September 16, 2026 – Housing Partnership – Video & Transcript

September 16, 2026 - Housing Partnership

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Now then we'll call the meeting to order at 7.03. I know that Jim is not going to be here.
So the meeting with Julia is not happening. She takes care of her 94-year-old mother, and that's where she is tonight. However, at 3.36 p.m., I got an email from Darren, who works in the office with her, and he said that she asked him to answer some of our questions. So I will forward the email to you, but I'll tell you the basics.
He said, The majority of the new septic systems are real estate driven. Typically the owners are leaving their property, moving to another, and the last thing they want to do is spend extra money on a septic system that they themselves will never use. We asked them about adding capacity. So when you propose to add bedrooms above the number that is existing, you trigger full compliance with all the state and local septic regulations and are then not allowed to take any cost savings variances slash waivers from full compliance. And he says the Mass State Code is one of the few. He said there's only a few codes that factor excessive septic replacement costs as a legitimate ground for granting variances and waivers. He said Massachusetts is one of the places that does grant, is one of the few that grants waivers for exceptional costs. That factors in the excess. So replacing a septic system once a year is an additional cost. I am not a plaintiff. I am not a plaintiff. I am a legislator. I am a lawyer. I am a lawyer. I am a lawyer. I am a lawyer. I am a lawyer. I am a lawyer. I am a lawyer. I am a lawyer. property and when you are required to sign full standards it's very often significant it can very often significantly change the look of the property our plan review fee is higher and there is twice as much testing and adding staff review time all of these things increasing the cost of adding the capacity means not what we want to hear which could be hundreds of dollars less expensive when you are testing designing for a replacement system than for the replace adding in going through this procedure a replacement situation no added bedrooms some of the existing settings septic components may be reused if you're adding flow and bedrooms generally can't do that so those are all cost factors and then the full compliance required when you add flow bedrooms to an existing property is sometimes just not possible and only a replacement system is possible there is a process for requesting variance from the state code but it involves having to prove that should the Fahrenheit's not being printed would not move all the beneficial stuff I think that's an incomplete sentence later on it comes back to them most of the home sales we see are for three or four-bedroom single-family dwellings often there is a prospect of remote home sales for a來 often with an additional home office or family room. And going to anything greater requires more area for the septic system, often larger components which can restrict locations for the dwelling, pavement, stormwater controls, irrigation wells. Adding a detached ADU is worse as it has all those additional utilities and their septic components offset requirements, which further limits available area on the property for a larger septic system. And he has some comments that might help. It seems to me that maybe allowing two or more multi-family, single structure dwellings that take advantage of vertical living area could be allowed. Perhaps even closer to property lines than the setback currently requires to maximize living space while not straining the smaller lot size. And folks always have the ability to repurpose one bedroom as a home office by removing the closet so they can add an additional room that fits the bedroom dimensions. Regarding possible variances to the state or local regulations, I pasted some pertinent text from the applicable codes below that speaks to it. But without the respective codes changing, it may be very tough, a very tough sell given the specific language. And he does have a couple of sections of that. He has highlighted sections of the code here and has highlighted some of it. So I will forward that to you. Julia had said that they would be happy to meet with somebody if somebody wants to meet with them. This does not sound very promising to me. No, it's going to be huge. It's a huge obstacle to what we're trying to do. Yeah. It's just that the Board of Health somewhere on their paperwork just suggests to people before they're submitting their paperwork for either a new or redesigned or any sort of work on their septic that they just suggest that people put a brain cell into thinking about whether they might want to over-design their system now if they might want to put an ADU in later. And everybody agrees that adding to your septic is expensive, adding to your septic is a big deal, but it's way easier to do it now when you're doing your system as opposed to 10 years from now when you're thinking, oh, maybe we should put in a granny flat so that my mom can come live with us. Because it's going to be way more expensive to do it then as opposed to when you've got your system dug up right now. But as he says, most of the people who are doing it are leaving. It's only people who are living there and have a failed system. But there are some of those. If they're trying to sell it and their Title V failed and they've got to rip it out, they're not going to do it. I suppose there could be a builder who's like, oh, it would be good to be able to sell this within ADU capacity, but I don't think most people are thinking that far ahead. They just want to get it on the market. And want to do it as cheaply as possible. Whatever the holdback is in the sale is the minimum amount. So I guess the question is, do we want to follow up more? And we'll send it so you can read it in more detail. Sounds like it's a very comprehensive, thorough, you know. Yeah, I mean, it's not anything we didn't all know. They're just saying, hey, putting in a bigger septic system is expensive and difficult. And we know that. But we were just asking if they'd be interested in just tweaking it. Tweaking it. Just poking people and saying, hey, wait a minute. Before you do this, just think about that. But he hasn't said no, has he? No. No. I don't know that he really seems to understand what we're asking. So maybe we should, you know, after we've had a chance to read it, do kind of a very short response. Or whatever list of recommendations this committee comes up with, include that one. Just include it? Yeah. And they're less likely to go target that and say, wouldn't we check that? Because it seems just sort of common sense. Good. Yeah. I guess I still don't see this as a big impediment, having to put in another septic system. I really don't. They do. If you look at it as a percentage of the cost of the project, it's not that huge. I think it depends on your lot. Yeah. But there's two different issues that we should mix together. I mean, one is, is there physical capacity in the ground? Can you put in a drain field? Can you get in a big enough tank? And can you park? So that's one problem. And then the second problem is, how does the cost of doing it affect your assessment about the desirability of the project? This town has really big lot zones. I mean, big. Not all of the town. Lots of people have great big yards. I think a lot of people are going to not have any mechanical problem getting a one or two unit thing in on their land. Attitudinally, I would just look at it as a percentage. How much more am I going to have to borrow with my monthly services? Compared to the whole cost of putting on a one bedroom ADU, it's not going to look like much. So I'm not so worried. And maybe I'm just naive. It's not just the cost. I think, you know, having done a septic system a dozen years ago, anybody who's done a septic system, I mean, it is a big mess. And your whole property is just dug up. I mean, we have an acre lot, but it's near the river. It's wetlands. It was very hard to even get what they got in because we've got wetlands right behind the house. And the yard was a mess for months. It was a mess. It was a mess. It was a mess. It was a mess. It was a mess. It was a mess. It was a mess. It was a mess. It was a mess. It was a mess. It was a mess. It was a mess. I mean it was horrible. It was just a mess. Muddy, and miserable, and ugly. And I think that, look, we don't know how people will react. But when they hear a pricetag of 25,000, $35,000 plus the upheaval and the mess, it's liketech like money down the drain. And it's not what they want. They want their down. They want to improve their property, not put in a bigger... I mean, again, you might be right. It might hit some people as well. It's a relatively small percentage of the couple of hundred thousand dollars it might cost. But for a lot of people, it's going to be, ah, no, I'm not doing that. It's a mess. And I mean, if you have a five-acre lot, you can put in a second septic system. You don't even need to touch your house. But most of us don't have that. Right. Yeah, most people don't. I mean, even in a, you know, I don't know what percentage zones, half acre, one acre, one and a half. I don't know what the percentages are. But even on one acre lot that we have, it's not a simple thing to even get the one in that we got. No, and a lot of Weyland is wet. I mean, if you look around, you see plenty of people who have big mounds, and that's all they can do. They can only do the big mounded septic systems. And if you're going to add extra capacity for an ADU, it's going to be even bigger. So... For some people, it's easy. And for a lot of people... It's a deal breaker. Yeah, especially because then you're also looking at the cost to build the actual ADU if you're doing a separate one. So, or to do some extensive home renovations to do one that's in-kind. Because you have to have a kitchen. You know, if you can have an ADU... If you didn't have to have a kitchen in your ADU, you can do it pretty cheaply. But once you start talking about having to, you know, you've got a bathroom, but maybe you had a bathroom you could carve out. But having to add a kitchen... A kitchen gets expensive. Yeah. And it has to have a kitchen to be an ADU.
