There are 249 town meeting members 125 constitutes a quorum The constable informs me that 125 are present the November 6th 2017 special town meeting will now come to order the clerk will read the call and return of the meeting Hampshire to one of the constables of the town of Amherst and said county greetings in the name of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts You are hereby directed to notify the registered voters of the town of Amherst of the special town meeting to be held in the auditorium of the Amherst Pellum regional middle school in said Amherst at 7 o'clock on Monday the 6th day of November 2017 when the following articles will be acted upon by town meeting members You are hereby directed to serve this call by posting attested copies there off at the usual places Hereof fail not and make return of this warrant with your doings there on at the time and place of said meeting given under our hands the 16th day of October 2017 Douglas Wesley Slaughter Constance e Kruger Andrew J. Steinberg Alyssa v. Brewer James J. Wald select board October 16th 2017 in obedience to the within warrant I have this day as directed post a true and attested copies there off at the designated places Chunyu zoo constable town of Amherst Thank you very much Are there any newly elected town meeting members who were not sworn in last spring? I see at least one hand so so please rise and Do you swear that you will faithfully and impartially perform the duties of town meeting member? Please answer I do Thank you and congratulations a quick note. You all know better than that Quick note on finance committee appointments Sharon Pavanelli has been appointed to the empty seat that was vacated by Steve Braun last spring Mary Lou Tileman and Bernie Kubiak have been reappointed to new three-year terms I would like to thank without applause past current and new finance committee members for their service to the town It's a tradition to remember former town meeting members who have passed away since the last town meeting There's no comprehensive list of former members So if I've forgotten someone please let me know and I will remember them in a subsequent session Since last we met last spring. We have lost Isaac Ben Ezra Louie Greenbaum Ruth hook Rick Keller and Rhonda knock bar Please rise if you are able and let's have a moment of silence to remember our friends neighbors and public servants So quick review of the schedule. We're scheduled to come back on Wednesday, November 8th Who knows maybe we'll finish up that night. Maybe we'll finish up tonight You never know Then we have the auditorium Booked for a Thursday the 9th Monday the 13th Wednesday the 15th Thursday the 16th Monday the 20th and Monday December 4th I'll explain on Wednesday how we're gonna deal with the question of when we meet next after Wednesday if it comes to that Some important reminders for everybody the seats on the floor of the auditorium may be occupied only by town meeting members Except for the front row which may be used by members of the press and by members of town committees and town staff participating in the presentation or discussion of articles Such persons must wear non-voter stickers, which are available at the check-in tables The seats in the front row of the section in front of me can also be used by those who are on deck if the next article is one Where you'll be presenting or expect to be questioned on please come forward and sit in one of those seats before the vote on the Current article the seats in front of me on the right are occupied by the select board members the town manager The assistant town manager the co-finance directors the assistant to the town manager and IT staff The finance committee is seated to my left Spectators and town residents who are not town meeting members may be seated in the bleachers to the rear of the auditorium New information for town meeting members can be found on the back table Old information can be found on the back table to my right back there new information if there is any would be on the back table to my left Amherst media provides gavel-to-gavel coverage of our proceedings on public access channel 17 I'd like to thank their staff and volunteers Videos of town meeting sessions are replayed frequently and can also be viewed on the Amherst media website If you wish to speak you must raise a hand and be recognized You must hold up a card to indicate your position green indicates Yes red indicates no and a white card indicates that you wish to speak without advocacy or you wish to ask a question When you are called on please first state your name and precinct if you forget I will interrupt and ask you to do so if you need more than three minutes or more than five when speaking to your motion You must request additional time before speaking and town meeting will vote on your request If you're speaking from the floor, please speak into a microphone that will be provided once you are recognized This will allow the viewers outside the auditorium to hear you the microphone will be on when it is handed to you Please hold it close to your mouth when you speak Non-members wish to speak should stand at the rear of the right-hand aisle, which is the aisle directly in front of me Any registered voter of the town of Amherst who is recognized by the moderator may speak without special permission Others may speak with the permission of a majority Assisted listening devices are available for town meeting members at the sound board in the back of the auditorium If you're making an amendment to a motion the amendment must be presented in writing with four copies Submitted to the town clerk the moderator town manager and staff and the chair of the finance committee or whichever board is seated to my left Procedural motions such as a motion to refer a motion to dismiss do not need to be presented in writing If you make any motion from the floor It must be the first thing you do after you have been recognized and have identified yourself You cannot speak first and then make a motion If you haven't already done so, please check your cell phone. Make sure it is silenced or off. I Will be reasonably strict on time limits and I will always try to call on people who have not yet spoken If at any point in time you are confused about the proceedings It is appropriate to call a point of order and ask for a clarification Also, it is always okay to phone me send me an email or see me prior to town meeting if you need an explanation of any kind I Will not call on members by name even if I know perfectly well who you are I Will stop speakers when your time is up and ask you to finish your current sentence I will attempt to be consistent with all speakers and equally fair or unfair to all But I will be inclined to give some deference to board and committee members petitioners and town employees We're now going to have a quick test of our Electronic voting devices So hang on while I get that script in front of me All votes taken to town meeting will initially be by voice vote after a voice vote if the moderator or any member So request requests we will take an electronic vote When you checked in you received an electronic voting device We will now run a test vote to make sure that everyone understands how it works First make sure your device is turned on when your device is on you will see your device number on the device LED display If you see a totally blank screen press and immediately release the power button Which is in the bottom right hand corner and a display will appear on the screen Is there anybody who does not see a display on their screen? Okay, we're good somebody who doesn't see a display Stand up or yell or wave to me all set now if you come to the front here We have another device for you or Sean's bringing it back there So while we're waiting for that It's a good idea for everyone as soon as you get your device turn it on and then if it's not working You don't have to wait for me. You can come right up and deal with it Okay, I'm gonna go on talking while he's working on those two devices So the only functional buttons are one two and three one means yes two means no three means abstain You will never need to press any other buttons on the device other buttons will have no effect on your vote When we're ready to come to an electronic vote the subject of the vote and a countdown timer will appear on the large screen in front of the Auditorium when the timer on the screen in the front of the auditorium begins to count down You may enter your vote by pressing one for yes two for no or three for abstain You can change your vote while the timer is counting down again by just pressing one or two or three It is not necessary to press any other buttons Your last vote entered while the timer is counting down will be displayed in your LED display This is the vote that will be counted when the timer reaches zero There may be a lag time of up to five seconds from when you press the button to when your vote is displayed If you do not vote until after the timer reaches zero your vote will not be counted If you change your vote after the timer reaches zero your change will not be recorded and your previous vote will stand The middle line in your LED display will always reflect the most recent valid vote that was counted a Vote to abstain will be recorded, but it will not count towards the result for a majority vote The greater of the yes and no votes prevails for a two-thirds vote to pass The yes votes must be at least two-thirds of the sum of all yes and no votes Abstentions are not counted in either equation You may only vote with the device that has been assigned to you if your friend or loved one goes to the bathroom They cannot give you their device and you cannot vote with two devices only your device When you leave town meeting, please power off your device and return it to power off your device at the end of the evening You press and hold the power button until the LED display is clear Please drop off your device in the same side of the room where you picked it up If you do not return your device you will get a call from the town clerk's office the next morning Requesting that you immediately bring your device into the town clerk's office We will have a 30-second window to enter our votes. Are those two devices all squared away? Okay, we are now gonna have a test vote. So if you would put it up on the screen and the window is open Is there anybody who does not see their vote displayed on their device? Okay, the window is about to close and Yes, 121 no 55 abstain five and it Yes, is correct. There was indeed a bylaw against using cocaine while driving your taxi Just to know Okay, what's gonna happen next is we're gonna hear four procedural motions There are four articles that the sponsors wish to move to be held on Wednesday So you're gonna hear four different somewhat odd times in their motions But the gist of it is the order in which we hear these motions. That's the order We're gonna hear these four articles on Wednesday. So I first call on Chris Riddle to make a motion for article 13 And wait for a microphone, please and wave your head and up and down good. There we go Chris Riddle precinct to I move that we hear article 13 on Wednesday, November 8th at 7 0 5 Motion made in second. Did you wish to speak to your motion? Microphone back, please microphone microphone microphone Sorry we tricked you This is mostly me I'm personally I think that it would be possible that it would show up on Thursday and if we were still doing this on Thursday I cannot be here on Thursday for the another commitment. So I'm asking that we do this on Wednesday at a date certain Is there further discussion before I come to a vote? I See no hands. We're now gonna have a vote requires majority to hear article 13 on Wednesday, November 8th at 7 0 5 All those in favor, please say aye opposed, please say no It carries we will hear article 13 at 7 0 5 Now I call on Nancy Higgins to make a motion for article 12 Miss Higgins is right in the front corner there. Here comes your microphone and you can stay seated if it's difficult to stand Hold it really close to your mouth Aaron, can you check if it's on try again? I Move to hear article 12 on Wednesday, November 8th at 7 15 There's a second you may now speak to your motion if you wish one of our speakers is only available on Wednesday Thank you. Is there discussion before we come to a vote? I See no hands. We will now vote on moving to your article 12 at 7 15 on Wednesday, November 8th All those in favor please up. Yeah, and there's a great reason for it And you have till the end of the evening to figure it out and then tell me what you think All those in favor of hearing article 12 on Wednesday, November 8th at 7 15, please say aye Opposed no one's opposed passes unanimously. I now call on Andrew Rose to make a motion for article 16 I move that we hear article 16 on Wednesday, November 8th at 7 20 Motion made and seconded you may speak to your motion We well now they're out of order, but the reason is the same reason as for article 13 that Chris Riddle cannot be present on Thursday and The select board and the petitioners agree that we'd like to have 16 and 15 on the same day Thank you. Is there further discussion? I See no hands all those in favor of moving article 16 to Wednesday, November 8th at 7 20, please say aye opposed It passes article 16 will be on Wednesday, November 8th at 7 20 I now call on mr. Riddle again for a motion for article 15 Chris riddle precinct to I move that we hear article 15 on Wednesday, November 8th at 7 25 Motion made and seconded you may speak to your motion Identical to them my Needs with regard to article 13 is there for the discussion. We ready to come to a vote See no hands. We're voting on whether or not to move article 15 to Wednesday, November 8th at 7 25 All those in favor, please say aye Opposed please say no The eyes have it unanimously. So the order when we get to Wednesday will be 13 then 12 then 16 then 15 and that's it for the Preamble and we are ready to go forward with article one and I call on mr. Slaughter from the select board to make a motion I Move in terms of the article Motion to be made and seconded you may speak to your motion as is the as is the common practice it both special and annual town meetings We authorize article one to allow for boards and committees to deliver reports to us And we appreciate getting information from them thank you and The finance committee is no position this requires a majority for a come to a vote I should just tell you that there are two reports that we're gonna be hearing from first the dog park task force is gonna be issuing a report and then the Select board and the economic development director will be Issuing report on all of the five marijuana related articles and they're not going to give that report until we Reach article three so after this passes, we're gonna hear the dog park task force Then we proceed with article two and then we're gonna hear the marijuana report. Is there further discussion before we come to a vote I See no hands. We're now voting a majority vote on approving article one to hear reports all those in favor Please say aye All those opposed, please say no The eyes have it unanimously. I now call on Nina Allen from the dog park task force There's a podium right there Amherst is home to over 2,000 dogs and the humans that love them We are striving to make Amherst an even more dog-friendly community by creating a place where dogs and their families Can come together to socialize and play the Amherst dog park task force was established in the spring of 2017 Our vision is to build a fenced-in park in Amherst that is free to all visitors and is supported and maintained by volunteers in the community The task force has nine members appointed by the town manager as well as