All right. The appointed hour of six o'clock haven't been reached. I call this meeting of the Amherst Zoning Board of Appeals to order. My name is Steve Judge. As ZBA Chair, I want to welcome everyone to this meeting. Resume to Chapter 20 of the Acts of 2021 and extended by Chapter 22 of the Acts of 2022. This meeting will be conducted via remote means. Members of the public who wish to access this meeting may do so via Zoom or by telephone. No in-person attendance of members of the public will be permitted. But every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time via technological means. Additionally, the meetings are recorded and can be viewed via the town of Amherst's YouTube channel and the ZBA web page. In accordance with the provisions of Massachusetts General Laws, Chapter 40A and Article 10 special permit granting authority of the Amherst Zoning Bylaw, this public meeting has been duly advertised and notice thereof has been posted and mailed to parties at interest. We will begin with a roll call of the ZBA members and panel for tonight's meeting. Steve Judge is present. Ms. Parks? Here. Mr. Maxfield? Here. Ms. Gilbert? Or Ms. Marshall? Present. Also attending the public hearing tonight is Maureen Pollock, Planner, and Dave Wastevich, Senior Building Inspector. The Zoning Board of Appeals is a quasi-judicial body that operates under the authority of Chapter 40A of the General Laws of the Commonwealth for the purpose of promoting the health, safety, convenience, and general welfare of the inhabitants of the town of Amherst. One of the most important elements of the Amherst Zoning Bylaw is Section 10.38. Specific findings from this section must be made for all of our decisions. All hearings and meetings are open to the public and are recorded by town staff. The procedure is as follows. The petitioner presents the application to the board during the hearing, after which the board will ask questions for clarification or for additional information. After the board has completed its questions, the board will seek public input. The public speaks with the permission of the chair. If a member of the public wishes to speak, they should so indicate by using the raised hand function on their screen. The chair with the assistance of the staff will call upon people wishing to speak. When you are recognized, please provide your name and address to the board for the record. All questions and comments must be addressed to the board. The board will normally hold public hearings where information about a project and input from the public is gathered, followed by public meetings for each. The public meeting portion is when the board deliberates and is generally not an opportunity for public comment. If the board feels that it has enough information and time, it will decide upon the applications tonight. Each petition is heard by the board is distinct and evaluated on its own merits and the board is not ruled by precedent. Statutorily, for a special permit, the board has 90 days from the close of the hearing to file the decision. For variance, the board has 100 days from the date of filing to file its decision. No decision is final until the written decision is signed by the sitting board members and is filed with the town clerk's office. Once the decision is filed with the town clerk, there is a 20 day appeal period for an agreed party to contest the decision with the relevant judicial body and superior court. After the appeal period, the permit must be recorded at the registry of deeds to take effect. Tonight's agenda, a public hearing, ZBA FY2023-04, Redwood Construction Inc. Requests a special permit to modify the previously approved special permit, ZBA FY2018-21 for the proposed modifications to conditions one, six, 11, 12, 19, condition four, 21, 22, 23, 25, 28, among possible others as they relate to the proposed changes to the site plan, site amenities, building plan and management plan under section 10.33 and 10.38 of the zoning bylaw located at Renew Amherst, 266 East Hadley Road, Map 16D, Parcel 13, Neighborhood Residential, RN Zoning District. We will then have a period of general public comment with public and comment on any matter, not before the board tonight, as well as time for other business not anticipated within the past 48 hours. Before we begin, are there any disclosures for anybody wishes to make? No disclosures, but Steve, you missed me on the roll call there, so. Did I really? You did, you blended two together, but it's all right, John is in fact present. I'm glad you are, John, and thanks for pointing that out. So we've got a full house. We've got a full house. Before we begin, the public hearing will restate the matter before us. That's ZBA FY2023-04, Redwood Construction Inc. Requesting a special permit to modify the previously approved special permit ZBA FY2018-21, the proposed modifications to conditions one, six, 11, 12, 19, condition four, 21, 22, 23, 25, 28, among possible others as they relate to the proposed changes to the site plan, site amenities, building plans, and management plan under section 10.33 and 10.38 of the zoning bylaw located at Renew Amherst, 266 East Hadley Road, Map 16D, Parcel 13, neighborhood resident RN Zoning District. We conducted a site visit on Tuesday morning. We met with the Berkshire Design Group. We noticed that there were, we noted where the previously approved new building was to be located. We noted the previously approved change in the parking lot near the new building. We observed a standalone outdoor grill near the parking lot, which is similar in design to the proposed barbecue grills. We observed the currently approved location of the playground, the community gardens, and the proposed location of the new location of the playgrounds and the four barbecue grills. We had questions about the number and location of bike racks, the changes to the room layout of the new building. We also had questions about the completion schedule and whether the mansard roofs had all been removed as required by an earlier special permit. Ms. Marshall, is there anything else that was requested or discussed that you think needs to be mentioned tonight? I would add that we saw the location of the previously approved new parking lot as well. Right, exactly, good to catch. Okay, I'm gonna go through submissions and then we will open it up to the applicant. We have received submissions to the project summary, ZBA special permit application, dated September 8th, 2022, a management plan, management plan additional information required for apartments, previously approved ZBA FY 2018-21, previously approved ZBA FY 2018-21 permit plan set prepared by Berkshire Design Group, dated January 26th, 2018. These include one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13 different site details, previously approved ZBA FY 2018-21 building plans prepared by O'Sullivan Architect, dated September 13th. These include three different plans, previously approved ZBA FY 2020-16, special permit decision, previously approved ZBA FY 2022-03, previously a special permit decision, proposed the proposed permit plan set prepared by Berkshire Design Group, which contains one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, I think site details, existing conditions, site preparation, overall site layout and planting plans, grading plans and drainage plans. Proposed building plans prepared by O'Sullivan Architects, dated January 21st, 2022. Those include four, or three floor plans, a roof plan and an elevation, a sample lease floor plan for an existing leasing office, the stormwater management report prepared by Christopher Chamberlain PE, and at our site visit we received two, I think those were set on to you Maureen, two visuals showing the new building and the parking lot, as well as the proposed new playground and lawn area that were proposed to change from the existing plan. Town staff submissions include a project application report dated September 6th, but we also have one dated September 8th, a project application report updated, comments from the town engineer dated March 1st and comments from the town engineer dated September 7th. We've received the applicants waiver request for plan requirements, for a lighting plan, a sign plan and a traffic impact station. There's a list of complaints from 2000, 19 back to 2014. Were there any public, and that's a list of submissions. Were there any public comments? I've seen none on the list. No, no, not at this time. I will say that the applicant didn't provide a tenant leasing a leasee notification form in the common areas, I believe of all the apartment buildings on the property notifying of tonight's public hearing and he submitted a notarized affidavit indicating that he did so. Okay, great. All right, who is going to present for the applicant? Please state your name and address for the record. Yeah, I'll go ahead and kick us off. Is my audio coming through okay? Yep. Well, good evening, board members and town staff. My name is Tyler White with Redwood Construction address 2082 Michelson Drive in Irvine, California, 92612. Before I proceed, Maureen is David O'Sullivan in the queue that we can let him in. He's the architect that will be helping to present. Okay, yeah, I'll bring him up as a panelist. Okay, he's coming over. Great, thank you. Thank you for the opportunity to present tonight. I'm gonna go ahead and share my screen and we'll get into the presentation. Let's see here. So as was mentioned, my name is Tyler White with Redwood Construction presenting as well tonight for the applicant team is Mario Martinez, the portfolio manager for the company who's assigned to this property. Also David O'Sullivan from O'Sullivan Architects and Carlos Nieto from Berkshire Design Group who's the project engineer. Just to give a little bit of a background for the benefit of those who may not have been on the board when this project has been presented over the past couple of years, just a quick overview. First phase of the project was constructed in 1968 and then more units were approved in subsequent years from the 1970 through 1994 when 182 units were built. And fast forward to July of 2018, the previous owner of the property was approved to construct 47 additional units bringing the unit count to 229 units. The previous owner applied for an extension for that special permit because construction did not commence in time and that permit extension was granted in March of 2021, Redwood Construction and its affiliate FPA multi-family closed on the property and subsequently transferred the special permit in October of 2021. And that brings us to the summer and fall when in July, 2022, we submitted in our final application to the planning department to amend the special permit which amendments and changes will cover tonight. So that's just a quick overview. Just wanted to share before we get into the various changes that are being requested, just wanted to share some colored renderings of the project of what we hope to construct. As was mentioned with the site visit report, the special permit is tied to the construction of a new amenity space with open space and with the playground as well as additional parking and a new 47 unit building that you see on the plan south of this rendering. We'll get into again more of the specifics of these changes and of what we're requesting to be amended from the special permit as we go through but just wanted to provide a quick overview of the project and show these renderings here just a zoomed in view of the northern section and a zoomed in view of the new 47 unit building that we're proposing to construct. So based off of conversations I've had with Maureen, we've decided to go through each of the approved conditions from ZBA 2018-21, one by one, to share the changes that are being requested. We'll focus on the conditions that are being changed or requested for change, but we'll go through one by one. If any time anyone has any questions, feel free to stop me or anyone who else is presenting and we'd be happy to clarify or go over any questions that you have. So condition number one, a new building shall be approved within the South Point Apartments as located on the approved site plan dated January 26, 2018 having a total of 47 units with the following breakdown. One bedroom, 44 two-bedroom and two three-bedroom units. I'm going to go ahead and pass it over to David O'Sullivan, the project architect to explain the modifications we're requesting to this condition with respect to removing a utility garage and adding a bedroom to David O'Sullivan. Hello, members of the board, David O'Sullivan from O'Sullivan Architects. And Mr. O'Sullivan, where's your firm located? Rating messages. Thank you. When we had done it, we had taken the footprint of a two-bedroom, but the past owner had asked for a small garage for maintenance and a half bath for the maintenance staff. The new management does not need this, does not see the need for it. So within that same footprint, which was our standard two-bedroom, we had taken out the bedroom and added the little bathroom in the second bathroom, as you see above. The new unit seen below restores it to a two-bedroom. And this was on the south corner, outside corner of the new building. So it doesn't change the footprint, it does not change the design other than taking the garage drawer we'd proposed and making it a double window like all the other units. Thank you, David. So the request for this condition would be to add one bedroom. So it'd be 45 two-bedrooms and two three-bedroom units. So just a minor change on that one. Any questions there? Yeah, we'll keep going. Condition number two, the total number of units found on site within the South Point apartment shall not exceed 229 units. No changes being requested to this condition. The plan is to still construct 47 new units to the current 182 units, bringing the total site units to 229. So no change here. Condition number three, at least six units shall be set aside as affordable housing, which is defined as a unit which could be purchased or rented by a household making up to 80% of the median income of the area. Such housing must be subject to affordable housing restrictions to preserve affordability in the long-term. No changes to this condition. The plan is to provide these affordable housing units as required. And some of the next conditions are similar to affordability and ADA compliance with no changes being requested. Condition number four, the affordable units and ADA units shall not be segregated from the market rate units in accordance with article 15, Infusionary Zoning of the Zoning By-law, the affordable unit shall be dispersed throughout the development and shall be comparable to the market rate units in terms of the quality of design material and general appearance. No changes requested to this condition. The applicant plans on meeting this condition as worded. Same with condition number five, all affordable housing units shall be marketed through a suitable housing entity authorized to assist applicants in attaining affordable housing. The applicant plans to do this and go through the appropriate channels to market these affordable units. Condition number six is a condition we're requesting for some modifications to. All parking shall follow the approved site plan dated January 26, 2018, with an addition of 56 new parking spaces. The overall parking shall not be less than 359 stalls for the entire South Point project. And with this, I'll turn it over to Carlos Nieto, project engineer to explain that the changes we're requesting. So good evening, my name is Carlos Nieto. I'm a principal at the virtual design group in Northampton, Massachusetts. This condition and the changes that we're proposing, first of all, I wanna, the first thing is that we're not changing the parking count. The conditions