special town meeting of november fourth two thousand and thirteen for the town of belmont we have a quorum i'd like to please ask you to rise for the pledge of allegiance  thank you let me review a few matters for the meeting we have asked all town meeting members to be my far right and the center now non town meeting members on the left and the ribbon is simply to allow for counting more easily without getting double counting so the tellers will be to divide the center if we have a standing vote so that's the purpose of that and i think this will be clearer and easier for us when we're meeting here a generat admitting non town meeting members to the floor the town administrator and assistant town accountant department heads warrant committee school committee superintendent schools business manager anybody else who might have missed out on town meeting members if not that completes the list of those who are admitted to the floor we have the usual  tellers here on the left center marty cohen penny schaefer and then in the right center in stayton and charles hom and then the far right and rick is arean and marian scally jim state and will be the coordinator and the gentleman who pulls together all the votes gives them to me when i want to you let me review a few of the rules you obviously have received my letter to the overview but i'll touch on a few things we will follow of course our normal role with respect to the advance filing of proposed substantive amendments as you well know a long list of amendments has been filed i will review the amendments that relate to each article at the beginning of those articles so rather than do that now  example the demolition byelaw i will wait until we were about to present that and i'll explain to you the order of the amendments we've tried hard to organize this in a way to minimize what is obviously a confusing situation the moderator has sole discretion to allow amendments that are easy to understand from the floor however a town meeting member who wishes to make such a motion must make the motion before speaking to it and not at the conclusion of a speech or bylaws provided that all votes must be taken in the first instance by voice vote the moderator is in doubt as to the result or if any town meeting member requests counted vote a standing vote will be taken any town meeting member may also request a roll call vote now in terms of timing we know that  the maximum allowed time for a speaker's ten minutes suffice it to say we have a lot of business to conduct i don't know if it's possible to do this in one night i know all of us would like it to be minutes how many members who have previously spoken on a matter did not ask to be recognized until all others who wished to speak of had a chance to do so except answer a question or correct a previous misstatement no person may speak for more than five minutes when speaking for the second time all speakers must address the moderator and questions asked through the moderator that obviously is so we can have some discipline and keep things running smoothly and all discussion obviously must be relevant to a motion before the town meeting and with the unanimous consent of town meeting members all asked the town clerk to read only the return of the warrant without the text of each printed article meeting by posting in a tested copy of the warrant on the town clerk's official bulletin board in the town hall and at least five other places in town fourteen days before the date of this meaning in accordance with chapter thirty nine section ten of the general laws and section thirty one ten a of the general laws of the town of belmont furthermore i do so here by certify that i gave notice of the special town meeting of november fourth two thousand and thirteen by causing a copy of the warrant to be sent to the town meeting members at least fourteen days before the date of this meeting and by causing copies of the warrant to be made available at the public library and the town clerk's office all in accordance with section thirty one ten b of the general laws of the town of belmont and the representative town meeting acts of one nine hundred twenty six as amended thank you and i will now turn to the business of town meeting one report on her article one the underwood building committee and i'd like to call on and paulson who is chair of the committee is pauls ellen shriver and james smith we have met a number of times held interviews and have voted to engage the services of bachmann hendry an object type as the designers of the new pool ph an aide to the feasibility study but the final choice for design it was difficult as we had very good firms applied b a h a n a was strong in the interview presented good ideas and the firm has good in house professional capability we are also required by state law to have the services of an owner's project manager to perform that function we have hired the firm pink incorporated will be the person working closely with the committee and the designer the committee has been working on an accelerated time schedule and we expect to schematic plans completed and presented to the border select and by the middle of january so that a debt exclusion vote can go forward at the april town election we would not have been able to achieve this schedule without the assistance  town employees peeta kasten ino the director of public works gerry boyle the director of facilities and david calle ocho administrative the original feasibility study estimated the cost of a new pool to be about four million five hundred thousand dollars and we will work close we will work hard to stay close to that figure but the amount was not developed as a result of schematic terrariums or with import from the community and the building committee we also expect to receive some c p a fund which would affect the total amount of the debt exclusion the committee is looking for enthusiastic community input into the design and men and news of this pool to that end we are going to hold a public meeting at the chana ri middle school here on thursday november twenty first at seven thirty please mark your calendars please come bring your ideas suggestions and concerns about a new pool this meeting will be followed by a walk around the pool area with the designer on saturday november twenty third at one thirty followed by a session at the library where ideas can be developed through discussion in writing or by drawing we hope lots of children will attend and draw their vision of a pool for the future but we also want to need citizens of all ages to participate if the town votes unable to move ahead with the construction of the pool the committee will have the construction plans drawn up put them out to bid and begin work back september we have been assured that a new pool can be ready for use by june two thousand and fifteen with that timetable we will not lose the pool for a season although many in belmont have fond memories of the pool and pool house as they stand today the town has been one that the state board of health and our local board of health have concerns about the pool and the bath house as they are not up to code i think many of us who have spent hours at the pool know that with the help of a d p w which pays constant