three non-voting liaison members Dave Zomac the director of conservation and development Carol Hepburn the animal welfare officer and Jim Wald representing the select board The task force first met in June of 2017 and has had four full meetings as well as several subcommittee meetings Members of the task force have been working in five separate areas site location design funding rules and regulations and sustainability The first school is locating a site for the park The task force is working closely with town staff to identify possible locations Our preference is to use donated land or land already owned by the town But we are also looking at the possibility of purchasing land The current plan of the task force is to submit a request to the Community Preservation Act Committee in December Requesting funds to purchase land for the dog park We plan to supplement the CPI funds with a grant from the Stanton Foundation of Massachusetts Which supports the development of enclosed dog parks in Massachusetts cities and towns The Stanton Foundation grant will pay nearly the full cost of building the park Task force meetings are posted and the public is welcome to attend In addition, we will be reaching out to the Amherst community looking for support and volunteers to assist in the maintenance of the park once it's built We will be looking for your support in the 2018 annual meeting to vote in favor of a CPA allocation The members of the task force believe that a dog park will be a benefit to dogs their families and the community at large We're grateful for the strong support. We're receiving from the town manager and the town staff We hope that town meeting will support our efforts as we move forward. Thank you Thank you We now move on to article 2 and I call on Ms. Ratner to make the motion. I Move in terms of the article Motion is made and seconded you may speak to your motion Thank You mr. Moderator This article requests town meeting to move some free cash one million three hundred one thousand six hundred and thirty three dollars to the stabilization fund Free cash is money that remains at the end of the fiscal year because town departments did not spend all money Appropriated that year or because actual revenues were more than budgeted revenues for the year This money goes into a free cash reserve account As of July 1 this year There was five million one hundred and sixty two thousand two hundred thirty nine dollars in free cash certified by the state The town's other reserve account the stabilization fund currently has seven million five hundred ninety five thousand Three hundred and fifty dollars in it This one receives a higher interest rate than free cash as it's bundled with other funds Appropriation to both funds requires a simple majority vote of town meeting a Simple majority vote of town meeting is required to withdraw funds from free cash While a two-thirds majority vote of town meeting is required to withdraw funds from the stabilization fund The town's financial management policies and objectives state that reserve should be from five to fifteen percent of the general fund operating budget These policies also state that a free cash exceeds five percent of the operating budget the excess may be transferred to the stabilization fund Currently reserves are at sixteen point five percent of the general fund operating budget So the finance committee is recommending by a vote of six to zero with one absent that the free cash above the five percent level or One million three hundred one thousand six hundred thirty three dollars be transferred to the stabilization fund the total in the stabilization fund would then be eight million eight hundred ninety six thousand nine hundred eighty three dollars after this transfer The total amount of reserves would still be twelve million seven hundred fifty seven thousand five hundred eighty nine dollars as seen in the chart Thank you. I Call on mr. Slaughter from the select board The select board voted unanimously to recommend this article to you for the same reasons that Ms. Ratner just identified Thank you. This requires a majority vote for passage is their discussion before we come to a vote and Yes, right in the front row there with a white card I wonder if somebody your precinct please a precinct in I wondered if somebody could tell us the portion of this million three hundred and one thousand that came from not having to fund programs to the level that we had voted on and the extent to which they were it's Additional resources from revenues came in I'm asking that because You know, we made we made some hard decisions last last time about what we could and couldn't fund And if a major part of this is from not having to spend money on Projects that we had funded it would be important to know what they were and For us to have a sense of what we missed that we could we could have used this one million three hundred thousand for some very important project So I'm not opposed to putting it in free cash, but I think we need some better explanation Anybody at the front table have an explanation offer Hang on here point of order. Yes, wait for the microphone, please and identify yourself Jim Berset precinct six. Is it possible to just get the lights in the front to be horizontal? They're always directed right at this side That overhead light especially. Thank you Our IT person is on the case but no promises Meanwhile, it can't does anybody want to respond to the question mr. Buckleman Make sure that microphone is working Mr.. Moderate, thank you, mr. Auditor. We don't know the exact Numbers we can get that for you tomorrow We made the report to the select board and to the finance committee But we just don't happen to have the numbers in front of us right now Further discussion before we come to a vote on article 2 I See no hands. We will come to a vote. This requires a majority Okay, all those in favor of the motion which was in terms of the article get the motion up on the screen All those in favor of the motion, please say aye Opposed please say no the eyes have it and Before we get to article 3 we're now going to hear a two-part report on The marijuana Articles, but before that I just want to let you know that for some unknown technical reason AC TV is not currently transmitting town meeting They're aware of it and I've been told that can't be fixed at this time So in case you hear of that we're aware that they're having some sort of technical difficulty. I Now call on Select board miss Kruger first Good evening. I'm going to give a brief report Explaining why we're here before you with five Articles related to the local regulation of recreational marijuana or what is sometimes referred to as non-medical or adult use marijuana So I'm sure by now, you know that on November 8th 2016 Massachusetts voters passed the state law legalizing recreational marijuana Medical marijuana had already been legalized in this town meeting had already adopt has already adopted a zoning by-law amendment regulating medical establishments Many people felt that the initial bill passed needed improvement to this end Governor Baker signed a bill Delaying implementation by six months during that time the state legislature made several changes in July 28th 2017 Governor Baker signed the general court's revised law on the subject an act to ensure safe access to Marijuana or the act adopted as chapter 55 of the acts of 2017 so This compromise bill helped clarify some of the aspects of the law that we in Amherst were concerned with However, the newly appointed cannabis control commission has until March 15th 2018 to promulgate regulations These regulations we hope will give much more detailed information about how a municipality can regulate recreational marijuana Until the time that we can review and respond to these regulations We believe that the package before you tonight is the best and most responsible way For Amherst to prepare for the legal sale and use of recreational marijuana 54% of Massachusetts voters approved the ballot initiative statewide last November in Amherst 74% of the voters approved the initiative The team of elected officials and staff working together to prepare Amherst for retail sales is Well aware of the health and safety challenges legalization for non-medical purposes brings with it We have not taken our Responsibility lightly Regardless of how you feel or how you may have voted on legalizing marijuana The fact is it is now legal and given our position as a regional center and the host to a university and two colleges We anticipate Amherst will be impacted by legalization Tonight you will hear a suite of articles designed to best address these impacts We realized that once the cannabis control commission promulgates regulations Adjustments may need need to be made and we will be back before this body We may need to be back before this body for additional amendments or bylaws This is a work in progress But we believe these actions will best prepare Amherst for regulating retail establishments Collecting revenue in dealing with public consumption of marijuana products So now Jeff Kravitz Amherst economic development director He was chosen by the town manager to lead the town's efforts in Preparing us for implementation of legalization is going to give me more detailed presentation about Why we're trying to pass these the particular bylaws that are before you tonight and in fact one of them We may not want to pass Hang in there and Follow us along So I'm gonna turn this over to mr. Kravitz who's going to give a little more detail and an overview of the timeline and What we're gonna do and then we're gonna have three general bylaws and two Zoning bylaws. So um, that's that's the five and I know you have information in your packet about that So I could turn it over Thank you, and I just want to note I'm not going to be putting a timer on mr. Kravitz This is in lieu of me calling on him for three minutes for each of the five articles So he assures me his total time is going to be less than 15 minutes and Watch your step by the podium there and don't trip on that cable, please Good evening Jeff Kravitz economic development director I'm gonna keep this as brief as possible But I will be sticking around in case there are specific questions on individual warrant articles The first thing is I want to talk a little bit quickly about The internal working group. We've done the best we can to educate ourselves We've gone to dozens of and participate in dozens of hearings in public meetings Forums workshops listening sessions and our approach with the five warrant articles before you this evening Is to provide you with as much choice as possible And ways to implement the will of the voters in a thoughtful and deliberate manner So I'm gonna Talk to you about why we're doing the articles tonight and the timing Bring everyone up to speed on where we are with medical marijuana because that impacts recreational marijuana And then briefly go over the five warrant articles So here's a timeline dating back to September and there are three dates that I want to highlight The first is that the cannabis control commission regulations are due on March 15th of next year They're gonna begin accepting applications for recreational marijuana retail licenses on April 1st, however We're not having another town meeting until April 23rd Now this is critical because the only thing that the law says is that when the cannabis control commission gets an application They're gonna Evaluate it to see if it's in compliance with zoning at the time the application was made So anybody who puts in an application prior to town meeting It would be based on our current zoning This is a bit of a dated map About statewide the places in yellow are Actively dispensing medical marijuana dispensaries There's also another one in Great Barrington that recently opened and there are a total of 15 operating All the purple ones are the ones that have achieved accreditation status. There are about a hundred of them It's important to note that because they the ones with accreditation status it get priority review And if there are no cannabis control regulations by July 1st 2018 they can automatically start to sell recreationally and then regionally they're 16 proposed in the Pioneer Valley one currently operating in Northampton and Amherst has four the only community with more is Holyoke with five moving on to Amherst as I mentioned there are four here None are currently in operation it's important to know this because Again, they're given priority review and municipalities are prohibited from preventing a medical dispensary from converting to recreational establishment according to the law so All four of these here's the current status all four have received Provisional certificates of registration from the Department of Public Health Two of them also have special permits from the Zoning Board of Appeals neither of them has signed host community Agreements, which is also a requirement of the law one has a host community agreement, but no special permit So that's currently where everything stands and now I'm going to talk about the warrant articles Article 3 is a local option retail marijuana excise tax This is the same idea as the local option meals and rooms taxes that Amherst has already adopted Essentially the town would receive three percent of all revenue generated by the sale of recreational marijuana by establishments in operating in Amherst Article 4 is a limitation on the number of recreational marijuana retail establishments The law sets out sort of two paths Those who for me to spell is that voted for the ballot question and those that did not vote for it As miss Krueger said we did vote for it so any limitation below either 20% of the Off-premises alcohol licenses issued or less than the number of medical marijuana dispensaries With accreditation status must be approved by a vote of the voters so that would be Lower than four would need to go through a ballot quite a local ballot question and I also want to note that town council and the attorney general's office Recommended including this limitation both as a general bylaw and in the zoning bylaw. So that's why you'll see it in both places Article 5 is a prohibition on public consumption of marijuana or THC Currently the Amherst Board of Health regulations are broadly defined and prohibit the smoking of marijuana in public places and workplaces This would extend that prohibition to other forms of consumption In public places Article 6 is the zoning bylaw It's recreation marijuana retailer. It creates a new use classification called marijuana uses moves Medical uses to that classification creates a new category for recreational marijuana retailers And then amends the version of medical marijuana standards and conditions and uses that as a basis for all marijuana uses the zones are the same zones that were approved for medical marijuana dispensaries except no recreational marijuana Retail establishments would be proposed in are allowed in the office park zone and a planning board representative is going to go into a lot more detail on some of the particulars of that article and Finally article 7 Would prohibit it's a temporary moratorium through January 1st 20 well technically through December 31st 2018 And it would prohibit new recreational marijuana retailers from applying for a license until that date and one quick note on that if town meeting passes both articles 6 and 7 the way the moratorium is written it would Take precedence over the zoning so there would be a moratorium even if both pass and with that Hopefully I was short enough and I'll stick around for questions because I'm happy to answer any of those Thank you very much. I hear a point of order wait for microphone, please Jeff you can have a second age precinct one. I apologize that I didn't