All right. It's recording. And then let me just check my email too to make sure. Oh, she keeps, Jan keeps getting a message saying that the webinar will begin soon. There's two people listed as attendees, Mark Andrews and Jane Marquette. Oh yeah, here we are. They just popped up for me. Promote to panelists. All right. Hey, you're, you're outlawed. I know what was that about? I just had a meeting with you. You didn't like my last participation. I didn't like your comments. I was complimentary. I told you you could multitask and that was pretty good for a guy. What's wrong with that? I'm working on it. Yeah. So it looks like Mark Andrews from Amherst colleges and attendee, and he'll be presenting for the demolition applications.  However you'd like. I can share a screen too. So, you know, for everyone who's listening, the, you know, this is by zoom. The planning, the planning, the historical commission, you're all panelists. So that's different than a meeting. So this is considered a webinar. So all the members are panelists. So you can unmute and do your video on your own. And you can speak how you like the public are considered attendees and they enter as muted and they can speak by clicking to raise their hand or the, the coast, the co-host myself and Jane can move them to panelists for part of the meeting, or we can just allow them to speak as they, as they wish. But this way we're, you know, the town's structuring meetings this way. So it's not just a free for all. So if we scheduled it as a zoom meeting, potentially anyone who joins could speak as they wish, but as a webinar, the co-host can control it a little bit more. And like I said, we can make any members who are attending become a panelist so they can join our conversation. And then, you know, I can be sharing the screen. So, you know, I can pull up the agenda if you'd like, or the demolition applications when it gets to that time. So it looks like Tom Davies and Mark Andrews are both here from Amherst College. So I'm going to allow them to talk. And then maybe I'll actually just make them to panelists right now. And then they can participate. And then we have, we have some preliminaries to. Yes. To walk through. Right. Okay. All right. Good evening. Good evening. Hi. So we'll, we'll get started with a call to order. So we'll begin just with a welcome to the Amherst historical commission, public hearing and public meeting on April 22nd. 2020 at 6 p.m. Based on governor Baker's executive order, suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law, MGL, chapter 30 a paragraph 20 and signed Thursday, March 12th, 2020. This hearing and meeting is being held virtually using the zoom platform. My name is Jane Wald and as chair of the Amherst historical commission, I'm calling this meeting to order at 6 0 6 p.m. This meeting is being recorded and minutes are being taken as normal. So now I'll take a roll call of the commission members. Members, as you hear your name called. Unmute yourself. Answer affirmatively. And then please place yourselves back on mute. Patricia off. Present. Right. Robin Fordham. Present. Jan Marquardt. Present. Jane Scheffler is absent. Heady startup. Present. And Jane Wald. I'm present too. So board members, if technical difficulties arise, we may need to pause temporarily to rectify the problem. And then we'll continue the meeting. And if you do have technical issues, please let Nate know. Discussion may be suspended while the technical issues are addressed. And the minutes will note if a disconnection has occurred. Please use the raise hand function to ask a question or make a comment. I'll see your hand. I'll see your raised hand and call upon you to speak. After speaking. Remember to remute yourself. Opportunity for public comment will be provided during the general public comment period. For the meeting and at other appropriate times throughout the meeting. Please be aware. The board will not respond to comments during the general public comment period. For members of the public. If they wish to make a comment during a public comment period. They must join the meeting. Via the zoom teleconferencing link. The link can be found on the meeting agenda. Located on the town website. Another way is through the calendar listing for this meeting from the homepage. And find the link within the event details. Again, for public comment. If you wish to make a comment by clicking the raise hand button. When comment is solicited. And if you've joined the zoom meeting using a telephone, please indicate you wish to make a comment by pressing star nine on your telephone. When called on, please identify yourself by stating your full name and address. And press the raise hand button. If you wish to make a comment by clicking the raise hand button. Please identify yourself by stating your full name and address. And put yourself back into mute when finished speaking. Residents are welcome to express their views for up to three minutes. And at the discretion of the historical commission chair. If these guidelines are not complied with or the speaker exceeds their allotted time. Their participation will be disconnected from the meeting. Next. And the public hearing. For the, for the public hearing. Pursuant to. Governor Baker's March 12, 2020 order, suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law. And the governor's March 15th, 2020 order imposing strict limitations on the number of people that may gather in one place. The historical commission is being conducted by remote participation. No in-person attendance of members of the public will be permitted. But the public can listen to the proceedings by clicking a link on the town's webpage. Written comments are always welcome and can be submitted to the planning to the historical commission to the planning through the planning department. A. Gav. In accordance with the provisions of Massachusetts general laws, chapter 40. A an article 13 demolition delay of the Amherst zoning bylaw. This public hearing. Has been duly advertised. And notice thereof has been posted and mailed to parties at interest. The Amherst historical commission is continuing this public to provide an opportunity for interested citizens to be heard regarding the following demolition application request. 211 South Pleasant Street, parcel 14A-193 from Amherst College, request to demolish a detached one car garage. And 197 South Pleasant Street, parcel 14A-195 Amherst College, request to demolish a wood-framed barn. So the public hearing is open, and as the first item of business for the public hearing, I need to make a public disclosure that I am an employee of Amherst College, is employee of the Emily Dickinson Museum, which is owned by Amherst College. And I just want to check with Mark and Tom that these properties, are they related to plans for remodeling for CHI in the history department? Yeah. OK, so further disclosure, I am a member of the advisory board of the Center for Humanistic Inquiry at Amherst College. And so while it is chair of the Historical Commission, I'll help to moderate the discussion. I will be abstaining from voting on the demolition delay request. OK, so we have information about both of these properties. And I'll first invite the applicants to make any comments you would like to about the application for a demolition permit. Hi, Mark. This is Nate Malloy. You've been unmuted, and I can share a screen if you'd like. So if you want to call up the application or images, just let me know, and I can do that. Sure, I might actually invite Tom Davies to speak. First, I think you had a couple things you want to say, but why don't you put up the application, and I'll get the brief overview. I'm having trouble unmuting Tom. You should be able to, there we go. And the application, sure. Let's do that. Which one would you want to start with? It doesn't matter. Perhaps the barn is a little bit more significant. Sure, we can do the, here's the 197 South Pleasant Street. Sure. All right. So can everyone see the application? Jane, can you see the application? Yep. Great, OK. All right, Mark, I think you're all set to speak if you'd like and just direct me. I also put the images up for this as well. The JPEG could send. OK, perfect. I'll just say the college is looking at 197 South Pleasant Street to turn it into an academic building. We're looking at probably an addition and renovation project. That is what we know. We are extremely early in the design process. So if you're familiar with schematic design development and construction documents, we're not even there yet. We're still wrapping up the concept phase. But what we believe to be true is that the barn, given the footprint of the building and the program required, is likely going to inhibit the new construction. So we don't have a lot of specifics. Actually, we have almost none. But in terms of the size and the match to the building, we can predict with reasonable certainty that the barn is going to become problematic. It's going to become in the way. So that's where this comes from. There's not a tremendous amount to say about it. That's sort of the brief 10,000 foot view. Right. OK. Tom, do you have things you'd like to say? Well, the only additional bit of information is that we have taken a look at the condition of the structure. And it's in very, very poor condition. The structural members, that is, are in very poor condition. From bug damage, I'm not quite sure what kind of bug. Maybe you know, Mark. Some sort of beetle. I forget the specific kind. Yeah. So there was some thought to, well, maybe this could be repurposed and used within the project. But it quickly became apparent that that was not going to be feasible. So that's really the extent of it, Jane. OK. Thank you. Nate, is there additional information that you have or comments that you would like to make? The, you know, this is considered, you know, this house has been inventoried only in so much as it was the president's mother's house, president of Amherst College's mother's house when it was inventoried. There's really not a lot of history on the property. There are some sandborn maps, you know, the fire insurance maps that show a structure here in the 19 teens that was connected with the house.  