Select Board Hybrid Meeting Aug 16 2023 Clean Copy

001good evening everyone welcome to the Ashland select board meeting of August 16th oh good evening welcome to the select board meeting of August 16th thank you Michael for turning on my microphone that's very nice um I'm caught uh uh this meeting is called the order and um it's being live streamed by waca TV and I will the first item on our agenda is Citizens participation is there anyone here for Citizens participation right Mr Morgan approached the microphone Mr Mike on yeah so I have two issues I'd like to discuss tonight I'll be brief I'd invite any select member to come to my house and review these yourself if you're interested in any facts or documents so the first thing I'm concerned about is around Tuesday of last week the existing boundary fence over with them

002into school behind my property was removed and a backhoe was ran across the property this went beyond the boundary fence that existed for decades this issue came up two years ago in the hearing that that boundary fence is on a deed and it is may not be exactly there on a modern survey but that's where it is it's pretty settled uh issue but the contractor with no notice came over remove the fence backhoe the back of the property so I engaged with the police department I asked what the procedure was and I have since filed a new trespass with the town and with on the contractor and offered to discuss the boundary and result resolution instead I've gotten a letter from Town Council threatening to send the police to my property I've been assured by

003the chief that they have no Authority which I know they have no authority to send police on a civil matter to my property but yet I was threatened by a letter by time Council which by the way showed up a day late with the wrong date on it and wasn't helpful accusing me of not being the trustee of my own condo association and completely informed so I think that's for you to review with Town Council but I expect that fence to get put back where it was it's a decades-old boundary I don't understand why people are fighting over a few feet in my backyard when it has no impact on the design of the road or the property and yet this is where we are and I think a lot of that has to do

004with who's running that project in the town so I'm not sure but I think it's pretty simple if you want to see what was done happy to show it to you I've told the contractor I'm happy to work with him if he can you know he can come onto the property and put it back if he needs to whatever the case is as long as he puts it back where it was that's all I'm asking for put it where it was um and that seems to be too hard so uh um at the moment you know I'm being threatened by Council I also understand Council May or the town is threatening through the contractor my neighbor shed at my adjacent property which they're claiming his hometown property they're they're threatening my other neighbor for the

005down the road that his fence which is backed up with the existing fences on their property and this is all going on in my neighborhood so there were assurances that this would all be done in a neighborhood friendly manner but yet we have this whole row of Neighbors being threatened over this boundary that doesn't even appear to be needing to be moved but yet the town is trying to insist that they've got this modern electronic survey and they want to move it so I think you need to review that and figure out whether that's really a priority for the town um you know if we want to I suppose we could argue we're trying to block the school's opening or something if we want to go down these paths but this is nothing to do

006with any of that this has got to do with my backyard and whether the defense is being moved and you know that fence has been there in some form for what 70 years since 1953 when it was required by indeed that the town accepted and is obligated to fulfill this was all discussed two years ago so why this is happening news to me but I would hope you get control of it I I don't need I don't need to be spending my time talking to the chief to remind her she has no authority to follow a town council's opinion you know this is civil matter it's like a divorce case police are not supposed to be involved if Tom Council wants to go to land court and argue that the land shouldn't be at the

007boundary defense she's welcome to do that I'm not interested in going away in court don't think that's the right approach but she's well within her rights to go to land court and suggest that my understanding of the boundary is not correct and that she wants to quiet the quiet the boundary or whatever the case may be that's her prerogative but it's not her prerogative to threaten me with police and say she's removing my property and my signs which is what she's done so that's that's comment number one so I would invite anybody to come look um as a side matter you know they violated the conservation restriction which Becca has now resolved on the stream that we've all discussed nearby and you know I understand mitigation is going to help me put in place but

008this was this was on this project I know they also nearly flooded one of the other neighbors further down with water which we all know that site's full of water they almost flooded the new school and these are all things that were covered in com um on on Monday so I don't want to get in all that here but that's that's for information um I would hope you know again someone would take an interest I'm happy to you know provide information sit down and resolve this but I'm not interested in moving the fence onto my property it wasn't there for 70 years no reason it should be there now okay that's pretty simple second point I want to make since I'm here and I'm motivated to talk about this project is I've been getting to

009run around by this project for now over over 10 months almost on insurance claim this project damaged my home I have new cracks in my Foundation I have towel cracks in my floors I have separated sheetrock throughout my house I don't know I'm not I'm not a contractor but this is probably about something like 15 to 20K worth of damage that I file an insurance claim with with the contractor who in turn sent it to their subcontract to send it to another subcontractor who all of which claim none of it's their responsibility I was in my home when they were doing this work I can't tell you whether it was the blasting The Rock crushing the impact Wells being drilled you know I'm not the one to decide that but I know that I was

010in my house my house was shaking all day long caused by those Rock Crushers and those those impact drills a couple of the blasts that went off almost shook me out of my chair I'm not here to argue seismic data fact is they shook my house I have damage in my house I'm happy to show it to anyone who's interested in looking at it they all have videos of it but they're still claiming oh no possible way this damage came from us and that's just it's nonsense so I don't think it's a big deal you know on a project of the size but why is it that the town and its contractor can't take responsibility for the Neighbors I don't know what damage my other neighbors have um they've told me they have damage in

011particular the historic home on The End by the driveway he's told me he's got foundation cracks that are new yeah you know and again I'm not speaking for them they can come speak for themselves but this this is what's going on in the neighborhood so maybe people don't like me here but this is not about me it's about what this project is doing to my home and I would invite you to either come look or sit down and discuss a resolution it's very reasonable I know I know the chief said my request was very reasonable that people not move the fence she assured me that she had told her staff that they were not to come on the property and they were not to you know take anything off the property until it was resolved

012by a court which is a very reasonable decision and a correct decision so I don't I don't know Tom Council obviously has a different opinion she'd like to wave a new survey and say I own this land she's welcome to go to court and prove that and quiet the title but until she does I don't need her threatening me telling me I'm damaging her and trespassing on her property when she's the one representing the contractors who came by with a bulldozer removed the fence through self-help and now complain the sign's not exactly in the right spot you know we're not arguing about inches here we've got about five to eight feet here we're talking about get the signs a few inches the wrong way I'm not arguing about the exact positioning of the sign that's

013not the goal here the goal is to put the fence back where it was that's my goal and protect my property all right thanks Steve and while and while I'm at it I like the screening trees put in that are in the plants which are not there um so just leave that was there let me um so you've raised some important points is there anyone here like the Town Council Town manager or any who has detailed knowledges that cares to respond to what Mr Morgan is saying or he's asked us to follow up and investigate so he so I would suggest to the board that this is not on the agenda um and it's a legal matter and I would respectfully suggest that this is a matter that would be handled either an executive session

014or when it's properly on the agenda and would involve the building committee as well okay so and we do have some members of the building committee so I guess I'm just procedurally I'm just um just want to make sure that there is a process in place for reviewing and resolving what Mr Morgan is bringing up does that process underway which well he's made a number of claims here are he's alleging two different things here that seem important so I think both of them I'm going to say both of them Steve I'm going to say the the fence issue and then also um you know the damage issue the insurance claim I think there's a process that's been laid out and I think you know both parties have been following that you know and there's so

015just take the insurance claim for example you filed a claim it's going through the process it might not necessarily be the answer that you want to hear but there's a process to resolve that and I'm sure if it gets denied you have the ability to appeal that um and again I know you're a process guy so I would say take advantage of that so thank you thank you and and there are there are certain processes um I know that Tom sent me a letter claimed that they didn't have presentment and weren't responsible so if that's the process that the town wants to take they won't even investigate they'll send a letter saying they need presentment they don't have even after they've been told that that's that's certainly a an outcome I think it's it's it's

016incorrect to suggest that the process has been followed um I will tell you I'm I I don't want to bring a legal case for for 15 to 20 000 but I'm talking to a lawyer now about this and in particular about my damages in my home and if people can't come look at the damage you don't have to be an expert to look at damage and understand that the vibration of my home caused the damage in front of your eye you know it's obvious um I've gotten the public records about these things there was a dispute about whether an inspection was allowed which the records that were presented were inaccurate I personally walked the inspector around the whole condo unit exterior um with him and then he filed a document claiming he only looked at

017the exterior 138 which is half of my building and then he claimed that we're not responsible for the damage for blasting because we can't prove it wasn't there well he walked it with me there was no cracks in my Foundation when he walked it but yet I have four or five brand new cracks in my Foundation which you can look at the not full of moss they're not old you know it's pretty obvious what was done here and so if I need to hire a lawyer to go to court to get an insurance claim enforced so I can fix my home because we have a problem that the committee doesn't want to own with a contractor nobody wants to own a problem I understand that but these are these are not like earth-shattering things that

018should take a big thing so anyways that's my comment and I appreciate the time I just want to yeah so just want to make sure that we have something in place for some sort of follow-up so did you is he advised to go to the building committee at this point or what would yeah I I actually would take attorney me's advice at this point and you know if we want to have a fuller discussion about this we have it on a properly noticed agenda sure and um and it sounds like it might be good if you shared some of this background information with the board because what we're getting is emails from Mr Morgan we're not I wasn't aware of the Town council's letter or that I mean I don't know if what other board

019members think if you want to see this kind of material or or how to handle this I believe it was sent to the building committee right it was so Town Council sent me a letter which was delivered by a police officer after nine o'clock last night they show up at my door which was dark banging on my door to deliver a letter that was dated from Tuesday or excuse me Monday so it was a day late almost two days late claiming that if I didn't remove mine no trespass sign within the next 48 hours they were gonna accuse me of trespass and sue me for damages that's what the letter said to me at nine something last night okay now I I understand the Town Council isn't supposed to be doing that she threatened to

020send police to my home and remove those because she felt it was her property and she could have police do that and police are not civil enforcers they are criminal enforcers thank you so so this is what's really going on so I hope you do investigate I appreciate your asking a couple questions and and a final point on if I may this doesn't need to be in an executive session necessarily you have to decide as the chair that this is harmful to the town's position to discuss in the open so I would think this is certainly something you can discuss in the open I'd be happy to discuss with any individual member well we'll we'll take that under advisement future agenda and so thanks for coming forward and thank you hopefully you guys appreciate the

021time thanks dude please talk to my neighbors okay thank you anyone else for um citizens for Marx Mark desoni I think you're gonna mute yourself and uh keep up the fight Steve because you you your property is being protected by you and the neighbors but I'm coming up with something that is different this is towards the town manager and I asked the town manager a question yeah are you okay with that Rob oh sure go ahead okay now Mr Tom manager about the comprehensive plan have you been getting emails from me about grants that uh from different government agencies for me Mark I have been getting a lot of emails from you about grants and things that you've signed up for and all this information and data that you've collected um in the way that

022he was saying to me that's that's my way of trying to shrink the Gap the Gap exactly so I'm I was trying to put that in a way that I could that we both can understand where I'm coming from and then it can go forth to the concert plan which is tomorrow night and be talked over as a group and have them get involved with grants is is a way to um get expenses and economic growth for the plan to work right yeah and I think this is going to be a great topic a discussion Mark when we get to that section of the comprehensive plan where we talk about like Economic Development and Community Development yeah so that that was that was what I I you got those I know I know I've been

023said the dog I've been looking at them and it's all it's all it's basically on this on the side of things I've been I've been wanting to push the science standby by biology and all that stuff and education of students in college and economic growth of people coming here so I'm just saying that I thank you for saying replying that you did get those and you agreeing that they can be a good start for the comprehensive plan to talk on and I want to keep it that way I want to keep it for that and my other question I asked you at the founders Market is there going to be a chance for Zoomers to participate in those meetings yeah Mark that's really going to be up to the chairs I I do know the

024chairs for tomorrow night I know um I know it's important to them to have people have an opportunity to speak but we do have a rather large committee and I think probably they will be prioritized first but I'm sure they would like to hear your comments so we'll have Alvaro helping with the meeting tomorrow night and he can help and again Steve fight for what you got there because you deserve the property be yours and that could be expanded or not that was not there before thank you all right thanks Mark anyone else for Citizens participation okay um seeing no one I'll move to the next item on our agenda which is a legal update from uh Our Town Council Lisa Mead thank you it's great to be here I was just talking to the

025chair ahead of the meeting so I'm here quarterly so last time I was here was in April um and so some things have changed and some haven't and we're doing some new things that we hadn't been working on before um just an update on the petition to NSTAR we have not received um any decision yet from the efsb and so we continue to wait on that um we settled the ATB case with um Mr Taylor and the board of assessors and so that was resolved that was still outstanding last time we were here um I know you're all interested in what's happening up at Burnham Circle um the planning board did vote on June 30th to give notice that they would revoke or at least provide notice to the bond company relative to completion of

026the project um that 45-day period ended yesterday in the meantime they did put together a contract and scope of work which we had reviewed by the or Peter had reviewed by the peer review consultant and we provided that back to them and hadn't heard back from them uh Brian as you know is taking the lead on this and he's given him a number of chances and finally today we've got information back that they were still waiting on comments from their contractor related to or they're expert related to the scope of work and they hadn't started the contractor has come in to try to start work but until we haven't agreed upon scope of work to make sure that the job is done properly that hasn't been the permit hasn't been provided to let them go

027forward so we have the next step would be depending on what happens to this agreement is if they don't come back with a proper scope of work that we would then file a proper notice or a notice to the bond company so the bond company did get notice before that we sent the notice to the developer related to completing the project but now there's another notice we'd have to give to the bond company so they would start to move on the bond so we're kind of in between right now waiting on that to happen um but obviously it is top to priority sure go ahead um I drive by there quite often and with all the torrential range stones that we've had I drive by there and I hope the scope of work is a

