is what we'd be looking for for the dumpster enclosure like I had said you know this one I think measures 4x4 we'd be looking to have something that actually you know if the dumpster's tall enough if it's 6 feet tall it will obviously screen it and appropriate width as well to make sure that it's it's screened and then I don't know that I need to share anything else but what I'll talk about is um the least modifications and the dimensions of the units so Kurt actually went out there and measured the studios they're 280 square feet each and then the one bedrooms are double St stos essentially so 560 square feet um we've updated the lease and I sent a red line in and you can see the changes what what we did was we updated the guest policy so that there's no more than one overnight guests in studios and no more than two overnight guests in each of the one in two bedrooms uh there's no more than a three night stay for any overnight guest uh the parking policy was updated to reflect what we had talked about which is one space per unit and then there's a limitation on the number of occupants uh maximum save for families which again we had this discussion last time I don't want to run a follow of the law if families can exceed that amount uh but for for unrelated let's say no more than two in a studio and one bedroom and no more than three in a two-bedroom so there's one two-bedroom on site we would allow up to three there for the studios and the ones no more than two except in any case if it's a family and if that's allowed and I frankly I just like I said I don't know um the law on that one and so that I think are those are the items that were outstanding uh that we needed to provide and we've provided them so we're happy to answer any questions that you have so the one question I have is I mean I I appreciate the response uh to our questions Mr REI and I know you don't have the the site floor plan but I have to take your word that those are accurate I mean seems about right so I'm sure that that's an accurate square footage um I the quick question I have for Mr MOA is so if you got is there is does the state sanitary code limit the number of people in a 280 square foot um dwelling unit to three or is it two and can a family is is there an exception for a family I know we kind of talked about this last week but the only thing I'm thinking about is would would a mother father and two children be allowed in a studio apartment of 280 Square F feet so the the code answer to that question is the the number of occupants is two for that that amount of square feet yeah number two okay so your your lease may be my understanding if that's correct then your lease may be um contemplating a situation that you can't do right so yeah and that's and that's fine if that if that's what I mean we're not we're trying to you're not you're not going to violate the sanitary code right right precisely yeah we're just trying to stay we're trying to violate anything right I know I know what you but I just want to make clear that does not permit does not allow four people to live in a in a 280 square foot and if if the board would like I mean we're happy to update the lease to reflect that I think the language I might have added was a parenthetical about families just so we weren't running a follow of law but if we want to say something about you know no more than two individuals in you know this in this studio uh as per sanitary code to give the you know land some cover that's absolutely no problem okay all right Mr sloger well my my question or point it goes to that as well uh and I have a note here it's number four R which is what we're already talking about your parenthetical says uh for a family as the term is defined by local state and federal law laws and in ammer it's my understanding that four unrelated people can constitute a family so I think there is the potential for an unnecessary complication here for students who want to reduce their individual cost of monthly monthly residential cost could claim to be a family like they do in all sorts of student housing so if if as Mr moris said you can't have more than two people here anyway I think it might be wise to just take the family exemption out of this Clause Al together and then if it's simply limited to two since I don't care if anybody's related or not if it's just going to be two then leave it at that I that was my own only note I appreciate the changes you made on the lease that I brought up last time about cars per unit and all that and I think you've done a very nice job and I I want you to know that I recognize that but uh the family the definition of family in Amor always makes me a little uneasy and that's why I went right to this one when believe it or not I actually read your lease again so um my that's my suggestion is that any any reference to family comes out especially after what Mr Morris said yeah great suggestion and I don't think there's any issue with that again we were trying to uh just prevent any discriminatory uh suggestions about Prohibition of family so right I think also don't want to run a foul of Mr Mora well no now that I've heard what Mr Mora says right follow yeah no we we we'll make that update thank you so you you'll remove beginning with accept and ending with prevention and begin J with the with no no correct correct no yes no yes yes all right are there other comments questions regarding the proposal I guess the one thing that I would would ask um is condition that we had contemplated and I have a revised possible conditions list from 81424 and jenta is that the most recent yes that's corre oh you it's pretty hard to hear you jenta can you turn up your volume or maybe Chris you have your hand up I wanted to ask a different question so Miss Williams can tell us the can is this the most recent possible conditions list yes it is okay I think that's a yes all right um Miss PR I just had a question about the screening for the trash um you showed a panel or two panels uh that would screen the trash bin um how is that going to be configured is it going to be like a three-sided um structure and does it have a gate on it or is it just open um these things can get to look pretty ratty after a while so I wondered if you could describe a little more about how that's going to be set up and how you're going to maintain it yeah that's a good question and I think ultimately what we'd like to do is you know let's assume that there's an approval this evening potentially I would suggest before a certificate of occupancy is issued we provide the inspection services department with the actual specifications of what we're going to be providing because there's obviously going to depending upon which side we put the trash and the dumpster on it may open a different way but I would suspect that there will be some gates that would need to open for Access and then the question would be again depending upon location is is it all enclosed or is one side open and so that's why I think just as a practical matter once we know where I think we can better say what um and then we can just provide that but the intention would be uh white vinyl uh screening of the the dumpsters I would assume with a gate that could open thank you sir okay any other questions all right if there's no qu other questions from the board um as per normal process we can open it up for public comment um the public if there's any anybody in the public who wishes to comment on this matter uh so indicate by raising your hand um using in Zoom or using star n on your phone I don't see anybody indicating they wish to speak all right there's no no public comments no further comments from the board or from the participants I would entertain a motion that we move into a public hearing a public meeting while keeping the public hearing open in order to deliberate on this matter do I have such a motion chair judge yes Miss Miss Williams interrup you had four public comments submitted either via email or by letter did you want to acknowledge those um we had four public comments on this matter um sorry no you did not I'm 61 chestnuts on the next matter I'm ahead of you sorry go ahead that's I'm glad you are ahead of me Miss Williams thank you but um thank you anyway um sove is there a second and we need a second seconds so we have it's moved and seconded is there any discussion no discussion the vote occurs M the chair vot's I Mr Meadows I sler I Mr Varner uh you're you're muted Mr Varner I Mr Henry I Mo motion is carried five to nothing we're in into public meeting portion um my inclination is that this they've answered the questions we had um about the project this project is going to I think improve the neighborhood it's going to be improvement over the the uh previous use and um I think with the protections of the conditions that we've discussed and the changes they've made this is a an application that ought to be approved I I'm looking for other people's proposals they General sense of the board before we move on to conditions oh well go ahead Mr sler well if you're looking for comments I agree with the chair I think they have sufficiently answered our concerns I think that I also had a note about the trash enclosure because the the panels that they uh that Mr REI showed don't move the something it it can't both hide the trash and uh not move because a big truck has to come in and do something to it at some point so I'm going to trust that they will do an appropriate job or Mr Morrow won't let them get away with it so we have to at some point trust somebody but I think that they have sufficiently answered the our concerns and that this project properly done will actually be an improvement over the existing conditions so I also think that this one warrants approval great and unless anybody feels otherwise what I would like to do next is to move to consideration of conditions and I think the best way to do that is for Miss Williams can you put the um most recent possible conditions for approval on the screen so everybody can look at it make sure we're all operating off the same document do you see those I can all right this your the conditions are pretty small there and I don't think it's just my eyes no I'm going to enlarge it there we go and what's the date on this one I have so I'm operating off something it's also dated 8:14 but we'll this if there's any difference I will um I'll try to I I'll I'll try to I'll mesh them in but let's operate off this because this what we have this before for us so the first condition and I'm going to go through these if anybody has an objection to one of these conditions state it and we'll we'll deal with it separately but my intention would be to go through these um and and consider them all in Block aside from ones that people may have a specific concern with so the first one is it has to be managed Accords with the proposed management plan as approved by the board on the appropriate date the same thing with the parking plan dated what's the date on the parking plan that you've submitted it's dated yesterday is it not Mr Ry I think we we'll get the right date but it's a parking plan it's the plan that you submitted um actually for the prior the the prior uh meeting so we'll get the right parking plan this one so the one that was submitted is August 19th 2024 got it okay any significant changes to the lease shall be submitted for review and approval by the board at a public meeting any changes to the existing conditions PL for landscaping or exing lighting shall be submitted for review and approval by the board at a public meeting all move in and move out shall occur during the hours of 8: to 7: and shall be coordinated to leasing office to to lessen the impacts of multile moving trucks blocking parking or the fire Lanes all snow plow in the parking area should be promptly renewed from the site um all trash pickups delivery construction maintenance machinery and landscaping equipment shall be conducted during the hours of 8 to seven exensions still include emergency vehicle snow removal or other emergency situations as were approved by the Building Commissioner the waste receptical placement shall be one of the two locations shown on the site plan final placement location and approved by the building commission prior divition of the building permit the board shall be the board may consider Mr chair just one thing there and and maybe this is from Mr Moore building permit um I don't know that another I don't know that we need a building permit for the trash enclosure and I believe a building permit's always been already been issued for the building so maybe issuance of a certificate of occupancy would be more appropriate there yeah I think that's right Mr I think what I think what that condition is asking for is um confirmation on where is it going to go and what is it going to look like uh by the issuance of the building permit and I just I I think there's already a building permit issued for the building to for the Lo for the lodge rehab I don't this is more Technical and in the weeds I don't know that we're going to seek another building permit yeah they'll need to be because the the the permit is limited to a scope of work that doesn't include the change of use uh doesn't include the installation of the kitchens you know it was a uh partial permit to start with some of the Cosmetic upgrades and and system upgrades for the lodge as a lodge that was you know an opportunity that the that the uh the owner took to get started a little sooner okay uh not knowing not knowing the outcome of this hearing and I would just I would suggest the second sentence be replaced with details of