And, you know, I looked at old aerial photograph as much history as I can. And there's really no, you know, there's no, nothing that can satisfactorily say that this is the same structure that was shown in the earlier maps. You know, the footprint and the orientation are similar, but the locations are a little different based even on the sandborn maps. So, you know, we have the age of the structure as of 1930 and that may be accurate. It's hard to say. There could have been a structure earlier there, but you know, these are, I'm showing, you know, an interior view of the barn. That's really it. There really isn't a lot on this property other than its association with the president's mother in 1988. There really isn't a description of all of this barn anywhere. Okay. Commission members, do you have questions or comments? And I'll learn about raising hands and... Oh, sure. Should I? I can stop sharing if you'd like and help or would you like to... Well, no, that's fine. I don't see any raised hands right now. Eddie looks like... We're not able to raise our hands. That's only for the outside people. We can mute and unmute. There is no raising. Okay. I guess, yeah, I was gonna say, I think as panelists, it's interesting with the planning board, maybe they did it as a meeting. Okay. Maybe you can just unmute yourself and see how it goes, yeah. Although, how do you hand her hand up? I did have my hand up. I did have my hand up. I'm looking at the picture that is on the screen right now. And I just have a couple of questions about the foundation, the cement block foundation and what is in the corner under the window on the left-hand side? Is that some kind of bulkhead or crawl space or something in the corner there? There's a fair amount of debris. I guess I'd call it debris and chairs. That looks to be a door. Yeah, it looks like just a door that's on the floor. Got it. Thank you. But the concrete foundation that's coming up a couple of feet as far as we know, that's original to the 1930s. Yeah. I would guess not, actually, because of the presence of the concrete floor, but we don't know for sure. It is in remarkably good shape if it's that old. Yeah, can I just say since I tend to always take the point of view on behalf of historical commission that we don't wanna lose barns, that this does look an awfully good shape. I realize it has some wood damage, which may be caused by this wood beetle or whatever it is, which is something that obviously could be taken care of. The foundation and the support wall look good. The outside, I mean, it may be a little bit rotted at the bottom and need paint, but it seems to me it's not in that bad a shape. The question, of course, is how you can reuse it within the structure that you're planning. I don't know whether something could be incorporated that just the look of this barn could be kept, but it is a problem. As you know, you've heard me say this before and you've heard it from other people that were losing barns throughout the town. And this is on that side street that you turn from pleasant to curve over to the field and pick up some of those sides ways back to route nine that people take quite a bit. And so it's pretty visible. I would urge, since you are at the pre pre planning, to reconsider again the possibility of using this structure in some way to keep that look of the barn and the landscape that's around it. Robin, you have a question? Yeah, I figured out, well, A, I figured out how to raise my hand. Am I unmuted? Yeah, okay. And I can see your hand raised. So there's a raised hand function if you open the participants list in the bottom there, if anybody wants to do the electronic way. Yeah, no, I looked at it. I looked at the building from Google Maps today. I just wanted to ask Jan where you could see the barn from because I wasn't able to see it from the street street view. It does, it is a beautiful building. Well, it's tucked away behind some trees, but if you turn left coming north on Pleasant, onto Walnut, then it's on the right. Okay. I saw the one car garage there. I didn't know that you could see this particular building from there. On the other side of the street. Okay. Just to clarify, this barn is north of the one, Jan that you just mentioned in Robin. So there's the one car garage on 211 South Pleasant. And this one is 197. So it's actually north of that. So it's- On the other side of Walnut, right? So that would be South, right? Yeah, no, it's actually- It's the same, it's the same side, it's north. So it's, I could, in the application, if you can still see my screen, let me just see if I can. Yeah, you'll have to rotate it. Yeah, let me see if I can minimize this a little bit. All right. Yeah, the, if you can see, this is Walnut Street here. Here's 211, 197. The barn is actually off the screen to the left. So north is going to the left. Okay. Right, right, right. Okay, I misread it. Pat? I just have to say that I did a site visit. I didn't walk on the 197 property, but I pulled to the side street and checked out the barn and the garage. And I'm in Jan's camp, in that it just seemed like a barn that should be maintained. It is a classic style. And I don't know what architecture we would call it, but it had a prominence behind that house in a way that it was noticeable from the side street. The garage is the home of the story, but the barn seemed to be restorable or removable or whatever. And she maybe have a second look with that idea in mind. All right, there are other questions. Have you considered moving it? Yes, we considered two options. One was disassembly and reassembly on a new site, and the other was moving it. They were both, the structure itself is in such bad shape. Either condition would require significant new material inside, significant new structural material inside. You're talking about the structure, the wood? The wood, the roof itself is in pretty bad shape. The entirety of the roof would have to be replaced. It's not adequate for anything. So it appears to be a little self-defeating. I mean, by the time we were done doing what we needed to do to it, to either brace it to move it or reassemble it, in either case, we'd have to make it a structurally sound building that wouldn't be as much left as you'd think. It's so far into the corner of that property, at least in the corner of what's fenced. Do you own the property on either side of that corner? Yes, we do. Okay, so you'll be taking the fence down and this new building could extend past the fence line? Is that the idea? Yes, what is likely to happen, and again, as Mark said, it's early, but what's likely to happen is that this building, will be connected with other college buildings in that area, in that block, via pathways that meander around within the block, because the sidewalks don't provide any accessible routes between the buildings, because there are steps from the sidewalks, the town sidewalks, up to any of the buildings. So we are likely to be creating kind of a bit of a district there that has some pathways that allow for accessible pathways between buildings. Okay, are we ready to make a motion on this demolition permit? Yeah, I understand, yeah. So this is one application, and then the other property next to it's another. And yeah, I mean, the commission, like Jane said, we can make a motion and make a determination on this application. If we want more information, that can be some of the discussion too. I think that this structure isn't very visible from the street. I do agree that it looks, it's an older structure and its appearance seems to warrant some further investigation. I will say I've driven by a few times and it is really difficult to see this from the street. Maybe when the project comes through, it'll change, but right now, it is difficult to have a view of this structure. On our timeline, even if we were to grant permission today, would you be able to do anything within a year? It seems like you're further out than that. Well, with the caveat that who knows now because of COVID-19 related chaos, but the intention is to have a design process that moves along swiftly and a construction project that begins about six months out from now. Is that right, Mark, about six months? Yeah, maybe a scooch more. That could just be COVID reality bleeding into things. Everything seems to be taking longer than it used to take. So you'd be doing it in the winter? Yes. Absolutely. Can I see another hand, Hedy? Yeah, is it possible that that barn has already been moved once, at least with those? I'm sorry to harp on my earlier question, but I'm just trying to get a feel for the significance of it historically for the property when there was a house there. Do we just not know? I have no information, one layer or the other, about that building existing on another side. I just think I agree with Jan that there has to be some sensitivity at Amherst College in the town of Amherst with its rural heritage to kind of both mine that, own it, and also play with it. So that that kind of allows people when they're there in your new building, especially given it being for the Center for Humanities, that it kind of speaks to them about what has been there before if we decide to make a decision to go forward with one particular set of choices. But I'm feeling like you are at too early of a stage to really help us discuss this any more at this point because we don't have that to kind of work into our thinking process. I like the way you talked about owning it and playing with it. Have you thought of something like among these pathways and connections between buildings, maybe just re-roofing it and opening doors on four sides and just having it be one of the things you walk through, for instance, rather than trying to use it as an actual structure that was solid and closed, just a way to still have the look in the landscape without necessarily being incorporated into the really serious construction project. It's not very big. Is it, does it look very big? No, it is not very big. Is it appropriate to respond at this point, Jane? You are welcome to respond. However, the role of the historical commission is less about what future plans are and more about what the value of the historic significance of the current structure is. So you may confine your response to the significance of the historic structure. Okay, well, maybe it's a moot then. I was gonna speak to our focus is actually on preserving the value of the historic house. And that's our primary goal. You can talk about that. Oh, well, that's our primary goal. You know, we're not showing photos of that but you probably all know it. And so I guess the two things that I would say, and it is early, so I understand that we can't be conclusive about these things. But the focus is on really preserving that building and really making it sing on the site. But we also know that the desired program is fairly extensive and that the site will get quite tight accommodating the program that the college anticipates for that site. And so that's the part of the motivation here is that we know that we're going to have a bit of a challenge making the program work on the site and that the barn is almost certainly going to be kind of at odds with that goal. So that's all I guess I wanted to add to that. So what we had said previously. Robin. Yeah, I was just asking, I'm trying to recall what our options as a committee are in terms of taking time to get more information. Yeah, Nate, would you review the options for us? Sure. You know, the commission can allow demolition, right? You can issue a 12 month delay, and when issuing a delay, an applicant can always come back and request that the delay be lifted if more information has been presented. So alternatives have been examined or other things. It's hard to say that you can issue a delay and then have conditions on it, but it seems like the applicant is in a point where they would maybe be willing to do that. You could agree that a structure could be taken down in a certain amount of time if the applicant returns with more information. You know, it's not the same as a delay, but it's saying that, okay, in three months time return with some more information about the structure or plans for the site, but... But in terms of the procedure and the figuring of determining its significance. Oh, sure. Is there a way to ask for pause while we find out more information to determine its significance because the delay doesn't come until after we vote on its significance, correct? Oh, sure, right. So in that aspect, you know, the hearing's been opened and continued already and in order to do that, we would ask, you know, the hearing, we want to continue the hearing then to a date and time certain in order for, you know, staff and the applicant to try to find more information about the history of the property, you know, particularly the structure. So I think, you know, that's in terms of trying, and if not trying to take a vote tonight, that's the option would just be to continue the hearing. Okay.  I think the, you know, there's, at the Amherst College Archives, there's some great photographs taken from the hillside looking, you know, down Route 9 and to the tour of the town center, you know, probably even in the 30s and, you know, there's nothing visible, you know, from the images showing the structure, you know, the history of the property in terms of its ownership is, doesn't seem to have any, any significance in terms of who lived there. I'm not trying to downplay the character of the barn. I just think that if we, you know, if we were to continue the hearing, we'd really want to be clear with the applicant what we'd ask them to do.  You know, we brought up the foundation. So is it the more accurate estimate of the age detail of the rot perhaps?  