028little bit larger than what was originally anticipated to be done because the the washouts along that Northern side of the Hill that that's that's coming down towards the edge it's it's gotten worse it has gotten worse so I hope that scope of work expands to make sure that they put something in it that they keep that from happening because if you look at the cul-de-sac it's it's it's all dirt so there's two there's two remedies here one is the requirements under the planning board decision which is what we have the bond for and that would be for the remaining undone work which I recall was about three hundred and ten thousand dollars I think um and but there's also the jurisdiction of the Conservation Commission so um I understand there are concerns by the conservation

029agent related to storm water and washouts and things like that so I can't tell you Joe which which bucket that is in um but I know that everybody's keeping an eye on it yeah okay there's a lot of us are thank you you're welcome so just a quick follow-up question to Joe's so um with regards to the what's in front of the the Conservation Commission or what's in their purview is it still is there is there some action that they are currently taking or are they at this point sure so they issued um enforcement orders and they issued fines um if depending what happens with the the planning board items there is a hearing scheduled for the fines but really that's this doesn't get the job done right you want the job done so if

030we can't get anywhere then the town has the choice to take action in court to force to compel that work to be done and of course that would be a determination of the Conservation Commission thank you okay I'm just curious about the what's the timeline on all that you know the way things seem to drag out sometimes it isn't right and things do continue to deteriorate there so we have made it very clear to the attorney for the developer that we need an answer now which is why we turned around the peer review on that um he sent to indicate in his several emails today that they were going to be doing that right away I will tell you the contractor is anxious to get going because he's been up to the planning office several

031times but he he can't do the work until the scope is approved so everybody understands that the urgency of it it's a matter of them getting it done and so at some point we will have to call the bond if we have to but the bond company would do the work so that frankly that's a longer process and so it's better from an efficiency point of view to get the developer to do it and to do it now with the bond that's secured up hopefully it's secured if the if the work that needs to be done is greater than the bond that is currently there who pays for the uh the extra well that would that would have to be the developer okay right and if the developer doesn't where does it fall well it

032depends on the work right so it it depends on the work because there's the conservation work and then there's the planning board work so the planning board can only enforce that which is required under the plan and so that's with the developer right that's with the developer okay all right thank you okay um and speaking of rain and Muddy Waters um You Might Recall we had um we reached an agreement with the developer and contractor at Legacy Place concerning stormwater runoff and implications in the Hopkinton Reservoir and whatnot um so um that was going along slowly but getting done and then this summer apparently the developer opened up a new section to build houses um and did not have the appropriate controls in place and so um that has reared its ugly head again um

033but it's separate from the agreement that we already have because that involved a different thing but it does involve implications into the reservoir so um Hopkinton actually is all over this they have issued significant fines they have requested the dep get involved and come in and do an enforcement our Conservation Commission and conservation agent likewise is doing the same thing and I have reached out to council for the developer as well so Hopkinton did Issue assistant require them to secure the site yesterday it's it's a mess yeah it's a total mess yeah I don't I don't I don't it's a disaster right right so and of course the Summer's weather has made it all the worse right which is at least I just had a question like there used to be a concept you know

034of um a well protection Zone I'm just wondering why there's no why that hasn't happened in this case like why there's no uh Zone around the well that is you know as a buffer or is that so this goes into the reservoir right surface water yeah so it's surface water but there still are they're still drinking water requirements I thought it was impacting our our Well site directly as well it goes into the reservoir near the near the wells right right the issue is this then it's then it's a watershed aquifer for foreign for us it's the sediment um because it causes us to treat the water with more chemicals more fully and it costs us more money for treatment no yeah I understand I guess I'm just I think you know it is it

035is a reservoir and so usually there's a protect those houses are very close I'm just wondering why it was not why we didn't didn't protect that area better from well it's not our development right it's I don't know I understand right I guess I just thought these things were better protected than they are and these are you guys have been hesitant to DCR has not stepped in it really despite repeated requests from Ashland and Hopkinton too okay intervene yeah so all right thank you you're welcome um the public safety building I continue to work on with Jen to close that out um and it looks like we're getting closer to a final resolution on that so um and I'm sure you've heard the updates from Jen on that um Mendes school we have providing ongoing

036assistance to the school building committee uh related to issues around construction um so we'll continue to do that um I was going to update When I Was preparing this earlier today um regarding the ugc and Gainer matter I was about to tell you that there was a hearing um a couple of weeks ago ugc had requested that um Gainer provide a bond to pay for attorney's fees and costs and interest um during the litigation you can do that when you appeal a 40 when a 40b is appealed so that hearing happened and we hadn't heard from them in lo and behold today we got the decision um so we we're playing an inactive role in that as you know but the judge denied the bond Not Unusual that it's hard to get those approved but

037it was there's a couple interesting things that came out of it so first of all a case management conference is set for September it an UNS you know an unstated date but there will be one in September um and they're going to discuss consolidating the cases at that time and so we have the the case the appeal of the 40b and then there's the other separate case between in ugc and Gainer related to the enforcement of the purchase and sale agreement um so that typically would be a much slower case um the 40b cases on a fast track um fast in quotes um and so it'll be interesting I don't know if they'll consolidate the cases or not they're all the same parties so um we wouldn't obviously be a party to the purchase a

038sale agreement case but um I don't know how that's going to go and then they're going to set a date for trial at the September case management conference again you know setting a day for trial is going to be next year sometime at the earliest I suspect you actually see it going to trial or would could there be another Court settlement well there can always be an out of court settlement but you just have to consider the parties that are involved you know if this If This Were in land Court you know one of the things about land Court in addition to being more a more efficient process is the courts really press judges really press mediation and resolution in the land Court um and the Superior Court they just don't have the bandwidth to

039do that they don't have they don't make the same effort um and it's also in land court with one judge at Superior Court they're on a rotation so you're going to get one judge today and another judge for those case management conference and another judge for Trump Lisa excuse me I have to interrupt we have to um call them public hearing and then we'll suspend it and come back to you so I think I uh I will read the legal notice um notices hereby given that the select board will conduct a hearing regarding an application for a grant of location to install one poll number three slash two three XA and one anchor guy the applicant is n Star Electric Company DBA eversource energy Ponderosa Road Northerly side approximately 444 feet plus or minus east

040of Cordova Road Ponderosa Road Ashland Mass a public hearing will be held on the matter on Wednesday August 16 2023 at 7 30 PM parties wishing to be heard on this matter are invited to attend a public hearing either in person or by logging into the zoom meeting interested parties are unable to attend the hearing May submit written comments so select board's office Town Hall 101 Main Street Ashland Mass 01721 are by emailing Susan Roby at s Roby ashlandmass.com signed Robert share chair select board so I asked for a motion to open the uh all those in favor of open to hear and say aye aye um the the hearing until we're done with our legal update let's get a second all those in favor suspended here and say aye aye meeting suspended okay continue

041okay um then we've had a couple of gun license appeals with the police chief um not an unusual thing um and um so Brian has been working with um the chief on that on those two matters uh you have before you this evening a approval of the new lease for the cell tower at the water tank on Cedar Street um this has happened we worked on the RFP with this we worked on the lease with this we worked with Greg Aldridge at Haley and Ward and Doug's Doug Small the goal over the last couple of years has been to get the antennas off of the top of the tank and put them down on the frame um for longevity of the tank and so once this lease is signed then T-Mobile will be required to

042remove the antennas from the top of the tank and put them down on the frame this lease also as opposed to the 20-year lease before has very specific design requirements about those connections which will be overseen by our console loans as they go up so it's a much better lease for the talent and you're still obviously going to get the revenue out of that um we've been working continue to work on the road acceptance for Brogden road we've been waiting on all the documents hopefully that's going to be on the tel meeting warrant in the fall um also we've been working with Evan on an easement access on some property that you all own on High Street um mere behind Whitmore which is open space and there's a field up there that was donated to

043the town in the 90s by the crawfords um there's a restriction in that deed that you can't access it access it over Whitmore you have to access it over the there's a little aisle area on High Street and the um the grade is really really steep so one of the neighbors over the last number of years has allowed the town to go through their property and access it to Mullet because you can't get to it from Whitmore um that neighbor now has volunteered to provide an easement to the town so it's permanent and then everybody's protected from an insurance and indemnification provision so we're working on that that'll be on town meeting this fall Lisa just so you you're aware that that's the upper Charles Trail is also trying to access it in that area

044so I don't know if this particular easement and I think we've talked to that person about the trail well so um I'm going to stay out of the negotiations um because that was Evan because the access is only limited to a couple of times a year because it's only from growing they didn't want to you know overly overstay their welcome so to speak okay so there's a there's another okay um just so you I just want to make sure you're aware I didn't know about that so that's good to know maybe you can put some steps in the other yeah section um the uh old fire station I've been working with Beth and Jen on the RFP and the lease for the old fire station um obviously the RFP was awarded um the lease has

045been provided to them and Beth is working on finalizing the the lease for the old fire station um I've also been working with Jen in the Board of Health regarding the receivership issue with a local house that I think is going to be moving along in the right direction for the town and for the residents um and then I've been providing consultation with the planning board and with Peter on the Main Street project and with Mike so we've been doing that on an ongoing basis and obviously the zoning board and the planning board ask us questions here and there regularly so those are the big issues in addition to our regular day-to-day open meeting Law Public Records requests and things of that nature that we do with the talent and approval of contracts okay questions

046or any other comments discussion thank you I do have one question and this might be more for Michael now that we we finished um the FY 23 budget um just kind of is the is our legal cost sort of in line with prior years has it been flat has it been pretty I'm just curious it was a little over this year okay um I don't have an analysis and breakdown of that but it was a little over okay um and so just remember the the legal costs aren't necessarily just for Lisa or her firm we also have Labor Council involved as you know we've had a lot of Labor exactly especially Civil Service stuff okay I'm just curious because every year when we do Town Council evaluation we one of the items is it talks

047about budget and we never really have any frame of reference to kind of go year over year so I'm just while we're finishing up the fiscal year good question oh that does remind me of one other thing when you said labor and Civil Service the other thing that we've been working on is the Civil Service getting the police department on civil service so we're that has now been the package has now been finalized and it's getting sent off tomorrow to civil service it's one agenda item we can cross off right all right great thank you thank you um later on we're doing the the um their liquor license home rule petition are you going to be involved in that as well um I usually I probably we probably drafted the the letter and everything for

048the home rule petition so you've been working on that right yeah okay is there any um did you um anything else we should know about in terms of background for that in terms of legal stuff are the legislature while you're here you're leaving I presume you're not staying for her I'm not yeah I am gonna leave um that affects your budget um so the uh is there anything else I'll just answer your question related to the liquor license so every town meet every town meeting season um you know we probably have a half dozen to a dozen of our towns that submit numeral petitions they really need to change the law how many of them have ever have gotten it approved they'll they'll get oh okay yeah how long does it take oh anywhere from

049eight months to two years really but from what we found out I think Susan had a conversation with the abcc and they don't have too much information uh in terms of the legislative process but it does seem to happen a little bit more quickly than other homework yeah it's it's pretty standard because now it's yeah it is almost so we're asking for 16. is that pretty typical given our size and our is that you know I've had smaller communities ask for a dozen So and I've had larger communities ask for one so it's kind of all over okay are we ready to move along here just waiting for the podium to be let in but I don't just let us know any other questions does Susan know that you're waiting for the podium to be

050let in I think so yeah we're back on yeah we cut the wack of feed as well okay delay three years I've never been Zoom bomb before that was quite a cool experience it's awesome it's just fabulous it's bad it's just it's great to see all of you welcome aboard right thank you no yeah he's pretty familiar it's been at least two or three times I don't remember that before Paul do I join with audio on this no no it's just crazy okay so do we have anybody here from um right now it does not look like it okay yes Mark Helen or Joan are now Moonlighting forever go into the deputy chief that's going to take a little while if they show up yeah we are at 7 42 right now is there a

051way to contact them or Susan I assume you've been in touch with Chris it was um Shauna what is her name and I did send her a reminder last Thursday I sent her something again at like 7 20 when I didn't see anyone on and I've heard nothing so I don't know if something happened but they were well aware of it are we prepared to do without them or are there concerns or thoughts or people think they need to hear a presentation from them on this or I mean it's pretty straightforward we we just did one of these a couple weeks I mean at our last meeting a whole hearing um uh you know they don't ask for them unless they need them it's it's on Ponderosa Road it looks like it's in a good

052location Well we'd have to then reopen if we want to reopen the hearing I guess that's what I'm asking are we ready to reconvene here is everything's working now okay so I'll get a sense of the board we where we uh thinking about moving ahead and ready to reopen the hearing uh to ask for a motion to reopen it motion to reopen the hearing my other's in favor say aye aye aye the hearing's been reopened so we have material in our packet is there anybody Michael do you have a presentation anything you want to say about it or Jen I'll just um I'll just let you know that the deputy chief is here to provide this update on what's known as their comprehensive emergency management plan so this is an update of our prior management

053plan talking about yeah so I just I thought we'll get it done oh no we're asking if do feel like I mean I mean I think we all think that with the information that we have we can move forward with this without NSTAR eversource being here yeah if that's okay with you I've got no concerns with that would have would relay to eversource Susan is that this is kind of a courtesy um in terms of approving this without them being here and they really should be here yeah this will not happen again next time we just suspend the hearing until the next meeting okay I move that we accept the grant of location to install one poll three slash 2-3 XA and one anchor guy on Ponderosa Ponderosa road with based on the material presented

054in our packet so I've got a motion second any further discussion or questions or folks ready to vote on this I'll ask for a vote then all those in favor opposed an Ocean passes so the um the uh the poll location has been uh approved we didn't close the hearing motion to close the hearings I'll second that we'll get a motion to close the hearing all those in favor say aye aye aye okay the Motions closed um yeah so we don't need to vote you know we're already voted and approved it okay so thank you but I would say that next time if they're not here we will suspend the hearing until the next meeting okay yeah thank you so it was a little one it's we don't want it to be a habit right