the enclosure you know six foot high vinyl enclosure uh you know in accordance with the detail you know provided something like that all right Miss Williams we're having a really hard time hearing you at least I am hearing you can you increase your volume um I've increased it significantly that's better right now that's better now I think I just have to project chair judge so that's what I will do all right thank you you're welcome in accordance with the uh well I think you just referenced the the um cut the sheets that they provided to us earlier this okay today all right then I think the comments about discussing the dumpster screening can be taken out when you finish that y I would just ask use use the word enclosure and minimum 6 feet high in there uh because the detail is not that at all the detail is really just for the the material all right and the look so we have to Something in here that the final details of um the enclosure that is at least that is at least 6 feet high right you could just add those words and fill it in later yeah I I come up with language later add it at the end six six feet high enclosure Y and we can come up with final yeah the projects will comply and be managed in accordance with the AL terms of the management plan and altered approved this is standard stuff uh the applicant show log and maintain all complaints filed with the property owner this is standard stuff as well this is what we do with rental properties consistently um so we go on down to the next one let's go down to 11 that's again standard this is the annual review during the rental registration and submission of information the role of the on-site managers defined by the zoning bylaw shall be assigned to an occupant of the Pres premise at all times we talked Mr judge just a moment on that one uh and just sent I don't know if you miss Williams I don't know if you could bring um Mr shamway in I think we just wanted to talk about the imposition of this condition and maybe not imposing it um because of the the management and know 247 call service that I think Kurt could probably talk a little bit about I'm bringing him in now one you're welcome um okay um Mr shamway what I would like I guess it's if you have somebody on you got 21 units or 17 units I guess it is on site if you have one person that's kind of assigned for the immediate um handling of any problems before they have to go to the 24-hour um call system that you have for your your um your tenants I'm wondering what the the difficulty for you is to have somebody getting a slight break to be the initial the inial first call for certain kinds of problems just so let us know what your thoughts on that all good evening that was a question to me yep is Kurt yeah um well it it's it's it's not necessarily um I can kind of talk to you a couple challenges but it's not necessarily that it's a a huge deal other than you're you might have turnover there and you try to we're re-educating people all the time as for this type of thing um I I think I'd like to fall back on sort of our reputation as managers you know I've got uh many many properties some 18 units and more right downtown ammer we've got the 45 unit building down the University Drive South uh with no on-site management and we we we manage very very closely and carefully and I and I think our reputation is such that uh it's it's it's really just unnecessary um it's uh it's not a financial thing it's just a another uh I would say requirement and if I have turnover I've got to sit with somebody and and discuss with them what what I expect of them and all that so it's it's you know if I felt that we had a lot of problems and and we would the the the rare occasion we might have somebody that might help somebody with lockouts something like that um there does become other issues when you have quote unquote on-site managers um if you get into some bad situations um it's not necessarily a healthy thing for that individual either I don't I I don't like to put people in those positions when it's really our job to do that so I I would prefer not to be expected to have a manager and and um I guess our reputation Rob and anybody else once again you can you can fall I I just fall back on our reputation we just manage closely enough that I don't feel like I need to have somebody there thank you Mr shway um Mr MOA but for this condition would they be required to have an on-site resident manager no they wouldn't um I'd also say the the resident manager if you look at the definition you know it really fits better for the smaller properties and I think that's what it was designed for um you know we we often see it two family dwellings converted dwellings and you know the individual assigned those duties you know serves a purpose in that uh type of a building but when you look at the definition about coordinating the maintenance housekeeping administrative duties for the rental units under their charge it really doesn't fit when you have a a established uh property management company and firm right down the road uh that Mr shamway has so uh you know I would just add that for your consideration thank thank you Mr sler was this your was this your suggested Comm um condition or not I don't remember um exactly I don't think so neither do no I don't think so this is not a big sticking point for me me either okay anybody else have concern about that all right let's Miss Williams let's remove that condition so we're moving I mean 11 number 12 thank you number 13 is a the new number 12 is parking management plan shall be followed at all times equip any changes have to come to the Zoning Board of appeal at a public meeting parking controlling occur on marked spaces Vehicles parked on site without authorization from the own outside Mark spaces shall be towed all exterior lighting shall be designed and installed to be shield with a downcast aboard light trespass and adjacent properties lighting F shall be selected according to the dark sky compliance recommendations evba rules and regulations property shall be maintained free of litter and debris occupancy of the dwelling should be predominantly by matriculated students enrolled University Massachusetts ammerer Hampshire and the family members and Resident manager we'll have to we can amend to take the resident manager out and support of family members to the extent Allowed by law occupancy should be limited maximiz permitted man Massachusetts state sanitary code as follows so two is the first x two is the second X and three is the third x correct Mr Rey two for the first X that is correct three and three all right greetings shall uh Gatherings not greetings Gatherings shall be limited in accordance with the terms of the lease agreement no partying shall be committed on site without the approval of the owners and prior notification to Inspection Services excuse me can we go back to number 17 and put I think it's two or a one-bedroom unit isn't that correct yeah two yeah it's two two two for a one B one bedroom yeah that's right okay thank you thank you and and while we've paused maybe go back one more to to 16 um with uh yeah just just to talk about because I I thought we heard during the last hearing that there wasn't requirement of having matriculated students there and so I think I just Kurt probably as well would like to explore this a little bit more and and maybe it's a question for Rob about does this use category require it is this language okay could I guess what do predominantly mean and um you know what I guess what's the expectation because I think Kurt would you know like to be able to provide housing kind of and stop um if it if it must be written this way it must be written this way if if it can be a little bit more LAX or eliminated I think we'd appreciate that so just looking for some guidance here so those was a question that I had um was is there requirement that only people that are enrolled be allowed to live there and if that is the case then what happens if that person is no longer um enrolled in school do they get evicted do they have to leave um and I also have concerns on their part if that happens through no fault of their own now they're in a break Le situation where there're Los in security deposit and first and last run you know so yeah those are questions and concerns that I also had as well I think Mr Mora spoke to that last week if I remember right about one that the wouldn't expect that if if somebody ended um their School mid lease that they would we would expect they would be allowed to complete their lease the term of their lease I think that's what you said um but I don't remember what you said regarding the whether this we needed to have the um condition of dwell predominantly matriculated students so can you go back over those things Rob and talk to us about it yes um so in my opinion it's not required you know this condition does not have to be written this way it is a uh condition that has been used in uh planning board site plan approvals for larger uh developments of this type but I do think you need to you know have some kind of language or condition in there that sets this building apart or expectations apart from an apartment building uh because otherwise that would be the use class of ification that this this building would be permitted by and it may or may not be able to be done for for one reason or the other so you know whether it's you know 50% or 20% or what you know we don't have to come up with a number but you know we don't know what predominantly means anyway you know if we can come up with another word that we don't know what it means uh we can try to apply it but I think the the intent here is that the building is available for uh students of of of those colleges and the university uh but it doesn't mean it has to be every occupant but predominantly just means it means mostly it doesn't mean 100% and that's kind of so it gives some flexibility I don't know what other word you would use um you would put a I I don't know how else you maintain the student character of this building which I think we need we should be doing um giving them a little bit of flexibility for situations that occur without holding them to no more you know no less than 75% or predominantly seems to be a term that that's plain meeting is you know more than more than more than half and not necessarily all is what predominantly to me means and that seems to me to be the plane meeting I I don't think that's something that you're going to you're not going to be going over there Rob and saying well I think predominantly is 75% and you have only 60% students I I think it's no I'm I'm not troubled by the condition or the language um you know and and sure we'll figure it out if we needed to but Mr Mr Henry had another question about what happens when if there should be a change in the student status during this term of his lease is that right that was another question that you had Mr Henry is that correct I I did and again it it goes back to what controls here the lease or their student status because that seems to be um if if this project is intent on having students live there with a condition that they're looking at number 16 that they're students um if they're no longer students then and I know Mr Mo said you know they're not going to evict people but um and that's confident that you know that's not going to be strictly enforced but does the landlord get difference to say you're no longer student you have to leave um that's that's part of the concern here is May I comment this is Kurt yes hi um to to that I think we talked about last time specifically I I would not um it's not reasonable fair or or any of that to try if someone leaves School willingly willingly or unwillingly during a lease we we would we would allow them to run out their lease assuming you all agree with this we would allow them to run out their lease and um it's very likely it's possible that they would just move out on their own but to the language I would suggest something that we would we would attempt to predominantly have students and um you know that's our our good faith effort I I I think it's really hard as we're discussing that if something happens Midstream of a lease I don't think anybody expects someone to be uh evicted and that would be uh that just wouldn't be the right thing to do I don't think anybody here is expecting that based on the conversation I'm hearing so if we were to say that we we make an effort eort to be predominantly student and if we kind of get to 49% because one of these you know individuals become uh be becomes a non student then we make an effort to make it over 50% the next rent rle something like that I just don't I I'm not sure how important this actually is so if we make a best effort it seems to me that might be satisfactory to everybody here you know I think language like to the greatest extent possible predominantly students would be fine with me that would solve that problem but your question is whether the leaste isn't it really whether the lease requires them to be students and I don't think it does the least is that myy we we manage our properties per property I have properties that I won't allow students um and so it's very rare that I have a lease that is specific to a property actually I don't have uh I don't have that unless it's talking about whether you've got including utilities we we make those modifications there but this would be the only lease that we actually have that is specific to the property it's generally more our efforts than just saying no you you know we do or don't allow students um but you you know I think I think we're all in agreement