I, you know, we do have certain criteria we have to vote on. Right. Is could one of those, I mean, in the age of, social distancing, a site visit can be problematic. A site visit to look at the condition could be problematic, but the condition is a different thing from the significance. Right. I think we, you know, if Amherst College allows, there can be a site visit. You know, we'd still ask, we could stagger it.  And there are masks at town hall that I could try to find to be available for commission members if they needed it. If we were to hold a site visit, a formal site visit, you know, sounds like some already did an informal site visit, but I agree the condition is different than the significance unless that helps determine some of the criteria. I would like to do a site visit. I haven't had a chance. But I think it would be useful to go all the way up to it and see it. I don't know if anybody else wants to. Yeah, I would like to. I think it would be worthwhile to be able to go inside. My informal site visit was from the side street. And I took from a couple of different angles, but it's not the same as going inside. And I didn't do that because I didn't have a formal invitation to do it. Yeah, that's something that only, you know, just this week, you know, it's been discouraged, actually, to have to have site visits. And this week, you know, like I said, we were able to get some masks and some guidelines came forward about that. So OK, so is that what commission members would would like to do? And is are the circumstances for doing that? A continuation of this hearing or is it some other kind of motion with a site visit that is scheduled in as a condition? Well, are the applicants willing to continue it just a little longer? All right. Tom, are you are you willing to? Are you muted? Not anymore. OK. Sorry. Would you be willing to continue to have the hearing continued so that commission members can look inside the barn?  I, you know, I want to this is this is kind of gone on a little bit longer for obviously no one's fault or anything like that. So we're a little bit behind the gun at this point. Just in terms of visiting the site, we'll have to be coordinating that through our EH&S, the Environmental Health and Safety Office. So if that is the next step, you know, we'd have to coordinate that with whomever very closely. The college is closed so that there there are no one. It's essentially it's treated as a bubble for the few students that are still there. So they're very strict about managing any anyone visiting. So just not that it's not impossible, but just so that you all know that we'll have to manage that very closely. You know, thanks, Tom. Like I said, the town's been closed as well.  I think the cleanest thing would be to continue it to a day and time certain and then, you know, pick it up again. I don't, I think trying to take a vote closing the hearing and taking a vote and then having a site visit is problematic. You can always reopen the hearing, but if new information is learned, you know, it's just it's another step. So, you know, the commission and the applicant are comfortable, you know, we could, we'd have to determine a date now. And, you know, it doesn't have to be, I will say with Zoom meetings, I know people are working, but it can be, you know, at a different time in the afternoon or evening. And, but we'd have to pick a time that everyone is available. If that's the route we're going. And it doesn't need a two week notice. It just needs a two, a 48 hour notice as a public, you know, a continuation of a public hearing.  But that's just, you know, how a continuation can work. Okay. Commission members, I think there, sounds like there is an option to try and schedule a site visit, which would need to be, I think, approve, meet the approval of Environmental Health and Safety at Amherst College. So, we could plan a continuation of this hearing fairly soon, within a week or so, and try and get that visit scheduled. Is that interval? How does that interval sound? A week? Good. Okay. I guess I'd look to the applicant. I mean, would it, you know, do we want to say two weeks? I don't want to schedule something that may not be feasible in terms of getting a site visit or more information. So, I just want to make sure we're, you know, we're cognizant of that. On the site visit, if we were to schedule that for some time next week, that's just as good as in two weeks. That's totally manageable. If the question is, are we going to find more information? I think that the answer, I mean, just to be blunt, is no, you know, we can look again and talk with our archivist again, but you've done that as well, Nate. And, you know, I am less optimistic that there'll be any new information about the history of the structure or its age. Okay. So, it sounds to me that the real purpose of the continuation is a site visit to look at the condition. Is that correct? The condition and the style and the setting, everything, yeah. Right. Okay. Then we can, why don't we block out next week, just the whole week to be able to have that flexibility for a site visit and then have the hearing continued the following week. Okay. I'm not available every single day, but we can, we can. Are you talking about for the site visit or the? Yeah. Well, either one. So, let's look at the first day. I have to leave, so. Okay. So, let's look first at the date for the continuation of the hearing, assuming that will be two weeks from now.  The 5th doesn't work for me, but the 4th and the 6th too. Monday and Wednesdays are the days that I possibly have to go the whole day to New Haven. So, I'm better on Tuesday, Thursday or Friday. Sorry, I don't know for next week yet. It's always the last second. Okay. I can do Thursday and Friday as well. I can do Thursday and Friday. I can't do Tuesday. I can do any day except Thursday night. So, it looks like we can do a daytime site visit on the 7th. Well, I was thinking the site visit would be, the site visit would be next week. Right. And the hearing would be continued, please. Oh, next week is, oh, okay, sorry, I'm a week ahead. So, we're talking, right now we're talking about the hearing. And it looks like Thursday and Friday work for everybody, but I'm not sure about you, Nate. Oh, it doesn't matter for me. Okay. Oh, it works. Okay, can we find a daytime time? Daytime works for me. Yeah. For the meeting on the 7th? Meeting on the 7th? Yeah. I would be available after 12.30 on the 7th. Okay. So, two to four, four to six, something like that? Yeah. Okay. Two to four would be good. Let's say, I'm not available at two, but let's say, I mean, and I don't think this is a two hour, this will not be a two hour meeting. So let's say, if we can say three o'clock, will that work? Yeah. Okay, three PM. And seven. Okay, so that's, if that's, you know, if the commission may 7th at three, if that's what the commission would like, you know, we need a motion and not, you know, a procedural process, but so I just want to make sure that may 7th at three PM works for the applicant and for commission members. So. Tell them, Mark, is that, is that a possibility? It should be brief. Yeah, I can make myself available. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So, is there a move? Yeah. I'll move that the, this hearing just for 211. 197. I mean, 197. Is that right? Just for that one, right? Right. We continued until May 7th, 2020 at three PM, held via virtual platform. A second submission. Thank you. All in favor? Aye. Aye.  So. Okay. All right, great. All right, four and I will continue my, I don't know, do I need to abstain for this? Oh yeah, you were abstaining, so right. I'm abstaining, yeah. Okay. Okay. Thank you. So, how about 211? That is- We need to schedule the site visit or are we going to wait on that? I think that's going to take a little more coordination. So, let's, why don't we, if you don't mind, let's go through, go through this other property first and then come back to what we need to put in place and who we need to check with about the site visit. Yeah, I'm okay. If we have to do that, you know, just by email with the applicants, I think that I don't want to try to spend time tonight doing it. If we, you know, they don't know the information. You know, as long as it can be, it can be any time before that next hearing date, right? So I mean, it can be the day before, right? I mean, it doesn't have to be next week, but so now we've given ourselves a window of when that could happen. So, I mean, Tom and Mark, I would just look to you, you know, we can email tomorrow and this week and just, you know, I'll let you do some research on your end and you can get back to me and we can forward it to the commission. I don't, we don't necessarily need to spend the time tonight on it. Dave, I have a, I have a question. Amherst College must have building inventories. And would this particular house be part of a building inventory that would show when the house was acquired and when the barn was acquired? Oh, that's on the property card. So, you know, it's been. So you've reviewed that. Yeah. And so like I said, there really isn't much on the ownership. You know, there was, you know, like I said, when the property was inventoried as part of the Amherst College Historic Inventory and the property was too, there's just, there's mention of the house, but of the barn, there is no mention. So anything I found, there's no mention of the barn, you know, really, other than that, there's a barn on the property. There's no, no description of it or anything. So. Okay, thank you. Just double checking. You know, I'll look some more. Like I said, I've looked and there's really, I'm surprised, really, there hasn't been any research on the barn. Any documentation?  Yes, I wanted to clarify, and I apologize, I should have said this previously. The college did not own this property until very recently. It's been owned privately by various people associated with the college. Most recently, Betsy Cannon Smith who oversees our fundraising group. And she sold it back to the college or sold it to the college five years ago, Mark, something like that. And so because it's not part of the campus proper or it's not, you know, it's not like College Hall or, you know, Converse Hall or the library where we have all these of information, it's a neighborhood building that was certainly associated, I think, off and on anyway for most of its existence associated with the college, but wasn't part of the campus proper and wasn't owned by the college. So I should have mentioned that previously. Okay, thank you. So the assessor's office would have the history of when the barn showed up as a taxable outbuilding, right? Well, so I mentioned that the sandborn map show a structure there earlier, but then the footprint and location changed. So there's been some type of outbuilding on the property in that similar location since the 19 teens, but then, you know, this structure, I think the assessor's car did say 1930. So, you know, using those tax records will show that there's a structure there, but it's hard to say if it's the structure that's currently there. Great, okay, thank you. Yep. All right, so let's see, this is now 211, south pleasant, a one car garage. And if you can see the screen, I have the property pulled up with the, you know, the garage here within the dotted line of the property. You rotate the view once, Clarke-Warths? Let me rotate the view, huh? Ooh. Oh, come on. You're good enough for that. It's a pull down from the top of your screen. It's not on the PDF, it's on your screen. How does this, I mean, does this, is this rotated the way you like? Yep, well, you're quick. He probably did that while he was doing something else. Probably did. It's as much as you were reminding us about the meeting during our previous meeting, I was answering who was it, Hedy or somebody about how to sign in. So, you know, we're one on one here. Right, right. Okay, so, Tom and Mark, is there more you would like to