I can remember, I came from Ohio. We had sewers. You had sewers. Sewers. So coming here, I knew nothing about septic. Right. At that time, it was cesspools. Yes, right. And I can remember saying to John, you mean that hole is $750? $750, just for that? $750. Right. Yeah, that's like a down payment on the engineer. Yeah. I have to just say, I didn't know you from Ohio, but I used to work very closely with a land use planner, lawyer at Tufts. And he was always coaching people to take the planning certification exam. And he would tell his students, if you don't know the answer, say Ohio. No, no. Okay. The Euclid zoning case, and there are other key cases that he would say, if you don't know the answer, it's Ohio. Okay. I keep wondering if they're ever going to address how poor a proxy number of bedrooms is for determining how much use of the septic system is going to be. Okay. I was talking to somebody the other day who said that. $6,000. 50% of the three-bedroom houses in the Commonwealth are now occupied by two people, a retired couple. In this town. All over the state. In all of the Commonwealth. Oh, wow. 60% of the three-bedroom houses being occupied by a retired couple. So what you're saying is that we have overcapacity in many towns. Overcapacity all over the place, apparently. Even, you know, it's good. I mean, I think the number 1.5 kids is, I think, where we are now in family size, so I keep thinking they should change the measurement, and we've got the technology to do it in terms of measuring flow to the tank, and really see how much people are producing, you know. And if you have more kids and you have more flow, then you have to put in a new septic system. Well, and probably you should, or you'll end up like the house I ended up in, which had a failed septic system, and it burbled up under the ground, and my mother grew ornamental gourds there to hide the fact that there was water on the surface over the septic tank, so the inspector couldn't see it. Oh, I've just been watering the plants. You know, 20 years of living there, they never replaced the septic system. It was, yeah, so I know the bad things that go on, because I live looking out the windows, seeing the rubble out there. What state was that, Jean? California. It was California. I can fly now in California. Yeah. So, what do we want to do as far as Julia and or Darren? I think we should thank him quickly for the note, and say... I've already done that, but I certainly... Okay. Yeah. And just say that the committee, you're going to be disseminating it to the whole committee, and that we have to raise the questions, and we'll get back to you. Yeah. Thank you. If once we've all read that, we can talk about it next meeting, and sort of, or even by email, discuss sending something back. I really like your idea, Robin, of just saying, you know, at the very least, when somebody who is not selling, who is simply upgrading because they need to, put it, you know, the bug in their ear that for X thousand dollars more, you're going to have to do something about it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think that they can look to the future and have an upgraded septic system. Yeah. I don't even think you have to say that. Yeah. You just have to say, you know, this is a good time to consider whether you might in the future want to, you know, have an ADU in the next case. Or an extension to your home. Yeah. Or an addition, and consider whether you want to add the capacity now rather than having to replace your septic system to do that. Yeah. So, you know. And like I said, there's nothing in there that seems like it's really anything we didn't all know already. Mm-hmm. Right. Okay. Well, thank you, Mary, for that. Yeah. No updates. Anything from... Yes. I had heard nothing from Good Shepherd. You know, the last I heard was it really sounded like more than a little problem, but they're not giving me any details. Mm-hmm. I did hear from Father O'Leary. I... Did I... I told you... Yeah, I don't think we talked about that the last time. Mm-hmm. Father O'Leary had a stroke. Did I tell anybody this? Mm-hmm. You sent an email. I did send an email. Okay. I heard from him again, and he's moved into the senior priest's residence, which is right near Mass General Hospital downtown, and I can... I'm going to try to visit him at some point. I have reason to be at Mass General downtown every now and then, so I will try to check in on him. He said, please call first. Okay. He said he's actually at Mass General Hospital right now. He's in a similar situation just now because I have a lot of doctors appointments, but he certainly... His email was completely fine, even though he says he's got some neurological issues, but he sounded good. He sounded like he's adjusting, can't adjust easily to eating dinner at 4.30, so he goes out to Whole Foods or I think he said Burger King, maybe, to get himself something to eat. Okay. And then he... So he doesn't have to eat dinner at 4.30. He just can't do that, and he's got a balcony overlooking the city, so he sounds really dedicated. So he sat there, content, but I think an adjustment, given how active he was as a community priest. You talked about trying to do something. Yes, well I did write that note, and I don't think I got a response. I don't think I got a response. I think a few of you said that was a good note maybe, but I don't think I got a response from them. So I will leave it until we get under construction. Let them break ground, and if they break ground, then we can plant a tree. But until they break ground, I think they've got their heads wrapped up into getting the deal done. So that's the update. I have no news on the project. Given how late it's getting into the fall, it's unknown whether they can break ground until 2026. Is the issue the Barrier Patch Diocese? It's the state, and what I understand is state funding filtering from the federal government. So I don't know the details. You know, all these funding deals are incredibly complicated. I don't even begin to understand having to weave them together. I know that most nonprofit affordable housing, housing developments have somewhere north of 15 different funders subsidizing. State, local, federal, philanthropic all have to be knitted together, and this is part of the state package, I guess, flowed through from the federal. I don't know the details. I haven't understood it. They haven't explained it in detail. But these are enormously complicated deals to get a project like this done. I was on the road today, and I was listening to ask the governor of GBH, who was very clear as to the litany of issues that were getting adversely affected by the Trump administration. Whatever's going on. In terms of whether it's housing or whether it's healthcare. Today it was endangered species. I mean, she went down this list. Yesterday it was snapped. It goes on and on. So I think we're getting caught someplace in that. But they continue to be optimistic. And as I've said, and you've met the people, these are enormously competent developers. They've done many, many projects in the state. They do great work. And I just have to have faith that they've got a lot invested in this. They've got a lot of time and effort. And they don't get paid until they start. Developer's fees come