ask this when you first raised it the ACTV is not broadcasting, but are they taping and if they're not I hear I see somebody nodding Yes, great just because otherwise we could get somebody's phone going or something. Thank you Thank you Okay, we now move on to article 3 and I call on Ms. Brewer to make a motion. I believe the wording No, I believe you're moving that motion I Think I believe our town council recommended it Right so I move that the town except mass general law chapter 64 and section 3 a as Recently amended by section 13 of chapter 55 of the acts of 2017 and impose a sales tax upon the sale or transfer of marijuana Or marijuana products by a marijuana retailer operating within the town to anyone other than a marijuana Establishment at the rate of 3% of the total sales price received by the Marijuana retailer as a consideration for the sale of marijuana or marijuana or marijuana products Motions been made and seconded you may speak to your motion Mr. Moderator given that I'm going to provide both Rational for the article and the select words position. May I just combine the eight minutes? Yes, you may Thank you. And for those of you wondering what was taking so long up here We were trying to remember what was different from the warrant and as many of you have probably spotted if you look at your warrant in The second line where it said a ridge third word was originating that words just been removed So I could have moved in terms of except removing that word, but that's how we did it Let me just interrupt for a sec for those running the clock We're giving this brewer eight minutes because it's five for speaking to a motion plus three for the select word position. Just, you know Thanks, you may continue. Thank you The select board recommended article three by a vote of five to zero on October 23rd 2017 we hope the town meetings aware that prior to our specific select board Deliberations on these marijuana articles three through seven at the select board meeting of October 23rd broadcast live and available on channel 17 and on your computers That we have had marijuana updates at most select board meetings for the past year under member reports and also Specifically provided a community conversation item at the select board meeting move September 18th Which included a slide presentation by mr. Kravitz and the opportunity for public input although attendance was relatively light We also hope you found the double-sided FAQ fact sheet Provided in the town meeting mailing informative and that you visited the marijuana web page Which is just Amherst MA gov marijuana on the town website and that you may have also viewed yet another presentation by mr Kravitz in addition to tonight at the televised TMCC League of Women Voters warrant review on October 24 We have not been provided any questions by those who facilitated the TMCC warrant discussions And I've only heard back reports from a few individuals, so we're not really sure how much information you want to hear tonight Although I'm confident you don't want me to speak for eight minutes, so I'll try not to do that Mr. Kravitz gave an excellent overview The reason for article three is quite straightforward as he indicated the select board doesn't know how much education Of our ever-changing population on the safe and legal use of recreational marijuana is gonna cost us and having a revenue stream Will help that's why the select board advocated with the state for an increase as this has been playing out over the past many months For two to three from two percent to three percent to provide that three percent local option to each of our 351 municipalities We believe the maximum allowed three percent is right for Amherst The users of the recreational products will actually pay the tax through increased recreational product prices Just as with restaurants and hotels as mr. Kravitz mentioned earlier and as we were early adopters of as well If we don't have this revenue stream We are going to have to cover our entire educational efforts with first funds from host community agreements and then general taxation Of course the downside of doing this is that recreational use product point price point will reflect that local tax Just as restaurant and hotel prices reflect our extra local option excise tax The question has arisen is does this apply to medical? It does not we cannot no matter what we try and do here in Amherstown meaning we cannot tax medical There are two specific provisions in the law that prevent us from doing that mass general law chapter 64 and section 4 that refers Specifically to not applying to the sale of marijuana or marijuana products by a medical marijuana treatment center or a Registered personal caregiver to a qualifying patient or personal caregiver pursuant to chapter 369 of the acts of 2012 Nor of course to any unlawful sale because how would you collect taxes on an unlawful sale? Also, it's in session law 55 Which you'll he'll referenced again tonight probably because session law 55 is the one that finally got passed this summer And it specifically added medical use of marijuana to the act and it said marijuana sold pursuant to this chapter Shall not be taxed under any of the chapters that tax marijuana Then the question arises as to why isn't the host community agreement in the law enough? Why isn't that enough money? Well, we don't know how much money that's gonna be at this point We don't know how much we're going to be allowed to put in the host community agreement It's not yet clear from regulations as to whether or not it will be only police enforcement. Are we saying it's public safety issue? Does that have a cost assigned to it? Does it include effective educational materials that we're constantly distributing and doing outreach to new residents? College students who live on campuses Tenants we don't yet know what it'll yield what it does say in the law is that we can't require payment That is not directionally proportional and reasonably related to the cost imposed upon the city or town by the operation We don't know where education is going to fit into that. We don't have any regulations yet from the state So we think the excise tax is what's gonna help us there in terms of when this takes effect The law was written to provide basically a default Which is that it would take effect in a city or town on the first day of the calendar quarter following 30 days after its acceptance That's the one we decided to go with unless we had wanted a later date. We put it into effect now Obviously nobody's selling yet, but we will be ready when they are we hope you support this Thank you Pardon me. Is that a point of order? Okay, wait for the microphone, please Jennifer page precinct eight I think they're just maybe a typo in the motion that miss brewer read the last section of the last portion of the last sentence Should maybe should be sale of marijuana or marijuana edibles or marijuana products, which is similar to the way It's written in the original article Otherwise it looks redundant Yes marijuana or marijuana edibles So I'm gonna take that as a friendly amendment to the motion That makes sense So what town council recommended it's that extra marijuana We wanted to read total sales price Received by the marijuana retailer as a consideration for the sale of marijuana or marijuana products period Thank you We now hear from mr. Kubiak of the finance committee Thank You mr. Moderator And thanks to mr. Kravitz and his ruler for their Excellent presentations all of you have had a chance to look at the finance committee report and you'll find our recommendation on page four of that report and the rationale for that this The finance committee by a vote of six zero with one absent recommends the passage of this article Thank you. This article requires a majority vote for passage Are there further questions before we come to a vote? Yes, I see a White card way in the back there Alemberg precinct one I would like to discuss first of all medical marijuana was passed in 2012 and people except for veterans Were charged two hundred dollars to get a marijuana card which amounts to an illegal tax in my opinion Can I interrupt for a second? I don't know if you understand but the discussion here has nothing to do with medical marijuana It's about a tax on recreational. I understand. Okay. Good. You may continue So we're not taxing medical marijuana users Nonetheless a lot of people who might have become medical marijuana users were afraid to get on that list and indeed The federal government has requested that list from Massachusetts Um, so I'm just wondering um on this Article three. Um, is there a similar tax on alcohol sales or pharmaceuticals? Or tobacco? Okay, let me see it Further discussion Yes, second row right in the center there Although I called in you this time, but I didn't see any color card. Thank you That's the last time I'm going to do it. I'm going to be really careful and not call on people who are just showing me a hand with no coordinate Gordon Gordon freed precinct six I'm going on poor information but What I think I know or don't know is that if someone Makes money off of the sale of marijuana Something about they can't put it into banks and So, how do we know how much money they are making off of it? That's one question and the other question is Will this 3% be put into a separate fund or will it just go into our regular? General fund mr. Bachman In terms of the first the second part of your question Funds like this would go into the general fund of the town and that be considered a revenue just like any other revenue And the medical companies are there the recreational companies are supposed to report to the town. There are sales Thank you further discussion I'm the aisle right there with the weight card. I'm wait for the microphone, please Pat the angel is precinct six I'm still trying to get an answer to the part of the question that you had which is Our liquor stores charge an excise tax you said rooms and food but you didn't say liquor alcohol and I'm trying to figure out whether we charge an excise tax for them for police Extra police work or anything like that or education and if we don't why are we going to do it for marijuana? Ms. Brewer We don't have that option So we are allowed to increase the tax that applies to meals And so that includes things like ready to eat meals from the grocery store and meals from restaurants whether take in or take out and then Eat in or take out and then we we can also do that with hotels But we are not authorized by the state to add Attacks on to what you might buy at a package store bottle of wine, etc I'm sure we would do it if we had the option, but we haven't I hear point of order Because I identify yourself, please John corporate thing too because we're trying to cover the bases here I'd just like to be an obnoxious English major and say that I would like the last bit of Article 3 to read Products containing Sorry, I'm sorry. That's not a point of order You can raise your hand and maybe you'll be called on You can't it's not a point of order that you want the article or motion to be phrased differently It's you have to be recognized to talk about that that I think it is wrong Yes back corner right there Mr.. Connor one to identify yourself and make your motion, but then I'm gonna have a little pause afterwards why okay? Sure, then so Connor a precinct one, and I move to remove from article 3 The word recreational wherever it appears Okay, is There a second Okay, first of all you have to understand you can't remove anything from the article your motion needs to be removed the word recreational from the motion from the motion if that's okay, and yeah And before you speak to it, let me look at this and determine if I think it's valid So mr.. Connor the motion does not have the word recreational in it Unless I'm missing something anybody else see the word recreational in the motion No in the motion. We're looking at the motion Okay, there's the word recreational does not appear in the motion It's the motion that we're discussing and voting on so this is not applicable I hear a point of order page wilder precinct 3 I just want to clarify originally when I mean 10 I don't know why I said 3 article 3 When the art motion was presented we were told that the only change was to eliminate Originating so now we have different more changes can someone speak to exactly what the changes are, okay? It's not more changes, but we did overlook that change But let me explain a little bit an article is what the town and town meeting is warned about ahead of time This is what's going to be discussed the motion is what's actually discussed and voted on It's perfectly okay to remove a word add a word so long as the moderator determines it's in scope in this particular case I suspect if you look at the law that's being cited in both the article in the motion Probably in there the word recreational shows up and it's not necessary or Critical to have it in the motion is my best guess at any rate The important thing is the motion before us is what we're discussing what we care about The significant change in the motion from the article was changing that word of originating within the town to saying Retailer operating in the town and that's because town council felt it wasn't clear what we were taxing and where the Idea is to tax retailers who are selling marijuana in the town So that's the significant change that was made to the motion so there is no reference to recreational in the motion and Therefore your motion is not applicable, so No, you may not I may call on you or I may not but you should have a seat, okay? Okay, okay Okay, but hopefully you do now correct Good, and it's tough. I know I can't read from back there either when I was a town meeting member I always sat in the front because it's the only place I could see anything Further discussion, I see a hand on the aisle right here again with a white card Hilda Greenbaum precinct one and I have two questions the first one is there was an article in the New York Times today, which said that mentioned the proportionality between the cost of legal for sale retail marijuana was many many times higher than the illegal stuff that you could buy and California and So my question is Given this this is a largely cash business if what? The previous speaker said about not being able to bank the money. How do we know how much money is actually Being spent on legal marijuana in this town. How would you how are we gonna audit the proceeds from these stores? Mr. Kravitz or mr. Buckman if you care to try and respond you may Mr. Kravitz So the way that the tax is gonna work is there's also a state sales tax and a state excise tax that are imposed All taxes are gonna be remitted to the state. So they're ultimately responsible for ensuring that that their books are kept clean and then they will remit the 3% if we pass this article to the town So it's gonna be the state's responsibility to check on that Thank you Way in the back corner there Maureen Adams precinct 10 I Don't now see With the word recreational taken out How the distinction between medical and Repriational is maintained that somebody please explain that to me mr. Kravitz. Can you help us out there? Ms. Brewer So I acknowledge that it's strange But it doesn't matter we could say medical in it and it wouldn't apply because it's illegal for us to have the tax on Medical so it's only what we tend to use the term Recreational for although you also see the term retail as opposed to medical So the fact that it doesn't specify which one doesn't matter because there's only one kind of marijuana sale that it can apply to It can't apply to illegal sales For your accounting reason and it can't apply to medical sales based on the two laws that I cited it It cannot no matter what we try and do it will not and