tell us beyond the demolition delay, the demolition permit application? Yes, this is also, as you could guess, related to the project that we were referencing earlier. And the current property at 197 South Pleasant has a small, very awkward, steep driveway that comes right off of South Pleasant Street. What became very obvious to our landscape architects and planners is that that would not be a viable option for accessing an academic building or really any building of any size for handicap accessibility, for servicing the building, trash collecting, whatever, all that kind of stuff. So, they set about identifying a way to create a viable driveway. And the only real option because of topography and other things, it's quite a hilly site, but the only viable option is to actually come off of Walnut Street and the grading required and the site required essentially would go through this little one car garage that's associated with a college-owned faculty rental property right there on the corner. So, the plan would be to remove that one car garage essentially to enable the access drive for the academic building that we were talking about earlier. Okay, thank you. Nate, is there anything you would like to add to what we know or don't know? No, I think, again, very little research on this. It does appear the assessors had it in the 60s as well as date of construction and that's really it. There wasn't much history. The house itself is older, but again, not much on the owners really, the house was inventoryed, but there's really not, there's no mention of the garage and nothing with the owners really. Okay, members, do you have questions? Can I try and redeem myself in Tom's eyes by saying I think there's nothing precious about this and you can take it down in my view? And I agree, it's totally a nondescriptive structure. I was able to see that closer than the barn and to save it in the light of the plan for the property makes no sense at all to me. I'm in agreement rather inconsequential. Okay, well that's, I think all parties are heard from in that case, so it sounds to me like we can move to a motion or that someone can make a motion. All right, so I move that we approve the application for demolition of the small one car garage at 211 South Pleasant Street. Seconded. Okay, all in favor, wave your hand. Okay, that's four and one abstention. Mom, will you ever speak to me again now? He's muted. Like that's not. Yeah, well, okay, so thank you all. Thanks Mark and Tom for coming to tell us about these projects and we will I guess be in touch through Nate about organizing a time for a site visit. Yeah, that'll work. So I can just wait to hear from Tom and Mark and then if you do just maybe offer a few times and we can see when the commission is available.  Someone I could be there just to monitor, but trying to get the co-commission into the barn at once is probably not advised and something the town wouldn't wanna have happened. I'm sure Amherst called one either. So just we can, you know, we'll work it out, but. Yeah. Okay. All right. All right, thanks. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks. All right, now I need to, let's see. So we'll put the agenda. That was it. The next thing needed. Oh, is that it right there? A minute. Yeah. All right. So it looks like, you know, the, there's two attendees. One, I know one is for the Civil War tablets. If the commission wants to move quickly through the announcements, if there are any, and then there are minutes, but. Jane, it's up to you if you want to, how you want to structure that. I think if we could just very quickly. Now let's, let's go if there is someone here for the Civil War tablets, let's go there and then we'll come back to announcements and minutes. Okay. Yeah. So, you know, I think I have to, I'm going to move Anika to a panelist to allow her to speak. And she's unmuted. Thank you. Great. Okay. Hello, Anika. Hi, how are you? Good. How are you? How are you? Thank you. Are you here by phone or by video? Video. Can you see me? No. Yeah. You can, I think as a panelist now, you can make your video. You can turn your video on. Bottom left of your screen. There's a little camera. That's it. There you go. Okay. Do you see me? Hi there. What do you do? In your sideways. Yeah. Why is she sideways? Perfect. I'm seeing all of you sideways. Oh no. That happened before. And I'm not, we couldn't fix it on a previous video. Okay. All right. Well, we'll just, we'll just. We'll all just turn sideways for you. Yeah. But that might mean we're turning. How did I not see I'm not in? Yeah. Okay. So Anika, welcome to the historical commission meeting. Because we're absolutely not in the same room, I think by, by, you know, mousing over your screen, you can see the names of people, but we can introduce ourselves very quickly. So I'm Jane Wald. I'm the chair of the historical commission. And Pat, why don't. I'm Pat off a member of the historical commission. And Robin. I'm Robin Fordham, a member of the historical commission. Eddie. Hi, I'm Hetty Anika. I'm a member of the commission as well. Well, nice to meet you all. Nice to meet you too. And then. Yep. Hi, Anika. We met briefly. I'm going to be playing with the town of Amherst. Yeah. And Jane didn't acknowledge me, but I'm here. No, I did. I called your name twice. Oh, sorry. I was, I was getting rid of Nate's screen so I could see the. That way that came. Sorry. Okay. I'm here. Sorry. Meeting fatigue. All right. So thanks, Anika. What would you tell us what you have in mind about the Civil War tablet? Sure. Well, thank you quickly for having me. Just a little brief background for anyone whom I haven't met. I became actually reintroduced, you know, my interest actually was regenerated with these plaques through my late grandfather, Dudley Bridges, who I believe was a member of with you all, the historical society. He was a long, long time. He was a director of building services at UMass and also through my great-grandfather, Gilbert Roberts, who a musician born in Amherst in 1896 where he lived until he was 107. I remember them, you know, talking about these stories, maybe, you know, late 90s. Flash board, I have recently relocated back to the area from Brooklyn after a few decades. And I really became interested to see, you know, had the plaques been up. I know that initiating a fund was something my grandfather had done. And I was really surprised the amount of interest that was generated just through my own field. I work in design and I'm a milliner, aside from working with advancement and development. And through a friend of mine who had worked in production with Movie Glory, she was able to connect me with some folks who, you know, were really interested in helping out with a memoriam. And just briefly looking at some of the previous plans and hearing, you know, just the amount of work and costs associated. I've been looking in, you know, some ideas that were, you know, sustainable with maintenance, with ongoing maintenance, and, you know, that perhaps could help with just another project that could be going on in the area. Meeting with Nathaniel and Jennifer Moisten, they did tell me about a few different areas that they were looking at. And so I've, you know, really continued on to really move ahead with a project. And then here we have our little world on pause, which of course, as I'm sure everyone knows, has for the moment kind of changed the landscape of giving for the moment, if it's not directly related to life-saving services, it's kind of on pause. But I have been in contact with some of these folks, especially through that work on production and glory. There's also a group of two different groups of 54th Regiment Reenactment Historians that have reached out. And so I've basically had to rethink just a bit, just to retweak my proposal to send to you all and see what you think about it. But I do, you know, I have recently received some emails back that is still on people's radars. But of course, with a lot of the film companies and production houses being closed for the moment, it's something that would probably, you know, not come up into the radar for at least the next foreseeable months. But I just, you know, I'm happy to be invited and I just wanted to, you know, share that, you know, I'm still very passionate and excited about it. It's just because there is quite a bit of gift giving associated with this and fundraising those developers have been put on pause for at least the near foreseeable future. Okay, thank you. So you mentioned a proposal. Are you planning to submit a specific proposal to the Historical Commission or elsewhere? Yes, absolutely. It was, I initially was going to, you know, send something along via night beforehand, you know, last month before the start, but just due to the current goings on those, just numbers and, you know, just certain facts would have to be tweaked. And so I just wanted to get, you know, just as much information, especially for design suggestion and, you know, the best sustainability, I wanted to be able to gather a little bit more of that and just be able to give something that was just a little more thorough. I mean, of course, there's so much that we don't know going forward, but, you know, we still haven't been able to have, you know, just a site visit to see the current condition. And of course, with social distancing, those, that's a little challenging at this point. But the pictures that I was sent were, you know, quite enough to generate a lot of interest. And so hopefully I would, you know, hear more by mid-May. I would say that would probably be the latest that I would have someone reaching out to me just in terms of what they could commit. You know, what they could commit to now. And then I would be able to put together a, you know, a thorough package to send to you all. Okay. What others could commit in terms of services or? Services, you know, knowing what I had heard is bold part of what, you know, may be available for in a memoriam, you know, clearly there would have to be additional funding, quite a bit of additional funding on top of that. And in regards to whichever memoriam the maintenance of, continued maintenance of. So, you know, just in terms of the design projects and what those estimations may be, you know, a couple of options, of course, you know, for, you know, what would be deemed appropriate and, you know, embraced by the town, if any of them. So everything is spelled out, you know, if this is acceptable, if this is like, this is what it would be figured out in terms of this is cost who has committed, you know, these type of things like that. Commission members, do you have questions, comments? Sorry, I'm just gonna, yeah, but in quickly. Thanks, Aniga, the, yeah, I think, you know, so this was, gosh, it's been a few years ago, you know, there was CPA money appropriated to clean and restore the tablets and they've been created up in Rockston and North Amherst near Puffers. And the idea originally was that that was gonna be temporary and then there would be, you know, an installation for these, you know, they're really meant to be seen, you know, first it was thought maybe in town hall, but then it became apparent that it was difficult to get them all into town hall. Then the idea was maybe they would go into the new library or if the Historical Society Museum was expanding, they would go there, you know, there's still the possibility of them having space in the library, but that's, I'm not sure where that, you know, discussion is. So when staff met with Aniga, you know, we've also shared that, you know, at one point it looked at having outside displays outside of town hall, you know, we mentioned Kendrick Park or the gate slot at the end of Sweetser Park.  So, you know, some of it is with the commission, if there's a proposal that comes in, you know, this can be something that the commission and others can then, you know, it'd become a process where we'd make a presentation to the town manager and possibly the town council and we'd, you know, we'd keep this moving forward so that it's not stalled.  