Leave everyone wants to get this on the road. Sounds good to me. All right, you're recording. Thank you. Okay, let me get my stuff ready. Oh and welcome Stephanie because I know Stephanie just came in. Okay. Seeing a presence of a quorum, I am calling this September 21st, 2023, regular meeting of the community resources committee of the town council to order at 432pm pursuant to act chapter 20 of the acts of 2021 extended by chapter 22 and 107 of the acts of 2022 and extended by chapter 2 of the acts of 2023. This meeting will be conducted by remote means members of the public who wish to access the meeting can do so by zoom or telephone. No in-person attendance of the members of the public will be permitted but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time. This meeting is being audio and video recorded. At this time I'm going to take a roll call attendance of committee members to make sure everyone can hear and be heard and after that I'm going to call on the three guests we have just to confirm that they can hear and be heard too. So we will start with the committee Pat. Present. Shalini. Shalini may not be here. Well she's not here right now. We'll catch her if she shows up. Mandy is present. Pam. And Jennifer. Present. And with that let's go to our guests. We welcome councillor Ana Devlangafia. Hi everybody. Thank you. ECAC member I guess. I don't know whether you're on the board one of the titles but Jesse Selman. Hello. We've got our sustainability director Stephanie Ciccarello. Hello. And I think Rob just joined us. Rob. Yep I'm here. Hello. Hi Rob. And Shalini Balmill you've just joined us so. Yes I'm here. Excellent. With that let's see it is 4.33 so the first item of business will be a public hearing but we can't I can't start the script till 4.35. I don't believe the minutes of the September meeting were in the packet but I could be wrong. Does anyone remember seeing them? They were not. They were not. I didn't post them. I'm sorry. That's fine. I was like sometimes I miss them myself so we will postpone consideration of that. I'm just going to go through some of our other agenda items till we hit 4.35 here. So the minutes will be postponed till the next time. I don't have any announcements so does anyone else have announcements? We'll skip next agenda preview till the end of the hearing but any announcements from anyone so we can check that off the list. Oh the announcements I have we won't be unless this hearing goes really quick we're not going to be doing nuisance house or AMHT follow-up discussion items today so we won't be doing agenda items 3B or 4 today unless for some reason this hearing is over by 5 and then we'll might actually just see what the committee wants to do at that point but yeah Pam. I don't think the nuisance bylaw was in the packet either so I actually was looking for the most recent and I said ah it's not even in the packet I think this is not the topic that we're going to get into. It was not because I haven't modified it I actually found just to do that and then we'll start the hearing as part of an announcement I found Boston the city of Boston has a nuisance property bylaw and I will put it in the packet for next meeting that I might be doing what we have been struggling and talking about trying to do so I think it's going to be in the packet it might be worth everyone looking at that when I put it in the packet because it might save us a ton of time if that's I think that in reading it I think it's the way we would want it to go so I will make sure it's in the packet for next week and all so with that but yeah there was nothing in the packet for anything other than the stretch energy code today so you can tell my plan was not to do anything else um with that we will go to the public hearing so it is 4 36 p.m and I am opening this public hearing of the community resources committee of the town council which has been advertised and notice has been posted on our town bulletin board and the hearing is being held for the purpose of providing an opportunity for interested residents to be heard regarding the following proposed amendment to our general bylaw and its general bylaw section 3.48 stretch energy code to see if the town will vote to amend general bylaw 3.48 stretch energy code to adopt the specialized energy code codified by the entirety of 225 CMR 22 and 23 including appendices RC and CC with an effective date of July 1 2024 so that hearing is open at 4 36 p.m is when I started reading that um the order of the hearing is we'll ask if there's any disclosures and then we will hear from Jesse and Stephanie and I'm not sure who all is doing the presentation but Jesse Stephanie and Anna about the the request and the proposal and then we'll take questions from the committee questions from the public uh comments from the public any responses or further questions from the committee and then we'll see whether we're ready to close the hearing or continue the hearing at that point and with that are there any disclosures of committee members that need to be made seeing no disclosures um we will move on to Anna and Jesse and Stephanie you are up for presentation discussion well presentation of what has been proposed thank you um so I think really we don't have much of a presentation because our goal today was to get you the answers to the questions that were posed the last time that this was in front of CRC so um I just want to confirm that everyone has had a chance to read those responses otherwise we can go through them uh if folks would like but if if you've already read them um I don't know that we need to go through them one by one unless the the chair thinks that would be helpful um ultimately just as a reminder we are asking the CRC to recommend to the town council that we move forward in adopting the specialized energy code which is a more advanced building code designed to help us to reach our climate goals uh and help improve building efficiency and lower um lower emission greenhouse gas emissions from buildings across Amherst so that's the that's the goal here um we are part of the stretch code right now we have adopted that and this is a specialized code on top of it that is more stringent and would bring us further um along that path to meeting those goals we are CRC asked some really great questions last time and so we worked really hard to get those answers to you um and and believe that we've answered those thoroughly so happy to take any questions that folks have but Jesse or Stephanie or and I want to thank Rob for being here too I know that was a question if you have anything to add please feel free Jesse Stephanie anything to add seen nothing up Stephanie um no I'm actually I'm just really um deferring to Jesse on this one who did a lion share of the responses to questions so I kind of wanted to refer to him but I'm here if there are some questions that maybe need the town perspective thank you the one thing I could say is we are not the only town having this conversation and there's and so we included in that path in those responses links sort of I tried to hydrate the links to get to what we thought were the the best sort of top seven or so other resources so we weren't reinventing the wheel so thank you thanks jesse we will move on to questions from our committee members Pam thank you thanks I was going to ask Rob um given that it's really going to be within his purview to keep an eye on things maybe just some feedback on this hi Rob um just some feedback on the what you've bumped into already with stretch code requirements and how I know you have said that the department can implement them but I would