Meeting transcript
Planning and Zoning Commission - Regular Meeting
September 21, 2020 · Watch on YouTube · All meetings
Public hearing is for a two lot subdivision on 12 Webster Lane. And with that in mind Jerry would you like to run us through the application
Sure. This is a, pretty simple application for a split of an existing lot. The lots about 3.6 acres, with an existing house on it. My clients purchased this house. It had been it had been in an estate and had been empty for a number of years. It was pretty deteriorated. They have done a lot of work on it. The house is really nice right now and they recognized that they had enough room that they could split another lot off of this and so that's what we have that's what we are attempting to do is is to cut the existing house and adequate area off and have a remaining lot that they can develop with a single family home. We have been through inland wetlands in Bolton, and we've been through inland wetlands in Andover and have approvals from
both of those commissions. We've been through planning and zoning in Bolton and have approval from that commission. Have both lots have septic systems designed and approved by the Eastern Highlands Health District and I believe that we comply with all of the wetlands conditions and all of the planning and zoning requirements at this time. The plans that you're going to be looking at were just revised again this morning because I was under the impression that we needed to have a buildable area shown on the lots each lot as we did in the Grimaldi application. And so I adjusted the property line between the two lots so that we could accommodate a 150 by 200 foot square rectangle on each lot. Other than that, the plans have not changed. The only other thing to address that I I can think of is the solar access question, which which is easily addressed in this case. The current subdivision plans, if if we had them up, we could we could notice that the current plans, excuse me, show for the house to be oriented at a almost north south
direction with the ridgeline. When it comes time to construct a house back there, I believe that the ridge line will be running mainly parallel to the, to Webster Lane, which runs essentially east west, and that would provide for a better orientation for solar access. What's shown right now on the subdivision plan, would not be optimum, but I don't think that that orientation of the house is necessary once an application to build is submitted. I believe that the one of the conditions of the wetlands approval was to have a gravel driveway so that will be done. There were some questions about the erosion and sediment control plan, and my position on that is that that should be discussed between the town agent and the contractor
anytime you start a project for construction because I've been doing this for a long, long time. And every time I put together a soil erosion and sediment control plan, the contractor has a different idea of how it should be done, and usually better because it fits his schedule. So I believe that the contractor and whatever town agents are gonna be monitoring the project, they're the ones that should be determined where and when silt fence goes. And I can I hope answer any questions that anybody might have?
So Amanda do we have for posting the revised plot that Jerry discussed with this buildable box on it? Let me start sharing my screen.
This is Halsey. I just want to weigh in. The reason Jerry was under the impression that he needed a buildable square was because I misled him. I was using an older set of regulations, we thought were current. That one's on me. But if I could request of Jerry through the chair that touched upon the discrepancy between the approved wetlands permit or the plan that accompanied it and the plan before the commission today.
Okay. I would like to see the the most current plan.
Is it this one, Jen? Right here? Let's try that one.
Let me know where you would like me to Yeah, if you could just scroll down a little bit so that we get yeah, that's good right there. That's great. Thank you. So go ahead, Jim.
I just was wondering if if the engineer could touch upon how this is different from the approved wetlands plan and why.
Sure. Sure. This plan Jim was drawn to accommodate the current regulations for subdivision which require that the the septic, and the well all be outside of the 100 foot upland review area for weapons. And so that's what this plan shows, that we can accommodate those requirements. We can have the house, the well, and the septic system all outside of the 100 foot review area. Once the subdivision is approved, then the regulations or requirements default to a zoning, which does not have such requirements, and to wetlands, which conditions of approval carry forward for whatever time until the construction is completed or the permit lapses. So we're showing on this plan, the subdivision plan, that we can comply with regulations and so this should be approved. And I think I have represented from the beginning that this house layout as is shown here will most
likely not be followed and that the house will, if there is a house built here, it will be built in a configuration that's where the long end of the house or the ridgeline of the house will be more or less parallel with Webster Lane, essentially parallel the existing house. Is is did I explain that okay?
Yes. You I'm I'm happy. Thank you. Yes. Before anyone else? I'm all set with that, Jerry. Who is that, Scott?
I'm all set with that as long as he's, you know, he didn't move the house closer than what he just said. Closer to what?
To the requirements, back you know, whatever is required. If he just said that he was gonna be in those requirements, as long as he keeps that, I'm all set with it.
Well, the proposed location that Jerry would plan to build on, which goes back to his original proposal that was submitted to us at the start, would not meet the subdivision regulations of being 100 feet from the wetlands.
Didn't he just say that they were going to be 100 feet though?
I don't think that he did and Jerry you can speak to that but, I'll let you you answer the question, Jerry. Okay.
The subdivision regulations are intended to show that that lots are suitable for building, And in fact, our regulations for whatever reason ask that the engineers say that the lots are suitable for building. So I'll say that right now. Personally, I think that's the purview of the health department and they already have done that. So the subdivision regulations are so that we can show development of parcels and meet their requirements for minimum size, configuration, etcetera, to show that it will not be a hazard to safety, or health or whatever. That's what the regulations were written for, and that's what this plan follows. Once the subdivide once the subdivision is approved, plans are filed, and it's a stand alone and we have two stand alone lots here, then the regulations default to zoning regulations.
And subdivision regulations are not applicable to any building. So once this is approved, the intention of my clients, I believe, is to build a house that is configured much the same this one is, but will comply with the configuration that was approved by Wetlands. It will be more or less parallel with the existing house at 12 Webster Lane, and portions of it will be within the 100 foot setback but will be compliant with wetlands regular with wetlands approval.
So does that make sense, Scott? Yes. Do you agree with it? It's complying with the wetlands regulations, but
are you complying with the planning and zoning regulations, Gary? I I am with this plan that's shown before you. Yes.
But as soon as you rotate it, is it still gonna comply?
Well, it won't matter. That's my point is once the subdivision once the subdivision is approved, Scott, then we have two lots. And if nothing happens with these lots for 25 years, then things may change. But the fact is they'll have two lots. They'll be able to sell the lot that has the existing house on it with 1.3 acres and they can sell that lot and they'll still have an empty lot that's approved for building. They could build a house that looks just like this. They could build a house that looks just like the one that was approved by Inland Wetlands. But what they won't be able to approve is a house that's that doesn't comply with wetlands regulations because that is a condition of approval that stays with the approval. Subdivision plans, house locations, house sizes don't have to comply after subdivisions approval. And in fact, I'll tell you this, I've hardly ever seen a house on a subdivision plan that's actually built that way once the house once the once the lot is approved because most of the time to save time, effort, an engineer will put a rectangle on the piece of property that's, you know, 28 by 35 feet long or something like that. That represents a house because you don't know what a builder's gonna build. So we just put a house on there to show that they can comply with the zoning regulation or the subdivision regulations. That's what we've done here. Although I've tried to make it a little more realistic so that so that everybody can see what's what's gonna happen. That makes sense.
So Scott and and Jerry, you know, guess I've heard the discussion, but it just, you know, I still am unable to come to grips with the thought that we approve a subdivision plan that shows where you can build a house. And then once we approve the subdivision plan, we are no longer obligated to build the house in the area that we said we could build it in order to have an approved subdivision. And that is where I am struggling here. I have no reservations at all about understanding that if we can approve the subdivision based on the drawing provided here, at least that's my opinion at this point, but I cannot figure out how we think that then we could take a put a house someplace else that wasn't giving us the authorization by our regulations to subdivide it in the first place?
Jed, I think that's a question that you'd have to that you'd have to address within your regulations. I'm just going by what the regulations say and how they work. I understand and you know got it understand so
that's that's where we are on that. You put the buildable square on there and you can put the house in there in the future anywhere in the buildable square you're saying?
Actually Scott, as far as the regulations go, you don't have to once the lots are approved, you don't have to use the buildable square to put your house in. You just have to have a buildable square on the property. This comes back to the buildable square thing came up in the '80s, Scott. And, you know, that's when I started that's when I started in this business in the mid eighties when subdivisions were going up everywhere and towns were trying to find ways to slow down development. And this was one of the tools they used. I don't think Andover is in that position anymore. First of all, obviously, we're not in that position because the Buildable Square requirement was expunged from our regulations in 2018, I believe, 2019 whatever because it's onerous. We shouldn't be trying to slow down development today because heaven knows we need a few more people in Andover. Okay.
So I'm gonna leave that as an open question that that if need be I can get a legal interpretation on at some point here. I did talk to Mark Branch about why you know about our 100 foot regulation. And his perspective on that was that that was to allow us to have a little bit more control over subdividing a piece of property. Jimmy: That made it easier to put those controls in place than for the Inland Wetlands Agency to determine why a design would be detrimental. And so you know now I find myself wrestling with the issue of we as a planning and zoning commission are authorized to create the regulations but once those regulations are created we as a planning and zoning commission are expected to follow those regulations. But the house location, the well and the septic are in compliance with our subdivision regulations as they exist today. Correct.
Okay. Anything else you would like to add on your proposal, Jerry, before I go on to Jim?
No. Just that, again, I believe we comply with the regulations. And I'd really love to get this thing approved so that we don't hold up my clients any longer on this.
In response to that question, I do feel that the Planning and Zoning Commission once again is well within all the authorized time constraints that we have placed upon us, including the ninety day extra that the governor through his executive order has provided. So I I don't feel that we are slowing the process up any.
I didn't mean to imply that you were, Jed. It's Okay. It's more than been on me and all the little, you know, oddities and peculiarities of this particular application.
Understand. And we're wrestling with that too. Jim, could you give us an update on the completion and thoroughness of the application itself?
I have reviewed the application and I I sat through the the wetlands hearing and or I'm sorry the wetlands meetings and had a tough time following the whole concept with the subdivisions. I I with the subdivision being able to build compliance with zoning regulations. But no one this subdivision regs are no longer applicable after such time as it's proved. I understand that. I mean, somebody builds somebody has 20 acre lot, how to shown over on one side, and they want to build on the other. It happens. It's the same sort of thing. As far as the plan, you know, I have spoken to Jerry a number of times over the months.
