Dorothy and show me. All right, we're recording but there's still people coming in so just hold off. Certainly. We'll go ahead and start. Okay. Good evening. Two meetings. I want to ask people to mute so that there's no echo. Thank you. We have two meetings this evening. The first one is public form. I'm calling on the CPA recommendations, but not including the library. The second is our regular town council meeting. So I'm going to start by calling meeting to order. Governor Baker's March 12th order, suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law. Allows us to hold town council meeting. Given that we have a quorum of the council present. I'm going to call upon each councilor by name. At that time, they should unmute their mic and say present. This one to Kate that you can hear me and we can hear you. Please remember to mute your mic after saying presence. And so I'm going to start. I don't see Shalini. So I'm going to start with Alyssa Brewer. Present. Pat De Angelis. Present. Darcy DeMont. Present. Lynn Griesma is present. Mandy Johanna. Present. Dorothy Pam. Still waiting. Okay. Evan Ross. Present. George Ryan. Present. Kathy Shane. Present. Steve Schreiber. Present. Andy Steinberg. Present. Sarah Schwartz. Present. We're going to begin with a very, very brief presentation on this. It'll be a slide. It will show the recommendations. Of the Community Preservation Act committee. And I also want to note that with us in the audience this evening. Is Sarah Marshall. Who is chair of the Community Preservation Act committee. And also note that with us. As a panelist is Anthony Delaney. Who is the major staff supporting. That group as well. So very quickly. Could you show the slide that shows the recommendations? So this is the fiscal order. That shows the recommendations. And I just want to point out very quickly. That each of the recommendations is shown by the amount of money. And they are. In various. Groupings. The first one is housing. The second grouping is historic preservation. The third grouping is open space, but there are no projects in open space this year. The fourth is total recreation. And the fifth is administrative. And then in addition to that. We also make sure that there is. A reserve. And a. Historical reserve. So we're going to take that down. I'm going to ask the audience to raise your hand. If you have. Comments with regard. To the community preservation act. Recommendations. Chris Brestrup. Would you like to make a comment? Can you show the slide again. About the CPA. Monies. I guess I was mistaken about. The North common. I thought there were two amounts for $250,000 each. One for historic preservation and one for. Recreation. Anthony, do you want to clarify that? That is, that is what's there. There's a. There's a line. It would be line six there. Yeah. Where the mouse is. And then yes. So it's the same project split. Into two different fields. Two different functional areas. I see. All right. Thank you very much. We'll leave it up for a little bit, but meantime. Are there any questions or comments. From the audience. This is the public comment period. This comes to the public comment. This is the public comment period. This comes to the council for a vote later on. We are not voting on the recommendation with regard to the library. That's the Jones library. Are there any other questions from. Staff or counselors. Kathy. Lynn, I have a comment more than a question just for the audience. I just wanted to make sure that. I just wanted to make sure that this. We earlier this year. Voted on the Belcher town road purchase. So there we have actually CPAC has allocated more to community housing than is shown here, but that was taken because we had an immediate need to close down a purchase order. So it was done off the normal. Michael. So it's just. Thank you. It's not on this purchase order because we've already done that. Are there comments or questions from the audience? Yes, Bruce. Please enter the room. State your name on mute. State your name where you will live and your question. Bruce called them. I live at 159 mine street. In Amist. My question is just looking at the. The list of projects here. I noticed that almost all of them are. Town related. Which seems to be a change from the. Previous years where I was more involved and interested because of the North Amist community farm. I was paying attention to this. Over the past five or six years. I'm not sure if this is just a section of the, of the total. Allocations. There's actually two allocations that are not on here. One was mentioned earlier by councilor Shane. And that's the allocation that we did. To purchase. The property on Belcher town road for low income housing. The town community has to buy a $20. $20 for the Jones library historic preservation. That was before the council in April. So, so I guess then we are looking at a CPA allocations, which is substantially. Town generated the town projects. Is this a trend? Or. Is this an aberration? Do you think it's, I don't think it's either. I think it's a. a respectable applicant for community preservation? Oh, yes, yes, I'm sure. Sorry, I didn't mean to imply otherwise. I'm just curious as to why there seems to be so few community nonprofits that have been apparently motivated to apply. Athena, I'm gonna ask if you would bring Sarah Marshall into the room, if she'd like to comment on that or maybe Anthony Delaney would like to comment. So it is true that the town makes up the majority of the proposals accepted this year. Only one proposal was proposed and not accepted this year. It was a private initiative that was in its initial configuration rules not eligible for CPA. The CPA has some ideas about outreach and we'll be making some efforts towards that this summer. Greater advertising, some info sessions, other ideas under consideration. So committee has noticed that too. If Sarah has something else to say there, I would definitely want to hear from her. You could bring Sarah into the room. Sarah is, as I mentioned earlier, is the chair of the CPA committee. Am I in the room? You are. Okay, hello everyone. Bruce, I don't know, but my guess is the pandemic may have just slowed down the work of a lot of private organizations. That's just a guess. Thank you very much, all of you. That's helpful, I'll help them. Thanks, Bruce, and thanks for joining us. Are there any other comments from the audience at this time? Questions are also welcome. Yes, Janet Keller. Please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Sure, Janet Keller, and I lived on Post-It Hill Road in North Amherst. I just came in, I apologize. Are we only talking about community preservation at things? We are, this is the Public Forum Community Preservation Act only. Okay, I'll go away. Thanks. Thanks. Are there any other comments about the Community Preservation Act recommendations from the CPA committee? Janet, you need to lower your hand, please. Thank you. Are there any other comments? Going to remain for about another two or three minutes, and then we're going to move to the regular council meeting. Okay. Any other comments from the audience? Gabriella, please enter the room and state your name and where you live. Can you hear me now? We can, and these are comments only on the Community Preservation Act. Okay, so I have a question about the Gabriella for that. I live in Amherst at Greenleaves, and I have a question about the North Common Project. I confess I have not been following this project at all, so I may be asking a question or making a comment which has already been covered at previous times. So is the North Common Project, is that the one that is going to be removing parking spaces and putting a ban shell up in the common? It is the one that we are going to be discussing later on the agenda tonight, and there's actually dedicated public comment for it. It actually, there's two proposals on the table. One is a partial removal of parking. The other one removes all of the parking on the common. It is not where there is a proposed ban shell. That would be on the South Common. Okay, but there will be, you will be addressing that later on in the meeting? Yes, we will. Okay, thank you. Are there any other public comments on the CPA recommendations at this time? I see none. I'm going to ask that we take the slide down and I'm gonna just pause for one more moment. And I'm going to at this point adjourn this public forum and we're going to move immediately into the town council meeting at 6.45. I've already talked about Governor Baker's provisions. This is now the regular town council meeting. I'm calling it to order at 6.45. Two additional counselors have joined us. I wanna make sure that they can hear us and we can hear them. Shallonee Balmille. Yes. Thank you. Dorothy Pam. Please unmute and let us know if you can hear us and we can hear you. And I'm gonna come back to Dorothy in a moment. Okay. This meeting includes audio, video and is available live on Amherst Media. There's no chat room. If anybody has technical issues, please let Athena and myself know and we can decide at that time what to do with the meeting. I also want to draw attention to the announcements on the printed agenda. I'm not going to go through those announcements but I do wanna highlight that there are two public forums on the property village intersection. One is Thursday night at six and one is on Saturday, March 7th. Dorothy, I see that you're here. Can you hear us? And we can hear you. Right. Thank you. All right, so we're going to move on to, and let me just mention, we have one event outside Town Hall. It is an event with flag raising. It's a ceremony along with a proclamation regarding child abuse awareness and prevention month. And that is on April 6th at 9 a.m. in front of Town Hall. We can take that down. We have no hearings this evening so we're going to move to public comment. While there may be an opportunity, while there will be an opportunity for public comment on the North Common later in the agenda, this is the only other public comment this evening. I'm going to ask for a show of hands of all the people who would like to comment. Okay, residents are welcome to express their views. I'm going to say for up to two minutes at the discretion of the council president, based on the number that I'm seeing, I'm going to keep it to two minutes. The council will not engage in dialogue or comment on a matter raised during general public comment. So I'll begin by asking Michelle Miller to enter the room and state your name and where you live. Hi, I'm Michelle Miller in North Amherst. Good evening, counselors. I'm here tonight on behalf of reparations for Amherst to comment on Mr. Vakulman's memo 7C update on funds appropriated to address systemic racism. First, we want to commend the community safety working group for their deeply transformative work on behalf of our community. We congratulate seven generations movement collective for winning the bid and are confident they will do exceptional work to support the group. We're also very happy to see Mr. Vakulman's thoughtful consideration with respect to the remainder of the funds available to address systemic racism. We wholeheartedly support the work of the core equity team, proposal one and the data collection, proposal three and do not wish to compete with either of those initiatives for funding. And we firmly believe both of those things should be incorporated as line items into the regular operating budget and be considered ongoing work of the town. If we are to become a truly anti-racist community we will need to be addressing equity and collecting data regularly. Our municipal budget is a direct reflection of our value as a community and must therefore include addressing the town's systemic racist practices and collecting racial data in the regular planning of our budget. Our request is a one-time ask specific to time-related items and if approved will be directly used to support the town's commitment to engage in a path of remedy for black residents. Specifically, the funds will be used to compensate black folks for engaging in our research work and facilitating educational opportunities for our community. The town council support of this request will have benefits for all. At this very moment, counselors in Evanston are getting ready to vote on the first iteration of their reparations bill. If the vote passes, they will become the first US city to offer reparations money to black residents ever. We could be the second but we need your support to help us advance. Thank you. For your comment, Michelle. Alex Kent, please enter the room, state your name and where you live and please to the extent possible keep your comments to two minutes. Thank you, counselors. Alex Kent, 83 North Prospect Street. Naomi Klein has written limits are a problem for our economic system. Ours is a culture of endless taking as if there were no end and no consequences. A culture of grabbing and going. This attitude is manifest in buildings like one East Pleasant Street, a building that is vastly out of scale compared to the rest of the downtown business district. Its walls run sheer from the sidewalk line to the top of its barely articulated no setback five story facades. Friends are sky high from $1,660 for a studio to $3,100 for a two bedroom. Like other archipelago projects downtown, the building offers zero affordable housing and probably never will. As a 20 year downtown resident, I support development of the business district and downtown neighborhoods. I would support zoning that permits even encourages greater density, but only if that development includes owner occupied rentals, multi-unit owner occupied condominiums and preferably in town co-housing. I want zoning that actively discourages the construction of absentee landlord student housing. I strongly support the proposed permitting moratorium. Thank you. Thank you for your comment, Alex. Ira Brick, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Hi, I'm Ira Brick. I live at 255 Strong Street. And I just want to support the idea of taking a break, a moratorium to do more planning, more public input, more seriously considering a lot of the objections from a lot of people in our community that we are not building the right things. Nobody wants those five straight buildings and it looks like there's no end in sight to them. Nobody who's complaining on these calls at least wants the densification to the point that you're creating overcrowding that is more slum-like than anything else. Everybody wants to live in a nice neighborhood no matter how diverse that neighborhood is. And I think that there's a lot of damage that can be done if you build now that's gonna last for generations. We can take a pause and you will be glad that you are building what the community wants, what's going to entice people to go downtown. And just one mismatch that just seems to be more apparent than ever is the number of student apartments that are surrounding the new playground. Who's gonna play there? It's an attractive nuisance for college students. So I'm just saying let's pause and do more planning and more public input. Thank you so much. Thank you for your comments, Ira. Ruth Hazard, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Okay, thank you. Can you hear me now? We can. Thank you. My name is Ruth Hazard. I live on Pine Street in North Amherst and thank you for giving me a time to speak. I see that a decision about anti-racism training for the council is on your agenda this evening. I'd like to express my appreciation and my support for the anti-racism training that you are soon to embark on and urge you to fully engage with the training. I have also done various trainings from decades ago to days ago and to learn about and to gain skills to undo the systemic racism that pervades our country. And I have learned