we can create whatever language we want and we'll we'll uh you got to be fair to the people who are there unless they're you know what I was going to say if they're real troublemakers we all know that we we have a hard time evicting those folks anyhow Mr Henry so um thank you Mr chair so I'm I'm not comfortable with the language in number 16 for two reasons um and I'm using the history of sitting on this panel we have had applications come before this board where people have tried to convert and because there's a concern that students are going to rent into these neighborhoods they were denied I will only support this if number 16 in no uncertain terms says this property must be occupied by students we have time and again denied petitions because students may move there this is close to UMass this is this is away from neighborhoods the OCC the application was geared as the property was meant to be for students so unless it actually has specific language to say must be occupied by students and I appreciate that the lease will take precedent over anything else and that's comforting but there cannot be any room to say best efforts or we'll give preference to students first and then somebody else it has to be student based so your were opposed to the word use of the word predominantly yes the word the word the word what happens but what happens if this person loses their status as a student during the course of the Year well we heard Mr says that the lease will prevail lease prevails so so then we do have then we do have a conflict between the condition and the and the and the lease um and that's why L was there I think I don't necessarily think we do um it's even if the person um is no longer enrolled as a student when they started this lease they were a student and and I'm comfortable with that but to say best efforts and then it gets rented to um quite frankly majority is non- students um it goes against what the original intent of this application was was to create student housing okay uh Mr Meadows I agree with Mr Henry Mr sler uh wait am I muted no okay um well there are a couple of things at play here that I think conflict a little bit Mr moris said that the classification for this property is aimed at student housing basically that it falls under a a student organization I think Mr Henry's concern about people dropping out of school in the during their lease and potentially being evicted is a good point we don't want people can drop out for all sorts of reasons and Mr shamway said he would the lease would Prevail I think that predominantly could actually be defined in non-punitive way as 75% or something like that that Mr judge referred to it strikes me as very unlikely that out of 21 units in the building that over the course of the year more than 25% of those units are going to drop out of school the purpose is to be in school and find a a decent place to live so it it could could be that you need to be a student in order to move into the place in order to sign a lease that at the beginning of the lease you have to be a student at one of the colleges and then you can secure the residence because you're a student and if you leave during the school year it's not you know it will not pose a problem you can't you won't be evicted just because you're no longer matriculated but if this is supposed to provide student housing we could just make it a requirement that you need to be a student to obtain the lease in the first place and then the lease would Prevail if people drop out I I I would bet that it would be predominantly students throughout the year people aren't people don't leave school that easily so it could be that it would address Mr Mora and Mr Henry if you needed to be a student to secure a residence in this property at the beginning of the lease I think that may be an elegant way to resolve our differences or resolve the concerns that were expressed I don't know if the great differences Mr Henry is that satisfactory to you it is but looking at the language shall needs to be changed to must isn't it the same the word differ you're a lawyer it it has different meanings um and Mr um um so it's to Mr sl's Point um it makes sense yes the when you police you must be student and if Mr shimu um standing him by his Le saying okay student um we're still going to honor the least that is um that is acceptable but again going back to my initial point the major concern here is that this is meant to be student housing and it needs to be student housing so let's let me read through this language and then I'd like to move on because I think we' reached a con here lease agreements must only be made with the matriculated students enrolled at the University of Massachusetts am ammer college or hamere college and their family members and his or her okay we got too much there and their family members and delete yeah all right to the extent Allowed by law I don't know that we need that all right in the event that a student no longer maintains their enrollment the lease agreement will be honored for the full duration of the agreed upon rental term good enough simp yeah Craig's got a problem oh you're you're um you're muted Craig I don't care for the and their family members well the only one I can think of is if if you have one student who's married living in the studio with his spile s's partner is or her partner or a graduate student with a child yeah but they all in any case they can't have more than two in the studio they can't have more than two in the one bedroom and they can't have more than three in the two-bedroom that's always the limit by the sanitary code so you can't have four people living in a studio or one or two or even the two- bedroom I I think it's okay to leave in family member as long as one of the people is a matriculated student if if if the lease signer is a matriculated student and has a family member live with them then it is that should be permissible it's a it's still student housing crowded student housing but it's student housing so we're not going to get we're not going to get four people into into one of those Studios it's not that's not going to happen by using the term their F their family there's still the limit on absolute number of people is that does that deal with your concern Mr Meadows yes okay all right so I think we have 16 locked down all right 17 occup limits shall be we talked about that already um Gathering shall be limited in accordance with terms of lease agreements but the approv the owners and prior no or notification Inspection Services you have to have notification to inspection services for a for a gathering that seems oh think that says parties no Pary shall be permitted on the site without the or and inspection services all right let's remove the the red okay thank you I mean Mr chair just for if we're getting into words I guess party is a broad spectrum um and I I don't know that I've seen this condition elsewhere I might not have been paying attention elsewhere but it just concerns me because I guess I don't know that there if if you put parties of greater than x or Gatherings because we have Gatherings and Gatherings under the lease says no more I think than three per and so if it's if it's more than that is that a party I just don't well would isn't that the purpose of the requirement is that anything more than the lease as a party if that's the and maybe I just s i see a little bit behind just send the screen okay so larger than the Gathering yeah I think that's fine then I just didn't read far enough that's my fault all right so let's get back parking shall be limited to building occupants and their guests all right EV charging stations may be involved with minor necessary adjustments to parking count due to the regulations the size of the loading zone um that's fine applicant shall remove the existing University Lodge sign pres certificant and the applicant shall return to zba or approval of any future sign accessible parking spaces we've been through this the minimum number is um two based on 26 and those things can be taken out all right are there any other conditions that people wish to add if board members wish to add I I just have a question not at a sign do they need to come back for number 21 can this not be approved outside of the zba it's a sign that no I think we have to I think that we're we're supposed to at a public meeting approve a sign that typically is what happens with um for businesses and other instances now now we could leave it up to the Building Commissioner to approve the sign but typically if they want to put up another sign it comes back to us for a quick public meeting but M Mora you had your hand up uh I something else so you can go ahead to the sign wouldn't they just be replacing the existing sign um and if if that is the case um isn't there something that the building commission to your point Mr Shar The Building Commissioner could say it meets the size requirements locations um I mean we could do we could do that yeah yeah it's it's yeah it we have done both a lot of times especially in residential neighborhoods we like to have a view of the sign to make sure that it's consistent but I think this one if it if it comports with the sign regulations it should be fine I'm just curious is there even going to be a sign is this property going to have a name it's not a it's not a hotel that people need to find on a regular basis is it going to have a name Beyond a number it it will I know uh Kurt's thinking about what that name may be he's bandied about a couple of them but it won't be University Lodge anymore okay all right okay all right do we have other any other questions concerns about conditions then Mr Mora you had your hand up and then Mr Barner um I think in the last meeting either Tom or Kurt mentioned that the parking area was going to be resurfaced and restriped um I'm not sure that shows up in a note on any of the plans so we should make that a condition if that's in fact what's going to happen uh good catch good catch yeah thank you um Mr Mora what exactly would you like it to say uh just just make a note for uh the parking area shall be resurfaced and restriped and then we can you know make the connection to the plan when we finalize the conditions thanks and we'll provide for flexibility for the staff to make technical conforming changes Mr Barner oh you're muted just a quick question about a definition of Inspection Services what what are Inspection Services this was in an uh a a few uh paragraphs back number 18 yeah uh to inspect yeah the notification to Inspection Services what what is inspection services and inspection services is that that's the city's Inspection Services correct the town's Inspection Services right the inspection services department and the reason for notifying them is that it would be invi be beyond the lease if it extends if if the uh party is um more than would be allowed by the lease they have to get permission from the town is what that effectively does very good okay certain size I guess it's for neighbor you know to um reduce the likelihood of disturbance in the neighborhood the residential neighborhood around them thank you all right um if there are no further questions and there are no further amendments I would I would entertain a motion that we approve the conditions as set forth above with the understanding as amended with the understanding that um staff is is going to fill in some of the blanks and connect the parking and and U provide more detail regarding parking and other issues that we as we've discussed do I have a sec do I have a motion in a second so moved second second moved and seconded is there any further discussion on the motion to approve the conditions as amended and authorizing staff to make technical conforming changes if not the vote occurs on the motion to approve the conditions the chair vote I Mr Meadows hi Mr Varner hi Mr Henry hi Mr sloger hi the conditions are approved the next order of business is to consider the findings we have to make pursuant to um I think we have to make a 9.2 finding we um we have to we can allow non-conforming use of a building a structure or land to be changed to a specified use not substantially different than character or in its effect on the neighborhood of the property the vicinity the set Authority may also authorize a non-conforming use of building structure or land accent that's not that's not our um situation so it's this has been permitted before it's initial permit under um hotels and motels this was a pre-existing non-conforming use and essentially we have to to say that this is not um is not detrimental to the neighborhood and I think we can I feel confident we can make that finding the next finding we have to make deals with 10.38 we don't have to make a finding under 3.32 I do not think correct me if I'm wrong um we have to make findings under 10.38 the proposal is suly located within the neighborhood which is proposed to renter the total town and is deemed appropriate by the special granting Authority The Proposal is compatible with existing uses and other uses permitted this is um this has been a it's a it's a residential area there is uh are other there's other multif family multi-unit uh developments in the area including the uh sororities and other student housing um and and it's um in a residential area near close to downtown ammer and UMass 10. 382 383 385 and 38 8 7 all deal with nuisance of um to the neighborhood uh inconvenience and Hazard to BU to a Butters reasonably protects ad joining premises against detrimental offensive unit uses and provides convenient and safe vehicular and pedestrian traffic I think they all are I think that's they've done that with the screening with the downcast lights without um with a um I think the management by the management company of the staff the limits on parties and noise all in the lease I think that we can make the findings under 10. 