really love some feedback on what it's going to feel like hi everyone um yeah so we've you know this year we've been uh implementing or you know applying and inspecting the new stretch code requirements and it's gone fairly smooth um there have been some changes uh you know the residential contractors certainly um get caught by surprise more than anyone else you know that you know projects that don't have design teams associated with them so we work our way through those um all of our staff have been training uh the new stretch code throughout the year myself I've attended most of the mass save webinars those are easy to you know to to listen to they they're about they put them into about hour long sessions and you know I don't think there's been one uh one of those that didn't touch on the specialized code or reference to it or comparison to it uh so it's always interesting to hear the comments or read the comments particularly from building officials because um you know they they definitely um you know have a lot of responsibility in learning these things and and you know it kind of just gets given to them on a particular date so uh we're looking you know looking at this as a positive advancement in the code uh looking forward to the trainings that will be offered specifically for specialized code we started looking at it because we as you know we're always looking at projects that take 12 months 18 months to to go from design into construction so design teams are you know starting to look at that and and we are as well so um yeah we're you know we're I think as the questions and answers um reflected you know we're supportive of this and you know in for what it takes to uh be prepared what are what are some of the things that your contractors are bumping into and that that that I understand this most of the changes would not occur unless it's the residential over over 4,000 square feet but so yeah so not not specifically with the specialized code but with the new stretch code that is an effect that went into effect recently uh some of the changes with residential code is um uh having a fully balanced HVAC system so this requires an additional piece of equipment there's more cost there's more installation time uh you know that was one thing that I've you know I have a lot of conversations about uh EV charging in a home under you know a new new construction home the the latest code requires that you actually install the wire in the circuit uh the breaker so in a receptacle you don't have to actually have the the charging unit installed but you have to have everything but the unit uh so that's you know that's something new uh so you know those are the types of conversations we run into the one that's been um probably the biggest you know point of concern recently has been what happens when you're putting on an addition and the level of testing and certification that has to happen and there's this 1000 square foot threshold now that you know didn't exist before so that's you know those are things that you know just take getting used to and you know as we become aware of changes like that and we will with the specialized code we try to try to capture those and talk with the builders and the developers and the owners when we're at the earliest stages of planning their project what's helpful for us what's helpful for everybody is that there's always a third party involved here so when when there's new construction or substantial alteration or addition there's going to be a hers raider that's hired by the owner or contractor they do a lot of the programming planning and kind of you know putting all the pieces together and then you know from that point on our our goal is to prop is to make sure that the installation is correct and that nothing happens between the various trades coming in and out of the project and you know drilling here or adding things and adjusting things and making sure everything stays according to that that plan I clarify one thing for is that okay Mandy sorry yes Robin you were talking about those the hiccups that have occurred those are with the existing code and as an example not something that would be we don't necessarily know you were just giving an example but those are things that are with the current code not attributed to the new that we want to opt into right though those are all examples of the latest addition of the stretch code that we are that we have in effect right now thank you just started working on this year thank you yeah thank you my last comment is is that um our our new ad us can go up to a thousand square feet so I guess if they're at a thousand square feet or 999 maybe some of these uh requirements do not apply I would say if there are additions to homes at 999 and you know as you already suspect I'm sure is that uh you know we we have cases where you know a proposal is a little bit over the thousand square feet and our discussion is well you know this is what you can do if you're at 999 and really the the the interesting part of the code and I know it's being discussed by you know the the writers and you know we might see amendments someday from what I understand is that when you're doing when you're putting that addition on your home the testing that's required applies to the entire existing house and what happens when you cannot test now this has nothing to a specialized code again this is about current code today that we're working through these issues that you know first how do you do that test and what happens if you have to do something to your existing house to make it comply and how much do you have to do and it just simply the code the way it's written just simply says you know you have to meet this standard so there's been variance requests made and you know I think ultimately we'll see some adjustment in the code to deal with that or have better guidance on how to deal with that thank you so my my question is you know I was I will say is I was looking at this in some sense I was pleasantly surprised that the difference between the specialized code and the stretch code isn't that much in terms of some stuff because it it lessens my worry about increased costs and all of that but to me one of the things the biggest difference and that most of the differences were with mixed fuel technology not all electric technology and and so you know pushing towards all electric technology is something we probably want to be doing anyway but the biggest difference seemed to be in those multifamily homes where you have to go to it looked like in multifamily homes if you adopt the specialized code you would have to go to her zero hrs zero net zero basically whether you're all electric or mixed fuel so I guess the first question is am I understanding that correctly and if so can someone describe to me what that like what how do you do that like how do you get from a hers 42 or 45 to a hers zero like what are that because that seemed like the biggest difference between the two codes and so I would be curious to hear what what jumps you from 45 or 42 to zero I'm going to look to Jesse maybe Rob on this one but start with Jesse I'm not sure that's right I think I think you're seeing the a dwelling unit a single dwelling unit it's over 4,000 square feet that one of the one of the specialized pathways is a hers zero and and the way I hers zero what a hers zero is let's say you the lower the number the less energy the home consumes over the course of a year so maybe a well so you can see that some of these are hers 42 45 those are some of the targets you know 35 would be a really exceptional home and to cut to go from 40 to zero would be