so that just leaves what we refer to as recreational or retail Thank you Yes, I see a white card halfway back there John cool present to in the last line of The motion Does marijuana products mean? Products that contain or products that are used in conjunction with marijuana mr. Kravitz products that contain Thank you For the discussion before I come to a vote Yes in the corner there then so kind of precinct one so one of the reasons I Made the motion and I apologize for not having realized that that was removed from this particular article But there is no indication on the other articles that refer to recreational marijuana that the that that word Recreational is going to be removed and my understanding is that the new law which those of Some people who have smartphones can actually look up chapter 94 g of the Massachusetts general laws Actually does not use the word recreational and And therefore that word is not defined I don't see it defined in in any of these articles and The word Obviously is it's problematic if the new if the new state law that authorizes all this activity Does not use that word and we are using that word in our both our Our general by-laws in our zoning by-law. I Just wonder aren't we creating a problem that I think I'm sort of neutral on the tax thing I think it's probably a reasonable amount as opposed to maybe the state tax Which I think is a little excessive, but I am concerned that we may be Using a word not defined in the state law and And I have no idea whether it's been proposed to be defined certainly, I don't see a definition in the general by-laws and And or in the zoning by-law and I I wonder what the response of those who participated in the in the process of bringing These articles forth have to say about that Okay, it's technically more a question for article four than three, but I'll let you respond now if you want to mr. Kravitz Sure, I think the idea was that we wanted to make a distinction between medical use and non-medical use chapter 94g the title of the entire chapter is regulation of the use and distribution of marijuana not medically prescribed and I think we used it as another way of saying marijuana not medically prescribed to distinguish it from medically prescribed marijuana and to avoid confusion that if we just said the word marijuana people might think it's both medical and non-medical It's Kruger if I could just add because you asked what was discussed in the Working group that we had and we did have a discussion about using that word because it has certain implications that we might not want to associate with What we were trying to regulate, but it was it was decided that it was a common understanding that what we were talking about was recreational called recreational marijuana and that to start calling it non-medical or You know age eligible and we looked at a bunch of things We rejected that at the end because we just thought the common understanding would be clear if we just said recreational marijuana You might have a different opinion about that For the discussion before I come to a vote Yes, I see a hand in the back over there Hi, Caroline Murray Pruce for do you have information on what the tax rates are in the neighboring towns? Holyoke and Northampton in particular No one has that information Let's say so no nobody just to interject. I don't think anybody has bylaws in place This is this is new to everybody Miss Brewer to give anything to say or no Okay further discussion. I see no hands. I think we're ready to come to a vote This is a majority vote. The motion is before you on the bottom half of the screen All those in favor of the motion for article three, please say aye Opposed please say no Moderator here's a majority We will have an electronic vote so so When the vote is on the screen and the timer begins you can enter in your vote and We were voting on whether or not to accept the motion under article three and the window was open You may vote and I didn't I I didn't receive press your vote a second time if you don't see a yes or no or an abstain Hang on. We are just on hold while it figures out what's going on Your test vote worked correctly You broke it what will probably of hang on Okay, can she still vote right now Sean? Okay, so why don't you put in your vote and then? As soon as he gets back to the desk here, we'll show you the results We have hundred seventy-five. Yes, seven. No for abstain the motion has passed Let me just write that down one seventy-five seven four and we now move on to article four and I call on Ms. Brewer to make a motion I move in terms of the article Motion made and seconded you may speak to your motion. Thank you. I'm very sorry for the confusion on the last one There was a lot of last-minute typing associated with that this one's quite straightforward It's in terms of the article the select board recommended article four by a vote of five zero on October 23rd We have every reason to believe Given current information provided in the law and in the absence of the regulations that aren't due to be promulgated until March 15th That all four of the medical marijuana dispensaries in process in Amherst will eventually be allowed to either change to both a Medical and recreational retail model or perhaps just a retail model without further local control Beyond the development of a host community agreement That means we are working from the assumption that we are going to have for what we've been terming recreational non-medical Marijuana retail establishments without taking any further action and with no further say as to where they are Some people may wonder if we should just let the market decide the number we end up with beyond those four It is certainly worth noting that no other type of business in Amherst is limited in our town general by-laws Or in our zoning by-laws by the actual number of establishments in terms of a simple number Versus placing zoning restrictions or health regulations Yet, some people are also leery of simply letting it happen given the fact that this is a newly legal industry Some people say recreational Non-medical marijuana use should be treated similarly to tobacco and alcohol both of which do have local limits For example the Amherst Board of Health and appointed not elected body not subject to town meeting approval Chooses how many tobacco sales permits to issue? So how many tobacco outlets exist in Amherst and has in fact also required them to sell to 21 and over not 18 Like you still see lots of places and has regulations about things like selling individual cigarettes The Commonwealth of Massachusetts in its infinite wisdom has provided all of our municipalities with a federal census population Based quota system for alcohol licenses roughly in segments of a thousand or five thousand populations So for example an all alcohol on-premises license, so that's a restaurant or a bar We've issued 35 of the 40 that were allowed were allowed 40 We have wine and malt on-premise Licenses think of Amherst cinema the Amherst golf club and six restaurants that chose to go that direction We're allowed eight we've issued all of those and we also have off-premises licenses You heard us speaking briefly of package stores at one point for all alcohol and places like Atkins Cushman and the Amherst Center store for just wine and malt again based on per five thousand of population we've issued eight package store licenses and Three of the eight wine and malt licenses were allowed by quota in terms of off-premises Yet despite these strict alcohol quotas the Commonwealth has not limited the possible number of recreational marijuana retail Establishments Commonwealth did try and do that with medical at some point, but then that got changed recreational marijuana legalization Advocates and the Commonwealth determined for reasons that have truly never been clear to any of us who have been working on this for the past year That the number of recreational marijuana retail establishments could By local option be limited to 20% of the alcohol off-premises licenses that we have currently issued So redirecting you back to the preamble for article four and the warrant Mass general law chapter 94g does not require a vote of the voters to approve any limitation on the number of recreational marijuana Establishments that is at or above the number of medical marijuana treatment centers registered to operate doesn't matter if they're open or not or Equal to or greater than 20% of the licenses issued for the retail sale of alcohol beverages not to be drunk on the premises If town meeting members want the number To be less than for recreational marijuana retail establishments then town meeting would need to pass an amendment to this motion and Vote a motion for some number between zero and three But then there would be no effect until we have a town-wide election Posing that number somewhere between zero and three that was selected by town meeting and put that on a ballot question Mr. Kravitz does have handy for us the logistics of election scheduling if that's what you want to know about later So without a local town-wide ballot question with no one which no one in our community is called for the only restriction Town meeting itself can effectively apply is some number greater than four We therefore chose that's number eight an article for based largely on these factors I'm gonna run out of time and I'm really be surprised if I had eight minutes to begin with but I'll try finish it up. I don't think I did We believe many Amherst voters voted for question for not because they wanted the streets of Amherst lined with recreational marijuana retail establishments But because of all the criminal and social justice factors involved with the long history of disproportionate marijuana criminalization imposed on people who are not white and If we chose the number four then all four of those recreational marijuana retail establishments We're going to be owned by white men. We already know that we know who they are If we choose the number six and some people thought that was a little too low given the number above the moderator Wouldn't have allowed us to increase the number He will not allow you to increase the number tonight above eight to remain within the scope of the article So the number eight seemed to give town meeting some breathing room. You could sum it up quickly. Yeah, so Anyway, you will hear more about the number eight when we're talking about zoning So this does go with planning article six and you will find that if this number changes as town meeting votes on article four Then the planning board will move article six to reflect that change Thank you the finance committee has no position and Article four requires a majority vote. Is there discussion before we come to a vote? Yes, right here in the aisle Janet McGowan precinct eight I have a question About lessons learned because we're not the first state to have recreational marijuana or medical marijuana And I've seen you know parts of LA that have just medical facilities that are pretty sleazy Colorado has had an experience with recreational marijuana and also has college towns and You know, Washington state. There's some cities, you know, like Amsterdam that have kind of gone up and back with marijuana I'm just wondering like what are the lessons learned? What are the pitfalls? What could be something you'd like to prevent? Is there, you know Just what what did the committee learn, you know about youth use of marijuana affects on businesses, you know Having a whole street with things just Anything like that if somebody in front cares to answer they can raise their hand Ms. Krueger I don't think this is really the time or place to get into that. I can assure you that we've been we've Done that research. Mr. Kravitz has done much of it. I've been one of the memorable ones I went to as a audio presentation with a judge and a dean of students from Boulder, Colorado So I think we've collected that and tried to incorporate that knowledge into Our thinking about what we could regulate locally but to really get into a conversation about all the things We've learned from other communities. I just And I don't see how we could do it right now Yes way over in the left corner there microphone Is it on hang out?  I'm Marla. You made from precinct seven And I am concerned about the number of facilities that we might have in Amherst that were able to sell recreational marijuana if we do have for pending medical facilities which can then also sell recreationally plus eight additional recreational facilities Okay, I guess I'm being told that that it would just be four more recreational facilities for a total of eight Nonetheless, I'm still concerned. I think even eight Is too many Our primary business here in the town of Amherst is that of the university and colleges The shared mission of these institutions is the guidance of students many of them are young There they are being guided towards rigorous academic achievement Heavy recreational marijuana use can and sometimes does lead to apathy impaired memory diminished cognition There are studies showing it may also contribute to major mental illness in young users Inhalation of marijuana additionally causes respiratory damage So allowing several recreational marijuana shops in town I think runs counter to the welfare business and goals of our unique high aiming community It has taken you mass decades to lift its prior reputation as a party school I'm old enough to remember when UMass was known as zoom ass We can continue to struggle with management of alcohol consumption periodic heroin overdoses on the campuses and with issues of consent and periodic sexual assaults on the campuses The addition of abundant recreational marijuana to this mix could well exacerbate existing core problems I think we need to carefully guard UMass is hard to one Current reputation as an excellent state school with some top programs Let's also not let Amherst become a destination site for recreational marijuana We want a thriving downtown with a lively mix of stores not a major concentration of head shops I believe that we need to lower the cap that has been proposed Further discussion. Yes, mr. Kravitz I did just want to clarify that it would be a Maximum including if the medical converted to recreational, so Thank you Yes, right there second from the eye with the red card Thank You mr. Moderator peter vickery precinct to there's a good question about how other communities have responded and we don't know But we can't tell how Amherst would deal with four let alone eight So we can run a real-life experiment with four and see how that goes We can't tell tonight. Nothing's as hard to predict as the future as the same goes So why don't we try for and then if it goes really really well? Move it up to eight Yes, the green card there third row from the back Jack will in my Donna precinct five To answer the question about how other communities and let's say color Handles it My grandson was stationed in Colorado and he went to a fair and with his wife and three-year-old son and He said that There was so much marijuana smoke That they had to leave the fair because they had their three-year-old child with them and He was rather taken back by that. So I I'm Conflicted So I don't know how I'm gonna vote on this Anyway, that's Colorado Just to clarify the red green and white cards Green indicates you were in favor of the motion on the floor and you weren't really speaking in favor of it So let's try and be careful and think deep before you put up your cards. You're holding the right one I hear a point of order in front row stand up wait for a microphone. Please identify yourself William case in precinct three if we don't pass this I'm just wondering what happens. I'm hanging on hang on I'm first trying to decide if it's a point of order I'm