through for them. So they've got a lot involved in this. So fingers crossed. Housing production plan. Okay. We met and looked at both the initial applications from the two bidders and then the supplemental documents that they were asked to provide. And we lost one committee member when the assistant town manager left Wayland. So we're down to three people. And basically picked Goldson as the one we thought was the best fit. And Robert sent that on to the town manager. And now the town manager has requested another meeting for next week to discuss the price points because they have now opened the envelopes, which are kept separate with the bid in them. And I guess one bid is fair. One bid is very different than the other bid. So now as chief procurement officer, Mr. McCall has to go through some kind of justification process to determine who will be hired. So that's where we are right now. With that said, I went ahead knowing that whoever the contractor is, they will be charged with collecting public information. Public thought about the housing production plan. So I went ahead and reserved a table spot at the town festival on October 3rd. With the intent that we'll get somebody to staff it and provide information about we have such a thing as a housing production plan. It's about to begin. This is what it is. This is why we do it. You will be asked to participate. You know, it's not a mystery. It's an open public process. And we'd like to hear from you in public about your housing concerns in town. And Robert immediately said he wanted to come and staff the table. And he will bring his daughter for the day. Lovely. But hopefully by then we'll have the vendor and we can talk to the vendor saying, if you can send one of your own people, great. If you can't, what do you want displays? You must have posters, literature, stuff like that. You know, send me e-copies of whatever you've got. We can have it all printed. If you want surveys, hand it out to the public. We can do that. So I'm about to hustle around and find volunteers. So this is where I try to get you to offer to take an hour on that day to sit at the housing table. And it's seven hours long. Yeah, I know. I cannot. I'm already at two tables. I know you can't. You're, you're, you know, I'm already supposed to be in multiple places. So I'm going to find hopefully somebody else to run the native plant thing. And so that I can run the housing thing if necessary. Is Michelle? Hmm? Is it Michelle? Oh, yeah, Michelle's moved to another town. That's what I thought. And she can't come. I know. So I'll find somebody. You know, we'll do it somehow. But at this point, it's more important that we talk to the public about housing than we talk about native plants. So the garden. That garlic mustard in our neighborhood. That's crazy. We go door to door to our neighbors trying to get them. Beg them to pull it up. Sometimes we just pull it up ourselves. Yeah. We just go through the neighborhood with big garbage bags and getting too tired to do that. Garbage bags and garlic. Garbage bags and garlic mustards. Yeah. At least it's easy to pull. It is easy. Yeah. Some of the other invasives are. I've tried to. I've thought about how to get the high school to get the kids out one day in the spring doing a garlic mustard pull because it's all around the perimeter of the high school. Let alone the trash pickup tape, which I have. Got to get to the earth science teacher. Earth science. I don't know. The trash around the high school is just horrible. But anyway, that's not. Teenage. Teenagers. No, it's also the town has to open it up. There's a lot of old sport equipment under the stands. I mean, I walk there all the time. So, anyway. Anyway, good gene. I will try to do it. But as we get closer, I'll talk more about that. Okay. But it's an interesting idea. Yeah. Well, I just feel bad for the vendor. This is the biggest event in the year to get the public to walk by and listen to something. I feel bad for the vendor that, you know, we don't get to do it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I know it's got to be done right, but... Well, I mean, it's all the planning, the community meetings, the forums, the surveys, all the stuff that they end up doing. That is the part that's going to take time. And, you know, the closer you get to Christmas, the harder it is to get any kind of... Sponsor. You know, the holidays starting late November or mid-November, it's like nobody wants to go to meetings, nobody wants to fill out surveys. Right. So we've got two months to kind of, I don't know, we'll see. Anybody else able to... Didn't they do an online one? It's the third. Yes, they did an online survey the last time. The third of October, the Saturday. But I think we had some community forum meetings. I think there was some in-person meetings that the consultants ran. I think there were two. Maybe one or two. Anyway, Jean, thank you for all of that work on that. Yeah. And I have been meeting with people on other committees in town just for casual conversations and reminding them, you know, this exists, this exercise in planning, it's important. You know, we want people to participate. We don't want this to appear to be something that isn't, you know, community-wide. So hopefully, if I keep doing that, I'll have a bunch of people make a call and say, would you write to whoever your group is, whatever you do, and see if you can shake out the conversation. And now some people will show up at focus groups or discussions. The town is sending out far more emails now. And, you know, there's a better way of getting in touch with more people. Right. This has been held before. I'm sorry? This has been held before. Last year was the? The festival, yes. And it was a great success. It used to be touch a trucks at the record store. The recreation department did. And then there was a multi-cultural festival that was held in the schools, the elementary schools. And they've mushed them all together, H-R-D-E-I. And they threw the 250th in there now. But that's, this is going to be our last year. Although, I've already been told they're planning to continue the parade. Yes. Oh. Okay. Anyway. So that's enough on that, I think. Okay. Is it like an hour, two hours? One hour, if we can just get people to do an hour. That's why I'm saying it's seven. You said Robert's going to be there all day, though. Well, he's going to try. But he's going to have a child in tow. And I'd prefer he didn't have to be there all day. And he'll probably be there. But he's going to have to get up to the planning board to see if something really needs to go wrong. So it's not long. If they have the flyers or all that stuff, it shouldn't be that difficult because the housing authorities do that too when they're doing their production. Right. I'm sure there's lots of stuff we can come up with, ideas to catch people's eye and get them to stop and talk. And I'm trying to borrow doll houses from people and put up, doll houses in front of the signs about housing. You know, where do you live and blah, blah, blah. Because it will make people stop. A lot of people are pushing strollers and have little kids. There's a doll house. The kids will stop and poke at the doll house and they can say, wow, your child is interested in housing. Do you know Alyssa Skola? Yeah. The Historical Society had a doll house show. Uh-huh. Okay. Okay, 212, anything new? No. They have still not sent out the RFP. No new answers about why that hasn't happened. I actually confirmed that with somebody in a program. I was in a position to know today and the answer was it hasn't been sent out yet. So here we sit. Based on yesterday's meeting, they said they did mail it out of yesterday. I was going to say, Chris Reynolds is now on the Housing Trust and he actually came to the meeting. Yes. He was posted. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. And he's, he's, you know. He said that they were, that the RFP would ask for 2, 3 or 4 dwellings on the property. Uh-huh. So that was better than what I had heard. Right. And they're not going to put one person in each of the four dwellings. Yeah. Well, I'm still unhappy. It sounds like you're going to have more people. I'm still unhappy. It's like, that's, we started the conversation with two, two, two dwellings. About 10 people served. So it'd be better to get it up to 20, but on four acres of land. I know. I'm sorry. At some point, you know, we may need to send a letter and say. Well, go ahead. They've already heard. They've already heard from me at length. Well, and certainly Tom has heard from me. Uh-huh. But the trust, I think, would write a letter. I mean, Mike Stady. Yeah. Thinks that. Yeah. really needs to have many more people. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Any updates going back to, you know, our meeting after Dana? Last time I had a report on the Core 95 partnership housing meeting. I don't have any new reports from them. Nobody else? Okay. The annual report. Now, there were lots of. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Corrections. We had them from both Jim and Rachel. Jim had, I think, only a couple. And I believe I included one. I think I said. Oh, gosh. Look at that. When you double-side paper, it doesn't always work out. Yeah. Okay. So I think I included the first of Jim's, the last of Jim's. Yeah. I think I just changed the wording slightly. So I think basically the edits that I did. I don't know if anybody else did edits. Just the two of you. Just the two of us. So are there any additional? And there was, oh, Janot made one other comment, which had to do with the comment about, if we can find the paragraph about the Good Shepherd. Because in the annual report, it said the former. Yes. And she said, no, isn't it correct that it's being leased? And that is correct. They still own the property. And you corrected. I corrected. That to 60 units of affordable housing on a portion of their. On a portion of their. I took out the former. And I think the only other thing that I changed was the last sentence of the annual report. And, Jean, I just want to say again that this was a big job. You did a phenomenal job. Thank you. You're very kind. Thank you. Oh, really, thank you. It's a lot to go through, all the minutes from the year, as we know. So I think if you like the wording of the last point on the last page, if you're happy with that, then I suspect, I mean, Jim wrote back and said he was happy with the edits. So he's happy. My question was one from the, that I sent originally that, well, it says that the partnership serves as. Oh, yes. The initial. Yeah, that's. I think we should need to follow up because that is on the website. Yeah, so we. And I would remove it from there because. It should be removed from here. Did we, did I not remove it? I don't know because I already crossed it out. So I don't know whether it's your, you or me, Jim, but anyway. Well, it should be crossed out. So you have my draft. Yeah, and I have Jim's. So all you have to do is accept the changes and put in, make sure that your comment is heard. So we need a motion. Can I ask a question about Father O'Leary? Should there be a reference to the time that he was on the committee? Oh, that, I had wondered that as well. Where is he mentioned? This project was initiated by WHP pre-COVID in collaboration with. Oh, yes. I would say. Parish priest, Father David O'Leary, who was member of the WHP. Good point. Mary, did you find that? I haven't, and I have a messed up page here. It's on the. I think that's a good point, Kathy. It's on the third page. The bottom of the second page. Okay. Mm-hmm. Begin with the partnership, also continue to follow. Jean, were you okay with all the edits that I did? Well, I haven't seen edits from everybody. Just the two. It was just Jim and Rachel. Yeah. Given how many edits there were, I'm not sure we can vote tonight, because I think they have to be in by the end of the month. Do you want me to, I mean, we could read it, if that would help. What would help so that Mary can get this submitted? Well, I just, it's a matter of form, just that everybody on the committee has seen it, all the edits, or heard all the edits. Right, but I know in other committees I've been on, they, you know, they've discussed the edits and. Accepted it as amended. And said that. That's fine. Why don't we do it that way, then? Why don't you go through and, you know, talk about the edits so that we're all clear about, you know, the edits. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Did you not get, did you not get my edited version? I did. Oh, okay. I did. But I don't. Well, that's, that's basically, that's pretty much it, because you said Jim had them. Jim, Jim wrote back great edits. I don't know if he sent it just to me or to him. No, he sent it to everybody. So he was happy with what I had done. And, you know, I, I, as I said, I, I made the mistake of not starting my edits from his edits. But I went back and I said, I'll just insert them. But I think you said for this. He had only two things. I believe there were only two comments on this. So basically, you've seen. So, Mary, would you go back, and all I want to hear is where the comments are of substance to the message, you know, the key, what did this committee do, facts. And lots of the stuff is just form and how one prefers to say something, just to make sure we're all clear. I think the website says what we used to do, which was that we were the first group that a developer of a 40-feet would come to for information and for, and so forth. They used to come to us, make their brief presentation before they went to other committees. When the town manager took over, that, his mandate, the town manager mandate changed so that he or she, the town manager, became the first line of. Right. And so, we're discussing a project with the developer. So, what we've got, though, is something we never picked up before, which is that we've got a discrepancy between the website and the rules that we're operating under. So, I think the annual report should be consistent with the rules and that we could change the website. And you've done that by eliminating the last paragraph of page one. I hope so. Partnership serves as the initial town project. Yep, that's out. That's out. So, I think we, I think in terms of substance. You know, I think I was following what is true as opposed to what is not true, which is the website is incorrect. I would take out a planning board rep, the conservation committee rep from the initial membership because all of us, all but a few of us, are representing something. All right. So, I would take that out. I would eliminate the sentence about the initial town. Jim wanted the years of all of the dates. So, the second paragraph under the summary is February 12th, 2025. And again, on the top of the next page, also the date. Rachel added that Catherine Provost was a former member and then the 60 units at Good Shepherd and giving credit to Father O'Leary. More dates on page three. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. The last one investigated in the report, to build affordable housing and build additional units on existing, on the parcel. That's the term. So, that's what, those are the changes. Okay. Okay. So, is there a motion to? So, I don't have a motion. So, I'll go ahead. SUBMIT THIS AS I DON'T KNOW, AM I MOVING? BECAUSE I'M SORT OF A LIAISON. NO, BUT I'M A LIAISON, SO I CAN STILL MOVE. OKAY. SO I MOVE THAT WE APPROVE THE ANNUAL REPORT AS WRITTEN, AS AMENDED. I'M SECONDING. GOT TO BE SECONDED. ALL IN FAVOR? AYE. OKAY. WELL, THE ARTICLE FOR THE POST, THAT HAS A LOT MORE STUFF. I DON'T KNOW THAT NECESSARILY I WANT TO ASK YOU TO WORK ON THAT TODAY. I THINK WE'VE GOT A WAYS TO GO. THE LAST COUPLE OF ARTICLES THAT I SUBMITTED TO THE POST, THEY REJECTED FOR LACK OF ME INTERVIEWING PEOPLE WHO COULD EITHER SUPPORT THE ASSERTIONS OF THE ARTICLE OR DISPUTE THEM IN A MEANINGFUL WAY. AND SO WHAT I WANTED TO DO WITH THIS FIRST, YOU KNOW, OUTLINE... AM I CORRECT THAT ONLY MARY AND I HAVE SEEN IT? YES. OKAY. SO PEOPLE ARE NOT AWARE OF WHAT YOU'VE DONE IN THIS OPUS. YEAH. SO I'M JUST WAITING FOR THE TWO OF YOU TO TELL ME WHAT TO DO. I WROTE TO YOU. YEAH. NO, NO. I UNDERSTAND. I UNDERSTAND. IT'S JUST, YOU KNOW, KIND OF WHAT THE NEXT STEP SHOULD BE. DO YOU NOW WANT TO SEND IT TO THE ENTIRE COMMITTEE? I'M ALWAYS WORRIED ABOUT RESPECTING THE OPEN MEETING LAW AND HOW MUCH I CAN DISTRIBUTE ANYTHING UNTIL I GOT INSTRUCTIONS FROM THE CHAIR. SO, YOU KNOW, IF YOU'RE READY TO SHOW IT TO THE WHOLE COMMITTEE... WELL, I MEAN... BUT I THINK IT NEEDS TO COME FROM YOU, NOT FROM ME, IF IT GOES TO THE WHOLE COMMITTEE. OKAY. BUT YOU'RE GOING TO MAKE CHANGES ACCORDING TO RACHEL, OR ARE YOU SENDING OUT THE ORIGINAL? WELL, I'M NOT SENDING OUT ANYTHING. I EXPECT WE'LL SEE A COUPLE MORE GRAPHS BEFORE WE GET CLOSE TO SOMETHING I CAN SEND TO THE FOST. WELL, I KNOW, BUT... YOU KNOW, I... LOOK, AGAIN, JEAN, THE AMOUNT OF WORK YOU DID ON THIS IS... IT'S, LIKE, PHENOMENAL, HONESTLY. WELL, I'M USING ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE TO BE DOING MY RESEARCH, SO... JUST TO BE HONEST. AND I DO TRY REALLY HARD TO CHECK IT ALL, AND YOU DO IT AS YOU GO ALONG, AND THEN YOU DO IT AGAIN AT THE END. SO, THERE'S SO MUCH INFORMATION, YOU KNOW, AND IT'S, UH... YEAH. AND I TRIED TO... WHEN I WROTE TO YOU, I TRIED TO SORT OF GIVE AN OUTLINE FOR WHAT I THOUGHT... YES, YOU DID. ...THE ARTICLE SHOULD BE, AND IT OBVIOUSLY HAS TO BE A LOT SHORTER... YES. ...THAN THIS. NO, THIS WAS STRICTLY... I WANTED TO LAY OUT ALL THE POINTS RELATED TO THE HISTORY OF THE COMMITTEE, YOU KNOW, AND IT'S GOT TO BE A LOT SHORTER, AND I NEED TO GET QUOTES FROM OTHER ENTITIES IN TOWN WHO HAVE AN OPINION ABOUT WHAT THE COMMITTEE HAS DONE. I THINK THE FIRST THING IS TO SORT OF DECIDE ON AN OUTLINE, AND I OFFERED YOU WHAT I THOUGHT WAS AN OUTLINE. YES. AND YOU CAN EITHER SAY, I LIKE IT AND I CAN REVISE IT THAT WAY, OR YOU CAN SAY, I WANT TO TWEAK IT AND DO A DIFFERENT OUTLINE, BUT I THINK WE NEED TO, YOU KNOW, I'D BE GLAD TO READ TO THE COMMITTEE WHAT I WROTE AS WHAT I THOUGHT THIS ARTICLE SHOULD SOUND LIKE, BUT I'M ALSO HAPPY TO WAIT UNTIL THE NEXT MEETING, HOWEVER YOU WANT IT. YEAH, I THINK PROBABLY FOR ME TO TAKE YOUR THOUGHTS, COME UP WITH A SECOND DRAFT, GIVE IT TO MARY AS CHAIR TO DISTRIBUTION TO THE WHOLE COMMITTEE SO THAT WE CAN DISCUSS IT THE NEXT TIME. AND I WILL TRY HARD TO SHORTEN IT UP. BUT I LEARNED A LOT FROM MAKING MYSELF GRIND OUT ALL THE DATA. I LEARNED A LOT TOO. CAN I JUST ASK, IS THIS WHAT YOU WROTE, THIS ARTICLE, ABOUT THE WORK OF THE COMMITTEE? YEAH. I'M JUST TRYING TO HELP JACKIE OVER HERE. IT'S SORT OF TO LOOK AT WHY COMMITTEES LIKE THIS EXIST IN MASSACHUSETTS TOWNS. THEY ARE NOT MANDATORY. YOU DON'T HAVE TO HAVE A COMMITTEE LIKE THIS. AND SO WHY WOULD TOWNS CHOOSE TO HAVE ONE? HOW DOES IT HELP THE TOWN, YOU KNOW, PROCEED TOWARD ITS AFFORDABLE HOUSING GOALS? AND THEN IN THE CASE OF THIS SPECIFIC TOWN, YOU KNOW, WHAT HAS BEEN DONE OVER TIME? WHAT PROJECTS HAVE BEEN COMPLETED? WHAT OPPORTUNITIES HAVE BEEN EXAMINED? EVEN THOUGH MAYBE THEY DIDN'T COME TO COMPLETION BECAUSE THEY WERE REJECTED ALONG THE WAY. AND I JUST THINK IT'S A TIMELY THING TO DO BECAUSE THE PUBLIC IS GOING TO START HEARING ABOUT THE HOUSING PRODUCTION PLAN. AND IF WE GIVE THEM, YOU KNOW, WE NEED TO CREATE SOME CONTEXT BECAUSE I REALLY THINK IT'S IMPORTANT TO TRY TO GET THE CITIZENS TO PAY ATTENTION TO THIS AND KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON AND KNOW THAT IT'S A TRANSPORTATION AND TRANSPARENT PROCESS AND THE TOWN REALLY DOES MAKE EFFORTS TO ADDRESS AFFORDABILITY IN TOWN. AND WE'LL ONLY DO THAT BY GETTING OUT IN FRONT OF THEM MULTIPLE TIMES IN VARIOUS WAYS. AND THE LAST HOUSING PRODUCTION PLAN QUESTIONED WHY WE HAVE THREE COMMITTEES. YEAH, AND IT'S PRETTY OBVIOUS WHY WE HAVE THREE COMMITTEES. THEY'RE VERY DIFFERENT. AND YOU CAN ADD THE PLANNING BOARD IS IN THE BOARD COMMITTEE INVOLVED WITH HOUSING AS WELL AS THE TRUST AND THE HOUSING AUTHORITY. SO THEY REALLY... BUT EVERYBODY HAS ITS OWN... AND NOBODY IS AN ADVOCATE THE WAY WE ARE. WE'RE THE ONLY EXPLICIT ADVOCACY GROUP OUT THERE PUSHING THE ISSUES AS MUCH AS WE CAN. OKAY. OKAY. THEN THE THIRD THING UNDER THIS IS THE MINUTES FROM THE LAST MEETING. AND THERE WERE A FAIR NUMBER OF EDITS FROM HER AND FROM RACHEL. MANY OF THEM... CORRECTION KIND OF THINGS, NOT ALWAYS THERE SUCH COMMITTEE. ANYTHING YOU WANT TO HIGHLIGHT? I DIDN'T THINK I HAD ANY CORRECTIONS FOR ME. WELL, I THINK JIM HAD A LOT OF SORT OF EDITORIAL KIND OF THINGS. YEAH, I HAVE ONE CHANGE THAT I HADN'T EMAILED IN, BUT I WOULD LIKE TO SOFTEN SOMETHING IN THAT LAST PARAGRAPH NUMBER FOUR BECAUSE IT SAYS THAT WE WERE FORCED TO DESIGNATE AREAS THAT CANNOT REALISTICALLY EVER BE USED. AND IT WOULD BE GOOD, I THINK, TO SOFTEN THAT A LITTLE BIT AND JUST SAY THAT IN ORDER TO COMPLY, WE DESIGNATED PARCELS THAT ARE UNLIKELY TO EVER BE DEVELOPED. I THINK THAT'S A GOOD EDIT. THANK YOU. SO DO YOU WANT TO MOVE? YEAH.
I WONDERED ABOUT THAT. WE WOULDN'T BE THE FIRST TOWN THAT CHOSE PARCELS THAT WOULD NEVER BE DEVELOPED. I'M GLAD YOU'RE NOT BEING ABLE TO TELL ME ABOUT THAT. YEAH. WE CERTAINLY WERE NOT THE ONLY ONES, BUT I AGREE WITH THAT. YEAH. I THINK IT'S BETTER NOT TO HAVE THAT ON THE RECORD QUITE SO EXPLOSIVELY.
I USE MY BEST HANDWRITING. OKAY. WELL, SOMETIMES I CAN'T REMIND EITHER, BUT IF I WORK AT IT, I WORK AT IT, OKAY. I'M JUST LOOKING AT MY OWN EDITS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE FIRST PAGE UNDER 4B. IT LOOKS LIKE I DIDN'T STRIKE THROUGH AT THE NEXT TO LAST LINE AS AN AND. THAT LOOKS LIKE IT'S HANGING THERE THAT DOESN'T CONNECT WITH ANYTHING. SO IT SAYS, THE COST OF CREATING AN ADU PERIOD. AND THEN I STRUCK OUT ACTIVITIES. OH, YOU LEFT THAT AND THERE. YEAH, SO THE AND, I DON'T KNOW IF YOU SEE WHERE IT IS, MARY. THE VERY BOTTOM OF THE FIRST PAGE, 4B. IF YOU PASS IT OVER, I'LL MARK IT.