And so I think for the commission, you know, some of it is, you know, what is the location? What is it serving? You know, what is the design? And then fundraising and pieces of that. But I think it's nice to have a project proponent and then, you know, maybe that's something the commission can work with. And then, like I said, you know, make more presentations on this. The, you know, we've mentioned it to different people but with so much happening, you know, there hasn't been a champion of this. You know, we still have outstanding CPA money and the CPA committee asks every once in a while but it's not as if they're saying, well, we're going to offer to help do the project. They just want to know what's happening with the money. So, you know, to me, that's what I see. I see this as, you know, getting more support, maybe, you know, galvanizing support for this to become a priority again in a way that it hasn't been. And so, you know, I don't have necessarily any answers. You know, I can help do some research and things. But, you know, that's kind of where we are right now. You know, that's why I had also from initially been looking really outside of the town as far as funding with people who would have an interest and a more flexible interest as opposed to the town, especially now, I'm sure that there would be, you know, other issues that would take priority as far as gift giving and fundraising would go you know, within the coming months especially or even year. So, the original plans and proposals that I included were just through the spaces that were shared with me, which was, I believe it's North Common. The other is the park that is across the street, excuse me for not knowing the name of it, with a fountain that was across the street. And then it was shared that there was issues with that fountain. So I was thinking, well, maybe, you know, with those fundings would also make repair, could repair the fountain as well. And then also the Abilities Kendrick Park. So those were when you see the proposals that I give, it just will have those three spaces as example. But of course, you know, the more the mayor, if there's any other ideas, that's just the information that I have to be able, that I was able to include in the proposal. Okay. Nate, is the idea to use them outside, assuming that we can put some sort of finish on them that will make them impermeable to weather, because just reading the description of the restoration on there, it looks like they're not in any shape at the moment to be outside. So yeah, here, you know, with some of the CPA money at one point, we had hired HAI architects and they, at one point was trying to, you know, could they be outside of town hall, you know, in some type of display? So I think what happened with town hall is that, well, one, it's not fully accessible in some areas. And, you know, maybe people won't actually go into town hall to see the tablet. So the question became, if they were displayed in town hall, for instance, in the town room, how publicly accessible are they really? Because who comes into town hall to go into a meeting room and look at the tablets when there could be meetings going on. So the idea of having them outside was one, just to make them more publicly accessible.  I think the other issue, Jan, you brought it up, was right, that how do these tablets, how are they maintained if they're outside? So the thought was that they would be in, not necessarily a case, but they'd have to have some protective glazing in front of them. And there'd have to be a mounting system where moisture could circulate around them in air so they're not susceptible to extremes in temperature and humidity. So none of that was necessarily worked out. It was just, those were the questions and issues that were brought up. And so, if you can see the screen, here's one schematic that was thought of. One was having another type of, display, they're also meant to be seen in a series too. So, you know, they were originally, you know, in a stairwell, but they were meant to be seen sequentially or altogether. And so, you know, we were also trying to find a space big enough that they could all be viewed relatively easily or together. So, you know, some people have said, well, can we have two areas where they're viewed? But then, you know, separating them physically might, you know, have other problems and may not have a full impact of seeing them together.  And, you know, my thought is, you know, we're still working on the North Common. Yeah, I'd rather see them as some of the knee walls in the North Common kind of incorporated into the space rather than this awkward sticking out of the side of the building like that as a little gallery. I was just wondering if we know for a fact that there is some material that can seal them. We never, the architect said probably, just we never really went that far, to be honest. If I could, I had one architect proposed, well, actually all of the proposals included, they are encased, but it's a matter of the type of encasing. So, it's weather resistant, whether, you know, it would stand and withhold like the New England winter, but basically everything there is protected. And then one has an actual like top enclosure so you can walk through. I did send pictures of the areas just, you know, for the designers looking at it to be able to compliment the background and kind of have it work in something. So, you'll see what they're sending. There's one is, one almost resembles like when you're like a museum in Kosher. So, it has the look of standing outside but it's protected from the elements. And they also, these designs do not have the draining, they do not have the same draining issues that I believe some of the other designs did and that cost the elevated just slightly.  I wonder if they could be incorporated into the design of the bandstand, whenever that happens or whatever that design is. I don't know what the design is. Right, no, yeah. It's in the midst of being changed radically. So, perhaps, I just see it working on the North Common better because they're so big. There's so much linear space that'll be taken up, right? And they're tall too, you know. Yeah. Yeah, the dimensions of them are laid out right here. So, about five feet by six feet. Yeah, Jan, I agree. I like the idea of trying to integrate them into the North Common. I think if we ever change the boltwood as and then made a better plaza in front of town hall could they be incorporated there into this whole design? Again, it's something that, I think the commission could, if once we could wait till June, but keep this moving and keep it as part of the conversation. So it's not just, it's not lost when the North Common gets picked up again. Well, my understanding was that the North Common will be picked up again next year for the following year, right? It was, you know, the town manager had done his four, you know, mentioned four projects to kind of revitalize downtown or increase the public space of downtown. And the North Common was one of them along with some Kendrick Park, you know, work and maybe a possibly a public private partnership in the parking garage and accessibility improvement. So this was one of the projects, you know, that, you know, the whole common, you know, the bandstand in the North Common was one that he wanted to write, see happen in the near future. So it's probably to push back a little bit, but. Yeah, okay. Well, because that project is being supported by the town manager and may, may well proceed, that seems both the most practical and probably the most significant possibility for placement right now. Yeah, we only have half the money we need for the design that's currently working, but it'll be modified because of that. And so incorporating these, you know, could be put into that modification pretty easily. We're gonna have to kind of start over anyway. So what shall we, how shall we proceed from here? Should we just continue to keep this on our, as a sort of an ongoing agenda item so that it, it's all, you know, that we can sort of track it and then take advantage of timing opportunities as they come up. It sounds really interesting. I think we should just keep plugging away at it and making sure it's on our radar as well as other people's. What was the goal of having it on the agenda today? What were we, what were we expected to do? I think, you know, just to reintroduce it. So, you know, have Anika talk about it. I think because of the COVID crisis, it did, you know, tweak the schedule a bit. But I think, you know, hearing her speak, I think, you know, we could have this as something that on the June agenda could be a topic, it could be in July, when this would be, you know, she could discuss it more if she has a proposal. The town manager has said he doesn't want to have site visits until late June on town property. So it could also be that maybe in June, we could have, you know, have people go to Rockston and see the tablets. You know, we could actually do that then in late June, early July. So, you know, tonight really is just, you know, is that, you know, so there are new commission members. My thought is just to get this again, right back on the radar, have the commission members thinking about it.  What are possible issues or challenges? What are opportunities? And then it just, you know, becomes something that we can further the conversation. It would make sense to me to put it on the agenda when Anika is ready to come back with a proposal. And it would seem that that would probably coincide with the June or July that you're talking about, perhaps. And then a site visit so that we could be more familiar with the tablets and then go from there. I think that makes good sense. And that way you all would be able to, you know, have your opinions on what design structure proposals you like, if any, and, you know, be able to visualize them. That sounds great. Can I just mention one thing to keep in mind? Cause I think I'll be off the commission by then and I don't know about you, Jane, but note that they vary in thickness. It says for approximately one and a half to two inches. These are marble. Marble has the lowest tensile strength of almost any material, which means it can't hold its own weight. That's very thin. So they're gonna have to be set within some other structure no matter what, unless they're hung on an interior wall or something, and even then they could just break from their own sheer weight, you know, on themselves. So keep that kind of in mind when you're thinking about display that no matter what you do, they're gonna have to be reinforced with some sort of frame. Yeah, the consultants, you know, Irving Slavitt, who, you know, is from Monument and Conservation Collaborative, he had said that. I mean, he recommended that if they were displayed to have a backing on them, the entirety of the tablet, some of them have cracks, you know, through them, you know, we, they're in Rockston now. At one point, we actually had, we talked with Irving, you know, this is a few years ago about trying to get them in the town hall and even having one, some of them be displayed and, you know, they recommended having a professional rigor move them because they're so fragile and it is a big project because of that, you know. But I think, yeah, I think waiting till late June or July, I can try to, we can see about a site visit for the commission members and others. And then this can be, you know, on the agenda for June or July.  And Jan, yeah, you probably, that's right. So commission members, there are a few that terms expire June 30th. Typically, if you've been on for two terms, you are, you won't be reappointed. But Jan, you know, we can make an exception if you want. They're always welcome to come back to a meeting. I'll just keep, I'll keep you on the email listserv. So you always get the emails anyway.  