deal with assigning some ADA parking spaces and assigning some compact car spaces. The approved plan includes the proposed building, the way that it's designed and placed on the site, will remove 17 parking spaces. So starting with, we're removing 17 parking spaces, but adjacent to that new building, there's gonna be a total of 43 new parking spaces. To the north of the proposed building, there's a new parking area that was also approved and that area includes 30 parking spaces. So when we do the math, picking out the 17 that we removed and then adding the 43 and the 30 that we added, we end up with the count of 56 parking spaces. In the condition number six as proposed, we've kept the number of parking spaces, so we still have 56 parking spaces. We still keep the ADA parking spaces that were included in the next to the proposed building. What we've, the change here is to add to new ADA parking spaces to the 30 parking space area and to be able to provide this new 10 parking spaces, got new ADA parking spaces, these two ADA parking spaces. We've used some of these compact car spaces to provide enough space within the same area that we had. So we didn't wanna add more pavement or add to the footprint that we already had. So in the summary where we're asking on condition number six is to the inclusion of two new ADA parking spaces on the 30 parking space area to the north of the new building and the proposal of six marked compact parking spaces. Okay. Thanks Carlos. Any questions with the changes being proposed here? If not, I'll move on and feel free to stop me whenever if you would like me to come back to any proposed changes. Condition number seven. Mr. White, I think we'll probably, you'll have questions at the end of your presentation, but sounds good. We'll just proceed and hit the questions at the end. And if people do have questions, they can ask, but they tend to ask questions at the end of the presentations. Okay. Thank you. Condition number seven, all parking areas and driveway shall be constructed, meeting the standards found in section seven of the general bylaw and be maintained seasonally as needed, include surface material, curbing and painted lines. No changes requested to this condition. Same with the number eight, the site shall maintain 1.6 parking stalls per unit at all times. No changes are being requested to this condition. We're planning on adding the 56 parking spaces as conditioned. Condition number nine, all handicapped stalls shall meet applicable code requirements and shall be clearly marked by signage and painted on the paved surface. No changes are being requested here for condition number nine. Initial number 10. Crosswalk shall be provided at the new parking area. No changes are being requested to condition number 10. No changes are being requested to condition number 10. Crosswalk shall be provided at the front entrances off of South Point Drive in front of the new building and in front of the new parking lot adjacent to the west side of South Point Drive. No changes are being requested here as well to condition number 10. Condition number 11. Benches and bike racks shall be provided in front of the new parking lot as well to condition number 10. No changes are being requested here as well to condition number 10. No changes are being requested here as well to condition number 10. I'll pass it over to Carlos to walk us through the proposed changes, excuse me, the approved plans and the proposed changes for this condition. So just to start off with condition 19, we are, this is good. This condition 11. about the movement or moving the playground from one location to another. And that will probably clear up a little bit of the explanation I'm gonna have now. But in simple terms, as and the approved plan in the original location of the playground, there was one picnic table and then several benches, two benches right next to the area where the picnic table was and then three benches across on the 30 parking spot. And then we had in front of the building as shown on the lower left corner, we had two other benches and a bike rack. So, and I'm gonna just do a total count now. So approved, we had seven benches in total, one picnic table and the two bike racks. Proposed, we are proposing adding three new benches closer to where the new playground area is gonna be and we're gonna touch that on condition 19. For having a total of 10 benches, we're also proposing adding one picnic table closer to the playground for a total of two picnic tables. And we'll be providing the two bike racks. There's gonna be one bike rack. It's not called out in red, but if you look at the proposed playground on the left, on the bottom part, you'll see three lines right at the entrance of the part of the playground. That is the, those are three bike racks, three bike loops. And so we've kept the same number of bike racks. So just to summarize approved, we had seven benches, one picnic table and one and two bike racks. And in the proposed, we have 10 benches, two picnic tables and two bike racks. So what we're asking for to be a total of 30 benches or one picnic table. Great, thank you. Thank you, Carlos. The next condition is condition number 12. The lot shall be approved at no more than 35% lot coverage. We're not requesting changes to this condition. We, as you'll see, may have noticed in the plans, the lot coverage is at 35.2%. If the board feels like this condition needs to be updated to be, to have that 35% number increased to 35.2, then we would request a change. But if you round down to 35%, which is kind of our stance, then we're not requesting any changes to the condition. Condition number 13, all on-site landscaping shall be maintained in perpetuity and the complex shall be cleaned of trash and other discredit material at all times. applicant isn't requesting any changes to this condition. Planning on continuing to maintain landscaping and making sure that the property is in good condition. Condition number 14, safe site distances shall be properly maintained on the property at the intersection of South Point Drive and East Hadley Road. No changes to this condition number 14. Condition number 15, all air conditioning units, communication devices, and all other outside mechanical equipment shall be placed on the roof of the building and not on exterior walls or within windows. Any equipment that is required to be located on the ground shall be screened from view of planting such as grasses or shrubs. No changes requested to this condition as well. Same with condition number 16, all on-site lighting shall be downcast as not to shine on adjacent properties or into the night sky. Applicant plans on complying with this condition. No changes requested. Same with condition number 17, location of lighting fixtures shall be identified on the construction drawings submitted with the building permit. No changes here to this condition. Condition number 18, the traffic impact study in the stormwater management report shall be reviewed and approved by the town engineer prior to a building permit being issued. No changes here to condition number 18. Condition number 19 is a condition we are requesting changes to. The following amendment shall be approved to the specified special permits. ZBA 1968-48 condition number one, that the number of dwelling units to be constructed shall not exceed 47, and the entire site shall contain no more than 229 dwelling units. And the strike-through that you see there is the same as what's listed in the special permit showing the amendments that were made. So we're not requesting any changes to this one. And the others below 71-3, conditions six and 16, 87-28, conditions one and 11, 94-46 condition number three, those were all removed per ZBA 2018-21. But the condition we are requesting changes to and we'll show the changes that are being made is ZBA 94-46 condition number four, the recreation areas as shown on the plan prepared by Berkshire Design Group shall be maintained in working order at all times. And I'll turn it over to Carlos again to share about the proposed changes to the landscaping plan. So I'm gonna start by, there's a couple of subjects that we're gonna be talking here. So the first one I'm gonna be talking about is about the approved location of the playgrounds and of the career, which is what you're seeing right now on your screen. So what you're looking at on the left is the approved location of the playground, which was along South Point Drive to the east side of South Point Drive north of the proposed 30 parking space parking. And then when you were looking at the right was the approved location of grills that were approved before with the former owner. And it's showing a scattering of four grills basically on the backs of some of these buildings. And then one of those grills was proposed also next to the playground area. So now moving to the proposed, what we've done is we've moved the playground area from the north, if you look at the proposed on the left image, we moved it from the north of the 30 space parking area, which is on the right of that image. And we've moved that to the left on the west side of South Point Drive, now serving more centrally to more units and also between three apartment buildings that are existing. As part of this, the move of this playground, we've also added a lawn area formalized with several benches around, which we talked about on 11. And we've also added to substitute the four grills that were scattered throughout the project. The applicant is proposing to add four grills in two stations that are on the right image that you're seeing. The ones on the red squares, those represent those two outdoor kitchens, if you wanna call them with two grills each. So for four grills, we've also included a paved area around it. So for the convenience of the people who are using these grills. And again, we have this more formalized grass or lawn area across from them to provide some space for grilling or outdoor activities. On the next slide, we're gonna be talking about the other change to this condition is in approved plans. The previous owner had proposed two community gardens. You can see in the image here, one of them is in the area of where the new grills or new amended grills that we're proposing. And then there was another one right behind one of the buildings to the north, as you can see here. The applicant at this point is requesting to remove that as part of the condition. So they do not want to install these community gardens. And the main reason is management issue where community gardens end up being a management nightmare to a certain degree for the management company that's there. And also if people leave or do not stop taking care of their gardens, they become kind of an eyesore. And again, it becomes a maintenance nightmare. So the applicant at this point, he's requesting to not have to install these to a community gardens. And I think Carlos, it might be helpful if Mario shares a little bit from his perspective, kind of from a property management level. Our property management group has manages thousands of units across the United States. We have some good experience with working with these community gardens. Mario, would you mind sharing a little bit kind of from our perspective about and kind of adding to what Carlos said about kind of our feelings towards these gardens? Sure. Can everybody here and see me? Yes. Very good. My name is Mario Martinez with FPA Multifamily LLC located in Atlanta, Georgia, though coming to you today from Las Vegas, Nevada. So Tyler's exactly right. We own about 30,000 apartment units all throughout the country. And we've implemented in the past a few of these community gardens and our experience has been less than fantastic with these community gardens, not upon their initial implementation, but in terms of the upkeep for these gardens themselves. We love the idea of them, but the reality is I think a lot of our tenants usually don't upkeep them or maybe one person will. And then trying to find a balance between the folks that want them and the folks that don't and the upkeep that is associated with them and who is responsible for that typically just ends up creating friction. So what we've tried to do since our tenure of ownership started in 2021 is embrace and go after those amenities and communal experiences that the residents really are seeking out. And really the short answer is this is not one of them. So that's really the short answer. Great, thank you, Mario. I think that's it for the community gardens and for condition number 19. So move on to condition number 20, full construction drawing shall be prepared and submitted to inspection services with the complete building permit application. Applicant is not requesting any changes to this condition. Condition number 21, all site demolition shall follow the approved plans as identified on sheets E2 and E3 of the approved site plans dated January 26, 2018. We are requesting some modifications to this due to the nature of moving the playgrounds to a different location, but I'll pass the baton to Carlos to share more about what we're requesting here. Yeah, just exactly what the basic Tyler said because we're now proposing to move the playgrounds to a different location, there is some demolition that has to happen in this new location. So basically the demolitions that we were doing in the original as approved are gonna stay the same for the most part, the parking area for the 30 parking spaces has its own area, which is what you're seeing right now. And then this is the area for where the building is gonna be. So the demolitions have not really changed in those two areas where we are now proposing of adding is an area of demolition for where the playground area is and the lawn area is. And I just wanted to make sure it's pretty blank here. When we were on the site, I expressed this to the board that we're keeping all the trees that are there, the mature trees that are there. There's plenty of grass space to do the work that we need to do around them and they will provide that larger scale shape and there will be complement that with a number of other tree plantings that we're proposing for this area. But again, just to summarize, this is a effect of moving the playground from one side to the other. Now we have an area that we were not doing demo before and now we're gonna have some demo in that area. Great. Thank you, Carlos. Moving on to take condition number 22, the building shall be constructed following the design on sheet A 3.0 of the approved plans dated September 13th, 2017. And I'll turn it over to David O'Sullivan to share about the requested changes here with respect to the building heights. All right, this was the approved plan. We had had pretty much a basery base with siding above, mimicking the other buildings on site. If you go to the next slide, we're still doing exactly the same thing. With the changes we're doing to HVAC systems that we'll get to later, and the structural system in the building, we wanted to go to Wood Trusses versus Joyce because they're superior for construction and easier to do mechanicals and easier for sound control. So we're proposing increase the building height from 28 to 33 feet, which was to get additional height for the deeper structure. I don't think it would be noticeable on the site, so it's minor change. And then we did redesign a little bit that you'll see later on the interior. So we did change a few windows around the front door and obviously that garage door in the back became windows. So that was the, so there's a height change and there's a few minor window door relocations. Right, Mr. O'Sullivan, can you describe the exterior of the building, what the material is and how it looks, what the first floor is versus the second and third? So the first floor is masonry, just