There is one waiver request, I believe in the in the file. I believe it was posted on the website pertaining to the topography off-site. As far as I had made a comment to Jerry regarding the field erosion and sedimentation control, and I I understand I have no problem with really defining the ENS controls in the field, provided that the lever handles that matter, whether it be voting agent, but one thing. Has the ability to do it based on on the approval. That can be addressed as a condition. Jerry, did seem to miss the chart that that's on the plan has some discrepancies as far as dimensional requirements.
I think I addressed those when I did the buildable square, Jim. Okay.
You know, I honestly didn't have a chance to review that. Okay. At the end, review that after the submitted. But the setbacks that are shown on the on the map and was were accurate. So with that, I want to point out that there were a number of this was referred to the towns of Bolton, towns of Hebron and Capital Region Council Of Governments. And I have no response from any of those bodies. Other than that, I have nothing more to add.
Oh, I would also like to point out that I just for the record I did post a sign on the property indicating that there was a public hearing coming out coming up in Andover tonight with a spelling out the town website, and we also mailed letters with a copy of the River East notice to each of the abutters within a 100 each of the parcels within a 100 feet.
Amanda, can you go back to the the site drawing that you had put up just a minute ago, please? Yes.
I think Jim, weren't you referring to the fact that we were expecting to see a block for the dimensions on each of the lots, not just the the one?
Correct. I mean, could certainly happen within the same block.
Hey, Amanda, if you could scroll over that little block that's to the right of of the property here. Yep, you have to scroll to the right some more the blocking It's going Amanda. Okay, there you got
I'm of the opinion that both lots should be charted out here. They appear to comply as far as the setbacks on the house lot, meaning that not with the existing home. There's not a compliance issue. It's just a matter of of the chart. And I just want to point out what applied was we did not apply the the lot with requirement from Andover because part of the lot is in Bolton. But I'd yards. Weyard lot size. All are governed by end of a rick's.
Okay, but on the so the specifications on lot area for minimum side yard, have listed 10 feet. I think Right. Isn't the 25. Number there 25? I can make those corrections, obviously. We can make that a condition, right? Yes.
Okay, Jim, did you have anything else you wanted to add on the application itself? No, I do not. We need a motion for the
waiver on At this time, it would be prior to voting on the during the regular meeting. Prior to
Amanda, could you close this drawing out and put up the topography map, is the one just above us? This one?
Yes, please. Okay, I just wanted everybody to have a chance to see this one as well. And I know as I was going through Jerry, and you may have corrected on your drawing today, there were a couple of things on the legend that I thought were inconsistent with your drawing. And say scroll down Amanda. I see I see the regulated area in the setback lines on the legend are the same annotation in the regulated area is yes. Okay okay
so Jim if you are done I will open the conversation to commission members. Does anybody have any questions for either. Or Jerry. And so hearing none, I do have one question, Jim. I know Jerry said he had the septic approval. I did not see that in our file online before he came on today. Do you have that copy and it just didn't get posted or or what happened there? I believe Amanda posted it just prior to the meeting when I Right here. I will open it up. Thank you. And right here.
You know if I just make a comment, is what regulations read one thing, know they're asking for a letter. This is what Highlands do, this is what they provide. So we're gonna get.
Okay, but it looks like they've they've had a chance to look at what the Wetlands Commission approved, not necessarily what what our subdivision plan would approve. And so that's another discontinuity that I struggle with on having one plan not reflect the other necessarily.
Jed, just for the record, I talked to Thad King, the acting sanitarian for this project, about what difference it would make if I changed the reserve area and the primary septic area as as is shown on the most recent subdivision plan. And Thad said as long as you're within twenty five feet of the test pits that we originally dug, he is confident that the soils will not have changed and he would approve that. He just said it just goes without saying that anything within 25 feet of the test pits is approved. That's what I got from Thad.
Okay. And so for the benefit of our commission, can you run us through why you chose not to put the septic system outside the 100 foot regulated area?
Yeah, the septic system as originally designed is east of the driveway in the area of the test pits and the soils there have more of a slope to them which is more conducive to getting the effluent out of the septic system into the ground. Your system doesn't have to be as long as spread out, with a steeper area. The soils are better there and it fits the lot configuration better there. So that's why I designed it to be there.
Okay. Thank you, Jerry. Any other questions from any of the commission members on the application? Okay, Amanda, if you can close this out and go back to the development map, please. You mean this one?
Yes, please. Jerry, I was looking at the sequence of construction, and I didn't see anything about when the driveway would be installed.
I would suggest that that would be one of the first things, Jed, because you gotta get back there. But are you looking for a date, a time of year, or just that that's going to be the first thing in?
Well, I know our regulations talk a little bit about timing. I understand that's difficult when you haven't gotten approved plan yet. But I do know that on other applications, we've had issues with the driveways. And, and so we as a commission said we needed to pay a little more attention to the sequence of construction. I see we don't have the driveway in here, which was a problem with another application recently. So I just thought it would be appropriate to have that added to our sequence, wherever that whether that's before or after the installation of the the silt fence. I think our regulations probably require that after the installation.
Oh, the silt fence has gotta be the silt fence would go in first, Jed. There's no doubt about that. We will put the silt fence in before before construction of the driveway and a and a construction entrance pad at Webster Lane.
Okay. So so you will add that to the sequence of construction? I can certainly do that. Yes.
And I was also expecting to see on this drawing and didn't, but I could not find in our regulations. So maybe one of our fellow commission members would help me out. I was expecting to see where we would stockpile the topsoil that step three says strip and stockpile topsoil.
To be honest with you that's another issue that goes along with what I've said about working with contractors in the past. I would typically think it would go over where on this back lot where it says buildable square over near the well. But so often I get this wrong that I just figure I'll just leave it off and let the contractor and the whoever the town agent is discuss that because the contractor is going to put it someplace else. I don't think I've gotten it right yet.
So Scott, I know you brought this up on a previous application. You aware of something I'm missing in our subdivision regs that require that? Or was that just a common practice that we had seen on drawings?
It's just a common practice. This lot is very flat, though. Understand and agree.
Sometimes you'd like to see it if there's wetlands close by, but where Gary's talking about, you know, I can see where he's gonna put it. He's gonna put it up behind the house to the west and it's flat up there so.
And Jim, what would be what would be the requirement to have the fire marshal inspect the driveway? When when does that happen? Is that part of this application?
Well, it's it's a requirement in the subdivision regs that after x number of feet, I believe it's 200 feet, there'd be a turnaround. It doesn't I don't believe it specifically calls for the fire marshal approval. It has been done as a matter of course in in at least in my experience. I mean, that could certainly I mean, should the commission look favorably on the application, that could certainly be covered up by way of a condition. I covered, I mean, having the fire marshal review the plan, review and improve the plan. Okay. Thank you, Jim. Is Kevin still on the line? Yeah, I'm still on the line, Jud.
Kevin at this point would you, do you have any questions or do you have any comments concerning this application?
Yeah, I think the biggest thing that I'm struggling to understand is how you can present a plan to a commission to build a house, and then once it gets approved, the contractor can go through and put the house wherever they want it to in the first place. That would be like going before a town saying this is where I'm gonna build a road, and then once they approve it, you can just go build the road wherever you were planning to build it anyhow. So I read through section six for review and approval. Can someone just point out where it says that once a plan is approved, the contractor applicant can go and put the house wherever they want to?
Those words are certainly not in section six or any other place in our subdivision regulations.
What it falls back on is the subdivision approval is not a site plan approval. A wetlands approval is in fact site plan approval. I mean, you build specific to that approved plan. Subdivision is not. It's simply, you're proving that show where you can put a house.
Okay, so once so once if if this were to be approved, then whether it's Jerry's client or whoever else is building, they will have to come before planning and zoning again with a final site plan of showing exactly where they're going to get to put a house?
At that point it would would fall upon the zoning regs. Any development would have to be compliant with the zoning regulations. And that does not require commission approval. If you look at, I mean, I'm sure you have, because I know you've spent a lot of time on this. I appreciate that. I mean, a lot of is in the subdivision regs is mirrored in the zoning regulations, but there are some differences. I think there's a number of reasons for that. One of them is, I mean, you're simply showing that that a lot can support development. Whereas with subdivision application, whereas zoning regulation, and then you have setbacks, you have grade requirements such. Which all fall under the subdivision regulations as well. Just a little less. They allow something fitness. Okay.
I can appreciate it. It is a hard concept to grasp, but I struggled a bit. Okay.
If we're going by the subdivision regulations for initial approval, there was a calculation example done out in there to prove whether a lot being subdivided could sustain two houses or not, and when I did the calculation if you consider both lots it's capable of supporting 1.79 lots, and if you just consider lot two it's capable of supporting point nine six lots. So you're under two and you're under one when you factor in driveway area and wetlands area. In what section was that example calculation in Kevin?
Hold on. Let me bring it up for you here. Sorry it's a really long document it's hard to find it. Oh, actually, sorry, it was in the zoning regulations. It's five dot five dot seven dot four or sorry. Five dot five dot seven dot five.
Okay, I will take it on faith at this point, Kevin, that your math might be correct. I would tell you that I looked at that calculation and I got a little confused. So I'll have to go back and take another look at that one because that that was not a trivial calculation to go through. And so I'm not prepared to discuss that at this point. Are you Jim? No. I am not. I apologize.
Okay. So, and that is the reason that we have, the public hearing is to, get input, from the public on that.
That's on the zoning regulations, not the subdivision regulation? Correct. Correct.
Can we pull that up so we can look at that? Amanda, are you able to do that? Yes.
Working on it now. Okay. Okay. So you said the zoning regs? Right. What was this section six? On page 70. It's on page nine. It's on page 70. 69. Page.
It's different because you're opening on a web browser, but it's five dot five
dot seven dot five. Alright. I can address that. That applies to open space subdivisions, which this is not. Okay.
And you know, I have to be honest, way the regulations, just the way that numerically laid out makes them hard to read. I mean, five points What is ARD? For instance, 5571 is a component of five fifty seven, as are everything five fifty two-seven. Oh, I understand. Sorry, it wasn't clear. No, I can appreciate. It's the layout of the regulations.