using pv and there's the combinations in there so if there's a little note with the pv it says if you can do pv because many sites to have trees and and and this code is not in any way interested in cutting down a tree to get you pv can't tell you cannot ask the building code cannot ask you to cut down a tree so it's so if you have solar access they use words like feasible for the solar access but that's how you would get from 40 to zero is some amount of of solar pv on site on the roof I do not believe the multifamily is hers zero it's uh there's a handful of different ways and the main way they're looking at is the passive house certification and and I think it's an appropriate uh use of that certification because it's a building type that both has a tremendous benefit as far as indoor air quality and low utility bills um and also the the massing and and track record there's a lot of passive house certified multifamily buildings in new england it's it's being done over and over again and not not at a large price point um so I don't know if that answers the question that helps yeah thank you um Jennifer uh thank you so I I did want to ask as I was I guess confused about that if you added a thousand square foot addition then the original structure also has to come up to the same standard I mean even with our you know the stretch code we have in place now is that was I understand that correctly so I'll take it fast oh no I didn't okay it's it's um the hers rating hers rating can only rate a dwelling unit and so if the addition I think Rob correct me if I've got this wrong let's say it was just a 990 or let's say it was a adu addition and it had its own kitchen and bathroom and it was a its own unit then that could it as I understand it that could get its own hers rating and it would have to hit whatever that target is if the addition was just additional living space serving the same original dwelling unit it would treat the whole thing as one dwelling unit um but it would be one rating for the entire building so it may be that the it doesn't mean you now have to definitely do a checklist of things on the existing building it more it more means that when the entire building is modeled in the in the by the hers raider they sort of look at all the components the addition and the existing building that whole package deal has to hit the target and it could be that some work is needed on the existing building to get there it could be that additional work on the addition the addition could just perform that much better to carry the old building so it's not it's not simple it like you have to completely gut run on the entire existing house just because you're going to like a thousand and one square feet rob does that sound right to you it does that's correct um each dwelling unit would have its own hers writing and and scored independently so I have a question if now is there a difference moving from where we are now to the specialized code it in terms of what I guess it would be in terms of what's required if you were to put an addition onto your house of a thousand square feet I think that all additions and renovations are are under the stretch code I don't think the specialized code really okay affects that and that's that's my understanding but I say that the risk that and if it well if there was a difference it would be you know the difference would be like a couple of her yeah rating points right it's not a big you're not moving to got a big leap it's not a big leap no it's it's a from stretch to specialize is a much smaller leap than from base to stretch is to stretch yeah and stretch is what we have that's very helpful thank you I just have oh sorry go ahead I just have one more question yeah the hers raider so I wasn't actually aware of that I mean just this is not just for my own curiosity the home the property owner pays for that and is that a costly our experience has been that on every every project I've used with a hers raider the incentives that the hers raider finds for the homeowner and the homeowner oftentimes pays them directly sometimes the general contractor pays them the incentives have either equaled or far exceeded what the hers raider brings to the project you know the all right now all electric houses are getting between 15 and 25 thousand dollars of incentive money and the hers raiders typically are you know 10 percent of that okay thank you that's it any other questions from the committee shallony it looked like you were raising your hand shallony thank you yeah no thank you for the feqs that was really helpful and um and I just wanted to say that I we built our house in 2012 and it was all electric and I can say it is very expensive at this point so I'm hoping we're doing this actually it might bring down the cost but at this point we are on a fully electric system and we have a general and it's pretty expensive so I just hope that when you say this is going to bring down the cost maybe because there are more homes that are being put um and so I'm not sure I understood how it brings down the cost if you could explain that and then have the capacity to get so many more homes on electric I think that's the right way to go and I'm fully in support of all of this but and that's one question and the second is I think the bigger definitely they should all be on board I had to fight with my contractor so I'm hoping this includes some sort of education for contractors to get on board and do this right I had to ditch my contractor and get a new one to put out your thermal because he wanted the old system so that's the first thing to have some sort of education to bring the contractors builders on board the second thing though my bigger concern is how does it impact um lower income housing or um rents when all of the costs are absorbed by renters basically so how do we make sure I think I mean I think that's exactly the right question um the theoretically and I think this has been proven in a number of examples is the operating cost is is lower um you know I well I I don't know all the details of your home the the and so let's put it this way the houses use less energy that's or that is the goal and so whatever the cost so their pay these houses would need to pay for less energy um as I understand it right now gas is considered a lower cost fuel per million btu's it's not currently available for new construction enamors to think it's maybe a separate conversation so there isn't enough I'm not sure what the other option would be the I think the goal is a more comfortable better indoor air quality lower operating costs living space that's that's I think the what has been seen in many of these projects I think there are projects where um the cost per million btu's of electricity is higher therefore the the load of the house the amount of electricity that the house consumes is high it will cost more to operate I so I don't know for every example but um a large house with a lot of blazing um and 2012 code insulation that will use more electricity which is yes expensive um and all of these fields I think will continue to go up in costs um and so that's another thing is the idea that if it uses less if the home requires less energy it is more resilient to changes in energy costs so if energy costs spike that savings that was invested in the envelope and windows and the mechanical systems that use less energy period it will cost less than a home that does it I mean I just want to say that we just got a massive and which I think everyone should do get that free audit and they said our insulation and everything was matching the top code right now in town so we did do a