like the other existing buildings on site. And then the upper two floors will be the vinyl siding in the same color scheme as the ones that are existing as part of the overall Amherst Renew Amherst project. So we're basically matching the existing buildings and character colors materials. Thank you. Thank you, David. On the condition number 23, an example of the tenant parking sticker and guest placard shall be submitted to inspection services prior to receiving a final certificate of occupancy. This is a condition that we're requesting modification of based off property management's experience with the number of parking spots that are available throughout the day on site. We're not opposed to having a parking plan in the future. If needed, especially when the new 47 unit building is constructed, however, we don't feel like it's a need at this time given the number of spaces that are available. I'll share some pictures here in a minute and turn it over to Mario to share a little bit more and maybe give an idea of based off the demographics of the population, the tenant base demographics, why there are a lot of leftover parking spaces. But I just wanted to share some photos here that were taken exactly a week ago. And as you'll see, we took them at two times in the day, we went at eight and went at 4 p.m., 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. As you'll see in both sets of photos, there's plenty of parking spaces available. And this is consistent with management's report throughout all times of the day that there are sufficient number of spaces. Therefore, the applicants requesting that a parking plan and parking stickers are not required at this time, but on an as-needed basis in the future. I'll turn it over to Mario to kind of share a little bit more perspective from a management point of view on parking. Yeah, really, I don't think I can say it much more eloquently than Tyler just did. I think this is a problem that or it's not a problem that we're trying to solve in this site. We're, the site currently is about 98% occupied. And as you can see from the photos that Tyler sent around, they don't have much of a parking issue. So we think there's sufficient parking for everybody on site. Great, thanks Mario. Move on to condition number 24. New language shall be added to the management plan and lease agreement, limiting the stay of guests to five days and a maximum of 10 guests per unit, unless otherwise approved by management. The revised management plan and lease agreement shall be submitted prior to receiving a final certificate of occupancy. We're not requesting any changes to this condition. And in fact, have submitted an updated lease agreement and management plan with this updated language in it. So have no further updates or requests to change this condition. Condition number 25, South Point Department shall add a weekend security guard when the new building receives 80% occupancy and review of security shall occur at a public meeting within 90 days following one full cycle between May 1st and November 1st. This language relating to onsite security shall be added into the revised management plan to be submitted prior to receiving a final certificate of occupancy. So this condition was approved in ZBA 2018-21. Applicants requesting that this condition is removed altogether. And again, I'll have Mario give some insight here in the second, but at the moment and has been our experience since we closed on the property in March of 2021. There haven't been any safety issues or incidents at the property or noise complaints or safety complaints. As you can see as well on the incident and noise report provided in the application report. So our position is that we don't feel like a weekend security guard is needed based off the safety record that we've had at the property ever since we took ownership. Mario, anything else you have to add to that? Again, I think you stated it all pretty eloquently. Much like the parking issue, I think this is a problem or an issue between us all from which there is no real problem at this point. Our intention is and has always been to make sure that our presidents are safe and secure. That being said, and we've been very fortunate here during our tenure of ownership. We haven't had any issues and our tenant feel safe and this is not an issue that they're coming to us about. Not to say that we wouldn't address it if it ever became an issue, but it just has not done. So, great job. Yeah, perfect. Thank you, Mario. Moving on to condition number 26. I'm sorry, could I ask a question? I couldn't see how to raise my hand. Sure. By 25 and I'm sure we'll talk more about this, but I just don't, and I know you want to remove this condition, but I do not understand what was, and maybe I don't know, what was meant by one full cycle. Full cycle of what? Does anyone know what that means? Of lease, it was one full cycle of leases so that after approximately a year of occupancy, see what it was like, come back and report to the board. So first it reaches 80% or the thinking was reach 80% then wait a year and then have a meeting within 90 days. Of what, yeah, one full cycle, meaning sort of a year of occupancy and with 100% or whatever it would be. But it says May 1st to November 1st, so I don't know, maybe. Yeah, I don't know what that means either. You know, I can't, I don't recall the reason for that, but I do recall the intent was, let's get a year under our belt with full occupancy and see and then come back and talk to us about what is needed, what isn't needed. Thank you. So that is the public meeting of the ZBA, not like that's the apartments, not run by management or something like that too. No, public meeting. Okay. Any other questions on that one? Yeah, thank you. Moving on to condition number 26. Any substantial changes to the files approved site plan, requested revised management plan or the requested revised lease agreement shall return to the zoning board of appeals for additional review at a public meeting. Applicant is not requesting any changes to this condition. However, because this condition addresses changes to the site plan and management plan and lease agreement, we wanted to cover and summarize the other changes that have been made to the site plan and the building and apartment layouts. So we'll cover that in these slides. So with that, I'll turn it over to David O'Sullivan to kind of give us a floor-by-floor breakdown of the building layout changes that are being requested. Okay, David O'Sullivan from O'Sullivan Architects again. The major, one of the major changes to the interior is that we had proposed a building with common laundries on each floor. And we are now with this new proposed and the revisions to the building, including washer dryers within the units. So our first floor as we came in the lobby before had a vestibule and a small sprinkler room and then laundry and mechanical on the first floor. With this change, we're not needing laundries on every floor because the common laundry can be put to better use for the building residents and we had integrated washer dryers into a unit. So we basically kind of shifted the door 90 degrees, gave a larger vestibule and off this vestibule we have leasing office with a small open area, small office, closed office and a small storage. In the same time, we relocated the elevator a little bit for better flow inside the building a little bit. So this was a change to the interior. It doesn't change the outside other than the, as we had stated before a little bit on the doors, doors and window layout on the outside right around the front door. So, and then we had inside the front door before we just had this basic common space that we had not programmed and this is off the vestibule. You see the double doors at the top. We now have what we call fitness center that's more appropriate, which is what some of the residents are looking for. It includes like a lav includes drinking fountains and the water room was relocated because there was a conflict with where the sewer was coming in the water, they need to be separated farther out. So the water room got pushed down a little bit because of site utilities and the fitness room was created because of demand by tenants. And that gave them a space to be right off the front vestibule fitness center that's accessible for not only this building, but other people in other buildings as well. Mr. O'Sullivan, what's a water room? What's a water room? That's the sprinkler water meter. Okay. Okay. So it's gauges and meters. Thank you. Yeah. And Mario, would you mind sharing a little bit of perspective from management side about the change from just a general common space to a strictly a fitness center and kind of why we feel like that will meet the tenant base and tenant demand. Yeah. Thanks, Tyler. I think we want to program our spaces so that they have some functionality. Idle hands can sometimes do nefarious things and we love giving these spaces use so people will use them to fitness and this is over 200 units with these 47 units. And there's no set fitness center anywhere currently on site. So this is a great amenity that folks are asking us for that we can program in this space. And it's clearly an amenity that everybody will enjoy and that they're asking us for now. Great. Thanks, Mario. And now moving upstairs on the second floor we had a large common laundry mechanical space as approved. Again, we moved the elevator a little bit and we moved the electric room up one level because we were the leasing office on the first floor. We thought that was important. We electric room does not need accessibility. You know, immediate it's moved upstairs and we created out of the laundry area a lounge space for residents. And I believe it's about, yeah. I thought we had dimensions on it but I believe it's about 12 by 16 or so that space. So that's on the second floor and we moved up on the third floor. We also took the mechanical laundry room space and basically created a lounge space for the residents which is 370 square feet. So this kind of replaces that first floor unprogrammed community room into a more usable lounge space for the residents. So we actually now within the building have three spaces and a leasing office where before we had one unprogrammed space, common laundries and storage, building storage. So this is going on to the apartment layouts which are alluded to this list of proposed apartment layout which was kind of based on the old similarity to the old plans in the other buildings except there was a two bedroom, two bath L shape kitchen and you can see that layout. We basically have changed that two bedroom, two bath layout to a revised plan here on the next slide. Retaining the two bedrooms, retaining the two bathrooms, moving around some of the fictions of bathrooms for efficiency. We also created a washer dryer closet within the unit and we created an HVAC unit closet within the unit at the same time changed the kitchen to a little more open with sink and little bar area so and move the closet that was kind of floating in the middle making the space look smaller to the corner over B by the front door. So we really didn't change the storage of the units. We basically just added some amenities within the units and some layout changes to get a little more efficient. So that's the side-by-side there if you want. Yeah, this is just a side-by-side to make it a little easier to see the bedrooms are very similar the living room seems basic thing and the kitchen's a little differently out. Right, thank you. The final changes that we wanted to discuss in this condition are the updates to the management plan. And I think we've pretty much covered all of the corresponding changes from the management plan and based on the corresponding changes in the site plan in the apartment units and the apartment layout but the changes that we made on those items also call for changes in the management plan. So for example, changes that were made were the basic property name updated to reflect new ownership. The bedroom count as discussed before with adding the extra bedroom on that first floor when we were moving the utility closet added or updated bedroom count in the management plan. Number third one, community gardens reflected that the approved management plan discusses community gardens and the proposed management plan were submitting for approval removes those any mention of community gardens. Parking plan is updated to more as needed basis as discussed before based off of the oversupply of parking spaces but that management is willing to go to a parking plan as needed in the future but not necessarily required currently. Guest stay limitations as it was covered on a previous condition, management plan was updated to include that language and the weekend security guard is requirement in the management plan was also removed. So those are the changes to the management plan that were requested. Going on to condition number 27, new property owners shall return to the ZBA at a public meeting to approve and update the management plan. Applicant is not requesting any changes to this condition. Number 28, revised management plan, parking plan and stickers and revised lease shall be presented and reviewed within 90 days of the first issuance of a certificate of occupancy. This condition is very similar to the previous condition regarding parking in which management is in which we're requesting that the parking stickers and the visitor passes and placards are not required at this time due to the number of available parking spaces on site. Number 29 and approved management plan by the ZBA shall be in place at all times. We're not requesting any changes to this condition and finally condition number 30, the removal of the mansard roof and exterior remodel ball existing buildings shall continue during the construction of the approved building. All building exterior innovation shall be completed prior to receiving a final certificate of occupancy for the new three-story building. Applicant is not requesting any changes to this condition. However, I know that there was a question based off the site visit that took place yesterday about the condition of the roofs and which ones had been updated and which ones had not. Mario, would you mind kind of giving a brief summary about what has been done to the roofs from the past ownership and from our ownership? Yeah, so we've replaced about 80% of the roofs in our tenure of ownership since 2021. The ones that we did not replace, we chose not to replace only because they were adequate. They were more than adequate. So the useful life of those roofs still had plenty of time on them. At about 80% of the roofs we have replaced. Thank you. So that's it for our presentation. We've gone through all of the conditions. Happy to take any questions from any board member, any clarifications. So that's the basic presentation. Thank you, Mr. White. I'll start with a few questions as I ran through it. One of the things that I was really optimistic about was the community gardens. So what I'm wondering is, how have the residents been informed that the community gardens was a possibility and are no longer, and you're proposing not to have community gardens. So is this something the residents are aware of on your notice that you posted, which I think was a good thing. I applaud you for that. The notice posting this meeting was taking place. Was it mentioned and do residents know that there was a requirement for community gardens that you're asking for those gardens to be removed? Yeah, so I can start and Mario can fill in any gaps. So to answer your question about the notice, the notice did not contain any information, particularly information with respect to community gardens and our request for removal of that condition. Based off my understanding, I don't, that hasn't been publicly announced to the residents about the changes, but that's kind of where we stand. Mario, is that accurate? Yeah, I think the way that we phrased the question a little bit differently, when we kind of approach all of our assets in a very open sense is to say that we go through a lot of our, when we're purchasing and ask what we'll do is we'll do a lot of questionnaires with the residents. We'll send it to the owner for them to ask and then move on site. We have our management folks also ask, how do you want to use these spaces? And oftentimes how they want to use the spaces are a little different than how we might do it at our home. I've got a garden at my house in Atlanta. It's great. What I'd like to do and what our residents want to do are oftentimes two different things and we have to find the balance between what can be done and what we will do to help support and program the spaces in the way that they want. And so the overriding comments that we got back from the residents when we took over the site was we really like a fitness center because one does not exist. We'd really like these communal grills. They want to be able to go out and grow. And that's how they wanted to program the space. And so those are the amendments you're seeing today. What's the management problem with community gardens? I mean, other than, they may not look nice, but gardens tend to be, I mean, that happens with gardens. The advantage of a community garden, especially in that area and for some of your clients and your residents is that it provides, and especially for families, a whole lot of good information. It's nutritious. It helps people understand where food comes from. It's cheap for them. It's at least we would endorse this and approve this kind of amenity in other multifamily buildings in Amherst. And then I find it an attractive amenity.  