July 20, 2026 – Select Board – Video & Transcript
July 20, 2026 - Select Board
Good evening. It's 6.32 p.m. and as the chair, I'm calling the meeting of the Select Board to order for July 20, 26 at 6.30 p.m. although we are starting at 6.32. This is a remote access only meeting. This meeting may be recorded and if recorded, it will be made available to the public on Wacom as soon as possible after the meeting. The public will be excluded from tonight's executive session.
Pursuant to Chapter 2 of the Acts of 2025, this meeting will be conducted via remote access in accordance with applicable law. No in-person attendance by members or the public may will be permitted. One may watch or participate with the meeting link remotely that can be found either on the Select Board's agenda or in the Wayland Town Calendar on the Wayland web page.
When required by law or allowed by the chair, persons wishing to provide public comment or otherwise participate in the meeting may do so via the remote access as applicable. Public comments should be limited to two minutes per person.
I'm going to read the agenda, but first I want to recognize that joining me in the room this evening I have Mr. Reynolds and Mr. Levine.
We are also joined by the Assistant Town Manager, Ms. Kelsey Pauw-Sperlet, and I'm going to stop here for one second to say, Robbie, do you see Mr. Whitney?
I don't see him yet. No, I do not see him. Mr. Levine, would you be so kind as to see if you could text him? Yes, I'm on it. I'm doing it. I knew you were doing it. That's why I asked you. All right, I'm going to read the agenda while we're doing this, so we move along as we're a pretty full night, as usual. So call to order. We're going to review the agenda. We'll have announcements and public comment, after which we will enter into executive session to discuss, pursue it to Massachusetts General Law, Chapter 38, Section 2183, discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining with the town's collecting bargaining units. At approximately 7.25 p.m., we will return to open session, at which time we will then turn our attention to reviewing and discussing the 2026 Hazard, excuse me, mitigation plan updates. At 8.25 p.m., we are scheduled to have a liquor license hearing violation, that will be followed by a review and discussion of the Sherman's Bridge Roads traffic study with potential recommendations, then discuss and update the Regional Housing Services Office, that's the RHSO, followed also by their inter-municipal agreement that we sign annually. Approximately 8.45 p.m., we'll have a discussion with the council and agencies, community centers, get a first-year recap, we'll have some appointments. We will be interviewing one candidate for the cultural council, and they will be making some confirmation of appointments. We will also have an opportunity to review our remaining open board positions. The town manager with a building, excuse me, the town building working group discussion, we'll follow that, and after that, we will discuss and finalize the fiscal 27, a fiscal select board and town manager objectives. Approximately 9.30 p.m., we will have from the town manager for the town manager's report, followed by minutes. We have, I think, three sets of minutes tonight, June 15, June 29, and July 7 of 2026. We have a few items to review and approve in the consent calendar. There's correspondence, select board members' reports and concerns, and I think it's an optimistic board we are scheduled to adjourn at 9.55. So the first thing I want to say is, are there any announcements from the board? Yes, Madam Chairman, there is a Town Beach concert this Thursday. I'm sure you're all on their seats, edge of your seats, looking forward to it. And we have one of Weyland's top showmen, Peter Lavinson, in comedy. And quite often, Mr. Lavinson is asked, are you going to bring Joanna Shuck from the Weyland High School Honors Jazz Ensemble? And I am pleased to share that the entire gang will be there, and the current weather forecast is very, very good. Terrific. Thank you. So, Ms. Powers-Burlatt, I've just gotten a text from Mr. Whitney saying the link is not working for him. Could you, I don't know where Mr. Levine is helping on that, or? I can take a look, and I can send him something. Okay, that'd be great. Thank you. Mr. Levine, do you have any announcements?
Okay. Mr. McCall, the Town Manager, will be joining us, hopefully, within the next 20 or 30 minutes. So, we were scheduled to go into Executive Session, but this is, we're going to postpone that until Mr. McCall is able to join us. So, what I think I would like to do, let's see if we can't get Mr. Whitney on board, wait a minute or two, see if we can get him on board. Oh, sorry. Is there any public comment? Yeah, I see two people, three people with their hand raised. I see Doug Stotts, I think. Doug Stotts, okay. Mr. Stotts, I recognize you. Sorry, I skipped this. This is hard for me to go back online.
Go ahead, Doug. Oh, there's Bill. Excuse me, I just want the record to show that Mr. Whitney joined us at 638. Thank you. Good evening.
Okay. And Mr. Stotts, you've been recognized. The floor is yours. Doug Stotts of Sherman's Road. So, my neighbors have reached out to respectfully request that the board defer discussion on the Sherman's Bridge Road traffic calming topic until we can have another bite at the apple and do a little bit more analysis on the underlying data set. The one topic I pointed out as being a potential shortcoming in my emails and some of the others to the board has been that such a high proportion of the traffic is going eastbound during morning rush hours. That traffic starts around Lincoln-Sudbury High School and goes two miles. And by the time they hit the bridge, they're in convoys of six, seven, and eight cars going, you know, 24, 26 miles an hour, whatever the lead car is. I think the issue is that it might skew the data down artificially from what's actually going on during off-peak. The other thing I'd point out is that the data that's been presented to you is not split between eastbound and westbound traffic. That's particularly important since the surveys were done by number 66, Sherman's Bridge Road, which is only a couple hundred yards from the bridge. We all recognize that the bridge has been serving as an inadvertent speed bump, and it's important that we understand the speeds going westbound and eastbound separately. Furthermore, I submit that doing that would get a good benchmark on eastbound speeds so we can see if they've increased markedly when the bridge finally does get repaired. Thank you.
You're muted, Carol.
Sorry. Robert, do we have someone else for public comment? Gretchen Dresdens. Yes. Ms. Dresdens, I recognize you. Hi. Gretchen Dresdens, 155 Main Street, and I had two comments tonight. The first relates to, in your packet, the June 29th draft minutes where it speaks about Mr. Gould's update on 195 Main Street. And specifically, at the top of page 106, I believe it's line 3, it says near zone 2, and it should actually read in zone 2. Mr. Gould's investigation does cover several parcels, and it's misleading to indicate that the PIFA contamination is near zone 2 when, in fact, it is in zone 2. And then my second comment relates to, I forget what page it is in the packet, but talking about the proposed town building working group, and I just question why there is nobody on the working group representing the schools, which is a significant portion of our budget expenditure, and why there is nobody represented from the public. Thank you. Thank you. Do you have anyone else, Robin? And Alyssa. Okay. Ms. Cotter, I recognize you. Thank you. Yeah, so about traffic on Sherman Bridge Road, we all know there's a lot here, a lot crosses the bridge, there's a lot of speeding. I've spoken before about the danger, this presents especially to the residents on my end of the road, the east end by 126, where we have no sidewalks, and it's twisty, and changing elevations. These four traffic studies from March to July this year echo the results of the studies done in 2025 and 2023, and a more detailed one by Sudbury in 2024, though that was just traffic crossing the bridge, but it did show specific vehicle types, but it was only for 100 feet. So, basically, if you're concerned about VRU safety or speeding, you want to look at the vehicles traveling alone, where their speed is not constrained by cars in front of them, and where that's happening. We who live here know when the heavy traffic is, and we don't walk then. We walk when there's little traffic, and that's when those speeders are the most dangerous and potentially deadly. That's what I see is people really speeding past me at dusk, you know, hours after the workday, and sometimes in the middle of the night going eastbound. The other ones going westbound. Cars pull off of Route 126 at 30 miles an hour. They don't even slow, and they may be going 35. I mean, not all the cars go down to 30 right around Turnbridge Road as they're supposed to on 126. And then they speed past all the houses that people back out of their driveways because their driveways are concealed. There's an elevation you can't see around there. There's nothing to warn the drivers. There's nothing to slow the drivers. I'm wondering if some kind of slow sign could be right at the entrance to the road, maybe even a little island that kind of divides the two lanes, because the cars come in and they cross over, you know, the outgoing lanes. And, you know, in the past, there have been a lot of accidents there. There's never any police stopping speeders here, but we're a small town, and how can we expect them to handle all of this out-of-town commuter cut-through drivers? We need signage to warn people, drivers, that it's the law that they have to pass by four feet. Any pedestrians or walkers in the road, that we have to use the road because there are no sidewalks. Some of the elders I've spoken with on this end want speed bumps to slow people down. They want a crosswalk so they could safely cross and get their mail, and they're right at the part where people are coming in from 126, fast, accelerating, and then hitting all that short sight line area with the small driveways, people backing out and stuff, caution signs, speed limit signs, and less traffic. I mean, maybe we could have just residential traffic, you know, in the nighttime, you know, from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. Anything that can incentivize, de-incentivize commuters from going down this small residential street.
And, yeah, slow signs. Oh, and also Sudbury has already placed a 25-mile-an-hour sign for drivers entering the bridge on their side. We have no such sign at our end. Why don't we have a 25-mile-an-hour sign on our end for people about to get on the bridge, as well as for people coming off the bridge? And Sudbury has both of those. Anything to let people know, they have to be careful. They're in a residential area. And it might, you know, make it better. So, yeah. Thank you. Thanks. Okay. Thank you. Robbie, is there anyone else who'd like to speak? I don't see no one else. Okay. So, I'm going to go back up here a bit and welcome Bill officially to the meeting. Sorry, I had problems with the link. Also, I want to ask if under the announcements that you would like to speak to the upcoming PIP meeting and give the details for that. So, well, you're on the mute, Bill. Sorry. I received the link from Mr. Gould but could not open it. So, I believe it's, is it the 30th? Yeah. And I do not have the login for that. I know that it will be entirely remote and it is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. 7? Yes, that's my understanding. So, perhaps that will appear on the town website, Kelsey. Yeah. Yes, Mr. Whitney, I will. And I just wanted to clarify, the meeting actually starts at 6.30. 6.30, thank you. Okay. 6.30. And it is totally remote. Correct. On our next, next, a week from Thursday. So, I just wanted to put that at the beginning of the meeting. Okay. I think you were not here when I mentioned that Mr. McCall is a bit detained. So, we're not going to go into executive session directly. We're going to do a couple other things first and hopefully he'll join us. Kelsey, will you, are you, is he going to text you when he's available?
I can ask him to. Okay. Thank you. And then you'll let us know. So, do we want to do the consent calendar? So, I need a motion. And the consent calendar obviously is in its own packet.
There are eight items. Can we have a motion?
Move to July 20th, 2026 consent calendar for approval. I would ask that we pull item six out for discussion. Yeah. Can you rephrase the motion, Doug, please? Move items one through five, seven, and eight for approval on the consent calendar. Second. Thank you. Okay. So, let's do that first. No further discussion on that. Then, of course, we're on the remote. Everything has to be a roll call vote. So, Bill? Yes. Doug? Yes. Chris? Aye. Yes. And Carol? Yes. That's four zero. And I think at the beginning of the meeting, I forgot to mention as well, Mr. Fay will not be able to join us this evening. So, on number six, I printed out some material for this. What specific is your question here? Well, I had a question. I had a question. As I understand that there is a lawsuit that is ongoing alleging price fixing among suppliers of fire apparatus, perhaps, or perhaps not, including ambulances. So, I'm curious as to whether that lawsuit would have any bearing on this purchase.
Mr. Winnie, I can answer if you'd like. Thank you. So, as far as I know, the lawsuit is related to mostly fire trucks, not ambulances. And I would say that I can't speak for the future to say if ambulances are going to be added. I don't know if Braun is part of that lawsuit, but I don't know if it would affect the price in our favor if we were to wait for the outcome of that lawsuit. Because I don't know if ambulances are going to be included. And if they are, who is to say how long that lawsuit plays out and how that would affect us? Because we need the, we sort of need the ambulance now. The other ambulance is kind of at end of life. So, yeah, I had asked because we're purchasing from Bulldog Fire Apparatus, Inc. Yeah, so Bulldog is the company that is selling us the, the, I have to, I, you know what, now that you say that, I'd have to double check to see if Bulldog is part of that because they're a third party seller of ambulances and fire trucks. So I'm not quite, quite certain if they're a member or party to that lawsuit. And I'd have to look it up. I don't know off the top of my head. I just know that they facilitate sales of fire apparatuses, both fire trucks and ambulances. Well, I personally would be comfortable in authorizing the town manager to execute the contract pending further investigation on this question, if the board is so disposed and would make a motion to that effect. Okay. I think this looks consistent to me, Bill, in the prices we've paid for ambulances in the past. But I do know that the issue is that sometimes there's delays and then things change. So. Yeah. Have we paid inflated costs for ambulances in the past? I don't know if it's part of the lawsuit. But anyway, I'm, I'm happy to make the motion that Michael McCall be authorized to execute a contract for the purchase of a new Braun chief. So we already have a motion on the table, though, for the other items that, what did we, did we approve that already? And we're just doing this one. We did. Yeah. Sorry. Go ahead, Bill. That was four zero. Yeah. And then, and then it was Bill's turn to address his question, presents his question on number six, which he's done. So have you finished your motion, right? Yes. Right. Okay. So now we need a second. It's hard. Second. Thank you. And then let's have a roll call vote. So Bill. Yes. Doug. Yes. Chris. Yes. And Carol. Yes. So that's before zero. Okay, great. So I'm going to note that Mr. McCall has joined us, which means then we are going to go back to the beginning of the, the agenda, and I am going to say that I move the select board, enter into executive session, pursuing to Massachusetts general law, chapter 38, section 21A3, to discuss strategy with respect to the collective bargaining with the following units. This is going to be the Wayland library staff, Wayland police officers, unions, the International Association of Firefighters, the Wayland Department of Public Works, asked me, is there a second to the motion to enter into executive session? Thank you. Thank you. The chair declares that a public discussion of these matters may have a detrimental effect on the litigating, negotiating, or bargaining position of the town. So I have a roll call vote. Chris. Yes. Bill. Yes. Yes. Carol. Yes. That's four zero. All right. The chair invites attendance by Michael McCall, town manager, Kelsey Powers, Spillette, assistant town manager. Um, and then I need a little assistance here. Is both Jalen and, and, uh, Kate joining us or just Kate?
Does anybody know? I believe it's just Kate who is joining. Okay. And Kate Ryan, human resources director. Uh, the committee will rejoin the public meeting from executive session. The meeting will return to open session in approximately 45 minutes. So everybody knows they have to go to the other link now. So we will see you there. Thank you. Thank you. Online. Thank you. Good evening. I'm, um, returning the select board to open session at 7 26 PM. Thank you. So, um, I think since we went to executive session, Mr. McCall, the town manager has joined the, the committee. I want to make note of that. And, um, we are still also assisted by, uh, assistant town manager, Kelsey Powers, Spillette. All right. So I think the next item on our agenda is I'm missing somebody that, wait a minute. I'm missing, uh, Chris, uh, Doug, you're all muted. I'm missing Chris and Bill. Right. Right. Oh, do I have to restart us again to open session? Cause they're not here. Yeah. You don't have a quorum. All right. Let me get one.
Okay. There's Bill. Hi Bill.
Chris is in the attendees. If we could move him over, please.
Somebody tell me how to put my name on the screen. Um, so you right click on, there should be a little box with three dots up in the right hand corner there. It might give you a thing in there that if you click it to rename. Okay. So in my, I was so excited that we were so right on time that I went right ahead and started without, um, Chris and Bill. So I'm going to re, um, bring this book back to open session at 728 PM. Our next item will be to review and discuss the 2026 hazard litigation plan. We're going to be looking at some updates. We're going to invite, uh, Chief Mark Hebert, uh, Fire Chief Neil McPherson and Jamie Kaplan from Jamie Kaplan Consulting. I want to ask you, there's a nice lock here as well. Are you also joining us for this, uh, gender item? Yes. Yes. So what this is, um, this information starts on page six in our packet. There's a few slides there, but essentially every five years we need to update and review our hazard mitigation plan. And this is what, uh, in the process of doing. And one of the steps is if they come and review progress and, um, uh, offer the public opportunity to provide input at a select board meeting. So I am going to turn this over to Chief McPherson, I think, first. Neil, did you want to speak first? So, uh, thank you. I just wanted to say, um, thank you to Jamie and her team. And we appreciate the fact that you've allowed us a half an hour tonight. So we look forward to Jamie and her team going through the presentation. We want to remind the public again of the opportunity in the future for more public input tonight because we don't have a lot of time, but it's been a very collaborative process. And it's been a pleasure to work with Jamie and her team so far in this important project for the town.
Should I go ahead and give the presentation, Carol? Yes, absolutely. The floor is yours. Thank you. Okay. Thank you for having us. So, uh, my name is Jamie Kaplan and I'm, uh, happy to be here in front of you with Ellen Grapp-Loth and, um, we've done a lot of work, uh, mitigation planning work throughout the state of Massachusetts. Uh, the graphic gives you some sense of that. And we also work nationwide, um, doing emergency management planning. Uh, we don't want to take a lot of your time today, but we do want you to understand a bit about what our project is and how you're involved with it. Uh, so the graphic is a screenshot of the cover of your, uh, current hazard mitigation plan. Um, and we are creating an update to that plan. And what I hope to do tonight is help you understand what mitigation is, what a hazard mitigation plan is. And then we'll talk a little bit about natural hazards and some high hazard areas, um, in Weyland, and then begin to think about some mitigation actions. And I'll give you a sense of, uh, the whole project in general and how you can be engaged with it through our process. Um, so when we think about natural hazards, we're thinking about any natural event that can cause harm to people or property or in the, the environment. Um, and we're trying to consider what hazards, um, could possibly affect your community, your neighborhoods, um, and all hazard occurrences don't necessarily have to turn into disasters. So if you think about, for instance, heavy rains, we can't stop heavy rains, but we don't necessarily have to have flooding and the activities that we can do to not have flooding would be considered mitigation. And so what our plan is doing is looking at the, what can happen and what can we do ahead of time so that you don't have disasters, um, and how you can mitigate those risks. So a big picture of emergency management tends to have these four components, uh, preparedness, response, recovery, and mitigation. Our plan is only about mitigation. Uh, when you think about preparedness, that's what I'm in Northampton, by the way, Massachusetts. So we think about preparedness. We're thinking about, for instance, winter storms, we get a warning, they're coming, everybody rushes to the store for milk and eggs and bread and that kind of thing. We're preparing because you know, it's going to happen response and recovery. That's what Mark and, um, Neil do a lot of, right? They respond to incidents. Um, and then recovery is putting those pieces back together. Our plan is only about mitigation. It's only about what we can do when we're not having a disaster. For instance, today, nice weather day, right? It was not too hot. It's not too cold. It's not raining. It's not snowing. What do we do so we don't have problems when those things happen? Because we can't stop them from happening. And that's what the plan is about.
So hazard mitigation has been proven to save approximately six or more dollars for every dollar you save, um, every dollar you spend, excuse me. So if we wait for, for instance, a bridge to wash out because it's too low for current, um, storms, that's very expensive, not to mention the loss of lives and, and economic impacts. Whereas if you spend the money today to build a bridge appropriately for current conditions, you're going to save money. Um, so our mitigation plan will look at ways to reduce loss of life and property. It will look at how to prioritize your investments, right? You have limited amount of human and financial resources, and we want to identify projects projects that will use those resources most effectively. Um, you will be increasing the community's resilience, um, and it's a requirement for federal funding through FEMA. There are millions, literally millions of dollars of grant funding available to you if you have a FEMA approved hazard mitigation plan. And so this plan serves to meet that need. We identify these projects. We're going to identify possible, um, funding sources for them. And then when, um, your plan is approved and adopted, you're eligible for funding. And I'm going kind of quickly because I know you're on a very tight schedule today. Um, but we are available in the future to answer questions. So, uh, what does hazard mitigation look like? These are just a couple of examples, things like culvert, um, upgrades, drainage improvements, elevating structures, all of that mitigates risk to flooding. We think about wildfire. We want to have defensible space, reducing fuels, um, and, and building with ignition resistant construction. I know that you're a very wooded community. Um, so that's something that is, is super important to think about. We want to maintain the health of trees and make sure that, you know, sick or dying trees aren't against buildings. Um, in terms of other things, we could think about having cooling centers. We're certainly seeing our environment get increasingly hot. Um, we want to have shade infrastructure and that could be expanding tree canopies. Um, so trees can be both good and bad when we think about mitigation. Um, and for earthquakes, I know we don't have lots of them, but we do have them. So you want to do things like, uh, retrofitting your critical facilities, securing utilities, that kind of thing. So we're looking at through our plan to understand what can happen and then identify what you could possibly do about it. So these are the key components of a mitigation plan. The first big chapter in your plan has what we call a community profile, and it really sets the stage for what is Wayland, who lives there. So we're looking specifically at demographics, not just people in general, old people, young people, disabled people. You want to get a good sense of, um, if there are any, um, high need populations, et cetera. Uh, we look at your built environment and that will include infrastructure like roads and, um, other utilities, as well as houses and, um, special critical facilities. That would be things like the library or town hall. Um, all of that is in the community profile. All your natural resources are described there. Then we look at hazard information and the risk assessment. And Ellen's going to talk about this in a minute, but this is where we go through all the different possible natural hazards that may impact the community and what you can do to, what, what those hazards will do to the community if they are to occur. Your capability assessment. This looks at the community's capacity today to mitigate risk. Um, and we won't talk a lot about that today. Um, but we do consider things like, do you have, um, the right plans in place? Do you have, um, different educational opportunities, financial opportunities, et cetera? What's the capacity that you have to implement mitigation measures? Your mitigation strategy is where it all comes together with these projects to help, um, increase your resilience and mitigate risk to the natural hazards. And then the plan implementation and maintenance chapter speaks specifically about how you can implement this plan, maintain it, get that grant funding. Um, and as Carol mentioned in the quick introduction, it is good. The plans are good for five years and then it's a requirement that they get updated. So we began your planning process with a kickoff meeting in February. We put together what we refer to as the hazard mitigation planning committee and Neil and Mark are the, um, chairs, if you will, of that committee, um, that is meeting four times through our planning process. We have, um, two opportunities, this being the first one for the public to engage with us and this planning process. Uh, then the committee, as well as the public have an opportunity to review the draft plan and that will happen, um, in September. And then the plan will go to MIMA, the Massachusetts emergency management agency for their review in October. After MIMA reviews your plan and they feel that it's met all federal requirements. They send it to FEMA, the federal emergency management agency for their review. Now when FEMA reviews your plan, they, um, look to make sure that we as a consulting team, um, and you as a community have met all federal requirements with the plan. And when they're happy that you have, they send the plan back to you. They send you a letter that says the plan is approved pending adoption. And that's the time that then this committee, the select board needs to adopt this plan. So that's part of why I've really pushed Neil and Mark to say, get us on this agenda. We want to be involved with the select board because I want you to understand what's in your plan, what it's all about. So come November, December, January, it's hard for me to know how fast FEMA will look at your plan. It's going to come back to you, um, and you need to adopt it. So I want to make sure you're in the loop the whole time. Um, and that we're meeting, you know, your needs that this plan needs to reflect what you care about. All right. So this committee, the hazard mitigation planning committee that we put together. Um, this is a list of, uh, most, if not all of the people who are on the committee. And this was one of our first big steps in putting your plan together is get the right group of people together to talk about these needs. And what we need to do is get supporting data and information. Um, as a consulting team, we've been doing this for nearly 30 years. We do it nationwide. We're good at it. We don't live in Wayland. We don't know your community the way you do. So it's so important that no matter what we're doing in our planning process between the beginning to the end, you're involved because your input is what matters the most. Um, so this committee has provided lots of information and data for us, assisted with outreach and engagement, such as getting us here today. Um, identifying and prioritizing mitigation actions. We have a good list going of about 30 mitigation actions already identified, and then they'll review and comment on the draft plan. So these are the folks that I turn to and say, what do you want to do in your job so that you are ready for a disaster? So you don't have big disasters. What can happen so that you don't need to respond with lights and sirens, basically? All right. I'm going to turn it quickly over to Ellen, and she'll go through the risk assessment. Okay. Thanks, Jamie. Good evening, everyone. So this slide gets right into it and defines risk as the potential for damage, loss, and other impacts that are caused by what Jamie was talking about, the natural hazards. So the risk assessment, the main job that it has to do is describe risk in detail for each hazard that's included. So the terms that you see on the left in parentheses are basically the same terms that we're going to use in the hazard mitigation plan. And you can see that we have to take a look at everything we can about what the hazards can do to the community and its assets is the type of language that FEMA uses. So the graphic that's shown there on the right was something that was created by FEMA to just convey the idea that risk is that area of overlap between the hazard or the occurrence of the hazard or the event, sometimes we say, and the community as represented by its assets. And then the next slide basically looks at a term that we refer to as vulnerability, which in this context, we're basically saying the risk assessment is understood as being a very deep dive into the ways in which the community may be at risk. And this is vulnerability. So we can kind of break the analysis of vulnerability into several steps, and that's what we're trying to show here. So exposure is basically describing the community assets that were mentioned on that last slide, people, structures, systems, valued activities for the community. And then it's natural, historic, and cultural resources. And what we do, we use existing data as well as models to try to help quantify things like potential losses from future hazard events. And one of the tools that we mentioned there in that third step is something that FEMA has, which is software called Hazus. And that's used to do the analysis for flood, wind, and earthquake hazards specifically. So as we go through and identify the potential damage, loss, and impacts, then what we do, and this is at the end of each section for each hazard in the hazard mitigation plan risk assessment, we come up with what are called problem statements. And these are specific to each hazard, and these are specific to each hazard, and then they form the basis for the actions to mitigate the problems, and we'll talk a little bit more about that later. So then on this next slide, we basically can show how it worked for Wayland. This is basically sort of a very consolidated view of what the results are. And this table accomplishes something that is a FEMA requirement, which is ranking of the hazards. So if you look down that left column there, that lists all 12 of the hazards that we're assessing in this hazard mitigation plan update. And how we get at this so-called ranking is basically coming up with a numeric score. So when you read down that list and then you look at what's to the right of it, these columns are basically the criteria that we're going to be scoring or ranking. So to arrive at what we have in that second to the right column, which is called value, each criterion is assigned a number from one to four, and then a weighting factor is applied to each one. So if you go across probability and impact are weighted at 30%, spatial extent is weighted at 20%, and then warning time and duration each get 10%. So that's basically how we come up with the number. And then that value just allows for the town to go through a process to kind of separate each of the hazards into a ranking category, which in this context we call high, moderate, and low. So you can see the color change from the red to kind of the dark yellow to the light yellow from high to low. And, you know, it's important to note that this supports an effort to do prioritization and to take a look at like which mitigation actions should we try to do first. But it's also important to note that priorities can shift over time, and it's not always possible to immediately address like all of the highest ranked hazards across all of the town's assets. So if we move to this next slide, basically what I'm trying to show here is some examples. So I mentioned that each hazard has a section in the risk assessment. And at the end of each section, we develop these problem statements. And this slide provides just a few examples of the type of problem statements that we derived from our analysis for Wayland and also from the input that we received from that hazard mitigation planning committee. The people that have the local knowledge, the people that have been through, you know, past occurrences of these natural hazards, et cetera. So as an example, if you look at that left column, we divided these into what we heard and what can be done. And for flood, we pulled that out as an example. It's very common. It's recurring. The town has experienced flooding in specific areas and has also identified that term that Jamie used earlier, critical facilities that may be exposed to that hazard. Or they may be vulnerable due to their location, their age and the type of construction. So we look at what those problems are. And then on the right, we propose some solutions for them, which we eventually develop into those mitigation actions that Jamie mentioned. And then as a second example, we took it to look at combining like two of the subsections because winter storms are evaluated as their own hazard and then other severe weather, which includes things like high winds and thunderstorms. We just took a look at combining both of those because they have some commonalities. For example, we see a lot of damage to trees. Limbs come down. Trees come down. Tree limbs come down onto power lines. We have power outages. It affects our ability to deliver certain services. And sometimes the schools and other things have to be closed. And then again, it gets to not just the natural resources and the infrastructure, but again, the people. And so we also look at problem statements that reflect what occurs with vulnerable populations and people that have different needs in the case of an occurrence of the hazard. And then on the right side, again, we try to propose some specific solutions that will be practical and can actually be implemented. And then if you want me to do this last one, Jamie, too. Up to you. Yeah, I can just run through it because this is just kind of taking a look at, again, how to describe what those steps are and what they lead to. So at the beginning, we said we go through this identification process that's based on quite a few factors. You know, what was included in the last plan? What has happened since then? What has changed? You know, what are the conditions that are different now? We get more intense storms, maybe fewer of them sometimes, but maybe they bring more rain or more snow or things like that. And then we basically take a look at, you know, what's being impacted and where and in what way. And lastly, that leads us to we got those problem statements written and we come up with mitigation actions to help solve the problems. And I think with that, I can give it back to Jamie. All right. Thank you. So when we're looking to solve the problem, which we do with these mitigation actions, we look for solutions in these four categories. Plans and regulations. This could be something like zoning regulations or bylaws so that you know that you're building in appropriate areas. You're not adding, you're not increasing risk with how you build or how you function. Structure and infrastructure projects. Easy to come up with. Those are big budget things like retrofitting a building or fixing a roadway. That kind of thing. Natural systems protection is also a good way to mitigate risk, especially flood risk, right? If we can prevent erosion or let water go where it wants to and don't build in those areas. That's a good way to mitigate risk. And then education and awareness programs, typically most cost effective. Personally, my favorite, because I think if you've got a well informed population, then your risk level will go down. They'll be more prepared. So your mitigation plan has these goal statements. These are not finalized goal statements, but all good plans have goals. And that's also a federal requirement. So the first one has to do with protecting life and property. And I should back up and tell you that the way we developed this list of goal statements is by looking at your previous hazard mitigation plan, as well as looking at the other plans that you have in place. I want this plan to reflect the culture and interest of the community and what you've already set in place and just move that forward. It's not recreating the wheel. It should be consistent with what you care about and moving you forward. Strengthening your local capacity to mitigate risk is very important. The more able you are to mitigate risk, the better off you will be. So there we talked about integrating mitigation and climate adaptation into all of your local policies and planning processes as a way to mitigate risk. The third one we have is enhancing resilience of buildings and infrastructure. And that obviously comes up with ways to upgrade and maintain your infrastructure and strengthen public facilities and your essential services. We've included protecting and sustaining natural resources. Your community is full of natural resources. They need to be protected. It's something that you care about as a community. So we want to include that. And we mentioned specifically water resources, air quality, open space, etc. Because again, by reading the plans you have in place, this is something that matters to your community. And then again, increasing public awareness. That's something that I always insist on. I think it is really important to include. And then what happens next? I want you to understand. So we've been at this for a while. We are knee deep in your planning process. We would like to finish up the plan towards September. Between now and then, you are welcome to today ask any questions, assuming there's time and we can answer them. You can share any feedback or questions you have directly with Neil or Mark and they can answer them or they can share them with us. We would like to have another public meeting in September. We're in the process of figuring that out. And I think it will be with in conjunction with the Council on Aging so that we can have something for specifically for that vulnerable population and have it be more of a hybrid meeting. So there's people in person as well as online. I think it's a good way to to meet the needs of the senior community. Not everybody's too savvy with Zoom, etc. Then the public has an opportunity to review the plan when that is the way we structure that is you will have a hard copy placed in one or more places within town as well as an online version. And I'll walk you through how that's going to occur. And then after, excuse me, after we receive all the comments and finish up the plan, it will go to again, MEMA. That's Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency. When they like it, they send it on to FEMA. When FEMA is happy, they send it back to the town for adoption. If in any of those steps, the plan needs a change or a correction, they let me know or let you know. And we make that change. That review process takes several months. It's hard for me to know how long it would take. I think it would be crazy for anybody to decide how long FEMA is going to take to do something. So I don't know, but they know that we're working on this. So, you know, I keep them in the loop to the degree that I can. Our plans are very well received in Massachusetts. So you won't have any problem. We guarantee that the plan gets approved. I should also mention that as the public reviews the plan, all the comments that we receive get included in the plan. So people are entitled to say anything and we include it. We don't edit the body of the plan. For instance, create a new mitigation action based on some public comment unless the hazard mitigation planning committee says, yes, that's a good idea. Let's add that as an action. So all comments get included. The plan doesn't get changed unless the committee decides that it warrants a change and then we make those changes. So typically what we do with public meetings is have two of