055okay so as as Michael said um deputy chief Morgan is here uh to present the comprehensive emergency management plan so yeah Linfield come forward do you have a um a a slideshow for us or okay to get set up okay so you're all set then sounds like that's okay we have we have it in our pack this is the actual plan I think oh boy she brought props oh boy very good will you uh are you sorry you left retired a little early I can tell you that I've had a few moments where I thought oh boy I'd like to be here for this and uh but all in all it was the right right move for me um but I can say that the real the biggest thing is that when I drive around

056town I see kids on bikes and stuff I really miss the kids yeah that's a beautiful facility it's a beautiful facility thank you [Music] should be on the computer if she'd put it in the with the flash drive earlier so um is something that we have to update every five to seven years along with our other plans shelter plan the hazard mitigation plan Chief Roby was able to secure a grant that that paid for this so we chose the Edward Collins Center for Public management to assist us in updating the current plan Stephen Foley was the representative from the Collins Center and together we work closely in updating the current plan before I start the actual PowerPoint presentation I just wanted to give you a very quick synopsis of what the the plan entails it's

057a the plan that provides a framework for the emergency management system and addresses the roles and responsibilities of the Town departments and outside agencies when responding to a large-scale planned event or an emergency disaster within the community uh just the arrows or the click what's the best way so let's do this deputy the way you have access to that and there you go so you should now be set up to just use the damn button okay just scrolling down yeah yeah okay great so I thought that um I would make a pretty easy PowerPoint presentation make it a little bit of fun just kind of rather than kill you guys with words and stuff like that I put a lot of pictures in so kind of make it fun and I figured the best way

058to actually break it down was to answer five questions about the plant who what when why and how so starting at the beginning scroll down yeah it's a little slower what is the Sam Plant the Sam plant is the comprehensive emergency management plan and what it does is it encompasses the four phases of Emergency Management cycle preparedness mitigation response and Recovery we use this plan for two different types of response scenarios planned events and probably the best example of that would be the Boston marathon every year and immediate response incidents which would be something like a train derailment something that we would not be able to plan for so to speak so who is included in the sap plan all the town big hitters the big players the town manager the town's emergency managers actually

059our very own fire chief chief Roby the police chief DPW superintendent Board of Health director Senior Center Director I.T director so I think that we all know what each department does so I just threw up a couple of pictures obviously the fire department's response to Medical emergencies fires extrications amongst other things the police department criminal investigations traffic control community policing DPW barrier protections road closures a big part of the scent plan is tree and debris cleanup huge huge part of any type of disaster in the town it'll play a huge role Board of Health we know how much they do between vaccinations food and water supply medication distribution Senior Center Outreach programs Support Services free vaccinations fun activities like sponsored lunch and fitness programs our I.T Department obviously technology the way it is these days

060we could we could not live without our Communications for all our school facilities Town buildings departments so like I mentioned before when do we use the samp plan when do we actually execute it two different types of response scenarios a planned or an anticipated incident like a hurricane that we know is going to come extreme temperatures we can plan for but probably the best is the Boston Marathon that every year and when we had covered we had it twice in one year that was quite an event and then obviously immediate response major traffic accidents train derailment active shooter or a major crime incident so those are the two main scenarios that we would the town manager would execute the Sam plan and bring in all the players so why is the sampland different than anything

061else and the biggest reason is that all the players that I mentioned before come together once the scent plan by the time manager is executed everybody comes together at the Emergency Operations Center and they work together to mitigate whatever the incident is the semp provides by bringing all those Heavy Hitters together face-to-face contact once the samp plan is is initiated by the time manager all the team members are called the emergency management team they have the ability once they're together in one location to put together an incident Action Plan for whatever the incident is the ability to be able to get resources from the person sent across from you if I'm sitting across from from Doug from DPW and I need heavier trucks I can just ask him to get them and it's face to

062face immediate response information sharing is a huge component of this you know being able to assess the situation ongoing is the incident Action Plan being successful and if not what do we need to do the changes all that can be done at a round table conversation so it really creates an environment that allows us to mitigate an incident much quicker and what all the resources necessary so I figured I'd give you two examples a planned event a non-planned events and as we know the unplanned event happens every year in town is the Boston Marathon we can't not plan for thirty thousand people run through our town at one time so again going back over the four phases of the Emergency Management preparedness mitigation response and recovery for a planned event the preparation for the Boston

063Marathon if you talk to the baa their preparation starts the day after the events for the next year but for us for the fire chief the police chief their designee we start meetings in January four months before the actual event is going to start so the preparation for that that huge scale event starts four months for us beforehand so we are totally prepared for what to expect in the town mitigation the day of the event the EOC the Sam plant is actually activated by the town manager the EOC is activated and currently the EOC is is the brand new facility the 12 Union Street so we now last year was the first this year was the first time that we got to use the facility and it was really awesome it was really really great

064um not only does the EOC get activated but the shelters get activated so not only is the Sam plan activated we incorporate the shelter plan so we have to incorporate all components of the Sam Plant for the Boston City Marathon once it runs through the town the response all the Departments that we just talked about the DPW the fire department the police departments they all have to be on response we have to split the town in half as you guys know so because we can't cross over so that means we have to bring it in outside agencies to help us town of Holliston sure but we have multiple towns that support us during that event the police department they have multiple agencies that come in and support the the Boston city marathon and then the

065recovery phases there's always a debriefing DPW has to go around and clean up all the mess that everybody makes all the water bottles everything else so they do a tremendous job with that but there's always a debriefing at the end of it so that's a planned event my example for an unplanned event was about four years ago we had a winter event with high winds and its power lines were taken down by trees and tree limbs and it affected the downtown area so the public safety was okay because we have generators but it impacted the downtown area and the big concern for us was the elderly complexes 119 Main Street and Park Road lost power so once we identified that the time manager activated the Sam plan and we met at 91 mainstream at that

066time we met and we identified the problems that we had to deal with we initiated an incident Action Plan we brought in eversource because they were a big proponent of getting the power back obviously but all the players were there DPW they assisted their resource with the debris uh take up fire departments police departments even Jen went around knocking on all the doors of 119 Main Street Park Road making sure that all the seniors checking on them make sure that if they needed any assistance the temporary shelter was opened at the senior center so Jen wolfing Joanne they they took care of that so by us making contact with all of the seniors in that area we were able to allow them the opportunity if they wanted to go to the senior center we use

067it as a warming Center but also for powering up Electronics That's What It ultimately ended up by being used for um to be honest with you we we spoke to hundreds of seniors and maybe one or two of them actually utilized the shelter they are very tough and none of them wanted to leave their own home so after about um 24 hours and with the assistance of all the town players in the sand plant they were eversource was able to resume the power and we were able to constantly give updates to the town again this is bringing in I.T social media updates we're constantly what all the the town um so once the the power was resumed then we did a debriefing with eversource and the other emergency management team players and we were able

068to suspend The Institute so it really worked out very well so that's it in a nutshell I'd be happy to answer any questions you guys have go ahead Brandi thank you uh deputy chief welcome thank you very much good report um I have a couple questions one I noticed that the uh school superintendent isn't part of the team how does how do the schools get kind of pulled in if there's something that would directly affect either the schools themselves or the the the kids so no usually if we were to execute the Sam plan the schools would not be functioning okay they would be our shelters are the schools okay so we wouldn't have the children occupy the schools because number one reason is that we utilize the Amazon the high school is the primary

069shelter and the middle school is a secondary shelter Okay so it in the event of any kind of disaster an emergency we would unless it's happening in the school then that's a different situation but no we would not have the kids go to school um we would we would want to utilize that school for the shelter okay thanks and I have one other question um how does the um reverse 9-1-1 system kind of come into play and how do we make sure like residents because we we had received an email actually today about you know sort of notification process like if there is you know kind of paralleling what's happened in Maui um you know to make sure that residents hear about whatever incident there might be happening um how does the reverse 9-1-1 kind

070of plane so we have a red alert system that uh we actually had a meeting about last week and the the residents could do the reverse line one one and get information out in that way but it's up to the residents to sign up for it is all different levels of that what kind of information that they want to sign up for and receive so we do have that available to all the residents they just need to go to the town website and sign up for um what they want to know about because you there's all different varying levels sure but we would utilize it in an emergency in a disaster absolutely okay we would utilize that that would be the primary way to get the information out and then on top of that the

071social media websites sure sure okay thank you and so that might be a good we may want to kind of go back out it's been a while since we've talked about the reverse 9-1-1 system and how people can sign up for it it might it might not be a bad idea for us to kind of do a you know a reminder to Residents follow-up question to Brandy's if we ever felt it was truly urgent and we needed all the community all members of the community to know would we like sort of bypass the people who have signed up and just get it out to everybody in the community do we have that ability if we have that capability oh okay oh that's interesting yeah so depending on what's actually happening though at the state level

072they can they can push okay and so like you know so if you're driving around and there's a tornado warning the national weather service at a federal level okay and so that happens through from a national or state level supposed to get routine not routine but we used to get uh public service calls it was always Ed yeah and and so that's actually one of the reasons why we met not too long ago is to see if we can determine some kind of standard as to when we're going to utilize the reverse 9-1-1 system um what we ended up deciding was that really it does come about on a case-by-case basis but I mean we um one of the things Randy to your point is that what we've tried to do I think in the

073last three or four weeks is push out all of our communication methods um into like one graphic I know that we've put in the newsletter and in social media and part of that Communications page does have um you can sign up for the code red system there so that's something that we'll continue to do do something for emergency prepare this number so September is emergency prepared this month and so the state will push out a lot of information about how you can get information at a state level so we probably can you know sort of piggyback on that on the local level yeah but we also do whatever it takes I mean as the deputy mentioned during that particular event we were literally knocking on doors um you know doing doing whatever we can to

074get the word out there and let people know that you know here's what's happening here are the resources that are available to you and is there um you know any way that we can help get them to Avail themselves of those resources you know now that I think about it that was a really you know it was a bad situation but it was a it was a great example of the team coming together and there's so many different parts that the Emergency Management director has to coordinate you know there's the Medical Reserve Corps there's the utilities you know all of that stuff any other question yeah go ahead Joe thank you Mr chair Deputy great presentation appreciate the uh all the effort that you folks do to have this plan in line I was just

075I'm sitting here and I'm thinking about all the different uh scenarios that could that could possibly happen in Ashland and I'm and I'm just wondering uh what especially in the downtown area where we have a multitude of you know senior citizens living in a very unique area I I was wondering if the owners of the property at 119 Main Street and I know that Ashland Housing Authority if they wouldn't uh install generators a generator to run those units should they lose power um that would alleviate a an awful lot of work uh as you just you know provided that you know everybody was going door to door knocking I'm sure you would do that anyway to make sure that everybody was okay but to have you know generators at these locations and I would also

076add presidential actually in Commons because there was a multitude of uh seniors that live in that location as well so you don't want to forget them as well as part of that program absolutely yeah that would be um exceptional if that if they could do that where they're all different departments though one is framing housing the others Ashland housing so they would and the utilities actually help with that it wasn't that long ago that we had a situation at Park Road where the power went out I don't remember if it was a poll that was hit or something and eversource actually came in and provided emergency power yeah for them until everything was up and running doable I know it's always comes down to the coin but at the same time you don't want to

077put a price on someone's life there's a lot of grants that are out there so maybe the the Housing Authority could apply for some of the grants and maybe get that definitely would be a great case for sure I just I had a well Claudia did you have a question or a comment go ahead yeah I was just going to say thank you as well and and um and just to Brandy's point about the superintendent of schools not that I want to volunteer him or maybe in the future or um for any more responsibilities but you know they might it might not be a bad idea because number one they do have the familiarity with the buildings right which obviously you all have access to but they would have the knowledge of the the workings

078of the building and what what might be needed um and then additionally they are a key in terms of getting in contact you know with families and they use it all the time now obviously that's only a portion of our population but nevertheless it's a significant number of people that um so I don't know it might be worth considering Brian yeah is that the Blackboard system yes that yeah well smore is the uh well you know it it's really the email um system but I just had a um is there anywhere and you know when these things happen when something important or happens Michael communicates with the select board and kind of Keeps Us abreast of things is there anything in the any anything in the plan regarding the select board and communication or uh

079with them or you know is that something that as you know do we have any cat what's our role in this if I know we're an advisory policy body we're not actually out there directing traffic but in terms of except for Claudia I think she was Joe was going to do it uh but you know what is the role of Select board are the political leaders of the community yeah I mean I I believe it would depend on the level of the disaster I mean if it goes to the state level or even the federal level then obviously decisions would have to be made financial decisions so I believe that you get you folks would be very much involved and again that depends on the scale of the incident but I think as as it

080expands and gets more complex I think the more that you would be Hands-On involved with the decision making yeah and I think really information sharing and like making sure that you're equipped with okay this is what happened this is what we're doing this is what the plans are in the future because people are going to come to you and go okay well what's going on you're making sure you're equipped with that information is key to this whole to these whole processes right um thank you any other questions or go ahead Johan just a comment really thank you um I think having these in place is so important for a community and as our community grows and we see different people and and just different groups coming in I think it's so important so thank you

081for doing the work and thank you for the presentation you're very welcome thank you the only thing I'll I'd add is like giving recent events in the world it just seems that all sorts of unexpected unplanned events happen that and it's good that we're got a plan in place and I would just encourage you to think broadly about what could go wrong because it seems to happen you know so anyway and that is um that it's very important to have the hazard mitigation plan because that identifies the risks and the vulnerabilities in the town and makes us aware ident by identifying it makes us aware of it so we can pre-plant for incidents that may happen because you know that reminds me do we have any severe like flooding threat that seems to be the