But I do agree with Jim that this is applicable to the open space cluster development rather than
the conventional subdivision. RD. I thought I thought you had us on that one.
The other thing I want to point out is that the test pits were done in August at the driest time of the year as opposed to February through May when they're regulated. So we saw the site throughout the entire spring into early summer and in the spring where the proposed septic is planned to go there were bodies of standing water for weeks on end. So I'm not confident I mean I'm not a soil scientist but seeing as how the zoning third the regs call for test pits to be done February through May obviously when the ground is at full saturation I don't understand how they can approve August test pits when it's at the driest time of the year. For instance right now like if you go over to Gay City even all the ponds that are completely filled with water have totally dissipated.
Well I I can tell you how you do that. You do that by looking at the soil conditions when you open the test pit and you look for what's called mottling which is oxidation of the layers which is the oxidation does make sustaining of the soil layer and that is an indication of the high watermark, the presence of water that's been there for thirty days or more at a time leaves some mottling. And that's what we use for the high watermark. It's a very conservative way to go. But you'll see in the test pit logs there that we have mottling at about 24 inches. And that's that mottling is the staining of the soils by high groundwater. If you look in the technical standards of the Department of Public Health for septic system, on-site septic system design, they they like, tests during the spring when the groundwater is typically highest, but they allow for testing throughout the year, and you use the the high mottling instead of groundwater elevations to designate that restrictive area.
Right. But that's not what Andover has in the regulations.
Okay, I understand your comment Kevin. Do you have any other feedback for us at this point?
I was just hoping someone could explain how the buffer areas work and how land clearing works like is the applicant allowed to clear existing tree lines once this has been approved? I just looking more for input and explanation. Is there clearing limits on the prints Jim? No.
Because it's already cleared. I think I think it's cleared up to the boundary line almost, isn't it?
It it is pretty clear. Let me let me throw this in there. It is pretty clear. I I'm sure that the the current applicants don't intend to take any more trees down than is absolutely necessary. And I have shown on the coincidental with where we propose silt fence, I have an arrow that says, proposed limits of disturbance. I I don't think that the, applicant's gonna clear any trees For this house. Thank.
I mean. As as I said this one. The wetlands commission and. It would have come up at that time. Had it been an issue. Yeah, it doesn't appear that there's.
Aren't the boundary lines close to the tree line? Gary? Not to the east.
Amanda, can you go back and and call up that bottom, the subdivision
drawing again so we can take a look at that? Amanda use development plan please. You got it. That's the subdivision plan.
It's loading. Oh, okay. Sorry. No. No worries. Let me I'm trying. Okay. Here we go.
You're doing great, Amanda. That's why I didn't want to do that. And I wanted you here. Anywhere I should zoom in?
Oh, I think that's good right where you are. Well, would say that they can't be clearing in the wetlands anyways and tree lines closing in on the wetlands anyway right there.
Where on this, this map, Jerry, is the area of disturbance you were talking about?
It's essentially spelled out by the silt fence. If you look right on the on the, eastern lot that we're talking about, right above where it says buildable square, it also says approximate limits of disturbance. Okay. I got you. Yep. Thank you. Alright. Anything else, Kevin?
So does that mean that they can clear the trees to the south right up to the line if they want to? We're having a really hard time with the fact that basically another house is gonna be built directly in our backyard. And and like even in the summer you can see it clear as day. It's a beautiful lot having a one continuous piece of land, but at the end of the day two houses are being sandwiched on one property that barely meets most of the regulations.
I understand. And so, Kevin, I guess with you having just made that that comment my question for you is. Would you prefer to see the House in the location that it's shown here or in the parallel to Webster Lane location that gets it a little bit further away from your property line?
To be honest, that's a tough question. Neither one is ideal. One of them because I mean ideally the way you lay out a house living area, bathroom, kitchen would be along the back wall of the house. I don't think people usually put a kitchen or a bathroom at the very end of the house opposite of the garage but they could do it in this case I guess but then you wind up looking you know basically directly at each other especially in the fall winter and spring. I know the other one is 75 feet off the boundary instead of 55 feet I don't think either one is desirable I know in this newly proposed plan the well is even closer to the well that's on our property right now.
Understand and that's one of the things I was struggling with the most here is if we comply strictly to the regulations, which the property owner has a right to do, I think he ends up with something that might be less desirable in your perspective than if he builds it in the situation where we've discussed that is not exactly in compliance with the regulations. And so I'm trying to sort my way through all of those issues, just like I agree with your comment on how can it be that he can build someplace other than in the location that he showed in the subdivision plan? But I got the input from you that I needed, Kevin. Not an easy choice. Thanks.
With that in mind, I think we've gone through everybody's had a chance to ask Jerry and Jim questions. I'll go one more time if anybody else has anything else they would like to discuss or ask before we would close the public hearing.
Is it possible to have a note somewhere that says that we don't put the stockpile to the east of the proposed home? Keep it away from the wetlands as far as possible?
My only caveat is, yes, keep it away from the wetlands as far as possible. Wanna make sure we're not running afoul of the wetlands drooling. Quite honestly, probably should have been dispersed at the wetlands commission and wasn't. But just a note somewhere or condition. Sure. I mean, can certainly be a there can certainly your condition
yes. Just put it to the west of the house.
So this will go before wetlands again then, right? Because we're approving a different plan or possibly approving a different plan than what wetlands approved?
I don't think that's necessarily true Kevin because the plan that we are discussing here is more restrictive than the plan that wetlands approved.
Oh okay, I just thought just thought I remember Amanda saying that if it changed it would have to come back. Oh sorry Megan.
Her comment is I went back and reviewed the wetlands discussions today was that if we change the location of the bump out, which there was there was some discussion at the meeting in about changing that to bump out to the West instead of the East, so that it would be further away from the wetlands. Then the discussion there at that point was that that would have to come back before wetlands. I'm not sure I understand that either because that made it more restrictive and better, but I do recall that conversation there.
So if it's to the West, does the septic tank still go there?
I'll let I'll let Jerry answer that question. Jerry. The
plans the plans that we're looking at are generic and so was the one of one before the Wetlands Commission was probably closer to what will happen. I don't know exactly where the drive driveway is gonna go and I don't know exactly where the septic tank is going to go. What's gonna happen is if and when this is approved and the client wants to build a house, we'll give us some plans of the house and then we'll lay out a site plan and the site plan is gonna have to have to be compliant with the wetlands approval. Specifically where stuff goes, I couldn't tell you.
You know as far as as whether the wetlands. And we have to go back before the wetlands commission. A that when I would Nolan's agent would probably defer to the commission if he had any question. Probably over the course of time, he will have a better sense as to what they want to see and what they don't. But at the present time, my guess is he would defer to signing off. Should there be a change?
My response to you, Kevin, would be that I would like this commission to approve a subdivision. It's in accordance with our subdivision regulations. And then I will continue to investigate the legalities of any deviation from that going forward. My goal at this point is to act based on our subdivision regulations as they're laid out in effect today. Understood.
Any other questions before for Jim or Jerry before we close the public hearing? Hearing none, I guess Linda, my expert is not here tonight. I can't recall whether or not we need a motion to close the public hearing or that. Say again. Yes, you need a motion.
Okay, thank you. With that, does anybody wish to make a motion regarding closing the public hearing? I'll make the motion to close the public hearing. Thank you, Anne. Is there a second? I'll second. This is Leanne. Thank you, Leanne.
Any discussion? Shouldn't be and hearing none, I'll call for a vote and we'll start with Anne. Aye. Scott? Aye.
Susan? Aye. Leanne? Aye. And I vote aye So as that concludes the public hearing. And at this point, we will move on into our regular meeting. Thank you all for your participation. Thank you, Kevin. So Amanda, if you can go close out the subdivision drawing that you're showing there. Thank you. And I have 806, and I'd like to call the meeting to order. So for a roll call, I see Anne, Scott, Bersan, Susan, England, and I hear Leanne. Right.
So I will seat Susan as a regular member for our vacancy. And that completes item two on the agenda. The third issue is addition or changes to the agenda. And I would like to move item 6A, the 12 Webster Lane application up above the old business so that we can discuss that. And then I would like to make item, old business item 5B, the annual report. And then make the draft late regulations in the bylaws come after that. Anybody else have any proposed changes to the agenda or additions. Amanda, we need to vote on the changes to the agenda. Yes. Okay.
I'd like a motion to approve the agenda as amended. So moved.
Is there a second? Second. Thank you, Scott. Thank you, Leanne. Any further discussion? Hearing none, I'll call for a vote. Anne? Aye. Scott? Aye. Susan? Aye. Leanne? Aye.
And I vote aye as well. That completes item three. Moving on to item four, public speak. Does anybody from the public? And I don't see Kevin with us any longer. So I guess there's no public speak. Kevin, I'm still here, but we covered it. Oh,
okay. Thank you. And then moving on to, I guess it's going to be item 5A, new business 12 Webster Lane application. So do any of the Commission members have would like would any of you like to make a motion one way or the other with respect to the application that we had the public hearing on
Would we have to start by doing the waiver request?
That would be a good start. Yes. I don't know if if the waiver request in the motion for what to do with the subdivision have to be well, let's let's. So as you're saying, Susan, I'd like to get a motion with respect to the waiver request that we had presented to us. That was How does that read?
I think the would be I would like to approve the request for a waiver of topographic requirement within 200 feet beyond the property line. I'll second that.
Okay. Thank you, Susan. Thank you, Scott. Any discussion on the proposal for the waiver? Hearing none, I'll call for a vote. Anne? Aye.
Scott? Aye. Susan? Aye. Leanne? Aye. And I vote aye as well. The motion passes five-zero-zero. Okay, now moving on to the application before us for the subdivision on 12 Webster Lane. And I think our choices are we can we can approve it we can approve it with conditions or we can defer discussion until the following meeting. If there was a need to do that.
I'll vote to or I'll to approve the application in Karma for 12 Webster Lane for the lot subdivision. I'll second it.
Okay, that was Scott making the motion. Was that you, Anne, for second? Yes, it was. Thank you, Anne. Any discussion?