them, this being the first one. And this meeting, I really wanted to introduce the topic to you as well as introduce the risk assessment to you and how we work through that. The second meeting will focus a lot more on the results of the risk assessment, specific, more specifics on the problem statements and a lot more specifics on the mitigation actions themselves and how you can review the draft plan. One other quick thing to mention is the mitigation actions will each action, just think about it as a project. Each project includes a description for what that project is and what you're intending, what risk you're intending to mitigate. It also includes who, what position in the town is responsible for implementing that action as well as other departments in town that may support the action or regional organizations that may support the action. And we identify potential funding sources for all the actions and a timeline for you to hopefully implement them. So I did also include our contact information here. So if you wanted to reach out, you're welcome to. But I think it'd be best if most comments run through Mark and Neil. So that's why I put their contact on this slide. And that's what we have for tonight. But I'm happy again, Ellen and I can ask, answer any questions you have, if you have any. Thank you. Thank you. I think I'd open it up. Very informative. I'd like to open it up to the board first. Maybe we could take the slide down. So yeah, that'd be great. Okay, great. Open it up to the board first to see if they have any questions. Also, if either of the chiefs want to add something, feel free to, I guess, raise your hand so we can acknowledge you. So, Mr. Levine. Thank you. That was especially informative and detailed, and I appreciate it, both of you. Jamie, a couple of process questions. Yeah. I'm a former EOPS guy, but I never worked on this granular level with the municipalities, even though I did work with MIMA. How often are you seeing hazard mitigation plans come back from MIMA with needed changes? Is that more of a rarity? Give me a bit for that process. I got to say, with a very big smile, they introduce us as the best in the business. So they don't send back a lot of changes. In fact, they frequently just send our plans to FEMA because we do this. This is what we do. We do a good job with it. We've had a contract directly on behalf of the state for five plus years to update plans on their behalf locally. So that's why we've done, you know, 40, 50 plans on behalf for MIMA. So, yeah, there's no problem here. This is what we do. And is FEMA actually reviewing all of these plans for all municipalities in the United States? Yes, they do. And so just for other people. So FEMA divides the country into 10 regions and FEMA region one, which is their base just outside Boston. They will review your plan. And, yeah, they do review all of them, which is part of why it takes so darn long. But I think they have about three months that they have to turn them around in. We sometimes I keep track of, you know, what day did they get it? And sometimes, you know, we bug them a little. But we've got a good reputation with FEMA region one and there won't be any issue. And I could tell you that FEMA region one, as well as MIMA, send pieces and portions of our plans to other communities that get their plans pushed back saying, do it like this. Yes. So, yeah, this you're in good hands. Thank you. And my last question is, based on your review so far, all the data and communicating with people on Whalen, what are you seeing that makes this town somewhat different or unique than others? And I know we are, like you mentioned, a very wet space compared to at least some of our neighboring communities. And does that make the plan different than a lot of our neighboring communities because of our amount of wetlands and wet areas? No, no. I mean, we work on a lot of coastal plans. So your wet is not, you know, that doesn't compare to, you know, every high tide you're soaked. So, so no, because we see that, you know, you're more of a bedroom community. You're not a large city. We wrote Worcester's plan, for instance. We've written New Haven's plan. You know, that's a different beast. We wrote Framingham's plan. But, you know, you're, you're a well-engaged community, which we really appreciate. I really value the public engagement. You know, what your comments are. That matters because you're, it needs to be your plan. I want the plan to reflect your interests and what you care about. So we're not sitting, we're not doing this in a vacuum, like, you know, just sign on the dotted line and we'll send back something in a few months. That's not how we function. Yeah. The fact that, you know, Neil and Mark are so responsive, like we reach out, they reach back. Neil called me on vacation for goodness sakes. Like you're in good shape here. Trust me there. You know, we've worked, we've done hundreds of these and, and I've literally had to say to people, excuse me, you're the town planner. Can you answer that question? And they, you know, and nothing happens. That's not the situation in Wayland. So in terms of your hazards, I mean, you know, Ellen can answer this, but I don't think that there's anything, you know, especially scary or weird happening that would make your plan different. You're in New England. You've got a lot of trees and a lot of water. Sorry. One final question, Carol. What is the stick for municipalities if they don't submit these or don't submit them on time? Do they get fined by the state? No, no, there's no penalties and there's no actual rewards other than you're able to apply for grant funding. And, you know, you need the money. Yeah, for sure. For sure. I'm going to, I want to get to the problem as well here. Thank you, Doug. Bill or, Bill, do you have any questions? I do. Thank you for the presentation. Under the problem statement, what we heard under flooding, I know that this is illustrative and not an exhaustive list. But one area where we've had a lot of flooding is an area called Pelham Island Road where we are routinely on local news with, you know, National Guard amphibious vehicles getting people to their homes and so forth. And there's a major new development under construction there that's pretty close. So that's one you might add to the list. With respect to the public meeting, I appreciate, Jamie, your comment about the need for public input. I don't consider this in a sense a public meeting insofar as we get public comment at the beginning of the meeting, which is confined to two minutes. And then we have, you know, kind of the business meeting, which is certainly available to people who are interested. But for the second meeting, you might consider holding a meeting at which members of the general public can ask questions and have a dialogue. And finally, with respect to the grants, I take it that these grants are in the in the vein of preventative action rather than recovery from a disaster. Is that right? Yes, that is right. It's it's mitigation. It's what you can do ahead of time. However, if you have a large scale disaster that then awards you money, then you can use some of that to mitigate risk as well. And then you don't compete for those funds. But we're talking really big time disaster. But on your every day, you're going to compete for grant dollars. Right. And then finally, we hear that the federal government is cutting back domestic funding in a number of areas, including FEMA. And so what's your what's your take on the availability of this kind of mitigation funding going forward? You know, I'm happy to say it is back in a big, big way. So if you look up BRIC, FEMA BRIC, that's the acronym for the biggest funding source right now that FEMA has. There's a lot of funds available. The Trump administration had sort of put the kibosh on it, tried to get rid of FEMA. They've since brought it all back. And in the news, there is a tremendous amount of money that has become available. So hopefully your plan gets approved. And by next September, not this coming one, but the year after, you should be well positioned to apply for additional funding. That being said, your mitigation actions, I identify as many state based sources of grant funding, not just FEMA funding, because, you know, it's a moving target. So we want to make sure that that we're identifying options for where you can get funds. And with that, I should say, I can't come with any guarantees that you will get funding. Sources can go away and you're going to compete for those funds with other communities. But I can tell you that your plan will make a good case for your need for them. Thank you. I'm all set, Carol. OK, Chris, just I'm going to hop in one real quick. So, Bill, there was a press release that went out about this meeting tonight, and it did say public input would be accepted. So I think I said that earlier once the board has its questions, I will open it up to see if anyone is listening. But I agree with they do need. And I was pleased to see on the schedule that there are just totally dedicated meetings to public input here. So, Mr. Reynolds, I'm grateful Mr. Whitney asked the question I was going to ask. No comment. No question. Thank you very much. I also want to thank you very much. Is there anybody, Ms. Powell Spurlett, is there anybody who has the hand raised who wants to offer input or to this presentation or any questions? I see two people with their hand raised. Yeah, I do. Yeah. OK, so let's, Ms. Currier, I recognize you. Judy? Carol, I was just asked to unmute. OK, I'm sorry. Is that you, Tom? Yes. OK, Mr. Siaka, I recognize you. All right, thank you. All the Whelan people here know me. My name is Tom Siaka. I've been Whelan's representative to the River Stewardship Council for 25 years. Pretty sure I know more about the hydrology of and flooding of the river than anybody else on the planet at the moment. If you want to know about the history of flooding on our river for the last 300 years, there's a presentation on the Whelan Historical Society website. I will announce to all of you right now hot news as of a little over an hour and a half ago. The Bill Ricca Historic District Commission was what was forced kicking and screaming to approve the removal of the Bill Ricca Dam. This is after 300 years. I am sure that that will have a significant effect on flooding risk on the river. There is one more hurdle at the Bill Ricca end, namely the CONCOM. But, you know, hopefully they will impose reasonable conditions that ought to be a procedural thing. The Bill Ricca HDCC, by the way, was ordered to do that by the Superior Court. I mean, Bill Ricca has been fighting the removal of that dam for 316 years. So that should help our flooding risks a lot. Hmm. I'm told I'm Jane Siaka here in this way. Okay. That always happens. I'm Tom, by the way. The remaining risks are the obstructions in the river. There are some 25 of them between here and Bill Ricca. And I would be happy to meet with you and explain all of them. And a major one in Wayland, which I've been raising as an issue for a number of years now. And I think what to be number one on your list of mitigation actions. So I think everybody here has got my email. So I'll leave it at that. And please contact me. I'm ready to help. Thank you. Carol, if I may, I just wanted to say, Tom, thank you so much. And Neil or Mark, if you can kind of connect us with Tom, I think that would be great. Great. And I did watch that presentation you mentioned on the historical society site. You're on it, Evan. Carol, we can't hear you. Carol, you're on mute. You got to shut off your mute. Well, no wonder I kept saying, hold on, and everyone kept talking. Sorry. Is there somebody else who wanted to make public comment? I want to call on them next, please. Yeah, I see Alyssa with her hand raised. Do Ms. Carter recognize you? Hi, Alyssa Carter. I live in Sherman Bridge Road, and it's named after the Sherman Bridge, which crosses the river about six or seven tenths of a mile away. And that river, that bridge is and has been below 100 year flood level and has flooded and is in the process of being expensively renovated, but not raised above the flood level. And it now includes trucks and lots of commuter cars since about 2000, you know, 2000. And I don't know whether that risk was in the previous risk assessment plan that was made or not. And I'm just wondering if, you know, rather than continuing to use it as a highway bridge, this wooden structure that's beloved and favored by the residents here. So if it were changed into a historic or a walking, you know, rich would then we wouldn't it wouldn't be as bad for in terms of risk assessment, because then if it gets washed away, we can put up a much smaller walking bridge instead of multimillion dollar high rise bridge between two residential neighborhoods. And I don't know if you have any comments on that from the risk assessment perspective. Thank you. Is there anybody else from the public who wants to make a comment about the presentation? No, I see no one else. Okay. Okay. Well, I'm going to thank everyone for attending and thank you. It was very informative. And definitely I encourage anyone who has any input or has any questions to reach out to either of the either chief McPherson or acting chief Heber and share your thoughts and your questions. And we look forward to seeing the plan in the fall. In the fall. Thank you very much. Thank you for having us. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. So now we would like to call over Mr. Patel is the only one who should be on the screen now is Mr. Patel. I think anybody who's here for something other than the liquor license hearing. Um, so it's just Mr. Patel. I think Ms. Ms. Shard is for the HRHSO presentation as this Mr. Hummel. So Mr. Patel was here earlier. Did we see him? Yeah, I'm trying to get him trying to get him over. Okay. Great. Thank you. Okay. Well, while we're waiting for him to come, I'm going to say that the next agenda item is a liquor license hearing violation by Whelan Variety and Delhi Corp. We are inviting attendance by Mark Hebert, acting chief of police and Mr. Patel, who's the manager of the Whelan Variety and Delhi. No luck. Uh, yeah, it keeps decline to decline each time I click on answers to decline promotions each time it's us. Do we have a phone number? Yeah. That's what I was going to say. Kelsey or Michael, do you have his number? I do not. He's coming out right now. He's coming out right now. He's coming right now. Okay, great. Perfect. Thank you, Robbie. I don't see him. He's still here. Oh, he's still here. He's on. Your video is off. Welcome, Mr. Patel. Your video is off. I am going to- I am starting there. I am going to declare the hearing open. So, notice is hereby given that the Whelan Select Board will hold a public hearing on Monday, July 20th at 8 p.m. at the Whelan Town Building at 41 Coticia Road in Whelan, Mass. And on Zoom. Well, actually, we're not in the Town Building. That's not correct. And on the liquor license violations by the Whelan Variety in Delhi at 770, Boston Post Road, obviously Whelan, Mass. 01778. The Zoom link is made available the day of the meeting, which is obviously on the Whelan calendar and is also on the Select Board agenda. The hearing is for a violation of Massachusetts General Laws, Chapter 138, Section 64, regarding the sale of alcoholic beverages to persons under 21 years of age. All right. So, welcome, Mr. Patel. Thank you. This is I'm going to explain the order here of how we do things in cases. Hopefully, this is the first time, maybe the last time you'll come to us. So, first of all, we'll have is that we'll ask the Acting Chief of Police to present the evidence related to the alleged violation. Then you will have an opportunity, either yourself and or your counsel, if you're represented by counsel, to respond and ask questions. The Select Board will have an opportunity to ask questions. Then you'll have a chance to print some more evidence or be bought any questions that have been asked. The Chief may ask questions of you. The Select Board may ask more questions, and eventually we'll have a summary. But I will say this. The rules of evidence are not applied during the hearing, but the board expects that the police department and the licensee will present credible and reliable evidence in a clear and concise manner. Options are discouraged. Okay. And then once we have the the conclusion of the hearing, we will deliberate and determine if we will make a decision tonight or defer to a later time. So, having said that, Mr. Hebert, the floor is yours, please. All right. Thank you. Let's get right into the facts of the case here. On June 4th and June 11th, the Wayland Police Department conducted alcohol compliance at all on-premise and off-premise establishments selling alcohol in Wayland. On June 4th, Detective Sergeant Costagno and Sergeant Kazan sent a 19-year-old operative into the establishment to try and purchase alcohol. The operative entered Wayland Variety Deli, located at 70 Boston Post Road, at approximately 6.40 PM. He took a six-pack of Budweiser 12-ounce bottles and brought them to the cashier. The cashier completed the sale without verifying the operative's age. The operative exited the building and business and relayed this information to Sergeant Costagno and Sergeant Kazan, who then entered the store and made contact with the cashier. They informed the cashier that he'd sold somebody under 21, and the cashier repeatedly stated, he's over 18, he's over 18. And they had to explain to him that the age for alcohol in Massachusetts was over 21 years old. All these facts are recorded in 26 way, 273-OF, Wayland Police Department here. Those are the facts of the violation, as I know them. Thank you, sir. Mr. Patel, do you have any questions for the chief or would like to respond? No, I don't have any questions. But all my employees know that, you know, minimum age is 21. And right on our cash register, every time we put the date, what year and current date. And we talked to the employee, and I'm not sure what happened. But every few days, we remind over all of our employees as me and my brother both own the business. So as we walk out, we always tell them, make sure any cigarette or alcohol, we check the ID. Anybody who looks under 30, make sure you check their, you know, ask them for ID. And in any reason, no matter what they say, or if you know them, if they don't provide the ID, you're not supposed to sell them. So but unfortunately, that mistake did happen. And I do apologize for about that. Okay, thank you. Does anybody on the board have a question for the chief? Mr. Levine. Chief, can you talk a little bit if you know about the history of violations at the establishment? Sure. So there's three violations and the file I have on hand for this business over the last, the first one was in 2012. So about 14 years ago, they got a two day suspension for that violation, and were put on probation for one year. They had a subsequent violation in 2018, where again, they received a two day suspension and a one year probation. And then in 2019, while they're actually still on probation for the 2018 one, they had a violation. But that violation was conducted by the Alcohol Beverage Control Commission. There didn't seem to be too much communication between the ABCC and the town of Wayland to violate the probation. They were issued a warning from the ABCC on that violation. So there's been three violations in the last 14 years or so for this business. Same ownership over that period of time? I believe so. I believe the ownership was 2010 or so that you became the owner, Mr. Patel. 2009. So this is about 18 years here. Thanks, Chief. Anybody else on the board have questions for the chief? No? Okay. Then we're all set. It doesn't sound like that you wish to rebut anything, Mr. Patel. So the chief, is there anything you'd like to rebut? No, nothing to rebut. I guess we don't have too many questions. I think what we should probably do is ask the chief what his, excuse me, the acting chief, sorry, what your recommendation is? So my recommendation was because of those previous violations, they're split up over multiple days that were not impact, not, not, not impactful, but reduce the impact to the business. Um, so I'm, uh, cause there's those three earlier violations, uh, recommending a full weekend suspension of the license, a Friday, Saturday, Sunday, uh, extended to a two year probation, um, for the liquor license. What happens during a violation of the probation chief? What is supposed to happen? I think we, uh, call an immediate, um, meeting again to do another hearing violation and discuss, uh, additional penalties. I don't think there's anything in the, uh, select board policy that specifically states what happens if a violation, conditions we can put on it. Um, so obviously it'd be an immediate extension and implementation of additional, um, suspension. Ordinarily when we get to deliberate, we also get input from the town manager, but he would like to address us now. So with the indulgence of the board, I'm going to, um, point of order. Uh, should we close the hearing if we're deliberating? I know. Really? Well, it says as to summarize the case. Um, sure. I'll close it. I moved to close the hearing. So I need a motion. I think I don't. So now we're deliberating. Um, Madam chair, if I may, I just, I had a question slash comment. Um, I dealt with these in other jurisdictions. And one thing I think would be important to know is how many of the store employees are being, uh, trained, such as in tip certification for off premises sales. And that might be something that the board wants to factor into their decision, whether or not we require, uh, the employees there to go through some formalized training to ensure they're properly checking IDs and, uh, that they're not taking people's words for it. So the formal training can be done. Okay. Um, it's from the board. Mr. Whitney. I guess my question has to do this with the sufficiency of the action, uh, in view of the, uh, this is the third or the fourth instance of a violation. Um, so, uh, Chief Hebert, do you think, uh, weekend suspension is sufficient? Uh, one thing about that, I took, uh, into consideration the length of which the first violation occurred or 14 years ago. Um, when thinking about it, um, if it was a few years in a row of violations, obviously I'd look for them to grow over time. And it did start with a Sunday, Sunday, and I think a Monday, Monday, trying to reduce the impact. I think this is kind of to grow the impact to take away a whole, um, you know, summertime, uh, weekend selling period is more impactful than those previous suspensions. Okay. Thank you. Anyone else have any questions? I'd like to hear Mr. Patel tell us he's going to do something different. Mr. Patel, I'm fond of your business and I'm not in the position I thought I was going to be in this evening. Is there something you're going to do about training or the tips suggestion or something that is different materially? Actually, two of my employed after that, they did do the tip, they did. And the person who sold the alcohol to the minor, they did get their tip certifications, you know, sold him and there's other employees. Um, we are working on all the employees that works that, you know, one by one, getting those certifications. So two of them already, uh, did the training. And you're personally committed to making sure things change. Otherwise you might be on a path to losing your license. Yeah, no, absolutely. You know, we are, you know, as I said, we've been constantly reminding them, make sure that no matter how busy you are, how big is the line or how, how many phones are ringing. If you have a doubt that somebody is under 25 or 20, 27, 28, just make sure you check the ID and don't fall for it. So, you know, we remind them quite often, but I'm not sure what happened that time. So, you know, and we'll make sure that it's, you know, it will happen. Then actually a couple of days ago, one of the employees asked the, I was there. I happened to be there and he asked the customer a night for an ID and he was 32 something. And I, I personally knew the person, but once he asked for the ID, I didn't say anything. It's just letting, you know, give you the ID once he asked for the ID. So, you know, I look forward to seeing you in your store and not on this screen again. I think this could get serious, Mr. Patel, nothing further, Madam Chairman. Thank you. Well, I also want to say one thing, Doug, you're all set, right? You're all set, right? Oh, you went first. Right. So this is a serious matter and it, it absolutely baffles me. We had, I think, was it one, Bill will remind me, was it last year? We had one as well. I'm absolutely baffled to be honest with you that by law, I believe the police department has to advise all the licensees, correct me when I'm wrong, in advance that there's going to be a sweep. So you're advised that it's going to be in this period and yet we're getting violations. That concerns me of what's happening when we're not doing the official sweep period. And we don't want to see people here. And we do want to see people succeed and have very viable businesses and be wonderful community members. And we, we issue these licenses with that intent, but that we're in a partnership and in a relationship here. And both of us have to uphold our end of the bargains here. So I agree that I'm not so sure we'd be very happy to see this again, even in a couple years. Um, I do think in the trying to remember now that Mr. McCall mentioned it, I believe last year, part of the violation, the recommendation was that all the tips, certification certificates had to be on file for the whole year as they went every new employee. And as they have to be renewed, it had to be on file in the police department. Does somebody else remember this? Yeah. Can you have? Yes. Thank you. Yeah. I'm wondering if that's something that we want to make sure that everybody's been through the certification, because to Chris's point, if they come back, this is going to be a serious, serious problem. So unless anyone else has anything now, I think we can move to, would you like to respond before we move to the real deliberation? Sir. Um, uh, no, we will make sure that everybody's gets tip certifications. As I said, two of them already got it. I have two more to do it and, uh, you know, make sure that they get it. All right. And I think, um, we'll see what the board decides. So, okay. So we're going to deliver right now. We're ready. We're ready to deliberate. Ready. Ready. Okay. So, um, we've heard from Mr. McCall. Uh, I believe, I don't know if he wants to give us a recommendation. Uh, we've heard from the acting chief. Why, why don't I open it to the board to see what you think, uh, is the right course of action? So, who would like to start? Chris? Uh, I recommend that we do what the acting chief has proposed, but I want to repeat. Uh, I, Mr. Patel, I look forward to seeing you in your store. I'm not on this screen within my term, which is three years. No, definitely. That won't happen. I have a good memory. No, we're done. Well, I'm, uh, I'm hopeful that, uh, Mr. Reynolds will be on for longer than three years. Uh, uh, I, too, uh, am, uh, fine with the chief's recommendation. Uh, I, I must say, though, that I think, uh, the, the tips training is, uh, uh, is, is necessary, but not sufficient. Uh, I was on, uh, the board at a different occasion where an employee sold, uh, an 18-pack of beer to, uh, a 17-year-old and that employee was fired. Uh, so, uh, I think to say that, uh, the cashier should, should have tips training is, is, uh, insufficient. So, I would encourage Mr. Patel to, uh, think of other means to, uh, motivate his employees. Mr. Levine? Um, well, my final word on this, Mr. Patel, is I'm also grateful to have you in town and your business. And I realize that you serve dozens and dozens or hundreds of customers per week and per month. But what I think of when these violations occur, and there are four of them in 14 years, is how many times have these violations occurred when there was no such sting operation set up by the Whale and Police Department or the ABCC. And, uh, I don't know how many folks are, are slipping through the cracks then, so to speak. And it's concerning, of course, because we know the dangers of alcohol on the roadway. And so you just have to take it a lot more seriously. Um, and, and again, nobody wants to be in this Zoom room talking about this right now. It's uncomfortable. Uh, it's not pleasant, but it's important. And that's why we take it seriously whenever we have one of these. And so, uh, we hope, as Mr. Reynolds said, to only see you in store and around town. And I concur with the Chief's recommendation as well. Hope that will provide good incentive. All right. Um, thank you, Mr. Patel, for joining us. Thank you. We will. We will. Um, and, um, and does the board, and then I will, and once you've, um, recused yourself here, I will ask the board if they would like to make a decision tonight. Do you want to deliberate, uh, at a further or at a future date? I think we're ready to vote, Madam Chair. Okay. Do we have a motion? Chief, can you, um, give us the, the details again? Was it a period of suspension running concurrently over the course of a weekend from open business through close of business Sunday? Yes. That's my recommendation. And how is that weekend determined? Um, for the rest of summer here. I don't think there's any in particular that I'm, I'm looking to target or anything. Um, so it's a, any weekend within the next six weeks or so, um, would be what I'd recommend. We pick, we want to go, you know, with two weeks from now, uh, that's fine with me. So, so a weekend, um, suspension to be served from open business Friday to close of business on Sunday, um, by the end of August, 2026. Yeah. That sounds good. Do I have a second? Second. Okay. Okay. Now in discussion, does anybody have any questions or comments? So there was a conversation about requiring the tips, uh, certificates to be on file at the police department. Do we want to include that in this? Sure. I'll accept that as friendly amendment. Yeah. A comment, Madam Chairman, that, that is required of everybody who serves at the festival. We have to have them on top on file and they have to be on their person. If somebody asks, it's just the way it's gotta be. They have them on the person as well. Yeah. Or all hanging up on the store or whatever, but they do have, they should be on file with the police chief's office. Yeah. Okay. Any further discussion then? Uh, yes. One more. I'm sorry to belabor this. My dad was an ER doc, if that explains it. If I find out that you picked a weekend that varies this in August, when you think nobody's around, I'm not going to be happy. So please live up to this. Thank you. I'm done. Okay. Are we ready to vote? Ready. Bill? Yes. Doug? Yes. Chris? Yes. Harold? Yes. That's four zero. Okay. All right. Thank you. Um, Mr. Patel for joining us. As I said, we hope we don't see you again. Thank you. Acting TP. Right. We'll see you in a couple of minutes for the next item. How's that sound? All right. Well, the next item on the agenda is, um, on page, um, let me find page 26. I think of that. Oh, shoot. Page 26 starts some analysis speed. Um, I think they call it traffic analysis or speed download data analysis. That's what the agenda we're going to go. This is review and discuss the Sherman bridge road traffic study with potential recommendations. And for this way, we are inviting attendance by acting chief of police, Mark Hebert. So I think that we have done a couple studies and I think we, we've discussed this a couple times based on some feedback from residents or what have you about traffic issues to make sure we capture things. Um, so let me turn it over to you and you can walk us through your findings and your recommendation. All right. Thank you. Um, thanks for having me back to discuss this again. Um, W director holder can't be here tonight, but I have discussed it with them over the last couple of weeks. Uh, how we want to approach this topic. Uh, they can his input into what I'm going to put forward tonight as well. Um, over the last several months, I've been able to conduct a few of these, um, traffic studies capturing around 33,000 cars traveling down Sherman's bridge, um, getting a good data set out of those cars. Um, the last one was conducted after school was out. Uh, I think it showed what we'd expect it to show, uh, in that case. And that the, you know, volume of cars dropped almost in half, um, from when school's in and when people are on vacation, uh, in July. So that's one, um, impact that I was able to show by doing that study, uh, a few couple of weeks ago. Um, the studies have shown that the average speed remains above the 25 miles per hour, uh, posted zone. And the 85th percentile, you know, is between 36 to 32 miles per hour with an average of about 34.8 being, um, the aggregate of all 33,000 cars. Um, because the 85th percentile remains quite elevated above the, um, 25 mile per hour posted speed limit. Uh, I do recommend some traffic calming measures be taken on the road, uh, which, uh, DPW director Holder and I have discussed. Um, what we're proposing is that we put up the speed feedback radar signs on either end of the street, uh, where we deem them to be most impactful. Um, so on the Concord road end, as well as on the bridge end of the road. Um, we'll further put up slow curve signs, uh, like that are present near Weir Hill on the same road over in, uh, Sudbury. To try to get people to slow down because currently there's no signage on the sharp curve that approaches the bridge on Sherman's bridge road. Uh, and I think that'd be highly appropriate to have. Um, two of the accidents we've had over the last four years, uh, were due to people on ice sliding off that curve. So again, some sort of signage to get people to slow down as they enter that curve, I think would be, uh, very appropriate. Um, these speed, uh, radar feedback signs have the ability to collect the same data that I've collected. Um, so I look forward to kind of going back periodically and reviewing what the signs have seen. What kind of impact they've actually made on the speed. Um, we'll have some before data to compare it to, and then some after data to compare it to. Um, you know, and, uh, study of studies done by MITSA and DOT. They're shown to reduce by four to five miles per hour. Um, which would bring us right down on the average to the, um, speed limit. So I think it'd be an effective, the least impactful, um, way to gain the most effect out of, uh, any sort of traffic. Common measures at this point. So that's what, uh, myself and DPW director are, uh, proposing we do at this point. Okay. Excuse me for a second. Betsy, could you do me a favor, please? And we're not on your agenda item quite yet. Thanks. Appreciate it. Cause I got a lot of blocks here. So, all right. I want to open it up to questions, uh, from the board, please. Yeah. Who would like to start? Yes. Would you like to start? Um, yes, I would. Uh, Mark, would you be willing to work with, uh, Doug's thoughts on the issue of peak density versus non-peak density? My goal in bringing this up is, uh, we can get some free consulting from him without increasing your workload or that of this board. And I know, uh, Mr. Sots has an ax to grind here, but I think the board's sophisticated. We're not going to get the wool pulled over our eyes or anything like that. I think he will do a good job. So we could still incorporate what you're proposing, but I'd like to consider the matter not done if, uh, he's offering to look at the numbers and maybe he's going to come up with the same conclusion or no conclusion or whatever it is. So I'd like to hear it, um, in a future meeting. And my follow-up question to that would be, are these studies any different than what we've done for other roads in the past? It sounds like we got a lot of input from residents regarding peak versus off peak traffic volume and speed. And I'm just wondering, um, are studies done any differently on other roads around town? Um, I know you haven't been in the position for a long time chief, but just curious if we're treating this one any differently. Uh, I know how the previous chief, uh, kind of showed me and stuff was to mostly look at the average speed and the 85th percentile when reviewing these reports. So I'm not sure how much more depth he went into it. Um, I was never told or shown to take into those considerations, but I don't, you know, I wouldn't discount them just offhand because we haven't done it in the past either. Um, and, uh, Mr. Reynolds point, I reached out to Mr. Stotts this morning after an email this weekend and actually have already provided him with the data and told him, you know, he's free to do with it what he'd like. Um, you know, it's 33,000 data points. So it is a lot to go through and kind of comb. Um, over the last hour or two before this meeting, I did do a little myself and took out the peak times. And from my basic Excel work, um, it doesn't affect the averages of speeds from what I can see. Um, if you want to go into standard deviations and other statistics that I haven't really approached since college, uh, you know, we can discuss that as well. Um, as far as averages and 85th percentiles, uh, you know, I can present those pretty confidently. A little color, if I may, when one is kayaking in that location, you can actually hear the difference between peak and non. Um, yeah, as you know, the, the tires make a company thump because the bridge has a segmented, uh, roadway. Um, that's why I'd like to see a BCG level MIT grad do the dirty work that I don't have to do. And now you don't have to do. Um, maybe you're right. Maybe it'll show the peak isn't that different, but I I'd like to know it's a profound, uh, difference. And when there are people fishing there or kids there or lemonade stands there, it gets a little scary. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Well, what are the various decision points that we would have to make? Um, I know there must be a range of recommendations for traffic calming measures. What would be a couple of other options to you? I mean, once you get past the speed radar feedback signs, you know, you get into road restrictions, you get into road engineering, um, and how you can design the road differently. You don't have a lot of those options, um, for Sherman's bridge, um, at least at my level of what I can, you know, recommend and impact. Um, so, you know, you talk about speed bumps, you talk about, uh, the diamonds you can put in the middle of the road to slow people down and push them to the edges, different road markings for bicyclists. Um, there's a whole range where we get an engineer out there to give us some recommendations, but I'm not sure the issue is high enough to go beyond, you know, some additional signage at this point. Um, so to Mr. Reynolds point, you know, start at the signage, start, we're going to do here, take a look at the numbers and, you know, I'm up to coming back and having a discussion and say, you know, we didn't get to where we wanted to go. And what do we do next? Thank you. Mr. Whitney. Chief, while you're, you've been in your acting position for a comparatively short period of time, you have spent a lot of your career in the Wayland Police Department. You've done, I would guess, hundreds of patrols in town. Um, what is your anecdotal or what's your gut feel about the, uh, the level of traffic impact on Sherman Bridge Road as contrasted with other similar roads in the town? Um, I mean, anecdotally, uh, I did spend a lot of time up there as a patrol officer running speed radar because it was a spot where it was an issue, uh, people going through there. We've since added stop signs up there. Um, and it's got less and less speeding, um, and more stop sign violations at the Alpine and Sherman Bridge intersection there. Um, but I would say over my career, you know, going back now, 10 years ago, um, traffic's only increased since then. Um, it was a spot to sit and do traffic things. I never saw egregious speeding. I wouldn't say sitting there seeing people going 50, 60 miles per hour down the road, but, you know, consistently 35, 38 in the 25 mile per hour zone, kind of what we're seeing from the data here. Um, so not much has changed in the last 10 years. Um, so the signage and also putting patrol officers up there. Um, there hasn't been a direct, I haven't wanted to impact the numbers. So I haven't put a lot of direction for there to be enforcement up there while we were doing this study. Um, but now as part of, uh, my recommendation here will also be increased enforcement as well in the area. And, uh, as, uh, my colleagues have indicated, we've had, and as, as you know, we've had some feedback, uh, from area residents saying that in the morning, uh, there is quite a backup. And so the average speed is slow during the peak hour. And then thereafter there is, uh, uh, presumably a higher rate of speed, which, uh, affects the average and the median. Um, so if further analysis, uh, bears that out, would that affect your recommendation at this point? Uh, I think it would affect it in that, that would give us a good, uh, example of when we can do more enforcement up in the area. Um, and kind of use that as the initial enforcement and, uh, traffic calming measures. Um, so we can really focus in on a time when, you know, and a direction that is most impacted by speed. I would look forward to getting that information so I could direct our patrol officers to be up there. Um, I think I'd have to see some very high peaks of cars during, um, high volume times to say, you know, we want to physically change the road in any way or restrict the road in any way at this point. So, so is, uh, I'm trying to, uh, infer a recommendation from you, or are you suggesting that we should, uh, uh, go ahead with the measures you have suggested, uh, review the data and, uh, see what the effect has been. And if necessary, then go to, uh, consider physical alteration or, uh, restrictions on the road. Sorry about my office. Uh, they're calling me. Um, I, I don't know if I'd ever get to the point of wanting physical changes to the road because of speaking to my brothers in the fire department and how they feel about. Um, so I'm not sure what other alterations. Um, so I guess my question is, uh, is your, your recommendation that we go forward with these proposed changes at this time, which would inform, uh, a future recommendation should, uh, there be a persistent problem. Or would you prefer to, uh, have, uh, this additional data crunching occur before the board asks you to go full process, uh, the additional signage and so forth. I would, I would rather at this point just go forward with the traffic and column measures, um, that recommended and then any additional data crunching be done after the fact, um, to discuss at a later point. Chris, what do you think about that? I like it with, uh, italics on making sure we hear more about this after the data analysis. Thank you. So, um, thank you very much for doing all this work. I know we have done several traffic studies here and I know we've had a lot of feedback from residents, you know, about this road. Um, a lot of concerns have been raised, issues and variations there are. Um, so I appreciate the work you've done and I appreciate the fact that you've consulted with, uh, Mr. Holder to come up with a recommendation. I will, I will, I sort of advise or remind the board that the recommendations are made to us and then we support them or not. I don't believe the implementation can occur without our saying, yes, go ahead and put those in. There were some adjustments made a few years ago. I'm trying to remember now. I think it's when we put the stop sign down by, is it Alpine? It was stopped and some crosswalks were put in. Um, I've heard from both some residents and some non-residents that those do have, do stop the traffic. And so, um, but maybe, so maybe these signs might this new, um, traffic coming. I think the measures might, might provide some different results. So I personally, I'm in favor of having, um, uh, following the recommendation of the chief, but we do need to make a recommendation. And also I think Mr. McCall would like to, um, opine as well. So with the board's, um, indulgence, Mr. McCall, did you want to add something here? No, thank you, Madam Chair. No, I, I think the board is taking the right approach, uh, taking an incremental approach to these, um, types of situations because you have to be careful about precedents. Having been a former select board member and also being in charge of traffic mitigation, working with police chief in one of my prior towns. If it is a difficult decision and how to deal with these because traffic is like water. Once you try and dam it up in one spot, it'll find a way itself into another neighborhood. And I've already received some comments from residents on Oxbow road that when there was traffic enforcement out on Sherman's bridge, that people will use that cut around to get over to the other main thoroughfare. So you have to be mindful of what we do in one neighborhood, another neighborhood might ask for, and that there are repercussions. So I applaud the chief and the DPW director. I did have separate conversations with them along the way, uh, about looking into this, trying to work with the neighbors and taking some incremental steps, uh, see what we can do. The physical alterations of the road are generally a last, uh, last ditch effort to try and alter, uh, traffic patterns, but there are repercussions as was noted with fire apparatus plowing and other complications associated with those. So thank you, Mr. McCall. Um, do I have, um, any further discussion from the board or do we want to make, um, motion, I guess. Madam chairman, I want to make a very, very quick comment. I urge the board to take the view. This is a different place in town. It's hard to think of another place in town. That has fishing and canoes and kayak trailers and lemonade stands and bird watchers at both ends of the day. Uh, I myself have gone kayaking there at midnight cause there was a cool, um, astronomy thing we were looking at and found I was hardly the only person doing it. This is, this is, um, tantamount to having ice cream trucks next to the ball field. This, it is a magnetic area for a lot of activity, particularly around the bridge. And I think it is a special area. Thank you very much. I promise I'm done on this. That's okay. So my question was, did we want to, uh, support the, the speed, the traffic calming recommendations? I know you all have already asked the acting chief if he would work with, um, the resident and he said he would on some data. So that would be like, to me, the next step, but I think we, do we want to at least take this step? Uh, and if so, I need a, I need a motion to implement these, um, traffic calming measures that have been recommended and everybody's on mute here. So. Uh, I w I would move that the board, uh, support, uh, the recommendation of acting chief Mark Hebert to implement a series of signage and other, uh, mitigation measures, uh, with the understanding that there would be a. Okay. Report back to the board, uh, as to the efficacy of, of, uh, these actions. Second. Second. Is that you, Chris? Sorry. Second. Thank you. Actually, I was just writing that down, the follow-up meeting on my list here. So thank you for putting it in the motion. All right. If there's no further discussion, then let's have a vote. Chris. Aye. Bill. Yes. Mr. Levine. Yes. And myself. Yes. So that's four zero. Thank you very much. Mark. Um, acting chief. For your help. And thank you for being with us tonight for so many agenda items. Appreciate it. Appreciate it. No problem. Thank you for having me. Thank you. We'll see you again. Yes. Thanks. Okay. So I think for the next, um, agenda item is, um, let's see. Um, we have a discussion and update from the regional housing service officers, commonly known as RHSO. We are inviting Christian Bouchard, RHSO director and Robert Hummel, our town planner to join us. There you are. Thank you for joining us. And then the second and after we're going to discuss what's going on, what's happening. And then Michael will give us a little update on the, um, IMO, IMA, because there was always an amendment every year and off we go. So who would like to start, um, Mr. Shard or Mr. Hummel? Um, I, I'd love to jump in unless Robert, you wanted to say a few words first. No, I think it's just, I'm just appreciated. We can have some opportunity to talk about affordable housing and able to not just brush us underneath the rug, but able to discuss what's the regional housing service office actually provides us to town. Um, and me and Kristen have worked together in the past. So, um, I'm very happy that she, she's now the new director of the regional housing service office and I can, hopefully we can expand affordable housing in the future. Perfect. So for those who are following along, there's some slides and some information. It's 61 in the packet. So the floor is yours. Thank you. Sure. Thank you so much. And thank you for that introduction, Robert. Um, if you don't mind, um, I could screen share, um, to share the presentation if that would be helpful. Um, so I could do that. Let me just make sure I get the right one up here. Let me know once you can see that. All right. Can you see that? It's floating. Yep. All set. Okay. Excellent. Great. So, um, thank you again for that introduction. Um, and you know, good evening to all the select board members. I think I've had an opportunity to meet, um, one of you or two of you possibly at one of the, um, housing trust meetings. Um, but I'm Kristen Gishard. I'm the new director of the regional housing services office. Um, as Robert mentioned, I've been working alongside Liz Rust. Um, the longstanding director, um, over the past year as we transition leadership. Um, I want to say, you know, a big thank you to Liz. Um, she has been an amazing mentor. She's done so much, um, for all of the communities in the RHS. So, um, I previously worked for the town of Acton. So I was a, a receiver of all of those services. Um, and the work that she's done to support the communities, um, in their municipal affordable housing function has been tremendous. And, um, we're fortunate to have her remain on staff, um, for the next year. Um, and hopefully next, uh, three years from moving forward. Um, but on a limited capacity and a staff supporting role. Um, but I'm happy to continue this tradition of holding this annual meeting, um, and presentation to share all of the work of the RHS. So that we've been doing to assist municipalities. Um, and most specifically tonight, the services provided, um, to the town of Wayland. So, um, I'm gonna just go quickly over, um, what I'm gonna review tonight. A little overview of the leadership, um, our year in review for what we've done over this past year in FY26, what we're looking forward to in FY27. Um, and then a summary talking about, um, the budget for FY27. Uh, so as many of you know, the RHSO was established back in 2011. Um, and it's created through an intermunicipal agreement. And that's renewed every three years. This is one of those years. Um, and, um, the select board chair was mentioning how it's on your agenda tonight for review. Um, and, uh, consider of approval. Um, and the town of Concord serves as the lead community. So they provide, um, that support to those 10 communities. They provide support to us in terms of office space. IT support, administrative support for payroll, um, and procurement. So all of the RHSO staff members, um, are hired through an RFP process. And the town of, um, Concord helps to facilitate that process for all of these 10 communities in the, um, RHSO. Um, and then each town purchases the number of hours that match the level of service that they need, um, to support the affordable housing in their particular community. So every town's a little bit different, um, and their needs are different, but I'll go into some of those core services that all communities have, and then kind of the specialties that, um, the town of Wayland taps into. Um, and for, um, for those of you that are maybe newer to understanding the RHSO, um, there are some regional things that we do together with the communities. And then again, there are, um, more specific things that each community likes to, um, to utilize the RHSO for. And oversight for the program is led by the lead community. So the town of Concord, um, and each year, we also hold an annual leadership meeting with the town managers, town managers. We held ours about, um, a month to two months ago, um, where we reviewed the draft IMA. We discussed any upcoming changes in staffing or programming and do a very similar presentation that I'm sharing with you tonight. Um, and then every three years, like I mentioned, there is a new IMA. Um, and then every year there's an amendment to acknowledge the next year's budget. Um, we also hold quarterly meetings with town staff. So for the town of, um, Wayland, Robert helps to represent the town of Wayland in those meetings. And it's an opportunity for towns to share with one another what they're working on, um, as it relates to affordable housing. Um, there's a lot of collaboration, um, that goes back and forth. Lessons learned sharing from one another. Um, and we also work on, uh, regional projects and discuss any programming that the communities would like to do moving forward. Um, and when we look at our annual budget process, it aligns closely with most towns. You know, right when we're tying up, uh, the year end for one budget, we're looking ahead at the next. Um, and so our deadlines for pulling that budget together, um, actually start pretty quickly, um, with the town of Concord's, um, Community Preservation Act funding applications deadline. So we're already starting to, um, think about next year's work plan or the following year. Sorry. It's work plan. Um, and we work pretty quickly on that. Um, finalizing budgets as best as we can by September, December, um, making sure that we're able to meet communities, CPA deadlines. Um, and then we make adjustments as needed. So as I mentioned, the, um, staff members in the RHSO are hired through an RFP process. So we don't always necessarily know what the contracts are going to come in at. So we're making those projections the best as, uh, that we can, and we make any adjustments in that time period, um, that we need. And then in May and June, that's when we're finalizing our budgets, um, and we pull that together. It's, um, for FY27, you'll find that in the IMA under the exhibits. So we're, we're, you know, kind of beyond that point now, we're now looking at finalizing, um, all of the IMAs for each community. And our program operations throughout the year, um, are tracked pretty extensively. Um, we have a semiannual reporting, um, report that goes out and that goes into the details of each community. Um, and then we have a monthly check-in meeting with the town of Concord as the lead community. So once we're done talking about all Concord specific things, then we talk about, um, the regional housing services office as a whole. And if there's anything that needs to be discussed for staffing or, um, uh, supportive services. And then we also help boards and committees and support them as needed. There might be a specific request that come up throughout the year and we hope to support them. So this very colorful slide depicts the six different, uh, service areas. So the foundational services that the RHSO provides are related to home ownership and rental monitoring. Um, for the town of Concord, um, for the town of Concord, um, the regional housing services office as a whole. And if there's anything that needs to be discussed for staffing or, um, uh, supportive services. Um, for the town of Wayland, the RHSO monitors 24 home ownership units, um, and 51 rental units. Um, this work consists of annual reviews of the registry of deeds, self-certifications, um, resales. Uh, we had one resale for the town of Wayland this year. Uh, we assist with capital improvement requests, refinancing requests, um, and rental property reviews. So reviewing, um, those rental units, making sure that the property management companies are renting to qualified individuals, that their, um, units are kept in a good condition, um, and making sure that all of the program eligibility requirements are being met. Um, and with the monitoring also comes the SHI management or the inventory management. So tracking any new projects that are coming online and maintaining the SHI or subsidized housing, um, inventory repository. Um, we also work on program administration, which we, um, include in that category, the home program consortium, which the town of Wayland is a part of. Um, the RHSO has done some significant work this year to support home funding, um, awards. Um, awards for the St. Anne's project, um, and we'll continue to work through that, um, into this next year. Um, we're also excited to, um, announce that we're working on a regional tenant based rental assistance program. So in this last year, we were working with the home consortium communities. There are six of them, um, in the RHSO, um, to really better utilize home funds to support households in the region when it comes to rental opportunities. So we started setting up that, um, kind of the outline of the program last year. And we're moving forward into this fiscal year on, um, implementing that. So, um, I think it's going to be a really good utilization of the funds, um, and making sure that there are going to, um, people in the region that, that need them to help support, um, their ability to find housing in these communities. Um, to live, work in these communities and making it a little easier to do so. Um, this past year, we also held a home ownership training. We do that every year, um, for new homeowners, indeed restricted homes or people that have been in their homes for several years, but have some questions. We have pretty good attendance every year. Um, we also hosted with CHAPA, uh, their annual regional meeting, um, and helped to convene a listening group, um, with EOHLC, um, and their new office of fair housing to really help them, um, to create a roadmap for that new office that they're establishing and understanding from different community members throughout the region, um, what they would like to see and what resources would be helpful to them. Um, we, um, also assisted MAPC with convening, um, meetings with housing trusts to help form a more collaborative information sharing group, um, and are assisting with that hopefully, um, as we move forward too. Um, and our office held a fair housing training this year for rental property management companies, um, in the hopes that we're able to help provide information. Um, we brought in the Suffolk University, um, office that, uh, legal office that helped to provide that training, um, to make sure that, uh, the property managers in our communities at the RHSO have the resources that they need, um, to make sure that they're, um, abiding by fair housing laws. Um, and if anyone's been on the RHSO website lately, you'll notice that it's a brand new platform. So we just completed the website migration, um, from the old, uh, platform, um, into the new, which, um, looks very much like most of the community's websites now. Um, so if anyone has interesting pictures that they want to share of new developments or something interesting that you've been working on in your community related to affordable housing, please send them our way and we can add them to the new banner, um, to refresh a bit. Um, and then in addition to those main services, um, we also provide, um, you know, local board support and local support to town staff, um, for Wayland, you know, helping to review the RFPs for the housing production plans, reviewing conditions for draft decisions. And just some small, um, check in questions every now and then that we get, um, and our goals for the coming year are similar to past years in that we really strive to support the resident owners and tenants in each community. Um, and as I mentioned, um, in the last slide too, we're working on, um, implementing the home, uh, regional tenant based rental assistance program. Um, and that will be, um, I'm projecting probably in October, um, uh, you'll, you'll be seeing much more on that. Um, and when we talk about, um, our, our other goals, you know, I think maintaining, um, the RHSO office, there is, um, a vacancy right now that we are looking to fill in the near future. Um, and so we're excited to get that position filled, um, we're planning to still hold home ownership trainings, um, and looking forward to, um, working with Suffolk University again. I think we got good feedback on the fair housing training. Um, we heard that it was very helpful. So we're hoping to continue with that. Um, and, uh, our website go live where we're happy to report that that, um, already happened. So, um, very happy about that as well. Um, and then when we look at our budget for next year, it includes, um, specifically focusing here on, on Wayland. Um, we have a slight increase for the town of Wayland, um, uh, you know, $1,500, um, approximately to accommodate additional administrative costs, um, for the lead community, as well as anticipated hours that we expect to support the town of Wayland in the next year with new projects coming online. Um, and any minor support that might be needed with the, the housing production plan coordination. Um, and I just wanted to note the, the lead community role the town of Concord, um, takes on was designated to be a cost neutral, um, role. And this is really the first time that the town of Concord has started to look at reevaluating how much it actually costs them, um, to serve in that role. So this is really the first year that we've seen, um, an increase in, um, in their request. So, um, but any unused hours, you know, are refunded into the next year, um, is as in line with the past RHSO, um, program. So, um, it's been great working, um, with the town of Wayland and with Robert and all of you. Um, and I'm, I'm happy to answer any questions, um, or go into any detail about the work that we do here. We'll stop. Thank you. Thank you very much. Um, it's nice to have this. I think we have an annual discussion kind of reminds us of the wonderful services you provide for us. I think I was on, um, and it's coming out when, when we joined this and that was a really clever idea to be in a regional consortium for these resources. So I'm going to open this up now to the board to see if anyone has any questions. Um, no, Kristen, thank you for that presentation. You, you mentioned, uh, you're anticipating working with the town, uh, prospectively on projects. Could you describe, uh, what those might be? Yeah. I'm primarily the St. Ann's project online. Um, and that's one that we anticipate supporting to support. Um, and what would your services be in relation to that? Sure. So, um, this past year, the RHSO assisted the, um, the program funding. So the home program funding has requirements. Um, the RHSO staff, a woman named Jody, um, worked primarily on the, um, requirements, um, and making sure that they were doing the reporting. Um, and we will be preparing the affordability restriction shortly, um, as well as, um, any of the, um, the latest. So I'm just pulling it up right now. We have, um, I just got an email back, um, the latest funding agreement. So working on, um, those aspects to make sure that they're completed appropriately and by the requirements. Thank you. Absolutely. Carol, you're muted. Sorry. Mr. Levine. Kristen, thank you for that very detailed presentation. That was a lot of information. So I apologize if you covered this, but I've been reading, um, various stories about the new Federal Road to Housing Act and how it can potentially impact municipalities. Have you guys done any type, you and, or Robert, done any type of dive into that new bill to see how you or municipalities, our towns, part of your partnership could be taking advantage of that in the coming months? I think that's a great question. And I would say I'm starting to, there's a lot to dig into. Um, so we are, we are working on it. What I'm hoping to do is come up with, um, kind of like a one pager, um, for the RHSO that we can post. So we do a newsletter, um, and our, our spring newsletter is probably going to be turning into a summer newsletter at this point. But, um, we had so many things that happened, I feel like between the time I was going to post it that I was kind of feeling like I think we kind of need to hold off. Um, we have a new hire, um, Katie Lacey just joined us, which we're really excited about. Nice. Um, she worked previously at, um, MHP Mass Housing Partnership, and prior to that worked at Mass Housing, um, and then was a planner in Hingham. So she has a lot of background, um, and I'm really excited to, um, really tap into her knowledge here because she's worked with so many state agencies. Um, and so I'm hoping that we're going to be able to pull that together, um, shortly and soon. Um, both what we're expecting, um, and, um, kind of the perspective of, I think, you know, what I'd like to weave in. We, we know that we have some town councils that have prepared some memorandums already or some newsletters that they've posted. Um, but every, not every community in the RHSO has the same town council. So, um, kind of thinking about all of that and how we can weave it together, but also making sure that we're not, um, overstepping, you know, um, a town council that already has prepared something. Definitely. Appreciate that. Mr. Renz, you're muted. Mute. I'm all set. Uh, please don't infer lack of interest by my brevity here. I think you're doing great stuff. Thank you. Thank you very much. All right. Um, I know you've been in contact with Mr. McCall, so I don't, I don't see his hand raised, so I don't think he has any questions. Thank you, Robert. Um, since, since there was some interest from the board about the impact of the federal housing act, you know, on these local projects, when, when that newsletter comes out, Robert, would you be so kind as to send that to my email and we'll get it distributed to the board as well. So I appreciate that. So if we don't have any other questions, I think then the next gender item is to talk about, um, being IMA or actually the amendment, if you will. And, um, Robert, Michael, did you want to speak to that? Uh, I think, especially if you on possible vote and authorize you to sign the updated. Yes. Kristen. Thanks again. So in, in my time here, we've done this every year, as Kristen commented, when they, um, come out with the new budget and the new numbers in this year, we have a slight increase in the number of hours. We will see in the budget went up slightly year over year. That is the primary amendment to the IMA that we have signed in the past. And all town manager administrators from the participating towns are asked to get permission from their board to sign. And so that's why, uh, we coupled this presentation with the request to sign the IMA so we can get it back to the RHS. So they have, um, I know been benefit to us. I know Robert utilizes them. Every time we get a question about our SHI, our subsidized housing index, or we've had several incidents where, um, restricted units have come up for say foreclosure. We involve them. We participate in the homes consortium, uh, and we get their assistance. And as you heard, they're working on a project here with St. Ann's. So there are so many things that we look at in a daily basis. It is good to have the, this extra set of eyes looking at some of the things that we can't always, um, tackle in our office. So they, they have become quite helpful to us. So the, um, the IMA, the amendment titled agreement starts on page 70. It's quite lengthy because there's a one, uh, page devoted to each of the 10 participating municipalities in case you're following along at home or if the board wants to review that themselves. Um, Robert, do you have the funding in place for the 1600? I do. Yep. I usually going back in town of Acton used when I went to Kristen in Acton, we got for CPC. Now, when I started off, I was trying to figure out where this money would come from. I asked CPC and then they directed me to the housing trust and the housing trust has been, uh, very supportive. So I've been going to the housing trust that I have a commitment of $40,000 for the next two years. And so I won't have to go back to the housing trust for another two years. So I have, I have, I have the funds all set for now. Good job. All right. So with that, I'm going to ask for, um, a motion please to authorize. It's on the agenda. I'll read it out loud. Um, the vote to approve and authorize the town manager, Michael McCall to sign the updated inter-municipal agreement amendment to share services of a regional housing services office. So moved. Thank you. Is there a second? Second. Does anybody say second? I actually have a question. Uh, I don't know if you need a second first. Put the second. I'll put it in discussion. How's that? Is that you're okay with it? Sure. That's fine. Thank you. Go ahead. In discussion. Just to be clear, I did not second. Oh, okay. Madam chairman, I will second as long as Mr. Whitney gets to raise his point. Absolutely. Now we're in, thank you. Now we're in discussion. Bill? Uh, on page 71 of the packet, uh, is the agreement, uh, under section six indemnification. Uh, the agreement provides impertinent part, uh, that, uh, uh, the, uh, there's, uh, an indemnification provision, which as I read it, uh, includes indemnification uh, uh, uh, for damage to real or personal property by reason of any negligent act or admission by the regional housing services office. So I don't understand why we are indemnifying for, uh, uh, for negligence. Are we indemnifying Concord as the leading town here, but not the agency? Is that what the second line says? Third line to indemnify the town of Concord? Right. I think that's why. I think that's why. So we're indemnifying the town, but we are not indemnifying the agency. Is that what it says, Doug? Uh, that's how I read those, those first four lines. Yeah. Municipality. Robert, do you read it differently? No, this is pretty, pretty standard language, but Concord is, is the, the host community. So I think you're correct in the, in the, in the view, because the housing service office is just a organization that's set up just to serve the communities. And I could help to speak to that, um, Madam Chair, if that would be helpful. Yes, please. Sorry. So, um, so that's, that's correct. Um, the RHSO staff members are individual contractors. So we all have our own individual liability insurance, um, as required by the contracts with the town of Concord. So you're indemnifying the town of Concord as, as lead community. Thank you. Do you have any, any other questions? No. No, I didn't mean just you. I mean everyone. Sorry. Does the board have any other questions? All right, then. Shall we go to the boat? Bill? Um, yes. Okay. Doug? Oh, Doug looks frozen here. I'm going to go to the crass. Yes. Doug? Doesn't he look frozen? Yes. Yes. Oh, wait one second. He'll come back before. I will assume he knows he's frozen. Did somebody? I texted him to that. Thank you. Thank you. It just left. So he's probably coming back. Here he is. Hi Doug. I know you're muted. I lost my internet for a moment. Yeah. Okay. So we're in the middle of taking a vote on the, uh. Yes. Thank you. Yes. That's what we're doing. I guess that's your answer. Yes to vote. Okay. And I'll say yes. So that's going to be four zero. All right. So thank you very much for coming. Thank you for the information. And, uh, thank you so much for having me. Have a good day. Thanks. Thanks. Appreciate being in this consortium. Trust me. So it's wonderful. All right. Let me think. Now it looks like we're going to invite Betsy Soule. And is it Judy or is it Julie? That's joining us. Uh, so discussion of the council on aging slash community center. First year recap. Hi, Betsy. Thank you. Hi, Carrie. How are you? Yeah. How are you? Good. Thank you. Um, is Julie joining us? No, she is not joining us. Uh, we, we made a decision that the board would come and present on this. Um, and as it turns out, she wasn't available tonight anyway. So Judy courier, who's also a member of the COA board. Um, we're going to tag team it, uh, because Judy spends a lot of time there. And so, um, what we're going to do is split it up. And you, Judy's going to talk about the successes and I'm going to talk about the challenges. So, uh, if that's okay, I will turn it over to Judy for the first part of our discussion. Okay. So do you, do you want to turn your camera on? Well, I don't know why it's not working here. Okay. It was working fine. And now it's not. I see. And it's, I say, start video. And it tells me that I cannot stop the video because the host has disabled it. So I don't know. I don't know. You all know what I look like. What's the difference? We love seeing your face. Definitely. Since I just saw you a few hours ago. Yes. I saw you. You know what I look like today too. Yes. All right. So the floor is yours, Ms. Courier, and you're going to talk about the successes. Great. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thanks for the opportunity to update you on the first year at the Council on Aging Community Center. There have been many accomplishments and some challenges. For several years, the COAs used a key fob system to track participation at the classes and programs offered. When the COA moved in 2025, we had about 100 fobs remaining from our first order. We have issued all of those, plus 300 new ones, and reordered another 300. Interest and participation have increased. Wait a minute. Let me stop. There I am. Interest and participation have increased 30 to 40% during the past 12 months. At our previous location, we offered four fitness classes a week. We now offer nine. Five of the nine classes have upwards of 30 participants each week. About 40 seniors attend our monthly pizza cafe. New faces appear each month. We offer drop-in scrabble, chess, mahjong, ping pong. No drop-in activities were offered prior to our move. And in keeping with our mission to provide programs and outreach services to and on behalf of the seniors, and we represent 30% of Weyland's population. To enhance the quality of life and promote independent living, we've added additional services. In the fall of 2025, we began a boxing for Parkinson's service. Excuse me, Parkinson's class for up to 10 participants at a time. This sort of exercise helps patients reduce inflammation and spark neuroplasticity for the brain's ability to rewire and strengthen itself. This class is full. The COA offers a quarterly veterans lunch where the town's veterans and families can receive updated information and ask questions of Weyland's veteran services officer. We began mocktails and melodies with live music on Monday late afternoons that has been very well attended. This is now scheduled for three Mondays in August. No late afternoon events were offered at our previous location as the room often needed to be set up for the town government meetings. Our outreach coordinator, Maura Snyder, MSW, deals with the real-life problems of our seniors, whether it's housing, health insurance, food insecurity, fuel assistance, or numerous other issues. She finds solutions or services to help. In fiscal year 25, she helped 188 Weyland seniors. In fiscal year 26, that number was 244, a 30% increase. Asian residents represent the second largest racial group in Weyland, making up about 14% of our population. Chinese is among the most widely spoken non-English language in the community. The group of Chinese seniors who have come to programming range from bilingual to those who only speak Chinese. The COA staff had a goal of reaching out to this group for quite some time. Chinese American seniors have historically been underserved population at the Weyland COA. Maura Snyder contacted the Weyland Chinese American Association and began a dialogue on how we could meet the needs of Chinese American seniors. The Chinese senior social group was launched on January 7, 2026. It runs twice a month on a Wednesday afternoon from one to five at the COA. A volunteer from the Chinese American Association attends the program to provide translation services, along with support staff from the COA. In just a few months, the group has grown to 15 to 20 participants per session, showing a clear signal of an unmet need and strong community interest. While the program was designed for Chinese American seniors, it's intentionally open to all seniors. We invite seniors of all backgrounds to participate, learn about Chinese culture and forge meaningful connections across communities. The COA has partnered with Open Table Food Pantry to provide free groceries and prepaid meals to Weyland seniors in need. Open Table offers a variety of healthy and culturally diverse food choices through pantry and meal programs. Each Friday, volunteers help seniors place orders and all home deliveries are made the following Thursday by other COA volunteers. We provide monthly rides to Market Basket in Waltham. Partnering with Weyland Youth and Family Services, commenter, and co-response clinician at our police department, four lunch and learn programs dealing with mental health issues were conducted during the year. A new caregiver support group for seniors caring for adult children with disabilities has just begun. All of the previous programs and services, as well as all these new programs and increased interest in participation, have been accomplished by the remarkable COA staff of 4.1 FTE, which brings us to some of our challenges. So, yield the floor to Betsy. Okay. Thanks, Judy. Thanks for the opportunity to report to you on this. As you heard from Judy, the successes are many, and the usage of the center has increased substantially, as the COA as well as groups of all ages are utilizing the space in a variety of ways. With any new space, it takes time to identify the challenges associated with managing it. The town believed that it made the most sense for the COA staff to manage the reservation system in the new space for space usage of the building for groups, both COA-related and groups outside of the COA. And we still believe that that's the best way forward, but I want to share with you some challenges that need to be addressed as we continue to do so. You may think that taking reservations for space would be a pretty simple thing to do, but all the things that go with it take significant time and attention from the COA staff. Just to give you some context, from March 8th through June of this year, there have been 56 non-COA events or meetings held at the community center. Once a reservation request comes in, many things need to happen, including coordinating room use, picking which room to use, the furnishings in the room, breaking them down, setting them up, giving technology and AV training to the groups that are going to use them, putting up signage so they know where to find their room, billing them, depositing the rental fees, advising on food permitting with the health department, and setting daily building lock and unlock time. They're also tasked with responding if a group that has a reservation has a problem. Like, for example, the most common problem is people are locked out or the doors are locked for some reason. And Julie gets the calls and emails as people know she lives in town. Now, if she is not reachable, there's no instruction from facilities on who to call or what happens. Most nights there are two rooms out of the five in use. Often there are three and sometimes there are five. And people request custom setups, chairs, configurations, various types of AV equipment. The one custodian assigned to this center works from 6.30 a.m. to 2.30 p.m. Monday through Friday. And since the rooms are often in use for COA activities until or beyond 2.30, these setup tasks fall to the COA staff. COA staff estimate that their work on the reservations easily translates into 14 to 15 hours per week. And with a staff of 4.1 FTEs, the staff does not find this amount of time sustainable as they have many other COA specific responsibilities to fulfill. And as Judy talked about briefly, in terms of the number of seniors in town over the past five years, in 2000 it was 19%. Now it's 30%. So while the population of Wayland has grown by about 10%, the senior population continues to grow much more significantly. As a result of our learnings, the COA board, based on consultation with the staff, have identified the following needs to continue to operate effectively. Serving the needs of Wayland seniors and serving the needs of groups who wish to reserve space in the community center. The first would be to change the custodian schedule from 6.30 to 2.30 to either 7.30 to 3.30 or maybe 8 to 4.00. This would allow her to assist more with the room setups for evening meetings and activities. Second, to clarify who's to be called if Julie is unreachable. If there's an issue with accessing the building, which is the door locking issue. One suggestion might be to give the custodian on duty at the town building a phone so that they could receive the calls about this and respond. Because Judy gets calls at all hours and Julie being Julie, she picks up the phone. But, you know, that is not really something she should have to be doing. Third, we feel that we really need to add some extra staffing hours to administer the registration system and all the tasks associated with it. And finally, to purchase a new reservation software that they've been looking at called Monday.com. And that has been identified as a better system to receive and communicate with those reserving space. It has a cost of about $425 a year. So hopefully that's not a tough decision to make. I will say that the COA board, the staff, and the users seem incredibly pleased with the community center and all it has to offer. And we thank the Board of Selectmen for your longstanding commitment to making it a reality. Our biggest question is how to staff all the demands of the center by the COA staff if more hours are not delegated to us. And there are basically two choices as we see them. Either cut back on services to an ever-growing senior population with many needs or to maybe cut the number of days that rooms can be rented or reserved for non-COA activities. It's just not sustainable. So that is our report on the successes and challenges, and we'd be happy to take any questions or comments. Well, thank you very much, Betsy and Julie, for those informative reports. Of course, it is our new baby, the COAICC building. It's been a long time coming, and I think everybody's pretty pleased with it. So I'm going to open it up now to the board for questions and comments. Who would like to go first? Doug's looking at me, so I'm going to call on him. Mr. Levine! I'm wondering, Betsy, that's very helpful information, if you have some short summary of some of those points somewhere that we could have. Sure, I do. Yes, absolutely. Can you talk about communication either between your board and the rec commission, for example, if they're programming or HRDEI is doing a little bit of programming? Just I want to understand better the communication among the boards and among the staff about utilization of the space and how that's been going. I think that the boards have not communicated about that, but the staffs certainly have. And I think the communication is going fine as far as I can tell. And, you know, if there are questions like that that we need to get Julie's input on a little bit more, we're happy to do so and give you some more detailed answers to those questions. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thanks, Carol. Oh, absolutely. Bill or Chris, do you have any questions or comments? No, I think Doug makes an excellent point. If there's kind of a recap that we could review sometime before 10 p.m., that would be helpful. Yes, we can forward you our remarks, which will give you all of that. Or if you just have a few bullet points, that'd be great. Bullet points would be good. Bullet points are better. We can do that, too. They love bullet points. I love bullet points. We like to do that. We've got your slides, so. I have three points. They're all going to be very quick. Ms. Currier, you mentioned the name of a superstar outreach person. She handled 200 this year. Yeah. What was her name again? Mara Schneider. Mara Schneider. A name worth writing down. That's just terrific. I would like it if you considered having a floater card. I have been a victim of being locked out there. And I just don't like things that make the town look bad. I just don't like that. So if there were a card that you could give to somebody when they have booked space and the card is cancelable, which is my understanding those cards readily are, and they're not FOBs. These should be standard access cards. It's a $2 item. I think that would help a lot. And you implied one of those might go to a new custodian or the old custodian under a new hour system. Whatever it is, please figure out the details. Please think about that. And then the last comment I have is, I really love the building. So please imagine the situation I was in last year with the festival. And I have to explain to people, no, the building's closed. I did not like that. And I'm seeing Mr. McCall's on screen and you two are on screen. Is there some way we could fix that this year? Everybody heard it's splendid. So they wanted to get in the woodwork, the staircase, the beautiful internal windows, the fenestration, as Julie and I like to call it. I really would like it if it were open this year, even if there were limits on it or something. It just didn't sit well to be on stage looking at a gorgeous building and telling people you can only look at the outside. Yes. Let me just briefly go back to the door thing. The opening and closing of the doors is not handled at the community center. It's handled at facilities. I'm sorry. That doesn't change my point. Can you talk to facilities? This is a town. We're an organization. We're going to fix this. And yes, I guess Julie can talk to facilities or someone can talk to facilities. Yes. We'll pass that on to her. I know she communicates with them regularly about a variety of things. So no reason she can't. And I think Julie also feels the same way that you feel, Chris, about the festival. She would like to have the festival extended to the community center and offer maybe something she said the other day, something like line dancing during the festival. Something that gets people there to see what the town has to offer. Thank you. That's all the plug. I need. Mr. Martin chair. We can turn this back to you. Two quick points. Madam chair. Every time it's my turn, you hop in. Go ahead. Can certainly work to keep the building open for activities. We just have to ensure we have staffing while the building's open and a custodian that that shouldn't be a problem. We can work that in for this fall. And one of the other things I've talked to Mr. Fay about, and I know he has. He's working on it if he doesn't already have an app. A lot of times there is an app that members of the administration can get in control, the doors remotely from their phones. And so if we can, you know, I can follow up with Mr. Fay on that so that they can be more than one person with access to that door to change or open a door or close them and secure them remotely via the phone app. The technology's there, done it elsewhere, and we can get that done here. Great. Thank you. That's great. Thank you. All set, Madam Chair. I laughed when you said she wanted to offer line dancing because that's so Julie. It's just such a joke. Who else would think of let's do line dancing in the COA during the semester? Everyone else would say, oh, let's have milk and cookies or something, you know. So anyway, unless anyone else has any other questions or comments, are you all set, Mr. McCall? Are you all set, Ms. Palmer Spurlin? Okay, great. All right. Thank you very much for joining us. Nice to see you. Nice to see you. Thanks for having us. Nice to see you all. Thanks. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you. So next on number 11 is going to be appointments. We have one appointment to consider tonight. Um, is miss. Why is he here? Why is he? I think it's crazy. She was here earlier. Like it's. Oh, there you are. Yeah. Welcome. How are you? Can you make your audio work? Sherry? Yes. Thank you. Okay. There you are. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for waiting. Sherry is interested in a position at the Cultural Council. And so what we do is we're very informal here. So you don't want to give us like a couple minute explanation. We have your information on a packet. We have all read it. Um, and in case somebody just needs a reminder, I think that's on page 91. I'm around there. Excuse me. 89. And if you just want to give us a two minute explanation or you're interested in the Cultural Council, then the board will each ask some questions and we'll go from there. Okay. So my name is Sherry Quasi and I have been working on the Native Cultural Council. This is my second time being on the Native Cultural Council. I've also been on many other nonprofits and run a nonprofit myself. And this is something I'm very passionate about, about having cultural events available for residents in the Metro West area, especially in towns that I am directly connected to. Um, I have a house in Weyland. So that's why Weyland is important to me. My parents' home is in Natick. And I got involved with Natick first because I had attended an event. They were looking for people. I got to speaking to someone and I had joined. So, um, this is something that I am even more interested in when it comes to Weyland because I've gone to workshops from the Human Rights and Diversity group. And I see that Weyland is trying to bring more functions into town. And it will be exciting to be part of that. Perfect. Thank you. So I'm going to open it to questions from the board. We've lost Mr. Levine, but I'll start with, um, Bill or Chris. Chris, go ahead, please. Uh, I'm in favor of this. And, uh, Sherry, please don't be insulted by our brevity. I thought the letter you wrote was terrific and I applaud your service. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Bill. Hi, I'm Bill Whitney. Um, you mentioned you have a house in Weyland. Are you a Weyland resident? Yes. My property is near the high school on 8 Castle Road. And you live there? Yes. I do travel a bit for work, so I live there, but I'm in and out. Yeah. And I was a bit confused when you mentioned your time on the Natick Cultural Council. So, yeah, I had moved out to San Diego, moved back 10 years ago. And initially when I came back, I came back because of my father's illness. So I came back to their place in Natick. My house had been rented out since I was in California. Yeah. Great. Well, that's very helpful. Thank you. And thank you for your willingness to serve. Thank you. That's all I have, Carol. Okay. Doug, do you have any questions for Sherry? No, Sherry. No, Sherry. I reviewed your resume. And I also am very grateful for your willingness to serve. As you probably know, we have a number of boards and committees in town, each of them serving such an important purpose. So we're very grateful when people as qualified as yourself step forward. So thank you very much. Thank you so much. Of course. And of course, like, I have to agree. Ismae really explained it all. And I don't have any questions either. I thank you very much. I think you'll enjoy being on the cultural council. It's a variety of activities that they perform and fun. So with that, do we have a motion? I would move that we... Go ahead, Bill. Sorry. I would move that the select board appoint Ms. Shireen Kwasi. I hope that's the right pronunciation to the cultural council for a term ending June the 30th, 2029. Thank you. Thank you. Any further discussion? Okay. We'll take a roll call vote. Chris? Aye. Bill? Yes. Doug? Yes. Myself? Yes. That's motion passes 4-0. Do we send letters to the cultural council, right? So go ahead, Doug. Do you want to explain the process to Sherry? Sherry, now that you've officially been voted in by the select board to become official yourself, you will receive a letter from the town manager's office with some information. Once you receive that letter, bring it to the town clerk's desk and she will swear you in so you can become a voting member of the council. She will also give you some materials related to conflict of interest training that you need to complete. And thank you again. Understood. And I finished the training. Oh, you're ahead of the game. Yeah. Because I have to do it for the other council too. Oh, that's right. Perfect. Perfect. So thank you. Thank you. All right. The next item on this is there are a few items of appointments that have been made by other boards and it's our responsibility to confirm. So we're just looking for a motion, please. Is that a single motion for all four? Sure. Okay. I move that we appoint Lisa Raftery to confirming the appointment of Lisa Raftery to the Youth Advisory Committee for a term ending June 30th, 2028. The appointing board being the Board of Health, Robin Borgstedt to the Wayland Housing Partnership, appointing board being planning board to a term ending June 30th, 2028. Jacqueline Espiritu Santo Vega to the Wayland Housing Partnership by the School Committee for a term ending June 30th, 2029. And Heidi Ellis to the Youth Advisory Committee also by the School Committee for a term ending June 30th, 2028. Hold a second. Second. Okay. Any discussion? All right. We'll go right to the vote here. Chris? Yes. Bill? Yes. Doug? Yes, indeed. I roll yes. 4-0. Okay. The next thing, which is on page 91. Excuse me, ma'am. I'm sorry. Did I make this? Under 11B, it says review open appointed positions. That's what I'm talking about. Okay. Sorry. She's on it, Bill. Go for it. Yeah. All right. 11B. I said, next on the agenda, it says review open appointed positions. At the beginning of the process, when we had a number, you know, we were doing a lot of reappointments and there were some people applying for new positions. And we had, I said, once we kind of got through that process, I would then have the open positions and the boards list updated and put it into an agenda for everyone to have a look see. I'm not going to spend a lot of time on it tonight, but this is what we have open. And I will tell you that we will be having a conversation about the vacancies in the, in the direction we want to take, or that's been recommended for the audit committee on the 17th of August. Um, and then I will also tell you on this one, the design review advisory board, I believe that's full. That position was filled. Um, just didn't get taken off, but you can see the rest of where we are. Um, I mean, and then the human rights, diversity, equity inclusion committee has a couple non voting positions open, but other than that. Um, but there are some areas here that I think we have to be really concerned about wastewater. Um, I think it's a three board committee, and I think we have one spot zoning board of appeals. Um, I think we, we have, we have, there's a key board that we need to get the positions full. So in case there's some cases to be heard. So I think we've got some recruiting to do there. I mean, it's a little late, but I did want to throw that out. And also on the dog control appeals board, again, there's three positions are open. I think this is another one we'll have a conversation about, um, in the near future. So this is, um, kind of give everybody a sense of what's, what we have left to do on these. Comments. Mike. Let Bill go first, please. Uh, Carol, with respect to the design review appointment board or advisory board. Um, I'm a little confused by the one planning board position. I think the planning board is the appointing authority. Right. And that is a five member board. And, uh, I think Robin has just gone off in order to serve in the housing partnership. And I'm sure that the planning board appoints somebody. Uh, but, uh, I think there are at present three members and, uh, we have one architect, no landscape architect, um, no graphic designer. And so, uh, I would encourage the members of the board, notwithstanding the fact that the planning board is the appointing authority. Uh, if you have any suggestions about, uh, any design professionals who might be interested, uh, in speaking with the chair of the planning board, uh, they have, uh, looked high and low. And if, uh, members of the, this board have other suggestions, uh, I'm sure they would be gratefully received. Thank you. Okay. So, you know, I, I'm sorry, Chris, did you want to add something? I just wanted to encourage what you said earlier about revisiting this topic. You'll recall I brought it up in our last meeting. Uh, we're hearing that, uh, town meeting may want to lower its quorum. We're hearing there aren't enough people on boards. Uh, Michael McCall has done great work on improving customer service and making, working with the town less off putting. We're about to say what our priorities are. And what I brought up in the last meeting was it's, it's kind of hard to stomach a priorities list that doesn't have this on it. So I, I really like your idea that we're going to come back to this. Okay. Well, this is actually, um, right. It's in the priority list to kind of look at some of the committees. Does it make sense? I mean, some of the committees have come forward to us and have suggestions on consolidating or what have you. So this is something we did to, and just for edification backfill for you, Chris, we did sort of talk about this last year, but we really weren't able to put a lot of, um, um, energy into it. So maybe this year, this will get some more air time. Cause I think it's, you know, sometimes boards are just, uh, they're developed for a need. And then, um, perhaps that need gets filled and we need to, you know, think, rethink it. But anyway, I just wanted to get this out. This is just where we are. Um, anyway, Mr. Levine, you all set on this? Good. Okay. All right. So then, um, I'm going to be fresh now and with the board's permission, I'm going to move to number 12, which is, uh, discuss the town building working group, including the next steps. This is the, uh, the, uh, draft is on page 94, the packet. Um, at our last meeting, we had talked about, we met with Mr. Fair about the town building. And, you know, he explained to us the different options of what they might cost. And we said, let's, let's get a group together to, um, you know, evaluate and make some recommendations of what we should do for this board. Um, and off we go. So this, um, I know Tom worked on this. I think Bill, you worked on, did you help Tom develop this? I, uh, gave him a few comments on an earlier draft. Okay. Um, so I had a conversation with him and then he said he was going to speak with you. So I didn't see this until of course it came back out, but anyway. So, um, I think that in the end we originally had talked about at our meeting a possibly doing like, you know, we, we weren't sure a committee and advisory committee or a working group. And I think we feel that, um, it, you know, we're looking at possibly consolidating committees. Maybe it makes more sense to just do a working group. And so, um, Mr. Um, talk to Mr. McCall briefly. He was on vacation. I did reach out to Mr. Fair as well. So he's aware, you know, that that's a direction that we're going to take in to get his input. And he was very comfortable, you know, with us running a working group rather than a full fledged committee. So, um, anybody have any thoughts on the, uh, proposed working group? Um, I'm going to say charge, I guess. So anybody haven't did bill, did you want to, um, opine on this? Um, yeah, I, as I recall the discussion, uh, you know, uh, uh, Mr. McCall and Mr. Fair had, you know, worked together to identify a potential range of costs of, uh, what it would take to essentially do a gut rehab of the existing town building, including relocating people for a year or two while construction occurred. Um, I, I think it is important that we, um, number three, identify the town's office space needs at this time and in the future. So I, I think that, uh, that would, and I believe Kelsey is working on that with others. Uh, I think that's pretty important. Um, the, uh, I guess the sense I had was that the board was interested in trying to figure out whether the town's long-term office and meeting needs are best acquitted in a rehabbed existing, uh, town building or in, in another location, uh, whether new construction someplace or rehab elsewhere. Um, I, I, I, I might have suggested something that talks a little bit more specifically about alternatives to, uh, to, to the, uh, town building, uh, proposal. Um, but, but I think this is a, a good start. Okay. So, um, you're all set so far with not too many, not any edits per se at the moment. Well, I'll be interested in the discussion by the board and particularly ideally with Tom, uh, before we were to finalize this. But, um, I'd be interested in, in, uh, the board's reaction. Okay. Yeah. I, I share that similar concern. Do you feel like it's addressed kind of in the preamble paragraph of the charge bill? And unlike the. I do. I do. But then when you look at the deliverables, there's a. Yeah. Mm-hmm. So do we have to change something? I mean, we can make some draft edits and then bring it back. So, um, do we want to make a change in the deliverables or I should say. It sounds like we probably should. I mean, to Doug's point, I mean, when you look at. The, the sentence preceding the list of deliverables says in addition to the tasks discussed above. Mm-hmm. Uh, the working group shall have appropriate ABCD or one, two, three, four. So, um, so as long as it's kind of understood that. Um, these are sort of subsidiary to, uh, to what's identified in the first paragraph. And I do think the point is very well taken about the additional feasibility studies, uh, which, um, of course raises the. The dreaded, uh, budget question about, you know, if you wanted to, uh, think about this as housing query, do you get someone in to do some quick sketches? Do you, uh, that can, and, or conversely more detailed design or more detailed explanation of what's in, exploration of what's involved in maintaining the town building. Absolutely. So. So. Is there any in particular edits we want to make on this? Or are we just talking about it and then I'll bring it back at the next meeting? I was kind of hoping we'd kind of move it along cause if we wanted to get the committee going, but cause the next meeting is not until August 17. So. Are you afraid if we finalize it on August 17th, that those six months are insufficient for the working group to do its work? Hmm. No, we can do it on the 17th, but I, I, I'm just trying to, you know, move things along, move things along. That's my job is facilitated. Are we moving along? Are we revisiting? You want to just take it off the list. I did. I didn't want to say that. I wanted to make just one, one, a couple of teeny observations in general. And we actually had public comment too, about the, the makeup of the committee. Um, I do like the idea of, of having Mr. Fair, who's, who's, this is his skill set, you know, probably being the lead on this. So I would like to say on the top, um, Wayland town manager, Michael McCall or his designee will establish this committee. Um, and then he could designate Mr. Fair to do it. Um, we talk a lot about not having, um, Michael be on every single committee cause it gets stretched too thin. And I think this is one where, however, he does need to be involved. And I did have this conversation with him. I just want you to know, I didn't just come up with this tonight. I thought we could make, instead of number one member on the committee, we could make Michael an ex officio. Because I think he should be involved perhaps maybe in the beginning. And then as the plans go along, you know, kept, kept in the loop and being able to opine. Um, I was, I do like all these. I want to ask, um, those, that means you, Bill, in this field, if they think maybe we shouldn't in the list, maybe have the planner, would the planner make sense to be on this list? Um, and, and I did, like I told you, I did speak to Mr. Fair briefly, and he was comfortable with having, you know, four or five members on the committee. And then he said there were other people that he knew of that he might bring in to speak to the committee as needed. Um, and so I think it was pretty comfortable with that. But there's a couple things there. There's a couple things there. So what's everyone think about, you know, either making it under Mike Fair or making Michael McCall or his designee. Kelsey has it. Yeah, I know. Go ahead, Kelsey. Um, I would ask that I be a member of the, this working group because, um, I focus a lot on procurement. I'm, you know, working on a space report. This is something that has been a keen interest of mine for a couple of years. I've discussed this with other members of the public who are involved with the RAP report back in 2017. So I would respectfully request that I'd be considered for the working group. Okay. Sounds wonderful. Uh, but can we just go back to my original question? Is we okay with making it, um, town manager or his designee and then making the town manager an ex officio? We could actually put in here, uh, the assistant town manager. And then if we wanted to do that on the number five people. I'm fine with that flexibility. Sure. Okay. Do you want me or, um, or Mr. Levine? I don't hear any other words. You want me to just make a couple of little edits here on this and then. Yes. Yeah. I'll be the words. Yeah. I'll be the words. Yeah. And then in the last sentence, don't hurt this place in writing. I was just thinking maybe we might change that to say submit. Just minor net, but it just sounded like submit to the select board. Yeah. Cause it doesn't say where, where, where the report's going. So submit to the select board, right? The recommendations, blah, blah, blah. Yep. Okay. Can you give us a couple of little edits? Yeah. Sure. Mr. McCall, since I'm just giving, changing things here. I mean, we did talk about this. Are you okay with this plan? Yeah. I need it, Michael. Sorry. I am. And I'm supportive of having Ms. Power Spillette on there as one of the five. She's been involved with procurement. She's been involved with tracking some of our capital assets. So it makes sense to have her as part of that team. Okay. Okay. And, you know, if we think we want to add anyone else to this, let me know. All right. Well, I think that's good. I'll bring it back on the 17th. I didn't get to cross it off my list. There you go. All right. So the next item is, I think you have to go to the supplemental packet for this one. The next one is the, you know, we worked on our objectives for FY27 last time. And the packet is again, the ones that were the ones we had from last year. So I kind of drafted them up and made some edits and then Doug made some edits. And I think if you look in the supplemental, you'll find a clean pack, clean copy of this. And as soon as I find mine, I'll be talking about some. And we're just looking for feedback on, did we get, did we get, is this what we said? Is this the sense of what we said? What edits do we, further edits do we need, if any? And again, because the five of us are not here tonight, I'm going to recommend that we just vote this on the 17th. Unless you all think we can vote it tonight. I had a couple of comments, if you'll indulge me. Absolutely. I think it's very good. Under number one, we don't say anything about the operating budget. It seems to be. We did say that there. Oh, it does. Oh, operating override. Right. But it. What would you like it to say? Well, it, you know, I think the sense was that, you know, this is our top priority is, you know, in times of, you know, financial challenges for the town. We want to make sure that we have the ability to finance capital projects that, you know, are priorities. And we also, I think, want to sort of maintain the discipline that Michael has established of, you know, prudent fiscal management of the operating budget as well. Okay. Okay. I think we had that. Wait a minute. Is that in the comment here? We did not think we had. I don't think we said that. Do you have a particular phrase you're thinking of? I don't. I can give you some language if, but I think just something, the notion of continue prudent fiscal management of the operating budget, as well as, you know, a well considered long range asset maintenance and capital improvement plan, something to that effect. Okay. Doug, are you making notes? No. Yoo-hoo, Mr. Wordsmith. And you said you had a couple of points, Bill. Do you have another one? Yeah. Under number three, I am hesitating because I can't read my own writing. Okay. But, you know, something, instead of evaluate town-owned properties, I guess the point was, this speaks to housing increasing, you know, our affordable housing. And it seems to be confined to publicly owned land, as opposed to just generally promote the development of affordable housing. So, one might say, instead of evaluate town-owned properties to determine best uses, including, you might say, continue to promote the development and or creation of affordable housing pursuant to the housing production plan, as contemplated. So, one of the illustrations might be something like the Route 20 West recent addition to the MBTA zoning, maybe the Cascade development, if that ever gets sorted out. I don't know that we want to talk about housing at the Route 20 South landfill site, since that was pretty carefully studied and was deemed to be financially infeasible, given you to dig up the old dump in order to do that. Yeah. Yes. Hang on one second before you change that. This was something that Tom had wanted me to work into this plan. And if you read this, and I don't mind changing it. I hope you make a note here, Doug. But I just want to make sure we don't change something that we purposely put in and then have to come back. If you read the sentence, it says, evaluate town-owned properties to determine best uses, including development and or. So, was it the best uses? Supposed to be broader than just housing. Yeah. So it was being broad because in that case that might be, I think one of the recommendations was the lay down, possibly bus, possible field, that kind of thing for that property. But his point was, and I'm speaking from memory, not for him, that, you know, that report was given to us, and we should be going back and taking another look at that and making decisions how we want it, what the next steps are, if you will. Right. Well, I have no quarrel with that. It's just that I don't see affordable housing, really, in this list of priorities. Well, 2012 it is. So we should just come up, add a couple of examples, maybe. Yeah, I'm a little, and I have to tell you, I'm a little leery about putting in one that's a developer one, because we have no control over that. It's certainly, let me rephrase that. It is certainly a project we will look at, and it's on our draft list, but I don't know that's necessarily in the past. Doesn't mean we can't change this. We did not identify properties and projects we didn't have control over as part of our objectives. Does it mean that we wouldn't do others? Because if you notice some of the things last year we didn't accomplish, but we did other things that processed the way through. But I have no problem with, you know, whatever edits we want, just making that point. But in the meantime, do you want to come up with some ideas? Maybe it doesn't fit. I mean, maybe this number three is specific to town owned properties, right? Yeah. And this goes to the point of, you know, productive use or reuse of those properties. Right. But I do think that we got to say something about the development of affordable housing. St. Ann was not town on property, and yet we all feel pretty good about it. But it's permanent, see? We want to permit more affordable housing, right? No, I'm going to rephrase it. It's in the projects happening. And he's like, should we, but perhaps want to model that, follow in those footsteps and do more projects like that, if we could help move those through like we did at the ZBA. Okay. Okay. So what should we do? Bill, why don't you take it offline and maybe come up with a blurb that you could email over to me or Carol. Sure. Or the other of us, and then one or the other of us can work on it. Sounds good. Okay. Okay. I'll take it. Thank you. Okay. Listen, Chris, I have another thing that can point that way too. Okay. I mean, everything else. I think, you know what I have to say? I think every year we make this even better than the year before in terms of, you know, the clarity, you know, of the direction. I think it's a terrific because it's a terrific roadmap once it's done, you know, for the chair who facilitates, you know, and also keeps us when we review these every six months, you know, what we've done and then, you know, what we want to work on. Let's wait until Tom, we can start working on them, but let's take the official vote when Tom is here so we have all five because it is goals for the whole year. I said that earlier. Yeah. Let's wait. Okay. So that brings us now to. Oh, my God, I'm on the last page. The town managers report. Mr. McCall, the floor is yours. Thank you, everyone. Thank you, Madam Chair. Let me just read off a couple items here. And I know that select board member Whitney loves brevity. So I'll do the best I can at this hour. So just first up, my town manager office will be a week from tonight, Monday, July 27, 5, 530 PM, 630 PM in the old select board meeting room at town hall. Second on the update is regional 911. As you know, we are part of Middlesex regional emergency community. Cation center. The group that we have with Framingham and Natick. We wound up having a special meeting of the M rec boards, including our finance and operations subcommittees and various members of the respective communities to meet with state. State 911 as well as the executive office of public safety regarding safety and security regarding our grant funding. And we attended back on July 9th. Select board member Whitney was there representing Wayland, as well as our two police police chief, fire chief and deputy fire chief. From the state was Frank Pozniak, the executive director of 911, as well as the undersecretary of the executive office of public safety and security, Kerry Collins, and their support staff. At that time, we wound up discussing our frustration with our grant funding request, which was $5.6 million, which had already been reduced from our original request for $12 million to focus on needed costs per their suggestion. And what we received in return was $1.7 million, significantly less, and everyone went around the room explaining our frustration with the process, why we didn't think we were getting what we needed. We are currently doing an analysis of the FY 27 development grant applications of other regional dispatches to see, you know, what if any disparities were out there. And part of the meeting concluded with state 9-1-1 and the undersecretary of EOPS explaining that they would work with us to try and secure other funding outside of the state 9-1-1 grant. There are other grants available to help us make up this difference and help us with our future applications and funding. We still want to stay on track for opening next July, July of 2027, and we'll continue to work with the state to ensure that we get adequate funding to keep that on track. So I just want to make you aware of that. And then also, just a quick recap, as was alluded to, I was out last week, and I want to thank my staff, especially Ms. Power Spurlett, who was minding the store, so to speak. She was integral in handling quite a few questions while I was out, and I appreciate her assistance and all the support staff for making sure things move smoothly when I'm not there. And because we alluded to working groups, I want to remind the board that I am sharing a historic district parking working group. We're going to have our first meeting tomorrow to look at the situation down and around the intersections of Route 20 and Route 27 in the parking for the depot area, the library, the library, the new businesses that are coming in to see what we can do to find some creative solutions, expand parking. I have various members from town staff. I've invited some business owners and some residents, and I'm hoping that together we can come up with some ideas which I can bring back to the board. And that's all I have, Madam Chair. Great. Anybody have any questions for Mr. McColl? I have a brief one. Could you just comment on the status of the 212 RFP? Off the top of my head, I do not have an update on that. I would either have to defer to Ms. Power Spurlett and or Mr. Whitney, who's been working on 212. I haven't been that closely involved in that particular. I withdraw the question. Happy to stay on schedule. Thank you. We can get you an update. I'd be happy to address it if that would be helpful. We are right now reviewing draft number six of the RFP. It's been a lot of back and forth. It's been a very good process with Kelsey's consultant, who is quite experienced in this area. I think we're getting quite close. We are waiting for a draft of a purchase and sale and a lease that would go as attachments to the RFP. We are advised that we need to put those in the document. And the purpose for that really is that anyone who is interested in responding, we would ask that they tell us whether they have any material disagreements with the town's draft. We think that the town, frankly, has more leverage before a designation is made than afterward. And so if we put out terms which we think are eminently fair, but maybe tilted a bit in the town's favor, we think that we're more likely to get a favorable response from prospective respondents. But again, I think I think we're getting pretty close. And it's it's a ponderous document, but I think it's something that we hope to get to the board, perhaps put it on Carol's list for August. I wasn't trying to sound critical, which I'm worried I did because I was trying to be short. I'm just very interested in the project. No, no, by all means, it's it turns out to be pretty involved, but worth the effort, I hope. I have it tentatively based on a conversation with you, Bill, for August 17th. I think that's. Do you want to move it? You'll tell me. No, no, it's not like a deadline. Okay. All right. Everybody's all set. No other questions. So let's go to minutes. I move approval of three sets of minutes, June 15th, June 29th and July 7th as amended. Second. All right. Any discussion now? Let's see. Let's do them one at a time. This June 15th. Anybody have any edits on June 15th? Anyone? I don't think I do either. Okay. Okay. Let's go then to June 29th. Anybody have any edits? They didn't have any there either. I think I have some here. I got to just figure this out. Yeah. So on A5, where it has the joint meeting with the finance committee, and we actually received, probably I received an email about this, but I had already flagged these myself and we've already included in the minute taker into this, but Mr. Satish had not been sworn in yet. So he's not a voting member. So, but secondly, when you're having a joint meeting, you only just list those who are present. You don't say who's absent. So that has to come out. And then farther down on item B, when the finance committee are joined, you have to say, Mr. Hurley, he moved. And Ms. OXA seconded, or whoever it was, that they adjourn at X time. And then the roll call vote. So those, those have been already addressed, but I want the board to know that. And, um, um, I also thought that on, on A15, um, when we had the, um, A8, I guess it was, when we had the reviews of the proposals from the legal counsel. Wonderful, wonderful summaries. But I thought at the very end, it should say after a brief discussion, the board deferred deliberation until the June 7th meeting, because it's, it just took the information. We didn't do anything, but we did say that. So I thought we should have that. Everyone's good with that. Um, and I didn't think any, see anything else. Anyone else see anything? Okay. How about June 7th? July. July. How about July 7th? Do you have edits, Chris? No. Okay. Bill? Doug? No. Well, I have one at the beginning because it was a Tuesday. Nice catch. Lucky. Um, I don't understand what this questioning is. The recording of this agenda item was not audible for four minutes. So, um, I'm hoping it wasn't audible at all because we were an executive session. Um, I'm hoping it did say that when we went into, uh, um, executive session that I announced we would return into open session in 20 minutes. So, um, and then I think down on established select board goals. I'm sorry, Mr. Whitney, where were you? We're missing a corner. I apostrophe. I think. The board reassessed and we. Who cares? Who cares? Sleep at the wheel. The board reassessed and reprioritized the previous year's goals. Picky, picky, picky. I know. All right. And I think that should do it. So, everybody's all same with my suggested edits. We're good to go. Okay. All those in favor. Doug? Yes. Bill? Yes. Chris? Yes. And Carol? Okay. Uh, that brings us down to correspondence. Any comments on the correspondence? No. No. Okay. Great. I think that brings us to select board reports of concerns. Correct. Um, let me just throw in one real quick that I think would be, would have been Tom would have reported on at the very end of the packet. There is two pages about, um, the America's two fiftieth parade and be in the parade and talks all about when it is. And if you want to be in and get a route map and all this, and this was just, just to let people know that if you're interested in doing a float or marching or whatever, that this is what you should do. And I didn't want to leave this. I think this, cause he's on this committee. I didn't want to leave it till the 17th. I figured, put it out now. We can also talk about it on the 17th. Uh, since you brought it up, Madam Chairman, Brad Keyes is doing a terrific job as the parade captain, um, including above and beyond world work, which we'll have more to say about later. Thank you. And perhaps when you say that, um, you could also add into your, your comments. If the select, what's going to participate in that parade, which is Saturday, October 3rd. Okay. Um, select board reports and concerns. Who wants to start? Who has any? I have one, uh, which is, uh, I believe the board previously approved engaging council to assist the planning board and, uh, some route 20 zoning. Zoning amendments to, uh, but, uh, I'm concerned that it's unclear as to how we're going to go forward with that. Would the select board with the town manager, would the planning board identify firms? Would we go to our town council? Uh, I'm just unclear as to next steps. So, uh, just concerned that we not let that one slip through. And, and particularly since, uh, you know, we all got the KP law, uh, advisory today about some, uh, changes to state law with respect to zoning. Um, you know, that's more stuff that the planning board has to deal with in order to conform our bylaw to these new state laws. And so I think it's important that we, uh, we get the planning boards and help on that stuff. Thank you. Um, Chris. All set. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Thank you. Um, Doug. Um, I'm realizing that, um, the election this November, the general election is going to contain a lot more ballot questions than any of us usually see. There could be upwards of nine questions on the ballot. So wondering, um, if, if Michael should connect with Trudy to see if, if she's fully prepared. Um, I imagine this will be a very high turnout election as well, or if she wants to come before us to, to ask any questions or seek any help from us. I just want to put that on folks radar a few months in advance. Okay. Very well, sir. Good. Thank you for bringing that up. Cause you reminded me in the consent packet. We, we voted the warrant for the, uh, for the election. Right. But we have to sign this, right? Kelsey. We have to find the slip here, the consent count. We have to sign this. You have to make, make arrangements. No, one second. I go. You have to make arrangements to go in and sign this. Um, I think it's by before the next meeting. I think we have to sign by August 10th or 12th or something like that. So please do me a favor and reach out. Yeah. Well, the question I signed in the 26th warm for the state primary election, please reach out to Trudy and make arrangements to go in and sign the warrant. And I will remind Tom as well. Thank you for saying that, Doug. Um, I do want to say that obviously it just in case anybody else is listening, the two meetings in August will be remote. Just reminding that in September, we are meeting August, uh, August, September 8th, which is a Tuesday, the day after labor day. And the meeting after that, which I will send, uh, Abby send a note on will be another Tuesday. It will be September 22nd because I believe Rosh Hashanah is on the 21st or is it Yom Kippur must be Yom Kippur that late. Rosh Hashanah comes first. I know, but it's just the 22nd. Oh yeah. September. So I think that's might be Yom Kippur, but anyway, so that's it. Um, also wanted to remind you that the 17th will be a pretty full agenda item as well. Um, I, um, the finance committee appointing board has completed filling all the positions for finance committee. We had a couple of folks who did elect to, um, go for reappointment. And we appointed Mr. O'Herlihy, who was a former finance committee to come back. So it's going to give some strength. Um, and we have two new members, which is terrific. I'm really energetic. Um, and, um, they have taken, they've had, they've had a couple of meetings. They're starting out. They would like the, what they're going to do this year is have, I meet a little bit more on the summit to help smooth out their workflow. So I'll have more on that after, um, probably the next meeting. So anyway, and, um, I think with that, we could have a motion to adjourn at 10 31. So moved. Second and third. I'll second it too. Thanks man. All those in favor, Bill. Yes. Chris. Yes. Yes. And me. Yes. Thank you, buddy. Thank you. Good night.