382 383 385 and 387 um 10. 384 is adequate and appropriate facilities provided for the proper operation of the proposed use um I'm not sure that the staff reviews really um comports directly with that but there are the there are the connected to town water it's got all the it's it has the fire um extinguishers it's um or not a fire extinguishers but the the the the um the watering system to prevent the fire I think that everything is there for um for the units to be occupied uh Town Services 10. 386 The Proposal ensures that the in conformance with parking and sign regulation the conditions do that 10. 387 The Proposal provides convenience and safe vehic clear movement um we've talked about that we um and we've I think made a determination that the um the parking area while um it is um elevated and has a a slope to it is safe and convenient and provides for safe traffic in and out of this out of the area as well as in the neighborhood 10. 388 ures adequate space for off Street loading and parking um this isn't really is I don't think that's applicable uh but there are conditions regarding moving move in with moving trucks Etc that that address that second Section 3 10. 389 adequate meil of disposure I think disposal of storage or refuges and screening we've talked about that and the um two locations for um citing The Refuge bins 10.39 10.39 this is not applicable 10.3 91 important or natural um structures I don't think this is applicable 10.39 to adequate Landscaping uh the board we've seen the Landscaping I think they provide adequate Landscaping not a lot of changes 10.39 3 protection from adjacent Party by minimizing intrusion of lighting um this is basically downcast lighting and they've committed to have downcast lighting for both um existing lighting and replacement I for replacement lighting 10.39 4 I don't think is applicable that deals with disharmony with respect to terrain use and scale there's no changes in the building 10.3966 um is the provide screening for storage areas we've seen the plan for that 10397 proposal provides for adequate Recreation facilities you know I I think they're adequate they're not great but they're sufficient and there's no changes from what had been previously approved so I think we can find that 10. 398 proposal is in harmony with the general purposes and intent of the bylaw and the goals of the master plan I think it's true because it provides additional housing for students so I think we've unless there's any objections to the conditions and the finding to the findings at this point I would entertain any discussion about the findings if not I would entertain a motion to approve the findings all moved is there a second second moved and seconded to approve the findings this chair votes I Mr Varner I Mr Meadows I Mr Henry I Mr SL I so the next motion the next order of business is to consider the um approval of the special permit application with conditions uh as amended do I have such a motion to approve the special permit application and to close the hearing on this m public hearing on this matter sove moved it's and I will take that as a second because we had so many movers so it's been moved and seconded that we have to approve the special permit um I the number it's I think it's zba 20253 is that correct yes that's correct 20253 um with conditions the chair votes I Mr Barner hi Mr Meadows hi Mr slober hi Mr Henry hi thank you very much congratulations good luck thanks thank you all right it's 8:14 we have one more proposal I would um like to take just a two minutes to grab a glass of water and then be back so if we can come back here at 8 in three or four minutes and we can start up again and we take our little break all right sounds good great we'll do it you're out here oh I just thought you may be in the bathroom because the door was closed e EX for e for who did that first yeah I don't know but you must you must have been staying up late and watching TV like I was the last couple I did that and then I I had to get up really early to catch the train down here to the city and then I've I've been meetings all day long yeah I've been I'm I'm tired tonight I should have had a shot of coffee as opposed to a glass of water to stay awake for the rest of this so well and then we've got the rest of the convention after this so and so what that means is that I I've recorded it so I'll be staying up really late oh no my my better half just sent me a text and was like if you don't mind I'm just going to put it on we can rewind it if you want to yeah I know it's I I looked I said gez it's going to be hard it's it's so hard to run every a convention on time but um I I can't imagine that they were going to be able to do it tonight how do you tell elected officials that they can only speak for 12 minutes you know when it's their one shot it's their one shot to make a national name for themselves it's tough impossible yeah you'd need Nancy Lo hit with a gabble is the only way that that would work she would she'd be able to turn them off and shut them down and make them comply with the time all right enough of that let's get to our next business order of business let's see Mr MOA Mr Henry and Mr Barner will Mr Varner will not be on the panel for this but he's welcome to stay Mr White will join us for this panel all right we've got everybody the next order of business is zba FY 2025 -01 um YG Chestnut 161 LLC request for special permit under sections 3.3 211 non-owner occupied duplex to change the land and use CL classification from non-owner occupied duplex to from owner occupied duplex to non-owner occupied duplex on the premises of 161 Chestnut Street map 11d parcel 66 in the RG General residence zoning District um there was a site visit this week that I was not able to attend I know that um Mr slober attended staff attended and um I think I think that's it no Mr Mr Henry was there Mr Henry attended as well so you two guys can you briefly provide a um summation of the site visit I can do you want to go Mr Henry you can go Mrs sler that's fine all right um we met there with the owner who is it's a three-bedroom Cape with an attached auxiliary unit on a corner lot the auxiliary unit has one bedroom upstairs and downstairs a kitchen in a common area I I guess you would call it in a bathroom um and the owner is living currently downstairs in that unit and her kids are upstairs in that unit uh the main house has two bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs one bedroom and a powder room and kitchen and living room downstairs there is a quite large basement in the main part of the building and um there is a backyard with a swimming pool an inground swimming pool uh the applicant was not proposing any alterations to the building she was clear about that and it's it's on a very nice corner lot near two schools and otherwise the neighborhood seemed quite quiet that's my impression I don't know what Mr Henry wants to add and did um Miss Williams were you also at the the scite visit anything else that we should that would be responsive to Mr sl's Question no I think he captured it all accurately um I did note that there was a basement um with a few extra rooms but they are just going to be used as storage and um as a laundry room um and nothing else out of the ordinary was observed oh I will add though there is no fence around the pool there's a fence around the backyard but there's no um protective fence around the pool that's it excuse me I just got a message from Jeff Squire who is an attendee and he's asked to be admitted um on behalf of the applicant thank you Jeff is joining us all right okay all right um we have this the following submissions uh we've received a uh zba application package which includes a cover letter and applicant application permit findings and fees a management plan request for a Butters list photos of the site rental lease agreement um and a site plan we've also received uh four public comments one from Jean  second from Jean and um a note from John attached to it one from Nancy Schroeder and an email from Barbra Berlin um and we have also received a fire protection transmitt from Captain boscon the fire prevention officer for the city of for the town of ammer those are I think all the submissions that we've received is that right Miss Williams yes that's correct all right um so miss Yao um you're the the petitioner are you going to present or is Mr Squire going to present for you or are you both going to do that it'll probably be a tag team effort but I will Le the charge okay so then then if it's going to be a tag team let's get the name and address for the record for both of you great uh I am Jeff Squire from the Brookshire Design Group uh for Allen Place in Northampton M hi I'm leang and uh can call me lesle so I I'm Sorry Miss leang right yes lean I'm sorry yeah you can call me lesle though so um currently my uh my address is U 15 Jeffrey Lane em right now all right okay Mr Square great thank you very much um so yes uh here in behalf of uh lizia uh with a property at the corner at 161 Chestnut Street which is at the corner of Chestnut and matun uh across from the high school um just to the north um this is a single family residential property um zooming in uh a little over a third of an acre um as you noted a a cape style home pool in the back of the uh property a shed um and then a wide driveway um off of Chestnut Street uh the property is all within the RG zoning district and um and at least in terms of previous permitting uh history um it did receive approval for a two family um uh uh two family dwelling unit in uh 1980 and this application before you tonight request before you tonight is simply to convert this um as you noted from an owner occupied to a non-owner occupied dwelling unit uh there's really no other changes taking place um on the property um the just few images from the of the um of the ex existing structure from Chestnut this is maton in the background here um front of the building as you can see the driveway um uh that does have a garage and then two spaces adjacent to it uh again a view of the building uh the the residence from the corner um looking down matun this is the intersection uh that we were just at here on the bottom image so looking at the rear of the property you can see the pool off to the left here um then again a little closer up on the um on the maton side is the side elevation is a small concrete patio uh the parking that exists uh front of the house and then uh the fencing that uh protects that that side of the building um the as I noted that the application really is simply to convert this from a uh an owner occupy to an own non-owner occupied uh dwelling unit um there are uh total of three bedrooms in the um in one unit and the first unit which has three tenants uh the second unit um is one bedroom and would be um you know ideally proved for one to two uh tenants again thinking about um spouses or um you know other family members that may need to be in a single bedroom apartment uh or room but that's that's the intent of that second unit so there's there's a total of U of four bedrooms um we are providing uh four parking spaces um in total um there are three spaces and the the application did include a request for a waiver um under the parking requirements which restrict the number of cars to a maximum of two in in the front setback um this is an existing condition we're not again uh proposing to change anything so we'd like to take advantage of those three parking spaces and then there's an additional one um in the garage this can be highlighted in this lower image here just those three spaces each of those is is at least 10 feet wide by 18 feet deep um I'm not sure the inside dimensions of the garage but there's certainly space for a vehicle in there um in terms of lighting I know there were some questions concerns about lighting or there's some clarity to it um everything that's on the this the the existing building now is is proposed to remain um there's nothing that is um necessarily out of scale with the with the residential character of the of the building these are just some examples of um you know where the lighting is there's a small sconce at the at the main entryway that's covered under um under the entry to the main main building here um there's some small wall scones that flank the garage there's a motion detected light uh for security reasons above the garage um there's a small wall sconce at the entrance um off this side of the building off the east side of the building um and then some small you know just uh site fixtures building mounted fixtures sconces in the rear and like the pool area um but none of that is proposed to change um and is you know certainly in character with um you know the other residential users around it um the application did uh did include uh a management plan which included Provisions for trash and Landscaping uh snow removal um all of those were were detailed in the management plan uh there was a sample lease that were provided um you know a lot of standard language I think some of the highlights would be that there is a you know restriction on the number of uh guests allowed to no more than four um uh there was an amendment I understand at the at the uh late hour just to address concerns about the pool so those were certainly um acknowledg and added to the uh lease um and uh yeah landscaping and I I