Those are all fair and valid points. And the reality is we're never quite sure how they're gonna be adopted. However, well, all we have is experience and the experience here is 30,000 units. Now to your point, we don't have experience with 30,000 units in Amherst, right? And how that would be adopted there may be different than how it is adopted in our gardens in California and when we've attempted to do them there. So to your point, it could be that, this isn't amenity that folks don't realize they want, but once they have it, you say, this is really fantastic for all the reasons you laid out. However, in our experiences, well, we love the idea of these things for all the reasons you laid out, how they're adopted and how they're maintained is sometimes less than ideal. I'll say it that way. And the last question I have is, if you had one community garden, your place to not where the open space is meant and your new proposed open space, but the farther up, I guess it'd be to the, I don't know, to the north of the playground in that open space. But it's easier to, if it didn't work out and it just became a hassle or was unused, it could go back to lawn real easily. I mean, I think that it wouldn't be hard to transform the garden back into lawn if it was used and you found that it wasn't an amenity that people wanted or was of some way a problem. However, if they don't have it, they don't know that they're missing it. And so I'm wondering if you would consider thinking about having one of those community gardens starting it off and if it proves to be a problem or proves to be unused or proves to be too much of a headache for some reason, either for security or for, because it caused disagreements amongst the clients or the residents, you could remove it at that point. But I wonder if you would consider the possibility of having at least one community garden available to residents and see what it's like for a year or two and then we can make a decision. You know, let me, I very much hear your concern is not the right word, but I understand where your head is at because my head is very much in the same place. One of the things that we struggle with that this site actually benefits from that a lot of maybe our more urban or infill deals don't have, people forget sometimes that green open space is an amenity in and of itself. And I think one of the things that people do often is try to over program spaces. Having two young kids, it's really nice to throw a frisbee in a field. It's really nice to just be able to run around with the dog or however we want to use those spaces. So I hear what you're saying. I'll just leave it with, I think green space in and of itself is a wonderful thing for people to embrace. And I think that in and of itself is an amenity that my history has said, don't try and over complicate it. Sometimes just the space is the space and that's okay. But I hear your concerns, I'm sensitive to that. Okay, thank you, but what's the problem with having it for a year or two? And then if it doesn't work out, taking it away. Not necessarily a problem. Yeah, okay. All right, the second question I have is regarding bike racks. In the management plan, it talks about, you're going to have two bike, I think it's two bike racks with a total of 20 spaces for those bikes. So 10 per bike rack, if I recall, I'm looking for it right now in the management plan. But I think that's what you called for. On the site visit, we observed that the one bike rack that was in front of the, if you'll put up, I think it'd be helpful, Maureen, if you'd put up a site plan, an overall site plan that we could point to. There, that's good. So we were, by the building, the show where the playground's going to be right there. Yeah, there was a bike rack there. It's a six bike rack, so it has three loops. Six bikes can fit on that bike rack. There was easily 10 bikes attached to that on top of each other. It was inadequate for its use. At the same time, just looking around those areas, there were numerous apartments that had bikes out in front that were sitting on the porches or in the front door, not only in between these three apartments, but to look over to the other apartments. And there were also several bikes that were left unattended. Maybe they were locked to doors or I don't know how they were secured. But there seems to be a greater need for bike racks than there are bike racks right now. And so number one, I don't think you have right now, 10 bike racks that hold 10 bikes. And you don't have two of those. So I think you need, I think you need more bike racks for the, just by observation. And I would guess that as the year goes on, in the winter, there'll be less, but in the spring and fall and the summer, people use their bikes a lot and it's an easy place to use your bikes from where you're located. So I'm wondering about the need for more bike racks and perhaps having them closer to the buildings, each of the individual buildings as opposed to having one or two centrally located bike rack racks for the whole project. Hello, I can say that there is some room in front of the new building, for instance, for another bike rack. So there's definitely room on the 47 unit building. And in regards to, we have a bike rack right now proposed next to the playground, which would take over that one that we saw when we were in the site visit. Again, there is plenty of space in that same location we had next to the playground, which is pretty close to the entrance to that building where we could have another set of bike racks there. There's definitely the space for it. So you don't have, in the apartments themselves, you don't have a utility room where tenants can put their bikes. So unless they want to have their bikes in their units, which can be inconvenient, a lot of times they'll have them parked close. So one of the things that you may want to consider, it would be having bike racks associated with individual buildings. So to the extent that your residents use bikes and seem to be more than I anticipated when I observed the property, that would be a good idea to increase the number of bike racks and having one to serve each of the different buildings. I can see if it makes sense for the bike rack in the playground that the kids in the neighborhood will come up, they'll drive their bike, they'll go up to the bike rack, lock their bike, or put their bike up and play in the playground. That makes sense. That makes sense for that specific location. But there are other bikes, I think there are other bikes racks needed just for storage overnight or when the bike's not in use. I don't think we'd be opposed to adding more bike racks to handle the number of bikes that are on site. So to answer your question. Thank you. And then the last question I had about the amenities is on the grills. Work with me on this too. When we first approved it, the barbecue grills were scattered. The thought was more that no matter what building you're in, you're not far from the barbecue grill. And so for me, I'm looking at this and saying that if I'm cooking up a bunch of hamburgers and I live in one of the far flung apartments, they're cold by the time I get them back to my house. If I cook a month at the place where your four grills are now located. In the past, in the previously approved ZBA special permit, we had four set of sides throughout the project. And so it was easier to use and more likely to be used. I liked the idea of the two grills along the green space. It's an actual place for people to gather. It makes a lot of sense to me. But in terms of convenience for the renters, I'm just wondering if, and what we originally approved, I'm wondering about your thought process on that. Can you help me out a little bit with what you're thinking is? Mario, would you mind sharing just from a management perspective why kind of co-locating all of the grills in one space is beneficial to tenants and to management? Yeah, this is actually really exciting. So one of the ways that we're seeing a lot of folks are using these spaces is in a much more communal fashion than maybe they may have used them a few years ago. So the way that this is spread out, I'm looking at page six of the PDF, is oftentimes how we're seeing people use these spaces is they want to congregate so they can do not just one thing, but they want to do multiple things. They want to, in your example, cook their hamburgers where their kids are on the playground or whatever it is that they may be doing. And supporting that communal space makes it one, not just a more efficient use of the space, right? But in terms of a management perspective, in terms of if there's any cleanup on the grills or anything that needs to be done, that's almost the least of it really. Really, it's that that's how we're seeing these spaces being used now in that communal sense. Instead of everything being kind of spread out, everybody wants to come together and build that community and that's what we're really trying to foster here. And on top of that, to add to Mario, understand the convenience of having them, I guess, closer to the actual buildings. In reality, though, they're not that far from, the location that we're reposing in that same open space altogether is really not a far walk. So I think that's kind of the reasoning behind that went into that thought, that decision. Okay, so it's not that it's, you're worried about maintenance, that's not a big problem. It's not that they're pipe, they're not natural gas that you have to run a pipe through. These are gonna be propane, right? They'd be propane tanks, grills, yeah. So it's that you're trying to foster a communal barbecue area and that's what you're looking for, not that you're creating, that you're solving a problem that occurs when you have disparate, replaced barbecue grills. Well, I wouldn't say that's not part of the problem because it certainly, it is easier from a management perspective to have them in one place, but as Mario mentioned, the communal aspect is also a factor that went into this decision. So I would say- I think just one other comment that you saw that I think having them in a communal space also is a safer situation. I think where we have them kind of behind buildings or near the corners of buildings and things, you're gonna have people hang out at the grill and bother other residents, versus if you have it in that central area next to a playground and things, it's not gonna be as much of a disruption to other people. And from a fire control standpoint, you now have one location, not multiple scattered up against buildings throughout the site. I agree with you that it's easier to monitor a fire location. That's absolutely true. I mean, you can solve that problem by putting grills farther away from the building. If you have disparately placed grills, you can put them farther away from the building to avoid that.  Here we have four grills always having being in front of those two buildings and so all the disturbance goes to, but there does occur, goes to those two buildings and isn't distributed. But I mean, that's kind of a management question. I'm interested in it. I like the amenities. I think it's important for rental property to maintain, to have as much amenities as possible and financially possible because I think that helps people have a sense of pride and importance in the place they're living. And that's the reason I'm asking these questions. So I appreciate your answer. I may not do the same thing myself, but I appreciate your answer. What's the square footage from the playground you're proposing versus the playground that was approved? It's exactly the same playground unit in itself and the drop zone around it, which is the, you know, the safety surface is gonna be the same, basically the same amount, maybe a little bit more actually on this one. But it does provide a better space around that safety zone and a little larger space than what we had before. Before we were constrained because we had the bus stop and the road really close by. We're here, we have a little bit more breathing room. There's better separation from the road. It's a larger space in general, but the footprint of the play equipment itself is the same as we had before. And the footprint of that safety surface, which is the mulch that's gonna be used for safety, that's gonna be the same size as we had before. What happens now is that we just have a better green area around it than we had before. And it does give you the increased green space out in front of where the playground was originally approved to be. You have a long area for throwing frisbees. And it was really tight, but there was a, the former owner wanted things in a different way, and we followed what he wanted, but definitely it was a much tighter space than what we have now. Okay. What's the demographics of the renters? How many families, how many four-person unrelated tenants do you have? I'm sorry, I didn't catch the last part of your question. How many families are there and how many of your tenants for your two bedroom apartments are for unrelated, probably students, but unrelated people? Oh, I would be honest. I would be shooting a little bit from the hip if I could guess at how many families were on site. My guess, I don't have the number of the, it's, let me put it this way. It's not a quest as to whether, I would guess probably about 20, 25% of folks that are living at the site right now are families. Okay. With some level of kids there. I don't know if it's 2025, I'd say probably, I don't know, maybe 15% or so have 15 or 20% of kids. And I'd say probably 50-ish percent of the folks there, I would not say they're students, I think they're associated with one university or another. That's not to say that they are students necessarily. They may be educators, they may work at one of the local universities. So I don't know, I think I did a politician's job of answering your question there, but. Yeah. I wouldn't say that