sure it is and I'll let Ms. Brewer try and answer it. Ms. Brewer What happens is there's no limit. It's up to the free market And the zoning although technically since there's also a limit in the zoning by-law Well there miss Brewer so As I indicated, there's normally you don't put numbers in the town by-law the zoning by-law But the zoning that you provide obviously limits where things can be you can't put Walmart where my house is so that's okay The planning board if this doesn't pass we did not discuss that possibility we discussed if the number was different and they would adopt that number into the one sentence they have about the number if I It's my belief. Well, I'm not going to guess what the planning board would do. I have an assumption Mr. Kravitz, can you speak to if we don't pass a limit? Is there a limit? Can you speak to that please? My understanding is if this article Fails the the planning board in their motion would move to strike that line So there would be no limit in either the general or the zoning by-laws Thank you I'm only gonna call on people if they're holding up a card Yes third row right there and the other thing when you hold up your card This is a kind of funny thing, but if you hold it like this, I can't tell what color it is But yes third row right there Thank You Andrew parkering a precinct five I'm just gonna start the reason why they chose more than four is for their Medical marijuana facilities in here and they will automatically be able to be recreational if we limit it to four Then that would allow no other free market enterprise actually open a business here And it would basically give precedent to the people that have already applied for licenses So that didn't seem fair to them and that wasn't Said earlier. I'm not in favor of limiting them at all in terms of the amount We don't know how many we're gonna need why would we put a set number on them before we actually know And if we're gonna see the planning board, you're gonna see there's a very Finite number of places that they could actually exist Which is gonna fit within somewhere within the eight to ten to eleven So I'm I don't see a reason to actually put a limit on those unless it's required by the state board of health Thank you And now right in the center there with the green card make gauge precinct one I'm in favor of this I really appreciate the thoughtfulness that went into this proposal and the balance the number of things that people balanced It seems that some people are speaking against it because they're against marijuana or they're worried about the dangers And the fact is that this past this is legal and so we have to manage it or We won't have any control over it at all a lot of people don't like alcohol But we still have to manage it even if we don't want there to be any out some people may not want there to be any alcohol anywhere ever But that's not gonna happen here And so we have to manage it and I've just appreciate the thoughtfulness that went into this by the many different people who participated Yes, I'm second row right here in the corner. I Move to amend I'm sorry seven precinct seven I moved to amend the article to no more than six recreational Mariana meeting Motion has been made and seconded to change from no more than eight to no more than six You may now speak to your motion. We need a microphone there still It was the article to more no more than replace the word eight and the number eight with the word and number six Actually point of order with would would we be voting on the eight first and then the six? You know no, we will not we will vote on whether or not to accept the I'll explain that you speak to why you want to do that I'll explain the voting part. It's clear to me that we're all conflicted as to what what we want and It it feels as though we need to start with fewer and then see how things work and move on And I would agree that it's unfair to give a monopoly to those who have already posted for Medical so let's try with just two more but not for more And actually we will handle it the way you suggested We're going to discuss the pros and cons of six versus eight. We can also still be discussing the Pros and cons of any limit We will then come to a vote with the number eight and if that passes we're done And if that fails, we will then vote with the number six if that passes We're done with that if that fails then we have no limits. That's the way it currently stands One card only please Are you speaking against it? Yes back row go ahead Helen but precinct one I'm just wondering as far as the communities around us Holyoke and Northampton Have they limited the number of establishments? I'd really appreciate an answer on that and Secondly, my opinion is let the free market rule. Mr. Kravitz any comment on other communities? I'm not aware of any communities that have set a limitation other than complete ban In communities that don't want recreational establishments at all Thank you We're now both discussing the main article and also the pros and cons of eight versus six But hopefully soon we're going to come to a vote. Yes finance committee over there Tim Neil finance committee precinct eight apologize for the hat, but the light is right in my eyes I have a question on this How easily would it be to go to eight? If we find six is okay, and then how easy it is to go to ten what are the steps for moving up? Mr. Kravitz So just like we're doing tonight My understanding is we would need to amend the general by-law and then the zoning by-law as well So we would need to take two votes on two different war and articles to move it from six to eight and then we would need to do it again to move it from eight to ten and Similarly, if we added it eight and we wanted to go down to six Same thing we'd have to do it in both the general and zoning by-laws I see a red card over there and trust me There's lots of hands and I do see you all but I can't always call on you right away. So red card way over there Thank You mr. moderator Jim Berset precinct six So it just Kind of baffles me why we are thinking placing any limits on this Colorado and Washington Have really had no serious issues with this I regularly visit relatives in Fort Collins, which is a hundred and fifty thousand population a big university and They don't have any problem To even get into one of the rec the recreation stores. You have to show a valid ID. It's not like Kids can just wander in and out Also, if you just look at health statistics, you know, we're so concerned about Children's health and other people's health. We should just not allow candy to be sold in the in our stores that has a you know when you look at real statistics diabetes and Obesity, you know marijuana has nothing to do with those The same thing with alcohol the number of drunk driving deaths due to mayor due to alcohol is Just unbelievable compared to marijuana. So I think there's a lot of my impression is there's a lot of fear out here for a Drug that, you know has some proven health benefits And I think it's gonna be already be well-regulated. It's not like anybody is gonna be able to set up a little mom and pop shop wherever There's a pretty high Cost to set up an establishment The other thing I think we're forgetting about is there's a potential if we have you know a reasonable number of Facilities that we can buy from is that then there are that also creates opportunities for our local farmers who will hopefully be able to supply the stores and also just You know once we limit numbers Price price just goes up that's just supply and demand and if we're concerned about You know equity if if the price is so high we're gonna then we're gonna still have a pretty Significant black market and that is gonna you know potentially lead to more Injustice as well. So I I really think we don't have Much to fear because of all the regulations in place and we should really see What happens? Thank you Thank you Yeah, right there in the center white card Thank you Jennifer towel precinct 10 I had a question I mean this may relate to medical marijuana, but I moved here from Los Angeles and when they Opened medical marijuana dispensaries there. There was no limit. It was just like a loophole in the You know how the ordinance was passed and so dispensaries were opening up You know all over the city and so the city council had to fix that So I just had a question that I think that there are cities that have tried to limit the number of dispensaries and If you don't they they will pop up every place and I I don't see I mean there is we do don't we regulate liquor stores? I mean there aren't and I don't know but that's another question I would have does this town have a limit or anything on how many liquor stores can be in a given area Mr. Kravitz, so I think the previous question was about Regional communities that have limited it that I'm not aware of I think you're right that in other states there there are limitations as Miss Brewer mentioned Alcohol licenses are limited by a state formula Based on population. There is no formula given for recreational marijuana so We don't we don't locally control what the quota is for alcohol licenses that the state does I'm hoping we're getting close to a vote here Yeah, right there on the aisle Hi, Lisa Berry Precinct to I'm wondering when we take the vote if we can do that is it possible to do the motion for six first and then Yeah, no, no, it's not the rules of town meetings say when you have multiple Numbers or quantities you do the highest first and then the lower one. That was a good question Further discussion Yes, right there in the aisle Adrian to Rizzi a precinct seven. I have two questions one is Related to the zoning bylaw the the use category that would be established I wonder if we can get a little bit more information regarding the number of parcels that would come within the that bylaw that would have a use for Recreational marijuana. That's my first question if they have that information The second one is some help with understanding why we used the 11 Alcohol licenses rather than going and saying using the off-premise licenses One gave the use of 11 gave eight is the limit and my understanding is off-premise would have given about three So is there any rationale that would help me either with the zoning and or Why not the use of off-premise licenses? Ms. Brewer so I Realized that this is very directly connected to the zoning article But the zoning article is the zoning article and we'll be talking about parcels and how closely we can identify them in the zoning article I'm very sorry if I misspoke associated with the details that I provided with alcohol licenses We didn't choose a number. We are told what number we are allowed to use as our limit We're allowed to use 20% of off-premise licenses that have been issued whether they are all alcohol off-premise licenses or Wine and malt off-premise licenses Meaning all the package stores you typically think of wouldn't want any of them to feel slighted if I didn't mention all eight of them and The three wine and malt off-premises Atkins Cushman Amherst center store. That's the 11 we have to work with Because that's how many we've issued we actually are entitled To have issued five more of those wine and malt licenses and we have not actually issued those had we issued those We would be looking at a different number Yes, right here fourth row in the aisle came around precinct for I call a previous question Motion previous question has been made and seconded We will now come to immediate vote and the first vote will be on the larger number of eight If that passes then we've disposed of this article that fails We will then come to immediate vote on the six if that passes We've disposed if that fails then we've also disposed of the article, but with no limit. So that's where we're at now This is a I hear a point of order Amy middleman precinct five don't we have to vote on call the question you bet the fur I was about to say that What we're going to be voting on first is the motion for the previous question And that requires two-thirds so if two-thirds of you vote. Yes We will then have these series of potential votes Following that in either case if the motion of the previous question passes with two-thirds We'll have whatever votes we need to finally dispose of this article Motion previous question requires two-thirds all those in favor of the motion for the previous question, please say aye Opposed please say no Moderator here's two-thirds We now come to a vote on the motion with The limitation of eight so it was the main motion that was brought before us when we began discussion of this article This requires a majority vote again if it passes were done if it fails We will then vote on the number six So we're voting on the limitation of eight at this point in time All those in favor of the motion before you please say aye Opposed please say no Moderator is in doubt. We'll have an electronic vote Hang on before we start I hear a point of order Correct, it's just a majority vote So as soon as the windows up there everybody should see a readout on their device proving that it's on Anybody who just see a blank screen They're working over there. Our window is open. You may now vote voting window is closed. You may show us the results Yes 98 no 57 abstain 7 The motion with the limit of 8 has passed 57 can I see your motion after concerns 3d1 Essentially Hang on a second. Which article number are you on here? Okay article 5 is the next article Okay, so when we switch from 5 to 6 they'll be changing their seating come up to me then, okay I now call on this brewer to make a motion under article 5 8 minutes I move in terms of the article except So you got to pull out the warrant and they're gonna put it up there, too This time We're gonna be clear on this To delete the following sentence in its entirety the sentence in question is Whoever is found in violation of this by-law shall when requested by an official authorized to enforce this by-law State their true name and address to such an official Do I hear a second? Motion's been made and seconded you may speak to your motion. Thank you the select board Recommended article 5 by a vote of 5-0 on October 23rd and to remove that offensive sentence on Tonight, so that was 4-0 because mr. Steinberg was absolute public consumption of a legal product is A quality of life issue similar to public smoking of tobacco products open containers of alcohol Even if you're not personally offended by public consumption of these legal substances that doesn't mean that we as a community Necessarily feel comfortable having people walk up and down the sidewalks of Amherst with open containers of alcohol as opposed to some other places People might do that or congregate in front of businesses with open containers of alcohol or smoke tobacco next to our 10 year old Baseball players at Mill River or bring beer to their parties at Mill River Public consumption of recreational marijuana is in fact already illegal per state law and has a $100 fine This article was developed to be more specific about what is meant by public consumption and how it may be enforced with a $300 fine For those of you who have been in town meeting a while you know that we have a bylaw on open containers of alcohol It's actually relatively short It says no person shall consume any alcoholic beverages nor possess or transport any open can bottle or open container Containing any alcohol beverage alcoholic beverage outdoors on any town street sidewalk way and public property Including but not limited to parking lots parks school playgrounds Recreation areas or conservation areas and that is a $300 fine. We've had that on the books in some variation or another since 1986 The Board of Health who you will also be hearing from tonight Regulates smoking in workplaces and