082thing we have the river downtown and that is but we seem to have an escape the highest major issue in town is flooding we have six dams in town so that's six opportunities yeah and multitude of culverts I I will tell you like the past couple of storms have really really taxed um our Workforce in terms of um just responding to and handling damage that's been caused by the you know torrential floods that seem to happen now every other week at least right so is it it's time for us to sort of do a review or at least have Doug or I'm sure it's an ongoing thing of our culverts especially downtown where we are potentially vulnerable to look at what's going on and I don't think these rain water incidences are going to diminish

083I think if anything the 100 Year storm we're going to start seeing it every 50 years or every year or every year so is it time to do a review of what we need and look at what we're spending to make sure that damage that is done is corrected so that it doesn't get worse Yeah we actually took a very big step forward with that with the creation of the stormwater Enterprise fund right and so now we have dedicated staff who actually go and proactively that's good examine and analyze our Culvert system and things of that nature our storm water system to make sure that it can handle um the storms that we had and we've actually made a lot of repairs recently because we do have the funds to do that on some covert

084work I know specifically there's one on Oak Street that was Major that was recently redone also measuring out our outfalls and identifying them as well um and then we're also going to be in the process of updating our Municipal vulnerability preparedness programs so that's part of that as well but Evan and Kevin langmeyer now has kind of transitioned more to the Swarm water level they've done a great job okay great all right well thank you thank you you're very welcome thank you thank you for everything you all do every day too yes great work our copies of those in the town managers yes okay oh goodness [Music] okay take a look great thank you be available for the library or is that something that uh we can make ones well we want to be careful

085you don't want us yeah we don't want to make it too public just right to give people an opportunity um but it would certainly be available at the department yeah okay okay great great thank you thank you uh the next item on our agenda is a vote to accept it you're all right you know it's okay if I continue on yeah go ahead uh the next item is a vote to accept and sign the cell tower contract with T-Mobile Northeast LLC for the Cedar Street water tank so if you'll recall I believe we've discussed this at our last meeting and we're prepared to approve and move forward but had to wait for some documents um I have the actual contract here uh in the top Council spoke of it um briefly earlier today are there

086any um any questions or discussions or any other thoughts about this before we move to vote on it yeah is it going to improve our cell service in town we'll see we'll see about that but I believe the particular vote in this instance is to authorize rob you as the chair to sign this on behalf of the board so say so and we had we had discussed this at the at the last meeting so because we have right because we don't have anything in our packet just want to make sure nothing nothing has changed the actual contract is here anybody wants to look at it again uh yeah okay so this um so the motion the suggested motion be I think we can move ahead without uh Yolanda and I don't think you want me

087to read it I was gonna say I can make a motion yeah go ahead um so I'll I'll make a motion to um authorize the chair to sign the Cedar Street cell tower contract between T-Mobile Northeast LLC and the town of Ashland second a second so the motion's been made in second uh all those in uh in favor say aye aye motion passes four zero one it's uh Yolanda Adams temporarily yep okay so that's uh that's done um so the next item is discuss the results of the July 26 2023 election I think that's your cue Michael sure and um I this can be brief because a lot of information has already been shared and put out there but you know first of all uh you know we did have an election on July 26

088for the sole purpose of seeing if the town is supportive of getting out of civil service and uh we had a total of 314 people vote which is about 2.56 percent we can discuss that a little bit later but it passed overwhelmingly 253 for um in 61 voted against that measure I really have to thank the town clerk staff Cindy and Chris and Gene as well as the poll workers for assembling um a special election so quickly and executing it so well the reason it was done so quickly is because the quicker we were able to do this the quicker we were able to address some of our hiring issues within the police department which as you know had the Staffing had gotten down to critical levels and to that end I really want to

089thank the police department and the Police Association specifically for their work in getting to an agreement that supported this and also putting into place a process to to replace the Civil Service process so just going back again to the voter turnout at 2.56 percent it was relatively low it's not the lowest we have seen and actually we actually had lower in a regular election believe it or not a couple of times but obviously we aspire to doing better that to that better than that and we will hopefully we do not have many special elections in the past in the future I should say but um again we'll continue to look at what we do so I have a question um attorney Meade was talking about um sending off the the paperwork or whatever is required

090I assume that goes to the state um so what is what is the process so the state has to is it's not the legislature because we don't have to we didn't have to go through that process so what is the sort of like the next steps in the timeline for us to be able to officially say we're out yeah um so we sent a letter in the package to the state's Civil Service division they take that they review it um and then they should give us a letter of acknowledgment and make sure that everything meets their qualifications and standards so um you know many of the State offices are complaining about being understaffed and so things are taking a little bit longer I'm hoping one to two months okay thank you any other by the

091end of the year uh I I it should not be any later than that as long as long yeah we're talking the state at least it's not the MBTA so is that on the updates oh yes it is okay um okay so I think we're any other questions about the election um the next item is the Kitty fenwall car show and sponsorship opportunity which we had the letter in our packet here um is there anything to talk about with this Michael or well you know this is actually an idea that Susan had and Susan do you want to just explain kind of your rationale for uh suggesting it sure so I just thought it would be a fun thing for the board to get involved in it's an opportunity to give back to the community

092it's a small um sponsorship it's two hundred dollars and I just thought it was a Goodwill to um to give back to the community and kind of get the board out there in a positive light great so this is an effect and what's what's the source of the funds for this would this be our be the gift account right the gift account and the money goes towards Relay For Life and last year there is fifteen thousand dollars so they're hoping to beat that goal this year yeah the question sure go ahead so it just so happens that um because the show is coming up on September 9th I had the opportunity today to interview Peter comedian who said who runs the show and basically even though it's called the Kitty fenwall car show it's only

093because it sits on their property and it was originally their Relay for Life team that was looking for different ways to raise funds for their Relay for Life team and it grew from their first show in 2013 of 50 cars and last year they had over 300 cars and the idea is that if we do a sponsorship we can then present a trophy at the end of the day and it's they he said it's not that you know the cleanest car it's basically whoever's there representing the select board can say I like this car and we're going to give them a trophy kind of thing and it's just the sponsorships helps them they're the car fee is very low it's only ten dollars to bring your car in there's no charge for people to go

094and look at the cars so when when we meant when we discussed is that the agenda setting meeting I thought it's 200 it goes to a good cause it goes toward cancer research and I don't know about you guys but I don't know anyone that I know that hasn't been touched by cancer in some sort of way so I would recommend we do this okay and um other thoughts or comments I don't think there's anything that keeps us from using our gift account for something like this it's not something we usually we usually don't do charitable stuff but you know this seems like a worthy cause I mean I guess it's a little we don't usually we usually fund things through Grant applications but I I think you know it's a it's a great idea

095and I I love the idea of um maybe awarding a trophy at the end of the day yep um you know I think that uh it would be nice to have some kind of theme around what the trophy would be for from okay if somebody's yeah I'm curious about the hours of the event just because that's also going to be the day of the it's a very busy day here the new the ribbon cutting ceremony for the Mendez School yep and it is also going to be an opportunity um later in the afternoon for the community to visit the school as well so they typically wrap up around 1 1 30. so this is your typical Relay for Life right where you get like no this is not a Relay for Life this is a

096car show so that happens at kitty fenwell but if the money goes forward really for Life they're not running they're not doing the relay action this is fundraising for their Relay for Life team it's a car show I mean if you've ever driven by yeah same as their usual their usual car show yeah okay so so uh we had a motion on this I move that we support and sponsor the Kitty fenwell car show by using 200 from our gift account as a sponsorship so emotions been made in seconded all those in favor say aye aye opposed non-motion carries five nothing and Susan thank you for bringing this to us thank you Susan we've we've done stuff like this before every once in a while like we've done like the clock or Club has had

097like a golf we sponsored a whole golf tournament and things like that so this is good all right so that next is the warrant right so we get that right yes open the warrant for the special towel me to be held on Wednesday November 29 2023 so who wants to talk about that yeah we're going to turn this one over to Jen because she put it um so uh the warrant guidance which I believe is in your packet um sort of just lays out the timeline so um for a special town uh meeting on the 29th of November we'll open it tomorrow morning so we can send out guidance to all the Committees and then um people will have until October 6th to get a notice of intent to me and then we'll start building

098out the warrant um in hopes to close it on your first meeting in November which I believe is November 1st for a special town meeting we have to post the warrant at least 14 days ahead um so that gives us a little bit of um a little bit of time between when we close the warrant and then sort of finalize the warrant packet um that will be up and available for everybody by the 14th of November just a quick question so um it share we're planning to do special town meeting after Thanksgiving usually we do it before right don't we do it before it's very it's been all over the place we've done in the first week of December as well okay yeah okay um just the time I was just gonna ask like is

099is it just because like the timing you know making sure that there's enough time to give people to um to file their intentions and and be able to yeah okay and also to make sure that we have our free cash certified as well sounds good thank you any any particular warrant items we care to just bring up at the moment or the expected or things you've got a couple yeah there's a few that are expected um a sustainability committee um plans to bring back the um enhanced stretch code um they were talking about the tree bylaw I don't think that that will make it for the special town and will likely be on May um I think that Town Council spoke about the High Street easement for accessed um we may have brought in Road

100acceptance we're still waiting for um plans so we'd have to do a road layout and so they have a we were hoping that they had it to us by September 1st so if we don't then it will likely be pushed to the annual town meeting um and then CPC has voted to recommend funding for the dog park so that will also be on hand then we'll even do our normal sort of senior Tech exemptions pre-cash allocations okay one additional one that's recently come to uh to my attention and they talked to DPW director small about this is uh there's a potential issue with our water treatment plant nothing that can impact the safety of it but uh their safety of our water source but could impact the color and The Taste again nothing to do

101with safety but those are important qualities as well we might need to put a borrowing on for this town meeting to do that work to you know where the parts and install it and do that type of work so is that related to silt from Legacy Farms well you know we've we've made so we've there's a correlation but it doesn't necessarily equate to a causation hope so but um when we're talking about significant amounts of money people push back so yeah I'm not sure if we would be able to to successfully challenge that so well let's keep trying well that's so not only that I mean we're also looking at Grants making potentially some some Grant applications for that as well so what I've asked Doug to do is to work with Brittany to look

102at what we can do within our existing rate structure and see what we come up with see what kind of Gap if any there is and we'll figure out a plan on how to take care of it so the water Enterprise fund is not enough to cover the costs well it would it would come in there I think the question is whether or not we can do it within the current rate structure for the water Enterprise fund and when are people seeing these changes to the water now no not right now and this is an emergency situation we're trying to take care of it before it becomes an issue color and taste become an issue so so try to be proactive so I guess I'm so our color and taste absolutely going to be impacted

103if we don't eventually yes Claudia eventually yeah well sounds like more to come on this one yeah we'll have more about that we're really kind of at the fact finding stage right now right now what we know is that we do need to replace it um it hasn't gone yet it hasn't broke yet but again I think Joe you just mentioned we're trying to be proactive in this case okay keep us informed all right so we'll need a motion I move that we open the warrant for the special town meeting scheduled for Wednesday November 29 2023. second motion's been made in second all those in favor of opening the warrants say aye aye all those opposed on so uh motion uh carries five zero okay so the next one is discuss the home rule petition

104requesting additional liquor licenses um and um Michael do you have a presentation about this sir no I believe that included uh information in your packet about what uh what the request would be and so the total number would be 16. um the way this has been broken down and this has been suggested by Beth Reynolds is that we have um six dedicated for downtown Redevelopment six dedicated for Route 126 Redevelopment and then any other need in town uh four related to those uh and that would total 16. um I'm not wedded to this structure personally if you wanted to do you know just general and take off the restrictions for downtown and 126 but uh the way Beth puts it it does make sense I mean I think we could do it this way I

105just said before we get in just a clarification but this um this is 16 are these all alcohol these are all alcohol right Susan all right I was just gonna text you that actually wasn't Beth's breakdown that was mine oh okay um we thought we might potentially need but we would prefer not to have them District to a certain area because then it limits your ability to move them from one location to another and these um these would be all alcohol okay all alcohol on premises so it's we're not looking to yes on premises so no retail sales okay yes restaurants and things question so these are for restaurant but we know that we've gotten at least one request for someone else to do an all alcohol retail license do we need to do these

106separately or would it make it messy if we tried to add one more I mean I know the all alcohol the the retail is tied to the number of residents and things like that but would it make sense to look at doing that with this potentially I mean we do have one remaining um [Music] well this is a you know this is a wine Empire right you're talking about you know a year ago he made a request request from Jean Luca and he's like can you can you look at requesting an additional all alcohol retail license and at the point at that point it it didn't seem like there was appetite but if we're doing this well is that part of this boring yeah and that's part just to just to clarify but this is

107part of that same process we could then the home rule petition we could include what Yolanda's suggesting as part of this process is that well it is a home rule petition so we can ask for anything right if we wanted to I think maybe what would be important for me to do a little research into if we do ask for that type of license is that is it going to mess it up right and I and I would agree I think if we're going to go for this we need to just say the number of licenses we're looking for and not necessarily distinguish where they're going to be used in town because something may come up on Route 126 initially and they use it and then they go away and if we then have to

108keep it on 126 but something else pops up someplace else I think we need to have flexibility if if we can get this to work we need to have flexibility on where we can use them are you okay with the total number I was going to ask people what are people's thoughts on that so my understanding from representative Lewis is that we should ask we should ask one time like this is like one bite at the Apple so if we're looking at um you know so we shouldn't say okay well you know we're probably only going to need seven of them out of the 16 so we should only do seven you know we should look we should be very forward thinking as to how many potentially we could we could use so I think

109for me it's you know 16 is is is a reasonable number given the amount of development that's happening um both downtown and 126 and the other mixed-use developments I know that there's been talk like senti's kitchen is going in at 12 Pond hopefully right still yeah and I know like he was looking to do an alcohol license you know there's and so there's there's establishments that haven't even come forward yet to really um request it so I'm comfortable with 16. so we have six that we haven't used right now if you include two wine and malt so we would add 16. that does I mean from my own and this is all very inexact but my own looking at it like six licenses in downtown like that you know in addition to what we're having