very good job of all that I'm still not sure and how the cost is going to come down for the lower income housing with this and when we say the operational cost I don't have anything to compare with so I don't know if it's come down or not but um I think the bigger problem for smaller homes wouldn't it be at the time of construction itself to put in all these feet put in the higher investment like are there grants or something to support um something like that and the second thing that I'm thinking of is also we're builders and all consulted and brought into this process because I mean I'm just for example the one chain this is not got to do with this but when we make changes without hearing from different stakeholders we run into problems later and I heard that about the solar installations where the fire code where they changed at the state level without consulting the solar industry and so forth about rooftop and now I'm hearing a lot of complaints from the solar installers on rooftops that because of that change at the state level where the fire code people did not consult with for right or wrong I'm not saying that was right or wrong but just the fact that that was done in isolation without speaking to the other stakeholders now the other stakeholders are facing the impact which has ripple effects because many homes cannot afford to build rooftop solar because that fire code has not made it harder to you know has less space and that's kind of my point if you all have brought in builders and spoken to them partly education partly hearing what might be their concerns I was going to go to Anna and then Jesse maybe and then we'll go to Pat see if we can get answers to those questions Jesse if it's okay I have something on the first point Shalini there's a really great study from the Rocky Mountain Institute that talks about the cost over time and the greenhouse gas emissions over time with all electric homes and they compare it actually just to a mixed fuel home so you can just see the difference there in terms of upfront cost it's very close to the same there's a drop for total annual operating costs and again this is for mixed not not strictly gas but then when you look at again we have to remember the why we're doing this it's not yes this the studies that I have read and I don't again I don't know the details of your home and your experience but the studies that we have read have shown that it is more cost effective to to be switching these homes over and the other thing on that is that the larger reason why this is important is the greenhouse gas emissions that are coming from these buildings and when you look at the greenhouse gas emissions from single family homes that are mixed use fuel versus those that are electric there's a third over a 30 or just about a 30 ton co2 drop over 15 years so that's significant and I think that we need to zoom out and remember that it's that well cost efficiency matters and I believe is still supportive of this opt in of the specialized code it's not the only reason why and so we need to remember the other standards that we are holding our buildings to as well and why we do that and then the Jesse I guess I can I can defer to you on the second point about consulting builders but I just want to remind the committee that this is not a code that we wrote this is from the state level we are actually not allowed to change this code we opt in to the code as written by the state and this was written by the state I you know I guess Rob might have a better idea on the ins and outs and on how state policy is written but it is not written just by one party it is very much a long arduous process that they go through maybe Rob I'm guess I'm thinking about other bureaucratic systems where you know I'm sure you have lots of critiques but I do think that this is not something that is just drafted on a whim this goes through a lot of research iteration and and it's out there for good reason so just to be clear that while we have read the studies and have consulted with our planning department on their challenges year we cannot change this code we either opt in or do not and so that's the I wanted to just clarify that we can't edit it based on feedback yeah a couple quick things one is it the cost per unit of energy varies from fuel source to fuel source and if nothing happens to a building and you simply go from gas to electric then the operational costs can go up I think one of the one part of the intent of this code is to lower the overall energy consumption of the building so that when you do so that when it is electrified it's it's hitting an operational cost that's that's lower that's the goal so I think I kind of said that before I'm just trying to say it again but yeah the costs can go up the costs of energy is high and the volatile and overall the better the building the more protected someone is to that as far as outreach I think our group and and the town I think we can always do better I think our my sort of mindset is we can always do better with outreach we can always talk to more people always hear more voices I think we should never stop doing that we've done a certain amount we've had a number of meetings this meeting of course is posted we don't have a lot of public care this doesn't this decision today doesn't enact the code I think the ECAC is super excited about education Stephanie has always supported our education efforts we've already done I think four or five education workshops in our meetings would have been moderately well attended about the technologies about the code of working with massive all kinds of different things we've had actually some pretty good turnouts it's been pretty pretty good and this particular code was written by the DOER the department of energy resources it's one of I think seven books all of which are this big that Rob has on his desk that I have on my desk and and I I think an important point to make that Rob said is this will need to evolve and get better and and work better for builders work better for homeowners work better for everyone it's it is a good first step I think but I think Rob's spot on we need to give feedback we need to make it better one of the pieces of feedback I think is is a good one is we like to specialize we want we want the levels to be just a tiny bit higher kind of say that to Boston and the people who are making these decisions we want to be ambitious and if they hear that ideally they will create a simpler singular code that's not you know right now there's kind of four different versions of the energy code floating around and ideally we send the message give us one and give us a good one and that's kind of one of the sort of byproducts of this movement that I think would would be useful thank you Jesse before I go to you Pat I'm going to go to Stephanie thanks Mandy Joe I just wanted to respond to Shalini's concern also about low income housing costs for the upfront construction especially right now and especially in the state of Massachusetts there are a lot of incentives and programs that support low income housing so I I do want to say that you know with that in and of itself shouldn't be a barrier or maybe a you know a final decision maker on you know this is not good for low income so we shouldn't do it I really think that there's lots of program and support we're very fortunate that we live in Massachusetts I feel like in terms of energy efficiency opportunities within the Commonwealth and support for low income there's a lot of funding and especially with the federal funding that's coming down the pike that's going to translate to more support for low income