You've got a deal. Okay, well, Anika, thank you very much for coming to talk with us about this project. Well, thank you for having me. It was nice to meet you all virtually, who I haven't met. Likewise.  Great. Yeah. No, thanks so much. Okay. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. So let's see, we should go back to announcements. Are there announcements, Nate, or anyone else? No, I think that's a good segue though. The, I'll reach out to the commission members whose terms are expiring. It's the town managers aware of it. There's a number of, you know, on members, on boards and committees where members are expiring. So I'm not sure what the idea is, you know, at this time in terms of membership, but that's something I'll just reach out to everyone and, you know, see if I can get an update there. Okay. Yeah, we are, let's see, I think we are at a, we're one short of maximum, but that actually means that we're at a minimum, I think. So we're, you know, sure of, of funny number. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Minutes from the January meeting. They're here too, if anyone has any. Yeah, I saw a couple of things. Can I ask a couple of questions? I wasn't at the meeting, but I'm just looking at the actual text of the minutes. Under two, I assume that first eye is supposed to be A, because otherwise it goes straight to B. Yeah, that looks like that should be, okay. And then down in the Sarah McKee text, I think there's a typo on the fifth line down. It says there are aspects of the building that involve charging. I think it's changing parts of the outer structure, and it would be there are aspects of the plan. You move so fast, where are we now? Is that the D? Do you say the second page or the first page still? The third page. It's the third page. Oh, my goodness. 7D. I'm gonna see only two things I marked. I wasn't reading that fast. Okay, no, 7D, okay. See where it's a fifth line down should be there are aspects of the plan that involve changing parts of the outer structure. I mean, I'm assuming that's what she said. Instead of charging, and the verb is gone. Yeah, yeah, the other structure is really hard. Yeah, I think it's changing. Okay, yeah. And add in the word are. Okay. Okay. That's all I saw, but I wasn't there. So I don't know what y'all really said. I think the 7D, Molly Turner's comment, Putnam, I believe that is the name of the architect. I think it's Rosswell Putnam. It is right, yes. Let me do that for you. And maybe instead of historic architect, local 19th century architect or local 19th century architect. Yeah, I think local 19th century. So what's the architect's name? Is it Rosswell Putnam? Yes. Okay, because I'm intrigued now. I want to go find out more. Yeah, there's a few buildings around town. There were, I think three on North Prospect Street that were attributed to him. It was one actually right behind the Historical Society that was moved to make way for the CVS parking lot. But there's a few in town and then I think in the library as well. Thanks. So with those corrections, is there a motion to approve the minutes with corrections? Fine to approve the minutes as amended. Thank you. Second. Thank you, Pat. And all in favor raise hands. Should I abstain since I wasn't there? Yes. Probably, yeah. Okay, so we've got one, two, three, four. And one extension, okay. Comments for, comments to the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission for outbuildings and any of our district nominations. I think I'll just, one is the East Village expansion. I guess they've submitted it to Mass Historic and they're wondering if there's any local comments. So I can email this out again. It was emailed quite a while ago and Shannon Walsh came and discussed, from PVPC discussed this, I think, I don't know if it was at the November meeting. I was gonna try to find the map. So I don't necessarily have any comments. There's a lot of paper here, 37 pages. But I think if the commission members had any, the boundaries were extending quite a bit, a bit north and east. And... So I think probably that the historical commission, the local historical commission should make some comment even if it's just more like an endorsement. Sure. Yeah, you know what? That's too bad. I don't see a map here. Sorry to click through so fast. I don't see a map. Quickly for this. So yeah, there's a number of properties that are being included. So we can talk about it tonight or we can wait for the next meeting. What do you need from us? Just an approval or appreciation or something? Yeah, it could be that the commission acknowledges the expansion or if you had to comment on specific properties. I don't think that I do at this time, you know, the... Can we... Let's see, I'm thinking maybe I could draft a short letter of some kind that after I look at it again. And it can be part of the knowledge... Send the letter with the document and we can, you know, read the document and then tell you if we think the letter's fine or if we want to add anything. Sure. I can email all this again and we can see if there's any in the comments. She does good work. So I'm expecting it to be good reading. I mean... Yeah, no, I think, you know, we... This project started a while ago so I've already been over the boundaries. So we try to include, you know, for instance, going east toward Palom, you know, at some point there was a decision whether it was, you know, political or money-wise, why they didn't capture some homes that were also contemporary to other homes when the district was nominated. So, you know, for instance, we've tried to capture homes north and east that were left out that were also of the same time period and significant to the district and also south and west. So I feel like we've, you know, we've... Through her work, we've captured what is a pretty good boundary for the East Village. Nate, did I see in the list of properties that some were bolded in the table? Are those added properties? Yeah, let me get to that. It might just be my screen, but it looks like some are bold and some are not bold. Right, no, I think some of these, right, were added. So the ones in bold were added. Added, okay, thank you. Yeah, so there's a fair number. Yeah. Nate, I remember going through this when it was originally sent and I personally didn't have any comment, but I'm happy to go through it again. Great. All right. So, yeah, Jane, would you want to draft a letter and I can send this out tonight or tomorrow and we can just, you know, you and I can look at the letter sometime next week or whenever and we can send it off to Shannon. Yeah. Okay. Thank you, Jane. Thank you. Okay. Then updates. The Barnett 562 Montague road. We don't, we still don't have a report or findings of, from the timber frame guy, do we? What is it about barn people that come and promise reports and never give them? Is it something endemic to the field? They don't like computers. We can write it by hand. Commitments.  So I think sometimes when we say report or something, maybe it scares, scares people to think that they have to present something that's very formal, but I tried to say that it can just be, you know, as simple as, right? Um, a quote or bullet points, you know, it can be a hand drawn. A plan if you need. So I, yeah, I can, um, Yeah, I don't know. We need, we should have some follow up there. Is anybody contacted him since your last meeting when it shows it wasn't in yet? No. Okay. Maybe it's time. I walk past that barn when I go out for a walk and, um, you know, there was a little addition on the, on the West side that looked like it wasn't in very good. It's the worst. Right. And it has, it's now pretty much collapsed. Oh yeah. We still not sure what that little addition was, right? There are some ideas. Right. Yeah. Quite small, but now it's, you know, and it was in rough shape when we, uh, when we looked at it, it was probably the worst. Uh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It looked like it was either where there was, you know, compost or manure was stored. And then maybe later had been converted to some of a chicken cow, but, um, yeah. Yeah. When does the delay end on this barn? Yeah. In the fall, right? Yeah. Yeah. I think it was August. Was it August that was issued late August? Right around there. Yeah. Then we did a site visit when it had started to turn cold. I remember that. Right.  That seems like a long time ago. And then we went back to you and I went back with the barn expert. With Nate. And then it was. An expert. Yes. We've been there three times. Yeah. Yeah. So Nate, you're going to follow up with the fellow who was their last. Yeah, I can follow up. The owner. At the owner too, at the end, um, the meeting said he would be interested in possibly reusing. Some of the timbers too. Um, which was interesting. He said that he might want to use them and reconstruct a smaller barn or shed on the property in the same location. So. It may be that, um, You know, that that becomes the best route. You know, I'm not sure anyone is going to come and salvage it, but I'll follow up with Jesse and see what, um, I'm not sure if you can get us anything. Find out how hard it would be to salvage them out. I have a contractor who's looking for old beams like that. Um, And so if, if it's easy enough when they're taking it apart to save those, I know he'd love to come just take them off their hands. Right. Yeah. I'll ask that. I think the, um, it's funny, you know, some contractors probably just want to go in there with a wrecking ball, but. You could actually, you know, cut it in pieces and probably, I mean, probably do it in a way that it's not that hard, but that's something we can ask. Yeah. That wasn't the kind of demolition he had though, bid. Right. We're going to do it in like four hours. Get a knocking ball. Yeah. Yeah. Right. The, uh, We're on a ship for 62 main street. The, um, you know, the owner had advertised and, you know, there was some follow up, but nothing. There wasn't any taker. So the, you know, the, um, project is still, I guess, moving forward in terms of the, um, You know, he's cleared the trees around there. So the barn, you know, the garage, carriage house barn can come down. You know, there wasn't any. Anyone who was willing to come take it. So. And our last vote on that was that we would lift the delay. We would lift the delay. If he could, unless he found somebody, what was, we had a special head of you came up with that. He had to advertise. And if long as he advertised. After a certain point in time, we would lift the delay. Wasn't that the deal? It was right. So as of, you know, March or April, maybe it was through March. Uh, if he kept the advertisement open. Uh, then the delay would be lifted. And so. You know, he did show me some, you know, is the listing and Craig's listed online and he posted it again in the Gazette and there were some email correspondence with interested individuals, but nothing. Uh, worked out.  And they said, well, I think that the cost to who at Wanda, we use it would be greater. To try to reuse it than just to build new on this on their own site. So no one was willing to do that. Okay. So do we, uh, feel that the conditions that we've placed on that. Delay have been fulfilled. I think so. I can't see. Any real. Place we can go from here. Right. You gave it our best shot. We did. It's really a shame because now the trees are down. The property is already probably looking pretty bleak. Um, Let's see. So we. I mean, if there's, if there's a lot of people who are in the state, you know, if they're not allowed to do that, you know, then the delay couldn't be, wouldn't be allowed. I mean, the demolition wouldn't be allowed. So, you know, I thought that. You know, through email and what he had sent. Um, you know, it seemed like as if he had satisfied with the commission requested. And we already voted. So we don't need to. Right. That's an administrative. That's in the administrative arena. Now it's not, we don't, we don't take any more action. Um, you know, if there wasn't anything. Okay. Then, uh, demolition delay bylaw. Um, so. I didn't have a standstill there. Um, I did email Jane to get reconnected with her. We talked about having a workshop. Now we have social distancing. So, um, we're going to have a meeting. We're going to have a meeting over the next week or two. And we'll together what we've got and reconvene at the next meeting and let you know where we stand. Are you moving through it somewhat or are we still at the very beginning? Well, we had kind of paused to the hope of, um, sponsoring a demo delay workshop, but the mass historical commission. Right. Um, and then not having gotten that on the calendar. Um, But that's the, the, the, the COVID situation that doesn't look like we were hoping that that would help. We were kind of pausing to have that experience help direct us. So, uh, we have to. Take an approach or return to the old approach, I guess. I just personally, I think the longer we delay, not. Not updating our bylaw. The more stuff we're going to run into that's dicey. Yeah.  