110now how do you do we see that many establishments really um well I think Yolanda just made the point of mine may make sense to remove those restrictions well no no but I mean in terms of the potential right depend you know so the the brewery coming into the firehouse well they're they're covered yeah if something if changes happen if changes happen to the mill buildings right you could have a couple of things there and home around I mean yeah I mean think about some of the communities that people talk to us about what they like Waltham Moody Street all the restaurants there you know one right after the other Hudson and all the developments that's going on in their downtown I think wall things right substantially walk them substantially larger but look at Hudson

111and look at some of the development and some of the changes that have happened there and it's because they have more restaurants and most of those restaurants have liquor licenses I mean I I think it's a good stress I mean I think this is the right thing to do I guess I'm just 16 just strikes me as a lot and we have six already and I know there's one bite at the Apple thing but this thing only takes a couple years to get through at the most so so remember though just because you have the license it doesn't mean that too that's what I was going to say as well but I think a future board would think well we got the licenses we should we may need to give them out you know so

112I would think yeah but it's it's all potential yeah right so it I think that's that's part of what we need is we need to have that potential for growth and for the ability to mean Beth has done her homework and if you talked to Beth about this she's like I have businesses who want to come to Ashland who want to bring their restaurants to Ashland who want to bring their things to Ashland but they know we're limited for liquor license well but we aren't though we have four that we haven't given out yeah but I think we also have a couple businesses like the Warren Conference Center is going to need another one potentially because of what they're looking to do fishing game does this include fishing games any business that expands and if

113it's not attached to their licensed building they require a separate license well anybody what do other people think anybody else um Claudia I was looking at the uh Mr chair I'm sorry I was I was looking at some of the potential needs and and the Redevelopment stuff uh the MBTA train station by the train tracks yeah that was one I was wondering about that one I'm thinking out loud you never know right you kind of do have you have a bar there now you have a bar there now oh you have no you have a restaurant there okay okay but with MBTA communities there might be more mixed uses that go in there so at some point I think that's what there could be change of use for some of the buildings on on Pleasant

114Street right who knows well I think it's a it's a good proposal are there other people think that 16 is the right number to you know I won't stand in a way yeah I mean I I you know don't see why you know how much we should try to control this I think it's it's a good thing for the community in terms of having uh restaurants and um you know the ability for people to go out and have a drink with a friend and um you know it definitely is an attraction you know food unfortunately for the restaurant business isn't where they make most of their money so if we expect to attract restaurants and our plan is here as restaurants as opposed to clubs you know this would also clubs if someone opened a

115club or you know which you know depending on the right depending on the kind of club might not be a bad thing all right Joe do you have any other any thoughts no I was just I don't have a problem if Brandy uh spoke with the Jack about this and he said you know you have one butt in the Apple you might as well you know go for it I I don't have a problem with that and like Mike said you don't have to you don't have to issue them the only problem with not issuing them is if somebody wants one you know and you better have a valid reason for not right for not issuing because if not normally we're talking about legal fees you're gonna you're gonna have litigations so you need to

116be careful on that I think one of the things we prudently we should think that this is might actually happen and if well over the say next 20 years and it is that are we comfortable with that that would be sure you will all right so I don't know if we can do this I don't know if we can control what happens in the next 20 years right well but I think realistically you shouldn't have if you don't think you want to issue them we shouldn't get them so I think that's that's my take on that but anyway well we'll do what do prudence and diligence people submit and request and right yeah yeah you know the old adage measure twice cut once right right so you know it's probably better to have more an

117issue less than to be in a situation where people want more and you can't give up well like fish and game right fish and game has requested a second one and then we're like okay well what does that mean to other things that are potentially coming because because they have two they're gonna have two areas right instead of they have their building and then they have their field that they want to be able to do it so we always hear you know and to that point we always hear from from residents oh we want more businesses in Ashland right and if we don't have a liquor license available and we're turning away potential businesses that's you know well that's a detriment and that's what we're hearing from I mean that's why this came up just

118I just have one question so with respect to the Warren Conference Center um you said something about the fact that if it's not if the building isn't attached to the current liquor license uh premises location they have to they have to request or require an additional liquor license now in a letter that we saw earlier there was like four or five different locations are you telling me that they need to have a liquor license for each one of those locations because they're not attached to the the current premise that has the license so Joe what their situation is right now is they're looking to add a members Club this is all potential it hasn't come into us yet it's a discussion when they when they open the members Club they will be required to apply

119for a new license they won't be covered under the other one because the building is far enough away from their main building that the abcc is requiring a second license it's the same situation as fishing game okay all right thank you you're welcome all right any other questions or thoughts I think we're um I think I'm feeling that there's at least a majority of the board that's comfortable with requesting the 16 all alcohol licenses for on-premise retail and then there's the question Yolanda brought up about potentially adding one off-premise all alcohol at the same retail and what I would say is if if it's gonna negatively impact this process we can look at doing that separately but if it's not going to negatively impact it I would say let's see about moving forward with one

120more unless no one else agrees with that but I think one more all alcohol retail would not be an issue here in town yeah what do people think about the concept of adding one I know in the past there's been some concern about having too many package stores or you know added more but you have a big discussion we did we did have discussion several years ago um you know right in the downtown area Luke came right and there you know it it was a concern for the current folks that have their licenses and how it would impact you know there and was there a need there was you know if there was a need for that um so again it's all based on potential right you know and none of us have a crystal

121ball that can say this is going to be you know you have a group of people that are living in a certain area and it's better for them to have a look a liquor store up there and then have them have the travel down whatever but and I guess we have to wait and see what the what the scenario is in the situation is to to provide that right I just want to get an idea I mean I think I'm I think I'd be okay with adding one but I don't know other people have thoughts or they want to get more information or what what are people thinking here because I we did have like Bill Goldberg came in uh and was quite concerned for example this was about three years ago I think yeah

122so I don't know uh so anyway so how would the process work Michael then if we were to at least consider adding this particular what we would do is uh so why don't we go and look at a little research okay and we'll draft a warrant article based on the information go from there we can have that discussion when we talk about the article all right all right thank you so we don't need a motion or anything on this one so we can with those uh with that guidance we'll move on to the next one which is transfer funds from the Warren Barn to Warren District Perpetual care account so I'm like oh thank you tell us about that yeah so um this has come up because the Perpetual care account is very very much

123necessary to keep the ongoing operations of the Warren District going and um so I put this in Yolanda you'd ask me for some information which I have okay right now you know the Warren Barn only has 31 000 in it in the Warren District accounts we have ones dedicated to the Warren barn and it's at 31 000. we have received 750 000 from Senate President spilca to rebuild and reconstruct that barn and then the board also allocated half a million dollars as well so for a total of you know 1.25 million dollars so we should have enough money to do what we want to do there so what we what I propose to do is take the 31 000 from the Warren Barn account in the Warren Woods district and move that to the Warren

124Woods Perpetual care account so that currently has 279 852 after the transfer it would equal 311 227. so what is the Warren Woods Perpetual care account pay for so what happens is you have a large principle in there that generates interest and we use that interest to pay for expenses and for the most recent year excuse me folio that we have those expenses range from the utility bills to the oil bills um we have used it for brush hogging before Warren Woods and when I say bills I should say at 22 Elliott Street um really it's it's utility bills that's it for 22 Elliott for 22 Elliott so the last full year data that we have we've spent 155 dollars on the electric bill a little over a thousand for Holliston oil and about 140

125000 for town of Ashland related bills which would be water sewer and storm water and um did you say a hundred and forty thousand for town of Ashland water sewer I'm sorry 140. sorry about that it's a little different you know okay you know we get accused of jacking up fees but like I mean I know it's it's Town property and it still has to pay for stuff but that's you know so let's let's knock a few zeros off of that 140 40 000. we could do a lot with that man let's do it so again and then the total is uh for that last full year and the care the care and custody of this money is under so it's the town accounts stay within the town um so the land stewardship committee has

126uh has had access to this to pay the bills as they come through what happens is they get a bill it does go to Brittany and to well it was Carol now it's Stephanie for approval and processing so originally it started at 750 000. that was for the entire nut right yeah correct and then you get broken down into that specific account correct well into different accounts and Joe I'm sorry I don't have exactly what we have left yet okay that was going to be my next question and the the principal is sitting there and it's only the interest that's currently being used here's a question that's a fair amount of money if it doesn't need to get used for the Warren District Perpetual care what can this money be potentially used for in the

127future well we keep it there we'll keep it in that account and keep the balance and that's really the way it should work so if we're generating eight thousand dollars of interest in a year like we really shouldn't be spending eight thousand dollars that year because you want to build up a little bit of a cushion because in down Market years we won't have as much 2022 you're not going to generate eight thousand dollars we might generate four and are they using eight thousand dollars a year in expenses what we have done previously in previous years is yes so whatever was generated in interest was expended but uh Brittany and it was Carol at the time put together a policy in place that says I don't think you can use any more than 50 percent

128of what to generate if we purchase equipment as well so that was under the um just the the Warren what's account and that was many years ago yeah yeah and um yeah so there was uh the tracker that was purchased through there and that account so any expenditures out of that come to the select board okay yeah okay all right any other further questions or discussion on this item no I authorize the transfer of 31 375 dollars from the Warren Barn account to the Warren District Perpetual care account motion has been made in second olives in favor say aye aye aye those opposed none motion carries five zero okay the next item is discuss the process that will be used to distribute to 2024 Boston Marathon Invitational entry forms so yeah and actually Susan had

129proposed talking about this with the board as we head into that season so Susan would you like to explain or talk about it or sure so every year we receive 22 Invitational entry forms from the baa um as a thank you for the um Town allowing the marathon to go through town usually what we do is we distribute those two Runners um 10 of them go to a non-profit 12 of them go to interested parties before we start advertising for the distribution process I just wanted to check with all of you and make sure that you are looking to still follow the same process we have in the prior years and can you just remind us of that process Susan yes so normally what we do is we start pushing the word out to the

130public asking people that are interested to submit in a request we will get more requests than we have entries so then we just do a drawing we draw all of the names put everybody on a list and um go from there so I I have a question sorry go ahead so Susan I know one of the reasons that we've given 10 bibs to the non-profit in the past is because there have been some years where we haven't had a lot of interest from um to participate in the lottery and so we wanted to make sure that all the bibs obviously get used um can you talk a little bit about like what we've seen in the last I know we had covid and so things that were a little wonky because of of covid but

131um what you know what was the interest in the past say a couple years and and have we had a lot of um yeah we have we had a lot more interest from from Ashland residents than we have bibs to to fulfill it so if we submit our partnership with Nord we would end up with bibs likely that go unused we had a couple of years ago I went through every single person on my wait list um to finally get rid of all of them it's really a hard thing to tell from one year to another because a lot of people think oh I want to do this and then when it comes down to it it doesn't always come to fruition you got to raise money too yeah everyone everyone that that that uh

132signs on to it needs to raise three thousand dollars that's a reduced number compared to yeah to other to other Charities oh yeah a lot of organizations are there others are those 10 bibs is it all for them are there other non-profits that nope they're okay because we have kind of a yes what is Nord I was gonna say Susan can you talk a little bit about where Nord came from and and our you know relationship with them sure so what happened is initially when we had these we we had a couple of Runners from genzyme at the time and genzyme sponsored a running team and they did genetic testing and they paired up the runners with people that were suffering from those rare diseases that kind of morphed into Nord which is the National

133Organization of rare diseases and they do the same thing they partner um a runner who um is raising money for a particular type of disease or the testing for that disease so they provide us the money for in exchange for that entry and then that person fundraises um for the organization so we give the first 3 000 basically and um just you know because there was the question about other other Charities so the Boston Marathon has their Boston Marathon charity program I'm not exactly sure what the name of it might be just Boston Marathon charity um but they limit which organizations are able to apply for bibs and how many bibs that they could get so I think if if Nord didn't have the partnership with us they wouldn't be able to they definitely wouldn't

134be able to get 10 bibs through for fundraising efforts but um well the other thing in talking to Susan about it again as we were looking at the agenda she said because we don't know if we would actually get 22 people by giving 10 of them to Nord we know we get that money they they pay for those bibs and that is a definite we get to then use those funds to do some of the programs that we do with our baa scholarship program and that still gives us 12. that still gives us a good a number of bibs for people who want to run and raise funds for the community yeah I mean my personal perspective is um you know I I would say for this particular year we continue the partnership that we've

135had in the past I would say depending on you know our community has grown quite a bit in the last five ten years and so there may be more interest kind of as years progress and maybe at some point we want to um change the percentage of sure you know but I I would say that from this next year I'm comfortable kind of keeping it the way it is and then also leave it as the lottery right so if you wanna if you want to run you let Susan know your name gets put in a list it gets put in a hat and then on a certain day we draw names and those people are then selected and and those become our running team and if I remember right so Susan you basically recently have

136just gotten numbers close to what you actually have to give out is that right there hasn't been a long waiting list I'm sorry I don't understand the question no no I think you were saying that the 12 that it was it was hard to get the 12 bids uh bibs out to people so there wasn't like a lot it isn't like the lottery there's long odds against getting drawn is there I mean how many did you have last year for the for the 12. so normally what happens is people start right after the marathon submitting their names so I end up with this long list then but then when you stop pulling names every year I have people that drop out and usually it's three or four people drop out they drop out for various

137reasons right okay they have an injury they've moved there it is 26 miles so you know yeah so all right so it's always good to have a few extras okay so that's not an issue at the moment we'll move on yes okay could I trouble someone just to review for me please about um the monies that come to the town that we use for the vaa scholarships and and that and how this all works yeah so the program is as a runner is required to raise three thousand dollars that comes into our baa gift account our scholarship account we then twice a year year put out a call for requests for those for those grants and then as a select board we Susan very kindly gathers all that information puts it all together and then