Well, it has to have a lot of conditions, right, Jim? You have them all written down? I do. Yeah, you have that?
I have a lot of them written down. Stockpiles to the west of the house, ag driveway sequence to the construction sequence, Regulated area on a print.
I did have a draft motion. You did? I did, yes. Jed, do you do you happen to have it? A draft motion?
I do happen to have it. I don't have it available to post. Okay.
Okay. Yeah. I I apologize. I I don't have it readily available. Oh, wait a minute. I should be able to Be a minute. You type it, hon. And she'll post it for me. Oh, yeah.
Ed, did you have these, some of these written down? I should just be permitted, Scott. I did. And,
Amanda, am I, I think I can call it up here. I took a sneak peek. If you allow me to screen share, maybe I can call that up.
Okay I just made you a co host you should be able to share now. Yeah.
Okay, that should be it. Does everybody see the proposed motion? Yeah. Yes. Thank you, Judd. Jim, can you see that?
Yeah, but I think I will be momentarily. I can see it. Okay. So you add these other conditions to that, Jed?
So we, yeah, we would need to add the correction of the side yard from 10 feet to 25 feet. The legend where the regulated area needs to be shown not not like a setback line. Right. Change that.
Sequence of construction to include the driveway. Yep. And the stockpile. The not east of the stockpile to the west of the home. Right.
Those were the only other conditions that I recall as we were going through the discussion tonight. And you said to add
both lots to the sidebar on the print? Yes. Yep. At back lines? K. It's all of them I have.
Number five may become a book of book pointed. I knew that there there was an issue with the the discrepancy between the two plants, the wetlands and the planning, and I I have number five on there. It not be an issue. It addressed the open space payment, payment in lieu of open space. And for benefit of anybody who might not know how that works is an appraisal is done of the property at the applicant's expense, and the applicant pays up 10% of that value. Each particular case would be prorated between Bolton and Andover because the simple fact that it's in two towns. So it would be just a simple arithmetic function.
And I did see the appraisal on the website in the full list. Yeah,
I've addressed monumentation in a final as built. And just some general Jerry suggested that we sort of do field adjustments out there, I don't recall whether that the erosion control plan allows for that, whether it should be added, just simple. I mean, there were several changes to that. I think it should be part of the approval, part of the condition.
I'm struggling with the suggested wording there and it goes back to, you know I struggle with we have a plan but the plan doesn't need to be followed.
So I'm saying that the plan be amended to include notation to the effect that field adjustments per town staff.
For who? Town staff. Yeah, okay, so you would be doing those adjustments? Yes. Okay, I think that sounds like a reasonable condition to put in there as well. And then item five, you have a question mark on there?
Yeah, that I spoke of it. That deals with the deviation between the Williams plan and the Planning and Zoning Commission subdivision plan. Yeah,
quite and honestly, from the viewpoint of the abutter, I struggle with trying to understand, I guess my sense is that if I were living next to the property, I'd prefer to see the house that Jerry intended to build as opposed to the one that our subdivision regulations allow. Although I agree with the abutter that that, you know, none of them are ideal, but but the property owner does have a right to subdivide and and it would go there. So I guess my conclusion is, and this is my thought, to share it to you guys, you guys all, I got one vote, you guys all have one vote too. What's important to me is that we approve a subdivision that's in accordance with our subdivision regs. I am still learning how the system works and if the way the system worked resulted in a house being placed where Jerry thinks it's best suited. I'm willing to take that chance as a learning opportunity to find out how to be smarter in the future if I'm not so willing to have it deviate from what we're saying and I would then know how to stop it. But in this particular case, I do think that what Jerry is recommending that he'd like to do as opposed to what we require
makes makes a lot of sense. So that's where I'm at, and if the house gets built where he wanted it to and our subdivision planning didn't allow us to prevent that, we'd be smarter and know how to do it better going forward. But I do think that the drawing that he presented to us tonight is in compliance with our regulations. I guess the only thing that, you know, as I continue to get smarter on, well, I know we're in this discussion. So I probably said too much about what I think at this point we need to get the motion approved and then we can have further discussion.
But that's where we are with conditions on there. So I think we've got a motion to approve with conditions. We've got a second. Vegas, we are ready for discussion. And I can't remember what I was going say at this point. So there you go. You're safe from that. Any other discussion on the application?
I just have a question this is an approval to for a lot to be built on right and the house plans are not involved in this so the house plan might be slightly different than what that's where on the map is is that correct yes so they might it might be a slight difference and I think it makes sense to turn it so that it faces the the solar thing better. I know when we built our house, the architect originally designed the house the opposite way and I said, hey, you know, would be better if we had the driveway over on the left instead of on the right because of the sun and the melting of the snow.
Weren't really thinking about solar at that time, but we didn't have to go and get approvals. It was just we had the lot and already the subdivision had been approved and then we just put what we wanted on the lot. We didn't have to get the approval and I think it worked just fine. I can't see getting too specific with this one. As far as you know, like the position of the house, it's it's on there. It fits.
I think the difference Anne is that your house probably didn't encroach on the upland review area of wetlands. Yeah, maybe not. Wherever this one, the issue is there is a very small area that's outside the upland review area in which you can build the house. Yeah, exactly what fit just barely fit.
Yep, and so one of the options is to say nope, it's either in that area or nothing. But that's in a step after you know what we are approving is for it to be built in that area that's outside the Upland review area.
Yeah. Alessi, presumably, and I mean, the house was approved. It was approved administratively by the zoning agent, you know, based on compliance with zoning regs, you wouldn't have seen it. It's just part of the building permit process.
Okay. Well, it's fairly new that we have the solar requirement in there to take that into consideration. And that is at odds with our requirement. And I guess that's why we have a commission to make those decisions when it's, they're somewhat conflicted. Going back, thing that I did, you know, struggle with reading through the regulations and Kevin pointed it out rightly so, that our regulations do require the test pits to be tested during the February through April time frame I think. I in the past I considered a certification from the Eastern Highlands Health District to say they, you know, I deferred to their call on whether, you know, they're out there supervising the test pits, it must be good. As Kevin pointed out, our regulations show that it's different. That might be something that we need to change going forward. I had always thought that it did make sense to go out and do the test pits, not in the middle of a drought in the middle of August if that's when they were done and I did not know when those test pits were done. Assume Kevin's got the correct date of August on there. That's They've always done it by modeling.
Okay, yep, but we are working hard to try and make sure that we're in compliance with our regulation. Right, yeah. So maybe we have to write that down and check-in with.
Yeah. Perhaps we should have someone from Highland come and, give us, like, ten minutes and perhaps suggest language we could use to be compliant with what we're doing. That's right. Yep.
Not a bad idea. And yes, I'd be interested in hearing what they have to say on that so we can make our regulations better. There's probably a couple of things in there, but there's good reasons why regulations don't get updated more frequently and we're going to see some of that with the workload we've got coming up here. Any other discussion on the motion? So I guess I'm thinking that we should remove item five from the list that Jim has prepared there. We've discussed that. So we've got items one, two, three, four that Jim has on there. And a couple of extra modifications to the plan can be included in your item one on that, Jim. The side yard change, the sequence of construction, the stockpile location in both lots included in the sidebar.
I'm just gonna make a comment. Interestingly, I noticed on Jerry's plan, there's a little chart for the E and S, which I've never noticed before. And there's dates that you plug in. I mean, I assume it's the intent that this these dates be plugged in at the time of of construction. Or prior to. Is Jerry still on? No. I just wanted to point that out, that it wasn't, that it's on the plan, it just isn't filled in. I'm available, Jim.
I was just commenting on the on the box that's on the plan in the E and S. It allows you to plug in dates.
Right. And that's the stuff that I think needs to be addressed by the contractor and the town agent just before start of construction so that everybody's on the same page.
I was just pointing out that it's there to be filled in. Okay. Good. Good. But it's not gonna be filled in on the plan because it's gonna it's not gonna happen till after the plan is filed. Right. It's it's kind of a it was a little mystery to me.
Any other discussion on the motion? Hearing none, I call for a vote. Anne? Aye. Aye. Susan? Aye. Leanne? Did we lose Lee Ann? It looks like she's muted. Leanne? Yes. I mean, aye. And I vote aye as well. The motion passes five-zero-zero. Okay. Thanks for the time.
Yep. You're welcome, Jerry. And you're welcome to stick around if you want. But I suppose you probably got better things to do out there in California. It's still light out, Jed. Yep, still light out.
We're going to move on to old business item 5A, discussion on the update, the clock property. Scott can you tell us where we are on that?
Jim Celio, the real estate agent said that the clocks are not interested in any kind of donations or gifting of the parcel at this time in whole or partially.
Okay, so is there a way ahead or are we just going to drop that particular issue? We're
gonna have to drop it now because Planning and Zoning Commission okayed 100 and the Conservation Commission said half of the $2.13, right? Half of the 160.
I think they said half of what we have in the open Yeah.
Right. Not to exceed that half. Right. So, okay, we'll let the property sit on the market, see if price comes down. Right. Okay, very good. So anything else on the clock property? Any questions anybody has there? Okay, we'll move on to 5B, the annual report. Oh, look at that. Okay, so the annual report I got some good feedback from Susan on this and I think I incorporated most of the changes that she had. She did have Susan, you had a couple of suggestions for changes of the heading, I left those as originally put in the document because that was the format that was specified by the town. I was in some cases trying to
round pegs into square holes, but I did label those
document. Okay. I have a concern about mission statement because I usually think of mission statement as being the purpose of planning and zoning is to whatever. But
I think that's fine. Yep. And I understand and I started off with like the versions that I compared, you know, I looked at how wetlands did theirs and they took that verbiage that, you know, on our website saying what it does. And that should probably be a mission statement. We're probably not there yet, but I didn't want to redevelop a mission statement this time around. That might be something that if we get the luxury of working going forward, we'll make it a little more succinct, which is I think what you're used to seeing on a mission statement. Yeah.
I'm happy with, the reason I changed it also is if something were to happen and we no longer had the same lawyer, that which was in the original mission statement, that's why I tried to make it shorter and I think better off now. And I think it would be worthwhile trying to make a more concise mission statement in the future.