in public places and theirs is a lot longer They'll talk about that is medical marijuana exempt Yes, I know it doesn't say it here But it is per current state law although we're empowered to increase the fine as a local action and the methods of collecting it We are not in any way empowered to remove the medical use clause from state law in state law under 94g section 13 it talks about restrictions on public consumption of marijuana. That's the existing $100 fine place what it says there is no person shall consume marijuana in a public place or Smoke marijuana where smoking tobacco is prohibited It's a $100 fine and it clearly says this subsection shall not apply to a person who consumes marijuana or marijuana products in a designated Area of a marijuana establishment located in the city or town that has voted to allow consumption on the premises where sold and And shall not be construed to limit the medical use of marijuana It's unfortunate they combined all that all into one sentence because we are not yet at the place where we are bringing to town meaning or To the voters the idea of allowing consumption on the premises like you can consume alcohol at a restaurant We are not yet talking about that But that is where they stuck in the part about not be construed to limit the medical use of marijuana If you have questions about the methods of enforcement, and I know we put a bunch of MGL references there I know chief living stone is planning to be with us this evening If you don't pass this article five then the state laws restrictions with the lower fine remains in effect So basically we just tried to look at the same things We have prohibition on open containers and public smoking of tobacco and put it together with What we are calling recreational marijuana? Thank you Finance committee has no position on this and I'll call on Steve George for a statement from the board of health Microphone is on its way Steve George a precinct for member the board of health and I'll speak for the board The board of health reviewed the warrant articles related to Recreational marijuana as we're calling it. We appreciated the interactions We've had with those involved in drafting the articles on public consumption and on zoning and given the inevitability of commercial sales to recreational users and Amherst we support the thoughtful regulation of zoning and public consumption as in article 5 and 6 and as Ms. Pruer just Persuasively spoke about article 5 I would just like to add that the board does have concerns about the potential for increased abuse and health issues associated with marijuana products particularly when Retail stores go into operation presumably next summer We can't adequately address most of these concerns until we know how cannabis products will be regulated at the state level as Ms. Krueger discussed before when state regulations are in place the board of health may wish to develop local regulations of Recreational marijuana from a public health and safety point of view Similar to our treatment of alcohol and tobacco, but we do support articles 5 and 6 Thank you This will require a majority vote the motion is before you and we are now open to discussion Yes, right in the front row Carol Gray precinct 7 I Move that we changed the 100 the 300 to 100 So in other words Substitute 1 for 3 300 Okay Motion made in seconded before you go on I just want to say I was remiss when an earlier motion came along changing the number from 8 to 6 Because we do have a requirement if it's not a procedural motion that we get that motion in writing That was relatively simple and I didn't realize until afterwards And I'm going to give you a pass on this one as well from this point forward anything other than a procedural motion I want four copies in advance of what that motion is. I don't want to be surprised on the floor So the motion before us is to reduce The amount from 300 to 100 so again when we finally get to a vote We will first vote on the $300 amount and if that fails we will vote on the $100 amount So if the interruption you may speak to your motion I used to be a public defender and $300 is a very large amount of money to people who Are poor and I could see people Thinking that marijuana is legal and thinking they can go hike on a trail and smoke marijuana and not knowing that we in town Meeting have passed a bylaw that prohibits that I could see people accidentally breaking the law I would propose $100 but I would suggest that the plant that whatever board deals with this come back in a later Town meeting to propose graduated Penalties you could start with a $100 fine. The second offense would be 200 the third would be 300 I just for people who are wealthy 300 will be nothing for people who are college students or low-income 300 is a huge amount for something that they may not have realized was illegal I see a red card in the back corner there Mr. Moderator, I'd like to make a procedural motion to refer Article 5 back to the select board Do I hear a second? Motion has been made in second. Did you any speak to your motion and I'll explain what's going on? Okay, and is the clock going to be changed? Yeah, he gets five minutes to speak to a procedural motion. Okay, so I'd like to open by talking about The modern era prohibition that started under the administration of president Nixon And and we now know why The so-called moron drugs was initiated It was initiated to do two things It was initiated to harass Those who the that administration believed were its opponents students people of color the the second part of the effort was that the southern strategy of that administration in fact Related to the pot the likelihood that if you had a war on drugs and people were convicted of possession use distribution in many of the southern states and Some northern states Those individuals would be deprived of the right to vote Access to what used to be called food stamps access to public housing and federal employment This was a conscious deliberate political strategy and the town of Amherst should not Participate in the modern version of that strategy the continuation of the strategy by enacting this bylaw I agree with the previous speaker who's who who spoke about the the penalties involved But there are other problems with this bylaw One as it's clear from the statement of the select board member who presented the article There is a state law that state law prohibits public consumption and And I don't smoke. I don't I encourage people not to smoke If they need to use marijuana for some medical reason Find a method other than smoking and my father smoked two and a half packs. He died at 60 It is not it is not good to smoke. It's one of the Worst things you can do for your health. So if you want to use marijuana for medical reasons or otherwise Find another method This this bylaw is defective in terms of What it proposes to do by saying that no person shall ingest Think about that The people who are going to enforce this are police officers and I can't imagine What test is going to be used? I can understand the test for smoking Most people have been around marijuana Enough a few times even in their life to know what that's marijuana smoke smells like are our police officers trained to determine whether the Oatmeal cookie or the brownie or some other product that you are Eating on the downtown street or on a bench is Is contains marijuana? I don't think so and I think that The bylaw that addresses the ingestion of this product Is defective and needs to be reworked and shouldn't be Reworked on the floor of town meeting, which is why I did not make a motion to remove that particular word The fact is we we were told at the beginning of the town meeting under Article 1 That there was a dog park test Task force composed of nine members only three of whom were were town staff people The folks who drew this up with very good intentions were all town staff people and select board members We need a task force to deal with public consumption consumption that includes people like the cannabis reform Commission coalition from UMass Retailers or people who are engaged in producing these products and Residents of multi-family housing and let me say as a resident of multi-family housing I don't want my neighbors to smoke in their apartments Because there is always a danger of fire. I don't smoke the person who lives with me does not smoke and So we need to think through what we're doing with this bylaw to ensure that people who Who live in multi-family housing? Can use the product that is legal in in a an appropriate manner, but not smoke it in their homes and And and in some places smoking in some multi-family units smoking is prohibited So I think this needs to be reworked I would urge you to vote to refer it to the select board and ask them to create a real task for us that that is broader than town officials and Come back with something that is more appropriate. Thank you So the motion before us now is a motion to refer to the select board that's going to be what we're discussing now It requires a majority vote to pass if that passes then we've disposed of article 5 And it's something the select board is going to deal with and work on if that fails. We are back to the Motion on the floor that has the two different numbers the $300 number and the $100 number So we should try and limit our discussion now to the pros and cons of the motion to refer to the select board Point of order. Yes, identify yourself, please I'm Frank Gatti precinct 8 and I don't know if I missed it But I don't know what the state provision would be if we voted down This and the state provision would be what would be enforced It's not a point of order if you get recognized you can ask that question But that's a question of substance to the articles not a point of order point of order has to do with proceedings And what the vote is going to be and things like that Miss Brewer So the select board obviously knows nothing about this motion So we couldn't possibly have taken a position on it because we didn't even guess it was going to happen But what I would like to know in order to us to even think about that is the word We previously I read out what it says in the state law now is no person shall consume marijuana in a public place or Smoke marijuana. We're smoking tobacco as prohibited I was wondering if Chief Livingstone could explain to us what the difference in enforcement is of the default state law versus The particulars that we put in this bylaw the interesting Chief Livingstone if you'd like to come forward and Explain things that would be great And if you're curious, I'm allowing this because the motion on the floor is the motion to refer But the question of the issue is what does it mean to refer as opposed to enact our own bylaw? And that's what we're discussing here. You make a living stone, please chief So if I'm to understand the question What is the difference between the state law as it currently stands and what the difference would be if the bylaw were to pass? Part of it is the state law says currently Shall can no person's shall consume marijuana in a public place Versus our bylaw which is crafted to say inhale ingest or otherwise Use or consume marijuana. So we're wondering if there's a difference in how you would enforce that the default versus what we wrote She slings on just to remind both of you you have to raise your hand to be recognized by me We don't have conversations between people on the floor of town meeting Chief Livingstone I'm not quite sure how we would really enforce the Ingestion of the edibles part of it Can assure you that we're not going to be Stopping people walking down the center of North Pleasant Street and saying hey, what's in the brownie? The smoking part would be easier if officers were to see that and need to take action I see a lot of it potentially being complaint driven Quite frankly, I don't know if we've ever issued any cited citations for the for the state law I can tell you the biggest difference the way the state law is written currently and the Enforcement of the bylaws is the actual the bylaws hold more weight if it goes before a clerk magistrate There's no punitive action for anybody if they were to be issued a Citation under the state law. There's no punitive action if they just ignore the citation So you could get a ticket it with the state regulation do nothing with it. Nothing happens There's more enforcement behind the time about town bylaw enforcement perspective on that Thank you. Yes second row right there with a green card. Hi James Steinberg precinct one I Agree with this motion to refer the article back just because I think it should say smoke Given what chief Livingstone said that they don't know how they're gonna enforce it. I I Just don't think it should say ingest I mean, I appreciate the work you've done and everything but if it says consume and ingest It's really smoking that we're concerned about So Thank you As Ms. Kruger if I could if I could just share a little of the thinking of The article on consumption, so I think there's a lot of instances that wouldn't Trigger an enforcement, but there was a lot of concern. We heard in the community and in our own discussion about Underage people being affected and I can I can imagine in a public gathering Something that was somewhat egregious and not having any way to say hey, you know that is really not that Consumption is really not okay. You're in a family Or into the vent. So it's a tool and it may not come to bear a lot because I can't guarantee how it will be Enforced but it was partly a sensitivity to Wanting to protect Children and youth in what public consumption might look like in a broad sense Chief Livingstone I Would just add that similar to the open container by-law There are an awful awful the majority of them Interactions that we have with those individuals are warnings People are given the opportunity to pour it out discard it and get rid of it the individuals who are usually written citations and or charge for the ones who are really just Not willing to comply with an officer's request to do something with that and that's kind of how I see this Being enforced Mr. Kravitz Just to the the previous comment smoking is already prohibited Under Board of Health regulations. It's broad enough to include smoking of marijuana. So that's already prohibited by by Board of Health Thank you Yes at the back of the aisle there Leo Maley precinct 5 I'm gonna vote in favor of the motion to refer this back to the select board For two reasons one Just to reinforce what was said by a previous speaker $300 is a heck of a lot of money. There are Several studies that have come out within the last year that have been reported That look at the ability of people to To basically access funds and I don't have any of them in front of me But the gist of it those were that about half of American families would have would have difficulty with a $500 or $1,000 unanticipated expense even given one month to come up with that money That's the country we live in And that's not the country I want to live in so I'm very hesitant to support a $300 fine Particularly when we already have a $100 fine in state law We can work there to reduce fines and they've had it the legislature is heading in that direction in some cases with the with the current Efforts to reform the criminal code The other thing is That I recall back It may have been 15 years ago now. We passed something here in town meeting. I believe it was in town meeting It could have been it on the ballot To deep prioritize enforcement By the police and Amherst of laws relating to marijuana So even the laws that already existed at that time this far proceeded You know the the couple of things have been passed on the state level since then we had Something passed here that said we did not want these things