Um, or be a part of something. You know, I haven't cut that to date, but I know. You know, some communities have really, um, Updated their bylaws in the last few years. So there's some new thinking on how to. You know, how to manage a demolition bylaw. You know, ours is, ours is a 30 year old template really, right? A 20 year old template now. Yeah.  And so he. He actually has a draft. He thought he said he thought he'd send it to, um, You know, Ted Parker at the time, but let me follow up with Rob. He had tried to come up with a pretty clean version. Um, you know, a kind of a different approach. So let me. If he's willing to share that. Okay. So I. I'll contact. Chris Kelly again and see if he would want to do a remote workshop. Yeah. Or wait, wait this out and then do a workshop, but maybe he'd be interested in a remote workshop. Yeah, I can, if he, and I'm sure he can, um, but if not, I can always try to, you know, through the town, we could host something too. If he's willing. Yeah. You know, we could. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Great. Um, Let's see. Writers walk. Jan's going to really hurt me. I'm on the edge of my seat here. Yeah. You know, we, the town put this out to bid and. Um, I thought art effects was under contract. And then, um, so, you know, I've emailed Anthony, but there really hasn't been a lot, um, a lot, um, moving forward on that right now. So. Um, let me follow up with Anthony, but you know, like I said, I thought it was already under contract. It's just a matter of fabricating and getting them installed and. Um, you know, I'm not sure where that is. So yeah, he did send them. I mean, he did do the bid and it didn't. Get past that point. We were stalled because he hadn't sent anything out, right? But then that he did send out. Yes. And they responded. Yeah. I'd seen something. And you know, I've emailed Anthony a number of times on this and, um, It's, you know, for whatever reason, that seems to be the, um, You know, a bit of a roadblock. And I thought there was a contract for it. And, um, I haven't heard much. So let me just do that. You know, the idea was still to have it done this, uh, This spring, which is still the possibility. So we had been working to get this done. Install this spring and summer. And so that's, that's still the goal. Do we have the text corrected for the website yet? We can't fabricate it until we have that text. Uh, It was just the web address, right? Right. We were going to make it a better address for the tone. Yeah. So for the commission, You know, the UMass hosts, the writers walk, it's a, um, It's not a town owned or a town, a town website. And so there was concern that if it, you know, The domain never changed. Uh, then, you know, the, the web link would be to the wrong site. So I talked to it. We had two different ideas about that. Um, One is we had a web address that would just be like a redirect. So it wouldn't actually, you know, just. It would link to whatever though that needed to be. And so, um, The other one was then to try to actually put it on the town website, which isn't really what we wanted to do. So I think, you know, we were going to go with the web redirect, the hyperlink reader. Let me follow up with that, but I thought that was fun. I thought that was okay. You know, it was never finalized, but, um, As long as the address to redirect is an address that if that ever went away, we could use to fill it with our own. With the cereal, right? Right. Yeah. Okay. We do have to have that before we can send out the. Approved. Signs. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We, I just spoke with someone in our IT and we had come up with. What was the solution at the time. So let me. Right. And is there if, if Anthony doesn't respond, is it possible to go on the other end and ask Art FX, whether they. Got stuff and are ready to go. Yeah. I can ask someone else in accounting just where that is too. I'll send an email out tomorrow or tonight about that. Do you want me to bug you in a couple of days? Sure. Okay. And then I can forward your email. Okay. I'll write that that can be sent. To somebody else. People light in your bugging. What?  Oh, no, it'll be fine. Okay. All right. West cemetery signs. Yeah. Oh, you know, I, so I'm sorry. I have a fault here, which is that. I'd said that. I would reduce the. Reduce the identifications to, you know, a few words. And I did that, but I didn't send it to you. So I'll make sure that that gets to you for, for our next meeting. Yeah, I'll reach out to Kyle. I know that they, you know, One of their projects is completely stopped right now. And I know they've slowed down a bit. So. If this maybe, maybe this could. Maybe this could become then something they work on. In the meantime, I was going to say, you know, I don't know where they are though with their work. I know they have really slowed down a lot. Yeah. It sounded like. They hoped this would be our work. Yeah. Yeah. And I think the, the condition, the building commissioner was really, you know, of the interpretation that the. The way they presented it and the condition on the site plan review was that the commission would. Review information, but not necessarily. Be doing the design, right? Or paying for it. So. Yeah. Yeah. It sounded like. They hoped this would be our work. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. I think they were really looking for it. So. I thought that was clarified through the building commissioner with Archipelago. Yeah, I can do another follow-up with that. Send me what you have. You know, David Fichter was going to come up right with another. The art, you know, the muralist was going to have. He had, I thought he'd emailed me. We had asked him to do a little bit more research on what he wanted to do. So I think that was a good sign. I took a sign. Right. Yeah. All right. Okay. To the general updates. Sorry. Can I add F to the updates here? Item. No, I would add J as well. Okay. Um, can I ask about the sheep? Yeah. Yeah. I did. I did. And he's very willing. That's his business. He lives in Northern Franklin, just actually in, in Southern Vermont, just over the line, but he went to the Vogue school in Franklin County. And he's very interested. And I totally would get back to him when spring came, because he wanted to see. Where the sheep would graze. And he wanted to see what was growing there. And he had to look after the sheep. I think that was a good sign. Kind of on hold a little bit or one thing growth hasn't really happened. So that he would be able to engage. But, but, um, whenever you give me the go ahead, I'll get in touch with him again and. Nate and I can meet him at the cemetery and have him take a look. He just sounded very eager and interested. who teaches at the Vogue School.  I was working on talking to people who I thought could make a good recommendation. So Dylan Saldano, I think it's his name, but I'm thinking it's just a little early to do that. And then we've got- Well, the site is in town right now, either, right? Right, right, and he would have to give us a bid, but then there's the whole issue of whether the town would agree that we should do that. So, Nate, you have to guide us in terms of the process. Yeah, let me send an email around to staff. I think, you know, we talked with this a while ago, and I think Alan Snow, he's the division director of trees and grounds and cemeteries for public works. You know, Alan, I think has spoken favorably about this, and then comes down to logistics and other things that may be outside of his purview as well, but I'll send an email to Alan and just ask what he thinks, and he can be a part of the conversation, Pat. So I think, you know, if we're gonna schedule a site visitor email, I'll call him the sheep guy again. You know, we can move Alan in and just, you know, I think Alan- That would be good to have his input. And then, you know, to decide when would be a good time to arrange for Dylan to come. And if the town isn't wanting site meetings right now, then we have to honor that, but... Maybe in May. Yeah, I mean, outside of June. Yeah, I think, and it can also be Alan, you know, Alan may feel comfortable if it's outside and we keep our distance. So I'll email Alan and just see what, if he, how he responds. Okay, that would be good. Did the guys say anything about how many times during a growing season they would have to do it? Is it just once or would they have to come twice? He wanted to, he wanted to take a look at it. And I think, I think it might, I don't know, but I should think it might be more than once, but I don't know. It's his business. And he has, I'm not recalling the name of the fence, but he's got portable fences that he can set up to contain the sheep. And what I didn't ask him is if someone needed to be there supervising 24 seven or if they're good at night. And then we need to figure out whether they're safe. You know, it's a public place. The point. You know, the sheep are safe. So they're large enough that for the course of a day they might be able to do it all. It's not a big space. No, and you know, once he sees it, he would be better able to tell us. Right. To the, to what extent in time that they would need. But could someone make a recording, like just take some, you know, footage and send it to him. So, cause you could probably, I'm not, I'm not necessarily volunteering myself, but you could probably walk that area with a phone and then send it to him. And at least you'd get a sense of the area and how hilly it is and how intricate some of those falling or fallen stones are in relation to some of the. Well, I think that as I understand it, sheep are more docile than goats. And so we abandoned the idea of goats because they climb, they jump, they, you know, they could be destructive to the, to the headstones, but sheep are less so. So I, I don't, I need to know exactly where the area is myself. I have to tell you to be honest with you. I just know it from conversation, but I haven't walked it either. So the idea of filming it, Hedy is a good one. But I think at some point Dylan is gonna have to come and take a look at it and see whether he feels that he can manage his sheep there. But I think it's a great idea. I think it goes back to the historic bequest, if that's what it was. And, you know, it's important to do these things. So, Nate guide me, you talk to Alan and see what he says. And then if there's a possibility for us to take a look at it and we wanna invite Dylan sooner than later, then, you know, I'm happy to continue to be the liaison with him on this, this idea. Great, yeah, I'll call Alan. It's pretty great. It's great news. I'm so excited. I can't wait to see these sheep in one of them. I think it's just... I think it's going to be a very, very sweet occasion if it comes about. I'm really... Well, it has the potential for that, for sure. Wonderful. Okay, item G. Okay, so, I just wanted to give an update on the Jones Library