I did like that verbiage that we have on the website, though, because it spells it out very clearly. We are the authority for making regulations but once we make them we have to follow them. And I thought that was those words did not. I'm sorry my
internet is bad tonight. I just missed what you said.
Yeah, I just, I like the words on the introduction from the website that say we do have the authority to make regulations. Exactly. But once we make them, we have to follow them. And I know we're trying hard to do that as we go through these applications and I appreciate everybody's patience there. Looking over the year, we talked about the significant challenges due to personnel turnover both on the commission and with John Valenti's retirement and Jim coming in. As I was starting to read through this in you'll write it, I said losing all that talent was was a real hardship for us. And then when I look at the the experience that Susan brings, that Leanne has and Scott has, okay, there's maybe I don't have that institutional knowledge yet, but there's an awful lot of good knowledge on the commission. And I came away feeling pretty good about team that we got there. And Ann and I will work hard to get up to speed with the rest of you. So it does take us a little bit to get back up to speed, me especially on getting through the applications and that. But I think we're gaining momentum and going forward there, that's going to be good. One of the things was the exciting improvement in projects. Didn't think that we had an awful lot. We do have that community grant that we had worked through and that was in this fiscal year. I know that's not come to conclusion yet, but that's probably the biggest deal that we had going with us. We did have a couple of meetings where, you know, we were looking at the Andover Elementary School for
the senior center community center that didn't play out. I thought it was important that we do. I won't comment on whether or not that was good or bad that it didn't go that way. Then we had a couple of special permit applications and we did some good training. And so we did a couple of things,
certainly not up to what Eric and John had done going up to that point. For the future goals, looked, it would be nice to get a couple of new members to get vacancies filled. We've talked about updating the planning and zoning bylaws and I know we're not going to get time to go through those tonight. Leanne gave me some good feedback on quite honestly just hadn't had time to wrestle with the issues that Leanne pointed out to me. I did verify that the charter that's on the website is the current version and and so a lot of the comments that I had with Mark Branch, you know, I answered by saying we're doing what the Charter says and that that's the way it went. So we'll get the bylaws done this year. I still think there's some improvement we can make on figuring out how to make the application process more user friendly for all concerned. It seems like it's difficult for me anyhow. And then I rounded out that with our work on regulations to protect the water quality. And I do want to go through that with everybody here tonight, even though it's getting a little late. I've got some deadlines coming up in the near future with respect to that project and I need to get your feedback as we're working that direction. And then the last section was the member names and positions and that's just who we are. With that, that's what I propose for our annual report that I will submit to the town tomorrow
unless anybody has any significant concerns about the report at this point in time. Fabulous job, Jed. Thank you, Jed. Okay, well I don't know that it's but it's done And it's got all the things that you asked for, Amanda. Sure, John. Okay.
Very good. You'll have that tomorrow, Amanda. And that will be that. Good job, Jenny.
Okay. So the next next thing on the agenda is the lake regulations. And so Jim and I and John Valeni have recently started looking at how to get these to the finish lines. As I had mentioned to the Commission some time ago at the June Alma Alpoa meeting, you know, when they were talking about things, well it was from their minutes from the previous year was that the zone the lake regs had been approved. I said no they hadn't and they asked me to to give them a an update on the lake regs at the October meeting which is coming up on October 14. So I said, well, I better get my story straight and I wanted to share it with with all of you folks. As we get to the end,
you'll find out the way ahead on the interim is on October 5, I will be briefing the Inland Wetlands Commission on this presentation. Then on October 7, will be briefing the Alma board of directors in the President of Alcoa on this to take it to a meeting on October 14 for the general Alcoa Alma membership in the community. So that's why I needed to get this off and running and going from there. The lake regulation goals, you know, I put to improve the the quality of water in Andover Lake, that that is true. In Alma and Alcoa are the beneficiaries of that. I think the the real reason that the town is concerned on this is if the quality of the water in Andover Lake would be a risk to us that DEEP could come in at some point and say we need to put sewers throughout the town, which is a huge financial undertaking that at this point in time we're not really excited about doing that. And so we can improve the quality of the water in the lake, there's one of the significant risk factors to that that
we get better than Alma and Alcoa, you are certainly in favor of that. How do we get contaminants in the lake? We've got both stormwater runoff on the land and from the septic systems. So those are the two primary means that we have contamination going in the lake. And so the lake regulations divide the lake into districts and zones dependent upon how close property is to the lake, making the regulations more effective where the regulation would have greater impact on improving water quality, which is closer to the lake itself. So this is out of our I think I took this map out of our plan of conservation and development. And it shows in blue over here, this is the Lake District surrounding Andover Lake. And it just, you know, the people at the last Alpoa meeting didn't know where the Lake District was, didn't know where the watershed was, and all that stuff. So I wanted to start out showing the town of Andover and our Lake District. Within the last week, Jim was able to resurrect, find, obtain, I don't know how he got it, but we got what we were looking on previously for our
watershed zone map. And so you see the all these properties that are but and overlay shaded in yellow, that would be zone A, and they would have the most restrictive regulations put into it. Anything that's within 100 feet of zone a I think it is. Can't remember it's 100 feet of lake or property in zone a. I think it's property in zone A is property in zone A. B. And so that's in the light blue that surrounds all the zone A places. Zone C is more than 100 feet away, but still within the Andover Lake District. And you see some properties that go outside the Lake District that are in that zone C. And that's I'm just going to mute while my phone stops ringing. Okay, they're done. So anyhow, so one of the
somebody might be concerned that they've got your property that goes way over here to Route 87. You know why are they being impacted? Well, one they're being impacted because their property is in the Lake District. Some of it is some of it isn't and we're trying to improve the water quality. So we put it in there. That might be a tough sell with the public. I don't know. I'm particularly interested in feedback from the commission on some of these outline areas. And then zone D would be properties that are in the watershed, but not in inside the Lake District. And so then, you know, another thing that you know, struck me a little strange on the map is, is this lot right here may have a foot or two in the watershed area, but certainly is primarily not in do we want to make exceptions for for some of those guys. Then the last concern on the map when we talked about this probably two years ago when the commission is when we were working on it is when you get down past the dam in this area here, it's no longer in the watershed.
It doesn't drain to the lake. So these people could say, well, I why do these regulations affect me when when we're not we don't drain to the lake and affect the lake quality at all, which is the purpose of the regulations. So the map is what I'm struggling with a little bit just making sure that it makes sense to us all.
There's there's diff there's different trying to think of how I can say this. The classifications are, you know, adjacent to the lake, you know, a 100 free from the properties that are adjacent to the lake. There's different classifications. Those just because they're downstream of the watershed doesn't that that just means that they're downstream from the watershed doesn't mean that they don't fit into a classification in another way.
I understand that I'm just trying to anticipate some of the feedback that we're going to get, know, at some point we're going to have to take this to public hearing. And we just need to be, you need to help me get smart so that I can answer those questions when they come up at the appropriate time. But anyhow, that's that's the map is to where it stands today. And I think it's it's overall pretty good. Was a great map. So really, there was a lot of work put into that map. Yep. It and it shows. And I I think it's also interesting how much of the watershed is outside of the town of Andover, and we've got no control over whatsoever. It's
unbelievable how many acres that watershed really is. Yep, so
anyhow, that's the map. Then we've finally resurrected it and that's a great step forward. That helps tell the story. Okay, so you know, we talked about the two methods, stormwater runoff and the septic tanks. This talks about stormwater runoff in the in our thinking is that if you're improving your property, you spend money to improve your property, one of the improvements ought to be that we're going to improve the quality of the water that runs off your land into the lake. If we want to make the lake get better, not be getting worse, that should be there. And that will cost a little bit, but that's what I thought we were trying to do there. And so again, we we talked about zone A, B, C, and D. And in zone A closest to the lake, we were shooting for 10% reduction. So we'll see you in a worksheet as we go through to the next page. If somebody wants to make an addition to their house or put up a shed or any of those kind of things, and they're in Zone A, we do a little calculation with the worksheet to figure out what is the phosphate nitrogen runoff going into the lake today. Then they're going to build an addition, which is going to make the runoff worse because it gets rid of some of our pervious land that prevents the water from soaking in by having it covered with the driveway, patio, rooftop, you name it. So that's going make it worse and that's going to make more runoff into the lake. But we expect positive measures to be taken by the applicant, whether it's in rain garden, you know, taking paved surface and
making it lawn or whatever to be 10% less than he was initially. So we expect that the water that's going to go into the lake after the guy does his addition to be better than it was when he started. Similarly, with Zone B, a little further away, we said 7.5% reduction. Zone C, 5% reduction. And then Zone D, no worksheet required at all. And I said, well, there's no worksheet required at all, why do we get why do we even make, you know, those properties part of the lake rakes? And in the reason is the next two bullets. And so even though you know somebody's outside of zone ABC, he still must infiltrate the first two inch flush of storm water or volume of two inch rain event from the newly increased surface area or area of increased imperviousness like a driveway or whatever. So that's everybody gets to do that. In addition to the reduction that we're looking for. And then there's an allowance, you know, if you're you're making some small shed or some small patio or something in your zone A, it's less than 100 square feet, zone B, it's 200, Zone C is 300. May not require a worksheet, but you still need to mitigate that two inch rainfall runoff of the improvement like it was talking about up above.
So those are the those are the requirements that all the verbiage is supposed to get that thought across. And it's getting pretty close. Any questions on that one? Okay, so this this goes into the the worksheet itself and we're still working on that. As you can see up here, it talks about Columbia Lake. Highly plagiarized after what's used over on Columbia Lake at this point. So much so that we got to change that to Andrew. But the important thing on this chart that I wanted everybody to see are here are the factors that affect the runoff. And so you can see, you know, for a roof the factor is 1.3, the paved surface 1.5, lawn one point zero, and then you get down here woodland and mulch beds. So that's like it's the undeveloped property point one, that's where we want to get down into point 1.2, point three things so that we make the land better. But we go through in this worksheet, you know, we would put like 2,000 square feet here, how much paved surface lawn, all these things. And this sheet calculates all this loading and then it comes down to the total estimated load here. In this case it's 0.06 and that's pounds of phosphate per acre per year. So that would be the load today. And then if you're in zone A, we expect the final product to be 10% less than that. So we would put, you know, down here we'd fill in, okay, what's 10% less than that? And that would be a number that we're shooting for. So that's what the first page of the worksheet is all about. You get over onto the second page, and it talks about, well, what are you going to do so that you can get down to that number and meet the improvements?