something new and important from each one of them. As a person of European descent who has the privileges of whiteness, I have had to learn to see what was all around me and what I was conditioned by white supremacy culture to not see and to not understand. Often it is very painful to understand how the system has harmed black people, indigenous people and other people of color over centuries and how the system operates to keep itself going. It is not easy work, but I find that every time I see more clearly the truth of the harm and injustice that was and is still going on, I also gain in wholeness and integrity within myself. The work of white folks is not about becoming swamped and mired and lost in guilt and shame. Though the fear of that can sometimes stop me and us from moving deeper into the work. It is about lifting ourselves into wholeness, into being our highest selves, being grounded in our bodies and our hearts so that we can generously take responsibility for working to change what's wrong. I urge you to hold to the vision of a fully inclusive culture and structure in our town and beyond, one that empowers and enriches all of us. When I have taken the risk to keep moving toward that goal, I have never regretted it. When I have invested time and energy into that work, I've grown stronger accordingly. It was worth the investment. And so I offer you my support and respect as you move forward into that vision. Thank you. Ruth, thank you for your comments. Mary Sayer, please enter the room. State your name and where you live. Can you hear me? You can. Oh, Mary Sayer, Pine Street. And I thank Ruth for that. That was, anyway, I thank her for saying what she said. I'm calling about the moratorium. And I would, I am in favor of it because what I've heard from the town council and I've tried to follow the planning board on this that we have a housing crisis, but I haven't heard any even approximate figures on how many people in town rent, how many people own, how many people would like to move, where they would like to move to, what size they would like to move into, are they downsizing? So I think that we need to get that kind of information before we start simply building. Amherst actually in the past, in the 70s overbuilt. And I think it was the kind of place we're in right now where we just said, we need housing build. And I think that we need to do it in a considered way. So I am for this moratorium simply, I think we should send a survey to the town via our census and it can be anonymous, just asking people telling them why we wanna know their opinion and then asking simple questions. Are you planning on moving? Would you like to move? If you would like to move but can't move, why not? Where would you like to move to? There are so many pieces of information that I don't think the town has because I've asked and I haven't gotten any sort of hard figures. So I would like to get beyond a feeling that we have a housing crisis to, we have a housing crisis and here, and here's what it represents. Quickly, I know at North Square, all the affordable housing went very fast and the rest is primarily students and graduate students. So I think we need to look at what's already built and who's in it and then go from there. Thank you. Mary, thank you for your comments. Kitty, Axels and Barry, please enter the room, state your name, where you live. Hi, Kitty, Axels and Barry, I live on Stony Hill Road in Echo Hill, South. And I'm just wondering really what your vision for Amherst is, especially in light of COVID and affordability and the lack of projections about how the student population is going to increase or decrease. I don't think we really have any idea whether we're gonna need an urban corridor or even be able to use an urban corridor, tall apartment style student dorms that many people think are pretty ugly and overshadow everything else. So I'm wondering if what you really want is a healthy, robust, sustainable mix of ages, mix of shades and colors and genders, young families, middle-aged, older people, local, small, local businesses. I used to be able to get everything I needed downtown when I first moved here in 1971. Now, I really can't get ahead of lettuce unless it's the summertime, and then I can go to the farmer's market. But you just can't really get any groceries other than maybe CVS if you wanna support CVS. I can't get a hammer. I really, I can't get a pair of socks unless they say Amherst College. And yes, I can go out to eat. But I wanna be able to support my small businesses. I wanna be able to get what I need downtown and to walk there once I get to the downtown area by taking a bus is what I wanna be able to do. So my basic question is what's your vision for Amherst and is densification throughout the area that goes all the way from about Southeast Street, all the way to beyond Sunset Avenue, it goes way out to Route 9, it goes over to Polkberry Ridge, is making a lot of putting, is increasing the density so much, really the way to accomplish whatever your vision is. And I don't know what it is anymore. That's all. Thank you, Kitty. Suzanne Fabing, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Hello, I'm Suzanne Fabing Muspratt. I live at 38 North Prospect Street and I'd like to speak in favor of the proposed moratorium. A lot of issues are in the air at present that should be resolved before any more new buildings are approved, inclusionary zoning, downtown parking, how to attract year round residents, families, workers and retirees to live in or near downtown, how to sustain the small businesses that locals depend on, how to make our town a magnet for visitors and enhance its economic vitality, in short to address some of the other objectives of the master plan for town center beyond housing. There's even simply been a need to define a mixed use building and an apartment building, which hasn't been properly done here to four. The planning department has been working on many of these questions and studying several of the zoning amendments that council wants to consider, but those efforts are still very much in process. They've recently decided to hire a consultant to facilitate discussion with residents and other stakeholders, that's a great step, and to make recommendations about design guidelines and zoning changes. The consultant won't begin work until June, however. Meanwhile, developers are rushing to get their downtown projects approved lest any changes might be adopted that are not in their favor. Since all of these issues are actively in play, it makes no sense to approve building permits for new residential buildings in our precious but very small downtown and the surrounding RG before the consultants and planners have done their work and town council has been able to chart a course forward. The moratorium now will permit a reasoned and considered planning process for making the crucial decisions that will determine the town's future. With that a moratorium, more bricks and mortar will be put in place that the town will regret for decades to come and opportunities for positive improvements in our built environment will have passed us by. Thank you. Thank you for your comments, Suzanne. Susan Cummings, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Okay, can you hear me? Yeah, okay. Yes, I'm Susan Cummings at 27 Greenleys Drive. I request that they propose moratorium on the construction permits for residential buildings be extended to route nine and university place where in recent months there has been a dizzying amount of residential construction primarily for college students adding to these new buildings is yet another one currently under construction at the corner of route nine in Snell. The impact on traffic, crowding and the character of this area of town is staggering. I also would request the council to extend the proposed moratorium is two more than six months to at least nine months until after the town elections in November so that candidates and citizens can discuss what they all want for Amherst. And I just heard about this consultant which sounds like a great idea. So thank you very much. Oh, if I may, do I have time? Yes, okay. I would like to say looking at the future I would ask that if it is determined by the town and UMass that even more student housing is necessary the council seriously explore with UMass the alternative of joint public, private housing projects on the UMass campus which has been the idea of which has been thrown around for years and I don't know there was press about it a year or so ago and I don't know why it's not being considered. Sounds like a great idea. Thank you very much. Susan, thank you for your comments. Pat Rooney, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Hi Pam Rooney, thank you for having me. I'm sorry, Pat, Pam. It's okay. My grandmother called that too. I support forwarding this article to the planning board for the process by which the community can weigh in and discuss a moratorium on what's coming down the pike at us. I have been advocating for some time that we plan first and then change our zoning and adjust our bylaws second. So I am hardly in favor of moving this along so that we have some good discussion about, yes, let's build more in the town center but let's please do it in a way that we can live with for the next generation or two. So thank you, let's move it along and into the hands of the planning board with some good public process. Thank you. Pam, thank you for your comments. So again, my apologies for misstating your name. Jane Pearl, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Hi, my name is Jane Pearl. I live in Echo Hill on Duxbury Lane for almost 30 years. I have a question about the definition of affordable housing. I haven't seen in any town documents the town, what that means in dollars and cents. So I looked it up and there's a simple formula which low income is defined as 50 to 60% of the area's median family income for a family of four. And so if we assume 60% to be, you know, magnanimous to err on the side of the higher number and assume that 30% of one's budget should be devoted to housing, then it seems like, oh, and the median family income for a family of four in 2019 was $56,658. The 60% of that is almost $34,000 and 30% of that is divided by 12 is less than $900 for a family of four. That would be rent, affordable rent. That's, I may be incorrect, but that's the number I came up with. And there's another formula that I came up with for affordable home ownership, but I think we're talking about rental more for the coming buildings that are being discussed. And so I would very much like clarification about what that town considers an affordable rent for a family of four, maybe also for families of two or one or three. And if the percentage of units that would be devoted for affordable housing will include rents that low, that's all I have to say. Thank you for your comments, Jane. Janet Keller, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Thank you. Janet Keller, 120 Pulp at Hill Road in North Amherst. I too am supporting a temporary moratorium and I want to talk about the time it would allow the consultant to create design guidelines for how more housing can be built and then combined with small commercial spaces affordable and very... And is there a problem? A range of tenants and support, a year round economy it would address the problem that restaurants and other small businesses are now facing during the months of school break when their patronage drops by as much to 20% of normal while overhead remains at 100%. New guidelines would create an environment where local owners can afford to operate small shops, restaurants and services that cater to visitors and year round residents. Thorn's Market in Northampton shows how a collection of small and even micro businesses can draw customers and enliven a town center providing buildings with spaces to accommodate a range of residents and businesses is not necessary for a year round local economy. Many community members have spoken in recent months about the need for this type of development downtown and near downtown and the master plan repeatedly calls for design guidelines. Good guidelines will build community support for new developments and draw people downtown. I hope you adopt this important proposal to plan first for an outstanding town center along some outstanding design guidelines and then and only then incorporate them into any zoning changes. Thank you. Kenneth, thank you for your comments. Sandy, must prep please enter the room, state your name and where you live. We need to unmute. Then is there a problem? Thank you. There you go. Sandy must prep 38 North Prospect Street. I've looked over the town plan of 2010 and there are many lordable objectives including true, some for a regarding housing but not just a numerical count preserving the character of the town and so on. And as I understand it, there has been in recent years, last two or three years, a quite respectable number of permits met and buildings made and that is continuing. Under the current zoning laws is why is there a necessity of changing it? What experience we've had of that building has not been encouraging as many people have noted, largely students, not the desirable diverse population that we would like to see and certainly not affordable units other than those required by laws only. So rich students can afford these small place places but families of modest means cannot and there's not enough room for them even if they could afford it. So I want to know why there is a formulation of a housing crisis. I would like that to be explained and those who put it forward should put those numbers out there to explain why there is a crisis. I think there should be a moratorium. I like the idea of extending it to the time of the coming election. So indeed, extend it to nine months. Thank you. Thank you for your comments Sandy. There's caller with the last four digits of 5700. Would you please come in, enter the room and state your name? Are there special instructions we need to give them? I think that, oh, it looks like we're ready to go. Right ahead please. Hi. Yes, my name is Jeff Cobb. Six while, thank you for hearing me. I dialed in on a conference call not the zone, hence the strange introduction. That's fine. I just wanted to echo my support for a temporary permit moratorium until such time that some of the zoning rules and bylaws that are currently being looked at can be reviewed with the aim of having, you know, the right type of development that residents want in the areas that they live. I'd also like to see a better consideration of owner occupancy for supplementary units and also a dialogue with the university about the growing issue of student housing. You know, I participated in a number of planning board discussions and zoning board appeal discussions and there's no, and child beating discussions and there's no interaction with the university or there's no, I hear nothing from the university's input on this. And I think I would support a temporary moratorium and I would encourage the council and the appropriate town officials to really encourage the university to use their vast acreage to address the student housing problem in Amherst. Thank you for listening to my comments. Jeff, thank you for joining us. Claudia Pesmani, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Because I'm unmuted. Yes, you are. Yes. Claudia Pesmani here representing the Amherst area chamber as the executive director and I'm offering a brief statement regarding the proposed building moratorium that we feel is detrimental to local economic growth. And this is accompanied by a much fuller and complete statement that has submitted been submitted in full to the town council. So as stated, our old school 16 temporary moratorium for 180 days