I DON'T KNOW IF OTHERS SEE THAT. THERE'S A HANGING AND THERE. THAT DOESN'T CONNECT WITH ANYTHING. SO YOU PUT THE WORD COMMON, COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS ON THAT ADU. DOES THAT MEAN YOU'RE STRIKING ACTIVITIES AT THE END? THAT HAD GONE, I STRUCK THAT OUT. OH, GOOD. AND RIGHT BEFORE THAT, THERE'S AN AND THAT DIDN'T GET STRIKED OUT. STRUCK OUT? OUT. OUT. KILL. OUT. DELI해�ED? STRIKEN? STRIKEN. EXCEL. OKAY. OKAY. SO THANK YOU. THANK YOU. THANK YOU. YOU'RE WELCOME. MS. A MOTION TO ACCEPT THE MINUTES AS CORRECTED. I MOVE TO ACCEPT THE MINUTES FOR AUGUST 11TH AS CORRECTED. SECOND? LET ME MAKE A SECOND. MAHOLE FAITHER? Okay, all right, so next steps, we'll revisit the article at the next meeting, and the other specific. Did you meet with the town? Was there? Yes. About zoning, isn't there? Didn't you have a conversation about zoning? Yeah, we can talk about that. We both went. It was a very congenial meeting. This was with the town manager? This was with the planner. Oh, Robert. Robert, yeah. And you? And Kathleen. The three of you? Yeah, and basically, we told them that before we, you know, wade into the housing production plan, it wouldn't be a bad idea to have just a background review of the various kinds of zoning already in town, because one of the things you can include in a housing production plan is recommendations about changes to zoning. And I, for one, didn't know much about zoning. So we, he talked through all the different kinds. I think what we need to do is probably spend time with a map and a list of all the different kinds of zoning and kind of walk through. It's confusing. There are an awful lot of overlays in this town. So a lot of places, you're going to have to go through a lot of different kinds of zoning. And you're looking at at least double layers of regulation over how the land and, you know, like... Yeah, most of the, most of the multiple overlays are just here in the center of town. Once you get out into the single residential, it's, they're less. There are some water related overlays, things like that. But for the most part, not so much once you're outside of the downtown, downtown area. You know, some downtown areas are less. But for the most part, not so much once you're outside of the downtown, downtown area. Sometimes more helpful than the map is actually the chart that shows tablet and light says is that we're pretty mature so you don't go down and go back to it. If that happens we could give you an edge on the macro map, at least that's, that's, that's pretty big approval. But some more helpful than the map is actually the chart that shows the setbacks. There's a chart that pretty clearly lays outоз with an end lot sizes that kind of stuff. So that's also is very helpful to look at. . You were speaking from the chart. I always fall back to that all. But it's mostly relevant here in the center of town. So one of the interesting things that came out of that conversation is before we had the conversation I had done some research looking for progressive zoning in Massachusetts looking for examples where they were able to create more effective cluster housing than we have here. We have you know a cluster housing bylaw that basically doesn't increase density. They basically if this was seven acres, and it was zoned R40, then normally you would just cut it into seven lots and put seven houses on it. Under our cluster bylaw you push the housing closer together. They're still on their own individual lots and part of the land is kept for conservation. But there's really no any kind of strong incentive to increase the density. I thought you had to increase the conservation cluster. It did increase it, but not by much. It created the opportunity and it was small. So we, one of the towns that came up as an example of you know having really come up with a good way of increasing density and limiting house size. You know like setting a can't be bigger than this. Yeah, and the shield is Acton. Well turns out Robert used to work at Acton and really admires this piece of regulation that they put through there. So he perked right up and said, oh yeah, you know, that's great. And he was actually there and he knows all the people who did it. Just say again, what exactly it is that? Okay, yeah, so they, they, these things are usually called either environmental clusters or village clusters. Different towns call them different thing and the state has some, you know, regulation that gives its own name. But the idea is we go back to the same piece of land, let's say our seven acres, and this time what you do is you save a big old piece of conservation land and on the remaining land you substantially increase the density. So let's say Dublin goes from seven big houses to 14 cottages where there's a specified limit on how you can build, how big you can build one of these things. And the idea behind it is one of the reasons that developers won't build this kind of housing for us is they can't maximize their profit. You know, we have zoned these big lots and they can put one house or now one in an ADU on a property and they do all their spreadsheets. And that's how you stay in the building business. It's possible to design one of these things where you give them some concessions on costs and they actually make more money making the village than they do making the big house. And some of the ways that's done is like the suggested house size. I was again running off researching trying to figure out in a community like this what might optimal house size be.
1,750 feet kept coming up time and again as being what a family home used to be quite a few decades ago, but it still had all the pieces and functions. That people expect to have in a house.
It suggested use of shared driveways to minimize how much you're paving over and keeping your permeability and management. It recommended making it possible for them to do some kind of communal septic system that served all the houses as a way of getting the cost per house down. Susan When? It sounds like 40 feet. Well, I think when we he got pretty excited about it and he knows the person who planned it. And I suggested well, maybe we could talk about doing a case study day where and all these different boards that have been this long. that have a hand in uh building and development in town actually had somebody make a presentation say here's a case study we're acting here's how we figured this all out and here's how we made it win-win-win the town gets missile missing metal housing the conservation environmental objectives are enhanced because they get this nice big piece of land that's not going to get built on um the there's an increase in revenues basically again set it up looking so that there's no losses in taxation by putting in uh i don't know if you if you've listened to the conversations about the building big houses here big houses are not going to get built they're not going to get built they're not going to get built houses pay a lot of taxes that house that's been tur was on waltham road and it was a big mansion and it has been turned into a school one of the carroll schools they paid a hundred and thirty thousand dollars a year in property taxes on that property when it was a residence so you know it ends up being very tempting to a town that's looking for tax revenue so if we're going to get the revenue situation you know can't be undermining revenues and still run our town we've got to figure out how to do that and acton and a couple other towns who are doing similar things are asserting that they've done it you know that they they've come up with a model is superior for affordable housing and now we're talking small a affordable housing just so ordinary people who do not qualify for subsidized housing can get into a town or if they're already there and they're empty nesters and they want to downsize they do not have to move away because our condominiums all cost a million dollars so even though this isn't capital a affordable subsidized housing i think it's very much worth undertaking this and with your reference to 40tb trying to look for ways that we can get official you know shi countable units in some of these projects so how many how many parcels do we have that even that would even potentially be able i mean not many it's not easy are you saying that there are two parts to it yet including the four units collect belong to the city and all Hopefully, some of those units will become exercising not totally, not gonna be turns into bigger complex projects unless you knowisin, hopefully it has a anybody, whether it's a pvc program, there's anreading summer project to do that. Not many. Not money. Not money. Not money. No money. No money. Not money. No money. No money. Not When Acton did this, Acton was much less densely developed, fully developed. I don't know how old their bylaw is, but, you know, as a town, it wasn't developed as early as Wayland was. Right, and it's a little different as a town anyway. It's a little different as a town anyway. But I just, I mean, it sounds great. I just can't imagine how many parcels we have, even of seven acres. That would even be... Right, I mean, I realize that, but it's a way of, you get some, and it's a way of getting people to look at other opportunities.