And you can go, you know, lawn to mulch bed, lawn to garden, paved surface to mulch bed, all these things, and it will give you an improvement. And so you put how many square feet over here you're going to do to make this improvement, and it's going to get it'll put your the reduction over here. You add all that up, and it'll come out to a number, and then we'll see whether or not that's been reduced the nitrogen phosphate loading into the lake to the point where we meet what the regulation is.
Ted, did you work on this with John at all?
I have not. We just, John, just you found us this week, sent it out to me. I just put it in here to explain how it's gonna work. I'm not convinced I'm smart enough to know the details yet, but I do understand the concepts that it's trying to do. And I think it all makes sense.
So I Are think we'll get they currently doing this on Columbia Lake? Yes. They are. And
John's perspective is they've been doing it for quite a few years now. And he attributes this, which one he says none of the property owners oppose doing because they all want a nice lake, But the lake is not getting worse. It is getting better. Know, they have not had the algae blooms over there in some time. So he thinks that this will really help out and it has helped out over in Columbia. That's what he attributes his success to.
Well, could be helpful when you were talking about trying to explain your zones A, B, C and D if it's already working successfully there.
It sure would. Now we do have some people in Andover that might not want to spend their money that way, you know, because they don't get anything in their house to see for it. But I do think that we all have a vested interest in keeping our lake in good shape. So yeah, that's how
Well, they're concerned about spending the money, I don't know what the tie in is related to what everyone in town has paid for sewers. If sewers came to pass, my understanding is it wouldn't be strictly burdened on the lake dwellers. That could That always be could also be another point you could use. That's
another good point, Susan, and I will because, yeah, this is cheap in comparison to what you're putting in sewers. So thank you. So when when is somebody required to put in this nutrient allocation worksheet? You know, if you're building a new house on a piece of property, that that is certainly who we're trying to get to do it. We've got some verbiage here, if you're improving more than 50% of the structure square footage within a ten year period, we're trying to get out of, you you do 10% one year, 10% next year, trying to avoid triggering this. Now we make that cumulative for 50% and there's still a little fuzziness on what exactly improved that means. Know, if you paint all the walls, are you improving that? No. But somewhere in there, we're still working on some of that. Increasing the floor area that goes by zone, the amount that you're doing that triggers that. And then the accessory structure, it varies by zone as well. And then increasing the impervious surface like driveways,
patios, and all that. So when you're doing that, you have to use the worksheet. And that's that's what I think, you know, best describes that, our our plan to reduce the amount of nitrogen and phosphate that runs off our land into into the lake. It would be nice if we could just say don't use fertilizer, but I don't think we can go that route. That's that's not going to work. So that's the stormwater runoff piece. The next one is septic system mitigation. And I've been pleased to see there's been an awful lot of new septic tanks going in around the lake. I think that's great. But we do have a lot of small lots in old septic systems, and so there's probably more that need to be fixed. And I don't have the best understanding of why it is that, you know, somebody when we do sampling and we know that a septic system's failed, can't go back to that person and tell them to fix it. But that's not our jurisdiction. You know, that's the Eastern Highlight Health District and so we can't go do that.
What we can do is when somebody's going to build a new house or significant renovation on a house, we can can tell them to upgrade the septic system to meet today's standards. I guess we've also got you know the existing septic systems located near the lake are in the water table. And these new regulations would apply to Zone A and Zone B, which are closest to the lake.
In this regulation, there also is a regulation concerning distance to groundwater now, which wasn't in there before.
Yes. And so, let me see. So anyhow, the conditions requiring a new septic system, yeah, I'm not going to read them all to you here, but if you add a bedroom, you make your dwelling bigger, those kind of things, that's gonna make you have a new septic system unless you can prove that yours is okay. Maybe you put in a new septic system last year. And so here would be the criteria for exemption. And Scott was saying, if you can show that your system is greater than 12 inches above the max high water table, okay, that's good. If you're greater than 35 feet to the high water mark of Andover Lake or a tributary, which is one of the brooks running into it, you wouldn't have to do that. Or it exceeds 50% of the size requirements for new septic for principal
building. I'm still struggling with this one a little bit. It seems to me that we should expect 100% of the septic system. But more to do on that. That's what our regulation specifies now. And there's people that are trying to convince me that that's the correct wording on that. I'd like to be in that conversation too, Jed.
You'll get your chance, okay? Yep. So what's left to I want to make sure that the map is the way we want it. There's some finishing touches on the worksheet. I'd like to do a test run. At the Inland Wetlands meeting last week, a house with a small lot wanted to put a 20 by 20 shed on the property. And these regulations would have been ideal as we were trying to to talk the guy into doing some things that would improve the water quality because he's diminishing it. The regulations would give us that. I'm just not sure with this small lot that there's enough things that you can do to meet the regulations. So
we need to do a couple of test runs with it. And that lot we talked about last week with the wetlands folks, I think is a good one to go do that on. The we had the question of, you know, there's a couple of lots that are not developed now that are completely wooded. You can't go in and develop on those lots and make it any better than it is today. It's as good as it gets. Struggled with that concept,
the whole thing. Yep, and we're not done struggling with it yet. I think we're close, but we just need to make sure that that works. Maybe know, there's not an awful lot of undeveloped lots anymore. We can run a couple of test cases on on the the couple remaining lots and and see how that works out. But I need to be able to explain that and I can't today. So, I gotta get better on that.
And you got to change the placement of the L, Jud, and regulations.
Yep, okay. Yeah, I see that it was I added this five minutes before we came on to the meeting tonight and didn't get a chance to prove that very well. I think we need to know what what's left out there. The I was concerned about making sure that we had ways to trigger the use of the worksheet. You know, it wasn't clear to me that if somebody's going to go pave their driveway, that anybody here in the town gets a vote. I don't know. And so I want to make sure that whether it's the wetlands, the zoning agent, planning zoning commission, the zoning board of appeals, all those people who have a say in allowing somebody to reduce the permeable space on their lot that that they have the mechanism to trigger it over to zoning so that we can get them into the zoning. To do that.
And then there's some minor corrections to the regulations and that's almost prophetic the way that the minor corrections are the typos just like there is in that word regulation there. That's what's left to do. What's driving me to have the discussion with this commission tonight was again starting at the end, yeah, was going to brief ALPOA and Alma at the semi annual meeting with the public on October 14. And there were a bunch of steps that needed to happen before we got there. And that's with the Alma board and the Alcoa president on October 7. And so Jim, you will be getting I'm gonna send out I talked to Linda this afternoon on that. She's in charge of Alma, Linda Derrick, and I'll get her a list of names
from you and me and Megan and Joe, and then she'll get the Alma board and the Alcoa president. And there's a couple other people that Heather that's working with, I forget what group she's working with, that is trying to do a lot on the lake quality as well. But then I'll be briefing the Wetlands Commission on the October 5. So all that's going there. We as a commission will will look in detail at the wording, the map, and the worksheet and explain that to you. I just wanted to run by you guys tonight the the concept that I'm trying to get out to the public so they know what it is we're trying to do and maybe they can embrace us so that once we finally get to public hearing all those different organizations are standing tall with us saying that they support to this being the right thing to do. So that was was what I wanted to go through on
on the lake rigs tonight. For those that have been on the commission for a long time, they're probably not a lot new there. That's just telling you where we were. We are close to the finish line. We're working hard on that now, that's one of the goals for the upcoming year. But there's a first step, technically wise, is to get it so that the Commission's happy with it, and then we'll take it in final form to a public hearing where I expect all these other players to come in and support us there. Any other questions before we wrap?
When we finished that up and stopped working on it, Jed, the the only thing left was the allocation worksheet.
It I agree with you, Scott. However, I was not in a position that I could answer. You know, somebody could ask me a question, I have to get it so that I understand it. There's very little need to be changed in the verbiage, but I need to understand how the worksheet works better in a couple of things. So I think we are very close on the regs. It was just getting myself up to speed so that I can brief you guys on a final product once we get it there. And I want to give you a product that I think is ready to go and then let you guys take a whack at me and see how I do.
Jen, I have a question. I have, for some reason, some of my screens are going in and out. And I I thought I had something a little while ago that I can't bring up now about percentages, and I'm not sure what it had to do with if it was a percentage of something or a percentage of how far away you actually are from the lake. No. If the first somebody is further and further away from the lake, is this graduated as far as what they're asked to do?
Yes. And so the lots that are right on the lake, we're looking for a 10% reduction. Okay, that's what I probably had up. Yeah. So, in those lots that are the next ring around that are close to the lake but not on the lake would be 7.5. And those lots that are further away but still in the Lake District would be a 5% reduction.
Okay, that sounds like what I had up and don't have any more. Okay.