on building permits for construction of residential buildings with three or more dwelling units as proposed would be detrimental to economic growth in the town of Amherst and send the wrong message. Amidst the economic and ongoing housing crisis our town and region are facing the chamber has worked hard to position the Amherst area to emerge more resilient and coys to be an economic engine of the region. Redevelopment and housing production are an important part of the recovery and our long-term economic development goals as a town. This moratorium will directly hurt builders, trades people is fixedly irresponsible for the town and sends a clear message to those who are considering moving to starting their system or investing in Amherst do not dispel. So we do want to highlight it. It's antithetical to the town's own studies and stated goals. And it's been as stated as such at length by the Amherst municipal affordable housing trust the planning department and town council demand for housing and Amherst greatly exceeds the supply. The move is also in direct contradiction of three of your stated FY21's town council performance goals for the town manager including economic vitality for major capital investments and housing affordability adopted by the town council in September. Ultimately the chamber who has been working directly with the bid has been working to support and recruit new businesses residents to move to Amherst as well as planning and while rebuilding our tourism initiatives and securing funding for revitalization initiatives actively securing funding for revitalization initiatives. I state that emphatically. This moratorium works indirect conflict with those investments. Even together with the bid during the pandemic we work to address the need for adaptable pivots for our small business owners. We work together to encourage a modified zoning process as a direct result in June and then again in November 2020 the town council overwhelmingly passed zoning Article 14 including some of that temporary outdoor dining to encourage we are here to encourage and facilitate the reopening of existing businesses and the opening of new businesses to stimulate economic activity in the aftermath of the COVID-19 emergency. We applaud you for all the efforts there. Again, the proposed building moratorium acts in direct contradiction with these goals and it really seems to undermine Amherst short-term economic recovery from the pandemic. So we're really imploring the town councilors and planning board members to unequivocally reject this policy. Please send the message of the Amherst as a place that welcomes housing and economic development and simultaneously continue working diligently on the important planning and zoning reforms introduced in January of this year. Thank you for your time and service to the town of Amherst. What do you think of the movement? Bob Tancredi, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Hello, my name is Bob Tancredi. I live at 57 High Street in Amherst and I would like to reiterate that back up some of the folks that have already spoken about a moratorium on the building. I especially think that given what we've seen so far and the fact that elections are coming later this year, I think we need to digest what's happened to this point. Many, many people I speak with are not happy with it. Again, I'm just talking about friends and neighbors. And I think before we continue to pound nails and put in permanent solutions for temporary problems, we need to catch our breath and review where we're going. I'm certainly in favor of vitalizing downtown and revitalizing businesses in Amherst to spread this tax burden to businesses and other buildings, permanent business buildings. But as a homeowner, the tax burden continues to fall on people like me for everything we do. Again, a moratorium definitely, let's see where we are. Let's see if the people who Amherst are happy with what's happened so far and they can more time to discuss, more time to hear from other people and then they can vote their opinion. I would also like to mention the reason I'm on this call is somebody puts a flyer in my mailbox today, something about footnote M, something the planning board is reviewing and there would like to remove, I guess. And what that allows, I know I'm not gonna do it justice, but it seems like it allows knockdowns, houses, housing knockdowns in residential neighborhoods replaced with townhouses or apartment complexes, no matter who lives on either side or whatever. It just, it looks like a license again for knockdowns and building apartments. It sounds like a recipe to demolish neighborhoods near downtown Amherst. I can't imagine who came up with it, it makes no sense. But again, that's, I just wanted to get that comment and I really appreciate this time and thank you for listening. Thank you for your comments, Bob. I wanna mention to all of you that are so interested in commenting that the council will not be voting tonight on the zoning bylaw. It'll be referred and it must go through the hearing process and the hearing will provide plenty of opportunity for additional resident comment. So it's not a decision tonight that your comments are impacting. Carol Pope, please enter the room and state your name. Where you live. Hear me now? Yes, we can. Thank you. Carol Pope, 119 High Street. I would like to just strongly urge and echo many of the comments already tonight to support the temporary building moratorium. And I agree, it should be nine months, not six months. I think so many decisions are being made without people being fully apprised of what's going on. I know people should be listening to your discussions more, but for those who don't, I think there should be some kind of surveys or some kind of public information so they could all have a chance to express their dismay, perhaps, but anyway, their opinions about how this is all coming down. So I strongly urge that we have a nine month moratorium on this building projects. And I hope there will be lots of time for public comment. I appreciate your saying that, Lynn. So we are encouraged, I hope, to keep making public comments to keep this, whatever happens now is gonna affect us for generations to come. And it's already happened in our town. I mean, so many buildings have been built that many people I know and myself included are very unhappy with. They do not give us vibrancy in our downtown. They don't bring any wonderful green space. They bring nothing to energize our town or make people wanna come to our downtown. So I think at least having a brief nine month time where we can stop and make decisions and think about this would be a big help. Thank you all for your participation and your help. Carol, thank you for your comments. And Scarf, please state your name and where you live. Hello, my name is Annie Scarf. I live at 151 Amity Street in the Marsh House Condominiums. Just a personal note, we live in what was the Amherst funeral home. It's now been renovated and there are two condominiums in the old house, 100 year old house and then three units have been added to it. So we're five families living here and it's been wonderful. We've been here 12 years. So I guess that's one way of saying the kind of development that I hope we can focus on more than the buildings that have gone up in the last couple of years. I can second just about everything I've heard, but the three points that stand out for me are that with all of those four, five story apartment houses going up, as I understand it, there haven't been affordable units. There's no parking. And one thing I just don't understand is why are we solving the University of Massachusetts student housing problem? Obviously this is a college town and there's a lot of benefits that go both ways, but I don't understand why essentially dorms are being built in downtown Amherst. Anyway, thank you so much for the opportunity to speak and yeah, and have a good evening. Any thanks for your comment. Jennifer Taub, please enter the room. State your name and where you live. Jennifer Taub, I live at 259 Lincoln Avenue. I actually wasn't gonna speak tonight because I didn't wanna just repeat all the comments for people speaking in support of the moratorium as I do, but I just wanted to respond to the comment that was made from the spokesperson from the Chamber of Commerce. I think it was the chamber of the bid. And I'm not clear how the moratorium sends the wrong message to the business community since the new buildings downtown have only displaced numerous businesses. It seems like the new buildings have done the opposite of encouraging new business development that the new buildings downtown have done the opposite of that. And that they in themselves have sent the wrong message to the business community because the buildings have displaced businesses and no effort has been made, including the design of the first floor of these buildings to encourage businesses to come into Amherst. And as a resident of a downtown adjacent neighborhood, I want nothing more than to see new retail and service businesses come into downtown. I mean, I would volunteer to work with the bid and the Chamber of Commerce. I think the residents who live in the neighborhoods around town, we want new businesses. I think sometimes we're seen as anti-commercial development, but I can, at a recent conversation that the town manager has, I listed I think 14 businesses that have disappeared in the 10 years I've lived in Amherst that I regularly use. I miss them dearly. So I just, again, want to reiterate that I do support the moratorium to plan first before we build. But again, I don't see how the moratorium sends the wrong message to businesses. And seriously, if there's anything we in the adjacent downtown neighborhoods can do to work with the bid and the Chamber to try and bring new retail and service businesses into the downtown area, just call on us. We're there. Thank you. Jennifer, thank you for your comment. Kristi Straj White, who's entered the room, state your name and where you live. You are unmuted, but your voice is very soft. We need to turn your volume up, please. Yes. Okay, sorry about that. Hi, my name is Kristi Straj White, and I also was not going to speak and reiterate the same thing that everybody had said, but I also was moved by the statement of the business improvement district representative. And I guess I'm a little bit restating the person who was just on, but I am in favor of the moratorium. I am in favor of extending it to nine months to give more time for the consultant and to work and to get more input from community members. I also have noticed many of the businesses that we, our family, as we used to go to have disappeared downtown businesses like World's Apart Games and Amherst Martial Arts and the Amherst Pub and Loose Goose, just to name a few, are gone now and Shale Bear. There's more bubble tea shops. There's a lot more businesses that favor students and are not as good and interesting for families. And I would like to see more businesses that are great for families. And not have the downtown become another student center. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your comment, Christy. Adrienne Therese, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Thank you so much. Can you hear me? Yes. Well, thank you, counselors. And as a long-term resident of Amherst, there are a few issues that raise the temperature of individuals and the collective town. And of course, one of them is zoning. And I'd like to encourage everyone's temperature coming down and I do see this temporary moratorium as assisting in that way. For me, it's not about should we amend zoning bylaws. It's about what should those zoning bylaws be? And for me, let's not pit people against purpose or power against purpose. And for me, it's about what our community's vision is. And I think a 180-day moratorium brings us to a place to bring down the temperature to plan and then to make those zoning amendments. So thank you so much for your time and for your service to this wonderful place we all call home. Adrienne, thank you for your comments. Jesse Maverick. Hi, Jesse Major, live on Cosby Avenue in north side of town. Again, I won't echo all the comments which were probably said more eloquently than I would. Just wanted to add one different perspective slightly, which is definitely a favor of the moratorium. And that's because I fully believe there's a way for us to change and develop our town as successfully as numerous other cases around the country of small college towns of the same size, which are very vibrant, have lots of small businesses and are a great place to live. And when I moved here 14 years ago, I feel like that's how it was. And all I've seen is mostly changing towards or away from smaller businesses. And so I wholeheartedly believe we can get back there with the right planning. And I just don't see that happening with some of these new projects. So I'll just stop there. And again, thanks for listening. Bessie, thank you for your comment. Gabrielle Gould. Hi, thank you, Gabrielle Gould. I'm going to first speak as the executive director of the business improvement district. Just for clarification earlier, you heard from the Chamber of Commerce. For over 12 months, our businesses in our downtown have operated at less than 20% of business. And that is because we have not had the students, the parents and the faculty frequenting our stores. So as much as I would love to believe that our community is enough to keep our downtown thriving, it simply is not. We have all done our best. We have gotten more takeout than I've ever eaten in my entire life. And I've done my best to keep shopping downtown. It is not enough. The fact of the matter is, is that we need collective density in our downtown. The current buildings that everybody is so upset about and I want to use that word everybody because whenever my children say the word everybody to me, I find that very offensive. Not everybody feels that way. I live downtown. I am fortunate to be able to live downtown. And I love the downtown that I moved into. Do I think it needs help? Do I think it needs more? Absolutely. The bid is working on major projects right now, initiatives that will be coming forward to the public if they can all go the way we want them to do. To do a lot of what people are asking for, smaller shops, marketplaces, et cetera, et cetera. Those are things that we are going to need state funding for and things that only us as a 501C can be able to do. In the real world, there is rent to be paid and there are taxes to be paid. And it's very difficult to be a small business owner. As someone who has run small businesses myself, I say that with all of the heart, our businesses are doing their best to stay alive. Couple of things I just want to bring up is that the buildings that are downtown are bringing well over a million dollars in taxes versus the $60,000 that the carriage shops brought in. I also want to bring up that I've been able to speak to several of the carriage shops' previous owners and they are the ones that said that those businesses were failing long before the businesses were sold, the building was sold, and that they were falling apart. They couldn't keep them cool in the summer and they couldn't keep them warm in the winter. In the past two years, it's my understanding from our police chief that three calls have gone to one Kendrick Place and 11, I'm sorry, one EP and Kendrick Place. That means that they are not sucking resources unduly out of our community for the housing that they provide. I also want to state the incredible diversity that those houses, that that housing provides. It may not provide low income housing and I understand that that is a goal for all of us, but it is normal to live in downtown anywhere in America and have to pay higher rents than you would living on the outskirts of a town. But those buildings have an incredible racial diversity that I think benefits our community greatly and I see it when I'm walking up and down the streets. I see it when I walk into Lillies. I know that they have been an incredible boon for Paul's shoe repair and for Henian bakery across the street.  