as well so I just wanted to alleviate some of your concerns in that regard thank you Stephanie Pat you're muted you're muted in my naive or my first reading of this it seemed in a very general way that all electric homes are cheaper to build and there are incentives to be added there it seems to me if you're reducing I love the illustrations with all the wires and and tanks of gas and oil and all that other stuff it it even that image simplified and it seems to me that this potentially supports the making the cost whether it's a developer or individual homeowners reduces the cost of developing a duplex or townhouses which are smaller units usually but that's something that our society is moving towards so I had an opposite read to what Shanwane was sharing her concern she was sharing I just wanted to bring those up thank you Anna yeah I wanted to add to what Stephanie said she raised a really great point about the incentives available for low income housing there's also considerable incentives available for general single family housing right so there's a lot of things that came down through the inflation reduction act there's lots of mass save credits there are a ton of different incentives for folks to pursue for for that type of housing as well as for low income housing as Stephanie pointed out thanks thank you my my hand went down so I'm going to call on myself because they've got this new thing where they just automatically lower your hand for some reason and I'll go down um I was curious I thought I heard Rob in some of the first times he spoke indicate that his department is supportive of adopting the specialized code so I guess I wanted to just ask outright whether Rob's department and Stephanie I assume Stephanie is but I'd like to hear it from them without assumptions are are you supportive would you support the adoption of the specialized code and I'm guessing I'm asking Rob for his department and Stephanie we we are supportive of the adoption I think I'm not sure if this was mentioned yet but the stretch code you know automatically does have changes that occur July of 24 so you know adoption with an implementation or effective date of July of 24 to me is good you know so we're not making a change and then making another change so I you know I'm pleased to see that as kind of the way this is being lined up so yes we are supportive of it thank you Rob Stephanie yes absolutely in support of this and I just wanted to actually say to Rob that we actually listen to you and that alignment is at your suggestion if we were moving this forward so you know we do we did take that into account thank you Pam thank you we had some a lot of discussion as we were developing the rental bylaws that at the beginning we were really pushing to include some incentives or not not actually incentive some requirements to rental units to do the audit to start to upgrade rental housing because it's such a big portion of our housing stock what Anna said and other people have mentioned are there any incentives and I think I've heard no but are there any incentives for landowners to be able to start making some of these upgrades in their unit and that would that would really go a long way to to try to help meet our goal of upgrading rental Anna I just want to clarify in question do you mean directly from the town or do you mean in larger state federal etc the same incentives that you rattled off and I believe I believe I'll look I'll look to Stephanie and Jesse on this and maybe Rob as well sorry I keep just grouping y'all in there I believe that the there are incentives again through things like the inflation reduction act that aren't necessarily divvied out based on whether you're putting it in your own home or into in a home that you rent out I believe that those those incentives for things like heat pumps like heat pump rebates and such would still be available Stephanie Jesse or Rob do you have any insights on this that you'd like to share all I was going to say is that you know very often the federal incentives are actually implemented through the state so I'm not sure if that gets to what you were asking I'm not sure I hundred percent understood your question Pam sorry but but just I mean there is if you're asking if it's you know is their funding is supportive beyond just the state incentives very often what the state incentives are actually federal incentives so my question was Anna mentioned that there are lots of lots of programs grants incentives for single family homes the question is can landowners apply homeowner landlords I'll just say rental unit owners also be applying for these and getting some of these incentive dollars that homeowners tend to be able to do it's a great question I know massive has a target audience directly to renters which is kind of cool and that's somewhat recent for them don't actually know a lot about it I believe these and these incentive programs tend to change often as the funding streams change I think we're kind of at the precipice of quite a bit of new programs and I think this is another one where I would have to look again and obviously this is all separate from the specialized code conversation just incentives for existing multi-family buildings I think I believe any incentive I think those I think those incentives do exist I think in some ways there cannot be enough incentives for existing multi-family buildings it is an incredibly important type of building typology and population to improve that housing stock it's all over the news we don't have enough of it and it's not good enough there's billions of dollars of deferred maintenance in the existing low income housing in our state right now and so it would it would follow the incentive money would go to those buildings I think maybe I'm making a plug for it as much as answering the question it's critically important well Jesse I would point to the PACE program you know the PACE program and at the moment off the top of my head I won't even begin to sort of say encapsulate what that is but maybe Jesse can speak to that but that's an opportunity certainly for multi-unit dwellings and particularly low income housing so there's real I think there's a real incentive especially in Massachusetts right now to really target low income housing and renters rental units so I do think there are some incentives existing for landlords I couldn't tell you specifically what they are but PACE is certainly one of them and Jesse if you want to give a plug for PACE please yeah yeah so PACE and this is one that's actually handled by a different member of our the ECAC team but I think it's a it's a program for commercial building stock which includes multi-unit rental housing where it's great incentives where they're really adding sustainability upgrades a lot of mechanical and envelope upgrades to projects that otherwise weren't going to do them so it's a huge funding source it's PACE all caps pace I think it's worth googling our the ECAC that's actually one of our next education programs that we're going to be putting on where I will actually be learning more about it at that time as well so keep an eye out for that the Department of Energy resources also has a pretty incredible resource list of all the incentives available Pam and I was just looking at it to see if they specified and some of them do specify that they are available for rentals for rental units essentially so if you I'm not going to give you the long long long thing but if you google it's it's the title of it is Massachusetts energy rebates and incentives and they list them all out including for commercial businesses there as well in