Any other questions? Well, I appreciate the opportunity to practice my spiel with all of you. And there'll be more to follow on this, but I do think this is a worthwhile project for us and need to get that wrapped up. Up. So that's that one. Old Business 5C amendment to Planning and Zoning Commission bylaws. I'm going to pass on tonight. I still got a little bit of work to do based on Leanne's comments to me to be in a position. We're close, but I knew that by the time we covered all the things we're going to cover tonight, I didn't want to be here like I saw the Board of Selectmen meeting went on until almost midnight the other day. Nope, that's it. I like that thing we have in our bylaws that says we will be done by 10:30. And even then we should be better than that. Okay, so I think that's all the old business. Finishing up the new new business. Sign regulations. I got some words on there and I'm not even going to show them here. Somebody approached Eric Anderson a couple weeks back and said, you are violating my constitutional rights by not allowing me to put my political sign up now. And so we ran that by our lawyer Mark Brantz and I know the Down Lawyers take a look at it too, the feedback was, yes, while our regulations are very clear on when you can put up a political sign, that isn't the way that those things are viewed now in. And so essentially,
a sign is a sign. If we can have whatever rules we want to apply to signs, but it's going to apply to all the signs. I think we can deviate between temporary signs and permanent signs and make those rules a little bit different. But we can't regulate the content of what's on a sign. So after we get done with the lake regs, we'll probably take I got I have a copy of what was presented to me as a newly updated town sign regs in I'll study through those a little bit before I send them out to you folks. But that's that'll be one of our things to do. Although I did not put that as a goal to be done next year. We'll see reality sometimes gets in the way. And
we did meet with the head of the Andover Democratic Party and the Andover Republican Party and went through what we crafted is the most lenient, if you will, ruling on signs for private yards. And we said, okay, this is, you know, if this kind of sign can be 32 square feet, then then your political sign can be that too. And, and so we gave him some guidance there. And then I see that at the Board of Selectmen meeting recently we talked about putting political signs or signs in general on on town property in in the right away in everybody has a little bit of town right away in front of their house out by the road. So those little signs that you see along the road are all really on town property. But the Board of Selectmen agreed that one we can put signs on town property, but it can't be any bigger than I think it was four square feet went out on there, two by two.
Jed, could you repeat that about how close you can be on town property or not? So you
can put a sign up on town property. It can't be any more than four square feet in size. In town property, know, for purposes of this discussion we defined as along 15 feet along the road, you know, 15 feet within 15 feet of the road. Okay.
I think we're talking about two different things here. And one is the content of your sign, and the other one is how soon you can put it up. We may be even talking about three or four things, but that's what I'm getting out of this so far. I think they changed the regulation about when you can put the signs up political signs up. But, Scott, they're not supposed to change the regulations without us. I mean, this is a regulation that we have. The Board of Selectmen or concerned citizens, in my opinion, were not supposed to just do this. And we weren't even emailed about it. The state the state did it.
Well, no one's mentioned that so far. Right. Well, it's a state thing that happened. The So this came from the state, not from It came from the court, actually, I think. Yes, it was the court.
I don't know the specific case study that they referred to, But as it presented, as it was presented to us by our attorney, if we enforced our regulations, we would be sued, we could be sued, and we would lose. And that was not something that Eric or I were excited about. And so we did meet with these people and we pulled the pertinent issues out of our regulations in existence. And you should have those up on your screen now to take a look at the rules we put for signs on private property. And these all came out of our regulations.
I agree maybe I should have done a better job of informing you people immediately that we were doing something different. But I'm not sure I understand it well enough to do that even now.
The the state the state came down with this from the courts, and then the attorneys drafted all these new regulations.
Okay. Well, that's where The town attorneys. I think somebody should have brought us up to speed. I know there's a lot more going on in the world now, but, you know, I driving around, this rule has been in place in our regulations for years, and I wondered why both parties both major parties were what I considered to be flaunting it. So I just think it would have been a courtesy if, like I said, you know, we have a lot more to worry about than this right now, but it is a common thing, and I'm getting a little confused about what we're talking about. We're talking about distance from the road and content and how long you can leave a sign up and this and that. And I just, you know, I think we as a commission, I just feel would like to have been in the loop.
I apologize for that, Leigh Ann. I should have done that. And I wasn't sure anybody would notice that between the time that we put this out, which is maybe a week or two ago, and in the time that we were having the next meeting where I could do that. What I what I was concerned about and still concerned about is the proliferation of signs that you were which is what you said Leanne. The you know, there are between the we love our first responders. To Black Lives Matter, lots of signs and all those signs are out on town property primarily. And so I'm not sure that our regulations apply to the signs on town property. I got to go study that some more. But our regulations did talk about 90, we could, it was thirty days for a political sign, it could be expanded to ninety days. My thought was that we probably, I didn't want to go around and start pulling out all the signs or telling Jim to go around and start pulling out all the But we've got to figure out what to do with the signs. And so I thought we would get through political season, see where the abuses were, and that would allow us to
have a better understanding of what safeguards or restrictions to put into our regulations so that we get more of what we want coming out the other end.
Yeah, and as I said, it's, you know, we as a whole have, you know, a lot of things to worry about now, and this is not that important. But on the other hand, I can see where, you know, like you just said, there's and I you know, the signs are kind of heartwarming about we're all in this together, and thank you, first responders. And I don't think anybody wants to be, least of all me, wants to go around telling people that they have to take them down. I'm just concerned about the, like you said, the proliferation of it. Yep. If it even happens, and probably it's not going to be that bad.
So the takeaway is whatever rules we apply to those we love our first responders signs
yep. Are going to be the rules that we need to apply to the political signs as well. And so that's going to take a little bit of work because I think those are all temporary signs and we can make it consistent. But when we do put out new regulation, then once again, I think we're going to be bound to enforce it. And I'm not ready to be the bad guy and go pull down all those we love our first responder signs at this point. Getting close, but not there yet. No, I totally understand.
So that was what I wanted to brief you folks all on signs. So at some point next year, we probably will tackle that and we'll go from there. Okay.
Okay, that's it on signs. I'm going skip over HC. We'll get to the minutes in just a minute. In paragraph eight. Item seven on the agenda is discussion. Anybody got anything else they would like to discuss at this point? I have a question. Has Linda resigned? I thought I saw that on the Board of Selectmen agenda. Thank you for bringing that up and I feel bad that Linda was not here tonight so that we could thank her. She did resign and I knew that was coming. As And a matter of fact, one of the people that that was on and I don't see maybe if I stop sharing this is Mindy still here. Oh, couldn't. There now I can see your smiling face. Okay, so Mindy Gosselin is is going to be taking over for Linda is the board clerk. Okay.
And so, yes, Linda did resign. Hello. This was going to be Linda's last meeting with us tonight and she has certainly done a superb job of being the board clerk and so Mindy's got some big shoes to fill and I'm sure she can do that and I'm just we're excited to have you here Mindy welcome. Thank you I'm excited to be here. So that
takes care of that part of the discussion and Amanda is hoping that Mindy you get real smart on the zoom sharing thing so I don't drag her to all these meetings to put up all that stuff and I'm sure you'll be able to handle that too. Yep. Any other discussion topics?
Well, is there anything else ever going to happen on the Hendy Road property or is that out of our jurisdiction now?
Jim, I'll let you answer that. I am under the impression that is out of our jurisdiction at the moment. We're talking 57 Hendy Road? Yes.
That's the one with the lack of frontage out there.
Yeah, there's a number of issues. I don't see it coming to the commission, but I don't know that for a fact. Okay. I'm trying to work through there's some confusion. The flood regular in the flood zone regulations, they cast a net on the whole hundred year flood any property within the hundred year flood zone set by FEMA. But it's the flood zone reg. Flood zone is is much smaller than that include includes very little property. And we reached out to Mark Grant, and he said, oh yeah, you're, there would be no, I mean, there's not, residential construction is not permitted in a one hundred year flood. There's an inconsistency in our regulation. We're trying to work through that. That's that's about it.
What about the lot line? What about the frontage on a town road?
Well, I did reach out to Mark Branch on that as well. He said he basically said it's up to the the owner to come up with that. And when you look at that, you look at that plan, it may not be clear, but they own prop, they all have the furniture on the other side of the other side of the house. It it may not be clear because because there there's a at least one of the plans that was submitted to me is is what looked like a lot line, which is really a proposed lot line. So right now, the lot that they're we're talking about, the lot that surrounds that house has ample frontage to the towards the river. So it's not like they can't provide the frontage.
They can't they can't provide frontage on a town road.
What I'm saying is that that lot has considerable has the lot width on the other side of the house. That lot, it's it's a horseshoe lot around around the house. They actually have the lot with it, and and there's where you establish building line Mhmm. Which becomes very confusing.
They they don't they don't have anything. They have they have frontage on a town property on on both sides. John Valenti gave them the frontage on the town's property when he should have been given up telling them that they had to have frontage on Hendy Road, but instead he made it to town property, and that's wrong. And so if you if you let them do it on the other side, they're gonna be having frontage on the town property again and not not on an actual town road.
That's that's an argument that I I it's an argument that was put forward by by the owner and I disagreed with. I said it was just a mistake.
So so to add insult to injury, we would do it twice? Allowing it twice? Were lots there. They need it they need 400 feet on the frontage there or something close somehow and they didn't they just they still don't have it on the house that's sitting there it's not a horseshoe lot Jim those those lots were there were hooked together They came from one lot and the other ones came from another lot. Now you're calling it a horseshoe lot. It's not not what you're saying. It's a it's they're looking for frontage on town's property, which is incorrect. If they buy that property and they have the 400 feet, which they won't because I already looked at it, they still don't have the 400 feet.
I mean, part part of that is a lot that was the the existing house, the old, is it Parkington's house? Yep. Yep. So that was carved out whenever. I I don't know when that was
carved out. Park the Parkintons owned a thousand feet of frontage on the road.
So, if we go to our website on a pending application is the 57 Hendy Road and we can call up the pitcher because Jim and Scott are both talking to different things. I'll pull it up. What
I'm saying is property on the left side of the house is part of its contiguous immediate part of the land to the right of the house.
Okay. So we need to be clear on the house, the existing house that Jim is talking about is the one that's right in the center of the screen.
That's not the existing house. The existing house is opposite Pine Ridge Drive and to the right a little bit back there. That's a different existing house and that's where the confusion is.
The existing house off of Pine Ridge Drive is the one that Jim agrees with you that was improperly allowed and does not have sufficient frontage. Right. But that was authorized by our zoning agent.
Right. And we can't do anything about that now. No, keep in mind that that wasn't built on. I mean, was built, had been built years ago. Right, probably it was just twenty's or something. Was the lot was carved out more recently.
Right, okay so the proposed lot has 46 feet on Hendee Road. Here's what I'm saying, in
the center you get several 100 feet of frontage on the east side of that lot.
Yeah. But that's on town property. It's not on town road.
What difference does it make? The road used to go there. They had the French on the road.