Currently we are looking at a sea of asphalt and cement that the bid pays someone every day to go clean up and it is full of bottles and literal human species and it is disgusting. So the fact that somebody wants to come in and clean that up and build lead certified platinum buildings into this community, I do not see as a negative thing on any way, shape, or form. And when we're talking about a mere or a small nine months, the only reason our businesses are still in business is because this incredible community helped raise close to $400,000 for the bid and the chamber and the downtown Amherst Foundation to give grants to these businesses and keep them going. And the chamber and the bid have sat with business owners for hours and hours writing grants and helping them get all kinds of state funding. That is the only reason we still have businesses in place because most of them would have been closed if we had not done all of that. I also just wanna speak as a resident of 34 Canton Avenue with two children currently in the school system here. Most people cannot be on these calls because they're making dinner for their children. They're catching up on homeschooling because we're all sitting there watching our children learn and I use that in quotes on a screen. We are exhausted and we do not have the time. We should, we wish we could. I have five friends who would love to be on this call right now and make their opinions heard.  And I count myself lucky to have that privilege. But there are not the majority of this community. There are 38,000 members of this community. 15 people does not make a majority. That is at a resident, not as the bid director. I thank you very much for your evening and I know that this is not a voting evening. So this was the wrong tree to die on. Thank you. We have three more comments and I really would like to stop it there and one of them is repeat comments. So I'm actually going to suggest that Mary Shaw, Shahan, I'm sorry, I'm not going to pronounce your last thing correctly. Why don't you enter the room and state your name and where you live, Mary? You need to unmute. Thank you. Mary, I'm Shahan. I live on Blackberry Lane in North Amherst. Amherst is these enormous buildings, I think. Where am I? So I understand the economic advantages of having them and I just in support of a moratorium for the time being to look at things more closely before we expand and do. Sorry that we're having trouble. Mary, we did get your statement about understanding the economic advantages and but that you support the moratorium. Jennifer Taub, you've spoken before. Is there something that you feel pressing to add? Please enter the room and state your name. You lowered her hand. Okay. Francis Goyes, please enter the room and state your name. Hi, can you hear me okay? Yes. Excellent. Hi, my name is Francis Goyes-Flore. I am a renter and I am a resident in Amherst. I'm at 155 Lincoln Avenue, just a couple of blocks from downtown. I understand that there are serious, specially designed concerns with the two main buildings that are built in downtown. However, I also know that Amherst has a huge need for more housing of all types. The housing production plan lists more rental housing needed for families and individuals and also appropriate housing for students. There's been ample planning that's been done and I understand that whenever change happens, it's hard, especially for residents that have lived here their entire lives, but I don't think we should let some people that have had the privilege of being able to call this place home disallow others from joining us. I think that Amherst is a very privileged community that has many opportunities. And I think that it's only equitable to allow more folks to live. And even if the buildings, the new buildings are not for lower income households, increasing the supply is also likely to allow those lower income households to be able to live elsewhere. When you don't have enough supply is when we see displacement occur. And I am sure that as you know, displacement primarily affects both lower income households, households of color who also tend to be renters. So I think that if we want to be an equitable community, we have to keep those considerations in mind. And again, I know that change is difficult and that designs do need to improve, but I don't see the moratorium being a solution. And I also worry about what that means for state funding, especially at this time. I know that we're a housing choice community. And I also know that that may be at risk if we go down this route because then we wouldn't actually be a housing choice community. And that's all I'll say for now. Thank you. Francis, thank you for your comments. Janet, we really need to go on to the rest of the meeting. Is there something that you feel very pressing to say at this time? Please enter the room. You need to unmute. It makes me really sad when people suggest that those of us who are talking about bringing a wider range of business and people downtown, nobody here is saying don't develop housing. And personally, over the last five years, five years I've probably put 2,000 hours along with helping folks to become who are very low income and people of color to become homeowners. So it feels very hurtful to have those comments made. Thank you. Janet, thank you for your comment. We're going to move on to the rest of our meeting. And I do want to remind people that there will be additional periods both at the planning board, CRC and possibly other options. We're going to move to the consent agenda. Could you please show the consent agenda on the screen? The following items were selected because they were considered to be routine and it was reasonable to expect they would pass with no controversy. To remove an item from the consent agenda for discussion later, please ask me as I list that item or after I list all the items and the request to remove does not require a second. I'm going to read this as a motion and I will be looking for a second to move the following items and the printed motions they're under and approve those items as a single unit. The first three are the suspension of town council rules of procedure 8.4 for the following agenda items. 8E adoption of financial orders FY21-12, FY21-13 and FY22-07. 8F intermural agreements. 8G authorization for superintendent schools foster care transportation. That was just the suspension of the rules 8.4. 6.2 is the adoption of the 2021 child abuse awareness and prevention month proclamation. 8E is adoption of the following financial orders. F21-12-12, free cash to stabilization fund. F21-13, rescind authorized unissued debt. FY22-07, Community Preservation Act projects allocations. Please note that does not include Jones Library. 8F authorization for town manager to enter into the following intergovernmental agreements. Sealer of weights and measures with the city of Northampton for FY21. The municipal hearing officer with the city of Northampton for FY21. Veteran services with the city of Northampton and the towns of Amherst, Chester, Chesterfield, Cummington, Gaussian, Hadley, Middlefield, Pellum, Williamsburg, and provision of the ambulance service to the town of Levart for FY21 and 22. Provision of the ambulance services to the town of Pellum for FY21 and 22. Provision of ambulance services to the town of Shootsbury for FY21 and 22. Agreement for dog kennel services with the city of Northampton for FY21. Paramedic intercept services with the city of Northampton for FY21. Paramedic intercept services with the town of Hadley for FY21. And then we go on to HG, authorization for superintendent of schools, foster care transportation, and 11A, approval of minutes, March 8th, regular town council meeting minutes. Is there any request to remove an item? I have a point of order. Yes. You missed the paramedic intercept services with Turner's Falls when you read that. Thank you. Add the paramedic intercept services with Turner's Falls. Fire department for FY21. Thank you. Darcy. Yeah, I just have a question about the, financial orders and I guess I just don't understand if in the packet in the document with regard to the CPAC funding, it does include the Jones library. So could you explain why? And we're voting on that, right? Yes. The actual financial order does not include the Jones library and we're voting on the financial order. The packet in this overall report for CPA, but the actual financial order, what we looked at earlier does not include Jones library. And so did we already vote on that or is that coming up? Jones library will not come up until April 5th. So that will be included on that day, the CPAC funding? Yes. Okay. All right, Andy Steinberg. Yes. I request the removal of order FY207 Community Preservation Act project allocation from the consent agenda. That's ADE. I'm not objecting to inclusion under rule 8.4. This has to do with the adoption. Okay. Thank you. So the order that I've read earlier includes everything previously listed. What it does not include now is adoption of the financial order FY22-07 Community Preservation Act project allocations. It does however, allow us above to still act on that this evening after it comes to a vote. Is there any further questions or requests? I'll just for formality make a second on the motion. Thank you, Mandy, Joe. I appreciate that I was ready to ask for that as soon as we got there. Any other questions or requests? All right, hearing none. I'm going to move to a vote. And the votes I will start with is Shalini Balmilne. Yes. Melissa Brewer? Aye. Pat DeAngeloz? Aye. D'Arcy Dimog? Yes. Greecehiburds an aye, Mandy Joe Hanofi? Aye. Dorothy Pamm? Aye. Evan Ross? Aye. George Ryan? Sorry. Aye. Kat bola Shane? Yes. Dave Schreiber. Aye. Andy Steinberg. Aye. Sarah Schwartz. Aye. It's unanimous 13, 0, 0, and none absent. Okay, we are going to move on to the North Common. There is a very, very brief presentation. Then we also have a couple of earlier comments and we will take public comment. Ariella, I'll be asking how many people want to comment. Then we'll move to the council discussion and a motion and vote. So Athena, I think we're going to show the two different maps. And Guilford, you are making the presentation, correct? Yes, I'm making the presentation tonight. Thank you. There's really, everyone's heard the presentation before. You have the memo which shows the two differences. The plan you're seeing now is what we're calling 2B. It shows that you have parking on the common still and you have no parking on Main Street and you have some parking on Bultwood Avenue. The drawing you're looking at does show Bultwood being one way to the South, the way it's set up. And if you, if we get into more discussions about one-way traffic and two-way traffic, I can explain that better. The next drawing is the three, option three, 3B. The parking has left the common. We have parking on Main Street and we still have the parking on Bultwood and it's one way. In the table and in the handout that was giving to you, we talked about the parking changes. Right now, there's a total of 43 spaces in this area. With the parking lot, the way it is now before we do any work. If we go to plan 2B, two modified, we'll have 38 spaces. And if we go to the plan 3B, which you're looking at now, we'll have 27 spaces. If we just repave the parking lot and leave it the way it is now, we do lose about five spaces in the parking lot because we actually will lay the spaces out to their proper sizes. And some of them are smallest spaces right now. So as you, that's the basic, what we've been talking about for a while, I can't really add much more to it. So I'm willing to take questions if you're willing to, if you want to do questions. Okay. Are there questions from the council? You make that a little larger. Shalini. You can't see it. Yeah, I was interested in the feedback that was collected from businesses about the different plans, if that's possible. The head of the executive director of the bid is going to speak and I'll ask her to address that. Okay. Kathy, are there questions at this time? Yes. My question is the financing of this. The other part of the memo said the amount of money, including the new awards from CPAC, they have $500,000 and money that had been allocated in previous years is about 1.4 million. Does 1.4 million cover both plan? I keep calling them plan one and plan two, but modified plan two and 3B. So we've got that much money. The balance is 1.4. And I just want to know, as we're looking at this, whether that is enough money because there was one, there was a discussion at the Community Preservation Act of having to go out for a grant to supplement this money. So I just would like an answer to that. Our plan right now is to build to the $1.4 million. We believe we'll be able to do it. We may have to change some of the materials and go with a less expensive material versus a more expensive material, but we plan to build to the $1.4 million. Thank you. And just while I have you on your face anyway, Guilford, the one with the parking lot still there, can that be, that is going to be flat as I understood from an original Chris breast up presentation. So if we thought of it as a space that if we cordoned it off, we can put tables out, we could have a performance there, we could have a gathering there. So it's not slanted the way it is now. Am I correct? It would be a flat space that could be used that way. The one with the parking lot, that that parking lot could be used that way. It will be less slope than it is now, but it won't be totally flat. Okay, thank you. All right, I'm going to move to some public comment. We have in fact asked Gabrielle Gould to speak on behalf of the bid. Gabrielle, would you please enter the room and people are interested in the survey you did and also additional comments. Hi, am I here? Yes, thank you. We ran a survey going door to door to each of the businesses directly impacted by the work being done on the common all the way down Main Street to just below Black Sheep. We went into the Boltwood, Johnny's area, Arigato down to Amherst Coffee, Amherst Cinema, and then of course along both South Pleasant and all of Main Street facing the common. So you've just, so everybody understands it's Lavera Cruzana, et cetera. And if you look at Main Street, you're talking about Formosa, Pasti Basta, Russell's Lickers. The overwhelming consensus, 60% of the business owners requested that some form of parking remain with 30% saying they would prefer to see all of the parking go and 10% liking neither. And I'm sure anybody who has been downtown long enough knows who that 10% is. Even out of the 60%, there was a lot of heartfelt, I wish it could be all not parking. We think that that would be more beautiful. We think that that would be a better long-term position. But at this point, they feel that parking is going to remain important. I think before COVID, we were fortunate to come before the council with our wonderful plans of destination Amherst and those have not died by any measure. But our hopes when we presented that to the council was that we would be bringing the parking garage to you in tandem with the redo of the North Common or before the North Common. But due to COVID and a million other reasons, that was not the case. It is still our intention should this council deem it appropriate to change the zoning of the CVS parking lot that is town-owned and put out an RFP, we would like to be one of the private entities that apply for the RFP to be able to build this community parking garage. But unfortunately right now that's not on the table. So we have to look at the common without that as an option. And again, we're looking at a 60, 30 split on that. From our standpoint, and I speak for our board of directors, anything, anything will be better than what our offices look at every day. I have said this to several of you in person or on calls. When we had the Mary Maples strong this year, the landscaping company who we hired to do that for us told us that many of those branches are really about to come down. It is a dying tree and it is getting dangerous. We have ideas for a new tradition of Mary Maples part two for the future. And we look forward to seeing the heart and center of our downtown made beautiful, pedestrian friendly and accessible for all. Thank you. I also would like to call on Tom, the Reverend Tom Sinan, who is from Grace Episcopal Church. Please bring him into the room and have him on mute. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. I wasn't planning to speak. My senior warden is also present. But what would you like me to tell you? Well, we understand that at times you have spoken with Dave Zomac. Yes. If you would like, we can bring your senior warden in instead, but we didn't know which one of you would like to speak. We met with Dave and Christine earlier this month. The two proposals were presented to myself and members of our vestry. And we submitted a letter for the meeting that was supposed to be taking place earlier this month stating our position that ultimately, if the town council decides to go forward with the renovation of the North Common, we lean in the direction of Plan 2B. And in particular, I think our position is a lot, is quite similar to many of the businesses about the need for parking in the area for those of us who function and operate around the common. And I think also just to express our concern is not just it's about Sunday morning for us, it's the fact that parking in downtown Amherst in the evening is a very competitive operation trying to get a spot, whether or not you're going to Amherst Cinema or you're going to one of the restaurants, when we're not in the middle of a pandemic, we have things happening in our church in the early evening, almost every night, the choir rehearsals, 12-step programs, outside groups renting from us, our own meetings, and so on. So a thing we often hear, regardless of the work of the North Common is we always keep hearing how difficult it is for people to find parking in the evening. Excuse me, Reverend, but is Christopher Freightag, yes, why don't we bring him into the room as well? Good evening, can you hear me? Yes, we can. Well, thank you very much. I'm Chris Freightag, I'm the Senior Warden for Gray's Church. And I thank you for letting me have a few minutes here. Again, I think the Reverend sign and reiterated some of what we put in our note to the council. I know that Mr. Moreng discussed a little bit about one-way traffic, and it's been explained to us multiple times, even though the plans didn't show it, that should plan two, which is the preferred plan, not only by businesses, but I know that Gray's is leaning towards the preserved parking, is that this parking in front of Town Hall, that section of bullwood would be two-way. So it would allow traffic from the parking lot to go out onto Main Street and head away, as opposed to funneling all the traffic from Main Street, from the front parking lot, from the parking behind Town Hall, to in front of the church. And unfortunately, when Saturday's farmer market is there, in the past, that part of bullwood in front of the innet bullwood has been closed. So all this traffic would come through the church down Spring Street and then to get out. So it seems like quite a bottleneck there on Saturdays when the farmer market is there, if in fact that two-way designation for in front of Town Hall is not preserved. So again, we keep hearing about it, but even as Guilford said this evening, it's one way. So that's a major concern along with the thought of even losing parking. So I'd like a clarification on that and at least get the drawings updated to say what you mean, so that we have a better idea as to what type of traffic pattern is going to be coming through that area, especially on Saturdays with the farmer's market. But that's what I have to say for now. Thank you. Thanks to both of you for joining us this evening. Guilford, did you have any comment with regard to that clarification? So as far as, if you look at the plan, either one of the plans, if you want to bring it up. Either two or three B, both of which have been amended. Lynn, can you bring the one with the parking lot on it so we can see that's the going in and out of the parking lot? This is three B and this is two. So as you look, we did lay this out as one way down this way. So if you want to make this road two-way, there's two choices and it's in your discussion package. You want to keep it two-way, we need to either get rid of parking on one side of the road, either get rid of this parking, or move the parking in the sidewalk into the common about six to eight feet. So you can't have two-way, you have to get rid of the parking or you have to move the parking in the sidewalk into the common. And those are your two options. And we kind of showed you one-way because one-way is the least impact to the common itself at this time. And then if you want to adjust it, there's no really, it's easy to adjust it into the common. It's easy to take the parking out on the common side, but this shows you the most parking you can have there works best with one-way. Okay. Are there any, do any of the counselors need to see the drawings anymore? And I cannot, this is Kathy, I just, what the reverend said was he originally thought to get in and out of the parking lot, not all the way down, but just right in front of town hall, you could exit turning left and then go on Main Street the way you can now. So Guilford I think is saying you can't do that.  If you really, really want to have two-way so you can go out of the parking lot, you can't have two-way at that end and you can have one way in front of the church. It'd be very confusing. All right, I'm going to ask if there's any public comment at this time, right? Then I'm going, I don't see any. So I'm going to go back to the counselors and ask for questions or comments. Darcy. Yeah, I just wanted to have a clarification. When we had the presentation at TSO, I asked the question about can we cap the spending at the amount that we have? And at that time, the answer was no, that we were expecting that it was going to cost more. But what I'm hearing you say right now is yes, that we have decided to cap the spending on the project with at the amount that we currently have. Is that correct or am I hearing it wrong? That's correct. We've done some more estimates and played with some numbers and more and we're confident we can get this done in the amount of money we have. It may be more asphalt than people want and maybe less granite, more concrete steps. Those types of things may play into the mix, but yes, we feel like the 1.4 we can get this project built as you choose one of these two options. Thank you. I just wanna give some feedback that I've heard from residents. I mean, as you know, I'm the district counselor for the north part of Amherst, so I don't live downtown. But the number of people who talk about that lot in particular being important to them because they come down, they go into town hall, they pay a bill, they pick up something, they go to a meeting, they're in and out. So it's the in and out lot, they're not coming for a long time. And it gets huge, even with that, it's difficult to find a space. So it's of high value because it's highly used and there aren't a lot of other spaces for that whole cluster that's downtown. And I know we got a strong letter from Amherst Cinema, the overflow from the cinema is huge. You can go behind the cinema lot and it's full. People come in jockeying for positions in this small lot on North Commons. So we do have this other beautiful common. It's not that we don't have green. And I've watched the Belcher Town parking lot that's on their Commons right in front of their town hall. It's busy, especially when they have festivals. So it is a feature of a lot of New England towns when they don't have vast other places to park. So I just wanted to make that observation on its value to people. And then the other thing is just on a very personal level, when we were meeting in the town council, in the town room, I often had to come down an hour early to find a space to park. And we were meeting at 6.30. You know, if I tried to cut it close and get down at six o'clock, I sometimes parked a 20 minute, 30 minute walk away. I would just drive up and down streets. That lot was completely full. And I'm talking about after five o'clock. So people were using it for evening, for meetings and others that it's, for those of you who can walk into town or bike, but it's also really good for people who are all handicapped, you know, impaired because they don't have to walk very far. So it's central to us. And unless we have a real alternative right now, I think we need it. Sarah Schwartz. So I'm gonna agree with everything that Kathy just said about why that's important. New comments would be that, so you, there are businesses that are there like the liquor store, right? And so if that's a liquor store you've used for 25 years and you need to get home because you gotta feed your wife supper and she expects it by six and you wanna bring home a drink, you wanna park close to that, walk in, get what you need and go home.  The other thing is, is that we have a beautiful town hall and the parking in front to me seems welcoming to people that need to come in, run into town hall and get a map or get a permit or get their dog license. And I think that the people that still do that are the people that maybe are older or who don't have the money for a computer aren't computer savvy. And I think taking that parking lot away sort of sends the message that maybe town hall doesn't want people to have easy access to town hall. The other thing I wanna say is that I think during COVID-19 this pandemic time, we've learned that people need some places to be able to meet and churches are one of them. And I think it's really important that if the church is saying that it's going to affect their parishioners, I think we also heard, I think was brought up that it could affect funeral processions. I think we have to listen to them. I think churches are one of the places like libraries that are really important. And I would object to having the street be anything other than two way. And I think that maybe we should explore whether or not we wanna take part of the common or not. Northie Pam. I certainly think that Sarah made a lot of good points but I'm coming down on the opposite side. I think that the town hall is a beautiful and eccentric building and that we should have be able to see it that people coming into town should be able to see it without the screen of cars. Countering something Kathy said, I have never not gotten a parking spot for a town council meeting because Paul Backelman told me about parking behind town hall, which is there. But I wanna talk about why I think we can solve this problem in a way that will work. We had a parking consultant a couple of years ago and he talked about lots of little small parking places that existed that were private. And he said that we could make some arrangements and make some of them small available for public parking. And I'm not really good with some of these tech stuff but there are people that use their phone to find parking spots that actually use their phone to pay the meter. And that can tell you where these little parking spots exist. And if we can't find them behind local businesses where there are available spots then maybe we can make a deal with Amherst College which has parking lots nearby. I mean, it is too bad we lost the Spring Street lot, okay? I am gonna remind us that that was, I think, a bad decision. But many things take place in front of town hall which are very meaningful. The tech, the civic ceremonies take place in that region. The flag raisings, the proclamation readings. And I find that the drawings that Gilbert presented with the, that a green flat free area that was open to public life, it was just very attractive to me. So I'm not saying we don't need the parking. I'm saying, let's get more inventive. Let's find the spots. Let make, create more public spots in and around that area. But to free the town green, it's a very small. It's a very small green. We're gonna spend a lot of money, whatever we do on it. And I think that we should be able to see it and enjoy it and use it in the best way. George Ryan. I wanna follow up with Dorothy in support of this plan through the, first of all, it's not a choice between parking and no parking. In fact, as you can see from the chart, there's only a difference of 11 spaces between the two plans. Well, I realized that there's going to be some inconvenience. I'm not sure 11 spaces really is an overwhelming argument in favor of maintaining all that asphalt and that kind of unwelcoming space in front of town hall. So first I just point out that the difference in spaces is really not very large. And I think what we gain from plan 3B, besides the green, which I think is precious. And so the place for people to sit and read or play chess or have a sandwich. And there's still seven parking spaces right there for those who just need to come in and go out. What we really gain, it means the most to me is what Dorothy pointed out. It's that civic space. I think many of us have had, at least I have had some very powerful moments when members of our community, we had Tibet Day the other day, Puerto Rican Heritage Day, Black Month celebrations. We've had a series of important events that are held on a regular basis where we gather as a community. A flag is often raised, speeches and proclamations are read and people gather. And to me, I don't know if we could put that plan up again, but just to keep in mind that space that's created right in front of Town Hall, right by the flagpole, to me is a very meaningful action, especially coming out of COVID that draws people together. So for those reasons, I think, well, I acknowledge the inconvenience that will be for some, I think it's far outweighed by the advantages of the green space and by the possibility of creating a true civic space in front of Town Hall. Amy Steinberg? Yeah, I don't wanna repeat everything that the last couple of speakers just said, I agree with them, that the purpose of having a town common is the green, the enjoyment of the fact that there is a green space when Ms. Gould spoke on behalf of the bid, she talked about that as being something of value and she recognized that there was a split decision amongst the members of the business community who were polled. But it is 11 spaces, there was a creative part of 3B that has not been mentioned and that is angled parking spaces off of Main Street that do replace a good bit of the parking that's lost. And the idea of saying, well, we can't do it because we don't have any new parking accommodated now doesn't really solve the problem of we're looking at a long-term solution for the North Common and I think we have to make the decision as to what's the right long-term solution. And I think the 3B is the right long-term solution. Thank you. Alyssa, there you go. I couldn't tell if I was hearing my last name or my first name, I got so confused. Thank you. So obviously I'm in disagreement with the last couple of speakers based on things I've said