I don't see him yet. No, I do not see him. Mr. Levine, would you be so kind as to see if you could text him? Yes, I'm on it. I'm doing it. I knew you were doing it. That's why I asked you. All right, I'm going to read the agenda while we're doing this, so we move along as we're a pretty full night, as usual. So call to order. We're going to review the agenda. We'll have announcements and public comment, after which we will enter into executive session to discuss, pursue it to Massachusetts General Law, Chapter 38, Section 2183, discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining with the town's collecting bargaining units. At approximately 7.25 p.m., we will return to open session, at which time we will then turn our attention to reviewing and discussing the 2026 Hazard, excuse me, mitigation plan updates. At 8.25 p.m., we are scheduled to have a liquor license hearing violation, that will be followed by a review and discussion of the Sherman's Bridge Roads traffic study with potential recommendations, then discuss and update the Regional Housing Services Office, that's the RHSO, followed also by their inter-municipal agreement that we sign annually. Approximately 8.45 p.m., we'll have a discussion with the council and agencies, community centers, get a first-year recap, we'll have some appointments. We will be interviewing one candidate for the cultural council, and they will be making some confirmation of appointments. We will also have an opportunity to review our remaining open board positions. The town manager with a building, excuse me, the town building working group discussion, we'll follow that, and after that, we will discuss and finalize the fiscal 27, a fiscal select board and town manager objectives. Approximately 9.30 p.m., we will have from the town manager for the town manager's report, followed by minutes. We have, I think, three sets of minutes tonight, June 15, June 29, and July 7 of 2026. We have a few items to review and approve in the consent calendar. There's correspondence, select board members' reports and concerns, and I think it's an optimistic board we are scheduled to adjourn at 9.55. So the first thing I want to say is, are there any announcements from the board? Yes, Madam Chairman, there is a Town Beach concert this Thursday. I'm sure you're all on their seats, edge of your seats, looking forward to it. And we have one of Weyland's top showmen, Peter Lavinson, in comedy. And quite often, Mr. Lavinson is asked, are you going to bring Joanna Shuck from the Weyland High School Honors Jazz Ensemble? And I am pleased to share that the entire gang will be there, and the current weather forecast is very, very good. Terrific. Thank you. So, Ms. Powers-Burlatt, I've just gotten a text from Mr. Whitney saying the link is not working for him. Could you, I don't know where Mr. Levine is helping on that, or? I can take a look, and I can send him something. Okay, that'd be great. Thank you. Mr. Levine, do you have any announcements?
Okay. Mr. McCall, the Town Manager, will be joining us, hopefully, within the next 20 or 30 minutes. So, we were scheduled to go into Executive Session, but this is, we're going to postpone that until Mr. McCall is able to join us. So, what I think I would like to do, let's see if we can't get Mr. Whitney on board, wait a minute or two, see if we can get him on board. Oh, sorry. Is there any public comment? Yeah, I see two people, three people with their hand raised. I see Doug Stotts, I think. Doug Stotts, okay. Mr. Stotts, I recognize you. Sorry, I skipped this. This is hard for me to go back online.
Go ahead, Doug. Oh, there's Bill. Excuse me, I just want the record to show that Mr. Whitney joined us at 638. Thank you. Good evening.
Okay. And Mr. Stotts, you've been recognized. The floor is yours. Doug Stotts of Sherman's Road. So, my neighbors have reached out to respectfully request that the board defer discussion on the Sherman's Bridge Road traffic calming topic until we can have another bite at the apple and do a little bit more analysis on the underlying data set. The one topic I pointed out as being a potential shortcoming in my emails and some of the others to the board has been that such a high proportion of the traffic is going eastbound during morning rush hours. That traffic starts around Lincoln-Sudbury High School and goes two miles. And by the time they hit the bridge, they're in convoys of six, seven, and eight cars going, you know, 24, 26 miles an hour, whatever the lead car is. I think the issue is that it might skew the data down artificially from what's actually going on during off-peak. The other thing I'd point out is that the data that's been presented to you is not split between eastbound and westbound traffic. That's particularly important since the surveys were done by number 66, Sherman's Bridge Road, which is only a couple hundred yards from the bridge. We all recognize that the bridge has been serving as an inadvertent speed bump, and it's important that we understand the speeds going westbound and eastbound separately. Furthermore, I submit that doing that would get a good benchmark on eastbound speeds so we can see if they've increased markedly when the bridge finally does get repaired. Thank you.
You're muted, Carol.
Sorry. Robert, do we have someone else for public comment? Gretchen Dresdens. Yes. Ms. Dresdens, I recognize you. Hi. Gretchen Dresdens, 155 Main Street, and I had two comments tonight. The first relates to, in your packet, the June 29th draft minutes where it speaks about Mr. Gould's update on 195 Main Street. And specifically, at the top of page 106, I believe it's line 3, it says near zone 2, and it should actually read in zone 2. Mr. Gould's investigation does cover several parcels, and it's misleading to indicate that the PIFA contamination is near zone 2 when, in fact, it is in zone 2. And then my second comment relates to, I forget what page it is in the packet, but talking about the proposed town building working group, and I just question why there is nobody on the working group representing the schools, which is a significant portion of our budget expenditure, and why there is nobody represented from the public. Thank you. Thank you. Do you have anyone else, Robin? And Alyssa. Okay. Ms. Cotter, I recognize you. Thank you. Yeah, so about traffic on Sherman Bridge Road, we all know there's a lot here, a lot crosses the bridge, there's a lot of speeding. I've spoken before about the danger, this presents especially to the residents on my end of the road, the east end by 126, where we have no sidewalks, and it's twisty, and changing elevations. These four traffic studies from March to July this year echo the results of the studies done in 2025 and 2023, and a more detailed one by Sudbury in 2024, though that was just traffic crossing the bridge, but it did show specific vehicle types, but it was only for 100 feet. So, basically, if you're concerned about VRU safety or speeding, you want to look at the vehicles traveling alone, where their speed is not constrained by cars in front of them, and where that's happening. We who live here know when the heavy traffic is, and we don't walk then. We walk when there's little traffic, and that's when those speeders are the most dangerous and potentially deadly. That's what I see is people really speeding past me at dusk, you know, hours after the workday, and sometimes in the middle of the night going eastbound. The other ones going westbound. Cars pull off of Route 126 at 30 miles an hour. They don't even slow, and they may be going 35. I mean, not all the cars go down to 30 right around Turnbridge Road as they're supposed to on 126. And then they speed past all the houses that people back out of their driveways because their driveways are concealed. There's an elevation you can't see around there. There's nothing to warn the drivers. There's nothing to slow the drivers. I'm wondering if some kind of slow sign could be right at the entrance to the road, maybe even a little island that kind of divides the two lanes, because the cars come in and they cross over, you know, the outgoing lanes. And, you know, in the past, there have been a lot of accidents there. There's never any police stopping speeders here, but we're a small town, and how can we expect them to handle all of this out-of-town commuter cut-through drivers? We need signage to warn people, drivers, that it's the law that they have to pass by four feet. Any pedestrians or walkers in the road, that we have to use the road because there are no sidewalks. Some of the elders I've spoken with on this end want speed bumps to slow people down. They want a crosswalk so they could safely cross and get their mail, and they're right at the part where people are coming in from 126, fast, accelerating, and then hitting all that short sight line area with the small driveways, people backing out and stuff, caution signs, speed limit signs, and less traffic. I mean, maybe we could have just residential traffic, you know, in the nighttime, you know, from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. Anything that can incentivize, de-incentivize commuters from going down this small residential street.
And, yeah, slow signs. Oh, and also Sudbury has already placed a 25-mile-an-hour sign for drivers entering the bridge on their side. We have no such sign at our end. Why don't we have a 25-mile-an-hour sign on our end for people about to get on the bridge, as well as for people coming off the bridge? And Sudbury has both of those. Anything to let people know, they have to be careful. They're in a residential area. And it might, you know, make it better. So, yeah. Thank you. Thanks. Okay. Thank you. Robbie, is there anyone else who'd like to speak? I don't see no one else. Okay. So, I'm going to go back up here a bit and welcome Bill officially to the meeting. Sorry, I had problems with the link. Also, I want to ask if under the announcements that you would like to speak to the upcoming PIP meeting and give the details for that. So, well, you're on the mute, Bill. Sorry. I received the link from Mr. Gould but could not open it. So, I believe it's, is it the 30th? Yeah. And I do not have the login for that. I know that it will be entirely remote and it is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. 7? Yes, that's my understanding. So, perhaps that will appear on the town website, Kelsey. Yeah. Yes, Mr. Whitney, I will. And I just wanted to clarify, the meeting actually starts at 6.30. 6.30, thank you. Okay. 6.30. And it is totally remote. Correct. On our next, next, a week from Thursday. So, I just wanted to put that at the beginning of the meeting. Okay. I think you were not here when I mentioned that Mr. McCall is a bit detained. So, we're not going to go into executive session directly. We're going to do a couple other things first and hopefully he'll join us. Kelsey, will you, are you, is he going to text you when he's available?
I can ask him to. Okay. Thank you. And then you'll let us know. So, do we want to do the consent calendar? So, I need a motion. And the consent calendar obviously is in its own packet.
There are eight items. Can we have a motion?
Move to July 20th, 2026 consent calendar for approval. I would ask that we pull item six out for discussion. Yeah. Can you rephrase the motion, Doug, please? Move items one through five, seven, and eight for approval on the consent calendar. Second. Thank you. Okay. So, let's do that first. No further discussion on that. Then, of course, we're on the remote. Everything has to be a roll call vote. So, Bill? Yes. Doug? Yes. Chris? Aye. Yes. And Carol? Yes. That's four zero. And I think at the beginning of the meeting, I forgot to mention as well, Mr. Fay will not be able to join us this evening. So, on number six, I printed out some material for this. What specific is your question here? Well, I had a question. I had a question. As I understand that there is a lawsuit that is ongoing alleging price fixing among suppliers of fire apparatus, perhaps, or perhaps not, including ambulances. So, I'm curious as to whether that lawsuit would have any bearing on this purchase.
Mr. Winnie, I can answer if you'd like. Thank you. So, as far as I know, the lawsuit is related to mostly fire trucks, not ambulances. And I would say that I can't speak for the future to say if ambulances are going to be added. I don't know if Braun is part of that lawsuit, but I don't know if it would affect the price in our favor if we were to wait for the outcome of that lawsuit. Because I don't know if ambulances are going to be included. And if they are, who is to say how long that lawsuit plays out and how that would affect us? Because we need the, we sort of need the ambulance now. The other ambulance is kind of at end of life. So, yeah, I had asked because we're purchasing from Bulldog Fire Apparatus, Inc. Yeah, so Bulldog is the company that is selling us the, the, I have to, I, you know what, now that you say that, I'd have to double check to see if Bulldog is part of that because they're a third party seller of ambulances and fire trucks. So I'm not quite, quite certain if they're a member or party to that lawsuit. And I'd have to look it up. I don't know off the top of my head. I just know that they facilitate sales of fire apparatuses, both fire trucks and ambulances. Well, I personally would be comfortable in authorizing the town manager to execute the contract pending further investigation on this question, if the board is so disposed and would make a motion to that effect. Okay. I think this looks consistent to me, Bill, in the prices we've paid for ambulances in the past. But I do know that the issue is that sometimes there's delays and then things change. So. Yeah. Have we paid inflated costs for ambulances in the past? I don't know if it's part of the lawsuit. But anyway, I'm, I'm happy to make the motion that Michael McCall be authorized to execute a contract for the purchase of a new Braun chief. So we already have a motion on the table, though, for the other items that, what did we, did we approve that already? And we're just doing this one. We did. Yeah. Sorry. Go ahead, Bill. That was four zero. Yeah. And then, and then it was Bill's turn to address his question, presents his question on number six, which he's done. So have you finished your motion, right? Yes. Right. Okay. So now we need a second. It's hard. Second. Thank you. And then let's have a roll call vote. So Bill. Yes. Doug. Yes. Chris. Yes. And Carol. Yes. So that's before zero. Okay, great. So I'm going to note that Mr. McCall has joined us, which means then we are going to go back to the beginning of the, the agenda, and I am going to say that I move the select board, enter into executive session, pursuing to Massachusetts general law, chapter 38, section 21A3, to discuss strategy with respect to the collective bargaining with the following units. This is going to be the Wayland library staff, Wayland police officers, unions, the International Association of Firefighters, the Wayland Department of Public Works, asked me, is there a second to the motion to enter into executive session? Thank you. Thank you. The chair declares that a public discussion of these matters may have a detrimental effect on the litigating, negotiating, or bargaining position of the town. So I have a roll call vote. Chris. Yes. Bill. Yes. Yes. Carol. Yes. That's four zero. All right. The chair invites attendance by Michael McCall, town manager, Kelsey Powers, Spillette, assistant town manager. Um, and then I need a little assistance here. Is both Jalen and, and, uh, Kate joining us or just Kate?
Does anybody know? I believe it's just Kate who is joining. Okay. And Kate Ryan, human resources director. Uh, the committee will rejoin the public meeting from executive session. The meeting will return to open session in approximately 45 minutes. So everybody knows they have to go to the other link now. So we will see you there. Thank you. Thank you. Online. Thank you. Good evening. I'm, um, returning the select board to open session at 7 26 PM. Thank you. So, um, I think since we went to executive session, Mr. McCall, the town manager has joined the, the committee. I want to make note of that. And, um, we are still also assisted by, uh, assistant town manager, Kelsey Powers, Spillette. All right. So I think the next item on our agenda is I'm missing somebody that, wait a minute. I'm missing, uh, Chris, uh, Doug, you're all muted. I'm missing Chris and Bill. Right. Right. Oh, do I have to restart us again to open session? Cause they're not here. Yeah. You don't have a quorum. All right. Let me get one.
Okay. There's Bill. Hi Bill.
Chris is in the attendees. If we could move him over, please.
Somebody tell me how to put my name on the screen. Um, so you right click on, there should be a little box with three dots up in the right hand corner there. It might give you a thing in there that if you click it to rename. Okay. So in my, I was so excited that we were so right on time that I went right ahead and started without, um, Chris and Bill. So I'm going to re, um, bring this book back to open session at 728 PM. Our next item will be to review and discuss the 2026 hazard litigation plan. We're going to be looking at some updates. We're going to invite, uh, Chief Mark Hebert, uh, Fire Chief Neil McPherson and Jamie Kaplan from Jamie Kaplan Consulting. I want to ask you, there's a nice lock here as well. Are you also joining us for this, uh, gender item? Yes. Yes. So what this is, um, this information starts on page six in our packet. There's a few slides there, but essentially every five years we need to update and review our hazard mitigation plan. And this is what, uh, in the process of doing. And one of the steps is if they come and review progress and, um, uh, offer the public opportunity to provide input at a select board meeting. So I am going to turn this over to Chief McPherson, I think, first. Neil, did you want to speak first? So, uh, thank you. I just wanted to say, um, thank you to Jamie and her team. And we appreciate the fact that you've allowed us a half an hour tonight. So we look forward to Jamie and her team going through the presentation. We want to remind the public again of the opportunity in the future for more public input tonight because we don't have a lot of time, but it's been a very collaborative process. And it's been a pleasure to work with Jamie and her team so far in this important project for the town.
Should I go ahead and give the presentation, Carol? Yes, absolutely. The floor is yours. Thank you. Okay. Thank you for having us. So, uh, my name is Jamie Kaplan and I'm, uh, happy to be here in front of you with Ellen Grapp-Loth and, um, we've done a lot of work, uh, mitigation planning work throughout the state of Massachusetts. Uh, the graphic gives you some sense of that. And we also work nationwide, um, doing emergency management planning. Uh, we don't want to take a lot of your time today, but we do want you to understand a bit about what our project is and how you're involved with it. Uh, so the graphic is a screenshot of the cover of your, uh, current hazard mitigation plan. Um, and we are creating an update to that plan. And what I hope to do tonight is help you understand what mitigation is, what a hazard mitigation plan is. And then we'll talk a little bit about natural hazards and some high hazard areas, um, in Weyland, and then begin to think about some mitigation actions. And I'll give you a sense of, uh, the whole project in general and how you can be engaged with it through our process. Um, so when we think about natural hazards, we're thinking about any natural event that can cause harm to people or property or in the, the environment. Um, and we're trying to consider what hazards, um, could possibly affect your community, your neighborhoods, um, and all hazard occurrences don't necessarily have to turn into disasters. So if you think about, for instance, heavy rains, we can't stop heavy rains, but we don't necessarily have to have flooding and the activities that we can do to not have flooding would be considered mitigation. And so what our plan is doing is looking at the, what can happen and what can we do ahead of time so that you don't have disasters, um, and how you can mitigate those risks. So a big picture of emergency management tends to have these four components, uh, preparedness, response, recovery, and mitigation. Our plan is only about mitigation. Uh, when you think about preparedness, that's what I'm in Northampton, by the way, Massachusetts. So we think about preparedness. We're thinking about, for instance, winter storms, we get a warning, they're coming, everybody rushes to the store for milk and eggs and bread and that kind of thing. We're preparing because you know, it's going to happen response and recovery. That's what Mark and, um, Neil do a lot of, right? They respond to incidents. Um, and then recovery is putting those pieces back together. Our plan is only about mitigation. It's only about what we can do when we're not having a disaster. For instance, today, nice weather day, right? It was not too hot. It's not too cold. It's not raining. It's not snowing. What do we do so we don't have problems when those things happen? Because we can't stop them from happening. And that's what the plan is about.
So hazard mitigation has been proven to save approximately six or more dollars for every dollar you save, um, every dollar you spend, excuse me. So if we wait for, for instance, a bridge to wash out because it's too low for current, um, storms, that's very expensive, not to mention the loss of lives and, and economic impacts. Whereas if you spend the money today to build a bridge appropriately for current conditions, you're going to save money. Um, so our mitigation plan will look at ways to reduce loss of life and property. It will look at how to prioritize your investments, right? You have limited amount of human and financial resources, and we want to identify projects projects that will use those resources most effectively. Um, you will be increasing the community's resilience, um, and it's a requirement for federal funding through FEMA. There are millions, literally millions of dollars of grant funding available to you if you have a FEMA approved hazard mitigation plan. And so this plan serves to meet that need. We identify these projects. We're going to identify possible, um, funding sources for them. And then when, um, your plan is approved and adopted, you're eligible for funding. And I'm going kind of quickly because I know you're on a very tight schedule today. Um, but we are available in the future to answer questions. So, uh, what does hazard mitigation look like? These are just a couple of examples, things like culvert, um, upgrades, drainage improvements, elevating structures, all of that mitigates risk to flooding. We think about wildfire. We want to have defensible space, reducing fuels, um, and, and building with ignition resistant construction. I know that you're a very wooded community. Um, so that's something that is, is super important to think about. We want to maintain the health of trees and make sure that, you know, sick or dying trees aren't against buildings. Um, in terms of other things, we could think about having cooling centers. We're certainly seeing our environment get increasingly hot. Um, we want to have shade infrastructure and that could be expanding tree canopies. Um, so trees can be both good and bad when we think about mitigation. Um, and for earthquakes, I know we don't have lots of them, but we do have them. So you want to do things like, uh, retrofitting your critical facilities, securing utilities, that kind of thing. So we're looking at through our plan to understand what can happen and then identify what you could possibly do about it. So these are the key components of a mitigation plan. The first big chapter in your plan has what we call a community profile, and it really sets the stage for what is Wayland, who lives there. So we're looking specifically at demographics, not just people in general, old people, young people, disabled people. You want to get a good sense of, um, if there are any, um, high need populations, et cetera. Uh, we look at your built environment and that will include infrastructure like roads and, um, other utilities, as well as houses and, um, special critical facilities. That would be things like the library or town hall. Um, all of that is in the community profile. All your natural resources are described there. Then we look at hazard information and the risk assessment. And Ellen's going to talk about this in a minute, but this is where we go through all the different possible natural hazards that may impact the community and what you can do to, what, what those hazards will do to the community if they are to occur. Your capability assessment. This looks at the community's capacity today to mitigate risk. Um, and we won't talk a lot about that today. Um, but we do consider things like, do you have, um, the right plans in place? Do you have, um, different educational opportunities, financial opportunities, et cetera? What's the capacity that you have to implement mitigation measures? Your mitigation strategy is where it all comes together with these projects to help, um, increase your resilience and mitigate risk to the natural hazards. And then the plan implementation and maintenance chapter speaks specifically about how you can implement this plan, maintain it, get that grant funding. Um, and as Carol mentioned in the quick introduction, it is good. The plans are good for five years and then it's a requirement that they get updated. So we began your planning process with a kickoff meeting in February. We put together what we refer to as the hazard mitigation planning committee and Neil and Mark are the, um, chairs, if you will, of that committee, um, that is meeting four times through our planning process. We have, um, two opportunities, this being the first one for the public to engage with us and this planning process. Uh, then the committee, as well as the public have an opportunity to review the draft plan and that will happen, um, in September. And then the plan will go to MIMA, the Massachusetts emergency management agency for their review in October. After MIMA reviews your plan and they feel that it's met all federal requirements. They send it to FEMA, the federal emergency management agency for their review. Now when FEMA reviews your plan, they, um, look to make sure that we as a consulting team, um, and you as a community have met all federal requirements with the plan. And when they're happy that you have, they send the plan back to you. They send you a letter that says the plan is approved pending adoption. And that's the time that then this committee, the select board needs to adopt this plan. So that's part of why I've really pushed Neil and Mark to say, get us on this agenda. We want to be involved with the select board because I want you to understand what's in your plan, what it's all about. So come November, December, January, it's hard for me to know how fast FEMA will look at your plan. It's going to come back to you, um, and you need to adopt it. So I want to make sure you're in the loop the whole time. Um, and that we're meeting, you know, your needs that this plan needs to reflect what you care about. All right. So this committee, the hazard mitigation planning committee that we put together. Um, this is a list of, uh, most, if not all of the people who are on the committee. And this was one of our first big steps in putting your plan together is get the right group of people together to talk about these needs. And what we need to do is get supporting data and information. Um, as a consulting team, we've been doing this for nearly 30 years. We do it nationwide. We're good at it. We don't live in Wayland. We don't know your community the way you do. So it's so important that no matter what we're doing in our planning process between the beginning to the end, you're involved because your input is what matters the most. Um, so this committee has provided lots of information and data for us, assisted with outreach and engagement, such as getting us here today. Um, identifying and prioritizing mitigation actions. We have a good list going of about 30 mitigation actions already identified, and then they'll review and comment on the draft plan. So these are the folks that I turn to and say, what do you want to do in your job so that you are ready for a disaster? So you don't have big disasters. What can happen so that you don't need to respond with lights and sirens, basically? All right. I'm going to turn it quickly over to Ellen, and she'll go through the risk assessment. Okay. Thanks, Jamie. Good evening, everyone. So this slide gets right into it and defines risk as the potential for damage, loss, and other impacts that are caused by what Jamie was talking about, the natural hazards. So the risk assessment, the main job that it has to do is describe risk in detail for each hazard that's included. So the terms that you see on the left in parentheses are basically the same terms that we're going to use in the hazard mitigation plan. And you can see that we have to take a look at everything we can about what the hazards can do to the community and its assets is the type of language that FEMA uses. So the graphic that's shown there on the right was something that was created by FEMA to just convey the idea that risk is that area of overlap between the hazard or the occurrence of the hazard or the event, sometimes we say, and the community as represented by its assets. And then the next slide basically looks at a term that we refer to as vulnerability, which in this context, we're basically saying the risk assessment is understood as being a very deep dive into the ways in which the community may be at risk. And this is vulnerability. So we can kind of break the analysis of vulnerability into several steps, and that's what we're trying to show here. So exposure is basically describing the community assets that were mentioned on that last slide, people, structures, systems, valued activities for the community. And then it's natural, historic, and cultural resources. And what we do, we use existing data as well as models to try to help quantify things like potential losses from future hazard events. And one of the tools that we mentioned there in that third step is something that FEMA has, which is software called Hazus. And that's used to do the analysis for flood, wind, and earthquake hazards specifically. So as we go through and identify the potential damage, loss, and impacts, then what we do, and this is at the end of each section for each hazard in the hazard mitigation plan risk assessment, we come up with what are called problem statements. And these are specific to each hazard, and these are specific to each hazard, and then they form the basis for the actions to mitigate the problems, and we'll talk a little bit more about that later. So then on this next slide, we basically can show how it worked for Wayland. This is basically sort of a very consolidated view of what the results are. And this table accomplishes something that is a FEMA requirement, which is ranking of the hazards. So if you look down that left column there, that lists all 12 of the hazards that we're assessing in this hazard mitigation plan update. And how we get at this so-called ranking is basically coming up with a numeric score. So when you read down that list and then you look at what's to the right of it, these columns are basically the criteria that we're going to be scoring or ranking. So to arrive at what we have in that second to the right column, which is called value, each criterion is assigned a number from one to four, and then a weighting factor is applied to each one. So if you go across probability and impact are weighted at 30%, spatial extent is weighted at 20%, and then warning time and duration each get 10%. So that's basically how we come up with the number. And then that value just allows for the town to go through a process to kind of separate each of the hazards into a ranking category, which in this context we call high, moderate, and low. So you can see the color change from the red to kind of the dark yellow to the light yellow from high to low. And, you know, it's important to note that this supports an effort to do prioritization and to take a look at like which mitigation actions should we try to do first. But it's also important to note that priorities can shift over time, and it's not always possible to immediately address like all of the highest ranked hazards across all of the town's assets. So if we move to this next slide, basically what I'm trying to show here is some examples. So I mentioned that each hazard has a section in the risk assessment. And at the end of each section, we develop these problem statements. And this slide provides just a few examples of the type of problem statements that we derived from our analysis for Wayland and also from the input that we received from that hazard mitigation planning committee. The people that have the local knowledge, the people that have been through, you know, past occurrences of these natural hazards, et cetera. So as an example, if you look at that left column, we divided these into what we heard and what can be done. And for flood, we pulled that out as an example. It's very common. It's recurring. The town has experienced flooding in specific areas and has also identified that term that Jamie used earlier, critical facilities that may be exposed to that hazard. Or they may be vulnerable due to their location, their age and the type of construction. So we look at what those problems are. And then on the right, we propose some solutions for them, which we eventually develop into those mitigation actions that Jamie mentioned. And then as a second example, we took it to look at combining like two of the subsections because winter storms are evaluated as their own hazard and then other severe weather, which includes things like high winds and thunderstorms. We just took a look at combining both of those because they have some commonalities. For example, we see a lot of damage to trees. Limbs come down. Trees come down. Tree limbs come down onto power lines. We have power outages. It affects our ability to deliver certain services. And sometimes the schools and other things have to be closed. And then again, it gets to not just the natural resources and the infrastructure, but again, the people. And so we also look at problem statements that reflect what occurs with vulnerable populations and people that have different needs in the case of an occurrence of the hazard. And then on the right side, again, we try to propose some specific solutions that will be practical and can actually be implemented. And then if you want me to do this last one, Jamie, too. Up to you. Yeah, I can just run through it because this is just kind of taking a look at, again, how to describe what those steps are and what they lead to. So at the beginning, we said we go through this identification process that's based on quite a few factors. You know, what was included in the last plan? What has happened since then? What has changed? You know, what are the conditions that are different now? We get more intense storms, maybe fewer of them sometimes, but maybe they bring more rain or more snow or things like that. And then we basically take a look at, you know, what's being impacted and where and in what way. And lastly, that leads us to we got those problem statements written and we come up with mitigation actions to help solve the problems. And I think with that, I can give it back to Jamie. All right. Thank you. So when we're looking to solve the problem, which we do with these mitigation actions, we look for solutions in these four categories. Plans and regulations. This could be something like zoning regulations or bylaws so that you know that you're building in appropriate areas. You're not adding, you're not increasing risk with how you build or how you function. Structure and infrastructure projects. Easy to come up with. Those are big budget things like retrofitting a building or fixing a roadway. That kind of thing. Natural systems protection is also a good way to mitigate risk, especially flood risk, right? If we can prevent erosion or let water go where it wants to and don't build in those areas. That's a good way to mitigate risk. And then education and awareness programs, typically most cost effective. Personally, my favorite, because I think if you've got a well informed population, then your risk level will go down. They'll be more prepared. So your mitigation plan has these goal statements. These are not finalized goal statements, but all good plans have goals. And that's also a federal requirement. So the first one has to do with protecting life and property. And I should back up and tell you that the way we developed this list of goal statements is by looking at your previous hazard mitigation plan, as well as looking at the other plans that you have in place. I want this plan to reflect the culture and interest of the community and what you've already set in place and just move that forward. It's not recreating the wheel. It should be consistent with what you care about and moving you forward. Strengthening your local capacity to mitigate risk is very important. The more able you are to mitigate risk, the better off you will be. So there we talked about integrating mitigation and climate adaptation into all of your local policies and planning processes as a way to mitigate risk. The third one we have is enhancing resilience of buildings and infrastructure. And that obviously comes up with ways to upgrade and maintain your infrastructure and strengthen public facilities and your essential services. We've included protecting and sustaining natural resources. Your community is full of natural resources. They need to be protected. It's something that you care about as a community. So we want to include that. And we mentioned specifically water resources, air quality, open space, etc. Because again, by reading the plans you have in place, this is something that matters to your community. And then again, increasing public awareness. That's something that I always insist on. I think it is really important to include. And then what happens next? I want you to understand. So we've been at this for a while. We are knee deep in your planning process. We would like to finish up the plan towards September. Between now and then, you are welcome to today ask any questions, assuming there's time and we can answer them. You can share any feedback or questions you have directly with Neil or Mark and they can answer them or they can share them with us. We would like to have another public meeting in September. We're in the process of figuring that out. And I think it will be with in conjunction with the Council on Aging so that we can have something for specifically for that vulnerable population and have it be more of a hybrid meeting. So there's people in person as well as online. I think it's a good way to to meet the needs of the senior community. Not everybody's too savvy with Zoom, etc. Then the public has an opportunity to review the plan when that is the way we structure that is you will have a hard copy placed in one or more places within town as well as an online version. And I'll walk you through how that's going to occur. And then after, excuse me, after we receive all the comments and finish up the plan, it will go to again, MEMA. That's Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency. When they like it, they send it on to FEMA. When FEMA is happy, they send it back to the town for adoption. If in any of those steps, the plan needs a change or a correction, they let me know or let you know. And we make that change. That review process takes several months. It's hard for me to know how long it would take. I think it would be crazy for anybody to decide how long FEMA is going to take to do something. So I don't know, but they know that we're working on this. So, you know, I keep them in the loop to the degree that I can. Our plans are very well received in Massachusetts. So you won't have any problem. We guarantee that the plan gets approved. I should also mention that as the public reviews the plan, all the comments that we receive get included in the plan. So people are entitled to say anything and we include it. We don't edit the body of the plan. For instance, create a new mitigation action based on some public comment unless the hazard mitigation planning committee says, yes, that's a good idea. Let's add that as an action. So all comments get included. The plan doesn't get changed unless the committee decides that it warrants a change and then we make those changes. So typically what we do with public meetings is have two of them, this being the first one. And this meeting, I really wanted to introduce the topic to you as well as introduce the risk assessment to you and how we work through that. The second meeting will focus a lot more on the results of the risk assessment, specific, more specifics on the problem statements and a lot more specifics on the mitigation actions themselves and how you can review the draft plan. One other quick thing to mention is the mitigation actions will each action, just think about it as a project. Each project includes a description for what that project is and what you're intending, what risk you're intending to mitigate. It also includes who, what position in the town is responsible for implementing that action as well as other departments in town that may support the action or regional organizations that may support the action. And we identify potential funding sources for all the actions and a timeline for you to hopefully implement them. So I did also include our contact information here. So if you