to you, but you did do a politician's job because you only came up with 75% when I was looking for 100%. So. You have a future in politics, but I'm thinking that we saw the bus, you have three buses that come through there, right? For the elementary school. And then we saw the, right at eight o'clock when we had our, or 8.30 when we had our site visit, there were numerous college students. And I would, I would be, I'm surprised you don't know this number, and it would be really helpful if you could provide that to us. Sure. And I don't know if you can get it from your onsite manager, but they'd be helpful to know, because that does impact how important these amenities are and where non-family members may gather to grill. So families do one thing, they wanna watch their kids grill, I see it makes sense, but three 22-year-olds may wanna, or four 22-year-olds may wanna be back behind their house to grill. I don't know, you know, so that's part of the reason that I'm asking these questions. Yeah. Or church, would you mind just, just so that we can provide accurate information, would you summarize exactly what information you'd like us to go and find? Just a number of families versus the number of... Yep, percentage of your units that are rented to families and percentage of your units that are rented to two or more unaffiliated adults. So I've asked a lot of questions, I wanna open it up to other members of the board. I do have some more questions after they're done. So who has a question? Who, if anybody has questions? Ms. Marshall, I see your hand is up. Thank you, yeah. So I guess I'll stick with the outdoor amenities also. And so back up to the community gardens. I have two main questions about that. First, if that condition remained, what is it that would be provided? Is it just, here's an area, make a garden, or do you, I don't know, do you put railroad ties around to define plots? And so what would that be if it happened? And then secondly, if there is no such condition, can tenants request and get authorization to make a garden of their own somewhere, or there would be no opportunity to do that? Mario, I think that's another question for you as well. You wouldn't mind. I think you're on mute. In terms of, quite candidly, the answer to your second question is easier to answer. It is typically we don't allow a lot of these communal spaces to be selectively programmed by our residents because it's very hard to control how they end up programming that space and how other residents might feel about a communal space that they feel got taken away from them. If, for example, it's a tough one because you may find folks that are in two different camps about how they wanna use this space. Someone wants the garden, someone wants to do something else with it, someone wants to do something else with it. And when we run into those situations, typically what our default is, is oftentimes, especially with these fields, again, that is an amenity in and of itself, especially nowadays, it's becoming actually a fairly scarce amenity. People are getting kind of pushed closer together. And so when you have these beautiful fields, if you have it for New Amherst, we try and embrace that. And that's typically how folks are trying to use that. So the answer to your question, your second question, click Handley, is, no, we wouldn't, we would not try to, again, just trying to be honest with you. That's not how, it would create other, it tends to create other sensitivities within the resident base itself. As to what it could look like if it was deemed that those were to be supported, also gonna dance a little under the, you guys are gonna think I'm running for president by the time this is done. It could look like a variety of things. It could be railroad ties, though I don't think we've actually pre-programmed it. The ones that we had done in the past, it quite Candley has been a few years since we've started. We've generally gotten rid of a lot of fire pits and we've gotten rid of a lot of the community guards. Fire pits tend to be a liability for us and for the residents in the community gardens tend to go unkept. So if we were to do one, it could look like a, it could be something like railroad ties boxed in with soil. It could be something different, maybe with the brick and mortar. Don't have a great answer for you there, but it would be, if we were to do one, it would look great when we put it up. So it would be a defined space. You would, at a minimum, outline the area. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Okay, thank you. All right, about the grills, I imagine myself trying to cook at two, at one of two grills that are butted up against each other. That seems really crowded. And I wonder why you choose to arrange them that way rather than just for freestanding, like on the Great British Bacon Show. Since they're not plumbed at all, Tyler, why jam them together? So if you wanted to go to the details on the sheet that I believe is page 16 of the last page of the plans, which has the details on it shows. I do understand what you're saying in regards to separating them, but they do have, you know, space. Yeah, it's the last page. There we go, you passed it. Oh, not last page because last page of my plans. There we go. And if you can zoom to that corner there. Yeah, yeah. Did you just, if you just had a grill and to be honest with the older owner was thinking of was not this, he was thinking of camping grills. Like, you know, in the garden so that you have an idea of the former owner just wanted something that was easy in the sense of building. So he was thinking of just leaving a space. So that's why he chose a garden and that's why he chose the grills. These are much more refined. They have a counter space. That's my main thing. I prefer on this types of grills. It's just that it does have a larger counter space and they do have a shared counter space, but it becomes larger than if you just had one of these units. Because if not, it would be just a very small little space that you have on the side. Is it possible to rotate one? Rotate one so people are not cooking back to back, but on.  I think what we create, the way that we show these was to, we could make them totally flat. We had one is looking into the green space and the other one wasn't. So that there was like, when you look at the, so we could, and we didn't want to block the entrance to the green space. Right. So that's why we had them in an all shape. But could they be straight? You know, yes, we could definitely make them straight and have two grills next to each other instead of having the corner. And just to clarify, there are two of these stations. So there's four double grills. Four double grills. So what I just, maybe it wasn't clear when I said, if you still have them in an L shape to turn one of them 180 degrees. So. I get it. Yeah, yeah. Okay, so that's what I meant by that. Now, if these are, if tenants are really interested in community grilling, does management need to, I mean, do people need to reserve time to grill? Is this a sign or it's just first come, first serve?  Or can you just spread out and have a party for three hours on this space with your, so how are you going to manage the demand for these if they're really quite popular? And go ahead, Mario, if you would mind. Yeah, sure.  So we look at roughly doing, for about every 100 and 120 folks, what we've found is about one grill for that tends to satisfy demand. So in this case, we're looking at putting two grills and about satisfied demand for what we've seen in our experience for every about 120 units. So I think, you know, it's a little bit of the art and the science here. You don't want to get into the act of trying to over-regulate too much of the use because there may be an instance where folks come out there and they say, look, we're having a birthday party and we're going to be here cooking out grills for an hour. And that's okay. But the reality is those instances occur, seldom enough where it tends to, if we leave things like that, it tends to pacify residents because they're using the space generally how they want to use it. And we just don't find that there's much animosity with this count of about 120 to one in terms of, you know, fighting folks for the grills. That being said, this is more grills than it got now. So this is, I think they're going to be thrilled with this, but that's generally the answer. My, I think another question about just this area.  But I could imagine that, you know, people are going to want to hang out here and does that become a problem for the folks in those three buildings around this space? Yeah, I think the answer to that is, is that management is prepared to make sure that noise ordinances and the noise by-laws that have been set forth by the town of Amherst are followed. And I think, I'm not sure off the top of my head those hours, but that's the expectation is that residents will abide by those hours and management will enforce those hours as well. I have a question about the bike situation. Does do tenants or does management consider it a problem that there are bikes unsecured and leaning against walls and, you know, we're lying on the ground in front of the building? Like I said, either a safety concern or residents wish they were able to lock them up. Any thoughts about that? Yes, to your, to the variety of questions you asked, yes, it is a safety concern. Yes, we don't like them being up against buildings. Yes, we are supportive of the bike racks. Okay. And I also, just by the way, I noted the valley, there's a valley, what's valley bike, the rental e-bike station there on the property. So I just hope that's getting a lot of use that would solve the storage issue too. That's it for me for now about outdoor amenities. Thank you. Thank you. Ms. Parks. Hi, thanks. I would say that for me, I just want to talk kind of about the same things. I don't have a problem with not having the community garden there only because I know that often it's one person who kind of does everything. And so I think the idea of having the residents, if residents were to come to you and ask for that, it might be nice if you would be open to considering that, but I also, I don't know that it needs to be required. If I may, Ms. Parks. 100%, if there was a clamoring for it from the resident base, we would do it because happy renters pay rent. And that's what makes them happy. That's really the selfish answer, Ritt. If there was an amenity that they were clamoring for that we could install for them, we would always want to pursue it. Because again, our job is to create that community for these folks. And they decide what that community is. And so to the extent that we can foster that, that is absolutely what we want to do. So by no means are we opposed to any of these community gardens. We're just not seeing much of a demand for it from these particular residents. These residents are not me. They're not what I would do with the site. That are my, this is the business person here. My job is to figure out, what do they want? How can we figure out how to do it? Yeah. And I do think that Amherst is the kind of community that does like community gardens. And we do have the farmer's market and we do have a lot of garden shares that we can get. So it's just something that if you get people who are interested, be nice if you're open to that. On the subject of the bike racks, I support the idea of increasing the number of bike racks, especially if there's not room for all the bikes that are there currently. And so I hope you will consider adding more bike racks. And the last question or last idea I have is about the grills. Are there picnic tables that are close to grills? Because I know that whenever I go out and grill, it's really nice to have a table to sit down and eat at. And I see the grills and I see that there's counter space, but not everybody can sit on the ground comfortably, not everybody likes to do that picnic style. So when you were talking before about having a picnic table, I see the picnic tables are over by the playground. I don't know, would you consider putting a picnic table of some sort near the grills? I see. Yeah, that's something we can consider there. I will point out there are benches in this open space area as well that the thought was to use those for seating, for those who might be enjoying their barbecue or watching their children run around that they could use those benches. But if it comes down to it, we wouldn't be opposed to locating another picnic table in this area. I would support that idea only because when you're eating usually on a paper plate and sitting at a bench, it's not as comfortable. So in the parks around here in Amherst where there's grills, generally there are picnic tables nearby. And that's all I have. I understand, thank you. And Tyler, just so clarify, could you shift the image that there are two picnic tables provided right next to the, but it's on the playground area, but we do have to just wanna make sure. Yep. I just think it'd be nicer to have one closer to the grill area. Yep, yep, no, and I totally agree too. That makes sense. Any other questions from members of the board? I'll start again. One of the, this is something you may or may not be aware of, but this complex has had some history with it prior to your ownership. It started out, if you look at the old rental special permits, as having lots of amenities, swimming pools, tennis courts, basketball courts, all sorts of things were originally planned. Now that was 60 years ago and things change. But over time, my understanding of this location is that those amenities were not maintained, they were not used. There were lots of problems with the residents. A lot of police calls, a lot of noise problems, a lot of party problems. This was a pretty frequent place for the police to have to break up parties and deal with problems, quite frankly, a lot of problems in this development. That was before you became owners of it. And so that's not on you, but it is the reason that there was a concern about the police presence and that's the reason that condition was there. When we looked at this in 2020, you can see that the complaints from 16, 17, 18 and 19 were pretty significant and there were a lot of them. And that's the reason that the police or the special police force, the security guard was acquired for a year to see if there's still a problem or not. Can you tell me, number one, when did you first start managing the property? And from that time, have you had any complaints? There's no complaints with the town, but are there any complaints that you've had to deal with as managers since you started to manage the property? Yeah, so we purchased the site in looking for the exact date just to give you this very specific date, March 12th, 2021. And just to be clear, just to set the differentiator here, we engage an affiliated company called Trinity Property Consultants to manage these sites. We do for all of our sites across the country. So since then, as you've noted, we haven't had, and I figured that was the intent of originally why this was put in there, because if something had happened at some point many years ago, during our tenure of ownership, we haven't had any issues with any nefarious actors on site of any form. We've been very fortunate in that sense. It also goes down to, I think we've got some great management folks there. And if there were any bad actors that were on site, we have removed them very quickly after we took over. And candidly, we just haven't gotten much feedback either way. I think people generally feel content. They feel safe there. Which, by the way, a follow-up to your question from earlier, because I think it leads into this one. About 35% of the folks at Renew Amherst are families. 