in the past. So I'll try not to repeat new things and just kind of build off of some of the things other people have said. I do use Park Mobile to pay for my parking spaces. That app doesn't tell me where the available spaces are. Those do exist in other communities. We don't have that yet. So that's not gonna tell me. I've been parking for meetings a lot longer than Dorothy Pam has and I can tell you that no, there often aren't spaces behind Town Hall nor in front of Town Hall nor in Spring Street during the nights of what used to be select board meetings and we're later Town Council meetings. So obviously we all have our own experiences but I can tell you that that has been mine. I wanna make sure it's clear that I don't have strong feelings one way or the other for a change about something which is in regards to one or two-way traffic on boatwood. So I'm willing to listen to others and I think we haven't perhaps discussed that enough as to how that really impacts everybody and I really appreciate hearing from the church on that because I think they've been clearest about their concerns associated with that. In terms of me wanting to keep some parking on the common I of course do not see it as detrimental. I do see it as a welcoming space that exists now. I have been to many, many, many events in the 20 years I've lived here that have been exactly around the flagpole. I've been to many events that have been further over in the North Common section. We haven't needed the space in the parking lot. What we have needed is we've needed those spaces for elderly people and people with disabilities who can't walk very far to the flagpole or to the section of the North Common where we're meeting and celebrating Veterans Day or other items. So I think a lot of this is perspective based on what people's experiences are and I am going to say that I've had many, many years of experience with this and so I get frustrated when I hear people saying it's not a big deal to lose those parking spaces. It in fact to me is a very big deal for all the reasons that other people have stayed in that I've said. There is a clear majority, not a split, but a clear majority of businesses that depend on drop in business, not a business by appointment or that have a couple of their own parking spaces. A clear majority of businesses that depend on drop in business say that they want that parking to remain. So for us to just say, yeah, but it would look so much prettier if we didn't have the parking there. Just really smacks of privilege to me and in a way that doesn't make sense if we're supporting our business community particularly as they struggled come out of the pandemic. I would like to have a little more talk about the back-in angle parking. As most of you know, I went through the angst over the very first roundabout we built in town. So I'm certainly aware of how worried people are about change, but I'm wondering if this is actually a reasonable place to put back-in angle parking for the first time at Amherst and I'm also wondering what our options are in terms of if we put it in and then we say, you know, this is really working, although I think people could learn, then if we take it out what the impact is of that. Thank you. Man, Joe Hannake. Is it okay to make a motion right now or should I wait? Please go ahead. I move to approve plan 3B as shown with no modifications. Is there a second? I'm sorry, who seconded? Evan? Evan. Thank you. May I speak to it? Please. So plan 3B eliminates 11 spots from plan 2. As many people have said, if there wasn't parking on the common, we would not be having this discussion because at this point in time, we would never choose to add parking specifically on the common. We have a downtown parking study that we dealt with a little over a year ago that showed in appendix A, on page 26 of that appendix, parking utilization, that did not show at any time on a Thursday or a Saturday when they did the study for utilization, parking, public parking utilization in downtown exceeding 90%, not at a single point in time on those two days. If we eliminate 11 slots, it still will not exceed a 90% on any of the days. If we're going to do studies on parking utilization, we should pay attention to those studies which showed that we have plenty of public parking in town. What it showed and what we as a council actually voted to ask the town manager to do was we need signage. Those, that parking lot right there on the common might be used most because it's the easiest to find, not because it's the most convenient. I think we need to go with signage. I think we need to get rid of parking on the common because we need a nice common that people can use, that people can sit out and actually eat at or gather at. We're building, as Andy said, for 50 years, not 10. We should return the common to what it was meant to be a common for all people and not a parking lot. Steve Schrager. Wow. I have nothing more to say. Plus one to what Mandy said. Evan Ross. Right, also plus one. A lot of what I was going to say has been said. I think that in the public comment we heard earlier, we heard a lot of talk about making decisions that have long-term impact for generations to come. And to me, this is one of those. It is unlikely we will redo the common after this project for a very long time. And so I think we do need to be thinking long-range. I think we need to be thinking in terms of what do we want our downtown to look like? And I think we also need to be thinking in terms of how this matches up with our climate action goals. And I think, hey, continuing to pave over our common, pave over downtown green space to continue the support of cars is short-sighted. I understand the concern over losing parking. I don't really think that 11 space is that big a deal. But building on what Mandy said, she mentioned that we have a downtown parking study that we should listen to. I want to continue on that and say we have the recommendations from the downtown parking working group. One of my biggest frustrations I think on this council has been the amount of money that this town spends on consultant reports that we then put on shelves and don't pay any attention to. That plan gave us a whole lot of solutions to parking problems. Some of them which are pretty low cost like re-striping from 22 feet to 20 feet. And we have just ignored all of the hard work of that citizen group. And now we're talking about making a major capital investment of repaving a parking lot instead of considering other ways that we can offset the loss of those 11 spaces throughout the town with Dorothy said being more creative. I don't necessarily want to lose that parking but I don't think that that is the place for that parking. I think that there are other ways that we can offset those spaces which at the end are only 11. So that wasn't my most articulate way of saying things because everyone took most of what I was going to say but I am in support of plan 3B. I'm going to skip over Sarah because you've spoken already and go to Shalini. Yes, too many of the things that have been said. I do agree that we want to have a long-term vision and given that we are considering a parking garage down the road. And the other thing I want to highlight also was we've seen examples of the block party where we actually blocked out so much of the parking and it was really the, and yet people came and it was a building that community and so they can create these spaces downtown where people can bring out their dining and sit and congregate. I think that can be really very useful. The one question, oh, and the other thing was, can we, two questions, can we make it one way for now? But once we have the garage, could we open that up and make it two way in the future? And the other question was, how many handicap parking spaces are we losing? Please go ahead. So, yes, if you went with plan three, our plan two, and you set it up for parking on both sides of boltwood and after the garage is open, you decide you want to remove the parking on the common side, that's just a matter of taking meters out and repaying the road and that parking would go away and you could have two-way traffic there without encroaching onto the common. So, yes, that's doable in the future. The second is, is there's two handicap spaces in the area now and when we're done, there'll be two handicap spaces. Darcy, you've not spoken, please go ahead. I would like to say that I agree to a large extent with what Alyssa said and that I find it kind of not shocking, but just hard to believe that after doing so much to try to help our downtown businesses during COVID that we are not really making sure that we're paying attention to what they need now. And it feels like we are superimposing some kind of value on the situation. I also think we have like an amazing park system in our downtown with the South and North Common that we already have, Kendrick Park. I mean, we have a great downtown park system. So it's not really like we need to have this crown jewel park, but anyway, I also feel like I agree with Evan that we have to look at climate considerations and that with whatever we do, we need to sort of have an, take an inventory of what have an greenhouse gas impact report on what all of our projects are creating because we're trying to meet this goal. And it's the more we do to the more projects we do, the more projects we do, the more we sort of slower we can, slower it is that we can accomplish our climate action goals. So my actual preference would be to just upgrade the green space of the North Common and just leave the parking lot or upgraded as in the existing parking lot.  So one of the things I was going to say is that location is really important. So evening hours are very busy, trying to get into meetings at night. And when I was on finance committee, I'm going to echo what Alyssa said, if there was any kind of events in town, people go into movies, you had to drive around forever.  We need some kind of parking there. The other thing is we have the South Common, which is huge and beautiful. And then when you turn the corner, you're looking towards the lime red, not even, I mean, probably 65 feet from the Town Hall's second entrance is Sweetster Park, which has a fountain and which has permanent benches. So we do have a place for seating. For me, it just, it seems really, it seems like in some ways a vanity project. And the other thing is, is that I don't know when people will ever get away from cars completely. So eventually you could have charging stations there for electric cars. I think until this town actually really, really finds a way to make public transportation dependable and regular, I think we can't just wish away cars. We can't just say, I'm gonna not make a space. And so people from out of town or people from the North or the South end of town, you're just gonna have to find a way to get there. I don't think there's common sense involved. Matthew Shane. Okay, I have a question and then I just wanted to build on what Sarah said. My question when I look at the budget, and I thought I remembered you saying that the transportation fund money, which makes this possible, 450,000 was assuming a parking lot. Do we have that 450,000 if we don't have a parking lot? So that's a question just on money. The second is the observation in addition to all the little businesses around the green, we have two major draws to downtown right now. We don't have huge numbers. Emmer cinema and they, it was a cry of pain from them at the thought of losing this overflow lot for them and the church. So I'm listening to what the church said about two way and I'm not completely a person taking a little bit of the park along the edge to leave two ways along there. If that, if that's, we have a design choice on that. But I just think we need to listen to the downtown businesses as well as the people who come downtown. And I read the talking study extremely well, Mark Nandy, they did not talk about this lot. They still assume some parking spaces that had long since disappeared with one each pleasant. They didn't do their homework the second time around with the amount of cars downtown. They just, they, they took some old data on some of these. These places at various times of day are full on menu circles. So it isn't, we did do the survey. And if you read those answers, there were some that were distraught. They weren't just on the fence. They were distraught. Steve Schreiber.  We do not allow parking on front lawns of houses in the area. I do not understand why we allow parking on the towns from lawn. That was a grave mistake that was made sometime in the, the 50s. We have a chance to rectify that. So that's been a 60 or 70 year experiment that needs to go away. And this is our one shot at it. Habits are really hard to change. You know, you're absolutely right that the proximity to those stores along Main Street and along South Pleasant Street, people are in the habit of parking there. That's totally, I totally get that. Habits can also change. I think that the net of 11 spaces is really nothing. And I'll, says a guy that hardly ever drives into town because he walks into town, but it's just we're debating and discussing and basically 11 spaces. On street parking is the most efficient way to park because basically the road is already your dry vial. You don't have to also build a road. So basically if I put in any parking on the common, you have to build a road, the dry vial to get to the parking. And then you have to have the parking. I just wanna repeat one thing that Mandy said that the town common is, or I'm gonna paraphrase it, the town common is the most democratic space in Amherst, other than possibly the public library. That's another discussion, but the town common is the most democratic space that we have. It was, that's the purpose of a town common. That's why it's called the common. So what do we wanna do with our common? Do we want that to be temporary space for somebody's car? So they were running for somebody's car? Not everybody drives, not everybody has cars. No, but not everyone has access to that space. Or do we wanna make the common for everyone? So I feel strongly that this is our shot to change a mistake that was made a half a century ago. And it's the right decision, 3B. Seeing no other comments, I'm going to ask the town clerk to repeat the motion. To approve plan 3B is shown with no modifications. Okay, is there any further comment or question? Seeing none, I'm going to bring it to the vote. And I'm going to start with Brewer. Are you using first names or last names? I'm so confused. I'm sorry, Alyssa. Alyssa Brewer. Thank you. Thank you, I appreciate that. Although I know we're alphabetized by last name. I'm voting no, thank you. Pat DeAngelis? No. Darcy DeMont? No. Rhysmer is a yes. Panicke? Yes. Dorothy Pam? Yes. Evan Ross? Aye. George Ryan? Yes. Kathy Shane? No. Steve Schreiber? Yes. Andy Steinberg? Yes. Sarah Schwartz? No. Melanie Balmille? Yes. The way I counted, it's eight in favor and five opposed. No abstentions and no absence. Is that correct Athena? That's what I have. Thank you. We are going to take a five minute break and be back for the temporary building moratorium bylaw. Please unmute while you're gone and unmute when you come back. When you return, please turn, excuse me, turn your picture back on so I know you're back. Alyssa, are you back? Yup, she is. All right, we are going to continue. We're doing 8B next. It is the proposed temporary building moratorium bylaw. There is a brief presentation and then based on some counselor questions, I have asked the town planning staff to provide answers to those questions that was completely at my request. And then we will move to counselor discussion in a vote. And before we, after we get done with the presentations and the brief clarification, I