wanted to reach out, you're welcome to. But I think it'd be best if most comments run through Mark and Neil. So that's why I put their contact on this slide. And that's what we have for tonight. But I'm happy again, Ellen and I can ask, answer any questions you have, if you have any. Thank you. Thank you. I think I'd open it up. Very informative. I'd like to open it up to the board first. Maybe we could take the slide down. So yeah, that'd be great. Okay, great. Open it up to the board first to see if they have any questions. Also, if either of the chiefs want to add something, feel free to, I guess, raise your hand so we can acknowledge you. So, Mr. Levine. Thank you. That was especially informative and detailed, and I appreciate it, both of you. Jamie, a couple of process questions. Yeah. I'm a former EOPS guy, but I never worked on this granular level with the municipalities, even though I did work with MIMA. How often are you seeing hazard mitigation plans come back from MIMA with needed changes? Is that more of a rarity? Give me a bit for that process. I got to say, with a very big smile, they introduce us as the best in the business. So they don't send back a lot of changes. In fact, they frequently just send our plans to FEMA because we do this. This is what we do. We do a good job with it. We've had a contract directly on behalf of the state for five plus years to update plans on their behalf locally. So that's why we've done, you know, 40, 50 plans on behalf for MIMA. So, yeah, there's no problem here. This is what we do. And is FEMA actually reviewing all of these plans for all municipalities in the United States? Yes, they do. And so just for other people. So FEMA divides the country into 10 regions and FEMA region one, which is their base just outside Boston. They will review your plan. And, yeah, they do review all of them, which is part of why it takes so darn long. But I think they have about three months that they have to turn them around in. We sometimes I keep track of, you know, what day did they get it? And sometimes, you know, we bug them a little. But we've got a good reputation with FEMA region one and there won't be any issue. And I could tell you that FEMA region one, as well as MIMA, send pieces and portions of our plans to other communities that get their plans pushed back saying, do it like this. Yes. So, yeah, this you're in good hands. Thank you. And my last question is, based on your review so far, all the data and communicating with people on Whalen, what are you seeing that makes this town somewhat different or unique than others? And I know we are, like you mentioned, a very wet space compared to at least some of our neighboring communities. And does that make the plan different than a lot of our neighboring communities because of our amount of wetlands and wet areas? No, no. I mean, we work on a lot of coastal plans. So your wet is not, you know, that doesn't compare to, you know, every high tide you're soaked. So, so no, because we see that, you know, you're more of a bedroom community. You're not a large city. We wrote Worcester's plan, for instance. We've written New Haven's plan. You know, that's a different beast. We wrote Framingham's plan. But, you know, you're, you're a well-engaged community, which we really appreciate. I really value the public engagement. You know, what your comments are. That matters because you're, it needs to be your plan. I want the plan to reflect your interests and what you care about. So we're not sitting, we're not doing this in a vacuum, like, you know, just sign on the dotted line and we'll send back something in a few months. That's not how we function. Yeah. The fact that, you know, Neil and Mark are so responsive, like we reach out, they reach back. Neil called me on vacation for goodness sakes. Like you're in good shape here. Trust me there. You know, we've worked, we've done hundreds of these and, and I've literally had to say to people, excuse me, you're the town planner. Can you answer that question? And they, you know, and nothing happens. That's not the situation in Wayland. So in terms of your hazards, I mean, you know, Ellen can answer this, but I don't think that there's anything, you know, especially scary or weird happening that would make your plan different. You're in New England. You've got a lot of trees and a lot of water. Sorry. One final question, Carol. What is the stick for municipalities if they don't submit these or don't submit them on time? Do they get fined by the state? No, no, there's no penalties and there's no actual rewards other than you're able to apply for grant funding. And, you know, you need the money. Yeah, for sure. For sure. I'm going to, I want to get to the problem as well here. Thank you, Doug. Bill or, Bill, do you have any questions? I do. Thank you for the presentation. Under the problem statement, what we heard under flooding, I know that this is illustrative and not an exhaustive list. But one area where we've had a lot of flooding is an area called Pelham Island Road where we are routinely on local news with, you know, National Guard amphibious vehicles getting people to their homes and so forth. And there's a major new development under construction there that's pretty close. So that's one you might add to the list. With respect to the public meeting, I appreciate, Jamie, your comment about the need for public input. I don't consider this in a sense a public meeting insofar as we get public comment at the beginning of the meeting, which is confined to two minutes. And then we have, you know, kind of the business meeting, which is certainly available to people who are interested. But for the second meeting, you might consider holding a meeting at which members of the general public can ask questions and have a dialogue. And finally, with respect to the grants, I take it that these grants are in the in the vein of preventative action rather than recovery from a disaster. Is that right? Yes, that is right. It's it's mitigation. It's what you can do ahead of time. However, if you have a large scale disaster that then awards you money, then you can use some of that to mitigate risk as well. And then you don't compete for those funds. But we're talking really big time disaster. But on your every day, you're going to compete for grant dollars. Right. And then finally, we hear that the federal government is cutting back domestic funding in a number of areas, including FEMA. And so what's your what's your take on the availability of this kind of mitigation funding going forward? You know, I'm happy to say it is back in a big, big way. So if you look up BRIC, FEMA BRIC, that's the acronym for the biggest funding source right now that FEMA has. There's a lot of funds available. The Trump administration had sort of put the kibosh on it, tried to get rid of FEMA. They've since brought it all back. And in the news, there is a tremendous amount of money that has become available. So hopefully your plan gets approved. And by next September, not this coming one, but the year after, you should be well positioned to apply for additional funding. That being said, your mitigation actions, I identify as many state based sources of grant funding, not just FEMA funding, because, you know, it's a moving target. So we want to make sure that that we're identifying options for where you can get funds. And with that, I should say, I can't come with any guarantees that you will get funding. Sources can go away and you're going to compete for those funds with other communities. But I can tell you that your plan will make a good case for your need for them. Thank you. I'm all set, Carol. OK, Chris, just I'm going to hop in one real quick. So, Bill, there was a press release that went out about this meeting tonight, and it did say public input would be accepted. So I think I said that earlier once the board has its questions, I will open it up to see if anyone is listening. But I agree with they do need. And I was pleased to see on the schedule that there are just totally dedicated meetings to public input here. So, Mr. Reynolds, I'm grateful Mr. Whitney asked the question I was going to ask. No comment. No question. Thank you very much. I also want to thank you very much. Is there anybody, Ms. Powell Spurlett, is there anybody who has the hand raised who wants to offer input or to this presentation or any questions? I see two people with their hand raised. Yeah, I do. Yeah. OK, so let's, Ms. Currier, I recognize you. Judy? Carol, I was just asked to unmute. OK, I'm sorry. Is that you, Tom? Yes. OK, Mr. Siaka, I recognize you. All right, thank you. All the Whelan people here know me. My name is Tom Siaka. I've been Whelan's representative to the River Stewardship Council for 25 years. Pretty sure I know more about the hydrology of and flooding of the river than anybody else on the planet at the moment. If you want to know about the history of flooding on our river for the last 300 years, there's a presentation on the Whelan Historical Society website. I will announce to all of you right now hot news as of a little over an hour and a half ago. The Bill Ricca Historic District Commission was what was forced kicking and screaming to approve the removal of the Bill Ricca Dam. This is after 300 years. I am sure that that will have a significant effect on flooding risk on the river. There is one more hurdle at the Bill Ricca end, namely the CONCOM. But, you know, hopefully they will impose reasonable conditions that ought to be a procedural thing. The Bill Ricca HDCC, by the way, was ordered to do that by the Superior Court. I mean, Bill Ricca has been fighting the removal of that dam for 316 years. So that should help our flooding risks a lot. Hmm. I'm told I'm Jane Siaka here in this way. Okay. That always happens. I'm Tom, by the way. The remaining risks are the obstructions in the river. There are some 25 of them between here and Bill Ricca. And I would be happy to meet with you and explain all of them. And a major one in Wayland, which I've been raising as an issue for a number of years now. And I think what to be number one on your list of mitigation actions. So I think everybody here has got my email. So I'll leave it at that. And please contact me. I'm ready to help. Thank you. Carol, if I may, I just wanted to say, Tom, thank you so much. And Neil or Mark, if you can kind of connect us with Tom, I think that would be great. Great. And I did watch that presentation you mentioned on the historical society site. You're on it, Evan. Carol, we can't hear you. Carol, you're on mute. You got to shut off your mute. Well, no wonder I kept saying, hold on, and everyone kept talking. Sorry. Is there somebody else who wanted to make public comment? I want to call on them next, please. Yeah, I see Alyssa with her hand raised. Do Ms. Carter recognize you? Hi, Alyssa Carter. I live in Sherman Bridge Road, and it's named after the Sherman Bridge, which crosses the river about six or seven tenths of a mile away. And that river, that bridge is and has been below 100 year flood level and has flooded and is in the process of being expensively renovated, but not raised above the flood level. And it now includes trucks and lots of commuter cars since about 2000, you know, 2000. And I don't know whether that risk was in the previous risk assessment plan that was made or not. And I'm just wondering if, you know, rather than continuing to use it as a highway bridge, this wooden structure that's beloved and favored by the residents here. So if it were changed into a historic or a walking, you know, rich would then we wouldn't it wouldn't be as bad for in terms of risk assessment, because then if it gets washed away, we can put up a much smaller walking bridge instead of multimillion dollar high rise bridge between two residential neighborhoods. And I don't know if you have any comments on that from the risk assessment perspective. Thank you. Is there anybody else from the public who wants to make a comment about the presentation? No, I see no one else. Okay. Okay. Well, I'm going to thank everyone for attending and thank you. It was very informative. And definitely I encourage anyone who has any input or has any questions to reach out to either of the either chief McPherson or acting chief Heber and share your thoughts and your questions. And we look forward to seeing the plan in the fall. In the fall. Thank you very much. Thank you for having us. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. So now we would like to call over Mr. Patel is the only one who should be on the screen now is Mr. Patel. I think anybody who's here for something other than the liquor license hearing. Um, so it's just Mr. Patel. I think Ms. Ms. Shard is for the HRHSO presentation as this Mr. Hummel. So Mr. Patel was here earlier. Did we see him? Yeah, I'm trying to get him trying to get him over. Okay. Great. Thank you. Okay. Well, while we're waiting for him to come, I'm going to say that the next agenda item is a liquor license hearing violation by Whelan Variety and Delhi Corp. We are inviting attendance by Mark Hebert, acting chief of police and Mr. Patel, who's the manager of the Whelan Variety and Delhi. No luck. Uh, yeah, it keeps decline to decline each time I click on answers to decline promotions each time it's us. Do we have a phone number? Yeah. That's what I was going to say. Kelsey or Michael, do you have his number? I do not. He's coming out right now. He's coming out right now. He's coming right now. Okay, great. Perfect. Thank you, Robbie. I don't see him. He's still here. Oh, he's still here. He's on. Your video is off. Welcome, Mr. Patel. Your video is off. I am going to- I am starting there. I am going to declare the hearing open. So, notice is hereby given that the Whelan Select Board will hold a public hearing on Monday, July 20th at 8 p.m. at the Whelan Town Building at 41 Coticia Road in Whelan, Mass. And on Zoom. Well, actually, we're not in the Town Building. That's not correct. And on the liquor license violations by the Whelan Variety in Delhi at 770, Boston Post Road, obviously Whelan, Mass. 01778. The Zoom link is made available the day of the meeting, which is obviously on the Whelan calendar and is also on the Select Board agenda. The hearing is for a violation of Massachusetts General Laws, Chapter 138, Section 64, regarding the sale of alcoholic beverages to persons under 21 years of age. All right. So, welcome, Mr. Patel. Thank you. This is I'm going to explain the order here of how we do things in cases. Hopefully, this is the first time, maybe the last time you'll come to us. So, first of all, we'll have is that we'll ask the Acting Chief of Police to present the evidence related to the alleged violation. Then you will have an opportunity, either yourself and or your counsel, if you're represented by counsel, to respond and ask questions. The Select Board will have an opportunity to ask questions. Then you'll have a chance to print some more evidence or be bought any questions that have been asked. The Chief may ask questions of you. The Select Board may ask more questions, and eventually we'll have a summary. But I will say this. The rules of evidence are not applied during the hearing, but the board expects that the police department and the licensee will present credible and reliable evidence in a clear and concise manner. Options are discouraged. Okay. And then once we have the the conclusion of the hearing, we will deliberate and determine if we will make a decision tonight or defer to a later time. So, having said that, Mr. Hebert, the floor is yours, please. All right. Thank you. Let's get right into the facts of the case here. On June 4th and June 11th, the Wayland Police Department conducted alcohol compliance at all on-premise and off-premise establishments selling alcohol in Wayland. On June 4th, Detective Sergeant Costagno and Sergeant Kazan sent a 19-year-old operative into the establishment to try and purchase alcohol. The operative entered Wayland Variety Deli, located at 70 Boston Post Road, at approximately 6.40 PM. He took a six-pack of Budweiser 12-ounce bottles and brought them to the cashier. The cashier completed the sale without verifying the operative's age. The operative exited the building and business and relayed this information to Sergeant Costagno and Sergeant Kazan, who then entered the store and made contact with the cashier. They informed the cashier that he'd sold somebody under 21, and the cashier repeatedly stated, he's over 18, he's over 18. And they had to explain to him that the age for alcohol in Massachusetts was over 21 years old. All these facts are recorded in 26 way, 273-OF, Wayland Police Department here. Those are the facts of the violation, as I know them. Thank you, sir. Mr. Patel, do you have any questions for the chief or would like to respond? No, I don't have any questions. But all my employees know that, you know, minimum age is 21. And right on our cash register, every time we put the date, what year and current date. And we talked to the employee, and I'm not sure what happened. But every few days, we remind over all of our employees as me and my brother both own the business. So as we walk out, we always tell them, make sure any cigarette or alcohol, we check the ID. Anybody who looks under 30, make sure you check their, you know, ask them for ID. And in any reason, no matter what they say, or if you know them, if they don't provide the ID, you're not supposed to sell them. So but unfortunately, that mistake did happen. And I do apologize for about that. Okay, thank you. Does anybody on the board have a question for the chief? Mr. Levine. Chief, can you talk a little bit if you know about the history of violations at the establishment? Sure. So there's three violations and the file I have on hand for this business over the last, the first one was in 2012. So about 14 years ago, they got a two day suspension for that violation, and were put on probation for one year. They had a subsequent violation in 2018, where again, they received a two day suspension and a one year probation. And then in 2019, while they're actually still on probation for the 2018 one, they had a violation. But that violation was conducted by the Alcohol Beverage Control Commission. There didn't seem to be too much communication between the ABCC and the town of Wayland to violate the probation. They were issued a warning from the ABCC on that violation. So there's been three violations in the last 14 years or so for this business. Same ownership over that period of time? I believe so. I believe the ownership was 2010 or so that you became the owner, Mr. Patel. 2009. So this is about 18 years here. Thanks, Chief. Anybody else on the board have questions for the chief? No? Okay. Then we're all set. It doesn't sound like that you wish to rebut anything, Mr. Patel. So the chief, is there anything you'd like to rebut? No, nothing to rebut. I guess we don't have too many questions. I think what we should probably do is ask the chief what his, excuse me, the acting chief, sorry, what your recommendation is? So my recommendation was because of those previous violations, they're split up over multiple days that were not impact, not, not, not impactful, but reduce the impact to the business. Um, so I'm, uh, cause there's those three earlier violations, uh, recommending a full weekend suspension of the license, a Friday, Saturday, Sunday, uh, extended to a two year probation, um, for the liquor license. What happens during a violation of the probation chief? What is supposed to happen? I think we, uh, call an immediate, um, meeting again to do another hearing violation and discuss, uh, additional penalties. I don't think there's anything in the, uh, select board policy that specifically states what happens if a violation, conditions we can put on it. Um, so obviously it'd be an immediate extension and implementation of additional, um, suspension. Ordinarily when we get to deliberate, we also get input from the town manager, but he would like to address us now. So with the indulgence of the board, I'm going to, um, point of order. Uh, should we close the hearing if we're deliberating? I know. Really? Well, it says as to summarize the case. Um, sure. I'll close it. I moved to close the hearing. So I need a motion. I think I don't. So now we're deliberating. Um, Madam chair, if I may, I just, I had a question slash comment. Um, I dealt with these in other jurisdictions. And one thing I think would be important to know is how many of the store employees are being, uh, trained, such as in tip certification for off premises sales. And that might be something that the board wants to factor into their decision, whether or not we require, uh, the employees there to go through some formalized training to ensure they're properly checking IDs and, uh, that they're not taking people's words for it. So the formal training can be done. Okay. Um, it's from the board. Mr. Whitney. I guess my question has to do this with the sufficiency of the action, uh, in view of the, uh, this is the third or the fourth instance of a violation. Um, so, uh, Chief Hebert, do you think, uh, weekend suspension is sufficient? Uh, one thing about that, I took, uh, into consideration the length of which the first violation occurred or 14 years ago. Um, when thinking about it, um, if it was a few years in a row of violations, obviously I'd look for them to grow over time. And it did start with a Sunday, Sunday, and I think a Monday, Monday, trying to reduce the impact. I think this is kind of to grow the impact to take away a whole, um, you know, summertime, uh, weekend selling period is more impactful than those previous suspensions. Okay. Thank you. Anyone else have any questions? I'd like to hear Mr. Patel tell us he's going to do something different. Mr. Patel, I'm fond of your business and I'm not in the position I thought I was going to be in this evening. Is there something you're going to do about training or the tips suggestion or something that is different materially? Actually, two of my employed after that, they did do the tip, they did. And the person who sold the alcohol to the minor, they did get their tip certifications, you know, sold him and there's other employees. Um, we are working on all the employees that works that, you know, one by one, getting those certifications. So two of them already, uh, did the training. And you're personally committed to making sure things change. Otherwise you might be on a path to losing your license. Yeah, no, absolutely. You know, we are, you know, as I said, we've been constantly reminding them, make sure that no matter how busy you are, how big is the line or how, how many phones are ringing. If you have a doubt that somebody is under 25 or 20, 27, 28, just make sure you check the ID and don't fall for it. So, you know, we remind them quite often, but I'm not sure what happened that time. So, you know, and we'll make sure that it's, you know, it will happen. Then actually a couple of days ago, one of the employees asked the, I was there. I happened to be there and he asked the customer a night for an ID and he was 32 something. And I, I personally knew the person, but once he asked for the ID, I didn't say anything. It's just letting, you know, give you the ID once he asked for the ID. So, you know, I look forward to seeing you in your store and not on this screen again. I think this could get serious, Mr. Patel, nothing further, Madam Chairman. Thank you. Well, I also want to say one thing, Doug, you're all set, right? You're all set, right? Oh, you went first. Right. So this is a serious matter and it, it absolutely baffles me. We had, I think, was it one, Bill will remind me, was it last year? We had one as well. I'm absolutely baffled to be honest with you that by law, I believe the police department has to advise all the licensees, correct me when I'm wrong, in advance that there's going to be a sweep. So you're advised that it's going to be in this period and yet we're getting violations. That concerns me of what's happening when we're not doing the official sweep period. And we don't want to see people here. And we do want to see people succeed and have very viable businesses and be wonderful community members. And we, we issue these licenses with that intent, but that we're in a partnership and in a relationship here. And both of us have to uphold our end of the bargains here. So I agree that I'm not so sure we'd be very happy to see this again, even in a couple years. Um, I do think in the trying to remember now that Mr. McCall mentioned it, I believe last year, part of the violation, the recommendation was that all the tips, certification certificates had to be on file for the whole year as they went every new employee. And as they have to be renewed, it had to be on file in the police department. Does somebody else remember this? Yeah. Can you have? Yes. Thank you. Yeah. I'm wondering if that's something that we want to make sure that everybody's been through the certification, because to Chris's point, if they come back, this is going to be a serious, serious problem. So unless anyone else has anything now, I think we can move to, would you like to respond before we move to the real deliberation? Sir. Um, uh, no, we will make sure that everybody's gets tip certifications. As I said, two of them already got it. I have two more to do it and, uh, you know, make sure that they get it. All right. And I think, um, we'll see what the board decides. So, okay. So we're going to deliver right now. We're ready. We're ready to deliberate. Ready. Ready. Okay. So, um, we've heard from Mr. McCall. Uh, I believe, I don't know if he wants to give us a recommendation. Uh, we've heard from the acting chief. Why, why don't I open it to the board to see what you think, uh, is the right course of action? So, who would like to start? Chris? Uh, I recommend that we do what the acting chief has proposed, but I want to repeat. Uh, I, Mr. Patel, I look forward to seeing you in your store. I'm not on this screen within my term, which is three years. No, definitely. That won't happen. I have a good memory. No, we're done. Well, I'm, uh, I'm hopeful that, uh, Mr. Reynolds will be on for longer than three years. Uh, uh, I, too, uh, am, uh, fine with the chief's recommendation. Uh, I, I must say, though, that I think, uh, the, the tips training is, uh, uh, is, is necessary, but not sufficient. Uh, I was on, uh, the board at a different occasion where an employee sold, uh, an 18-pack of beer to, uh, a 17-year-old and that employee was fired. Uh, so, uh, I think to say that, uh, the cashier should, should have tips training is, is, uh, insufficient. So, I would encourage Mr. Patel to, uh, think of other means to, uh, motivate his employees. Mr. Levine? Um, well, my final word on this, Mr. Patel, is I'm also grateful to have you in town and your business. And I realize that you serve dozens and dozens or hundreds of customers per week and per month. But what I think of when these violations occur, and there are four of them in 14 years, is how many times have these violations occurred when there was no such sting operation set up by the Whale and Police Department or the ABCC. And, uh, I don't know how many folks are, are slipping through the cracks then, so to speak. And it's concerning, of course, because we know the dangers of alcohol on the roadway. And so you just have to take it a lot more seriously. Um, and, and again, nobody wants to be in this Zoom room talking about this right now. It's uncomfortable. Uh, it's not pleasant, but it's important. And that's why we take it seriously whenever we have one of these. And so, uh, we hope, as Mr. Reynolds said, to only see you in store and around town. And I concur with the Chief's recommendation as well. Hope that will provide good incentive. All right. Um, thank you, Mr. Patel, for joining us. Thank you. We will. We will. Um, and, um, and does the board, and then I will, and once you've, um, recused yourself here, I will ask the board if they would like to make a decision tonight. Do you want to deliberate, uh, at a further or at a future date? I think we're ready to vote, Madam Chair. Okay. Do we have a motion? Chief, can you, um, give us the, the details again? Was it a period of suspension running concurrently over the course of a weekend from open business through close of business Sunday? Yes. That's my recommendation. And how is that weekend determined? Um, for the rest of summer here. I don't think there's any in particular that I'm, I'm looking to target or anything. Um, so it's a, any weekend within the next six weeks or so, um, would be what I'd recommend. We pick, we want to go, you know, with two weeks from now, uh, that's fine with me. So, so a weekend, um, suspension to be served from open business Friday to close of business on Sunday, um, by the end of August, 2026. Yeah. That sounds good. Do I have a second? Second. Okay. Okay. Now in discussion, does anybody have any questions or comments? So there was a conversation about requiring the tips, uh, certificates to be on file at the police department. Do we want to include that in this? Sure. I'll accept that as friendly amendment. Yeah. A comment, Madam Chairman, that, that is required of everybody who serves at the festival. We have to have them on top on file and they have to be on their person. If somebody asks, it's just the way it's gotta be. They have them on the person as well. Yeah. Or all hanging up on the store or whatever, but they do have, they should be on file with the police chief's office. Yeah. Okay. Any further discussion then? Uh, yes. One more. I'm sorry to belabor this. My dad was an ER doc, if that explains it. If I find out that you picked a weekend that varies this in August, when you think nobody's around, I'm not going to be happy. So please live up to this. Thank you. I'm done. Okay. Are we ready to vote? Ready. Bill? Yes. Doug? Yes. Chris? Yes. Harold? Yes. That's four zero. Okay. All right. Thank you. Um, Mr. Patel for joining us. As I said, we hope we don't see you again. Thank you. Acting TP. Right. We'll see you in a couple of minutes for the next item. How's that sound? All right. Well, the next item on the agenda is, um, on page, um, let me find page 26. I think of that. Oh, shoot. Page 26 starts some analysis speed. Um, I think they call it traffic analysis or speed download data analysis. That's what the agenda we're going to go. This is review and discuss the Sherman bridge road traffic study with potential recommendations. And for this way, we are inviting attendance by acting chief of police, Mark Hebert. So I think that we have done a couple studies and I think we, we've discussed this a couple times based on some feedback from residents or what have you about traffic issues to make sure we capture things. Um, so let me turn it over to you and you can walk us through your findings and your recommendation. All right. Thank you. Um, thanks for having me back to discuss this again. Um, W director holder can't be here tonight, but I have discussed it with them over the last couple of weeks. Uh, how we want to approach this topic. Uh, they can his input into what I'm going to put forward tonight as well. Um, over the last several months, I've been able to conduct a few of these, um, traffic studies capturing around 33,000 cars traveling down Sherman's bridge, um, getting a good data set out of those cars. Um, the last one was conducted after school was out. Uh, I think it showed what we'd expect it to show, uh, in that case. And that the, you know, volume of cars dropped almost in half, um, from when school's in and when people are on vacation, uh, in July. So that's one, um, impact that I was able to show by doing that study, uh, a few couple of weeks ago. Um, the studies have shown that the average speed remains above the 25 miles per hour, uh, posted zone. And the 85th percentile, you know, is between 36 to 32 miles per hour with an average of about 34.8 being, um, the aggregate of all 33,000 cars. Um, because the 85th percentile remains quite elevated above the, um, 25 mile per hour posted speed limit. Uh, I do recommend some traffic calming measures be taken on the road, uh, which, uh, DPW director Holder and I have discussed. Um, what we're proposing is that we put up the speed feedback radar signs on either end of the street, uh, where we deem them to be most impactful. Um, so on the Concord road end, as well as on the bridge end of the road. Um, we'll further put up slow curve signs, uh, like that are present near Weir Hill on the same road over in, uh, Sudbury. To try to get people to slow down because currently there's no signage on the sharp curve that approaches the bridge on Sherman's bridge road. Uh, and I think that'd be highly appropriate to have. Um, two of the accidents we've had over the last four years, uh, were due to people on ice sliding off that curve. So again, some sort of signage to get people to slow down as they enter that curve, I think would be, uh, very appropriate. Um, these speed, uh, radar feedback signs have the ability to collect the same data that I've collected. Um, so I look forward to kind of going back periodically and reviewing what the signs have seen. What kind of impact they've actually made on the speed. Um, we'll have some before data to compare it to, and then some after data to compare it to. Um, you know, and, uh, study of studies done by MITSA and DOT. They're shown to reduce by four to five miles per hour. Um, which would bring us right down on the average to the, um, speed limit. So I think it'd be an effective, the least impactful, um, way to gain the most effect out of, uh, any sort of traffic. Common measures at this point. So that's what, uh, myself and DPW director are, uh, proposing we do at this point. Okay. Excuse me for a second. Betsy, could you do me a favor, please? And we're not on your agenda item quite yet. Thanks. Appreciate it. Cause I got a lot of blocks here. So, all right. I want to open it up to questions, uh, from the board, please. Yeah. Who would like to start? Yes. Would you like to start? Um, yes, I would. Uh, Mark, would you be willing to work with, uh, Doug's thoughts on the issue of peak density versus non-peak density? My goal in bringing this up is, uh, we can get some free consulting from him without increasing your workload or that of this board. And I know, uh, Mr. Sots has an ax to grind here, but I think the board's sophisticated. We're not going to get the wool pulled over our eyes or anything like that. I think he will do a good job. So we could still incorporate what you're proposing, but I'd like to consider the matter not done if, uh, he's offering to look at the numbers and maybe he's going to come up with the same conclusion or no conclusion or whatever it is. So I'd like to hear it, um, in a future meeting. And my follow-up question to that would be, are these studies any different than what we've done for other roads in the past? It sounds like we got a lot of input from residents regarding peak versus off peak traffic volume and speed. And I'm just wondering, um, are studies done any differently on other roads around town? Um, I know you haven't been in the position for a long time chief, but just curious if we're treating this one any differently. Uh, I know how the previous chief, uh, kind of showed me and stuff was to mostly look at the average speed and the 85th percentile when reviewing these reports. So I'm not sure how much more depth he went into it. Um, I was never told or shown to take into those considerations, but I don't, you know, I wouldn't discount them just offhand because we haven't done it in the past either. Um, and, uh, Mr. Reynolds point, I reached out to Mr. Stotts this morning after an email this weekend and actually have already provided him with the data and told him, you know, he's free to do with it what he'd like. Um, you know, it's 33,000 data points. So it is a lot to go through and kind of comb. Um, over the last hour or two before this meeting, I did do a little myself and took out the peak times. And from my basic Excel work, um, it doesn't affect the averages of speeds from what I can see. Um, if you want to go into standard deviations and other statistics that I haven't really approached since college, uh, you know, we can discuss that as well. Um, as far as averages and 85th percentiles, uh, you know, I can present those pretty confidently. A little color, if I may, when one is kayaking in that location, you can actually hear the difference between peak and non. Um, yeah, as you know, the, the tires make a company thump because the bridge has a segmented, uh, roadway. Um, that's why I'd like to see a BCG level MIT grad do the dirty work that I don't have to do. And now you don't have to do. Um, maybe you're right. Maybe it'll show the peak isn't that different, but I I'd like to know it's a profound, uh, difference. And when there are people fishing there or kids there or lemonade stands there, it gets a little scary. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Well, what are the various decision points that we would have to make? Um, I know there must be a range of recommendations for traffic calming measures. What would be a couple of other options to you? I mean, once you get past the speed radar feedback signs, you know, you get into road restrictions, you get into road engineering, um, and how you can design the road differently. You don't have a lot of those options, um, for Sherman's bridge, um, at least at my level of what I can, you know, recommend and impact. Um, so, you know, you talk about speed bumps, you talk about, uh, the diamonds you can put in the middle of the road to slow people down and push them to the edges, different road markings for bicyclists. Um, there's a whole range where we get an engineer out there to give us some recommendations, but I'm not sure the issue is high enough to go beyond, you know, some additional signage at this point. Um, so to Mr. Reynolds point, you know, start at the signage, start, we're going to do here, take a look at the numbers and, you know, I'm up to coming back and having a discussion and say, you know, we didn't get to where we wanted to go. And what do we do next? Thank you. Mr. Whitney. Chief, while you're, you've been in your acting position for a comparatively short period of time, you have spent a lot of your career in the Wayland Police Department. You've done, I would guess, hundreds of patrols in town. Um, what is your anecdotal or what's your gut feel about the, uh, the level of traffic impact on Sherman Bridge Road as contrasted with other similar roads in the town? Um, I mean, anecdotally, uh, I did spend a lot of time up there as a patrol officer running speed radar because it was a spot where it was an issue, uh, people going through there. We've since added stop signs up there. Um, and it's got less and less speeding, um, and more stop sign violations at the Alpine and Sherman Bridge intersection there. Um, but I would say over my career, you know, going back now, 10 years ago, um, traffic's only increased since then. Um, it was a spot to sit and do traffic things. I never saw egregious speeding. I wouldn't say sitting there seeing people going 50, 60 miles per hour down the road, but, you know, consistently 35, 38 in the 25 mile per hour zone, kind of what we're seeing from the data here. Um, so not much has changed in the last 10 years. Um, so the signage and also putting patrol officers up there. Um, there hasn't been a direct, I haven't wanted to impact the numbers. So I haven't put a lot of direction for there to be enforcement up there while we were doing this study. Um, but now as part of, uh, my recommendation here will also be increased enforcement as well in the area. And, uh, as, uh, my colleagues have indicated, we've had, and as, as you know, we've had some feedback, uh, from area residents saying that in the morning, uh, there is quite a backup. And so the average speed is slow during the peak hour. And then thereafter there is, uh, uh, presumably a higher rate of speed, which, uh, affects the average and the median. Um, so if further analysis, uh, bears that out, would that affect your recommendation at this point? Uh, I think it would affect it in that, that would give us a good, uh, example of when we can do more enforcement up in the area. Um, and kind of use that as the initial enforcement and, uh, traffic calming measures. Um, so we can really focus in on a time when, you know, and a direction that is most impacted by speed. I would look forward to getting that information so I could direct our patrol officers to be up there. Um, I think I'd have to see some very high peaks of cars during, um, high volume times to say, you know, we want to physically change the road in any way or restrict the road in any way at this point. So, so is, uh, I'm trying to, uh, infer a recommendation from you, or are you suggesting that we should, uh, uh, go ahead with the measures you have suggested, uh, review the data and, uh, see what the effect has been. And if necessary, then go to, uh, consider physical alteration or, uh, restrictions on the road. Sorry about my office. Uh, they're calling me. Um, I, I don't know if I'd ever get to the point of wanting physical changes to the road because of speaking to my brothers in the fire department and how they feel about. Um, so I'm not sure what other alterations. Um, so I guess my question is, uh, is your, your recommendation that we go forward with these proposed changes at this time, which would inform, uh, a future recommendation should, uh, there be a persistent problem. Or would you prefer to, uh, have, uh, this additional data crunching occur before the board asks you to go full process, uh, the additional signage and so forth. I would, I would rather at this point just go forward with the traffic and column measures, um, that recommended and then any additional data crunching be done after the fact, um, to discuss at a later point. Chris, what do you think about that? I like it with, uh, italics on making sure we hear more about this after the data analysis. Thank you. So, um, thank you very much for doing all this work. I know we have done several traffic studies here and I know we've had a lot of feedback from residents, you know, about this road. Um, a lot of concerns have been raised, issues and variations there are. Um, so I appreciate the work you've done and I appreciate the fact that you've consulted with, uh, Mr. Holder to come up with a recommendation. I will, I will, I sort of advise or remind the board that the recommendations are made to us and then we support them or not. I don't believe the implementation can occur without our saying, yes, go ahead and put those in. There were some adjustments made a few years ago. I'm trying to remember now. I think it's when we put the stop sign down by, is it Alpine? It was stopped and some crosswalks were put in. Um, I've heard from both some residents and some non-residents that those do have, do stop the traffic. And so, um, but maybe, so maybe these signs might this new, um, traffic coming. I think the measures might, might provide some different results. So I personally, I'm in favor of having, um, uh, following the recommendation of the chief, but we do need to make a recommendation. And also I think Mr. McCall would like to, um, opine as well. So with the board's, um, indulgence, Mr. McCall, did you want to add something here? No, thank you, Madam Chair. No, I, I think the board is taking the right approach, uh, taking an incremental approach to these, um, types of situations because you have to be careful about precedents. Having been a former select board member and also being in charge of traffic mitigation, working with police chief in one of my prior towns. If it is a difficult decision and how to deal with these because traffic is like water. Once you try and dam it up in one spot, it'll find a way itself into another neighborhood. And I've already received some comments from residents on Oxbow road that when there was traffic enforcement out on Sherman's bridge, that people will use that cut around to get over to the other main thoroughfare. So you have to be mindful of what we do in one neighborhood, another neighborhood might ask for, and that there are repercussions. So I applaud the chief and the DPW director. I did have separate conversations with them along the way, uh, about looking into this, trying to work with the neighbors and taking some incremental steps, uh, see what we can do. The physical alterations of the road are generally a last, uh, last ditch effort to try and alter, uh, traffic patterns, but there are repercussions as was noted with fire apparatus plowing and other complications associated with those. So thank you, Mr. McCall. Um, do I have, um, any further discussion from the board or do we want to make, um, motion, I guess. Madam chairman, I want to make a very, very quick comment. I urge the board to take the view. This is a different place in town. It's hard to think of another place in town. That has fishing and canoes and kayak trailers and lemonade stands and bird watchers at both ends of the day. Uh, I myself have gone kayaking there at midnight cause there was a cool, um, astronomy thing we were looking at and found I was hardly the only person doing it. This is, this is, um, tantamount to having ice cream trucks next to the ball field. This, it is a magnetic area for a lot of activity, particularly around the bridge. And I think it is a special area. Thank you very much. I promise I'm done on this. That's okay. So my question was, did we want to, uh, support the, the speed, the traffic calming recommendations? I know you all have already asked the acting chief if he would work with, um, the resident and he said he would on some data. So that would be like, to me, the next step, but I think we, do we want to at least take this step? Uh, and if so, I need a, I need a motion to implement these, um, traffic calming measures that have been recommended and everybody's on mute here. So. Uh, I w I would move that the board, uh, support, uh, the recommendation of acting chief Mark Hebert to implement a series of signage and other, uh, mitigation measures, uh, with the understanding that there would be a. Okay. Report back to the board, uh, as to the efficacy of, of, uh, these actions. Second. Second. Is that you, Chris? Sorry. Second. Thank you. Actually, I was just writing that down, the follow-up meeting on my list here. So thank you for putting it in the motion. All right. If there's no further discussion, then let's have a vote. Chris. Aye. Bill. Yes. Mr. Levine. Yes. And myself. Yes. So that's four zero. Thank you very much. Mark. Um, acting chief. For your help. And thank you for being with us tonight for so many agenda items. Appreciate it. Appreciate it. No problem. Thank you for having me. Thank you. We'll see you again. Yes. Thanks. Okay. So I think for the next, um, agenda item is, um, let's see. Um, we have a discussion and update from the regional housing service officers, commonly known as RHSO. We are inviting Christian Bouchard, RHSO director and Robert Hummel, our town planner to join us. There you are. Thank you for joining us. And then the second and after we're going to discuss what's going on, what's happening. And then Michael will give us a little update on the, um, IMO, IMA, because there was always an amendment every year and off we go. So who would like to start, um, Mr. Shard or Mr. Hummel? Um, I, I'd love to jump in unless Robert, you wanted to say a few words first. No, I think it's just, I'm just appreciated. We can have some opportunity to talk about affordable housing and able to not just brush us underneath the rug, but able to discuss what's the regional housing service office actually provides us to town. Um, and me and Kristen have worked together in the past. So, um, I'm very happy that she, she's now the new director of the regional housing service office and I can, hopefully we can expand affordable housing in the future. Perfect. So for those who are following along, there's some slides and some information. It's 61 in the packet. So the floor is yours. Thank you. Sure. Thank you so much. And thank you for that introduction, Robert. Um, if you don't mind, um, I could screen share, um, to share the presentation if that would be helpful. Um, so I could do that. Let me just make sure I get the right one up here. Let me know once you can see that. All right. Can you see that? It's floating. Yep. All set. Okay. Excellent. Great. So, um, thank you again for that introduction. Um, and you know, good evening to all the select board members. I think I've had an opportunity to meet, um, one of you or two of you possibly at one of the, um, housing trust meetings. Um, but I'm Kristen Gishard. I'm the new director of the regional housing services office. Um, as Robert mentioned, I've been working alongside Liz Rust. Um, the longstanding director, um, over the past year as we transition leadership. Um, I want to say, you know, a big thank you to Liz. Um, she has been an amazing mentor. She's done so much, um, for all of the communities in the RHS. So, um, I previously worked for the town of Acton. So I was a, a receiver of all of those services. Um, and the work that she's done to support the communities, um, in their municipal affordable housing function has been tremendous. And, um, we're fortunate to have her remain on staff, um, for the next year. Um, and hopefully next, uh, three years from moving forward. Um, but on a limited capacity and a staff supporting role. Um, but I'm happy to continue this tradition of holding this annual meeting, um, and presentation to share all of the work of the RHS. So that we've been doing to assist municipalities. Um, and most specifically tonight, the services provided, um, to the town of Wayland. So, um, I'm gonna just go quickly over, um, what I'm gonna review tonight. A little overview of the leadership, um, our year in review for what we've done over this past year in FY26, what we're looking forward to in FY27. Um, and then a summary talking about, um, the budget for FY27. Uh, so as many of you know, the RHSO was established back in 2011. Um, and it's created through an intermunicipal agreement. And that's renewed every three years. This is one of those years. Um, and, um, the select board chair was mentioning how it's on your agenda tonight for review. Um, and, uh, consider of approval. Um, and the town of Concord serves as the lead community. So they provide, um, that support to those 10 communities. They provide support to us in terms of office space. IT support, administrative support for payroll, um, and procurement. So all of the RHSO staff members, um, are hired through an RFP process. And the town of, um, Concord helps to facilitate that process for all of these 10 communities in the, um, RHSO. Um, and then each town purchases the number of hours that match the level of service that they need, um, to support the affordable housing in their particular community. So every town's a little bit different, um, and their needs are different, but I'll go into some of those core services that all communities have, and then kind of the specialties that, um, the town of Wayland taps into. Um, and for, um, for those of you that are maybe newer to understanding the RHSO, um, there are some regional things that we do together with the communities. And then again, there are, um, more specific things that each community likes to, um, to utilize the RHSO for. And oversight for the program is led by the lead community. So the town of Concord, um, and each year, we also hold an annual leadership meeting with the town managers, town managers. We held ours about, um, a month to two months ago, um, where we reviewed the draft IMA. We discussed any upcoming changes in staffing or programming and do a very similar presentation that I'm sharing with you tonight. Um, and then every three years, like I mentioned, there is a new IMA. Um, and then every year there's an amendment to acknowledge the next year's budget. Um, we also hold quarterly meetings with town staff. So for the town of, um, Wayland, Robert helps to represent the town of Wayland in those meetings. And it's an opportunity for towns to share with one another what they're working on, um, as it relates to affordable housing. Um, there's a lot of collaboration, um, that goes back and forth. Lessons learned sharing from one another. Um, and we also work on, uh, regional projects and discuss any programming that the communities would like to do moving forward. Um, and when we look at our annual budget process, it aligns closely with most towns. You know, right when we're tying up, uh, the year end for one budget, we're looking ahead at the next. Um, and so our deadlines for pulling that budget together, um, actually start pretty quickly, um, with the town of Concord's, um, Community Preservation Act funding applications deadline. So we're already starting to, um, think about next year's work plan or the following year. Sorry. It's work plan. Um, and we work pretty quickly on that. Um, finalizing budgets as best as we can by September, December, um, making sure that we're able to meet communities, CPA deadlines. Um, and then we make adjustments as needed. So as I mentioned, the, um, staff members in the RHSO are hired through an RFP process. So we don't always necessarily know what the contracts are going to come in at. So we're making those projections the best as, uh, that we can, and we make any adjustments in that time period, um, that we need. And then in May and June, that's when we're finalizing our budgets, um, and we pull that together. It's, um, for FY27, you'll find that in the IMA under the exhibits. So we're, we're, you know, kind of beyond that point now, we're now looking at finalizing, um, all of the IMAs for each community. And our program operations throughout the year, um, are tracked pretty extensively. Um, we have a semiannual reporting, um, report that goes out and that goes into the details of each community. Um, and then we have a monthly check-in meeting with the town of Concord as the lead community. So once we're done talking about all Concord specific things, then we talk about, um, the regional housing services office as a whole. And if there's anything that needs to be discussed for staffing or, um, uh, supportive services. And then we also help boards and committees and support them as needed. There might be a specific request that come up throughout the year and we hope to support them. So this very colorful slide depicts the six different, uh, service areas. So the foundational services that the RHSO provides are related to home ownership and rental monitoring. Um, for the town of Concord, um, for the town of Concord, um, the regional housing services office as a whole. And if there's anything that needs to be discussed for staffing or, um, uh, supportive services. Um, for the town of Wayland, the RHSO monitors 24 home ownership units, um, and 51 rental units. Um, this work consists of annual reviews of the registry of deeds, self-certifications, um, resales. Uh, we had one resale for the town of Wayland this year. Uh, we assist with capital improvement requests, refinancing requests, um, and rental property reviews. So reviewing, um, those rental units, making sure that the property management companies are renting to qualified individuals, that their, um, units are kept in a good condition, um, and making sure that all of the program eligibility requirements are being met. Um, and with the monitoring also comes the SHI management or the inventory management. So tracking any new projects that are coming online and maintaining the SHI or subsidized housing, um, inventory repository. Um, we also work on program administration, which we, um, include in that category, the home program consortium, which the town of Wayland is a part of. Um, the RHSO has done some significant work this year to support home funding, um, awards. Um, awards for the St. Anne's project, um, and we'll continue to work through that, um, into this next year. Um, we're also excited to, um, announce that we're working on a regional tenant based rental assistance program. So in this last year, we were working with the home consortium communities. There are six of them, um, in the RHSO, um, to really better utilize home funds to support households in the region when it comes to rental opportunities. So we started setting up that, um, kind of the outline of the program last year. And we're moving forward into this fiscal year on, um, implementing that. So, um, I think it's going to be a really good utilization of the funds, um, and making sure that there are going to, um, people in the region that, that need them to help support, um, their ability to find housing in these communities. Um, to live, work in these communities and making it a little easier to do so. Um, this past year, we also held a home ownership training. We do that every year, um, for new homeowners, indeed restricted homes or people that have been in their homes for several years, but have some questions. We have pretty good attendance every year. Um, we also hosted with CHAPA, uh, their annual regional meeting, um, and helped to convene a listening group, um, with EOHLC, um, and their new office of fair housing to really help them, um, to create a roadmap for that new office that they're establishing and understanding from different community members throughout the region, um, what they would like to see and what resources would be helpful to them. Um, we, um, also assisted MAPC with convening, um, meetings with housing trusts to help form a more collaborative information sharing group, um, and are assisting with that hopefully, um, as we move forward too. Um, and our office held a fair housing training this year for rental property management companies, um, in the hopes that we're able to help provide information. Um, we brought in the Suffolk University, um, office that, uh, legal office that helped to provide that training, um, to make sure that, uh, the property managers in our communities at the RHSO have the resources that they need, um, to make sure that they're, um, abiding by fair housing laws. Um, and if anyone's been on the RHSO website lately, you'll notice that it's a brand new platform. So we just completed the website migration, um, from the old, uh, platform, um, into the new, which, um, looks very much like most of the community's websites now. Um, so if anyone has interesting pictures that they want to share of new developments or something interesting that you've been working on in your community related to affordable housing, please send them our way and we can add them to the new banner, um, to refresh a bit. Um, and then in addition to those main services, um, we also provide, um, you know, local board support and local support to town staff, um, for Wayland, you know, helping to review the RFPs for the housing production plans, reviewing conditions for draft decisions. And just some small, um, check in questions every now and then that we get, um, and our goals for the coming year are similar to past years in that we really strive to support the resident owners and tenants in each community. Um, and as I mentioned, um, in the last slide too, we're working on, um, implementing the home, uh, regional tenant based rental assistance program. Um, and that will be, um, I'm projecting probably in October, um, uh, you'll, you'll be seeing much more on that. Um, and when we talk about, um, our, our other goals, you know, I think maintaining, um, the RHSO office, there is, um, a vacancy right now that we are looking to fill in the near future. Um, and so we're excited to get that position filled, um, we're planning to still hold home ownership trainings, um, and looking forward to, um, working with Suffolk University again. I think we got good feedback on the fair housing training. Um, we heard that it was very helpful. So we're hoping to continue with that. Um, and, uh, our website go live where we're happy to report that that, um, already happened. So, um, very happy about that as well. Um, and then when we look at our budget for next year, it includes, um, specifically focusing here on, on Wayland. Um, we have a slight increase for the town of Wayland, um, uh, you know, $1,500, um, approximately to accommodate additional administrative costs, um, for the lead community, as well as anticipated hours that we expect to support the town of Wayland in the next year with new projects coming online. Um, and any minor support that might be needed with the, the housing production plan coordination. Um, and I just wanted to note the, the lead community role the town of Concord, um, takes on was designated to be a cost neutral, um, role. And this is really the first time that the town of Concord has started to look at reevaluating how much it actually costs them, um, to serve in that role. So this is really the first year that we've seen, um, an increase in, um, in their request. So, um, but any unused hours, you know, are refunded into the next year, um, is as in line with the past RHSO, um, program. So, um, it's been great working, um, with the town of Wayland and with Robert and all of you. Um, and I'm, I'm happy to answer any questions, um, or go into any detail about the work that we do here. We'll stop. Thank you. Thank you very much. Um, it's nice to have this. I think we have an annual discussion kind of reminds us of the wonderful services you provide for us. I think I was on, um, and it's coming out when, when we joined this and that was a really clever idea to be in a regional consortium for these resources. So I'm going to open this up now to the board to see if anyone has any questions. Um, no, Kristen, thank you for that presentation. You, you mentioned, uh, you're anticipating working with the town, uh, prospectively on projects. Could you describe, uh, what those might be? Yeah. I'm primarily the St. Ann's project online. Um, and that's one that we anticipate supporting to support. Um, and what would your services be in relation to that? Sure. So, um, this past year, the RHSO assisted the, um, the program funding. So the home program funding has requirements. Um, the RHSO staff, a woman named Jody, um, worked primarily on the, um, requirements, um, and making sure that they were doing the reporting. Um, and we will be preparing the affordability restriction shortly, um, as well as, um, any of the, um, the latest. So I'm just pulling it up right now. We have, um, I just got an email back, um, the latest funding agreement. So working on, um, those aspects to make sure that they're completed appropriately and by the requirements. Thank you. Absolutely. Carol, you're muted. Sorry. Mr. Levine. Kristen, thank you for that very detailed presentation. That was a lot of information. So I apologize if you covered this, but I've been reading, um, various stories about the new Federal Road to Housing Act and how it can potentially impact municipalities. Have you guys done any type, you and, or Robert, done any type of dive into that new bill to see how you or municipalities, our towns, part of your partnership could be taking advantage of that in the coming months? I think that's a great question. And I would say I'm starting to, there's a lot to dig into. Um, so we are, we are working on it. What I'm hoping to do is come up with, um, kind of like a one pager, um, for the RHSO that we can post. So we do a newsletter, um, and our, our spring newsletter is probably going to be turning into a summer newsletter at this point. But, um, we had so many things that happened, I feel like between the time I was going to post it that I was kind of feeling like I think we kind of need to hold off. Um, we have a new hire, um, Katie Lacey just joined us, which we're really excited about. Nice. Um, she worked previously at, um, MHP Mass Housing Partnership, and prior to that worked at Mass Housing, um, and then was a planner in Hingham. So she has a lot of background, um, and I'm really excited to, um, really tap into her knowledge here because she's worked with so many state agencies. Um, and so I'm hoping that we're going to be able to pull that together, um, shortly and soon. Um, both what we're expecting, um, and, um, kind of the perspective of, I think, you know, what I'd like to weave in. We, we know that we have some town councils that have prepared some memorandums already or some newsletters that they've posted. Um, but every, not every community in the RHSO has the same town council. So, um, kind of thinking about all of that and how we can weave it together, but also making sure that we're not, um, overstepping, you know, um, a town council that already has prepared something. Definitely. Appreciate that. Mr. Renz, you're muted. Mute. I'm all set. Uh, please don't infer lack of interest by my brevity here. I think you're doing great stuff. Thank you. Thank you very much. All right. Um, I know you've been in contact with Mr. McCall, so I don't, I don't see his hand raised, so I don't think he has any questions. Thank you, Robert. Um, since, since there was some interest from the board about the impact of the federal housing act, you know, on these local projects, when, when that newsletter comes out, Robert, would you be so kind as to send that to my email and we'll get it distributed to the board as well. So I appreciate that. So if we don't have any other questions, I think then the next gender item is to talk about, um, being IMA or actually the amendment, if you will. And, um, Robert, Michael, did you want to speak to that? Uh, I think, especially if you on possible vote and authorize you to sign the updated. Yes. Kristen. Thanks again. So in, in my time here, we've done this every year, as Kristen commented, when they, um, come out with the new budget and the new numbers in this year, we have a slight increase in the number of hours. We will see in the budget went up slightly year over year. That is the primary amendment to the IMA that we have signed in the past. And all town manager administrators from the participating towns are asked to get permission from their board to sign. And so that's why, uh, we coupled this presentation with the request to sign the IMA so we can get it back to the RHS. So they have, um, I know been benefit to us. I know Robert utilizes them. Every time we get a question about our SHI, our subsidized housing index, or we've had several incidents where, um, restricted units have come up for say foreclosure. We involve them. We participate in the homes consortium, uh, and we get their assistance. And as you heard, they're working on a project here with St. Ann's. So there are so many things that we look at in a daily basis. It is good to have the, this extra set of eyes looking at some of the things that we can't always, um, tackle in our office. So they, they have become quite helpful to us. So the, um, the IMA, the amendment titled agreement starts on page 70. It's quite lengthy because there's a one, uh, page devoted to each of the 10 participating municipalities in case you're following along at home or if the board wants to review that themselves. Um, Robert, do you have the funding in place for the 1600? I do. Yep. I usually going back in town of Acton used when I went to Kristen in Acton, we got for CPC. Now, when I started off, I was trying to figure out where this money would come from. I asked CPC and then they directed me to the housing trust and the housing trust has been, uh, very supportive. So I've been going to the housing trust that I have a commitment of $40,000 for the next two years. And so I won't have to go back to the housing trust for another two years. So I have, I have, I have the funds all set for now. Good job. All right. So with that, I'm going to ask for, um, a motion please to authorize. It's on the agenda. I'll read it out loud. Um, the vote to approve and authorize the town manager, Michael McCall to sign the updated inter-municipal agreement amendment to share services of a regional housing services office. So moved. Thank you. Is there a second? Second. Does anybody say second? I actually have a question. Uh, I don't know if you need a second first. Put the second. I'll put it in discussion. How's that? Is that you're okay with it? Sure. That's fine. Thank you. Go ahead. In discussion. Just to be clear, I did not second. Oh, okay. Madam chairman, I will second as long as Mr. Whitney gets to raise his point. Absolutely. Now we're in, thank you. Now we're in discussion. Bill? Uh, on page 71 of the packet, uh, is the agreement, uh, under section six indemnification. Uh, the agreement provides impertinent part, uh, that, uh, uh, the, uh, there's, uh, an indemnification provision, which as I read it, uh, includes indemnification uh, uh, uh, for damage to real or personal property by reason of any negligent act or admission by the regional housing services office. So I don't understand why we are indemnifying for, uh, uh, for negligence. Are we indemnifying Concord as the leading town here, but not the agency? Is that what the second line says? Third line to indemnify the town of Concord? Right. I think that's why. I think that's why. So we're indemnifying the town, but we are not indemnifying the agency. Is that what it says, Doug? Uh, that's how I read those, those first four lines. Yeah. Municipality. Robert, do you read it differently? No, this is pretty, pretty standard language, but Concord is, is the, the host community. So I think you're correct in the, in the, in the view, because the housing service office is just a organization that's set up just to serve the communities. And I could help to speak to that, um, Madam Chair, if that would be helpful. Yes, please. Sorry. So, um, so that's, that's correct. Um, the RHSO staff members are individual contractors. So we all have our own individual liability insurance, um, as required by the contracts with the town of Concord. So you're indemnifying the town of Concord as, as lead community. Thank you. Do you have any, any other questions? No. No, I didn't mean just you. I mean everyone. Sorry. Does the board have any other questions? All right, then. Shall we go to the boat? Bill? Um, yes. Okay. Doug? Oh, Doug looks frozen here. I'm going to go to the crass. Yes. Doug? Doesn't he look frozen? Yes. Yes. Oh, wait one second. He'll come back before. I will assume he knows he's frozen. Did somebody? I texted him to that. Thank you. Thank you. It just left. So he's probably coming back. Here he is. Hi Doug. I know you're muted. I lost my internet for a moment. Yeah. Okay. So we're in the middle of taking a vote on the, uh. Yes. Thank you. Yes. That's what we're doing. I guess that's your answer. Yes to vote. Okay. And I'll say yes. So that's going to be four zero. All right. So thank you very much for coming. Thank you for the information. And, uh, thank you so much for having me. Have a good day. Thanks. Thanks. Appreciate being in this consortium. Trust me. So it's wonderful. All right. Let me think. Now it looks like we're going to invite Betsy Soule. And is it Judy or is it Julie? That's joining us. Uh, so discussion of the council on aging slash community center. First year recap. Hi, Betsy. Thank you. Hi, Carrie. How are you? Yeah. How are you? Good. Thank you. Um, is Julie joining us? No, she is not joining us. Uh, we, we made a decision that the board would come and present on this. Um, and as it turns out, she wasn't available tonight anyway. So Judy courier, who's also a member of the COA board. Um, we're going to tag team it, uh, because Judy spends a lot of time there. And so, um, what we're going to do is split it up. And you, Judy's going to talk about the successes and I'm going to talk about the challenges. So, uh, if that's okay, I will turn it over to Judy for the first part of our discussion. Okay. So do you, do you want to turn your camera on? Well, I don't know why it's not working here. Okay. It was working fine. And now it's not. I see. And it's, I say, start video. And it tells me that I cannot stop the video because the host has disabled it. So I don't know. I don't know. You all know what I look like. What's the difference? We love seeing your face. Definitely. Since I just saw you a few hours ago. Yes. I saw you. You know what I look like today too. Yes. All right. So the floor is yours, Ms. Courier, and you're going to talk about the successes. Great. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thanks for the opportunity to update you on the first year at the Council on Aging Community Center. There have been many accomplishments and some challenges. For several years, the COAs used a key fob system to track participation at the classes and programs offered. When the COA moved in 2025, we had about 100 fobs remaining from our first order. We have issued all of those, plus 300 new ones, and reordered another 300. Interest and participation have increased. Wait a minute. Let me stop. There I am. Interest and participation have increased 30 to 40% during the past 12 months. At our previous location, we offered four fitness classes a week. We now offer nine. Five of the nine classes have upwards of 30 participants each week. About 40 seniors attend our monthly pizza cafe. New faces appear each month. We offer drop-in scrabble, chess, mahjong, ping pong. No drop-in activities were offered prior to our move. And in keeping with our mission to provide programs and outreach services to and on behalf of the seniors, and we represent 30% of Weyland's population. To enhance the quality of life and promote independent living, we've added additional services. In the fall of 2025, we began a boxing for Parkinson's service. Excuse me, Parkinson's class for up to 10 participants at a time. This sort of exercise helps patients reduce inflammation and spark neuroplasticity for the brain's ability to rewire and strengthen itself. This class is full. The COA offers a quarterly veterans lunch where the town's veterans and families can receive updated information and ask questions of Weyland's veteran services officer. We began mocktails and melodies with live music on Monday late afternoons that has been very well attended. This is now scheduled for three Mondays in August. No late afternoon events were offered at our previous location as the room often needed to be set up for the town government meetings. Our outreach coordinator, Maura Snyder, MSW, deals with the real-life problems of our seniors, whether it's housing, health insurance, food insecurity, fuel assistance, or numerous other issues. She finds solutions or services to help. In fiscal year 25, she helped 188 Weyland seniors. In fiscal year 26, that number was 244, a 30% increase. Asian residents represent the second largest racial group in Weyland, making up about 14% of our population. Chinese is among the most widely spoken non-English language in the community. The group of Chinese seniors who have come to programming range from bilingual to those who only speak Chinese. The COA staff had a goal of reaching out to this group for quite some time. Chinese American seniors have historically been underserved population at the Weyland COA. Maura Snyder contacted the Weyland Chinese American Association and began a dialogue on how we could meet the needs of Chinese American seniors. The Chinese senior social group was launched on January 7, 2026. It runs twice a month on a Wednesday afternoon from one to five at the COA. A volunteer from the Chinese American Association attends the program to provide translation services, along with support staff from the COA. In just a few months, the group has grown to 15 to 20 participants per session, showing a clear signal of an unmet need and strong community interest. While the program was designed for Chinese American seniors, it's intentionally open to all seniors. We invite seniors of all backgrounds to participate, learn about Chinese culture and forge meaningful connections across communities. The COA has partnered with Open Table Food Pantry to provide free groceries and prepaid meals to Weyland seniors in need. Open Table offers a variety of healthy and culturally diverse food choices through pantry and meal programs. Each Friday, volunteers help seniors place orders and all home deliveries are made the following Thursday by other COA volunteers. We provide monthly rides to Market Basket in Waltham. Partnering with Weyland Youth and Family Services, commenter, and co-response clinician at our police department, four lunch and learn programs dealing with mental health issues were conducted during the year. A new caregiver support group for seniors caring for adult children with disabilities has just begun. All of the previous programs and services, as well as all these new programs and increased interest in participation, have been accomplished by the remarkable COA staff of 4.1 FTE, which brings us to some of our challenges. So, yield the floor to Betsy. Okay. Thanks, Judy. Thanks for the opportunity to report to you on this. As you heard from Judy, the successes are many, and the usage of the center has increased substantially, as the COA as well as groups of all ages are utilizing the space in a variety of ways. With any new space, it takes time to identify the challenges associated with managing it. The town believed that it made the most sense for the COA staff to manage the reservation system in the new space for space usage of the building for groups, both COA-related and groups outside of the COA. And we still believe that that's the best way forward, but I want to share with you some challenges that need to be addressed as we continue to do so. You may think that taking reservations for space would be a pretty simple thing to do, but all the things that go with it take significant time and attention from the COA staff. Just to give you some context, from March 8th through June of this year, there have been 56 non-COA events or meetings held at the community center. Once a reservation request comes in, many things need to happen, including coordinating room use, picking which room to use, the furnishings in the room, breaking them down, setting them up, giving technology and AV training to the groups that are going to use them, putting up signage so they know where to find their room, billing them, depositing the rental fees, advising on food permitting with the health department, and setting daily building lock and unlock time. They're also tasked with responding if a group that has a reservation has a problem. Like, for example, the most common problem is people are locked out or the doors are locked for some reason. And Julie gets the calls and emails as people know she lives in town. Now, if she is not reachable, there's no instruction from facilities on who to call or what happens. Most nights there are two rooms out of the five in use. Often there are three and sometimes there are five. And people request custom setups, chairs, configurations, various types of AV equipment. The one custodian assigned to this center works from 6.30 a.m. to 2.30 p.m. Monday through Friday. And since the rooms are often in use for COA activities until or beyond 2.30, these setup tasks fall to the COA staff. COA staff estimate that their work on the reservations easily translates into 14 to 15 hours per week. And with a staff of 4.1 FTEs, the staff does not find this amount of time sustainable as they have many other COA specific responsibilities to fulfill. And as Judy talked about briefly, in terms of the number of seniors in town over the past five years, in 2000 it was 19%. Now it's 30%. So while the population of Wayland has grown by about 10%, the senior population continues to grow much more significantly. As a result of our learnings, the COA board, based on consultation with the staff, have identified the following needs to continue to operate effectively. Serving the needs of Wayland seniors and serving the needs of groups who wish to reserve space in the community center. The first would be to change the custodian schedule from 6.30 to 2.30 to either 7.30 to 3.30 or maybe 8 to 4.00. This would allow her to assist more with the room setups for evening meetings and activities. Second, to clarify who's to be called if Julie is unreachable. If there's an issue with accessing the building, which is the door locking issue. One suggestion might be to give the custodian on duty at the town building a phone so that they could receive the calls about this and respond. Because Judy gets calls at all hours and Julie being Julie, she picks up the phone. But, you know, that is not really something she should have to be doing. Third, we feel that we really need to add some extra staffing hours to administer the registration system and all the tasks associated with it. And finally, to purchase a new reservation software that they've been looking at called Monday.com. And that has been identified as a better system to receive and communicate with those reserving space. It has a cost of about $425 a year. So hopefully that's not a tough decision to make. I will say that the COA board, the staff, and the users seem incredibly pleased with the community center and all it has to offer. And we thank the Board of Selectmen for your longstanding commitment to making it a reality. Our biggest question is how to staff all the demands of the center by the COA staff if more hours are not delegated to us. And there are basically two choices as we see them. Either cut back on services to an ever-growing senior population with many needs or to maybe cut the number of days that rooms can be rented or reserved for non-COA activities. It's just not sustainable. So that is our report on the successes and challenges, and we'd be happy to take any questions or comments. Well, thank you very much, Betsy and Julie, for those informative reports. Of course, it is our new baby, the COAICC building. It's been a long time coming, and I think everybody's pretty pleased with it. So I'm going to open it up now to the board for questions and comments. Who would like to go first? Doug's looking at me, so I'm going to call on him. Mr. Levine! I'm wondering, Betsy, that's very helpful information, if you have some short summary of some of those points somewhere that we could have. Sure, I do. Yes, absolutely. Can you talk about communication either between your board and the rec commission, for example, if they're programming or HRDEI is doing a little bit of programming? Just I want to understand better the communication among the boards and among the staff about utilization of the space and how that's been going. I think that the boards have not communicated about that, but the staffs certainly have. And I think the communication is going fine as far as I can tell. And, you know, if there are questions like that that we need to get Julie's input on a little bit more, we're happy to do so and give you some more detailed answers to those questions. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thanks, Carol. Oh, absolutely. Bill or Chris, do you have any questions or comments? No, I think Doug makes an excellent point. If there's kind of a recap that we could review sometime before 10 p.m., that would be helpful. Yes, we can forward you our remarks, which will give you all of that. Or if you just have a few bullet points, that'd be great. Bullet points would be good. Bullet points are better. We can do that, too. They love bullet points. I love bullet points. We like to do that. We've got your slides, so. I have three points. They're all going to be very quick. Ms. Currier, you mentioned the name of a superstar outreach person. She handled 200 this year. Yeah. What was her name again? Mara Schneider. Mara Schneider. A name worth writing down. That's just terrific. I would like it if you considered having a floater card. I have been a victim of being locked out there. And I just don't like things that make the town look bad. I just don't like that. So if there were a card that you could give to somebody when they have booked space and the card is cancelable, which is my understanding those cards readily are, and they're not FOBs. These should be standard access cards. It's a $2 item. I think that would help a lot. And you implied one of those might go to a new custodian or the old custodian under a new hour system. Whatever it is, please figure out the details. Please think about that. And then the last comment I have is, I really love the building. So please imagine the situation I was in last year with the festival. And I have to explain to people, no, the building's closed. I did not like that. And I'm seeing Mr. McCall's on screen and you two are on screen. Is there some way we could fix that this year? Everybody heard it's splendid. So they wanted to get in the woodwork, the staircase, the beautiful internal windows, the fenestration, as Julie and I like to call it. I really would like it if it were open this year, even if there were limits on it or something. It just didn't sit well to be on stage looking at a gorgeous building and telling people you can only look at the outside. Yes. Let me just briefly go back to the door thing. The opening and closing of the doors is not handled at the community center. It's handled at facilities. I'm sorry. That doesn't change my point. Can you talk to facilities? This is a town. We're an organization. We're going to fix this. And yes, I guess Julie can talk to facilities or someone can talk to facilities. Yes. We'll pass that on to her. I know she communicates with them regularly about a variety of things. So no reason she can't. And I think Julie also feels the same way that you feel, Chris, about the festival. She would like to have the festival extended to the community center and offer maybe something she said the other day, something like line dancing during the festival. Something that gets people there to see what the town has to offer. Thank you. That's all the plug. I need. Mr. Martin chair. We can turn this back to you. Two quick points. Madam chair. Every time it's my turn, you hop in. Go ahead. Can certainly work to keep the building open for activities. We just have to ensure we have staffing while the building's open and a custodian that that shouldn't be a problem. We can work that in for this fall. And one of the other things I've talked to Mr. Fay about, and I know he has. He's working on it if he doesn't already have an app. A lot of times there is an app that members of the administration can get in control, the doors remotely from their phones. And so if we can, you know, I can follow up with Mr. Fay on that so that they can be more than one person with access to that door to change or open a door or close them and secure them remotely via the phone app. The technology's there, done it elsewhere, and we can get that done here. Great. Thank you. That's great. Thank you. All set, Madam Chair. I laughed when you said she wanted to offer line dancing because that's so Julie. It's just such a joke. Who else would think of let's do line dancing in the COA during the semester? Everyone else would say, oh, let's have milk and cookies or something, you know. So anyway, unless anyone else has any other questions or comments, are you all set, Mr. McCall? Are you all set, Ms. Palmer Spurlin? Okay, great. All right. Thank you very much for joining us. Nice to see you. Nice to see you. Thanks for having us. Nice to see you all. Thanks. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you. So next on number 11 is going to be appointments. We have one appointment to consider tonight. Um, is miss. Why is he here? Why is he? I think it's crazy. She was here earlier. Like it's. Oh, there you are. Yeah. Welcome. How are you? Can you make your audio work? Sherry? Yes. Thank you. Okay. There you are. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for waiting. Sherry is interested in a position at the Cultural Council. And so what we do is we're very informal here. So you don't want to give us like a couple minute explanation. We have your information on a packet. We have all read it. Um, and in case somebody just needs a reminder, I think that's on page 91. I'm around there. Excuse me. 89. And if you just want to give us a two minute explanation or you're interested in the Cultural Council, then the board will each ask some questions and we'll go from there. Okay. So my name is Sherry Quasi and I have been working on the Native Cultural Council. This is my second time being on the Native Cultural Council. I've also been on many other nonprofits and run a nonprofit myself. And this is something I'm very passionate about, about having cultural events available for residents in the Metro West area, especially in towns that I am directly connected to. Um, I have a house in Weyland. So that's why Weyland is important to me. My parents' home is in Natick. And I got involved with Natick first because I had attended an event. They were looking for people. I got to speaking to someone and I had joined. So, um, this is something that I am even more interested in when it comes to Weyland because I've gone to workshops from the Human Rights and Diversity group. And I see that Weyland is trying to bring more functions into town. And it will be exciting to be part of that. Perfect. Thank you. So I'm going to open it to questions from the board. We've lost Mr. Levine, but I'll start with, um, Bill or Chris. Chris, go ahead, please. Uh, I'm in favor of this. And, uh, Sherry, please don't be insulted by our brevity. I thought the letter you wrote was terrific and I applaud your service. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Bill. Hi, I'm Bill Whitney. Um, you mentioned you have a house in Weyland. Are you a Weyland resident? Yes. My property is near the high school on 8 Castle Road. And you live there? Yes. I do travel a bit for work, so I live there, but I'm in and out. Yeah. And I was a bit confused when you mentioned your time on the Natick Cultural Council. So, yeah, I had moved out to San Diego, moved back 10 years ago. And initially when I came back, I came back because of my father's illness. So I came back to their place in Natick. My house had been rented out since I was in California. Yeah. Great. Well, that's very helpful. Thank you. And thank you for your willingness to serve. Thank you. That's all I have, Carol. Okay. Doug, do you have any questions for Sherry? No, Sherry. No, Sherry. I reviewed your resume. And I also am very grateful for your willingness to serve. As you probably know, we have a number of boards and committees in town, each of them serving such an important purpose. So we're very grateful when people as qualified as yourself step forward. So thank you very much. Thank you so much. Of course. And of course, like, I have to agree. Ismae really explained it all. And I don't have any questions either. I thank you very much. I think you'll enjoy being on the cultural council. It's a variety of activities that they perform and fun. So with that, do we have a motion? I would move that we... Go ahead, Bill. Sorry. I would move that the select board appoint Ms. Shireen Kwasi. I hope that's the right pronunciation to the cultural council for a term ending June the 30th, 2029. Thank you. Thank you. Any further discussion? Okay. We'll take a roll call vote. Chris? Aye. Bill? Yes. Doug? Yes. Myself? Yes. That's motion passes 4-0. Do we send letters to the cultural council, right? So go ahead, Doug. Do you want to explain the process to Sherry? Sherry, now that you've officially been voted in by the select board to become official yourself, you will receive a letter from the town manager's office with some information. Once you receive that letter, bring it to the town clerk's desk and she will swear you in so you can become a voting member of the council. She will also give you some materials related to conflict of interest training that you need to complete. And thank you again. Understood. And I finished the training. Oh, you're ahead of the game. Yeah. Because I have to do it for the other council too. Oh, that's right. Perfect. Perfect. So thank you. Thank you. All right. The next item on this is there are a few items of appointments that have been made by other boards and it's our responsibility to confirm. So we're just looking for a motion, please. Is that a single motion for all four? Sure. Okay. I move that we appoint Lisa Raftery to confirming the appointment of Lisa Raftery to the Youth Advisory Committee for a term ending June 30th, 2028. The appointing board being the Board of Health, Robin Borgstedt to the Wayland Housing Partnership, appointing board being planning board to a term ending June 30th, 2028. Jacqueline Espiritu Santo Vega to the Wayland Housing Partnership by the School Committee for a term ending June 30th, 2029. And Heidi Ellis to the Youth Advisory Committee also by the School Committee for a term ending June 30th, 2028. Hold a second. Second. Okay. Any discussion? All right. We'll go right to the vote here. Chris? Yes. Bill? Yes. Doug? Yes, indeed. I roll yes. 4-0. Okay. The next thing, which is on page 91. Excuse me, ma'am. I'm sorry. Did I make this? Under 11B, it says review open appointed positions. That's what I'm talking about. Okay. Sorry. She's on it, Bill. Go for it. Yeah. All right. 11B. I said, next on the agenda, it says review open appointed positions. At the beginning of the process, when we had a number, you know, we were doing a lot of reappointments and there were some people applying for new positions. And we had, I said, once we kind of got through that process, I would then have the open positions and the boards list updated and put it into an agenda for everyone to have a look see. I'm not going to spend a lot of time on it tonight, but this is what we have open. And I will tell you that we will be having a conversation about the vacancies in the, in the direction we want to take, or that's been recommended for the audit committee on the 17th of August. Um, and then I will also tell you on this one, the design review advisory board, I believe that's full. That position was filled. Um, just didn't get taken off, but you can see the rest of where we are. Um, I mean, and then the human rights, diversity, equity inclusion committee has a couple non voting positions open, but other than that. Um, but there are some areas here that I think we have to be really concerned about wastewater. Um, I think it's a three board committee, and I think we have one spot zoning board of appeals. Um, I think we, we have, we have, there's a key board that we need to get the positions full. So in case there's some cases to be heard. So I think we've got some recruiting to do there. I mean, it's a little late, but I did want to throw that out. And also on the dog control appeals board, again, there's three positions are open. I think this is another one we'll have a conversation about, um, in the near future. So this is, um, kind of give everybody a sense of what's, what we have left to do on these. Comments. Mike. Let Bill go first, please. Uh, Carol, with respect to the design review appointment board or advisory board. Um, I'm a little confused by the one planning board position. I think the planning board is the appointing authority. Right. And that is a five member board. And, uh, I think Robin has just gone off in order to serve in the housing partnership. And I'm sure that the planning board appoints somebody. Uh, but, uh, I think there are at present three members and, uh, we have one architect, no landscape architect, um, no graphic designer. And so, uh, I would encourage the members of the board, notwithstanding the fact that the planning board is the appointing authority. Uh, if you have any suggestions about, uh, any design professionals who might be interested, uh, in speaking with the chair of the planning board, uh, they have, uh, looked high and low. And if, uh, members of the, this board have other suggestions, uh, I'm sure they would be gratefully received. Thank you. Okay. So, you know, I, I'm sorry, Chris, did you want to add something? I just wanted to encourage what you said earlier about revisiting this topic. You'll recall I brought it up in our last meeting. Uh, we're hearing that, uh, town meeting may want to lower its quorum. We're hearing there aren't enough people on boards. Uh, Michael McCall has done great work on improving customer service and making, working with the town less off putting. We're about to say what our priorities are. And what I brought up in the last meeting was it's, it's kind of hard to stomach a priorities list that doesn't have this on it. So I, I really like your idea that we're going to come back to this. Okay. Well, this is actually, um, right. It's in the priority list to kind of look at some of the committees. Does it make sense? I mean, some of the committees have come forward to us and have suggestions on consolidating or what have you. So this is something we did to, and just for edification backfill for you, Chris, we did sort of talk about this last year, but we really weren't able to put a lot of, um, um, energy into it. So maybe this year, this will get some more air time. Cause I think it's, you know, sometimes boards are just, uh, they're developed for a need. And then, um, perhaps that need gets filled and we need to, you know, think, rethink it. But anyway, I just wanted to get this out. This is just where we are. Um, anyway, Mr. Levine, you all set on this? Good. Okay. All right. So then, um, I'm going to be fresh now and with the board's permission, I'm going to move to number 12, which is, uh, discuss the town building working group, including the next steps. This is the, uh, the, uh, draft is on page 94, the packet. Um, at our last meeting, we had talked about, we met with Mr. Fair about the town building. And, you know, he explained to us the different options of what they might cost. And we said, let's, let's get a group together to, um, you know, evaluate and make some recommendations of what we should do for this board. Um, and off we go. So this, um, I know Tom worked on this. I think Bill, you worked on, did you help Tom develop this? I, uh, gave him a few comments on an earlier draft. Okay. Um, so I had a conversation with him and then he said he was going to speak with you. So I didn't see this until of course it came back out, but anyway. So, um, I think that in the end we originally had talked about at our meeting a possibly doing like, you know, we, we weren't sure a committee and advisory committee or a working group. And I think we feel that, um, it, you know, we're looking at possibly consolidating committees. Maybe it makes more sense to just do a working group. And so, um, Mr. Um, talk to Mr. McCall briefly. He was on vacation. I did reach out to Mr. Fair as well. So he's aware, you know, that that's a direction that we're going to take in to get his input. And he was very comfortable, you know, with us running a working group rather than a full fledged committee. So, um, anybody have any thoughts on the, uh, proposed working group? Um, I'm going to say charge, I guess. So anybody haven't did bill, did you want to, um, opine on this? Um, yeah, I, as I recall the discussion, uh, you know, uh, uh, Mr. McCall and Mr. Fair had, you know, worked together to identify a potential range of costs of, uh, what it would take to essentially do a gut rehab of the existing town building, including relocating people for a year or two while construction occurred. Um, I, I think it is important that we, um, number three, identify the town's office space needs at this time and in the future. So I, I think that, uh, that would, and I believe Kelsey is working on that with others. Uh, I think that's pretty important. Um, the, uh, I guess the sense I had was that the board was interested in trying to figure out whether the town's long-term office and meeting needs are best acquitted in a rehabbed existing, uh, town building or in, in another location, uh, whether new construction someplace or rehab elsewhere. Um, I, I, I, I might have suggested something that talks a little bit more specifically about alternatives to, uh, to, to the, uh, town building, uh, proposal. Um, but, but I think this is a, a good start. Okay. So, um, you're all set so far with not too many, not any edits per se at the moment. Well, I'll be interested in the discussion by the board and particularly ideally with Tom, uh, before we were to finalize this. But, um, I'd be interested in, in, uh, the board's reaction. Okay. Yeah. I, I share that similar concern. Do you feel like it's addressed kind of in the preamble paragraph of the charge bill? And unlike the. I do. I do. But then when you look at the deliverables, there's a. Yeah. Mm-hmm. So do we have to change something? I mean, we can make some draft edits and then bring it back. So, um, do we want to make a change in the deliverables or I should say. It sounds like we probably should. I mean, to Doug's point, I mean, when you look at. The, the sentence preceding the list of deliverables says in addition to the tasks discussed above. Mm-hmm. Uh, the working group shall have appropriate ABCD or one, two, three, four. So, um, so as long as it's kind of understood that. Um, these are sort of subsidiary to, uh, to what's identified in the first paragraph. And I do think the point is very well taken about the additional feasibility studies, uh, which, um, of course raises the. The dreaded, uh, budget question about, you know, if you wanted to, uh, think about this as housing query, do you get someone in to do some quick sketches? Do you, uh, that can, and, or conversely more detailed design or more detailed explanation of what's in, exploration of what's involved in maintaining the town building. Absolutely. So. So. Is there any in particular edits we want to make on this? Or are we just talking about it and then I'll bring it back at the next meeting? I was kind of hoping we'd kind of move it along cause if we wanted to get the committee going, but cause the next meeting is not until August 17. So. Are you afraid if we finalize it on August 17th, that those six months are insufficient for the working group to do its work? Hmm. No, we can do it on the 17th, but I, I, I'm just trying to, you know, move things along, move things along. That's my job is facilitated. Are we moving along? Are we revisiting? You want to just take it off the list. I did. I didn't want to say that. I wanted to make just one, one, a couple of teeny observations in general. And we actually had public comment too, about the, the makeup of the committee. Um, I do like the idea of, of having Mr. Fair, who's, who's, this is his skill set, you know, probably being the lead on this. So I would like to say on the top, um, Wayland town manager, Michael McCall or his designee will establish this committee. Um, and then he could designate Mr. Fair to do it. Um, we talk a lot about not having, um, Michael be on every single committee cause it gets stretched too thin. And I think this is one where, however, he does need to be involved. And I did have this conversation with him. I just want you to know, I didn't just come up with this tonight. I thought we could make, instead of number one member on the committee, we could make Michael an ex officio. Because I think he should be involved perhaps maybe in the beginning. And then as the plans go along, you know, kept, kept in the loop and being able to opine. Um, I was, I do like all these. I want to ask, um, those, that means you, Bill, in this field, if they think maybe we shouldn't in the list, maybe have the planner, would the planner make sense to be on this list? Um, and, and I did, like I told you, I did speak to Mr. Fair briefly, and he was comfortable with having, you know, four or five members on the committee. And then he said there were other people that he knew of that he might bring in to speak to the committee as needed. Um, and so I think it was pretty comfortable with that. But there's a couple things there. There's a couple things there. So what's everyone think about, you know, either making it under Mike Fair or making Michael McCall or his designee. Kelsey has it. Yeah, I know. Go ahead, Kelsey. Um, I would ask that I be a member of the, this working group because, um, I focus a lot on procurement. I'm, you know, working on a space report. This is something that has been a keen interest of mine for a couple of years. I've discussed this with other members of the public who are involved with the RAP report back in 2017. So I would respectfully request that I'd be considered for the working group. Okay. Sounds wonderful. Uh, but can we just go back to my original question? Is we okay with making it, um, town manager or his designee and then making the town manager an ex officio? We could actually put in here, uh, the assistant town manager. And then if we wanted to do that on the number five people. I'm fine with that flexibility. Sure. Okay. Do you want me or, um, or Mr. Levine? I don't hear any other words. You want me to just make a couple of little edits here on this and then. Yes. Yeah. I'll be the words. Yeah. I'll be the words. Yeah. And then in the last sentence, don't hurt this place in writing. I was just thinking maybe we might change that to say submit. Just minor net, but it just sounded like submit to the select board. Yeah. Cause it doesn't say where, where, where the report's going. So submit to the select board, right? The recommendations, blah, blah, blah. Yep. Okay. Can you give us a couple of little edits? Yeah. Sure. Mr. McCall, since I'm just giving, changing things here. I mean, we did talk about this. Are you okay with this plan? Yeah. I need it, Michael. Sorry. I am. And I'm supportive of having Ms. Power Spillette on there as one of the five. She's been involved with procurement. She's been involved with tracking some of our capital assets. So it makes sense to have her as part of that team. Okay. Okay. And, you know, if we think we want to add anyone else to this, let me know. All right. Well, I think that's good. I'll bring it back on the 17th. I didn't get to cross it off my list. There you go. All right. So the next item is, I think you have to go to the supplemental packet for this one. The next one is the, you know, we worked on our objectives for FY27 last time. And the packet is again, the ones that were the ones we had from last year. So I kind of drafted them up and made some edits and then Doug made some edits. And I think if you look in the supplemental, you'll find a clean pack, clean copy of this. And as soon as I find mine, I'll be talking about some. And we're just looking for feedback on, did we get, did we get, is this what we said? Is this the sense of what we said? What edits do we, further edits do we need, if any? And again, because the five of us are not here tonight, I'm going to recommend that we just vote this on the 17th. Unless you all think we can vote it tonight. I had a couple of comments, if you'll indulge me. Absolutely. I think it's very good. Under number one, we don't say anything about the operating budget. It seems to be. We did say that there. Oh, it does. Oh, operating override. Right. But it. What would you like it to say? Well, it, you know, I think the sense was that, you know, this is our top priority is, you know, in times of, you know, financial challenges for the town. We want to make sure that we have the ability to finance capital projects that, you know, are priorities. And we also, I think, want to sort of maintain the discipline that Michael has established of, you know, prudent fiscal management of the operating budget as well. Okay. Okay. I think we had that. Wait a minute. Is that in the comment here? We did not think we had. I don't think we said that. Do you have a particular phrase you're thinking of? I don't. I can give you some language if, but I think just something, the notion of continue prudent fiscal management of the operating budget, as well as, you know, a well considered long range asset maintenance and capital improvement plan, something to that effect. Okay. Doug, are you making notes? No. Yoo-hoo, Mr. Wordsmith. And you said you had a couple of points, Bill. Do you have another one? Yeah. Under number three, I am hesitating because I can't read my own writing. Okay. But, you know, something, instead of evaluate town-owned properties, I guess the point was, this speaks to housing increasing, you know, our affordable housing. And it seems to be confined to publicly owned land, as opposed to just generally promote the development of affordable housing. So, one might say, instead of evaluate town-owned properties to determine best uses, including, you might say, continue to promote the development and or creation of affordable housing pursuant to the housing production plan, as contemplated. So, one of the illustrations might be something like the Route 20 West recent addition to the MBTA zoning, maybe the Cascade development, if that ever gets sorted out. I don't know that we want to talk about housing at the Route 20 South landfill site, since that was pretty carefully studied and was deemed to be financially infeasible, given you to dig up the old dump in order to do that. Yeah. Yes. Hang on one second before you change that. This was something that Tom had wanted me to work into this plan. And if you read this, and I don't mind changing it. I hope you make a note here, Doug. But I just want to make sure we don't change something that we purposely put in and then have to come back. If you read the sentence, it says, evaluate town-owned properties to determine best uses, including development and or. So, was it the best uses? Supposed to be broader than just housing. Yeah. So it was being broad because in that case that might be, I think one of the recommendations was the lay down, possibly bus, possible field, that kind of thing for that property. But his point was, and I'm speaking from memory, not for him, that, you know, that report was given to us, and we should be going back and taking another look at that and making decisions how we want it, what the next steps are, if you will. Right. Well, I have no quarrel with that. It's just that I don't see affordable housing, really, in this list of priorities. Well, 2012 it is. So we should just come up, add a couple of examples, maybe. Yeah, I'm a little, and I have to tell you, I'm a little leery about putting in one that's a developer one, because we have no control over that. It's certainly, let me rephrase that. It is certainly a project we will look at, and it's on our draft list, but I don't know that's necessarily in the past. Doesn't mean we can't change this. We did not identify properties and projects we didn't have control over as part of our objectives. Does it mean that we wouldn't do others? Because if you notice some of the things last year we didn't accomplish, but we did other things that processed the way through. But I have no problem with, you know, whatever edits we want, just making that point. But in the meantime, do you want to come up with some ideas? Maybe it doesn't fit. I mean, maybe this number three is specific to town owned properties, right? Yeah. And this goes to the point of, you know, productive use or reuse of those properties. Right. But I do think that we got to say something about the development of affordable housing. St. Ann was not town on property, and yet we all feel pretty good about it. But it's permanent, see? We want to permit more affordable housing, right? No, I'm going to rephrase it. It's in the projects happening. And he's like, should we, but perhaps want to model that, follow in those footsteps and do more projects like that, if we could help move those through like we did at the ZBA. Okay. Okay. So what should we do? Bill, why don't you take it offline and maybe come up with a blurb that you could email over to me or Carol. Sure. Or the other of us, and then one or the other of us can work on it. Sounds good. Okay. Okay. I'll take it. Thank you. Okay. Listen, Chris, I have another thing that can point that way too. Okay. I mean, everything else. I think, you know what I have to say? I think every year we make this even better than the year before in terms of, you know, the clarity, you know, of the direction. I think it's a terrific because it's a terrific roadmap once it's done, you know, for the chair who facilitates, you know, and also keeps us when we review these every six months, you know, what we've done and then, you know, what we want to work on. Let's wait until Tom, we can start working on them, but let's take the official vote when Tom is here so we have all five because it is goals for the whole year. I said that earlier. Yeah. Let's wait. Okay. So that brings us now to. Oh, my God, I'm on the last page. The town managers report. Mr. McCall, the floor is yours. Thank you, everyone. Thank you, Madam Chair. Let me just read off a couple items here. And I know that select board member Whitney loves brevity. So I'll do the best I can at this hour. So just first up, my town manager office will be a week from tonight, Monday, July 27, 5, 530 PM, 630 PM in the old select board meeting room at town hall. Second on the update is regional 911. As you know, we are part of Middlesex regional emergency community. Cation center. The group that we have with Framingham and Natick. We wound up having a special meeting of the M rec boards, including our finance and operations subcommittees and various members of the respective communities to meet with state. State 911 as well as the executive office of public safety regarding safety and security regarding our grant funding. And we attended back on July 9th. Select board member Whitney was there representing Wayland, as well as our two police police chief, fire chief and deputy fire chief. From the state was Frank Pozniak, the executive director of 911, as well as the undersecretary of the executive office of public safety and security, Kerry Collins, and their support staff. At that time, we wound up discussing our frustration with our grant funding request, which was $5.6 million, which had already been reduced from our original request for $12 million to focus on needed costs per their suggestion. And what we received in return was $1.7 million, significantly less, and everyone went around the room explaining our frustration with the process, why we didn't think we were getting what we needed. We are currently doing an analysis of the FY 27 development grant applications of other regional dispatches to see, you know, what if any disparities were out there. And part of the meeting concluded with state 9-1-1 and the undersecretary of EOPS explaining that they would work with us to try and secure other funding outside of the state 9-1-1 grant. There are other grants available to help us make up this difference and help us with our future applications and funding. We still want to stay on track for opening next July, July of 2027, and we'll continue to work with the state to ensure that we get adequate funding to keep that on track. So I just want to make you aware of that. And then also, just a quick recap, as was alluded to, I was out last week, and I want to thank my staff, especially Ms. Power Spurlett, who was minding the store, so to speak. She was integral in handling quite a few questions while I was out, and I appreciate her assistance and all the support staff for making sure things move smoothly when I'm not there. And because we alluded to working groups, I want to remind the board that I am sharing a historic district parking working group. We're going to have our first meeting tomorrow to look at the situation down and around the intersections of Route 20 and Route 27 in the parking for the depot area, the library, the library, the new businesses that are coming in to see what we can do to find some creative solutions, expand parking. I have various members from town staff. I've invited some business owners and some residents, and I'm hoping that together we can come up with some ideas which I can bring back to the board. And that's all I have, Madam Chair. Great. Anybody have any questions for Mr. McColl? I have a brief one. Could you just comment on the status of the 212 RFP? Off the top of my head, I do not have an update on that. I would either have to defer to Ms. Power Spurlett and or Mr. Whitney, who's been working on 212. I haven't been that closely involved in that particular. I withdraw the question. Happy to stay on schedule. Thank you. We can get you an update. I'd be happy to address it if that would be helpful. We are right now reviewing draft number six of the RFP. It's been a lot of back and forth. It's been a very good process with Kelsey's consultant, who is quite experienced in this area. I think we're getting quite close. We are waiting for a draft of a purchase and sale and a lease that would go as attachments to the RFP. We are advised that we need to put those in the document. And the purpose for that really is that anyone who is interested in responding, we would ask that they tell us whether they have any material disagreements with the town's draft. We think that the town, frankly, has more leverage before a designation is made than afterward. And so if we put out terms which we think are eminently fair, but maybe tilted a bit in the town's favor, we think that we're more likely to get a favorable response from prospective respondents. But again, I think I think we're getting pretty close. And it's it's a ponderous document, but I think it's something that we hope to get to the board, perhaps put it on Carol's list for August. I wasn't trying to sound critical, which I'm worried I did because I was trying to be short. I'm just very interested in the project. No, no, by all means, it's it turns out to be pretty involved, but worth the effort, I hope. I have it tentatively based on a conversation with you, Bill, for August 17th. I think that's. Do you want to move it? You'll tell me. No, no, it's not like a deadline. Okay. All right. Everybody's all set. No other questions. So let's go to minutes. I move approval of three sets of minutes, June 15th, June 29th and July 7th as amended. Second. All right. Any discussion now? Let's see. Let's do them one at a time. This June 15th. Anybody have any edits on June 15th? Anyone? I don't think I do either. Okay. Okay. Let's go then to June 29th. Anybody have any edits? They didn't have any there either. I think I have some here. I got to just figure this out. Yeah. So on A5, where it has the joint meeting with the finance committee, and we actually received, probably I received an email about this, but I had already flagged these myself and we've already included in the minute taker into this, but Mr. Satish had not been sworn in yet. So he's not a voting member. So, but secondly, when you're having a joint meeting, you only just list those who are present. You don't say who's absent. So that has to come out. And then farther down on item B, when the finance committee are joined, you have to say, Mr. Hurley, he moved. And Ms. OXA seconded, or whoever it was, that they adjourn at X time. And then the roll call vote. So those, those have been already addressed, but I want the board to know that. And, um, um, I also thought that on, on A15, um, when we had the, um, A8, I guess it was, when we had the reviews of the proposals from the legal counsel. Wonderful, wonderful summaries. But I thought at the very end, it should say after a brief discussion, the board deferred deliberation until the June 7th meeting, because it's, it just took the information. We didn't do anything, but we did say that. So I thought we should have that. Everyone's good with that. Um, and I didn't think any, see anything else. Anyone else see anything? Okay. How about June 7th? July. July. How about July 7th? Do you have edits, Chris? No. Okay. Bill? Doug? No. Well, I have one at the beginning because it was a Tuesday. Nice catch. Lucky. Um, I don't understand what this questioning is. The recording of this agenda item was not audible for four minutes. So, um, I'm hoping it wasn't audible at all because we were an executive session. Um, I'm hoping it did say that when we went into, uh, um, executive session that I announced we would return into open session in 20 minutes. So, um, and then I think down on established select board goals. I'm sorry, Mr. Whitney, where were you? We're missing a corner. I apostrophe. I think. The board reassessed and we. Who cares? Who cares? Sleep at the wheel. The board reassessed and reprioritized the previous year's goals. Picky, picky, picky. I know. All right. And I think that should do it. So, everybody's all same with my suggested edits. We're good to go. Okay. All those in favor. Doug? Yes. Bill? Yes. Chris? Yes. And Carol? Okay. Uh, that brings us down to correspondence. Any comments on the correspondence? No. No. Okay. Great. I think that brings us to select board reports of concerns. Correct. Um, let me just throw in one real quick that I think would be, would have been Tom would have reported on at the very end of the packet. There is two pages about, um, the America's two fiftieth parade and be in the parade and talks all about when it is. And if you want to be in and get a route map and all this, and this was just, just to let people know that if you're interested in doing a float or marching or whatever, that this is what you should do. And I didn't want to leave this. I think this, cause he's on this committee. I didn't want to leave it till the 17th. I figured, put it out now. We can also talk about it on the 17th. Uh, since you brought it up, Madam Chairman, Brad Keyes is doing a terrific job as the parade captain, um, including above and beyond world work, which we'll have more to say about later. Thank you. And perhaps when you say that, um, you could also add into your, your comments. If the select, what's going to participate in that parade, which is Saturday, October 3rd. Okay. Um, select board reports and concerns. Who wants to start? Who has any? I have one, uh, which is, uh, I believe the board previously approved engaging council to assist the planning board and, uh, some route 20 zoning. Zoning amendments to, uh, but, uh, I'm concerned that it's unclear as to how we're going to go forward with that. Would the select board with the town manager, would the planning board identify firms? Would we go to our town council? Uh, I'm just unclear as to next steps. So, uh, just concerned that we not let that one slip through. And, and particularly since, uh, you know, we all got the KP law, uh, advisory today about some, uh, changes to state law with respect to zoning. Um, you know, that's more stuff that the planning board has to deal with in order to conform our bylaw to these new state laws. And so I think it's important that we, uh, we get the planning boards and help on that stuff. Thank you. Um, Chris. All set. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Thank you. Um, Doug. Um, I'm realizing that, um, the election this November, the general election is going to contain a lot more ballot questions than any of us usually see. There could be upwards of nine questions on the ballot. So wondering, um, if, if Michael should connect with Trudy to see if, if she's fully prepared. Um, I imagine this will be a very high turnout election as well, or if she wants to come before us to, to ask any questions or seek any help from us. I just want to put that on folks radar a few months in advance. Okay. Very well, sir. Good. Thank you for bringing that up. Cause you reminded me in the consent packet. We, we voted the warrant for the, uh, for the election. Right. But we have to sign this, right? Kelsey. We have to find the slip here, the consent count. We have to sign this. You have to make, make arrangements. No, one second. I go. You have to make arrangements to go in and sign this. Um, I think it's by before the next meeting. I think we have to sign by August 10th or 12th or something like that. So please do me a favor and reach out. Yeah. Well, the question I signed in the 26th warm for the state primary election, please reach out to Trudy and make arrangements to go in and sign the warrant. And I will remind Tom as well. Thank you for saying that, Doug. Um, I do want to say that obviously it just in case anybody else is listening, the two meetings in August will be remote. Just reminding that in September, we are meeting August, uh, August, September 8th, which is a Tuesday, the day after labor day. And the meeting after that, which I will send, uh, Abby send a note on will be another Tuesday. It will be September 22nd because I believe Rosh Hashanah is on the 21st or is it Yom Kippur must be Yom Kippur that late. Rosh Hashanah comes first. I know, but it's just the 22nd. Oh yeah. September. So I think that's might be Yom Kippur, but anyway, so that's it. Um, also wanted to remind you that the 17th will be a pretty full agenda item as well. Um, I, um, the finance committee appointing board has completed filling all the positions for finance committee. We had a couple of folks who did elect to, um, go for reappointment. And we appointed Mr. O'Herlihy, who was a former finance committee to come back. So it's going to give some strength. Um, and we have two new members, which is terrific. I'm really energetic. Um, and, um, they have taken, they've had, they've had a couple of meetings. They're starting out. They would like the, what they're going to do this year is have, I meet a little bit more on the summit to help smooth out their workflow. So I'll have more on that after, um, probably the next meeting. So anyway, and, um, I think with that, we could have a motion to adjourn at 10 31. So moved. Second and third. I'll second it too. Thanks man. All those in favor, Bill. Yes. Chris. Yes. Yes. And me. Yes. Thank you, buddy. Thank you. Good night.