think a Complaint Form was also provided uh as an amendment to the uh to the lease uh as requested by um by the town um and so yeah I'm happy to answer any other question questions I think um you know it doesn't change the intent or character of this particular you know use this structure um the S and with the way it functions um and so uh yeah happy to answer any questions or clarify any um any remaining questions or or concerns um just a couple of quick questions and Miss Yao or Mr squire first of all Michelle I want to make sure I address you correctly so I want to make sure it's right how would you like me to address you miss ya or your sorry hello excuse me yeah could you repeat a question just I want to make sure I I'm respectful and address you by your right name so how would you address oh lean lean okay yes lean Miss lean um tell how long have you owned this property I purchased this property at the end of the April April of this year yeah it was the previous owners that did not have a rental permit since 2019 it was you did not you were not owning it then so my question was when was there um why would you're not why was there not a rental permit on this okay that's one question secondly um how many tenants do you intend to have in this property so in the main building part uh there are three bedrooms in that building I intend to have three students one students each room and in the apartment in the apartment I think uh one2 subject to you know maybe the caros I don't know because it's related by the unrelated people so I have to say maybe two maybe one maybe two yeah one or two all right um and you're do you live close by I noticed the complaint response form has a north and over address oh that is that just the company name so um company regist um place but the um I purchase a another property at 15 Jeffrey Lan emmer is 1.5 miles away it's located close to South Pleasant Street so that is that will be my major uh living location in the future so you live at at 15 Jeffrey Lake yes yes but the company is okay the company is headquarted in north and right um Mr Henry you have a question thank you Mr chair I did and you asked the first one um because I I I read the lease and there's a note at the very bottom that says you're renting per bedroom not per unit um so that was one of my questions um my other question goes to the um the waiver for the parking so um and I miss Mr sl's for he captured everything correctly had internet issues but um so the waiver that you're asking for um there is a garage and then there's I mean looking at the picture that you have right now M um where do you anticipate putting four cars there's one in the garage and the expectation that there' be three and is it tendon parking how do you if what what is the expectation for this park right so I mean as you know that there would be the idea is that there is is a space in the garage there is room for a third surface you know parking space because of the um the expansive driveway there so you know there there would have to be some shuffling of cars if that one in the garage needed to come out but presumably that you know that's orchestrated amongst the tenants so there's room to fit you know four cars you know comfortably on the site without without changing anything you mean in in that space that we're looking at yes and again that is so not including the actual garage itself there would be in a car inside the garage and then three you know surface exterior parking spaces okay um and then the studio apartment which is um the Singler unit um did I hear correctly that the intent is to rent it to two people um I I imagine it will be two people and I don't want to use the word related but let me ask a different question there is no intent to put to have like um it be shared space for two independent people so to speak no no similar to the just I overheard the previous hearing but just yeah it the intention would be that it would be two related individuals somehow whether it be a a a sibling or a a a um you know a spouse or a child that there's there's one bedroom that would be you know available for up to up to two people that would be related somehow okay and we um and you also have a basement just want to clarify that um the basement is not intended to be used for any living space living purpose correct correct yeah no that would violate code right okay um those are my questions thank you Mr chair thank you Mrs SP Mr sler uh I just I had other questions but Mr Henry just asked a question and Mr Squire responded and I want to clarify something the basement you said that people living down there would violate something what are you referring to it it's not intended to be a living unit I guess right but but you use the word violate um Mr Henry and I don't understand it was more in response to to have a living it would violate the building code right I presume so there's no means of egress it's not it's not intended to be a a living Unit A dwelling unit but it could be if it were properly permitted as such yeah it would need modifications there would you know it's it's it's not designed to be a dwelling unit right now right now I I was there on the site visit and uh but it is a a large space that would accommodate so I just I didn't I didn't quite understand what it would violate um okay right um Mr Squire um this is to Mr Squire you said that this is uh simply to convert it to a non-owner occupied um setup uh and that it would not not change CH the character of the use do you do you uh not think that a non-owner occupied changes the character of a property from an owner occupied uh I guess that's a little bit of a question of opinion right that's not up to me necessarily you know I I sure I mean there's some changes I think you know they they've got some very good tenants there now and intend to keep those tenants and want to keep those tenants and so um you know with a recent purchase of uh of another property in Amherst um they're seeking simply to um you know um you know offer continue to how to offer housing opportunities in in a place that has you know historically had um you know rental units so um actually the woman we met at the property yesterday Michelle uh said that there are no tenants in there now at all that the property is not rented because when she bought it uh she couldn't rent there was some issue with renting and she said it was completely unoccupied now I don't know so when you say that they have some very good tenants that they want to retain we were told yesterday there are no tenants uh hello hello may I speak to something oh yeah probably my language expression um makes some confusion here um actually now there's no tendent because I just purchased um at the end of April I didn't rent it out over summer uh not yet but I will have potential tant leaving in September 1st as I mentioned in the uh building I have already submitt renew um uh permit for for one for one unit not both of them because I'm applying for notown occupy right now but I have already submitt the renew um renewal of the uh permit in August to the rental uh department so this is something updated right now I'm sorry for if I misspoke yeah yeah okay um what are your plans for the pool it was closed it had not been opened this year and uh it's a very significan size pool and what are the plans for when it will be opened during the year um for given that it's a it's a short season anyway but what what are the plans please so the for the pool we definitely will open the every year because to maintain the um what it called to make the water clean and to make not you know if we do not open the pool it it will create a lot of insects even it is this um salty water pool so this year because I purchased this property too late and I I spent a lot of time to figure out how to manage a salty water pool because I have no experience until I get this confirmation from the private seller and they gave me the full instruction uh who I supposed to touch or who supposed to um confirm the cost and then for this year because it's too late I didn't open it but for next year definitely I going to open it for the um management um after the house inspection I think about overnight I feel like um the pool every year normally we open it um between June like at the end of June to at the end of August two month a year this is pretty much the plan and and during these two month iose I feel like not many students leaving in the house because most of them will go out go back home but maybe some they have some friends or living inside house maybe some rental something I was considering to uh put um swimming pool addendum a official Clause into the Lee because it's to uh I have two concerns one is for the safety concern another one is they do not disturb the neighbors no parties at all so I feel like that would be necessary for us to update our lease and and what would that what would that say what would the lease say regarding the pool when you up uh uh M Jeff could you could you share the screen about the this uh swimming pool attendant okay thank you yes let me find that so me sure this so can everybody see that is a swimming pool addendum yeah yes so this runs through yeah the the gist of the addendum um which would disclose that yeah it's it's it's only for tenants uh and guest at their own risks uh no children under 20 or under 14 are allowed uh reasonable caution using the pool and those not responsible pool is not guaranteed and so I think yeah if there's if we need to add some Provisions to ensure you know [Music] um um you know um the the number of people or or anything that's that's fine too but I think generally it's it's to acknowledge that the the pool um is an additional component that needs to be considered in the lease so are you going to issue a 12month will your tenants be signing a 12month lease or orally I I'm thinking to sign a 12 month lease originally but consider this pool I might sign n month leas maybe so still because the lease has not been fixed yet so I'm still thinking about the pool because this is something I really concern if I cover this pool by myself supervis by myself or maybe my familyes um have the summer house uh to uh sleep there so that's a good option for me too so maybe I can consider to N9 month leas but originally for um you know normally Amorous the students leas is almost like 12 month most of them but I may I may think of nine month lease at this point and if you if you operated with N9 Monon leases based on the school year then the students who rent during the school year would not be there in the summer is that correct yes this is what I'm thinking right now because I feel like concerns yeah and then would the house Simply Be vacant and just for the use of your family in the summer or who might use the house in the summer the summer day actually we probably because you know uh I have lot of friends uh from uh all over the world they are they are like just two month leaving I must for like uh International switch or just you know summer program probably just one or two month I do have some friends they ask me to you know leave two month maybe just one or two month short time maybe it's a good option for me or I have my family need to play a place you know leave a place to uh spend the summer so this is all the two options for family use or for my friends you know they have shortterm needs in am too so maybe um okay uh that's all my questions for now thank you I mean the qu one of the concerns I have is if you don't have a clear plan for how the house is going to be occupied how do you ensure the the pool is safe and that you don't have other people children wandering into the pool and scaling over the fence and jumping into the pool I mean if you have people around it tends to be less I mean they're not around 247 all the time no matter what occupancy you have but you're more you're more likely to have people around and that would prevent some of that so concern is is the the safety um the pool can be it can be inherently dangerous if it's not monitored and fenced off and what is your thinking on that may I ask a question so so for this um for this pool so in amest it's um how to say so nine month is good option for students safety I don't want the students to swim in the pool because it's sometimes you know teenager but if if we concern the summer day the house weekend or someone will escape the fence go inside the pool that's much dangerous for me actually than the students rental um if this is the case if this is the concern I feel like the 12 month is the best is the best option for me because this is some qu this is a question I need to figure out um from the hearing or from you know to write email to the town I need to figure out how risk for the pool it is but now I it is clear so I definitely can sign uh 12 month lease for sure so yeah if this is concern I can confirm here um I think I S yeah Mr Henry I think Miss Williams was first oh hi chair judge I just wanted to add um when we were at the site on Tuesday the pool was completely um covered like it's locked and it has a cover on it that I think you can't exactly just like easily get into so even though it's not fenced off directly it is not just opened out it is covered I don't know if that helps or not but does but the pool I mean that's a pool cover that can be removed if if you were having 12 two month leases I think so um I yep who was speaking go ahead was that you Mr Henry yes I so to your Point yes the pool was um covered to Miss Williams point but to your question it is plausible that um somebody could open it it it did seem quite um you need to know what you're