to generally be enforced So before proposing something that basically codifies You know a kind of disciplinarian approach Punitive approach. I would like to revisit it in the context of what we had done in the past Yeah, right here in the front row Richard Moore's precinct seven. I'd like to take the opportunity to do the salamonic thing tonight, which is I don't I am not worried about the Amherst police I do want to take somewhat of a disciplinarian approach, but I do like the option offered by Ms. Gray I think we should vote no on the motion to refer and then we should vote no on the higher amount and vote for the $100 because that's a reasonable amount of money. I don't think $300 is a fair amount of money for this particular kind of infraction So I would ask town meeting to let's get this done with tonight. Let's let's vote on the on the On the actual article, but the lower amount. Thank you. Thank you Yeah back row there Pat church precinct five I Appreciate the decision to suggest it's Referred to their select board But I also feel like Why is this here? We were just told that it's illegal to smoke Anything So why do we need another law that tells us it's illegal to especially smoke? marijuana in public It seems redundant It seems picky And I agree with everybody who said that the $300 is ridiculous So Please vote it down. Yes right in the corner. They are with a green card Alan root briefing to five first of all I fully am in favor of what is proposed by town meeting member O'Connor for the reason that the overall Composition of the first paragraph in this proposed bylaw is so complicated It's a it's a trading post for lawyers It it's it's ridiculous. It should be much more easy to understand much more compact And I also feel very very strongly in the hundred dollar amount not the 300. Thank you Yes, right in the front row there third from the end Laura quilter precinct nine is one of the 70 something percent who voted in favor of legalizing marijuana I would like to say that one of the reasons that I and many of the others did was because of the disproportionate enforcement and the and the discretion that was given to police officers and while I respect the The good intentions of our current police force that is not the law and so what I would like to do is to not have unnecessary law that Grants additional discretion to police to police Marijuana brownies that are being consumed on the streets. So I'd like to stick with the board of health regulation and Support the motion to refer for further study Ready to come to a vote soon Yeah, I see a hand in the back there Helenberg precinct one I wonder if this is not a very very clear case of Discrimination if you're not lucky enough to inherit as someone said in a meeting about affordable housing a House and the substantial portfolio to pay taxes on it And you have to live or rent an apartment where Usually snow smoking is allowed down there regulations against candles and little heaters and everything else, but you can do whatever you want when you're in a Your own house separate housing So I think this is an MCAT kind of Territory and I would caution the town against Creating a law that discriminates against the poor like this one does Yes on the aisle there with a green card perhaps because I just raised two young men I looked at this I'm sorry. I'm Janet McGowan precinct eight when I saw that list of no You can't inhale ingest or otherwise consume marijuana and Starting to list every possible public place I was thinking about like very clear instructions to UMass students about what they can and can't do and wear and so I don't I Don't you know, I'm also in a lawyer. So it didn't seem super detailed to me It seems super clear and I think that was the intent of the Select board to make it very clear to our many many young people that you know this is something you do in private and not out in public at Mill River or on the You know at the at the pool or in the bathroom to the pool and just like super clear Cutting down every possible excuse like oh, I didn't realize so I think that was the intent or that's just the way I'm seeing it based on my most recent experiences Thank you Second row in the center there Gordon Freed precinct six. I wrote raised the red card against the move to refer but When you go into a store and you look at the prices for Tobacco a pack of cigarettes. I think is somewhere around twelve dollars Maybe it's ten dollars. So three hundred dollars of cigarettes I'm is one month's worth of cigarettes. I'm not sure how much a month's worth of Marijuana is going to be I know that some people would consume it several times a day Some people consume it every single day. I don't think that three hundred dollars is Probably less than they might spend on a month's worth of marijuana. So if they don't have it I would guess that they would not be spending it on Marijuana for that month they could give it to the town as a fine So I would vote in favor of the original Article as presented Yes, second row from the back there Kent our precinct one. I'll do something. I've never done. I think town meaning I move the previous question Motion has is there a second? Motion the previous question has been made and seconded So the next thing we're going to do is come to an immediate vote and if two-thirds of you vote Yes, we will then next vote on the motion to refer which requires majority that passes We've disposed of this article if that fails We would next vote on the motion with the three hundred dollar fine Also majority if that passes we've disposed of the article if that fails We vote on the motion with the one hundred dollar fine if that passes were done if that fails We're also done because we run out of options Hopefully that makes sense But if you're confused what we're voting for at any given time you can make a point of order But right now we're voting on whether to end debate I see a point of order over there wait for the microphone identify yourself, please Rob Gussner precinct three the point of order was you you said what would happen after the vote on the motion Which the previous question was called? I thought we went back to the debate on the original original motion rather than to the other items after After a motion for the previous question is the motion to refer. It's not the other yes I suppose If the motion to refer fails if the motion refer fails We would be back to being original motion and maybe someone would make another motion for the previous question who knows Okay, most of the previous question is what we're voting on now if two-thirds of you vote Yes, we end debate and vote on the motion to refer all those in favor of the motion for the previous question Please say aye Opposed please say no Previous question has passed we now vote on the motion to refer can we get that up in the screen there? Is it's the second one from the bottom move to refer the article to the select board? This is a require this requires a majority to pass all those in favor of the motion to refer Article 5 to the select board. Please say aye Opposed please say no Moderators in doubt, so we will have electronic vote Okay, the motions before you you can vote and here come the results. Yes 86 no 99 So the motion to refer to the select board has failed So the main motion is on the floor with the two different numbers. Is there further discussion or are we ready to come to a vote? I see no hands, so we are now voting on The larger amount we're voting in article 5 as it was originally moved on the floor with a $300 fine this requires a majority vote everybody with me everyone understand what we're voting on All those in favor of the motion before you with the $300 fine, please say aye Opposed please say no Moderator does not hear a majority So we now move on to the $100 fine with article 5. This again requires a majority vote I see a hand, but I don't know what you mean. This is a point of order or do you have Where we're coming to a word. We've ended the debate and we're coming to a vote So if it's not a point of order who Don't do it because you feel you want to do it if you do it if you have a procedural question, please So yes, I just wanted to clarify what a yes What a no vote would mean a no vote my understanding means that there is no general bylaw right that it goes away Yes, a no vote here means there's no general bylaw. There's still a state law a yes vote means There's a general bylaw added with a $100 fine That was a good point of order. That's okay All those in favor for the motion before you with the $100 fine, please say aye Opposed please say no Moderators in doubt we'll have an electronic vote on this one. Pardon me. I Can't hear us Could we hang on don't start the vote yet? Please we have a device that's maybe not working in the back row there Sean what's happening? Are we ready to vote? Okay? Well, let's wait till she gets it. Okay, we are ready and The vote is before you window is closed and this passes 117 to 73 Article 5 has passed with a $100 fine We will now have the planning board replace the finance committee at the front table Please take your seats everybody Quick public service announcement while you're taking your seats The Amherst school parent and guardian Association is collecting winter coats and other outer wear for students pre-k through 12 If you have anything you'd like to donate, please bring it to town meeting on Wednesday. There will be a collection box. Thank you Okay, we are now ready to begin article Six right six and I call on mr. Burt whistle to make the motion Microphone microphone is it on yeah, there you go I move in terms of the article except to delete condition number three e One d in its entirety and to limit the number of recreational marijuana retailers to eight Motion to made and seconded you may speak to your motion. I'm actually I'm sorry. Mr. Stutzman is going to be speaking Yes, so you may proceed you have five minutes just waiting for my presentation to show up on the screen, please, okay? Okay, thank you, mr. Moderator. Thank you town meeting Article six relates to how the zoning by-law regulates recreational and medical marijuana as Moved it would reiterate the limit on the number of marijuana licenses eight allowed in Amherst as approved under article four It would also clarify where recreational marijuana would fit into our zoning by-law Right now absent a category specifically for recreational marijuana uses our building commissioner would have to make a determination About how to classify a proposed recreational marijuana use This could conceivably be treated as a medical marijuana use and have those same medical standards apply But there are some problems with this approach First many of the provisions governing the medical category just don't make sense for recreational uses Secondly trying to shoehorn Recreational uses into the current medical category may open the town up to legal challenges as the state is going to be regulating these two categories differently To be applicable today our zoning should accurately reflect the current state regulations as they have evolved since the medical marijuana zoning was passed in Amherst in 2013 in Terms of zoning by-law mechanics The planning board's approach has been to create a new recreational marijuana retailer Use category and adapt the existing medical marijuana zoning language to encompass both recreational and medical marijuana uses Specifically article six would insert references to recreational marijuana retailers or RMR's where appropriate It would remove references to medical when just marijuana is sufficient It would generalize references to state laws and regulations It would eliminate extraneous or outdated language And it would add a definition of recreational marijuana retailer in terms of regulating where marijuana uses can be located The article as written makes only one minor change Medical marijuana sales are currently permitted in the office park zone Article six would not permit recreational sales in this zone as no other retail uses are allowed there And the planning board did not find it appropriate The motion under the article does make a change which impacts where marijuana uses can be located By deleting a prohibition it would allow marijuana retail uses in mixed-use buildings Currently a medical marijuana use could be located adjacent to but not within such a building and Given that the potential locations for these uses are already very limited and that uses such as alcohol and tobacco sales are Not restricted in this way the planning board recommends that marijuana sales be permitted in these locations The planning board voted seven to zero with two members abstaining to recommend the town meeting adopt this article Thank you. I Call on miss Krueger for a select board Yes on October 23rd the select board voted to support this article as moved tonight with the deletion of Section 3e1d the vote was three in favor and two against Thank you Finance committee has no position This will require a two-thirds vote since this is a change actually in addition to the zoning by-law I'm now calling on Mr. Malley who would like to make an amendment to the motion Leo Maley precinct five I move to change the language in Section number three be Number one That's the section if you're reading along this is locational or physical requirements locational and physical requirements So that that paragraph would read all aspects of an MMTC or OMMD or RMR relative to the acquisition cultivation possession processing sales distribution dispensing or administration of marijuana products containing marijuana I'm sorry or products containing marijuana must be taken at a fixed location within a fully enclosed building So essentially this is motions been made in second and speaking so essentially this is just removing Some text from this particular Very long sentence if you could before you speak to it. Let's try and get the text on the screen and I'm gonna unfortunately Okay, sir for the delay you may speak to your motion Okay, so that's right That's correct what you see up there on the screen So basically all I'm suggesting are three changes for very specific Reasons and I just want to say in general. I'm glad that you know There's this effort to get out in front on this and have a bylaw. We need something like this a lot of good stuff in there Etc. This is the only thing that I have issue with So the first thing is The issue of related supplies Okay we don't We have a limit on the number of Package stores, you know places where you can purchase alcohol for off-site use We have just limited the number of places that we can now purchase marijuana at if assuming they get built But we don't limit supplies to go along with our wine or our beer You can buy stem wear wherever one wherever anyone wishes to buy stem wear. Okay, you can buy Mugs you can buy all sorts of things to consume one's alcohol with so I'm just simply suggesting here that Whatever the instruments are that you might use to consume your now perfectly legal marijuana should not be limited in this way We already have businesses in the downtown Arguably are selling products that could be used to consume your marijuana. They already exist. They're wonderful. I assume They're still there. So they're selling something So that's that issue Why treat these products different than we would any product around alcohol? Secondly is the question of educational materials and this is tied into the third point Which is that it should not be visible from the exterior of the building What that what that essentially says is that if you have a window You cannot display a book in your window You cannot display any kind of advertising in your window Now if you think about the local package stores They certainly advertising their windows. They have their products in the windows. They