addition to the PACE program that might be worth worth checking out and my final my final question is if we adopt the specialized code does that does that enable us to be considered for additional dollars is is there any kind of bonus to the town or doing that significant reduction in our greenhouse gas emissions it would it would also by default qualify I think qualify projects for more incentive but a lot of these incentive programs are based on your hers score so sometimes so it's gonna it would and again this is actually it's actually a small part of the puzzle for our town there's I think Rob eight to twelve new houses a year maybe in Emerson not a not a huge piece of the puzzle but the better the building the more the incentives typically I don't see any other hands right now this is a public hearing so I'm going to the committee will have a chance after we hear from the public to ask more questions but right now I'm going to move to the public question side so if any members in our audience have any questions for the committee or the presenters please raise your hand at this time we will have an opportunity for comments to be made after the questions are done see no hands for questions if anyone in the audience in the public would like to make a comment on the current hearing on the proposal to adopt the specialized code please raise your hand don't see any hands for that either so we will move back to committee questions and I have one more Pam raised a point and I guess I want to ask sort of a follow-up you know in reading the materials it indicated that all the green communities have adopted the stretch code my guess is that you can't be a green community unless you've adopted the stretch code and that being a green community opens up sort of extra points or opportunities for grant programs from the state and I think this is what Pam was getting at so I want to further expand on her question of do you see in the future that green communities requiring adoption of the specialized code or other grant programs you know saying well if you haven't adopted the specialized code or if you have adopted the specialized code you get priority over towns that have only adopted say the stretch code something like that I don't know how the green communities ones work but I think that's where Pam was going with it Stephanie and then Jesse so I'm actually have been on the green communities advisory committee and there has no been no discussion at least in the more recent we haven't had a meeting for a while but in the more recent meeting that did not come up as you correctly noted you have to become a stretch code community but it does not require you to adopt the specialized code and I don't necessarily have a crystal ball to know in the future if they would require that but I would say that there's likely to be some more advantages I think if you have you know in future funding I would expect that that would be an advantage it certainly would not hurt us thank you Jesse I think so this is all conjecture but and maybe a little different than what Stephanie saying is but I would just like to publicly make another push that we all everyone in the state has one code and it's a great code and it's a great code and and having multiple layers and conditional ever you know give all the town funding give all the towns a good energy code that's easy to follow that's that's kind of them that's beyond the scope of this meeting that my conjecture that's that that's the next step thank you Pam would somebody point us specifically to a comparison of what the stretch code upgrade that occurs next July 2024 how do we compare the upgrading stretch code with a specialized code that we might vote in now that would also go into effect in July 2024 is there a nice little table a little diagram specifically for the upgraded stretch code not today's stretch code is the charts that were in the FAQ is that for the updated stretch code I think it is I think it is like let me I if it if that is for the updated stretch code then that is the best summer there is if that's not if that's the current stretch code that you can see how the net chart might not exist right now but I could look I I could certainly look into what is the current best comparison chart this I put that in thinking it was the most current best comparison chart I think what you're asking for is confirm it's referencing stretch code July 1st 2024 yeah so I guess I must have misunderstood this I thought the specialized code that we might vote to opt into just meant that we got to that point sooner but I thought there was a point at which but that's not true that the specialized would become what what all of the stretch codes would know the specialized code and likely will stay ahead of it is my understanding right Jesse and Stephanie that's what we understand is that like this this this I think in an ideal world the specialized code is getting pushed out there and then everyone catches up and then in an even more ideal world like each time that the building code updates right now Massachusetts is in the 9th edition of the building code pretty at some point we're going to go into the 10th edition it'd be best for Rob and his team and all the other building departments to think of if the energy code just updated at the same time that this is this is Massachusetts's workaround right now because the because the base energy code is not considered ambitious enough for um getting to our climate goals so that's what the stretch code is doing so for the time being I believe the stretch code will lag slightly behind the specialized code I think catches up a little in July it gets closer yeah I believe the document that was one of the documents in your packet does outline some of the differences but what's challenging Jennifer's or whoever asked this question initially is that typically the comparisons are the July 2023 stretch code versus the old one and it doesn't bring in the specialized so you kind of have to do that do that putting them next to each other but I believe that one of the documents I'm trying to figure out the title of it now that's the FAQs from the Department of Energy does go through the differences at least in the the new updates and then it talks about the um the stretch code as well so if you can kind of do the back and forth and uh between those then there's the chart thank you Shalini I was looking at the question about the impact of this on the DPW and other town buildings and it's its CD attached report I I'm sorry if I missed it but I'm not seeing so can someone just summarize what would be the impact and where is that report so it's the I this is the I think it's the cost and energy efficiency analysis study that's linked um and what that report does is it goes through a number of different building types small office large office office lab elementary school high school multifamily tower four-story all etc etc etc goes through all of these so it doesn't have you know I don't let's see I don't know if it has a specific um sure for DP because we don't have the cost for a DPW yet but right um but which one is it I'm not still seeing it and I think just referencing the second to last page of that document where it says helpful helpful links uh-huh and I couldn't click on to them somehow I've downloaded yeah that could be that I wonder if those links got dropped in emailing either to you yeah I couldn't I did a search and I can put what I think two of those some of those that were linked to were already in the packet I believe and I think I found two of the other ones but if if Jesse sends me so I'm not guessing at which