138two members of the select board become the baa gift account or scholarship account Grant account they review it and then it comes to the select board and we then approve right and we just made some changes this past year in regards to amounts that we're offering people in the grant but that's basically the process and so the three thousand dollars we only comes to us from the 12 Runners that aren't involved no we also get that per per bib from North as well right so they give us that's thirty thousand sixty six thousand dollars yes into the runners account um there's restrictions around what can be what can be granted from the runner's account it has to be like a 501c3 right so what we tend to do is we split it between so in

139the past we've we haven't made the distinction when we go out to the public and ask for Grant applications of we asked them if they're a 501c3 but we don't um deny them a grant if they're not a 501 C3 so um for instance like um like the Ashland Public Library might ask for money and the public library is not a obviously a 501c3 but the friends are so you know sometimes the friends would have a a separate or a different request but um you know Yolanda said we made some adjustments last year but we haven't changed the policy and I I it kind of refreshed my memory that that's on my you had said that's on my plate so I would actually that that's a good reminder I would love to be able to

140put that on the next agenda and kind of review that yeah yeah because yeah the other thing is we do our fall Grant round typically we put the request out middle of September and we grant them sometime in October so if we're going to look at changing things it would be good to do that before we do the next one the thing is we're doing committee appointments next right I believe I have it on good authority that these positions may be vacant they are well one is definitely one is definitely vacant unless Steve Mitchell wants to come back and I don't know yeah so I don't know if we actually make decisions tonight but we could I think well I think what Susan was looking for was the process in regards to how we distribute

141the writers numbers and I think from what I I don't think we need to make any changes I think let's go for it with this year and then you know yeah to Brandy's Point what I would say is let's look at the number of people that request numbers and how many we actually give them to yeah we can do that okay the um thank you Susan yeah thanks Susan uh the next is the request to spend up to five thousand dollars from the selectman's gift the select boards gift account for the knightenza memorial still using the old terms so thank you Robin and uh first I just want to apologize I really hope that I would get from Keith Tech uh graphic representations of what's being done at the nianza memorial site but uh I

142did not uh receive those but let me give you an overview of what's happening and what the request is for so I think everybody's familiar with the nianza memorial site off of Memorial Drive it's the one that Danny Borelli had designed and and done um really kind of a solemn reminder of you know the past um in the history of nianza and uh the damage it inflicted upon the community in terms of lives lost and there's also a Native American part of that wasn't there part of that it wasn't it that is a Native American site like that Hill is so um it was incorporated I'm sorry I interrupted but no so so it was um vandalized um a few years ago and it also still wasn't really very well defined in terms of how

143you get up there and um you know once you got there you saw it you know you knew where it was but you couldn't necessarily uh really kind of navigate to it from the road unless you were familiar with it so what's happening right now is a refresh of it and um essentially it is going to be landscaped around the memorial site itself and then a an ADA accessible Trail will be built coming from the Middle School that little parking area up through there in the Outfield of the baseball field correct and so that work is a combination of Grant donations monetary donations for the plants and then Keith Tech has actually volunteered the design and actually volunteered the installation of the plants as well so that is done what we're looking at doing now

144is looking at getting money for the replacement of those panels uh that were glass at the time of all different colors they're going to be a much more durable material not just glass it's it's more than plexiglass but it's not a glass and so that's what this money would be uh would be utilized for what I would recommend or suggest if the board's amenable to it is to authorize up to five thousand dollars for that anything that's not spent would be go back to the account and we have substantial funds I believe I haven't looked at oh that's right we do I'm sorry we do have 48 000 left in the gift account 48 406. yeah so just just for clarification that gift account we do use for a lot of different things so I'm

145I'm I definitely support doing this I just want to make sure that that we're aware of um how we use that account how does the gift account get funded so that's funded through um well now hotels tax money really through Framingham State used to be the Warren Conference Center I think and actually any questions other thoughts no I think I think it was it was so sad I remember when I heard about the being damaged and it was glass and vandalized so to be able to support this and make it a more durable Memorial I think is a great idea it's it's it's a great way to memorialize what our community has gone through and I agree my only um my only question did anybody think about security or like you know in this day

146and age we can't have like a camera you know in terms of or you know I don't think about like what if this happens again so this is more durable it's more adorable but we could look at doing uh something that like that or um at least you know a hidden camera kind of in some ways doesn't work because people don't know what's there and they go ahead and damage it anyway and so maybe you you catch them but the damage is already done um you know letting people know that they are being watched either through signage or well really signage right word of mouth also under video surveillance right if a sign is there that says this area is under video surveillance it may not stop them but it may made them think about

147it I was just going to say that we have those signs that the Pavilion down in Stone Park and he still gets vandalized yeah well sometimes we have cameras I know it's just a thought as people you know yeah think about that but yeah for sure it's kind of an isolated area you know so that's the thing there's some kind of motion activated like right yeah yeah probably since it is forested you'd probably have to run a wire uh from the you know the the gallery or something you do a solar well you'd need the wire running from the unforested area where it can actually get sun to the light in the area so okay yeah it's not not an easy thing I move that we authorize funds to refresh the nyansa memorial from the

148select board gift account not to exceed five thousand dollars I'll second that motion's been made in second all those in favor say aye aye as opposed and motion carries 5-0 so thank you and I know Mrs Kane thanks you as well as you know Dan and the you know citizens action committee everybody who was involved in the first one right okay so the next um is the review and approve the annual reappointment so this is the thing we do every year at this time these are folks who whose terms are up and have indicated to Susan that they're willing to continue and so we have that list in front of us um I I just have one question because what's in the packet in the detail is different than what was on as part of

149the agenda right in in the packet on page 27 of our 64 Pat of our 64. there's another list that has the vacancies but does not have everything that's on the agenda recommendation Susan so so in your back up provided you all of the vacancies that we now have listed correct and what I what I listed on the agenda are all of the people that are seeking reappointment okay okay yeah that's what I mean that makes sense but at the top you had the people who are being reappointed and the vacancies and then there was extra um extra appointments because you had the select board baa subcommittee and you had mapc and Metro West Regional collaborative on the agenda so I just wanted to make sure people were aware of the slightly different ones yeah

150on the website okay great um I do have a question because like looking now I'm looking at page 27 and I'm looking at what was in on the agenda and like I'm looking at for instance Conservation Commission and I don't see that on the list on the agenda because I don't see their exploration date is 26. oh but I thought that was what we were yeah that's true well you were absolutely correct and uh so we would want that is my mistake so uh what have we identified ones that are different like so Yolanda you're not on this reappointment list I'm not on the one in the packet but I'm on the agenda so what why is that what's the difference and Brandi just identified the two for Conservation Commission are in the packet but

151not on the agenda oh you know if you want to move on to the consent agenda what I can do is try to really quickly okay go through and see if there's any differences here or list the differences yeah okay all right the next item on is the consent agenda have folks uh I think it might just be those couple of things it could be okay any anything on the consent agenda uh to pull out or um otherwise I'll entertain a motion a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented second all those in favor of approving the consent agenda say aye aye opposed none so promotion carries five zero no fair that is the quickest you have ever approved let's talk about wait a minute there's a one-day license no it's we've won it's

152one we've approved and all we did was change the date how about the block party at lanterns I got some questions about that no that was my question so um I do see that we are missing um the two members on the Conservation Commission like we can do a recessive are you ready or do should we take a little more time zba teams there's several in zba let's call I'll call a five minute recess how's that no no no no no no we don't need that much time four minutes yeah okay no so okay so what do we got so here we go I approve the reappointments as presented in our packet as well as and I mean in our agenda as well as include the two members for Conservation Commission and the members for

153zba that were not on the list in our agenda so for conservation it's Owen Ackerman for zba at Stuart Siegel and Ryan Sullivan and Anton uh okay yeah so I'm sorry to interrupt but unfortunately uh that is not going to work because those are different dates and they're not on the agenda but they're in the packet yes but they're not on the agenda oh so they're not so we can't appoint those people absolutely okay so we can appoint them in September and Michael yeah let me just let me think about that we might actually have to call a very quick special meeting to do it before the end of the month okay and uh that can be hybrid except we do need a quorum physically you would no no no no yeah so okay I

154apologize okay so I moved I'll change my agenda I'll change my motion I move that we approve the reappointments as presented on our agenda and thank the volunteers for their continued service okay I um is there a second just one item question what about the two ba subcommittees which have no no one listed there I think I mean unless people know right now they want to be those select board members I think we know we need to appoint them but okay so it'll continue it's two select board members okay I'd be interested to be being one named good I'm happy to do it great so I think we already have people so do we so just procedurally so let let's do this let's let's vote this and then we can change it well no when

155we do our special election when we do our special meeting then we can put names in there correct okay okay right because right now okay very good all right so the motion's been made in second with these blank names I'll I'll uh uh all those in favor of the motion aye aye aye all those opposed nuns emotions so these folks are appointed and we'll have another meeting um and due course and Susan just a um a question so the vacancies that are that are listed are folks that decided not to to be reappointed or whatever the process is for them are we um we currently have this list up on our website so if folks want to apply for one of these committees they can check out the openings and then complete a talent bank

156for them is that correct yeah that's correct okay great thank you and sorry about missing those two people it's all right we'll get them it was a lot well we'll tell conservation they can't do any work for a while no I'm kidding I'm joking I'm really joking I'm really joking we'll we'll figure it out all right the next our last items are the priority project update and town managers report this is both Michael's kind of presentation discussion then we'll be going into board reports sure so uh downtown really really quickly uh you'll see that they have milled Front Street that's because the quality of work of that paid job was not up to par it's not the standard that we expect so they will be Paving that as well as Paving the um the rest

157of the project meaning the Main Street Summer Street Homer Street intersection and also the Front Street intersection before Labor Day so end of August before Labor Day so that will be done and that for the most part will close out the streetscape portion there's still some stuff that they will need to do coming back in the fall mainly landscape related activities and planting traditionally it's too hot and too dry to plant in August but this might be the exception but we're going to go with traditional methods and and plant in the fall and so what we're working on right now is making sure that the utilities have their equipment the wiring installed in the underground conduits The Next Step will be making the connections to the buildings and then finally removing the wires from the

158poles and the poles themselves the timing so I'm anticipating that probably knowing the way the utilities are working for the polls to come down probably spring 24. Okay so but the road work and everything should be done mid-september so if you also noticed uh we did make them clean up and Report some of the concrete sidewalk panels because we found some deficiencies there as well so they are doing that where it is where is clearly their fault they are that is on their dime as is the repaving job that I asked Michael a question sure did that project questions and comments with respect to uh the downtown uh areas with beautification and things of that nature uh especially by the railroad tracks and the islands that uh oh the asphalt yes well could you explain

159to the folks so there's no misunderstanding as to what that is going to look like and will there be potential of the Garden Club going back and putting things out there to beautify that area which I thought was going to happen yes so with regards to the asphalt within the islands what's going to happen there is a company called McNulty is going to come in and stamp that and you with a special polymer over top of it and they infrared it and what it will do is it'll look like Cobblestone once that is done and I think if you look at some of the previous presentations that were presented to the town you'll see examples of that McNulty is also the company that's going to come in and do the crosswalks so they'll do a

160very similar process they will Mill a portion of the of the asphalt they will overlay a polymer and stamp it to where it looks like brick and they'll have some paint to outline the white section of it so you'll look like brick brick crosswalks it's color fast so as it fades away it's not like you'll see the asphalt you'll still see the the red and the Cobble as well Yolanda and I've already talked about the possibility of the Garden Club doing some work and and having some plantings in some of those locations as well and Mike you know I had talked to you a little bit about when somebody posted on Facebook asking some questions and I did respond with those comments um and you know actually someone then put up a picture oh it

161was perhaps taken from uh what a previous representation that was done yeah so yeah so uh great look good and thanks for that information I wanted to make sure I was giving appropriate correct information no it's it's great I mean it's obviously it's very visible now black asphalt yeah is a contrast to um everything else you see well those sidewalks I'll crosswalks and be raised a little bit or would they be flat um they will like the the final plane will be flat it's I mean you'll see little indentations where the lines for the bricks are okay and I know that one of the reasons we had uh the sidewalks redone in some areas was because um let's just call it some people were a little um careless they weren't paying attention that's a really

162good way um is it in a much better place this time around are we good like yeah there unfortunately it was one spot um that you know we were able to catch and clean up a bit but um it wasn't a hundred percent error-free let's put it that way but better much better much better and just to give you an example like sometimes what they do is they would pour a concrete slab under a tree after it had been raining and the raindrops would hit the concrete panel and actually make indentations so those are now fixed although it's been really hard to find a dry day um yeah exactly so just moving on to Mendez um so we were we did talk earlier tonight about the boundary issues or one of the boundary issues as

163Mr Morgan had noticed had noted there was uh one other homeowner that were in conversations with about the boundary I think Mr Morgan also mentioned something about a shed I'm not aware of that one but we're looking at those and I know Paul has been keeping the building committee informed of that we you should have received an invite for the uh yeah in September so exciting times um many thanks to everybody who's worked on that project Paul uh you know for his project management skills which has been amazing and then also the building committee for the work that they've done um Valentine if you've driven by you'll see that the windows are in um and clappard is the siding is actually going up they've completed the West Side they're now going to work on the

164back simultaneously what they've been doing is they've been installing the floor which is two inch rough sawn lumber similar to what was there before and so that's being installed um I have put together a plan for us to discuss as a board on what to do with the property with the anticipation that after that meeting we'll have a public discussion about it um but it's a multi-page plan um so there's that so with regards to the Warren District we will have the hall house on the next agenda there's a couple of items that we need to finalize with things that was crossed off on this one right so I I know Joe and Joan and Helen have worked with Paul to identify a location two outstanding items that remain are who is going to maintain