project and where it lasted with the CPA commission. We had met and we had voted to recommend $1 million, bonded over 10 years. And at the last meeting that I was at, there was discussion whether or not this particular project was allowable. And there was basically no agreement. And I just wrote some notes up for memory. I was trying to get my head wrapped around it again. The CPA, the Coalition Steward Saginore, I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing his name correctly, initially said it was clearly not allowable, but that was really before we focused the project around specifically systems for special collections. The town attorney said it was allowable. Oh, pardon me, that's my... One of the commission members, I wanna say she spoke to the, Nate, you probably know this better than me, the Department of Revenue, I think has the final say and guidance around CPA. So she had gotten some guidance being, I guess the technical term that's supplied to communities and to determine what's allowable. And my read all of it was that it wasn't really clear. It seemed like the CPA commission was heading towards seeing it as not allowable. And I wrote a long email to Nate Buddington, arguing what I thought it was. And there was gonna be a phone call and up to the town manager and I can't remember members of the commission. In any event, that's all the CPA commission has been on pause with COVID circumstances. So I don't know when it will get picked up again, but I anticipate it will be soon. So if I don't, I mean, I could certainly circulate the email that I wrote to Nate if people are interested in my line of thinking around it. It seemed to like it was the commission was all of a sudden staring away from seeing it as something that they could approve. And I saw it as much more of a gray area. So what actually my argument was that it wasn't it was. Are you asking? Oh, I just wanted vision. I wanted. What's that? I just wanted the commission to be updated on where things stood. Okay, it's not that you want us to push the hack a little bit.  The town attorney said it was and the CPA committee really didn't know how to, you know, kind of resolve the differing opinions and the Department of Revenue, DOR, right? They as, you know, because CPA is financial, the Department of Revenue from the state usually issues guidance on some what's eligible. It sounds like that wasn't as helpful either. So I think the CPA committee really is still in the discussion of whether or not it's an eligible activity to be funded with CPA funds. And so, you know, not that it was on the agenda. And I think Robin, I'm not sure you were asking, but it could be that the commission decides to that it is eligible and we'd write a letter to the CPA committee or just something quick or it's not. I think that they're, I think the members were really struggling to determine if it was an eligible expense. And so, you know, some of it is that it's a, You know, it's an amount, it's a $1 million and really it's meant for things for special collections. But within that, the CPA coalition, you know, there's some question about, you know, just building special collections may not be eligible, but if it's equipment or things that are needed to actually preserve artifacts, then it could be. But I don't think that kind of those details were ever worked out. And I think the CPA committee- Yeah, and that was, right, that was where, I mean, where I had left it was that after that meeting, I took my own look at everything because the Diana Stein's information from the department of revenue just came right at that meeting I hadn't had a chance to look at it. So I wrote to him about my feelings about why it was allowable. And I just wanted to loop the commission back and to make sure that I'm, you know, making the right arguments and that we're, I guess, you know, an agreement or, I don't know, I mean, so it's all new. It's a new experience for me. So, Nate, you're probably the better one to provide guidance on where to go from here. So, yeah, I mean, I guess it's up to the commission what the commission would want to do. I'm not really sure. You know, the CPA committee, I think we'll try to meet in the next few weeks to pick this up. I know they're also, you know, with the COVID crisis, there's also some discussion about reprioritizing and like one funding, like would it go to whether it's rental emergency funding or things. So, you know, yeah. But if we're looking at just this project, it's up, and I guess really, I'm not sure where the commission, if the commission would want to write a letter thinking that it is eligible. I mean, it's, you know, do we want to nudge the CPA committee at all? That's a good question. So, Ron, from what I've seen it sounds, it looks and sounds to me like the CPA committee is wrestling with terms like what does preservation really mean and how far does it extend? Yeah, I think that there isn't really a strong understanding between the differences around the fact that we're not dealing with the building that the historic preservation is the artifacts, that, you know, how that gets interpreted in relation to the guidance from the Department of Revenue in terms of what's allowable. There was, it was getting, I think, muddier than it needed to be. So I could share, I don't know, I can't remember if I CC'd you on that email, Jane, but I could share that with you that we could have a conversation together. Yeah, I think you did. And I think it sounds, I guess, I don't know if this is an accurate reading, but from what I understand of the way the discussion at CPAC is gone and information you've tried to provide to them, there's not a full understanding of what constitutes a qualified preservation project, you know, how far does preservation go and does it apply to buildings or landscapes or artifacts? And is it something you do that's tangible or is it something that you do for an environment? It just seems to me that there was a lack, sort of lack of clarity around that. Is that, am I, is that? Yeah, and I think the lack of clarity seemed to be coming from the fact that there was building going on. And so you could clearly point to an HVAC system being something that's been previously approved on a whole bunch of CPAC funding in different communities, but the fact that it was going into what might be a new building seemed to be what people were getting stuck on. So, I mean, I think it might be helpful to have a letter from the commission that outlines why we think it's eligible. Okay, yeah, and do you think? Because it's, I'm certainly the only one there who's able to argue for that particular position. Yeah, and how do you think, so how should that be focused? Do you think it should be focused on talking about special collections as historic materials and try to push away the new building piece of it as far as possible? Would that help? Yeah, when I wrote to me, I tried to go through the, and I don't have that email in front of me, but I think I tried to kind of make the case piece by piece. You know, the first part being, we're talking about artifacts, we're not talking about a building. The second part, if you are providing a system to preserve the artifacts, does it make a difference whether you're doing it in the old building or in a new portion of a building? I think there might have been one more kind of sticking point. So, I can resend that to you and you could look at it and see what, if you had questions for me about what specifically, if I wasn't clear about anything. It's like they, it's, can you kind of even have to walk people through it because of the building project? That's what I would say, but that's what's confusing everyone. It's that you can't use it for a capital project, but we're not really using it for a capital project, but that's hard for people to understand. Yeah, okay. I wonder, so I wonder if it would be helpful if the commission sent a letter that, you know, doesn't really deviate much from what you have said, but sort of tries to reinforce it. So, just so that they see the voices that are saying the same thing.  Jane, or the commission could vote to allow you to write a letter, you know, if that's the room we want to go. It wasn't an agenda item. We could try to pick it up. You know, we are meeting on the seventh as a public, continued public hearing. We could make this a, you know, if we wanted to have a few items afterward, you know, just want to make sure that we're comfortable. You know, I don't know if we have enough information to discuss that tonight, but would the commission want Jane to make, write a letter of what we want to pick it up again on the seventh? Well, we should do it off of an agenda where it's shown in a public meeting rather than sort of doing it on the back side of this. But I would think that Robin's done so much. It might be easier for poor Jane, who has to always draft these letters to like, take what Robin's done and pull something out of that rather, you know, simply not to get too complicated, because we're not really sure where this is heading and it isn't really our purview. It's just a nod to CPAC, right? So I don't want to dump a lot of work on Jane for something that may not really make any sense. Well, no, that's, I mean, Jan, thank you very much. And that is kind of what I would, that is what I would sort of plan to do. I wouldn't. I just hope that you, that what I wrote was sufficient. But that, yeah, you think you could take a look at it and formalize it. Make sure that it's not overstepping and regression other. Sure, sure, yeah. And I don't think we would want to introduce a lot of new argument, you know, we wouldn't want to complicate it with a lot of new arguments of what, you know, what you've got already said, Robin is the right argument. Then we just need to, we just need to endorse it and support it with maybe I could change a word here or there, or maybe I could change like five words or. I agree that it should be on the agenda for the seventh meeting. I think it's important to have it be a public agenda item. Yeah, so she's, so between then and now should I try to draft something Jane and send it to you and have it that be for review? Is that how we would go forward or? You can or you could just forward the email to me and I can draft something from the email or. Okay, all right. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Yeah, that'd be great. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, that's true. Not knowing where this is headed with potential need for housing support. Yeah. Okay, so I think we can see that there are now no members of the public present in the meeting, so we don't need public comment. And then we can set, let's go ahead and set, what's today, the 20 second. So shall we go ahead and set another meeting date after the one on the seventh, which is mostly public hearing? Yeah, that would be good. It would be May 20th or something. Well, we would normally be scheduled for the 20th exactly. Should we try for May, why don't I say May 20th? Yeah, for me. And what time, 6 p.m. as usual, 5 p.m.? Is there any chance it would be just as good for people to do it on the Thursday, the 21st? That's okay with me. Yeah, I can do that. I can't make the 21st, but you should go ahead. No, we'll then do the 20th and I'll work it out. I just never know if they're gonna need me on that day, but it's okay. We'll just say I can't, and we'll see how that goes. So are we saying May 20th at 6 p.m.? Yes. Okay. All right. So we need to make a motion to adjourn? Yes, we do. All right. I'm here by make a motion to adjourn. Thank you. Is there a second? Second. Second. And all in favor? Aye. Aye. Great, thanks everyone. Thank you. Thanks, Nick. Thank you everyone. Thanks to each of them. Have an afternoon and evening away from your family, Nate. They were here. Well, I know. Well, we saw that little cutie's head stick up. Good. Well, thank you all. All right. Thanks everyone. Good night. Good night. Take care.