ones they were I I will make sure they get into a packet can I yeah I sorry that's a technical something I apologize for that that's okay so which one would it be even out of these lengths where we can see the comparison for the different buildings what the back might be the the first one uh cost and energy efficiency and the DOER where it says helpful link so I'm going to send that to can I ask a clarifying question though um about DPW specifically um and fire station those buildings would be caught under the net zero bylaw already because they're over a million dollars correct and so they'd already be pretty much in this zone um so there wouldn't necessarily be I don't know the exact changes but because projects over a million I think that's the threshold right for net zero um but all town buildings right have to be it's all municipal yeah all municipal buildings over a million um in in building would be under net zero and so net zero is is getting pretty much at the same it's it's dovetails in with the the specialized code um nicely if that helps a little bit as well I'm going to interrupt for a second my dog just got back from the vet and I need to find out what I needed to keep her healthy okay thank you pat we'll note your stepping away maybe joy I sent you those links again hopefully they will be okay I will make sure I download them and get them into the packet for everyone um so that they're there but but Anna I think made a good point that the were required for those DPW buildings to be net zero anyway um and they would have to meet the base the stretch code anyway yeah they they will probably exceed what's required by the specialized code um so minimal additional impact is the the short answer to the the actual question minimal if any I would say any other questions from the committee without any questions it's up to us to decide whether we're ready to close the public hearing or not we generally don't discuss recommendations until the public hearing is closed um are we feeling like we can close the public hearing Pam looks like we could close the public hearing because we had no input as part of the public conversation sadly um so I would I would make a motion that we close the public hearing I would second me and hopefully there was a whole lot more discussion at at ECAC and then other than you yeah so we have a motion by Pam to close the public hearing and Jennifer you were the second right yeah Jennifer I just want to make sure I had the notes right um is there any discussion on closing the public hearing seeing none we will vote um Shalini yes uh Mandy is an I Pam yeah and Jennifer yes and Pat stepped away from the meeting for a bit so she is absent on this vote so that vote is four zero with Pat absent um on closing the public hearing so the public hearing is closed it is 532 that completes item two of our agenda item three a is the discussion and vote on a recommendation on the proposed adoption of the specialized energy code which is a actually by law language is this committee feeling like we might be able to complete that discussion today I can put the proposed language up on the screen it's in the packet um it's from the the state basically and while it looks like a repeal and replace it would not actually be voted as a repeal and replace um because we would want to keep the stretch energy code in place until the specialized goes in if we would adopt the specialized so we would not want to actually repeal the by law and replace we just want to essentially delete an insert it's kind of strange um but but the motion there's a draft motion in there too that sort of makes clear that until until July 1 2024 if this is the recommendation that the stretch energy code would remain the adopted code and conversation on that I know people want to get out but it sounds like we might be ready to have that discussion and potential make a potential recommendation today so thoughts on Andy yeah so on the on the second page of the of the sample town motion town council motion it is that the town rescinds oh yeah that is and I think that I think I forgot to fix that I will say that right now let me I don't have my packet up um yeah and so I think I think that in thinking about it later good good catch pan and thinking about it after this I was like wait if we rescind and replace word we might be rescinding the application of the stretch energy code um and we don't want to do that so I think we just I think the language is move that the town revise let me so I think we would want this to be I think it would be revise general bylaw 3.48 stretch energy code to adopt the specialized energy code well actually to adopt the specialized energy code would show up at a different spot I think this is the sample council motion revise general bylaw 3.48 as shown on whatever pages of the motion sheet for the purpose of adopting the specialized energy code and regulating the designing construction of buildings for the effective use and then everything else I think it is with an effective date of July 1 2024 current bylaw shall remain in effect until it is replaced with the specialized energy code something like that I just we KP law had recommended that we be clear in whatever motion we do that the stretch energy code remains in place until the specialized energy code is in there so we might have to finagle Athena might have eventually some idea of fixing better wording of the language language I guess it could be the current the stretch energy I guess it doesn't have to be this the stretch energy code shall remain in effect until it is replaced with the specialized energy code something like that but that that's a modification of the DOER recommended town meeting motion since we're not town meeting I had to figure it out they didn't recommend a town council motion so I had to do it but the proposal is essentially delete what's there and rename it specialized instead of stretch and take the language from from the DOER recommendation which is slightly longer because it defines stuff thoughts on recommendations for making this bylaw change because ultimately that's what we would be voting a recommendation on whether to recommend the council do this so our motion would be to recommend the town council blah Jennifer yeah I guess I just this isn't very profound but but we're kind of collectively in the situation part of why we're in the situation we're in with our climate and environment is that it was you know always too expensive to make the changes we needed to make so I think and that you know I would say we need there may be some expenses but it's the right thing to do so I'm gonna you know support it thank you any other getting this weird like window thing I will say I I think I I'm with Jennifer the the differences seem in some sense minimal but in another sense highly effective and necessary so it's not like we're dropping we're jumping from a hers of a hundred to a hers zero I would say you know like it's that next step from where we are and and it seems like we should be doing that so I I would it when we get to a motion I would vote in favor of a recommendation when we get there Pam yeah I don't I don't disagree and I think it's an important thing to do I I was sort of hoping to get that last piece of information which is how does the specialized code compare to the the incoming already in progress already anticipated 2024 stretch code again if it's if it's quite similar to what we're all already going to be dealing with because we automatically upgrade as the as the code does then I'm more comfortable with recommending it at this point you know we have between now and the