165that sign in the future and then also we need to settle up on the amount of money that's going to be donated from the current owner I don't know if you saw I want I suspect all of you saw um and people in our live audience saw and I would suspect some of our people viewing at home saw that the house did go on the market and it is under agreement currently oh wow wow oh it would a day something um and then finally one that we're going to see Helen and Jonah on I don't know I guess I thought we were going to be talking about it because it was originally on our agenda so we've completed those items Helen and Joan if you're you know let us know if you but we're pretty

166much done with that I think right Joe and you guys are following up on that it's going to we're going to talk about it we're going to talk about it on the next agenda the next gender yeah and you all have the package that I previously sent to you folks what do I need to do I don't know if we distributed that Joe so but I have them you have them okay um and then a new edition um that we will be putting on priority projects is the upper Charles Trail um so several members of the committee including Rob met with myself Jen Peter and Alvaro to talk about our steps forward with that um there are a number of town owned Parcels that are part of the trail or that are necessary to be

167part of the trail um they're what we decided at that meeting is that there could be some issues with those parcels and that makes sense to really identify what those issues are and resolve them before we start looking at private homeowners and so Rob uh one one actually came up today which was that High Street parcel which has some restrictions on it that Lisa had noted and then also one of the things that we need to get out on the table is the usage of the cemetery as part of the upper Charles Trail and Lisa had found after we had talked and after but before the meeting you know what she has been able to find is that we could you it looks like we could use the existing pass and walkways through the cemetery

168as part of a trail but we cannot lay out a public way an additional public way there so we'll do a little bit more in-depth research on that which is different than what was the trail group was um a trail committee was looking at doing something that would skirt sort of around the outside of the cemetery yeah although it was very s it was going to still be on that little road at the bottom so if you guys can visualize the old right by the river the lower section yeah there's an old cart path that comes up from the river it's it's that's in Wetlands as well so it's complicated but it was going to go on I I believe a little bit of the old path anyway that leads to the water of the

169pumping station so it is accomplished and so you know us as elected officials I guess need to be aware that if as the path progresses assuming there's no legal impediments that we will will be asked will be looking at actually having a piece of the bike path you know inner on the edge of the cemetery or actually inside it so we should be aware of that and there's some people that will have you know there'll be issues with that so that's something that I think we need to kind of process and think about ourselves good to get information it would be good to look at other bike trails and see if other Trails have gone through cemeteries you know is there precedence for it we can use that I don't know if we talked about

170that specific no we don't but that's is that something the pickles committee could do I think that's yeah I think and we've actually did do that in the past because we had a lot of these some of these discussions two three years ago and so we did you know I know Joel came up with a bunch of instances I know my my own parents uh Graves and act and there's a blocking Trail right right near there where people Park and walk and come back there is mixed use in cemeteries a lot anyway and the other um the other oh and of course it didn't you know Michael reminded us that we of course need to talk to the schools again and still haven't done it so that's kind of a glaring Mission I know we

171talked about that again a year and a half ago to go see the school committee so there's still you know people have said they're going to go see the school committee to review the plan with the school committee which really is the high school and where the trail is going to go in and around the high school so that's another major major public land issue hopefully we can get those resolved fairly quickly and it was great to see the enthusiasm and excitement from the trails committee members you know Tony Joel were very thrilled that we were kind of at the step where we're actually moving forward with this so that was great so that is really a priority project updates um so moving on to town manager reports I have some items that aren't listed

172here trying to think of which ones I want to start off with because the first one we have on here is uh I will just say is a not very pleasant one which is an update on the MBTA Renovations set to begin on August 19th so we have been under the impression because we've actually been told that bus service was going to be available to Residents um buses Elite Shuttle buses leaving from the Ashland station uh going to Framingham station to help uh basically right yeah and Stafford to alleviate some of the burden so that is still happening but the implicator the what was what was stated is that people could park there and do that and so what we found out and Brandy I started receiving texts yeah yeah Brandy I think rob you

173said one too there was conflicting information being posted on the MBTA website that said the parking lot was going to be closed so I reached out to the MBTA Senator spilka's office reached out to the MBTA asked first of all what clarification was which did come back that yes the parking lot is going to be closed and the buses would only be available to walk up well exactly I'm like you're not going to get much ridership out of that and even after the advocacy of Senator spilka's office they you know I never did hear back from Brian so I'll call him Brian's the executive director of The Advisory Board who was going to call as well yeah so the new memory yeah so the the new information that I received today um and I've received

174a couple of emails about it is that where those buses are going to be picking up or on the south side the 135 station the 135 side of the station which means that because we were talking sort of maybe Burnham's might be able to help but you can't get up and over yeah I have no idea other than the people at Sears who's going to get off at uh well I guess you could you could get driven Down Memorial Drive and dropped off instead of going to Framingham so I think the problem you know the main reason I think we thought this was helpful is because the parking could get congested in other places right yes and also it's probably convenient to park near your home so what was their answer to that are they

175saying you know did they say do we have reasons like why they're closing it and why they think it's not a problem to go to Framingham or South though so with regards to closing the parking lot they are going to be doing some work on the parking lot and they're also going to be using it as a staging area but that is a huge parking lot especially like if if I mean you know I'm thinking of the 135 side if they're gonna if they're gonna have that as the shuttle location I mean they could have one area of that parking lot that would be a small small part of that parking lot of 100 spots that people could park in safely and then they can come right into it and it would be far enough

176away yeah yeah I can't believe they're really using that yeah what the T should do is pay Danny to X number for X number of spots and give the parking free to X number you know at least Ashland residents you just can't get up and over that's the problem you can't because because they're going to be they're gonna be taken down yeah but I'm saying then they'd have to pick them up on that side and and drop them off on that side I'm sure they're probably thinking from a logistical standpoint to get to the Framingham station 135 is like the the which is stupid which is well I I also saw directions to the station from the MBTA that said take Pleasant Street to yeah well so the other thing is basically just thinking about

177now what you just said in if you're traveling to Boston in the morning you have to be on one side and so they'd have to drop off and pick up so they're closing the whole platform right yeah so but I mean if you're parked on the 135 side you would be you would be shuttled to Framingham you'd still be getting on the train and Framingham there's always a shuttle yeah even though the train is still going to be going through it's not yeah no I know I I so I do know that Daniel's table which is in Framingham is offering to rent spaces I haven't talked to Sandra to see like what the logistics of that is but they do have spaces available near the Framingham near the Framingham station and that that that parking

178lot on the Howard Street side or Franklin Street side is is is a decent size but it really does fill up like if it I mean I'm on the I'm on like the what's the 7 30 train out of Ashland but it's like you know see it's the only really good Express train to get into Boston in the morning and then when I'm coming home I can see that parking lot completely filled so it's filled now so that's a problem and Framing and that is very different than the analysis that they have provided us remember yeah um I have heard that they're different um businesses that are publicizing the fact that they have spots available for rent in Framingham which I think is good and I would just encourage them to advertise yeah continue to

179do that so is it your impression from your discussions that this is they think this is a done deal that the way they're doing it yeah I mean it is MBTA property it is um I just my my main disappointment has been that we were basically told these are the options and you know these are the basically the mitigation measures that we're going to put in place and as we get closer to that date that seems to have kind of Fallen yeah and then we can have a real problem with the Boston commuters if if what Brandy's saying is true and people of trouble finding parking after we close them in Boston well they're going to be pissed off too but yeah oh it's it's uh they're going to be very very frustrating so I

180did put something in the newsletter I will be putting something out um in local Town Pages uh which will be after the start date but um put something up on social media and I would encourage you all and anybody watching to share that to make sure the word gets out accordingly it's really weird because they're discouraging ridership they're making it difficult right like what um so there's that uh We've covered the update on leaving civil service next is an update on the human services department and I I will actually turn that over to Jen so as you probably um remember Jennifer wolfing um had moved on um earlier this summer so for the last several months we had a few other turnovers Caitlyn left from the food pantry I'm still really taking a good look

181at that department and what we've been able to do is actually promote Kristen French who was has been serving as our director of prevention so promote her to the Director of Human Services and prevention so sort of taking when you're really looking at what Jennifer was doing um a piece of her job was really the administrative oversight of that department um so Kristen will take over that and the supervision of the staff which will open up a little bit more time for direct sort of um Outreach and Human Services work and case management work and so we're able to promote um Courtney Laughlin who has been our case manager for over the last year to a lead social worker role and so she'll continue the work that she's been doing um for the last year

182and be the primary sort of Outreach and case manager that we'll have and a social worker she has her master's degree and social work and she's working towards her license which you'll get um in the next few months and then we have a case manager role which was just on the agenda so Joy will start um in the middle of September and we had usual start as a new food pantry resource coordinator um two weeks ago and that's been really great and so we're sort of trying to build out that a bit more to have more volunteers I think um Kristen will be able to help with that as she's been able to sort of mobilize volunteers through the decision the work she's done with decisions Coalition and so build up a little bit more

183volunteer and hopefully be able to reach more people with a pantry than also that sort of tends to sort of lead into a little bit more case management work Human Service at the community center and they'll all be housed out of the community center still and so it's always been really important to that department to sort of stay cohesive this will also allow us to sort of I think bridge the gap a bit between intervention and services and then some of the prevention work that's been happening so um Kristen also oversees Eliza who is um a coordinator for decisions at every turn works in the schools and does a lot of Youth Outreach and does a lot of prevention work she's also has a social work degree and background and has previously worked I'm in

184food pantry work and food resource work in other towns and so she's been a real asset over the last several months where we've had so many vacancies and so they're sort of building that Gap where hopefully we have a little bit better um sort of Continuum of services through prevention Outreach and then intervention and case management so I think that it's going to work really well for the community in terms of I don't expect anybody to see anything different from the Human Services side and I'm hoping that we're able to bolster some of our prevention and education and program work Kristin's great um she really is and so from like a point of contact so if we had somebody that we needed to put in contact with human services it would be Kristen that we

185would put them because not Courtney right okay and then Kristen would direct them to if if it wasn't something that she was directly responsible for she would she would be that point person so okay so we're fully staffed in the community yes Human Services oh that's good very shortly yes that'll be great that's good that's good congratulations to Kristen and Courtney it's always nice to be able to promote them yeah for sure um next on the agenda is uh notification about changing the trash billing Cycles um So currently we bill for trash the trash fee once a year and as you and everybody else knows well maybe not everybody else you know there's been a significant adjustment to the base fee to the tune of fifty dollars bringing it up over two hundred dollars so

186we've been trying to put our heads together as to how to mitigate that I mean we've heard some concerns especially from Seniors and stuff and what we've decided to do is actually break it up into two buildings so people don't have to come up with as much cash up front so we did look at the additional cost for that that would be about four thousand extra dollars again the grand scheme of our budget it's uh it's very little compared to what a difference this could make in a number of households lives and budgets so I want to notify you about that um you know is there any any possibility of coordinating that with the other quarterly bills yeah we can look at we could certainly look at that and see if there's a way we

187could make that happen um you know the key thing is going to be to help people understand hey you're getting one bill that's less than what you usually hit in August but you'll get another bill that was what I was going to ask like so what you know when we send out the um the First new bill and we do break it up into two billing Cycles what are we sending along with it as far as like information and because you know when we get our trash bill like it's it there's not you know there's not like much information on it and people are just used to paying it once a year thinking about like a little bit of Education along with the bill just to make sure that that they know that they're going

188to see another one so we don't have to because it could end up being more than this amount if we're if we're sending like additional mailings to people to continually pay that second Bill like if there's if if people aren't and we can look at putting an insert it might be a little bit too late for this for this first cycle but uh opponent say half of the bill versus a foot because like I think before it said your you know annual trash fee yeah so I don't think it would say buy annual trash fee minimum minimum why not put when the next bill is going to come right that right I mean I do that too well if we can print something on there even if it's just even it just says this is

189your full bill amount and this is like your yearly yeah right something someone like with your tax bills it should say like annual yeah and then what your quarterly bill is um I'd say I mean we said it might be too late for that maybe I mean I have to check yeah I mean maybe put a sticker on the outside or something right right I think it's it's pretty critical [Music] yeah I need to let people know um [Music] okay there's that um so update on new bicycle law signs so there has been a new rule um no new law that's been passed that requires motorists to give four feet uh space between uh themselves their car their vehicle and either a pedestrian or a bicyclist and so to in order to help promote that

190massdot has offered to give us signs to fabricate and deliver signs to us that we can put up so we have taken advantage of that we will be we have not got these signs in yet but we have made the request and they'll put the order in and we'll be putting those up on Chestnut Street Myrtle Street Pleasant Street and West Union Street so that reminds me of um it was a while ago that Joel was at our meeting and was talking about this new law and he had sent us um I think flyer or some sort of promotion stuff can we also you know put that out in social media and make sure we put that like in your newsletter and stuff like that just to kind of help you know because I think

191a sign is is good but uh it while all of a sudden is there a sign there right yeah I believe we did shortly after his presentation but we can do we can learn it again it was the police did a great job on that new intersection was it them doing I don't want to give them remember when you guys change the stop signs of Elliot and uh fruit yeah it was some great yeah DPW DPW and the police so somebody was constantly posting but uh please so we try to work in concert with each other and help each other out and so even the fire department might have put something in there so um that was great this was that yeah so that's a great you know thing to follow up on and you

192know thanks thank you for following up and doing that because as someone who at least rides around occasionally around town it's great that people have their uh reminder because many of our rolled shoulders are just not that great there's a lot of there's a lot of dirt and stuff in the side of the road sometimes you have to come out to go around potholes and things like that so anything that helps improve safety like that is great if it means respect to that if if cyclists are going to be you know riding in the roadway as like a motorist they need to follow the rules of the road sure you need to stop them when there's a stop sign you need to give a direction when you're going to turn left or right and I've