Well, I mean, on the east side, it's pretty much the way it is everywhere around town, At least for the most part. Where it gets weird is on the right, where the road was apparently relocated. But I agree, I mean, that's town property. Doesn't have frontage. Well, we use the term lot with, and it's measured
building setback or in front of the building setback line. But that lot is a U that goes around the existing house that's in the center of the drawing. It has the frontage on the left hand side that more than meets the requirement as long as that's one lot. What doesn't exist right now?
I can't read the plan because it's off of my screen, but there's a line in the stone house, it says existing house. It's the stone house. Which the rear at the rear of that lot, there's a a line, a property line, which doesn't exist. It's oh, it's but I don't know. So it's it's But it's pro that proposed to create a new lot, is it's proposed at the land to the the east of the house be now part of the house lot, which is is not depicted on this plan by by any mean.
I think at this part is there's no satisfactory solution proposed by the applicant. Is that fair, Jim?
I hung up on whether it's a permitted permitted or or the I'm of the opinion. I'm I'm told it's not a permitted lot. It's not a special permit or permitted. Hence, it's a prohibited use residential.
So they have not come to you with an acceptable plan that would make it work?
No. Okay. I'm trying to deal with the use that arguing the use and I haven't resolved that completely. I mean, did tell them that it was an unallowable unison. What's that unallowable usage?
Well, here's where it gets confusing. Flood zone regulations, they list permitted and special and special permit uses. They tend to be like agriculture, farming, Recreation. Residential use is not listed as a as either a permitted or special permit you. In the flood zone. Right. Okay.
But then you have to then there's the discrepancy in the definition of of what that flood zone covers. That's that's where I'm stuck.
So I think the the takeaway is that there's no reason for it to come to the commission at this point. But I don't see where they presented to Jim a path forward that complies with our regulations that allows them to do anything on Because you have the frontage issue in the floodplain issue.
Actually, redraw the lot line and make it ask for a rear lot. Okay. But that's if they resolve the either get a variance or somehow convince me that it is allowable use, whether it be a right or special permit. So we have two big issues here. So the rear lot would, if it was, if it did pursue that, and they're not inclined to, it would make sure for a special purpose. And that would, would be a way around the whole frontage issue. Not around it, but it would be a way to comply with it.
And would it to us if they got a special permit for a rear lot?
Right. It would be it would be a reconfiguration of that lot. Mhmm. So then it it would trigger a special permit. Is it still in the floodplain though, Jim?
What's that, Susan? So we don't have to worry about it for a while. We don't have to worry about it for a while. Yep. Okay. They're still out there stirring the pot trying to see where that's at. Okay. Any other discussion topics? Hearing none, we'll move on to the next item on the agenda, which is the approval of the minutes. And first up is our last regular meeting from 08/17/2020. Looking for a motion to approve the minutes from August 17. I move we approve.
Dropped out Susan where I couldn't hear you. Would you say again your motion? Susan, can you hear me? No, I can't. I'm having trouble with the internet tonight. Okay. I
heard you say you would make a motion To approve the minutes of our regular meeting of 08/17/2020.
Thank you, Susan. Is there a second? I'll second. Thank you, Anne. Any discussion on those minutes? I had no comments on the minutes. Anybody else? Hearing none, we'll take a vote. And Anne? Aye. Scott? Aye. Susan? Aye. Leanne? Aye.
I vote aye as well. The minutes are approved five-zero-zero. Next up are the special meeting sidewalk minutes from 08/20/2020. Like a motion to approve those minutes.
I make a motion to approve the minutes of the sidewalk, which is our special meeting on 08/20/2020. Thank you, Susan. Can I have a second?
I'll second. Thank you, Scott. Any discussion on the minutes?
I had one minor change. In the minutes, we talked about the real estate agent leaving at 08:40. I believe he left at 09:40. I believe you're right. That's my only comment.
Okay. Amanda, will you be able to correct that or since since I wrote those minutes? Yes. So the real estate agent left at 09:40? Yeah.
Okay. Yep. Okay. Thank you. Any other discussion on those minutes? I was going say the guy who wrote those up did a crackerjack job. Yes, he did. Hearing none, we'll call for a vote. Anne? Aye. Scott? Aye. Susan? Aye. Leanne? Abstain.
And I vote aye as well. The minutes are approved four zero one with Leanne abstaining. Moving on to the next section nine correspondence. I did get a letter from Eric Anderson today asking for an 08/24 referral on a couple of pieces of property that the town has been offered by a landowner and a land trust. I just wanted to call your attention to that. I will send you out the information that I got on it. There's a fabulous write up. I don't know who did the write up on on why we should get it from the Conservation Commission, but they they did a very nice job. And so I'll send that out to you tomorrow and we'll discuss that at the at our next meeting. And that was all that I wanted to do is call your attention to that. What is this? Is this a donation? It is a donation. Okay. It makes it pretty easy. Up by the dump. Okay, so this is for the next meeting? Yes.
Moving on to item 10, administrative reports. Jim, you have anything for us?
I did meet with the owners rep of the gravel pit at 517 Route 6. And I was a little concerned because I was dealing with the gentleman that I was dealing with is no longer in state. The site representative is an employee as opposed to one of the two brothers who was the applicant. So it was a little more distant. So I met with the engineer, went over status, and they have to start some restorations at this point in time. Project was approved in five phases. They're going to have to just restore a number of phases before they move forward. And I'm waiting for a restoration plan for that. What's involved with It's your restoration
grading and seeding, I believe. It's cut the slopes. I'm going have to check the plan. Really haven't gotten into that as of yet. I hope to to be doing that this week. I also do anticipate the gentleman that's from from Old Farms in Pine Ridge Drive, Lockett, is accessed from both of those streets. He is moving forward with a wetlands application for the Planning and Joint Commission for a lot of subdivision at some point in the future. Other than that, I don't know. Yep. Repeat what?
This is Leanne. Could you repeat your remarks about is it the extra mark that's what you're talking about? Do you say you had a concern because the owners representative is different?
Right no longer the Genovese brothers which I've been dealing with neither one is on-site, and I I just wanted to catch up. So I sort of facilitated a meeting with their engineer.
So did not does not on-site mean, temporarily, or you think they're kind of vacated, or is that not clear? Or they're just not gonna be the representative?
No. One of the brothers I mean, they've always run it out of the, gravel operation out of the auto parts. And neither of the brothers is currently managing those. I'm not sure what will happen in the future. Who's managing
that now? It's it's whoever is running the the auto parts store, the auto parts place, employee of and or auto parts. But I'm I'm gonna get a name. I'm gonna get a contact so I do have an on-site contact there. Kind of a big deal.
The people that took the application out aren't around anymore?
Well, they're they're off-site. Yeah. One of them is in Florida. It may be temporary, it may not. I don't know. And one of them I believe works in Connecticut. Yeah, I forget where, but no. Longer. Go ahead. No longer they're on a day to day basis.
So is the last person that you met with you said it's it's the person who's managing the Endover Auto Parts, or it's the No. The engineer of the That engineer, Chris Bell. Engineer of record. Chris Bell.
So that's who you've been meeting with, not the person who's managing Endover Auto Parts, or is it the same person?
I'm sorry. The last time I met I met Chris Bell and one of the Bill Genovese who came from another location.
Okay. So the last time you met, is it correct that you just met with Chris Bell? No. I met with Chris Bell and Bill Genovese.
Okay. So it's your understanding that from now on, Bill Genovese Genovese is for at least temporarily is not gonna be there?
Well, I'm just saying he's not there on a day to day basis. That's all.
Okay. And and just to go back for a second, is there a different person than either one of these two people actually managing the place?
Well, there's a gentleman that works in the in the auto parts place that handles some some routine business for them, yes.
Okay. Ask the person whose name you're you don't have yet. Who was the applicant? Bill Genovese?
Yeah. One of the Genovese. I I forget whether it was under I think it was Bill. Okay. Bill and Joe. I've dealt more with Joe because he was on-site. He was he was working in the Anover up until recently.
So what would be the normal process with that? With you having the applicant not meeting, not being able to meet with you?
Well, well, they did. I mean, Bill did make himself available. I mean, I kind of called, I was trying to actually put it together to meet with the Wetlands agent and her herpetologist, Nick. He isn't. I wasn't able to do it today. As fast as I would have liked, so I ended up meeting alone and I'm just going to bring them into the loop. I just thought it was important, given the fact that I became concerned that I lost my contact person with the reestablishment with those two individuals. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome.
Anything else, Jim, or anything else for Jim? Okay, the Inland Wetlands Watercourse Commission liaison, I guess the only thing that I'd like to share at this point is that the drawing on 57 Hendy Road that you are looking at was approved by the Inland Wetlands Commission for what they want to do to build the house there in the floodplain within the 200 feet of the river and that sort of thing. So that is through wetlands and is headed over to zoning or planning zoning, whatever the case turns out to be there.
So their regulations permit building in the flood plain apparently.
Yes. What the applicant did is Don't speak to a flood plain.
Basically, what they're doing is bringing infill and raising the level, bringing that house site out of, above the hundred year flood level. It doesn't change the flood zone though. Doesn't change the fact that it's in the hundred year flood zone. There's a way to changing that. Hasn't happened.
Okay, I'm moving on to public speak. I can't imagine anybody from public still with us. So with that, we'll move on to adjournment. And before we adjourn, again, I want to welcome Mindy to be the new board clerk. I thank Linda in her absence for all the great work that she's done for us. And I thank Amanda for helping us out tonight in all the times that she has in the past. And I appreciate all of you bearing with us. We went a little longer than I hoped, but we're well prior to the bylaws cut off of 10:30. So we're hanging in there. Somebody want to move that we adjourn? This is Leanne. I'll move to adjourn at 09:54.
Thank you, Leanne. Any second? I'll second it. Thank you, Anne.
No discussion, we'll vote. Anne? Aye. Scott? I guess he adjourned early. We'll call that an abstention. Susan. Aye. Leanne. Aye.
I vote aye as well. Four zero one. Scott Bersand abstaining. Thank you very much, everybody. Had a lot going on. We'll see you next month. Good night. Good night. Thank you all. Good night. Thank you, Good night. Good night. Oh, there's Scott. He's back. Okay.