35% of the units are rented to families? Yes. Which, based on my politician's math, I mean, 65% are not. Okay. So you took over the actual management of the property, or Trinity took over the actual management of the property in March of 2021? March 12th, 2021. Yeah, so the ownership and the management occurred concurrently. Okay, yes, got it. And then, so you've not had any, have you, you've not had any complaints that elevated the place where you had to send them to the police? But you must have had, you must have dealings with tenants where you've either had to evict them, you've had to counsel them, you've had to give them warnings. You've got 189 units. I can't imagine that you've gone 18 months without any problems. But that's what it appears to me from the management plan and from your representation. So what kind of, how do you deal with that? Well, just to back up because there's, I think there's a, I want to distinguish between two different things. I didn't, evictions are in our business, we deal with it all the time. That being said, because someone is getting evicted, does not make them a nefarious actor, right? They could be getting evicted for whatever reason. So I want to make sure that we distinguish that because that wouldn't count with the evictions here in that bucket that those situations may happen outside of whether that person is in a terrorist actor or not. As it relates to how many incidents we've had of, I think maybe I'm misunderstanding your question a little bit. No, I'm not worried about evictions for financial reasons for lack of payment of rent. That's not the problem. What I'm trying to guess, what I'm trying to understand is it's remarkably clean and maybe it's great management, but remarkably clean if there's been no police reports. I'm guessing you're dealing with it on site yourself, right? And you're not going to, it's not getting to the level where the police have to be called and brought in. So how do you deal with a, how often have you had to deal with noise complaints, keg parties, other kinds of disturbances which are in violation of the lease or cause for a warning or whatever that you have to deal with. And none of that shows up here on the property. So I'm wondering how you deal with it and how you've been successful in not having any complaints that go to the police since you've been managers. Well, I don't think it's common. I'd be quite frankly very concerned if we were having very, a lot of these, any of whatever issues you have when you put 200 folks in a few acres that go to the police. If you'd like what I can do is I can go through our, we have a system that tracks any of those issues. I can go through and see and pull whatever issues we've had. But the, at 60,000 feet, we haven't had any issues be significant enough where it weren't any additional concern that we would either be light on security that certainly if any issues needed to go to the police it's not like we're holding them back. We would let them go there naturally and organically. But there hasn't been any specific issues that would rise to that level. That being said, what I'm happy to do is if you'd like, we can go through our records and see, hey, look over the last, you know, at this point we'd be close to 18 months. What issues have we had on site? And that I'm happy to share with you. But you don't have that information for us tonight. I don't have that information for you tonight. So if we, all right. Yes, I'd like to have that information to know. But if mayor, I'm not going to make that a condition if we approve this tonight, but if we need additional information and we're ready to continue this hearing for two weeks, I would like that information. All right. So we'll get back to that at the end of the meeting one way or the other. Let's see. Lastly, where's the snow? Where do you propose to pile the snow? You've got a lot of space to put it. But, and I know the one of the conditions is that it not obstruct views and you know, all that's basic management and safety and it's, but it will be a condition of a special permit. Where do you plan to pile the snow if you're not taking it off of property? Good question. Unless Mario has a direct answer to that, I know that we have a third party snow removal contractor Shumway Services that plows South Point Drive and all of the parking lots. And the maintenance staff, I mean, on top of that the maintenance staff clears all the walkways to the buildings to the exact location of where they clear that snow until Shumway Services arrives and plows the streets. I'm not exactly sure, but I know that we have a third party and our own management staff.  And I didn't see it on any of the, and I think that's something we should know is where the snow goes. I know in Southern California and Atlanta you don't have this problem. On California, you don't have it often. We do have it here in Amherst, it's a real issue. And... So would you suggest that that information is added to the management plan and set? Yes, and this management plan on the site plan where location is identified. Okay. Okay. And the last question I have, and I'm sorry to have so many, but a lot of this came up. We haven't had a lot of time to deal with this application, but I was concerned about the town engineers' letter to the planning director indicating five areas where it looks like deficits for the planning. And I know you've seen this, the March 1st letter. Can you run through? Have you resolved those issues? What are your plans to resolving the issues? Or do you think they don't need to be resolved? Where do we stand on that? I can answer that. The March, just to be totally honest, the March letter never got it to us. So we received that letter basically yesterday. Oh, okay. We had contacted Jason Scales when the project got submitted because just as good policy in our office we'd like to follow up on the submissions because we don't want them to just go through the cracks. So we had send them an email and send them a link for copies of the plans and report just to make sure that he had those. And we have emailed on that correspondence going back and forth. But once he reviewed them, that comment letter never got to us until yesterday. That said, we were really concerned that we hadn't seen this. And we sent out my partner, Chris Chamberlain, the other principal in the office, civil engineer. And he went out today with another set of copies of plans and went to Jason's office to discuss the questions that he had. And our understanding is that those questions were answered on that meeting. There are some things that he wants to see. It seems like there are some construction details on the water part of things, water distribution, but there were more technical details that can be handled before submittal of construction documents for building. And then the question that he had in regards to the strong water system also was meaning we, he had received a revised report, but he never had received the revised joints which he received today. We assumed that he had received those, but he had not. So after the conversation Chris Chamberlain had with Jason, he was gonna re-review that. I believe that things are gonna be, that Jason's gonna be okay with everything as far as I understand, but I can't talk to him. He's not on the meeting today, so I can't talk for him. But he went down there today because we received these comments, the March comments yesterday, and we were very concerned that we had not seen those. So we went directly to him and dropped off a set of plans and decided to answer as many questions as we could. Maureen, have you had, or Dave, have you had any contact with Jason after, Mr. Skeels after the meeting with Carlos and Berkshire? No, I have not. Nor have I. Okay, well, some of these are pretty basic. Some of these could be done easily, like putting the water main on the drawings and some of those, but there also looks like there's valves that have been paved over. And I don't, I need to know more about the stormwater. I mean, we talked about it a little bit at the site visit, but we'd have to have, Mr., the town engineer has to approve this because we don't hold this expertise internally with the ZVA. So these are, these are, is something that I apologize, it's regrettable that you did not have the information beforehand, but this is something that probably needs to be resolved before approval of the special permit, I think. Aside from, yes. I did talk to the building commissioner about this today and he feels that, you know, as long as the layout of, you know, of what's included on the site plan, like the building and the parking and driveway, et cetera, et cetera, as long as those elements are not shifting or being relocated, he feels that, that, you know, what Tyler and his team are communicating with our town engineers fine and that could be done outside of the ZVA jurisdiction. However, if the site plan, like the building or parking area, something is gonna be shifted that would cause that the site plan to be revised, you know, if it's, that could trigger, if it's de minimis small change, maybe the board could review it at a public meeting if there's a substantial change that would be another public hearing, but it does sound like nothing, it sounds like the way that Carlos is working with the town engineer is acceptable and does not need to have the board review or approval because there is an existing condition that says something on the lines that the stormwater report needs to be reviewed and approved by the town engineer before the issuance of the building permit. It does not say to be reviewed and approved by the ZVA. So they are going through the proper process. And to be clear, we don't foresee any of these comments creating changes to the site plan. All right, I wanted to follow up if you'll allow me, Mr. Judge, on one of the comments or one of the requests that you had from us in terms of any major issues that we've had on site that would warrant some global notification, we've had one over the last 18 months and that one event was a broken window as a result of an overzealous teenager hitting a baseball through a window. And that's the extent of what we've had. The only sort of disciplinary disturbance that you've had is that outside of maybe any noise complaints which we typically don't go into noise complaints related to maybe someone jumping on a floor or something like that above another resident or something like that, that is all that we've had on site. But you would, if you had noise complaints because of parties or other things, that would be something that relates to me today. Yes, yes, sir. Okay. So kids with baseball is the threat that you have and not loud parties from neighbors. I've been very fortunate. Okay. Other people have questions. All right, let me just run through. Yes, Ms. Marshall. Thank you. Sure, I have a bunch. So just on the noise complaints, it seems, it's very, I find it very odd that the noise, these recorded listed noise complaints just stopped in June 2019 and that there has been nothing since. And I know you're not responsible for any of the record keeping or behaviors before you purchased the place, but the pandemic started eight months after this final noise complaint. And the town, like every town, I think had a lot of trouble with folks who were tired of being cooped up and not allowed to socialize or wanted to be outside and not cooped up with other people. That there was at least our town parks and recreation facilities were very heavily used. So it's just surprising to me that a place with so many people and so much outdoor space would not have had any recorded complaints during the pandemic. So I just wonder if you know or could check with the police department that their database is up to date. And if there had been any complaints subsequent to June 8th, 2019, they would be listed here. I mean, I wonder if they're just, they haven't entered their data or something for. Can I ask you a question to Maureen? Maureen, how are the noise complaints that show up on the town's public reporting system generated? Is there some sort of interface with the police department? Yeah, maybe Dave with Skevitz could better answer this, but so the complaints that are listed in your project application report are found on our GIS program. And so I believe those are complaints filed with inspection services and not in, I'm not sure if police complaints are filed there as well. Oh, I thought these work police complaints. So we don't have no data on police cause there was talk earlier about Mr. Judge mentioned now. Yeah, so in fact, don't have that data. It looks like, I mean, there's someone's arrest listed. So I was, yeah, police. No, yeah, some are police, but we could certainly, I could reach out to our police department and confirm that these are the most up to date recorded complaints as well as with inspection services. Yeah, again, not that the applicant now is responsible for what happened before they acquired the property, but it just makes me a little suspicious of this database. So I would be interested in that. And can you, I think it is the case. So correct me if I'm wrong, that there's no management presence weekend or weekday evenings. Is that correct? That is partially correct. That's partially correct in the sense that there is always a management presence on call from a facilities perspective is to say if a resident has an appliance that goes down or a heating and cooling isn't working, there's always someone on call to address that. What may not be on site is the other side, which is the leasing side of it. There may not be, especially now, I mean, the building is about 98, 99 for quite frankly, there's just not that many units to lease here. So it doesn't require a body to be here on the weekends. Okay, thanks. So parking, it seems like there's plenty of parking, but you are putting in a new lot and new spaces. And perhaps the town doesn't yet require this, but have you considered putting any charging stations for electric vehicles, either for management's own use or for tenant use, or have you asked tenants and that's not something that is of interest to them? Yeah, it's funny you bring that up because that's been a topic of conversation for us over the last month. We are actively engaged with speaking with our property management teams and then with our residents to start to facilitate feedback on that. I'm a big fan of those charging stations where they are going to be adopted. And the feedback I've gotten so far from Amherst, though we have not made a final decision on what we're gonna do with this site specifically, what we're finding now is there's much more demand in urban infill deals than we are seeing on some of these deals. That being said, I'm gonna reserve judgment on what we ultimately end up doing. We're trying to think, quite frankly, we're trying to figure out how to deal with it from a management perspective because I think I very much buy into that philosophy and have an electric car myself. I really wanna figure out how to support it but again, I've kind of got to meet the tenants where they are. And so if there's not much use for it then Soviet then at some point we'll evaluate it. So I think we're evaluating that actively and making sure that we accommodate the sites because I think that's the real value at. I know me if I was a tenant and I had an electric car I would really wanna do that.  Just to let you know, in the new building we have some provision in the electric loads to put in, I can't remember how many but there is provision near the new building that they can be added. In other words, we figured it into the load for the building. To load a building. Okay, that's great. I was my question like, yeah, will it be more difficult to install that infrastructure later if it isn't considered now? We did discuss it with the engineer and we did put something in.  