have all sorts of signs, you know 16-pack or whatever whatever it is is cheaper this week or whatever all that stuff is in their windows We have no problem Evidently as a town as a society with that being in the windows Why would we have issue with the exact same kinds of things in the windows of these sorts of establishments? I don't like it. It's about freedom of speech. We have regulations about Fonts and so on and size of signs and all that you can limit speech in those ways but why would you limit what could be viewed through a window and Particularly when it comes to literature So if we move from I think it's Russell's package store up there right right near town hall and you move up a couple of stores You get the bookstore Amherst books and they have all sorts of books in their window and Okay, you know books about politics and whatever and books about cooking and what have you so imagine Amherst books has a section of books about Policy issues related to marijuana. They have cookbooks up there about cooking with marijuana all of those things could not be They could be at the bookstore But they couldn't be displayed in the same kind of a window display at the business is actually selling the marijuana That's I got issues with that So I would wish to limit it in just just these very discreet Ways so that people can see see reading material They can they can look through a window and know what's there or they can look at the titles of books And so on and so that we treat marijuana We call it paraphernalia the same way we would treat wine paraphernalia Thank you So just to explain The next vote we take at this point in time will be whether or not to accept this amendment That would be a majority vote if we accept it We're then back to the main motion as amended which requires two-thirds if the amendment Exceptions acceptance of the amendment fails. We're still back to the main motion requires two-thirds so let's try and discuss as much as possible focus on the amendment and Deal with that first then focus focus on the main motion. So yes from the planning board Rob crowner The planning board obviously hasn't discussed this But an informal poll right now suggests that it's not a real problem I we don't mind if you adopt this amendment Is there further discussion or can we vote on the amendment? I? See no hands So we're going to vote the majority vote on whether or not to accept this amendment to the main motion all those in favor of Accepting this amendment, please say aye Opposed please say no The eyes have it We now have the main motion as amended on the floor open to discussion when we finally come to a vote It will be a two-thirds vote since this is a zoning by-law. Is there a discussion before we come to a vote? I See a hand there Second third row from the back Chris riddle precinct to a question to the planning board Marijuana retailers are allowed in mixed-use buildings. I am presuming that means that they are I'm thinking of the mixed-use buildings that I Know right no one loves right now though. They Kendrick place and the Boltwood I'm presuming that that means those retailers could be on the ground floor of those buildings and not up amongst the apartments Can I can you confirm that? Yes, if I could the previous speakers said that they are allowed They are not currently allowed in mixed-use buildings but the article as moved would allow them in mixed-use buildings and It doesn't speak to what part of the mixed-use building it could occur in so yes Your question was could they occur on the second floor? If the question was could they occur on the second or third floor any floor of a mixed-use building the answer is yes In the corner back there Morianne Adam is precinct 10. This is really a follow-up question of the previous speaker Under prohibitions it says the proposed uses shall not be located within 300 feet of a building containing residential units and my understanding is that mixed-use buildings do require do have Residential units, so I simply don't understand the contradiction between the text and The planning board spokesman's response to the earlier questioner Yes, mr. Statsman So the previous speaker is asking about a prohibition on medical or now both marijuana uses occurring within 300 feet of a Building containing a residence and that is correct But there's an exception carved out for mixed-use buildings So a marijuana use can occur within 300 feet of a mixed-use building in the current and in the proposed by-law Um Yes back corner there is This is this from you mr.  So, where are we? Page five where it says prohibition If you look So yes, mr. Everybody's not raising his hand we're open to discussion unless we want to vote Yes, back corner there with the red card now So Vince O'Connor precinct one So first I want to correct the statement by the planning board You may be right according to zoning by-law if that's all that governs anything in the town, but in point of fact the A retail establishment above the first floor of a mixed-use building Which was constructed so only the first floor is is Constructed in such a way as to allow retail use is not allowed This is a building code issue not a zoning issue Mr. Connor, I'd ask you to address me and look at me when you talk you're not admonishing the planning board You're talking to me about the rules, okay? My point is that statement is incorrect Nothing is allowed on the floor that was not constructed for a retail purpose and nothing above the first floor on any of those five-story mixed-use buildings was constructed for retail use and the building commissioner I think will correct you on that and that's why I think I'm distressed by by those five-story buildings in part The the point I was trying to make by my amendment and I'm urging people to To really consider whether to adopt this right now one. This is a fantastically complicated By-law and I'm glad that a previous speaker got an amendment that would Would reduce some of the problems, but My my my view Excuse me sir Connor. I hear a point of order We haven't heard a motion to amend yet I'm not making one. He's not making one. It was a little confusing, but there's no motion to amend on the floor What about this? I move to add the following is section 1e that's showing on the I'm sorry get rid of that because He was considering an amendment, but I ruled it out of scope. Okay so This is my problem as a precinct one-town meeting member one of the few dairy farms in Amherst Has a parcel that's owned Light industrial one of the medical marijuana establishments that has been applied for is in a In that same general area across 116 on Meadow Street where there are no residential Users or dairy farms nearby, but this particular Allowing the light industrial district to be used inadvertently would allow a retail marijuana establishment right next to a dairy farm where people have to get up at 4 and 5 in the morning and Go to bed early and quite frankly. It's just not an appropriate location The planning director has showed me that there are parts of the parcel that's adjacent to the dairy farm that could be used I think it is unfortunate that the planning board has not found a way to To keep a retail establishment of this sort from being located right adjacent to a dairy farm Where the people who work at that farm? have Are not do not need a retail establishment that is open even to normal business hours So I think unfortunately the planning board has has just looked at maps and not thought about the people who live next to these Red parcels, and I would urge people to defeat this bylaw. Thank you All the way in the back there with a white card I Mark power precinct one could you please put up the maps that show that North Amherst area, please? Because that area was owned flood prone conservancy by town meeting virtually unanimously in 2002, I believe I remember I was here then I'm back and The the idea of putting up a retail building in the middle of hundreds of acres of APR farmland that Amherst paid tens upon tens upon tens of thousands of dollars for and then Defended the flood prone conservancy to the state supreme judicial court with a three zip unanimous verdict we won and Now we see that someone's trying to put a retail marijuana store next to specifically the last dairy farm in Amherst and The idea is absurd that there would be a retail store in that area and first of all the map This is not the map. I'm talking about the one that shows the That's the parcel, but you have a map that shows about 40 percent of that parcel Down next to J&J farms as being available for retail in this space Well over 15 acres of this 20.5 acres is zoned flood prone Conservancy and that thing shows about seven acres in one end and some of the flood prone Conservancy is in them is in the north end and there's some area up there. My point is that the map is wholly Inadequate in terms of its accuracy and the idea again this whole area is all Amherst farms Anybody who drives down 116 and looks to the west and sees all that irrigation etc. Etc. Etc. Right? That's the farmland It's not the map. We all have it, but that's not it It's the one that shows the purple at the old auction bond, which is grandfathered in as Retail because it was a business all those generations, but the rest of that isn't there's no other retail in there It's housing and farms and flood prone conservancy Could you get the map up so people could see what I'm talking about? I think he's talking about the map that showed the medical marijuana facilities Mr. Stutzman meanwhile Overhead yeah, could you put no, could you move it up a little so people can see what's going on? Okay, you see the triangular parcel right below the purple rectangle Okay, you see that about 40% maybe even more of that down in the bottom the orange is now going to be zoned retail That's that's Why I mean it's it's absurd your time's up, and I think we got the point so Let's find out Stutzman first, and then it's breast drop after So I was just gonna say that the medical marijuana establishments are already allowed in that parcel There's no map changes that we're proposing at this point. What is being shown is what already can happen Excuse me.  We don't have a discussion back and forth I'm gonna call him his breast drop first. She had her hand raised for a while To say that There was a map up here earlier that showed a purple area if the IT department would put it back up again And it showed the purple area of that map there the purple area is zoned Limited industrial along with the other purple area to the north and to the east those are very small portions of this property the rest of the property as One of the town meeting members said is in the flood plain flood plain Conservancy so what shows up as yellow here normally shows up as green on our zoning maps So this map shows that there is a possibility that someone could Establish a marijuana Establishment in those red boxes that are to the east side of the purple area I think it's highly unlikely that someone would do that but those areas are 300 feet away from the farmhouse So I just wanted to show you that that is the case someone could do that, but it's unlikely and there is already a Medical marijuana establishment slightly to the north on the other side of Meadow Street that is currently under construction Yeah, right there white card You didn't hold my presence three I have a question so you have before you have the map about the North Amherst locations And this relates to the question about prohibitions and here says or any other facility in which children commonly congregate I think that's 3e Again, and then in the map of North Amherst one of the red squares is where Pineapple dance is currently so Is that a place that where children? Commonly congregate or so is across the street from the survival center. So how are these places the limited? Mr. Stetsman so I think the important thing to keep in mind with both this example the previous speaker asked and the speaker prior to That's question are that the maps we're showing are Potentially where these uses could occur, but they can't take into account every consideration such as Was pointed by the previous speaker or the one prior to that about a residential use which may occur or a place where children congregate That may occur because those circumstances are subject to change And so that would be something that would be assessed at the time of an application for one of these uses But the maps do show the actual parcels on which they occur not taking into account some considerations like that Thank you Always looking for new hands I'm Second row right there Laura quilter precinct nine. I believe that the select board said that the vote was three to two and If I'm correct, I would like to hear Somebody from the two sides speak that would thank you miss Kruger I Would be one of the two. I Should have said I kind of admitted this I was in my notes but the reason that we had that split vote was merely our difference of opinion over the deletion of the prohibition Around mixed-use buildings, so we had different opinions about whether Retail marijuana establishments should be allowed in mixed-use buildings or not everything else was fine and That was I was in the minority But the rest the majority of the board felt that it was okay to allow in Mixed-use buildings, so that was the difference in our vote further discussion Yes, I see a green card right in the front here Carol Gray precinct seven I'm gonna move to delete one section and here's the section It's great next time you have a motion I'd ask you to hold up a white card and not a green card green card implied that you were Gonna speak in favor of the motion on the floor, okay, and we don't have you know try and follow the protocol I thought you could make a motion on a green, okay? So I'm moving to delete section 3a to which limits the hours of operation Prohibiting any business between 8 p.m. And 8 a.m. And the reason is simply If it's legal then we shouldn't treat it differently than for example alcohol sales and I understand there's blue laws but I just I don't really see why we would treat this differently and That the the zoning excuse me the special permitting body can decide what's an appropriate time of closure, but As far as I know there's no limitation saying that liquor can't be sold after 8 p.m. Maybe I actually don't buy liquor or marijuana, so I don't really know but I'm I'm guessing that there's no such prohibition and I Think that we shouldn't treat this differently. We should treat it the same as alcohol. It's Alcohol is actually much more lethal to the highways and things like that Anyway, so and and if this doesn't pass I think this is a complicated by-law and there's seems to be numerous Issues with it and I plan to vote no if this doesn't pass So again, I ask people to hold up a card that's accurate to what they're going to be speaking. It's really unfair to me It's unfair to the meeting The motion on the floor is to Delete under the regulations which is section 3 The a dot 2 the second use regulation This is what we're discussing now and the next vote will be on this amendment which requires a majority We'll either delete it or not delete it and then we're back to the main motion and we'll come to a vote really soon Yes from the planning board. I like the planning board to speak to it next I have a point of order actually so this expanding the scope of the article so right now the Article is limiting sales to 12 hours a day and really what this proposed amendment is doing is open it up 24 hours a day Yes, so so if you have currently we have nothing and you're opposing a limit and this is Lessening the limit so it is in scope. It's between the limit and nothing so it is in scope Yes, mr. Stetsman if I could just clarify a statement you made mr. Moderator we do curren