193see I see it all the time that they don't do it and there's been some several near misses to the point where my heart's in my throat because oh here's the other thing Joe it's not now it's not just bicycles you've got all this electric stuff well that's what I was going to ask issues yeah we're gonna have continued issues I'm sure anyway not an easy thing though no no well we're always evolving improve the safety oh yeah um so speaking of safety and the police were mentioned uh just an update I believe you know the board saw on the board was aware that recently actually last Monday we promoted Michael ventula from the position of Lieutenant to the newly created position in Deputy Chief and Ryan Puzo from patrol officer to Sergeant so congratulations

194again to those gentlemen and we're really looking forward to seeing what what they do and in their new positions and seeing their careers continually progress right so those are the things I did have on the agenda um one thing I did two things I did not have on the agenda is um I hope everybody is aware that DCR has actually selected Ashland to host their uh annual Town Forest committee conference which will be happening on Saturday October 21st so they'll start out at the Ashland Community Center and then actually we'll bus people over to our town forest for a tour so was there was there an announcement they have so I did put something in the newsletter I'm not necessarily sure if something went out in um how did that come about today um our

195town Force committee you know lobby lobby essentially the Town Forest committee set something out I thought I thought that yeah they sent an email inviting us and letting us know about it so yeah I missed the blacklisted me from there oh I'm sure it's there they might add their reasons you know you never know and then and then last maybe you biked in the truck yeah that's right well they actually encouraged it so last but not least uh I just want to give a give thanks uh to the people and I'll name some of them here in a bit the people who produced and put on the remote Area Medical Clinic at Keith Town yeah so it was um the turnout was phenomenal um people were lining up midnight the day before to take advantage

196of it were you there I was not I was actually at a Meditation Retreat um which quickly went away on Monday but um nose and left that could be on a t-shirt no Zen left do you see more Zed actually now that I really well maybe I have to do this more often but um yes we ended up serving 316 unique patients wow um they ended up turning away uh quite a bit because they didn't have enough providers um which is Tuesday which is too bad we had a total of um 41 volunteers on the 11th 151 volunteers on the 12th and 112 volunteers on the 13th the total value that the volunteers provided was almost a hundred and ten thousand dollars and the service value of the professionals providing the service was over a

197hundred thousand dollars as well and so they did everything from vision service I believe they made um almost 150 sets of eyeglasses they did 77 dental procedures including 17 surgical procedures like extractions and one set of dentures on unmovable you know 98 physical exams um a number of shots Foot Care Dr Ron was a part of that a lot of volunteers so yeah so they they did an amazing amount of work that's great well thank you to those who organized and I know Steve Steve was there was part of it and um yeah Board of Health members so you know the Board of Health members uh specific you know specifically calling out uh Jay and Ed Berman for the work that they did although the rest of the Board of Health members helped uh Jay's

198wife Liz Liz Burns Steve as you mentioned uh Raj and Laura Ed Hart Kristen French who we were just talking about at Addie Gibson from Metro West Medical Center and we mentioned Steve and Bonnie and then also Fran blank Fran Blake and Rob St Germain were also nice important and this is a group that comes in and does this organizes this keep Tech periodically so they're the ones that do come in and provide the service the organization and the planning has been a year and a half effort a while and again it's just it's just phenomenal what they were able to do and what they provided yeah Raj show me what uh what the ram Clinic pulls up in is this the largest 18-wheeler that you can get on the road double level you know

199double level I hope they didn't go they clearly didn't go on Storrow Drive um but yeah and so what they do is they empty it out and then they can use the space inside for things like the eyeglass grinding and everything it's just an amazing thing I hated to miss it but um congratulations to everybody and so that's it for me thanks for reporting on that hey so that brings us to board reports and I guess I'll just start at the end and work our way over here so Claudia go ahead all right well you know I just wanted to say it was an honor to be present for the the promotion um for our police and uh you know it's uh it was just an honor it was very nicely done very well done

200they were family members I think uh I'm not sure who's who's I think it was we had a 100 year old um grandma that was uh Mike Ventura's Grandma yeah all right yep The Who was present um you know must have been really special for her right so thank you for that um we did have a bill Mendes building committee meeting last night and um you know this school is is really beautiful it's amazing you know I can't wait for people to be able to see it um and and one of the things a couple of things when the old building came down it was like the the new building was unveiled it was revealed yeah yep and then the other thing that I've noticed too is in in terms of the setting um the

201exit road now if you actually I had occasion to go over there one day and one of the uh uh superintendents gave me a ride around the front and you can really see we always have always known what a beautiful sight that is but now the building sits so that you can see where the forest behind it so um and and again the building itself just remarkable the the sign the electronic sign has been going up and today they were working on the bottom of it the Fieldstone um the the Fieldstone um uh surroundings so so really beautiful yeah there will be a an open house to the public uh I believe at 12 30 p.m on September 9th 12 30 to 4 on September 9th to 4 30 on September 9th um so so

202really exciting school is going to start on time um so right all of our All My Children friends uh yeah yeah it's a few days ago they get the Labor Day weekend in like when is this when does school start September 5th Tuesday after Labor Day right after Labor Day yeah there goes summer yes yes it is um and then this Saturday uh Mr mignani and I will be at the farmers market from 10 to 12. um with office hours thank you uh Brandi for we have some new decorations for the table so we'll really stand out I'm not sure I appreciate that but no no um so thank you for that and um looking forward to it it's sitting here tonight listen thinking that you know um uh I might make a little sheet

203that we could give to people that might have some of the highlights some of the things we discussed tonight things that are important um we'll put a little QR code on there and take it to take us to take people to our website so if anyone has anything they'd like to add on that um sheet the little one-liners let me know and I will add it to a to a sheet how's that show thank you that sounds good um so uh thank you that's that's it for me great thank you thank you next okay so um just talking about the office hours uh Yolanda and I had office hours at the farmer's market in July um the the farmer's market is a great place to to do the office hours um I just wanted to

204give a shout out to Gene Walker from the Ashland Farmers Market who um is a rock star in finding us spots and we're consistently been been there once a month um well we're now being there consistent so um and so um the question I did want to ask the group is um I haven't reached out to the um to the Ashland Day committee to do a booth at Ashland day let me know I wasn't sure whether we wanted to whether the group would prefer to do office hours the week before Ashland day at the farmers market versus try to man a booth at Ashland day so yeah so here's the thing I think with Ashland day I know for myself as I typically am filming and yeah it's hard to commit to being at the

205booth or even and I know we've done it many years ago we had a booth and it was tough trying to get people there I would say if we want to do hours at the farmer's market the week before and then just we're all at Ashland day unless we want to do something where we reach out to other elected and appointed committees and say it's an Ashland Town booth and whoever wants to be there but I know a lot of other committees already have their own moves so yeah they do yeah quickly okay so so if if everyone is okay with it then I'll reach out to Gene and see if we could do the 16th which seems to fall between the weekends of the opening of Mendez and the national day so I think

206it'll be a good weekend to do it so we'll we'll plan we'll I'll reach out to Gene to do that and I could be available on the 16th okay sounds good um the other thing I just wanted to talk about we are meeting the comprehensive plan steering committee is meeting tomorrow um I would like to remind folks watching that we have a new comprehensive plan newsletter that people can subscribe to um that is award-winning not really but I'm gonna it will be it will be it will be but it will be the one of the best ways that people can um see monthly what the comprehensive plan that's great steering committee is is um is working on so I would encourage folks to subscribe to that go on the communications Michael was talking about the

207communications webpage um or I have a QR code that I can get people to so send it over I'll put it right on my sheet all right sounds good one liner sheet one liner in the QR code yep yep so um and the last thing I wanted to just say is um I got an email from um the chair of CPC so um if you remember a while ago um we had talked about the working restriction the restrictions working group for our conservation restrictions and there was the discussion of whether um CPC might be willing to take on that working group because of the the way that that committee initially had um the allocation of folks really kind of mirrored a lot of what cpc's membership is um and I did get an email from

208Aaron Ladd that they did vote to um to take that on so um CPC will be beginning to work on the restrictions um I did ask Aaron if they had discussed specifically starting with because there's two properties that are really kind of priority projects priority um Parcels 125 Front Street and then six Cherry um so I don't know if they are necessarily if they have prioritized one over the other but I'm happy to I know Aaron's probably going to reach out to Michael but I'm happy to kind of stay connected to that too and see if um what their process if they have questions and things like that because they're gonna they're gonna probably have questions as they go through this process well they will have the resources to find the answers so they're smart

209people they are smart people so but anyway I just wanted to pass that along so that may be something to think about putting on the agenda just to kind of review all the all of all the history of that and where we're going and what the need for that is I mean I think it would be good to have CPC come at some point and just talk about you know their how how their funding mechanism how that's a great idea you know to discuss what they're looking because they're always they always say they're looking for projects but I don't it's kind of a big yeah because they're one of they're a committee you know and we always talk about seeing committees but I don't remember them coming in here for years really but it might

210be a good it might be a good thing to have them yeah and then and then talk about this as well as they're kind of getting started with it so great okay thanks Brandi Joe thank you Mr chair um uh real briefly uh this past uh Tuesday we uh celebrated 77th year of the independence of India from the British Empire and it was a wonderful event uh Brandi and I represented the uh the select board uh just wonderful ceremony and uh even though it was raining it was it was a very nice event when isn't it raining um but uh very nice event and uh folks were great so we look forward to uh I was talking to those folks about having the Indian uh recital to a dance a dance thing over at the

211Gazebo for Ashland day and they were all excited about it so yeah definitely definitely that would be great so um they segue into my next quick thing is that the summer concerts uh next Tuesday night was the last summer concert I can't believe it um it was raining as all heck I think we may have had two great concerts and then unfortunately a lot of them were postponed or rained out we did have it last Tuesday even after it rained it trickled a little bit we had about 50 people show up and you know with their rain gear on but it was a good band and it's unfortunate that uh we're gonna have more uh but we'll we'll see if we can do something uh maybe inside and have them uh come back again and

212play for everybody I was happy to be part of the promotions and be proud of the crowd and watch to find offices that I used to work with and one of them yeah that's why I have this long white bid uh was a former student of mine in in the Law and Order programs that I had in the school system uh Ryan Puzo was in my class and uh it's nice to see him be a sergeant and he says he says I think he rubbed off on me said oh man that's too bad but anyway he uh I wish him well and I hope they all stay safe and uh detective I mean uh deputy chief Ventrilo who was the detective under my tillage just good guy and I I think they'll do well for

213the Department as a whole and lastly Ashland day September 23rd always looking for help the last day for vendors who are willing to uh wishing to uh get involved is September 10th uh board members uh board committees from Ashland uh come see me uh get a hold of me I'd be happy to give you uh an application from I think right now we're about to have about 70 a 75 vendors which isn't bad considering that uh and oh yeah someone's going to be in charge of the goats I don't know you know I love the game yeah yeah this absolutely and it's it's not going to be as big as it used to be I mean we're coming back from the ashes unfortunately because of covert over uh three years uh but the uh the

214response has been very positive so we're looking forward to it and again let's hope it doesn't rain not cross your fingers Cross Your Toes cross your eyes do whatever but let's you know all right let's have a great day for it and and that's about it one last thing I want to thank Michael duka for the summer concert program Michael puts it all together um folks have no idea what it's like trying to get bands everybody wants this everybody wants that you know they want top dollar and and Michael knows how to work work it so that way you know we can we can get you know good bands and um you know for for under for under five to six hundred bucks which isn't bad because the average growing band right now is 750.

215well that's a lot of money you know so but we thank everybody and we look forward to Ashland day and that's all I have all right thank you sir motion to go past 10 o'clock all right and Yolanda before we go to you Michael has something he wanted to Yeah just something that I forgot I'm sorry so August 31st is um National overdose awareness day yes and so on August 26 here in the town of Ashland we will be um remembering that and memorializing that we will be set up from nine o'clock to 10 30 at Montenegro Square across from the library I'm sorry what time was that again uh nine o'clock uh to ten thirty um please stop by we'll have materials there for you um Raj will be there so Narcan training and

216then they're just going to so in 2000 so in 22 over 2 000 people died so there'll be 200 purple Flags out there can like sort of I'm showing um the number of people in Massachusetts yeah next Saturday the 26th yeah so our goal was to plant 236 Flags so okay cool anyway so thanks for letting me uh jump in not a problem um not too much we're from metros Regional collaborative we're in the process of planning our next Trails project committee event and that's probably going to happen in October the other thing for the Metro West YMCA this Saturday August 19th from 9 to 11 is having their group exercise showcase so it's at the Framingham YMCA it starts at nine o'clock it goes to 11 there are four different classes you don't have

217to be a member you can just go and try the different classes there's an exercise class there's a yoga class I forget what else but and you can go to their website to check it out so that's this Saturday August 19th from 9 to 11 at the Metro West YMCA and that's really all I have I haven't been doing too much lately I'm sure you have I'm sure you're doing a lot all right thank you Yolanda the only item I have is uh just a reminder we finally did schedule The Joint meeting with the planning board uh for September 14th at 7 15. I think you all know that right now just make sure you have that on your agenda and I think our next uh word not scheduled to meet again until our first

218meeting in September right so that's well now we're going to do a briefing hybrid online it's likely to be are we likely to zoom in yeah okay that'll be scheduled at some point but our next regular meeting is that first Wednesday in September so the only question I have is um is conservation meeting Monday like do we need to meet before conservation meets because they're they're all good okay 31st okay okay because like that's the only one so we have to do this yeah we have to do this before the end of August is that basically okay okay great all right so um if there's nothing else I'll entertain a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn I'll second that um good night good night