Like everybody's ignoring the ballot question here about giving people the right to create duplexes out of their house. And because it requires that you have sewer systems. And we only have a ton. We only have a tiny bit of sewer systems. There's almost no properties in this town that would be affected by that. But it doesn't mean that we couldn't propose something like that and say, okay, you know, let's figure out a rule. If somebody's house is over 5,000 square feet, they can, by right, turn it into a duplex if they don't increase the number of bedrooms. Sort of like an ADU conversation. It's kind of an ADU conversation. But it's intended to put another option on the table. And it's going to be, you know, there's the financial incentives are in the right place. You know, people do this in their self-interest. And they do all the financing. You know, we don't have to go around with a tin cup trying to find grants to do something. Housing starts to increase. Because the incentives are aligned. So it's a great idea. I just wanted to make one quick comment. When you talked about affordable housing, small a. So there's a phrase in the housing world that's called naturally occurring affordable housing. Okay. So when you're doing your AI research. Okay, I will look for it. I believe it's called naturally occurring, which is basically market rate housing. Yeah. It's like what a lot of us bought into. Wayland when you can afford to buy into Wayland. It's like I live in on Oxbow up on the launcher houses. And those were naturally occurring. And I live on Cherena in what was then a, you know, a starter neighborhood. And we were one of the early owners. And that was, you know, it was like a very middle class. Two wage earners. But, you know, we could barely swing it. But it was, you know, it was market rate low end. Kind of crummy houses that were, you know, put up with no insulation, single pane windows, you know. It was not. Welcome to launcher. Well, you know, same deal on Cherena Road. Yeah. They were not high. Yeah. It was not the Waltham Road kind of property. It was pretty low end of everything. But it was naturally occurring. And it was affordable. Right. And we used to call it entry level. There's no entry level practically. Even entry level has gotten expensive. Right. And before I was on Oxbow, I was on Jeffrey. And, you know, all those. 1960s ranch houses. They were entry level when I moved to town. But even those, even the ones that haven't been improved, they're still over a million dollars. Yeah. So. So one of the things that they didn't talk about effectively in this ballot question is replacing old buildings. This state is old. And it has lots of. It has lots of old housing. And not all the old housing is virtuous. It is not well built. It hasn't been well maintained. It's not historic. And so one of the big environmental problems we have here is a lot of the old housing stock is very energy inefficient. And spewing carbon everywhere because they have to burn so much fuel in order to create enough heat with the heat flowing out through the. Walls and the windows and the roof. We replaced all the windows. Pardon? We've replaced all the windows. Oh, yeah, very good. I just wanted to note that we do not have single pane. So there's all these old houses where the occupants really can't make economic sense out of pulling down their old house and replacing it. But if they could pull down their own house and put up two housing units, on the same lot, their numbers would start looking very different. And they would have an income stream for potential rental on one half of the duplex, which would become a rental unit for them. And we might see this becoming a way of people taking down housing that should come down and building stuff that's with current environmental code. But the state has tried to figure out ways to provide incentives to do this. And quite a few years ago now, maybe 15 years ago now, there was a state program for what's called deep energy retrofit. And you could apply if you had a house of a certain age and get a grant. And what it helped you do was pull off all the siding on your house and put on several inches of rigid foam insulation. And then you reclad your house and the walls are now thicker. And then you get all new energy efficient windows sealed into your newly sealed up no longer leaky house. And people snapped those up like crazy. It was a very popular program, and people were thrilled to be able to do it. But when the state sat down, looked at the numbers of what it would cost them to run programs like this to replace. Housing, there was no way they could continue, the numbers didn't work. But if you figure out a way to make it possible for the individual property owner to make it financially feasible, you can promote it as a way to go ahead and get a modern house. Anyway, I've been reading the promotional stuff written about that ballot question and it's not a point anybody's making and I think it's an oversight. It's too bad. There is a lot of debate, the little I've read about it, is there is debate about taking down older homes and putting up two very expensive homes, particularly in dense areas, in Cambridge for example. Right. Where there might be... Right. An older building with maybe a lot of roommates or whatever and then putting up two million dollars because Cambridge, you can put up a closet in Cambridge and it'll be two million dollars. Yeah, they take down sort of an apartment building basically and put in two single family houses. Yeah. Each one. So there's a concern about losing some of the naturally occurring affordable rentals where you've got... That's why you've got to write your regulations. The problem is that the state tries to do one size fits all and one size doesn't fit all. It has the opposite effect in a rural area and then an unanticipated effect in an urban area. Well, it's anticipated now because we... Now we know. Now we know that you put up... You give anybody in Cambridge the opportunity to put up two units on a single family zone and it's like, yeah, I'm in. It's like... Yeah. Yeah. It's like you're going to sell it for big, big bucks. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Anyway, Jean, thank you again. At some point, Kathy was talking about having a learning session as part of our meetings and I'm wondering about having sort of a primer on our zone. Is that something that we're doing? I don't know. something that is of interest and is it something that you can do or I feel woefully inadequate for the task because as long as I've been on zoning I have had almost no insight into the process every time I ask a question like well for this yes but for that no every time I'm like well how do you know when you have to go to the building department the zoning board or the planning board they're like yes no no I want an answer they're like so I can't a little bit I think it might be helpful if we did the meeting over zoom and asked Robert to join he's more likely to be willing to join or yeah yeah but they're more likely to join over zoom Robert especially at night so he'll come if he has to but he'd rather be able to be home of course so I really rather rather than reviewing what we have for zoning I'd really rather see a presentation about the way other communities are finding ways to create middle market housing and just as I was thinking of this as the first as the first step of yeah of a learning and I think that makes sense based on what we did the other day and I think that makes sense based on what we did the other day in terms of going through that giving up right because I don't think it would take all that much time right you know what we did with Robert I think really was I learned more from listening to James just what you just did now and I went there I really became a listener yeah and but I have questions I have questions about you may know the answer this conservation land not state conservation Waidland conservation right huh I know I think I know that when there was a school street property and there was an issue down there I think they had to go to the state legislature to get it converted back that Wayland needed to take it back conservation C goodbye it required a legislative action to do that if that's the case yeah I'm doing whether we can't do that again and identifying other parcels I I know that it will offend people, but when we talk about housing versus open land and all this, I just wonder sometime, who are we? I mean, talk about the entitled class and let's talk about people without housing and maybe we should be thinking a little more about what land we have taken as a town. I know we can't take federal land. Yeah, so it sounds right to me that if something was designated and a deed restriction put on it and made it conservation land, yes, you'd either have to have, you'd have to have some way of reverting that and I would imagine it might have to go to the legislature, but it first has to get through town meeting and that I see as being unlikely. See, I think it would be unlikely in terms of just like the holiday vote and things like that, but the neighborhoods get it. But I'm talking about the whole town getting to vote and. There have been two times that I'm aware of where the town did take conservation land and did try to put a house there and one was on Plain Road
where there was a Sears Roebuck house, I believe. And they were concerned about taking that house and making it into an affordable unit, but it was, it had to be torn down. Because it just wasn't salvageable. And then when Stonebridge, recently,