will talk more about the vote. So let's start with a brief presentation. Kathy, Dorothy and Darcy are making this presentation. Thank you, Lynn. I'm going to lead off for the three of us. And we have focused on trying to keep this brief. My role is to say why we need a moratorium and why we need it now. And I just want to stress, this is a moratorium on permits for multi unit residential projects in the downtown and adjacent areas. It's three or more. It's not to stop business development on town. It would allow home development. It would allow duplex. It would allow various other things. It's just to put a pause button on it. We need to do this because we really need a vision of the direction of change. I think many of us, and you heard eloquent voices better than mine earlier tonight, saying that this is not anti new development. It's just the size, the shape, what it feels like, and what we can have our vision of what we could have downtown and what we're going to have for years matters. We need to have a vision of what we could have. We need to have design standards. We just don't have them. Why now? Why is this urgent now? There are multiple reasons. The first is the council is actively considering new bylaws that would define what a mixed use building is. What's supposed to be downstairs in these residential buildings? Can we have shops? And discussing inclusionary zoning for any building with 10 residential buildings. We need to have a vision of what a mixed use building comes in. The timing is perfect to wait for those, have those buildings wait. So we do acquire those units. Second, we've had experience. We've had good experience with developments that added over 200, 227 residential units downtown without provision for parking, without walkable sidewalks where two people could pass with strollers with kids with walkers. And that's because they come right out to the street with no place to sit outside. If you want to have convening welcoming places. And meanwhile, they just play small businesses. This means we need to rethink the current zoning visions. It's not to stop a building from coming in, but have it set back, have some street design. And those were absent from our current zoning laws. And third, and very importantly, the planning staff had proposed a consultant project that would allow us to have a public meeting and recommend design guidelines and streets, streets, streetscape improvements that could go into our zoning laws. So the time is really ripe to hit the pause button and think about what we could have. So when new developments come into town, they bring us what we would really like to see. And it's not to stop it, not even to stop people living downtown, but to give that space that we can see in part of our town that we're losing. And I am now going to turn it over to Dorothy, but I just want to stress the urgency. And the other thing. As I'm talking about this is we put out that we were going to do this. The newspaper picked it up and we had people clamoring to sign our moratorium said, where can I sign just to show. And we had nearly 250 signatures without much effort. So it's a chorus of voices, not saying stop development, but saying let's think about it because we're going to live with it for a long time. It's a pro business pro downtown business argument that we're making. Thank you, Dorothy. Thank you, Kathy. So what will we gain with the moratorium? Words matter. People matter and history matters. And what is that? A city, a neighborhood or a community. We all decide kind of place we want to live in. Before we moved out, checked out towns in the vicinity of my daughter and grandchildren. Because we value community and neighborhood. We chose to live in the RG precinct 10, but then walking distance to downtown. They're full of owner occupied houses, both big and small and friendly people of all ages living. This is the neighborhood of socially responsible problem solvers figured out a way to slow the conversion of one family owner occupied homes into provide student rentals to the rental registration program. I live next door to a large house filled with students who value this neighborhood and behave appropriately. This is a neighborhood whose members have served and still serve on all committees of the new government. This is a neighborhood that hosts monthly brunches, open to all schools, teachers and home owners. We know that the way to get more affordable housing in Amherst is not to replace family home. The kind of expensive high rent, small apartment buildings necessary for a builder to make a profit. What is needed is across the board, inclusion or rezoning of the large buildings being built downtown. What is needed is public funding and or landowners, such as have created Amherst successful affordable housing such as Olympia Oaks and the upcoming affordable housing on Belcher Town Rub, East Pleasant Street School property, nearly increasing the supply of apartment housing does not lead to increased affordability. However, it raises the prices surrounding properties. My neighbors who lived downtown, they chose to live downtown because of the past. They enjoyed walking and shopping there. But now so many of the small, unique stores have been replaced. So they play glass windows. They're back at us. Invite no one in. It's harder to find a destination. The town is spending a lot of money making can be parked. A lovely place for families, children and people young and old together. But who will play on the imaginative structures? What are the children? If they come from outside the area with their parents and grandparents, where is the restroom? The loose goose, which in the past sold cookies and happy children. As the public service is a thing of the past. Now I would hesitate to walk past the driving corner of one East Pleasant Street children in hand. That's an exuberant child dash off the narrow sidewalk into the street. Remember my day pushing one child in a baby carriage and walking with one or two more rambentious children on the way to the park. I shuddered. So as I looked at the setbacks today, it became clear we need a consultant. The setbacks from the street sidewalk width that looks appropriate on a two-story building do not work on a tall building. Even the projects have large grassy spaces around them. We need to have the shadows of the existing and prospective buildings measured to guide building so that Kendrick Park does not become a shadowy uninviting place where nothing grows. We need to know how much space feels inviting to people for small plazas, courtyards and insets for outdoor dining and benches for sitting that the planning department is talking about. We need to have a more detailed public engagement process to find out what our residents as taxpayers value most, density or community. New England small town character in the street or inward looking tall buildings with no porches, no balconies, no intermediate shared public private spaces and barely any grass, shrubbery or trees. We need design standards that we want to live with that will allow the business districts BG and BL to look as if they belong here in this college town. With good strong design standards, it is possible to create buildings that work and also contribute to our tax base. As Senator Jones knows and is working hard to create in the mill district, we need art, culture, theater, music, poetry, painting and experiences downtown, a place where town and gown can meet, where people from all groups and neighborhoods in town can get together and create the community that we call Amherst and Darcy. I'm going to cover the last three bullets on slide two. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay. Several counselors, including the three co-sponsors of this legislation support amending the zoning bylaw to include inclusionary zoning that would require developers to make a portion of the housing units in their project affordable to low and moderate income households. That approach to affordable housing is the most effective means of increasing the number of affordable housing units and creates a wider variety of affordable levels within a development. And it's a proposal that has been put forward by the planning department since at least 2018. So we want to have time to get that out there. Common concern about inclusionary zoning is that it may slow the pace of development acting as a disincentive for private developers who may be considering investing in a community. But studies have shown that inclusionary zoning does not in fact slow the pace of private development in a community and residential development rates are driven much more by the strength of the local housing market and broader economic and market trends. Next bullet. In canvassing district five during my campaign in 2018, I found nearly universal disappointment in the planning board approval of the spring street building, whether with the height setback or some combination of those elements and much disappointment generally with the tall buildings that had appeared downtown. But parking was noted in particular as a problem. The fact that the new buildings in the core of downtown are not required to provide parking, even though the town provides parking permits at low cost for the residents of those buildings caused much concern. I support disincentivizing fossil fuel powered car ownership and incentivizing biking and car sharing. But if we do nothing to support those goals, we do continue to need parking. Many drivers are transitioning to electric vehicles, which don't add to our emissions. We will need parking for those EVs as well as EV charging infrastructure for residents of those buildings. Plus, if the downtown doesn't provide the basic goods and services required in a densified neighborhood, such as a grocery store that was mentioned before, cars will continue to be needed. We still need to go to the mall to get the hardware, the hammer, the head of lettuce, whatever. One way to disincentivize driving is to charge much more for our parking permits. That would bring in more revenue for the town if residents still need parking. And this is something that is currently being proposed. So I'm going to go back to that. I'm going to go back to that. Though the new buildings have some green features, we will, we want to make sure new construction is following the most updated recommendations for green buildings. And as I've repeatedly mentioned, the town staff will be presenting a climate action adaptation and resilience plan at the beginning of May. And it will include a number of recommendations regarding the building sector, some of which are recommended to be implemented in the near future. We just want to make sure that the building is on the最 minimum level and is at level five. It will be important for the planning board and CRC to make those recommendations under, take those recommendations under consideration, rezoning amendments during this temporary pause. So Kathy mentioned what an overwhelming response we've had to this moratorium petition. We got, I think. So I am prepared to read the motion now. Is that good, Lynn? I want you to read the motion that is in red on the sheet. That's the one that we submitted. We had to make some changes to the one that you submitted because there were some inaccuracies in what it was, what was stated. I just ask, we had one more slide Darcy on what are the proposed journey change would be. Can we just assume that the counselors have read it? Why don't we just, do we want to take a quick look at that? I'm sorry. I, I, I intended to say go to slide. It's fine with me to move on if everyone has read it, but I don't know whether the public knows what's in it. It's the next slide, Athena. I mean, I can do this Darcy if you want me to. Go ahead. Okay. So it is a temporary moratorium. It's as people have mentioned somewhere asking that it be longer. We thinking of it, it's hitting the pause button. It's not ending development for six months. It's a temporary moratorium on new permits for buildings with three or more units in downtown, which is BG district, limited district BL and the adjacent general resident or G districts. Note that this does not mean that it would make any stop on a single family home, a duplex, adding a, an accessory developing unit in your backyard. It would allow time to act, develop and implement provisions regarding mixed use building definition, design standards for streetscapes, revisit the parking overlay district provisions downtown and potential climate action criteria for new construction. We included in the proposed moratorium. It was that the temporary delay could be extended for 90 days. That's the summary of what's in. The longer text. I'm going to ask you to take that down and then let me just explain the following. Parts to this agenda. The first is the proposed bylaw that was originally submitted by three counselors. And I'm going to read a motion that in part incorporates what the three counselors wanted, but we had to make amendments because actually there was some inaccuracy. And that motion is now on the screen. So somebody can make that motion. Um, Lynn, could I just ask a question? The, the, um, petition of the residents. Yes. Um, if you'll allow me to finish, I would be glad to explain what will happen. Okay. Thank you. Regarding the part regarding the petition by the residents, the town attorney has advised that this is a non-discretionary action. It is strictly an administrative function. Therefore I am noting in the minutes receipt of the petition. And, and, and. Um, I am. Administratingly referring it to the planning board. CRC. And eventually GOL. So if counselors would like to discuss the initial proposal, they can certainly go ahead and do that with this motion, which will be put on the table. But in fact, what are the timelines though for the resident petition? Because that is in the, the other motion, but if the other, if the resident petition was automatically referred, how do we know what the timeline is? We will not know what the timeline is until the planning board meets and sets their hearing. That's at the discretion of the planning board. Can I say point of order? Yes. Okay. So there are state laws that require the hearing. As of today's date to be held within 65 days. Both the planning board on the CRC hearing to be held within 65 days. And the town council to vote within 90 days of the CRC's hearing. Thank you. So. Would one of the petitioners like to make the motion on the screen. I will read it. Can you make a figure? It is just so small. I can't. I'm having a real trouble reading it. You have control on your zoom. Is there any reason why we can't combine the referrals of this and the resident petition? Point of order. Yes. I'm sorry. And I really didn't mean to interrupt you. I'm very sorry. I really just don't understand based on what you just said, Lynn, about the citizen petition. Why on earth would we move this one? When we have the citizen petition, we have to do it. We have to do it. Which yes, is an administrative duty, but we still have to vote to do it. And so that's why we have one kind of motion. And I realized we might need to match up parts from the two different motions, but I have no idea why we would move the motion by the three counselors. In addition to. The motion by the petitioners. I'm really confused. I appreciate your question. I think the three counselors originally submitted their request. And it included the temporary zoning bylaw. In addition to that. 2,230 to 40 or 50 residents have signed a separate petition. That separate petition. Has to be referred. It doesn't matter, frankly, if the council votes to refer it or not. If the council would like to vote on whether they want to refer. The same wording. And the same additional. Petition. From the three counselors. This