Okay, all right. I'm sorry, go ahead. I'm losing my microphone. Go ahead, Ms. Marshall. Thank you. All right, a question about affordable units or really all of the units. Are they also or are some accessible, wheelchair accessible that requires or might require different doorway widths or putting appliances at different heights, something like that. So let me tell you, in this building by building code, 5% must be wheelchair fully accessible under the building code. Because it's an elevator building, all 47 units must be what is called an adaptable unit for handicapped. So the new building will have every unit adaptable for handicapped, which is enough that you can, get through any doorway with a wheelchair, et cetera, and the space for maneuvering, maybe not fully turning in kitchen appliances and stuff, but there are 5%. You can visit. Well, you can use the toilet, you can use the shower, but yeah. And then that's all 47, but 5% of them are fully the full access handicapped units. Okay, super. And some other questions about the interiors. Are, is management going to equip the fitness center or that's just a space where tenants can bring their own equipment? We would, we would facilitate the equipment. No, we would buy the equipment. We would furnish it, be top tier equipment that we have at all of our sites. Oh, okay, wonderful. And then did I, I think I heard that each unit has its own HVAC system. Does that mean there are heat pumps for every unit and they're all on the roof or something? Yes, there are. Every unit has a air handler within the unit and it's like your heat pump and there are condensers on the roof. Okay. And they each have their own hot water heater. I think I saw. Yes, yes. All right. And one thing about the landscaping, I don't think it's built into our zoning bylaw but I would hope it's good practice that any plants, you plant are not on the state's list of invasive species. None of them for sure are invasive species. No burning bushes. No, no burning bushes. No, you know, no, no way maples. No, no, no. Yeah. All right, that's it for me for now. Thank you. Thank you. It looks like Steve Judd. Oh no, sorry. I thought you left the meeting for, I thought you had internet issues. Sorry. I did have, I had earphone issues which I, but I figured out how to get a mic if you can hear me now. All right. So if there's no further questions at this time, it's time for a public comment if people, if members of the public wish to comment on this application. So indicate by raising your hand and Maureen, do we have anybody in the queue? Not yet. And if you're calling in, need to just verify, if you're calling in you would press, what would you do? You would press a star nine if you would like to speak, if you're calling in from a phone. No, no one's indicating that they would like to speak. Last week we took a three minute break right around eight o'clock. I think I'm gonna use the chairman's prerogative to give us another three minute break and then we'll come back and go through conditions and findings. And if there's any further questions that we have before we, when we go into the public meeting portion of the meeting. All right. Let's all be back in about three minutes, about 8.15. Thank you. It's gonna be a long process tonight. It's about an exam. That's a patient that should stay in our tier of the album and perhaps reach this. All right. I think we are back. Is everybody back? Yes, sir. All right. Now when we will move to the public meeting portion of the meeting. This is a time when the board has an opportunity to discuss amongst themselves their feelings about the application. It's where we look at conditions and we make findings and where we come to a conclusion on the application. It's not typically a time for public or applicant comments, but if we need information, we will seek it from you. And if it's helpful to our deliberation, we welcome comments, but we will seek those out. And if you feel something is important, please raise your hand and we'll determine if it makes sense to have additional comment from the board members. I wanna say that the way I wanna, first of all, I think we should get a feeling about whether we're ready to make a decision tonight on this or if the additional information that are gonna be provided, such as the number of possible EV, how many EV stations could be created by the additional load for the new building, what the police record or the complaint record has been, other kinds of things that are there. If we wanna wait for two weeks and get that information and if we need more information on anything that we've talked about tonight, we can wait then. But if we're gonna do it tonight, we do have a rather long process just because of the complicated nature of this application. What I intend to do, and I think the best way to do this is to go through the conditions proposed by the staff first, the possible conditions and almost all of those are, many of those are just transferred from the old special permit applications and approved special permits and run through each of these conditions and then go back and do our findings and then make a decision. That will take some time to do it and I don't think we'll be done by nine o'clock tonight. But we could probably get through that but we, if people are, but I also know that this material came to us late and you may not have had enough time to review this material. I mean, I've had two days till we look at this and I still have some questions and it's not pejorative to the application, it's just, there's a lot to look at and it's complicated because we're really taking seven or eight out of special permits, combining them all in one and which makes sense, it's the right thing to do, make it simple and easy but it may, you may not be ready to move at this point and if you aren't, we can ask for additional information and continue this meeting for two weeks. So I'd like to hear what board members are thinking about this and where they'd like to go. My inclination is to start the process but to wait for two weeks and finish it up then but if we're all ready to wait to go to nine 30 or so or 10, I'm ready to do that. Ms. Pollock. I just wanted to review the items that board members have requested. So additional bike racks proposed for each building to be shown on the site plan, verifying the demographics of tenants at the property, families versus non unrelated tenants I would say updating the management plan regarding the quiet hours related to the grill as it relates to either the applicants sort of hours that they wish or that references the town noise or ordinance and updating the site plan to show picnic tables by the grills. And then if you are going to change the orientation of the grills that should be shown and if there's any trash bins and recycling that's gonna be by the grills that should be shown on the site plan. And I can work with town staff about getting a list of town of air moist file complaints. And I believe Mario had said that he would he has a list of complaints that are internally filed with the owner. So if we could have that submitted for the record and then update the site plan showing the snow pile areas and then have that described in an updated management plan and then if there's gonna be any proposed EV charging stations or EV ready spaces for either of the lots I think that is Dave Buskevitz probably could chime in. It is a requirement under the state energy code to make at least a few of those spaces for both those new parking lots to be EV ready. So you have the 43 parking space lot and then the 30 space parking lot. So the board might be interested in knowing that the 30 space parking lot has enough room for making that EV ready and all that kind of stuff. So what's the state, there's a state requirement for availability of this or is this just? Yeah, it is, I can pull it up. It's part of the stretch energy code and that's only for the building. No, it's for parking spaces for multi-use, multi-use family developments. Evie, Dave, are you here? Sorry, I'm not looking at my screen because I'm trying to look this up. No, I'm still here. It's the amendment to the energy code. I can't tell you how many offhand right now without looking it up. Yeah. But it needs to be EV ready. With a conduit and one other thing. Yeah, a place for the circuit breaker. Yeah, the circuit breaker. So, all right. So there's a requirement for some of that to be done for a project of the size, some number, okay. Correct. Thank you, that's a good list. I think that's pretty comprehensive of the things that we were interested in hearing. What are people's thoughts on continuing tonight trying to finish this or do you want to get this information and have more time to review the documents than you have? Go, Mr. Maxwell. Well, yeah, I'm definitely looking to, I would like some more time to review the documents. I know I've had a hectic week this past week. I really wasn't able to sit down and read any of this until this morning. And I thought I had a good grip on it until I was hearing some of the questions that were being asked by other board members. And like, oh, I probably should have noticed that a little bit as well. So before we get into conditions, I'd really like some time personally to go through and really read these conditions again, see if there's anything that should be added into them or if I like the ones that have been put in there. So that's my take. Great. Mr. Goble, do you have a feeling about this? It looks like we're at three at this point, who would, all right, I think there's two. Excuse me, not three, two so far that express the desire to continue six weeks. Mr. Chair, I'd appreciate either continuing this in two weeks to finalize it or spending the next 35 minutes to go over some of the main points that Marine just highlighted that other board members had had questions on and comments about. So perhaps we approach it that way and or do the opposite, right? We could also do some of the layup conditions, right? That there are no issues on and then give us two weeks to review some of these other ones with a little bit more detail. That would be my recommendation. Something we could do. Ms. Parks or Ms. Marshall, do you have a feeling? Well, I know how much time I spent on this. I certainly hope the other board members can have the same amount of time. So I'm certainly happy to wait, but if there is some low hanging fruit, we can pluck tonight. That would be fine also. And I'm comfortable with waiting. I didn't have a chance to go to the site visitor. I might want to go by. Yeah. I think it's helpful to see the, in this case, it's helpful to see the property because you bet it, these are hard to, it's hard to visualize this if you haven't been on and walked the site. And I think you did, you were on the panel before, but that was a couple, it was a while ago and it's helpful. Well, I think Mr. Gilbert's suggestion is smart. There are a few things that we can get out of the way, which are some low hanging fruit. And then based upon some of the information we gather, we can then reconvene and continue this till the next meeting. And we can go through the other, the other conditions and the findings. So I think what I'm going to do, Maureen, is go through your proposed conditions that the staff suggested and circle the ones that we think are low hanging fruit. And if anybody has an objection to them, please raise it. And we will not include this in the approved conditions, the first set of approved conditions. It will come back and do all the rest of it later on in two weeks. I can pull that up so everyone can look at the same. So I'm on page 21 of 23. Which document? Cause I've got 27 pages. Yeah. I'm on the document of updated September 8th, 2020 and I'm on page 21 of 33 pages. So do you have, you have the September 6th project application report before you, I think, Ms. Marshall. And if you have- Okay. I found this other one on my porch today. So thank you whoever dropped it on. That's the in-person service we get from our staff. Ms. Pollock uses it as a way to get exercise, I think. Okay, all right. Tell me again what page. Oh, so we do. 22. Drops it around town to all of us. That's very helpful. All right. So on page 21 of page 33 pages. Point one. Project one, condition one, excuse me, is needed. So, and it's what we're gonna do. We're gonna replace all the conditions and start a new one. So that one seems to me to be low hanging fruit. Project two, excuse me, condition two, is gonna depend upon a lot of the things that we're asking about are gonna be in the plans. So I don't wanna do the plans right now. This is standard that we'll always have built and maintained according to approved plans, but we're gonna have new plans. And so let's, or at least some new information. Let's not do that. Number three, I think is straightforward. I don't know if anybody has an objection to the conversion of the workspace into another unit. You give one more unit of housing and one less unit of management. I think I didn't hear anybody complain about that. So that seems, unless there's a complaint about another unit, I think we could, that's one that we could approve. The total number of units found on site. I don't think there's a issue with the total number of units because that's just a change. Sorry. Yep, Ms. Marshall. Change the name. Oh yeah, thank you. And it happens in at least one more condition further on. So you just search and repeat. So number four, I think, again, it's a function of the approval of the additional unit. The next one deals with the higher level of the higher building from 28 to 33 feet. Does anybody have concern about the change in plans for that? I do not. I don't have a concern, but is it, because I'm new at this, is it clear to knowing if you're in compliance? I mean, what if the building's on the slope? Where is, where do you measure the grade? Where do you start measuring? It's the midpoint, it's the average grade. It's the midpoint of the roof measured, or in this case, it's the flat roof, but it's measured from the side of the building from the road. Okay, so there's a protocol for how. Yeah, there's a section 6.17 of the bylaw that outlines the specific sort of way they would measure it. And then it is indicated on their submitted building elevations. And then, you know, when they go for their building permit and their CO to actually have tenants live there, that all these things would again be confirmed. Number six deals with requirement for registration and permitting under the Amherst residential property laws. That's standard, no more than four. Number seven is no more than four in related individuals. That's standard. The street numbers being clearly marked with reflective signage and observable from both directions is standard. I don't think there's any objections to that. If there is, please speak up. Marketing and leasing, leases shall be a minimum duration of 12 months. There's nine. Number 10, all dwelling units shall be rented by unit and not by bed. That's standard again. Any short-term rental of any residential units shall be in accordance with all local regulations. It almost seems like it doesn't need to be said, but you can't rent. You have to rent according to the laws. It shouldn't be controversial. Mr. Judge. Yes, Ms. Marshall. Yes, you need to replace of after the word accordance with. Yeah, thank you. Number 12, lease agreement shall specify specifically prohibit trespassing on adjacent properties and shall outline enforcement actions. That was from earlier. I don't think that's a problem. Substantial modification, which may impact tenants oversight determined by the building commissioner, specifically excluding minor updates such as pricing, date modification, clerical