there, we took a parcel and there was a house on it and there was discussion about making that affordable. And again, I think it was torn down. Could you speak a little louder, please? I'm having trouble hearing you. Well, it's usually me. Anyway, so I think there are times when that has been done, but it doesn't mean, you know, it's not something that we'll. I was thinking more in terms of, I mean, Robert talked about getting like chaper involved in terms of a grassroots, you know, habit here. It's not just the Citizens Housing and Planning Association, which is kind of the regional, but more statewide housing advocacy group. And basically, clearly it's not going to go on display in terms of this additional kind of work to be looking at promoting this initiative. But, you know, Jeanne's ideas and there's a lot of ideas, but we don't really, you know, it might all come back to town meeting in the town, the rural community. And if it turns into, wants to stay that way, or maybe can, you know, find the targets. And I don't know, but this is seems like it's an idea that maybe we should come up with a list after we educate ourselves a little better. On that note, one of my pet peeves, whenever for years has been the little fiefdoms of Park and Rec and School Committee. And when we're talking about land and open parcels, I don't know. the numbers but i would guess most of the open land is under the control of one of these committees it's not this it's not the select board that has control so we've got park and rec and school department holding on to parcels and i don't know how much because i've never looked at it clearly but i know that there's a lot of open space on a lot of these pieces of land that you could definitely it seems to me add some housing units just like saint dan's did in part of their parcel you know there's wooded areas behind happy hollow i don't know where the property lines are between there and the uh yeah i don't know you know maybe i'm just talking about the but that's been one of my you know conservation land but maybe lower hanging fruit than conservation the school department and park and rec which is like i i don't know there's plenty of land on our school the only thing the other well not the only the other issue i see in whalen in particular a lot of parcels that have been turned over to conservation or even some of the undeveloped areas around schools and rec space is wet wet is what is wet and um and is unbuildable yeah well that you would have to take out yeah yeah we were talking about alpine field for god alpine field it's just awful it's not buildable down there you know the road is horrible wet is horrible but we would just basically have a list on identifying you know other communities what they're doing creative yeah our own barriers i don't know whether it's a barrier and i don't know how concrete it is but the issue about no shared driveways they used to have shared driveways in whalen yeah i would talk about them but my understanding is they don't allow them anymore so well why not because it does i mean some of it i think comes down to the fire department right that's what that's what robert said because if it's a shared driveway they have to be able to get in and turn around and they can't do that if it's unless you put a big enough circle at the end which like they're doing at charina with because they're putting a couple houses in over there and the traffic's the circle they have to have at the end of their dead end road because yeah it's huge because you've got to be able to turn a fire engine around in it so i lived in california for a long time and there's a popular housing style they're called a hollywood court and so here's your road and your court would have a green space in the middle that was a commons and then all around the court are the houses which are bungalows small little houses and then there's a road that goes around the outside like this there's a big one-way u like this so everybody came in this way and everybody had parking behind their house and the fire truck can get all the way through on this on this u and they packed a lot of housing units in not much space and this green space became where the picnic tables were and the barbecue pits and where everybody came hung out and their little bungalows they're adorable we're typically this is california this is california they were typically stuccoed and they were often pink and they were right here they do what they do it with townhouse loud�� houses around here and I see it out in Wisconsin when I'm visiting my daughter which saw them everywhere in Virginia but you see them here as townhouses and the garages come in from the back I'm not sure how many people enjoy living in them because you're because then what happens is the sort of the face of your house is really you know there's yes there's a little bit of green space in between but you're facing your neighbors there in a different way typically do on them they all have a porch and everybody sits on the porch watches everybody else and talks to all the neighbors this is like right out of Jane Jacobs the death and life of great American cities everybody's watching the children
okay fire trucks the next step should we invite Robert to come in? to come to the next meeting and talk about zoning I think you were going to get us started maybe or yeah I can get you started why don't we start with a 101 with Rob why don't we can embarrass ourselves and you first I'll embarrass myself but yeah that's okay I would start with if Robyn's willing and then we can have more questions maybe for Robert does that sound like yeah see if Robert can print me some of the some good-sized maps that show the overlays that would be great normally when it's on a regular piece of paper it would be a good idea to print some of the good size maps that show the overlays that would be great normally when it's on a regular piece of paper you can't see anything right can't even tell the difference between the different textures that are added to differentiate so so I think zoning zoning 101 okay with Robyn I like that sound I'm not sure I want to ask Robert to come quite yet Oh Robyn okay thank you zoning 101 with Robyn yeah zoning 101 with Robyn yeah zoning 101 with Robyn I'm really excited about the idea of doing a case study led by the person who did this innovative work for ACTA. I think maybe once we get sort of the foundation, then we can do a case study. And I asked them, you know, do they do employee enrichment activities here? Like, do you get time off work to go to some employee training, you know, enrichment kind of activity? And he said, yes. And right now how that time is getting used is that the employees are being encouraged to develop new practices in their department that will reduce the cost of insurance. So that's the current theme on this employee training, which sounds a little dry. Well, he participates in chapel meetings and stuff like that. He's a good guy. He does do other things. Yeah. And he did talk about getting guidance from CHAPA about, you know, if you wanted to have somebody come and just have a conversation with us about breakthrough thinking about housing. You know, what happens when you have a fixed set of opportunities for a long time, it's possible to see that there's no way out of it. And sometimes you need some help to get somebody to say, but. Elsewhere, this has worked, you know, to get you going and figure out where you can push for change with a chance of success.
Okay. So, Robin in October. Robin. Robert. In November. Whenever. The next meeting is whatever. October 14th. 13th. 14th. 14th. 14th. 14th. October 14th at 7 o'clock. It's Wednesday, October 14th at 7. Okay. The following week or the following month is Veterans Day. Right. And so the question is, is that a time when we could do it on Tuesday?
I can't do it that Tuesday.
But that's okay. I mean, in general, I would prefer to meet on Tuesdays, so I'm always happy to do Tuesdays instead of Wednesdays. Oh, I thought you said you wanted to meet on the odd Wednesday. No. No, because what happens, so Wednesday is my gym night. One of my gym nights. And so I have two nights every month to Wednesdays I have to skip because of planning board. So if you guys are meeting on a Wednesday also, it's like a not a Sunday. And I thought we were doing it to accommodate. No, Tuesday is fine with me. No, there was somebody else who didn't want Tuesdays, I thought. Well, let's check on that. So, but I can do the 10th. No, I can't, but that's fine. I'd be happy to listen in. Anybody else have a problem with the 10th of November? I think it sounds good unless I decide to go to Australia. To Australia? Yeah. How can we compete? There's some great, yeah, there's some great deals in the travel industry right now. You've never been, right? I've never been. But you get to L.A. and then they say that it's only 12 hours. Yeah. So 14 hours. Oh, my God. Just take drugs. Drugs, yeah. Significant drugs. Well, maybe at the next meeting we should talk about moving it to Tuesday. If that. Sure. Yeah, we can see how it works. Your calendars and see if Tuesdays are workable. I'm flexible either way. You don't mind me being a little stinky? Yeah, I went more dumb before I came tonight. I love it. I mean, I don't. I look great. I don't look like a pitiful thing. Sorry. Okay, is there a motion to adjourn? I will go. You do it and I'll second it. I need to be adjourned. Thank you. Second it. All in favor? Aye. Good job.