doing to be able to do so um but my question for was for miss ya um so owner occupied rental um when you purchased the unit from the previous owners did you get the [Music] prior well Mr Henry um we're you're breaking up and you're and you're kind of Frozen your video is frozen we're losing you can you try again maybe you need to um leave and then come back can because you're fro you're currently Frozen so um let's I have another I do have a question miss ya um I found that you're you're least unusual in that you have the lesie the the renters are in charge of making sure that the lawn is mowed and paying for for the maintenance of the lawn being mode and the same thing with snow removal you I mean I think it says someplace later that you're going to um reimburse them for the actual cost but they have to put out money for the they have to put out money for the the yard by the Mowing and they have to put out the money and organize the um the snow removal and I'm just wondering why that shouldn't be the responsibility of the owner and not the responsibility of the tenants I mean one of the things that students may not care so much about is um making sure that the side whatever sidewalk or the the the road is the driveway is cleared um they probably don't care as much about the they may not care as much about the lawn and it would Norm it's normally the requirement of the the landlord who does care about these things I mean that's the it's your property to maintain and that's it's all in your best interest so I I'm thinking that you have a possibility of more of of um not maintaining the property as well as if you were responsible for those things without having the students the tenants contract pay for and then get reimbursed for those Services which are pretty essential Services lawnmowing snow removal and garbage can you talk to me about your thoughts on that sure uh actually actually uh in this list um at the first page on the first page um there is um clouds about the um the rental rental charge so actually we have already calculate average month utility plus um long maintenance plus spring and fall cleanup plus like and I calculate like four times snow snow blowing as a average charge so I give all the cost add up together add up together and minus 12 month and I get aage average every month cost average so it's around like 450 to 500 per month so I charge the student each of them 150 per month so this is will list it on the first um the first Clause of the pricing Clause we have the basic rental charge plus a utility all inclusive charge for the cost so it's 150 per month so they're going to pay us in total but I have but I list all these covered you know 150 includes which part of the um the cost so that's why I gave the different list for example the gas electricity natural um the uh col and and um the snow blowing so that's why I list the different in different clouds different term I'm sorry I'm still very confused yeah I'm so sorry very very simple yes or no do the Lees pay for snow and garbage removal no no garbage garbage is my turn garbage is I pay for garbage but they pay for snow and Landscaping yes but they already pay by every month in every month charge it sounds like it's included in the cost of the rental fee yes and they're not expected to pay for that out of pocket as those services are needed that they're upfront and part of the part of the rental fee yeah yes it looks to me like it's there may be some discrepancy in the lease yes it looks to me like and it's kind of your decision how you want to rent this out I mean it's my concern is how that affects the main maintenance but it sounds to me like you rent there's a cost for rent and then there's a cost for the the yard and there's a cost for snow that's all added on to their monthly payment for rent so they have a b base rent and then we call it Landscaping fee each month they have a snow fee each month that you've averaged out over the course of the the lease and they have a utility fee Water fee each month as well on top of the the rental fee yes so they are they are paying paying for it yeah they are paying for it but I going to I going to find a company who maintenance the yard I going to pay all this charge to the company to the snowf flowing company to the Land Company it's ammer Nursery yeah yeah John I'm I'm but whomever rents the property has to pay you back who I'm sorry it's it it's I think there's a discrepancy in there's something wrong that's not what the leas that's not how the reads the lease reads that you're going to get money from them each month and then they're going to pay the cost for the landscape and they're going to pay the cost for this on as well for the the snow removal so I mean there is a discrepancy between what's on that first page and what's on page three yes because they they are contracted with maintenance companies for each of those items the trash removal Landscaping snow removal they do have contracts as a as a you know management to to maintain that stuff it's not it's not the responsibility of the tenants to pay for Andor organize that so yes I agree there's a discrepancy there somewhere yeah yeah so that's un unusual and I think it could have implications for property maintenance but y that's that's one question I have um is there other are there other questions from other so Rob I noticed that the parking the parking looks like it encroaches on the front setback but is that a is that because the an earlier special permit waved the parking the the dimensional requirements and so they were allowed to park within that setback or is this does this require a need for a waiver for the the front set back it it doesn't require a waiver at this time it was uh indicated on the drawings in the 1980 special permit uh so we had looked that up and saw that the three parking spaces were shown there uh I didn't go further to see if the bylaw actually restricted it at that time I don't think it did I think that's a a more recent provision uh so it likely is a pre-existing non-conforming condition but uh it was no doubt part of the approval back in 1980 1980 so it's pre-existing all right I'm conforming thank you for that otherwise we wouldn't it wouldn't it wouldn't otherwise be permitted I think all right um people have other questions I guess my I do I have a concern about the pool and just safety and and and the uncertainty that about what you're going to do kind of adds to that I'm kind of up in the air about what your plans are at this point in terms of of that um you know if if their students aren't there and and they're only you got a 10-month lease and they're gone maybe you're you have people coming in and out maybe you have maybe you use it maybe your friends use it maybe you know I don't know if it's rented out for short-term basis um but I I just I I I'm not quite sure about how you plan and I don't think you are how you plan to provide for the property during in the summer and I think that something we need we need to know what your thinking is um so we could because I think if you're going to have short-term uh if you I would I and I just thought of this and Rob please tell me if I'm and or Mr rest tell me if I'm wrong but if you have two months where you lease this out on a short-term basis you may need I don't know if it's permitted in that district and you may need uh other other approvals or a waiver to do that I'm not sure if you can rent it out for a week or two or for a day um I'm just not I don't know what the rules would be for property in that District I hadn't thought of that till just now what's the what's the requirement Rob is that allowed Mr MO is that allowed it's it's a lot we don't have local regulation on you know Airbnb or short-term rental okay all right Mr sler oh I mean wait before m m ya do you have anything else to to add to my um rambling question about what your decision is okay if I could just offer one yeah if I could just offer one bit of it um just suggestion or thought that um you know I think part of it is is obviously gonna be weather dependent that you know every every summer weekends you know it's hard to predict you know the use of of particularly the seasonal elements like the pool um you know instead of sort of a you know this is what's going to happen every weekend or every week so there's that but I think there you know one of the advantages technology that I've seen employed in a lot of places is that that you know video monitoring is very easy to do now and so I think there would be you know that potentially may be a Solutions particularly with a you know uh residents close by that there's there's a very easy way to to have a video monitor that sets off an alarm when you know somebody's there that shouldn't be there you know we've seen it you know in multiple cases for multiple instances but that would be a very you know sort of effective way to if somebody's not there to monitor the pool um you know again just from a from a reasonably close distance so just offering that as a suggestion Mr SL so first I just wanted to give a little informational uh point on the pool I saw the cover there yesterday I'm actually familiar with this cover it's um it secures the pool for being normally winterized it's difficult to remove the cover as it was there and it is absolutely a seasonal process it's the cover you put on when you're not going to use it most most people in the north put the cover on in late September or something like that and it doesn't come off until May it's it's difficult to install it's difficult to remove it's very secure but it's absolutely not the cover that would be used during the swimming season so as secure as the pool is now this is not the cover that will that will make it safe when it is open for use in the summer uh I don't know what cover would because covers in for pools are usually very they're usually bubble almost like bubble wrap and they come off easily because nobody wants to spend two hours opening it every day for a 20 minute swim uh I'd like to ask the applicant uh if for the the summer if you're only going to have a 9month lease are you considering Airbnb or some sort of operation like that for the for the summer months for revenue and for use uh actually r& BNB is very good because in am not you know am is always La of like housing in the summer is hous season a lot of people come from all over the world to attend summer camp um or the uh temporary like two month study something like that so a lot of people wants to come to here and this is a good location so rbnb is a good option but I just this is something I I didn't figure out yet is that is there any regulation if I run 9 month for like student rental and another three month in the summer they run as rbnb because as I know emmer is very hot it's hard to book a house here as our mbnb it's very hot so I'm pretty sure the occup occupancy will be very full I think so so nobody you know we we will not leave the house empty even for maybe three days between between two guests so I I want to ask is it allowed me to do that do rbnb for 3 month and 9 month for student rental is okay you know I think the answer from Mr MOA was that it's that there's no restriction on Airbnb in that zoning district is that correct shortterm no restriction on short-term rental that's correct so any restriction would be one that this board places as a condition of the permit if there were to be one okay um are there other questions from board members not a not a question Mr CH but I I have concerns um about the lease and the responsibilities of the tenants given the fact that um the intent here is to rent each bedro to a different individual um so I I would um prefer to see a finalized clean lease so to speak um that is very definitive as to what um the leses will be responsible for and for full disclosure I wouldn't be comfortable voting yes or no until I see [Music] that you know and I also would like to understand how you're going to allocate parking that would because you have potential for five people how do you allocate parking do you have assigned parking is parking come with a lease how do you make the decision on that is something else um is there no other questions at this time Henry white has his hand up oh I didn't you know those books are really hard to see that yellow hand and so does Mr Meadows so Mr White thank you you you helped me a lot Mr Henry I don't always notice those hands so thank you Mr White thank you Mr chair um I would Echo a lot of what Mr Henry said as well um given the lease that we've been presented with um even coming down to the length of the duration of the lease uh we just have in my opinion far too many unanswered questions um and to be brutally honest I also wouldn't really feel confident uh voting on this in its current state tonight I mean I also have concerns with that being a corner lot I myself live on a corner lot um and with four cars one being in a garage a school being right across the street how does when the school is in operation how does the traffic flow pattern of people dropping off their start picking up students affect the ability of people to get in and out of the unit there's just I have a lot of questions right now that I would feel much more comfortable if we could kind of gain more information get a more firm lease and then maybe vote then on this Mr Meadows uh I I agree with what's been said about the lease but I I also have to add that this is an extreme busy intersection when when school is in session you get buses going down from the high school to the Middle School you get buses coming down the street and turning into the middle school