council meeting to do the rest of the homework Jennifer yeah I also feel more comfortable that Rob Moro seems comfortable with it that that was important to me to hear I think this is a critical thing for us to do and I'm in support of it in 2011 we had an energy retrofit on our house we went from oil heat and every kind of very drafty home to a pretty tight home with one heat pump and a very very tiny wood stove that we use sometimes in the winter using less than half a quart of wood to heat because we rely on the heat pump so the these transition my house was over 100 years old then so I feel like these are actually very simple and what I see is the cost of maintaining a home or paying rent if you're a renter will less be reduced the cost of construction potentially can be reduced dramatically and I think that we need to step right up to this any other hands on discussion see none um I think we can go with a simple motion unless you want me to read the whole thing I'll read the whole thing I'll move to recommend that the town council that the town council vote to revise general bylaw 3.48 stretch energy code for the purposes as as presented this is the as presented here for the purpose of adopting the specialized energy code and regulating the design and construction of buildings with an effective date of July 1 2024 the stretch energy code would remain in effect until it is replaced with the specialized energy code is there a second second to the angel is is there further conversation seeing no hands we will vote um we start with pat all right Mandy is an eye Pam you know Jennifer yes and Shalini yes that is a unanimous recommend recommendation in favor of adopting the specialized energy code the next steps on this will be that sometime today or tomorrow I will forward this formally the revised bylaw or the proposed bylaw to pat as chair of GL for its consideration of whether that revision is clear consistent and actionable and and and then when GL finishes it would come to the council for a first reading and a second reading I can't guess when that might be but probably sometime in October or November so any other questions on that action item and the next steps for or this referral and specialized code Pat I don't have a question I just wanted to thank Jesse and Anna and I want to give a particular shout out or thank you to Stephanie and Rob Mara our building inspector you work hard for us and you have the respect of the town council and many many many members of our community and I just want you to carry that with you all the time please thank you Pat thank you to ECAC committee and I also second everything Pat said and I want to thank all of you maybe I'm headed over to the block party after this um maybe I'll bump into some of you but also just if anything else comes up you have questions or concerns send it to the ECAC through Stephanie or Anna and we will try to help make sense of it all thank you Jesse Anna yeah I just wanted to publicly do the same thank yous that everyone else has been doing um this has been I've learned so much from Jesse and Stephanie and and Rob through this process so I want to thank them for helping to educate us all as we as we go thank you thank you and I know it's a little late but I I think I explained this before but not during this meeting Anna is here because she is liaison the council liaison to ECAC I am not the council liaison to ECAC oh I thought you were here because I'm just sponsoring this oh you're sponsoring it and I thought you were sponsoring it because you were the council liaison oh Alicia Alicia's the council liaison to ECAC okay anyway you're here yeah thank you um with that um yeah everyone said the thank yous to Rob and Stephanie and Jesse and Anna um we will be moving on Jesse I think you might see many of us we have one more thing basically to do before we can adjourn our meeting um but everyone else is free to go we're going to be holding general public comment next um but then right after that it's done we will probably be adjourning our meeting so thank you Rob Stephanie Anna and Jesse for joining us today um with that I will be moving on to item five on our agenda general public comment public comments on matters within the jurisdiction of CRC will be accepted at this time anyone in the audience is welcome to express their views for up to three minutes and now that I am going to also say there are now no one attending this meeting the one person we had has left um so with that I am now closing general public comment um um we did announcements the next agenda will be I'm going to be really quick on this I mentioned a little bit about the Boston thing I will get that in I'm thinking of potentially drafting an updated nuisance based on the Boston one but um I don't want to take time today to pull up Boston to see if people are there so we'll see but um because everyone's trying to get out to the block party so um next agenda will have nuisance on it but the first thing on it will be rental registration Andy touched on it a little bit finance has sent us back some guidelines um and basically in my attendance at those meetings they've sent us the guidelines and I think we're back on with a recommendation for fees for the actual schedule based on their guidelines um so they also have some suggestions for revisions to the bylaw and the regulations so so I will come in with that I will put that memo in the packet um I'll come in with some draft revisions that were recommended by by Rob actually during discussions and by some of the finance committee members so we'll deal with that one first and then we'll go to nuisance and then um after nuisance if there are time we will return back to some of that AMHT discussions that's the plan for the next agenda anything else Pam um would you send along the Boston thing before you before you adjust the nuisance bylaw itself yes on the Boston thing to all I will I haven't decided I I will send it along and I probably because we're not going to take the time today to at least throw up Boston and see what people think I probably won't take the time to do anything um but it's it means I probably won't adjust the current draft of our nuisance either based on conversations I'm trying to be a little more efficient and save time um but yeah I will make sure Boston is in there I've been looking for some others but Boston like I said came up from seeing Boston's rental registration that referred to their nuisance property so um I'll put it in there any items not anticipated are we not meeting again till the 12th of October we are meeting the fifth I believe I think we're the fifth and the okay now confused what is the league of women voters it is the fifth um and we are meeting the fifth so that meeting will be a slightly shortened meeting so that everyone can get to the league we will start it for that's right they changed it because of TSO not us got it they changed it because of TSO that meets at seven and I told them that ours did not technically conflict so so you would not be conflicting with a CRC meeting if they held it at seven we will aim to end our meeting before 6 30 that day um so um we're not gonna we're definitely not going to go late and I will like I said we probably won't get to AMHT we might only get to rental registration depending on how long that takes and what we want to do but um we will end that meeting less than two hours in um as we all juggle everything but no the fifth is our next meeting um and then we are on the five plus the 19th I believe um first and third anything else seeing none enjoy the block party we're adjourning at 5 51 p.m see y'all there bye