errors. Like this is standard flexibility given to the building commissioner to approve minor changes if it is substantial. And he finds a substantial comes back to us of the public meeting. Affordable units, six dwelling units is what's required. I have a question. Sorry, I had to slow you down. I was confused about the six dwelling units. Is this in the entire complex or just in this new building? This is in this new building. Okay, because this is replacing all the other permits, so. No. Yeah. But you know, that's a good clarifying question. We could say a minimum of six dwelling units shall be provided. I can play with the language, but in the 47 unit building. So many of those buildings were built before there was the affordability requirements. So it doesn't apply to those. Okay. But that's a good catch, good question. Affordable units, 15. Is there, that's one, I do have to ask the architect, Mr. O'Sullivan. Is there a mix of affordable units? What? There are. Are they all four bedrooms? There are two, three bedrooms in the building. Yeah. Restrol all on three bedrooms. There's 45, two bedrooms and two, three bedrooms. And are the two, three bedrooms going to be affordable? That would be the management's question. So we want to describe what layout is going to be affordable. Will the three bedrooms be, the two, three bedrooms be affordable or will only two bedrooms be affordable? And Mr. White or Mr. Martinez, can you see what you're thinking is? I would think typically we have the higher demand is in the two bedrooms. I would think the two bedrooms would be the affordable one. Yeah, that would be good. My inclination is one. And would you have, but I was wondering if you had one affordable for families, three bedrooms tend to be a family, more so than foreign-related individuals. Would you object to five affordable units being two bedrooms and one affordable unit being three bedrooms? No, sir. OK. So five and one. Is there any objection from board members to that? Mr. Chair? Yeah. Yes, Mr. Maxfield. My preference would be that both the three bedrooms would be affordable units. As I think we mentioned, those typically are for families. And you would still end up with four or two bedrooms. And I think we would still end up with a ultimately very profitable venture here for the applicant, even with both the three bedrooms being affordable. Yeah. Oh, my only comment to that to make you aware of, because usually when you're doing affordable units, you split, spread them around the building, stack them, the three bedrooms are right above the front door, the two to three bedrooms. I just want to make you aware of it. It's not an issue as far as anything else. Oh, so you're Mr. Selving, what you're saying is that we require that they be spread out and diverse and spread out through the building and that they not be all located together. In this case, you have two of the units close to each other, but the rest of the units could be any place. Be on adjacent floors. It would be a second floor unit, a third floor unit, stacked above each other. Yeah, I don't think that's in any way that would happen. I don't think that violates the intent of the dispersal requirement. Making, I know it would for DHCD, but you have your own local, I just want to make you aware of it. Well, maybe that's something from the next meeting that we should, if you could, highlight in the floor plan, which ones would be affordable, because they should be dispersed throughout the building. And that is, I believe, one of the possible condition number 17 gets into this very topic, actually, being dispersed throughout the development and shall be comparable to the market rate units in terms of the equity design materials in general. Okay, this is slightly different, but that first part should be dispersed throughout the development. So perhaps we should look at floor plan to make sure that... We can do, we can work with the owner and provide a diagram. Okay, great. And if we're doing two, three bedrooms, they're gonna just be on the same location on the floor plan, just separate floors. If we could voice our opinion too, in terms of the mix of the affordable, our preference would be the five and the one. There are affordable options and the other units on site. Also, if you require that both of the three bedrooms are affordable, there's gonna be a lot of folks who don't qualify to rent that unit because they're out of the income bracket. And so I think there's a lot of folks who would wanna rent that, but won't be able to because it's strictly affordable. So if we do have a voice in the matter, our preference would be five and one. I'm inclined to, like Dylan's, Mr. Maxfield's suggestion, one possibility we can think about would be that you come back to us if you cannot rent that out. If that's indeed a problem, you can come back to us at a public meeting and we could change the requirements. Another possibility of how to resolve this condition, but we're not gonna resolve the condition tonight. So that's something for the board to think about, but there's clearly needs in Amherst for affordable units for families larger than two kids. So let's leave 15 as it is with a notice that we're going to, there's an inclination to allocate some of the three bedrooms and perhaps come back to the board. We could probably give you two options or four plans to submit too, so that we have the five and one option and four and two option. That would be great, we'd appreciate that. Oh, and Mr. Chair, yeah. So similar to another residential development the board reviewed on Sunset, our senior planner and housing planner, Nate Malloy provided comments related to about this topic. So he works closely with the Amherst affordable housing trust who has a real sense of what the need is here physically in Amherst of affordable units by bedroom count. So the board may wish to seek a comment from Nate Malloy. Yeah, that'd be helpful to know what the need is. All right, so that's something we can get from the staff and have it ready in two weeks. Can I ask? Hold on, Mrs. Marshall, just a second. So let's put that on a list of things to get and I'm not gonna, I don't think we're ready to move on 15. It's my call. Ms. Marshall, go ahead. Yes, I think that applicant, I'm afraid maybe Mr. White said a couple minutes ago that there are other affordable units in other buildings. So it might be helpful to us to know the mix of bedroom, how many bedrooms are, I don't know the right way to say it, the mix of affordable units elsewhere on the property. On the property. Yeah, thank you. All right. Okay, number 16, that's the definition that's affordable. We'll leave that up to when we do the affordable housing with 16 is the slam dunk, that's just what it is. So I think we can approve 16. 17 isn't a question of affordable units, it's a requirement that they be dispersed. That's actually, I don't think we have any choice on that. We should approve 17. 18, applicants should submit a local action plan. That's how you're going to, you need to do that to just to rent, if you go through this process to rent the affordable units, that isn't a question, 19 isn't a question either. I don't think that is a question. For the plate 20, the same thing. Support for the plate and a requirement of the program. 21 is a requirement of the program. 22 is local preference of 70% of affordable units. That's standard on 23, she'll be identified. Again, that's standard 24 of affordable units designated prior to the issue of a building permit. That will be done, but it's for deeds. Okay, so that'll be done 24 is pretty standard. 25 is the affordable unit, she'll be available intensively in process at the time of any full or partial certificate. However, okay, this gives you some flexibility if you have difficulty renting out the affordable units. 25 gives some flexibility to the building commissioner to not require that the process isn't, that those tenant selection processes is in process when you get a certificate of occupancy. So I think that should be approved as well. Unless there's objection, that's okay, that's okay. That should be approved as well. Unless there's objection, 26 town engineers shall inspect instruction, entryway and all onsite paved areas. I don't think that's standard. All onsite utilities shall be underground. That's standard. Applicants shall provide an as-built plan. Like we did before, I'm gonna hold off on the specifics of the plan until we get all of these questions answered. So 28 we'll hold off on. 29, there was no question about the exterior lighting, the downcast and dark sky compliant. Number 30, regulations should meet all energy efficiency code and regulations of stretch energy. Does this implicate the EV stations or is this separate, the stretch energy code? Yeah, I was thinking that as well. I mean, we probably have to do this, but I don't know if it will be any... It has to be done regardless of whether it's specified here in this exact condition, but I can put a note whether... Let me... Let's hold off on this and get more information. We'll come back to it. It doesn't look like it's... We may have to amend it. Okay. But it looks like David O'Sullivan has raised his hand. I was just gonna tell you that it is, the building code has an EV requirement and I know it. I just don't remember the amount, so... Yeah, I'm just gonna say EV ready. So we'll get that information and we can come back to this one at that point. Sure. All right, 31 temporary shall be approved through the building commissioner, if any. That's standard, the building... Okay, these are construction requirements that are all pretty standard. Shirty bombs, temporary occupancy permits. That should be approved, that's standard. All utility work with the public right away shall be conducted following regulations by the town. Again, pretty standard. These are for large projects. Some of the board members haven't seen these, but these are standard requirements. This is again for plans. I'm gonna leave that again on plans till we get all the plans done. Again, I will leave the DPW. There might be some questions on that. The 35 will leave till later. And the final certificate of occupancy shall not be issued for any building or unit until paving, landscape, and as built. That's pretty much, that's again standard. You don't get the occupancy until you finish the project. Amenities, smoke free projects, any objection? The applicant shall provide a minimum of electrical vehicles. So we'll hold off on that on 38, 39. We will hold off on 39. Mr. Schiff. Yep, yes. I had a question about 37. 37. Smoking, I just, my ignorance shows here. Does this mean that the tenant who smokes cannot smoke anywhere on the property, not outside, not inside? I mean, I'm not sure what to extend allowed by law with that. What that really means. How does that break down? I mean, in other places they've had, it has been, there's been a smoking area in some of the other projects we've approved. And it was only, it was within so many feet of the building or the window or the door. What does, I don't know the answer to your question. What precisely does that mean in terms of the tenant? So you cannot, they have to go off property over to. Yeah, as it's written, but if the applicant does wanna create designated areas or wants to propose something related to smoking, the board would entertain that. This was just a standard condition that was transferred over here. So this would permit, to the extent allowed by law, law allows you to have smoking areas. I'm gathering. What is the desire of the management? Do you wanna have a totally smoke-free area? Your whole project is smoke-free. Even the grounds and the, up by the street, or do you wanna have the ability to have a smoking, the designated smoking area where people can go and have a cigarette? Mr. White. I'll defer to Mario on this one. I think our preference is if we're gonna be smoke-free entirely. Entirely smoke-free. This includes marijuana and vaping. It would. And those are legal things. You know, it seems, why don't we... You could limit this to, another way of thinking about this is that you could, you know, do you know, people already live in the existing buildings. Do you wanna make a condition related to all the buildings or the whole property or just related to this new building? And this is something that, you know, everyone can think about between now and next time. So. Yeah, I just don't know what it means. So maybe the applicant knows what it means, but I don't, so. Mr. Chair. Yeah, Mr. Maxwell. I just wanted to say, I know on this one, number 37 where, remember when we had a similar situation when we were dealing with that 40B application a couple of years ago and we really had to labor over where we wanted to smoke in the area. I remember the consensus of the board at that time was, you know, people are gonna smoke. We'd rather, I think as the town and community, we'd rather have it happening somewhere on the property in a designated area, rather than it being pushed out onto a public sidewalk where the applicant has no jurisdiction. And I think for me that holds here in this case as well, I'd rather be somewhere than, you know, just walk onto the street and stand there and smoke cigarettes or something like that. So I think I understand you're, I think we could have a condition that allows the management to create a smoking area. Let's come back to that next week. We'll leave this as it is, but I think that when we can look at the 40B language, Mr. Maxwell, that's a good example. We'll look at the 40B language and see if that can be applied here. How's that? I like that. Okay. 38 will hold off on 39. We'll hold off on management plan. Move-ins were between eight and 7 p.m. That's, that's the, I think that's in the discretion of the management. Snowplow in the parking, probably moved from the site as part of this clearing process. Let's hold off on 41 because that we'll find out more, might have to say where it's moved to if you can't remove it from the site. 42, all construction, I was saying. Yeah, that's pretty much standard 42. 43 is terms of the management plan. All property business are sold. The new law is shown here with the zoning board of appeals that are public reading to review the management plan. Yep, this is a condition that we've been placing on properties, not on our occupied properties for a while now. 43 is standard, 24. All right, this is the- Mr. Judge, I'm sorry. 43. What is this paragraph, subparagraph A? Is this, it's not even a complete sentence. What is this? Project shall be managed in cloud. Property business will be sold on the site. That is, thank you for bringing that to my attention. This might have been, I was moving things around a few times. So maybe this, I'm gonna go do this. This might have by accident. I'll look into where that should be placed, if at all. Okay. All right, with technical changes, 43 is approved. Without objection, 44 and 45 are the logging and reporting requirements that are, we've included in recent application, special permits, parking, approved services only, that standard number of spaces maintained by, okay, so the numbers on site spaces, on this one, do we wanna just include the spaces in the new parking? Sure. So that's a plus 40, plus 17. Yes. It's 56, right? 56 is the number, right? That's cool. I thought it was 53. It's, yeah, it's the 43 plus the 30 minus the 17, should be the- 53, sorry. No, it is 56. 56. Okay. The 56 proposed, it'll be like as shown on play plan stated. All right, well, I need to play with this a little bit, but. All right. So you'll come back, we won't approve that. Do you come back with us with corrections? The parking management plan should be followed all times. Any parking management plan, so come back to the public meeting, we'll have to do that. That's- Wait, wait