you had buses coming up and going into this Middle School you have cars for all the teachers going to through that intersection into the parking spots you have in including my grandson who walks by there every my my earbuds just collapsed can you hear me yep we sure can uh I can't hear you but that's okay um they uh my grandson walks through there at least twice a day um on foot he and his friends go by there twice a day um my granddaughter used to well all of my kids have gone through there on a consistent basis it's not a good place to have uh a non-owner occupied um group of students uh there is a house across the street across maton street that is rented to students they're in the yard throwing Frisbees and balls all the time into maton Street kids running into the street to grab the the frisbees to grab the the balls if their that house is rented out to a number of students they're going to be intersect interwined with the students across mun Street I I I cannot support this request um so I think the next order of business we do need to get some public comment um and I want to I'm going to sign out and sign back in again all right I want to give the opportunity for public comment before we move on to a public meeting but I do want to provide that and then if people have a desire to speak they may if you do desire to speak please raise your hand uh to using Zoom if you are so recognized state your name and address address your comments to the board the applicant will have an opportunity to respond to each of the individual comments after all the comments are made uh and then we'll have a chance for board comments and discussion but this is a time for public comment and so um if you wish to speak I think we have one I have Trevor Morris I think has his has the hand up and keep your comments to about three minutes and I'll try to help you do that all right thank you uh can you hear me okay yep we can so I live at 123 Chestnut Street just a few doors down uh my daughter was able to walk to the Middle School and High School uh much as uh someone said their grandchildren and and others have done um thanks to Mr Meadows for characterizing quite well the house across the street on maton Street that's already rented out to students I I'll Echo those concerns about having yet another student house and that that turning into a uh you know sort of a party area um there is also an elementary school right uh across the hill so uh also in the in the a minor point in the picture that Mr Squire showed uh he said the that showed that the high school is to the north that's actually the Middle School the the high school is is South so that was there was something wrong on that diagram um I'll just reiterate that Miss Le leang uh bought the house just in April clearly had no intent of actually uh living in the this clearly zoned uh owner occupant uh property uh it looks to me like it it's a a money grab an an attempt to take what should be uh a family dwelling uh appropriate for people who want to send their kids to school and raise their their families here in ammer and uh just convert it into student housing it's not really at all appropriate for this neighborhood or for this uh this um this house uh so regarding the nature of the property uh Mr Squire said this won't change the N nature of the property turning it into an Airbnb having students there very much will change the nature of the property very different from uh few years ago when we had a neighborhood uh Gathering of all uh families who came together and met uh at the house and had a just a neighborhood block party so it absolutely will change uh so to summarize uh I strongly oppose this uh unwarranted zoning change thank you Mr Morris is there anybody else who wishes to speak I see we have a Nancy Schroeder hand is up uh can we bring r in it just takes a minute um but she's on her way okay there we go Miss rer you're there we go all right do you hear me now I do yes hi do you hear me yes we do hear you do you hear us I'm sorry one more time do you hear me yes we do hear you there we go um I guess the first thing I wanted to say was just give us your address please M rer uh 168 High Street okay which is uh well it's 168 so it's three houses down from the uh 161 Chestnut it's on the other side of maton street uh across from the middle school and I I didn't know whether I should read my letter aloud or whether you had the opportunity to to to to read it already well I have read sh however you want to present it is fine okay maybe I'll read it but I also wanted to address the parking issue uh what's going to happen with the parking is it two or three of the cars will be parked across the street in the Middle School lot um we all do that you know there's always parked there's always cars uh from the neighborhood parked in the Middle School lot um so just whatever for whatever whatever that's worth uh I'll read my letter I am a homeowner and live with my family at 168 High Street in ammer I object to the request to change the land use classification from owner occupied duplex to non-owner occupied duplex at 161 Chestnut Street regardless of who owns the house now and what their intentions are my experience is that a non-owner occupied house opens the door to student rentals now or in the future as you face our house the two houses to the right are both student rental properties our experience living next to student housing has been poor at best every fall I introduce myself welcome them and tell the students that this is a family neighborhood I get the phone number of one of the many students in both houses none of that matters late at night when the parties spill out into the POR into the back porch front lawn and Middle School school parking lot shouting incredibly loud music and cars peeling out of the parking lot are the norm on fall and spring weekends which start on Thursday nights one day one of the students who lived within a few feet of our house started shooting his BB gun into our adjoining backyards the folks who previously owned 161 Chestnut Court Chestnut Street had qu had quiet tenants because the tenants lived in the same house as the owner please don't allow this to change our neighborhood cannot absorb a row of student rental houses some of its owners will give up and leave thank you for your consideration so thank you for hearing me thank you m [Music] [Applause] sh all right [Applause] [Music] I guess the next we we have uh Nancy Schwarz Nancy Schwarz yep okay all set thank you I I did uh send in an email uh yesterday uh to miss breast I don't think it may have gotten included uh in your packet so I'm I'm just going to read it just okay and just give us your address please sorry thank you Nancy Schwarz 153 High Street oh about six about six houses around the corner four or five houses uh from the the chestnut property uh Street in question um as a resident homeowner at 153 High Street for 32 years I object to the requests for the special permit at 161 Chestnut Street from owner occupied duplex to non-owner occupied duplex our neighborhood of upper High Street and Chestnut Street has maintained a mostly quiet mix of single family homes owner occupied duplexes and a few single family rentals I see this trend happening in this neighborhood and others for investors to buy properties and turn them into mostly student rentals obtaining a special permit taking away the owner occupied provision should not be taken lightly and should take into account neighborhood concerns about noise traffic and owner responsibility my husband and I have successfully managed our own owner occupied duplex for over three decades with absolutely no issues to our neighbors that is because we live on site we are careful to screen tenants and we respect the peace and privacy of the neighborhood I've witnessed firsthand that when a property switches from owner to non-owner occupied as directly back of us at 174 North Whitney Street the incidence of uncontrolled noise and disturbances is greatly increased non-resident landlords have limited accountability to the neighbors in my experience we as a town should do all we can to preserve owner occupied duplexes and to provide an entry point for home ownership for firsttime Homeowner owners and middle income buyers thank you for your consideration and I hope you'll agree that this special permit is not in the best interest of our neighborhood that was that was my email I I have to say after after attending this hearing tonight I I I so glad that Mr Meadows brought up the fact that you unlike the visit that site visit a few days ago this is that is not a quiet area it's a extremely heavily trafficed intersection it's a four-way stop sign and especially at school hours it is is hectic and and students walking cars turning I can't even imagine uh all the cars that might be parked in that driveway trying to back out and and access uh Street traffic it would be horrendous I'm also I'm actually taken aback by the the owner's proposed uh rental plan not only is she going to maybe rent out as a non owner occupied unit she sounds like she's going to intensely look to rent out every room during every possible week or month out of the year I I I I see this as an egregious overstep of the uh of the the use and I I I'm appalled that somebody would buy a property zoned this way and think that it would be an easy thing to switch just so that they can uh make make money off of our our our population here our student population so I will un end my comments on that and I thank you for listening thank you I see no other hands raised um m y you have an opportunity and Mr Squire you have an opportunity to respond to the public comments and then I think we'll um just we we'll um have a discussion amongst board members go ahead um yeah I mean I I I think everything that's been said has been um you know absolutely heard and um you know really just pointing out that um you know we're not proposing to change you know the the traffic patterns um you know it would be the same number of cars parked there um you know under the proposed condition as are allowed now we're not seeking to violate that all at all so you know obviously that there's going to be limitations to to how much traffic um this site could possibly generate um but absolutely you know heard heard all the concerns and we can return um you know with a lease that's a little bit more defined and and clarifies some of those responsibilities um and um yeah looks at looks at what else we might be able to do to relieve some of the you know concerns we heard tonight um and I don't know whether yeah Leslie you want to meant to say anything else but um I don't know if there's any other yeah any other requests of the board at the moment well I think it seems to me number one we need to have the polias clarified in the conflicts resolved one way or the other number one number two I think it would be it makes sense to me to for for you to describe what your plan is for how you want to lease out the property uh in those two months is it is it a 12 month leas a 10 n month lease short-term rentals what are you going to use it I just plan makes I think you need make a plan um I think that there are some I don't know if that's going to resolve everybody's questions about the the the permit I think you heard some uh other concerns raised that I don't know if they're able to be resolved uh with additional information but those are the two that I have that come to mind right away Mr Henry I see your hand up you do Mr chair thank you so um I I am very student housing friendly but um I I I do have very serious concerns and having walked through the property um I I am not going to support it if it's like rent every single bedroom to a different person as put that on the record so um I would suggest that the applicant reconsider um this I I I don't think the converting the living room into a bedroom um I'm I'm I'm in oppos opposition to that and I I understand you know there's two adequate bedrooms upstairs shared space downstairs um but to rent every single room to a different person I am not going to support that other comments from board members I I would like to vote on this tonight you're you're will willing to um vote you have your your mind made up already absolutely that's it's a very inappropriate place for that Mr slober I agree with Mr Meadows I would like to vote on this tonight and uh I presume at some point you're going to go to a public meeting yep when we can discuss it and take a vote so I would encourage that we do do that so that I can make the comments that I want to make in the public meeting and not now and I'm sure other people may have comments if they haven't already been made all right um I'm GNA ask the opinion of the board we have two members who like to do this tonight it's late U my original thought was we set this for another date but um it sounds like another date for at least two of the members isn't going to there's not additional information will change their mind um so I I guess I'd like to get a a feeling from the board do we want to go into public do we want to go into a public um meeting so we can discuss this more and it sounds like we got two at least two people that do and and you want it'll take another half hour but that's you know if you want to spend it tonight we certainly can or Mr CH Mr chair do we do we have to go into a public meeting in order to in order to vote on the application yeah yes well have to but we I don't think we have to but it only takes a second to get into the public meeting and that's the best place to have the discussion I don't want I don't want to change