is your opportunity to vote on it. But the dates are different. In the two motions, one is based on mass general law and the one by the petitioner. But sorry. It's a wrong use of petitioners. The one by the three counselors is using an earlier date than the one that's required by law. These are the dates that those counselors requested I put in here. That's just an outside date. For when it would need to be held. No, it's an inside date that April is too soon of a deadline based on mass general law. So that's just an outside date. That's just an outside date. So that would be within. What 60 days. So you're putting on an additional. Okay. Now we're in deliberation. I'm sorry. Christine Brestrup has her handle. I wondered how you came up with the date or who came up with the date of April 21st, 2021. How was that date arrived at? It was 30 days. By the three petitioners. So that's just an additional. Proposal by the three counselors. Is that right? Is it a motion that the three counselors advanced to me today? With that date. That's kind of soon. It can be done, I believe, but it is. Rather soon. We, we put it in there because we thought the actual act of having a public hearing. Would not require. That much preparation. Compared to, for example, making the written recommendation. Order. Are we in debate on something that hasn't been moved yet? Or are we still. We're still in debate on that. That's the. To make this motion. And then if somebody wants to amend it, they can. Okay. I'll read the motion. I guess I. And if either of the other counselors wants to. You can do so per MGL chapter 40, a section five and charter section nine point eight G. The proposed temporary building moratorium zoning by law. Sponsored by counselors do not Pam and Shane. To the planning board and to the community resources committee for a joint hearing held no later than April 21st, 2021. And for a written recommendation along with an explanation as to whether the proposed by consistent with a master plan. From the planning board to the town council no later than 21 days after the joint hearing and further to direct the community resources committee to comment on. Voter recommendation. And to submit all materials to the governance organization and legislation committee for review of clarity, consistency, and action ability. And time for the town council to act within 60 days of the hearing. Is there a second. My second. Now there's a motion on the floor. I'm going to turn it over to you. Alyssa. Rather than trying to mess around with this based on what I was trying to get across and point of order when I really was just truly confused. I believe this isn't. If close to being illegal motion because mass general law gives a certain period of time. I have no idea why we imagine. That we can make that time period shorter just because we feel that we can make that time period shorter. And that we can make that time period shorter. One be defeated. And the other reason it should be defeated. Is because as we know, it's not automatic that when three counselors bring forward a zoning bylaw that we have to push it along. But it is definitely automatic that we need to push it along for the signed by 10 voters. And we obviously have way more than 10 registered voters. So as you point out, it's not automatic. It's not automatic. It's not automatic. We just come through as a 10 signature. We technically wouldn't need to vote. We always do just because then it's in our minutes really clearly that we know what we're doing. And it's always nice to have dates if we can. So that everyone knows to expect both on town council and in the public as to when these things are going to happen. So they don't have to go look up. MGL 48, 40 a section five. But I can't support a motion at all. I don't know what mass general law requires for zoning. There's a motion on the floor. It's been made and seconded. Are there any other comments? Um, Lynn, I withdraw the motion. Does the person who has. Seconded the motion agree with that. Yes. Okay. Any other comments. I said, yes, that we go back to the emotion that had the other dates in it, right? That's what works. I guess. You want to make that motion. Kathy. The computing thing to me. Um, just as the second. I hadn't seen the first motion until the weekend and it kept having edits in it, Alyssa, you know, so I'm. So trying to figure out what. Which is the motion. So ling. Can I just ask, do we have to make a motion to refer, or is it automatically referred. With all the dates that are in that. It's really a pleasure to counselor. It's automatically referred. Point of order. Yes. What has been automatically referred is what has been submitted by has not been referred. Is that correct? Thank you. Is there any further question? So the minutes will show that the petition submitted by the residents were in fact referred to the planning board, CRC, NGOL on March 22nd, 2021. Alyssa? I have a request. I'm wondering since we're just putting it in the minutes, because we're not trying to recraft a motion that might have changed, is we are actually, could we have in the minutes reflect those time periods? Because again, we're all going to be scrabbling to look and say, well, was it 60 days from and was it 21 days from? Can we just make sure that that's noted in the minutes as well, as opposed to when it gets closer to our actual town council meeting? And then my other question is, since we're talking about what's being automatically referred, what does the petition itself, which we didn't get until Saturday, say in terms of dates, just to make sure it doesn't say anything different about dates? I'm assuming, I'm glancing at it quickly here again. I only looked at the signatures before, that it's just following mass general law and it's not asking for different dates, but since we've never put that up on the screen, maybe we could do that. Okay, would you please put up the petition language for one of the petitions? Sure, just one moment. Thank you. Kathy, I'm waiting for this first. Are there questions with regard to the petition? Kathy, do you have a question with regard to the petition? I was just going to answer Alyssa's question, the petition, petitions this particular article. And so the understanding was that once 10 people had put their signatures on, it would go through this process. So there were no dates inserted into it. We did explain to people that by signing this, they were asking for it to move to the next stage, but that was it. So literally, that is the same language that you had in your packet as town councillors as the proposed amendment. Mandy, Joe? I just want to clarify on dates. May 26 would be 45, 65 days from today. So the hearings will have to be held by May 26. The next deadline is movable. It's 90 days from the date CRC helps the hearing that the council must vote. So you'll see that you can't name that date because you don't know when the hearing is. Darcy, you have a question? Just a procedural question. What is the language of the referral that is being made with regard to the resident petition? It is consistent with mass general law, and it is to refer to the planning board, the CRC, and the GLL. Is it the same language that we have here? It is the language that we have up here. It is consistent with the charter and with the general mass general law. And so we'll be able to see that somewhere, that referral order. Yes, Lynn? Yes. Okay. That seems adequate. I'd like to also just for the sake of answering questions, have the other slides that were prepared at my request by the planning staff shown. And this is an answer to questions from councils. Right. Rob Moore here, building commissioner. If the presentation can be brought up, I'll get it started. And Christine, brush drop planning director will join me in a couple slides. Thank you. So, yeah, in response to a few very specific questions, we have some information clarification about the proposed article 16 temporary moratorium for holding the issuance of building permits for six months that are related to residential buildings of three or more dwelling units. Next slide, please. Yes. As mentioned by the sponsors of the language initially in the presentation earlier, there are three zoning districts that this proposed moratorium would apply to the general business, the limited business and the general residence. Next slide, please. Shown here on the map are those three districts. Right in the center in red is the downtown, the business, BG, general business district. Right up against that in blue are several little areas of the limited business district. You'll notice as you look far to the west on the map, there's another section of that limited business zoning district. And then a little piece as you work your way over onto College Street at the intersection of Dickinson Street.  The remainder of the colored portion in the center of the map is the general residence district, the third district that would be affected by the proposed moratorium. Next slide, please. We were asked which projects potentially would be affected by this moratorium. Currently there are two that I know everyone has heard about and were aware of. One of them, 11 East Pleasant Street, that's the site that includes the former pub restaurant owned by Archipelago investments. Proposed there will be a mixed juice building, 55 dwelling units, a mix of one to four units with a first floor retail component and parking on the interior of that level as well. This is an application that is not fully complete but has begun that we expect to and does not have a hearing date yet with the planning board for site plan reviewer special permit, but we expect to have that established in the coming days. The second proposal that we're aware of would be what was advertised recently as a demolition permit of 37 North Pleasant Street and 45 Boltwood Walk. At this time, there are no plans of the redevelopment that have been provided, but we do understand that a similar type of development to 11 East Pleasant of a mixed use building, first floor commercial with residential units above. Next slide, please. We were asked about applications that are in process that would not be affected by this proposed by a lot. In other words, this could be, as an example, a apartment building in a district that is not subject to the moratorium. In fact, we don't have any proposals of that sort at this time. I'll turn it over to Chris for the next slide. Good evening. I'm Chris Brestra, Planning Director. So we were also asked about other projects that would not be subject to the proposed bylaw. And for various reasons, these projects here would not be subject to the bylaw. 26 Spring Street is the building on Spring Street that's partially constructed. That was fully permitted a while ago. It's going to contain 58 apartment units. And it's under construction. And we understand that construction will be resuming soon. The reason that's not subject to the proposed bylaw is because it is already fully permitted. 462 Main Street is a project that was proposed by John Roblesky. It's a mixed use building in the BN zoning district. It contains, it will contain 24 apartment units. That is also fully permitted and under construction. And it is not subject to this moratorium because it's in the BN zoning district and also because it's already fully permitted. There's another project at one university drive south, which is a project that Barry Roberts has gotten his land use permits for. He hasn't yet gotten his building permit. That's in the PRP zoning district. So that would not be affected by this moratorium. And that's going to have 45 apartments and five of them are going to be affordable. Other projects that you may have heard about that wouldn't be affected would be University of Massachusetts is proposing what we've been calling the P3 projects, the public private partnership projects. They have one on Massachusetts Avenue, which I believe is going to contain 800 dwelling units along with some commercial and retail space. And they also have North Village, which they're proposing to rebuild essentially. So neither of those would be affected by the moratorium because they are both in the ED or educational zoning district. Then we have a building at 133 and 143 Southeast Street known as Southeast Commons. It was proposed by Amir McChie and his wife. It is in the BVC business village center district. And so that would not be impacted by this moratorium. And that's going to contain 57 apartment units when it's completed. We also have 132 North Hampton Road, which you may remember from last year when it was permitted by the zoning board of appeals. It's the Valley Community Development Project. It's going to contain 28 apartment units, all of them affordable. And it was granted a comprehensive permit in 2020. And we believe that that would not be subject to this moratorium. And the last project that I wanted to talk about is 408 North Hampton Road, which was proposed by the Breckenridge Group Amherst, MA, LLC. And that is under construction now. It's in the PRP zoning district. It is fully permitted. It has 88 apartments with 11 affordable units. Next slide, please. So we were asked to outline a timeline for this moratorium. And that's what we've attempted to do here. So the town council received the petition, I believe they received it on March 19th, which was Friday. And the petition is now being referred to the planning board, the CRC, and the GOL within the 14 days from March 19th. So the planning board will receive the referral and it will schedule a public hearing. The planning board must hold its public hearing within 65 days of referral. And I think Mandy Jo just gave you a date for that, which I believe is May 26th. And they, the planning board may hold its public hearing jointly with the CRC or the Community Resources Committee. Prior to the public hearing, the planning board will a notice of public hearing that has to be published in the paper and sent to adjacent towns and the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission and I believe DHCD at least 14 days prior to the hearing. So then the planning board holds its public hearing and the planning board issues a report to town council with a recommendation on whether to adopt or not adopt the proposed moratorium. And that has to be done within 21 days of the close of the public hearing. After that 21 days or after receiving the report from the planning board, the town council may vote to adopt, amend or reject the proposed zoning amendment. And then town council, excuse me, must vote within 90 days of the public hearing or else the planning board needs to hold its public hearing again. And then we have some Q&As here at the end. Questions, next slide please. Questions that we think that people have asked. So is a mixed use building considered a residential building that would be affected by the proposed moratorium? And the answer is yes. The reason we thought that was important is because people don't always think of a mixed use building as being a residential use, and it is. The second question is if the proposed moratorium is adopted, can a building permit be issued before the moratorium has expired? And the answer to that is no. The moratorium specifically would prevent a building permit from being issued. The last question though is something that we thought everybody should be aware of. If the proposed moratorium is adopted, can a site plan review approval or a special permit be issued before the moratorium has expired? And the answer to that is yes. So somebody who's already in the permitting pipeline can or even somebody who hasn't yet submitted an application can submit their application and go through the public hearing process and then receive site plan review approval or a special permit. The only thing they can't