anything I just was curious that's fine thank you all right um Mr chair my yes my position my position would be um fundamental fairness I understand Mr meta's concern and Mr s's position but I think given that um there's a lot of incompleteness with what's presented give them the opportunity to go back fix those things and come back um and if the answer is a no then it's a no then but I think they should have the opportunity to make Corrections and satisfy some of our concerns so here's what I'm going to do we're going to go into public we're I would move to be go into a public meeting and allow the discussion we can and that exactly the point you made and Mr Meadows have made and Mr SL can make we can discuss those further if that's and we can take a vote either just to to um make a decision on it or to continue the meeting to someplace else and that we give everybody the opportunity to speak so that's what I think is the best thing to do um and the fairest thing to do for both the members as well as the applicant so I would entertain a motion that we move into a public meeting uh while keeping the public hearing open in case we come back and and do um come back and do consider this and we move on into a public public meeting while keeping the public hearing open do I have such a motion so all right I moved and seconded I don't think there's any discussion chair votes I Mr White hi Mr me Mr Henry hi Mr Meadows hi Mr sler hi all right we're now in a public hearing which is typically not a time for public comment and it's a Time board deliberates on the matter before us so um Mr Henry I heard you say that you would prefer to give the applicant a chance to come back and try to fix it and perhaps it could warrant your um approval with if changes were made I think that would be a fair that is correct Mr chair it looks it looks to me like Mr Meadows just thinks this is not well not well situated and uh further changes the lease and other things it may come back you're not going to change your opinion about where this is suitably located in this area correct that's correct um I don't know what you think Mr sler or Mr White why don't you Mr slober you've spoken what do what's your view okay um I just want to take my hand down all right there it is um I think that this application and this proposal is so flawed that nothing can fix it I have concerns that I haven't even really brought up yet about the number of people who could live in this house there's a there's a common practice in this town in student rentals that in order to uh reduce the per head monthly charge that they I've seen places where people live in the living rooms and and you get many more people the basement of this property is an a big quite nice room it's a little musty now but nothing that a dehumidifier wouldn't take care of in a couple of weeks everything that Mr Meadow said about his grandchildren going to school and the activity everything that the letter writers uh said that they are unanimous in their opposition uh Mr Squire said that this proposal would not change the character of the property I disagree with that um the building may be consistent with the neighborhood but non-owner occupied by students is not going to be consistent so for all of those reasons the traffic Mr Meadow's points the neighbors I don't see how anything about this proposal could be fixed and uh I was I'm going to oppose it and I don't see any point in bringing it back because nothing is going to change and uh so I'm I'm also not going to support this and I will oppose it and I will oppose them even bringing it back thank you Mr chair thank you Mr sler Mr White thank you Mr chair um I'll try to make this brief um basically uh I would not feel comfortable voting tonight because we have incomplete information um to me a big part of public service and how we serve our communities is try to try to have all of the information before we render a decision in the affirmative or in the negative and you know I agree with pretty much every Point that's been said tonight however I would not feel comfortable voting on this at this point we have so so many questions and so many things that just we don't have answers for um but that's where I'm at thank you and so is is your position that you would want to continue this or is your position that this is that we don't have enough information and that you don't want it you're ready to oppose it is because you don't have the information I'm not sure I know where you're coming from well I mean at this point uh I mean given everything that's been said and the evidence excuse me the documentation we've been presented with uh I would be in opposition to this uh however I was just letting you know as a chair and as a board that I don't feel confident in issuing a vote a vote in the affirmative or the N I understand Mr Henry um you voiced your opinion when we were in the public hearing I want to give you a chance to talk again on the um in the public meeting as is Mr chair I would not support it but I also believe that we should give them an opportunity to make some corrections um I I understand you know half the board is potentially going to vote no but I think they should be afforded the opportunity to um go back and come back with a better case and make that case got it well it seems to me the best the best process here is is to um give Mr Henry an opportunity to vote uh on his his notion which is to uh continue to a later date if we vote that down we move to then we have there's the affirmative vote to um vote it either to approve it or to disapprove it and I think that that's fair is everybody a shot at the vote that they wish so the first I would think the way we want to do this is the opportunity to to the board members to vote where they want to continue it if that doesn't pass then we move to um to to uh consider approving or disapproving the motion so that's how I'd like to handle this and give everybody a chance to um have their vote in front of the in front of the body so what I would like to do is entertain a motion that we continue this has her hand up Mr chair what that M best has her hand up I just wanted to mention that um this isn't going to be it whatever vote you take it's not going to pass if three people vote Yes because you need four people to vote Yes just wanted to remind everybody of that yeah I think we know that all right um Mr Henry I would entertain a motion to um continue this to a date um to to um two meetings out um is so moved is there a a motion to this for uh a month from now the next meeting a month from now and we'll put the date in which I think would be uh mid-september so move Mr chair is there a second to that motion second it's been moved and seconded this requires um a majority vote um any discussion I think we've all had a discussion the chair votes no Mr what Mr Henry I Mr White I Mr sler you're muted Mr SL I think Mr sler is a a no I was mute I was a muted no now I'm an unmuted no and Mr Meadows no all right so the motion to continue this has failed the uh next motion would be on approving the um are just approving the the um project at the U application the effect of this is if you vote yes we've approved the application if we vote no um the application is denied it needs four votes to um approve the the special permit application are there any questions or discussion from Members okay um can I just interject for a moment chair judge um I don't know if the applicant is aware that they have the ability to withdraw their application seeing as how we are in a similar situation to a previous case um and I just wanted to note as somebody who is observing that this individual um does not have a lawyer present so they may not know that that is an option um if someone else would like to expand on that and explain what that means I think that would be helpful um just so that they have the full understanding of what's available to to them I think we're in the middle of a vote I don't know that that's possible at this point thank you for the a little late we it is it is a legal right though so I I would I would we're we're in it's understood um we're in the middle of a vote the motion before us is to um approve the special permit application fy20 25-01 is there a second second oh first we need a motion I'm sorry Mr judge oh oh sorry we're in the middle of a vote y okay second it's been moved in second is there any discussion no discussion the chair votes no Mr Meadows no Mr Henry abstain Mr White abstain Mr sler no the motion fails um the special permit is denied you have the ability to come back with a um it's an another application at a later point in time um but the application before us is denied at this point unfortunate we didn't have a complete discussion but I understand and thank you for your time Miss y you can you can um change your application come back with some kind of a diff something different and we will um we'll be able to see it but I think you I think you heard from the board There's real concern about the location and the uh the concept of the project at that location and so I think you will want to um think closely work with the staff and see if there's some way you can fashion this so that it's um a little bit different application than we saw before us now uh yeah I understand now because we I I'm new here so I don't know the historical problem here in the community so now I understand now so the concern I got concern so I just have one question so because um um do do I have option to without this application or not no anymore not you can't withdraw it now but you can come back with another application oh oh okay okay thank you thank you for the time thank you but I would tell you don't come back with the same application you'll see the same result right yeah ion get to us at that point I I know the business to so yeah I I know now thank you all right was there any other questions comments from board members if not the next order of business is public comment on any matter not before us tonight we have nobody from the public who wishes to speak the next order of business is um old business or business not anticipated within the last 48 hours and I think that's just about schedule is all we really need Miss Brash can we run through the schedule and may I make a comment I think Williams is in a better position to through the schedule before we do the schedule do you have something well I I just want to say that I I had asked for the attorney to come and explain things to us and I I appreciated his coming and and uh the town manager allowing him to come and explain but as I said I was more confused after we finished than I was before um primarily because my sense is that the Commonwealth has got too conflicting um uh they're not regulations but they're um sponsorships uh and the the ability to have an attorney come and work with us on this uh I I think is essential do we need to write a letter M brr as a as a board requesting this from Mr bachan or can why don't I try first and maybe Mr Mar has a different opinion but I can try first I've done that with um comprehensive permits and the town manager has agreed um so I can try and then see what he says and if there's a problem I can come back to you and get a letter does that make sense yep that makes sense great okay um Miss Williams what do we have the next two meetings so next week we have wayfinders um on the 29th and that agenda has been published for anyone who is watching and is curious as to what we're going to be discussing um and I will be sending out links to that application packet as well as um any additional things that we've received but you should have actually already received a link to the app application packet but I'll send it out again if you don't have it um on the 12th it's just a regular meeting right now we have shoots Berry Road lined up um we could have a potential application come forward for Canton AV but it might be too late for them um I'll just double check that and another application that could come forward if they get their ducks in a row is to um just similar to what we saw with u Mr Patel's application simply just um accepting or you know the existing management plan for uh one of their properties that they just took over but again I need to get confirmation on that so you could potentially have three cases or you could just have one which is shes Berry Road um and the rest of the schedule is kind of the the way we've been talking about it nothing else has come in or changed great all right thank you any other comments questions I would just say that we are following the fine tradition this week is that we're running long just like the Democrat convention I apologize to you all for that but um that's just the way it is sometimes um there wasn't a Bill Clinton among us but um who spoke twice as a lot of time but that's all right all right guys thank you very much we will see you all next week for wayfinders I appreciate it thank you Mr chair again thank you for the especially to the staff who Mr chair do we need not need to vote to adjourn yes we do need to vote to see see look when I get off past 9:00 I'm ready to go but we need to do it right you know it's past nine o'clock I don't know what I'm doing all right thank you very much Mr White I would entertain a motion to adjourn move good I heard a second yep uh this is a non-debatable motion the chair votes I Mr White hi Mr Henry I Mr Meadows I and Mr slober I thank you motion passes we're adjourned thank you to the staff again for staying late and uh even though you're working a full job during the day thank you so much all right everyone run away