attention to the facility to make sure that the quality of the water resat is factory and that the bath house has operational we should be able to continue to operate the pool for the next season but the viability of the pool is coming to an end and without plans to reconstruct pool and bath house we will soon be forced to close down this important amenity in our town the underwood pool is over one hundred years old it has been a focal point for our town year after year and generations of children have learned to swim the hundreds of families have spent enjoyable hours at this facility hopefully it will begin a new life in two thousand and fifteen and continue to serve our community in its new form for the next fifty years thank you mahoney town meeting member precinct one and chairman of the capital budget committee article two moved that nine hundred sixty thousand dollars be appropriated for the purchase of materials and to perform repairs including major improvements to the harris field complex and to meet this appropriation the treasurer with the approval of the board of selectmen is here by authorized to borrow and to issue bonds and to take any other action necessary and incidental they are to you have a vote of the capital budget committee yes capital budget committee unanimously supports this article and the june we have returned with this article for your consideration this evening we all know that the harris field is in need of some work it's time for it to happen and we are back now with some firm numbers and identified exactly what we're going to do at that field i think we have some slides up there next slide just to review a little bit about the complex the current uses of the complex are  many at the high school i think many of you are familiar with football soccer look cross i now have found out that rugby is played at the high school who knew girls and boys track being even though it's flat they do work out there for skiing indoor and outdoor track so lots of uses for the high school in addition for the younger children soccer lacrosse field hockey and the track program as well as the belmont sport program and then just residents loads and loads of residents who walk on the track or do pick up games or whatever that slide as you may remember the field was installed in two thousand and two and it was one of the first artificial turf in the area i think where the second high school to do it in this area however the field at this point has exceeded its expected life time and we did have some issues with it over the last few years the track was resurfaced in two thousand and eight that has a shorter life span and that is due to be resurfaced again soon and resurfacing the track you're not tearing the whole thing up just putting the new rubber surface on it any of you who walk there will note that even now in some of the lanes you can see the black through as opposed to the kind of reddish color and we need a little bit more of that stuff put down so by doing both of those installations together this coming summer we save some time and the field is offline only once but we figure that makes gotten a full briefing on it and are very confident both in the numbers and very supportive of of all of the details of this project the field construction turf replacement itself is about seven hundred sixty five thousand dollars to resurface the track it's about one hundred twenty three thousand dollars to repair the concrete surface around the bleachers again any of you who go there will see that it is really torn up and actually pretty dangerous at this point so we're looking at eleven thousand dollars to clean that up to install animals in front of the bleachers thereby removing the existing fence the thought is that the fence is a little beat up we put solid panels in the front it looks neater it last longer we've seen pictures of it done in other schools and it looks really nice and that's for about seventeen thousand dollars also miscellaneous other repairs for about five thousand dollars a perimeter fence the kind of low black fence that surround the entire complex needs some work that is thirty six thousand dollars so in toto we're asking for nine hundred sixty thousand dollars and we're confident that the bids will come in right at that level in addition to that and got it thank you there is a proposal to add some netting to allow multiple uses of the field at the same time in other words netting that could be raised or lowered so that games could be played in the middle of the field while some track things for example are going on on the periphery the estimated cost of that is eighty four thousand dollars but that is to be raised by private funds so we are not asking for those funds tonight we just want to make you aware of that possibility the financing to make this happen will be covered by a ten year bond this bond rees replaces an existing bond that has come out of the capital budget funds for approximately one hundred twenty four thousand dollars and that on goes offline in two thousand and fourteen and that bond was in place for replacement of the h b a c units at the high school we are done with that though it's a one for one replacement of that financing bond schedule if approved by you this evening is the plans will be finalized in early january bids will go out in january bids will be awarded in february construction will begin presumably right after school gets out in june with a goal towards final completion in august and plenty of time for pre season for the high school sports we are very happy that we have a fall town meeting and we can come back to you and ask for this wanting approval lissie evening because this allows your cast and you know to go out to be january and get in line to have this field replaced this coming summer and we think that's important that's all i have to say thank you i know completed all right discussion on article t o jan cruised to many members from precinct three just a question if i may what is the estimated lifespan of the replacement bill that would be my understanding is that the life span is a little bit longer than the existing one and that we're talking around twelve years i'm looking at patrick mcguire who's nodding said yes so around twelve years thank you for page precinct three jan i asked my first question my second question is is it possible to think about or refunding these things if we anticipate a a budget expense of th size we know when it'll be and we not begin to pay it forward i think if we were now looking at floyd i think if we were to keep this bond in place in effect that's what we would be doing we could continue this bond going forward when the next replacement is due in twelve years and therefore it's not exactly paying it forward but it is setting aside a piece of the capital budget money that is earmarked for this complex mr stan it's instant precinct three and certainly in favor of doing a high quality job but i'm surprised that the thirty six thousand for the fence that together with the paneling in front of the stands is over in the mid fifty's but that's trouble our sidewalk budget  is that complete fence replacement no that's a refurbishment of the fence if you will note the fence is black and that black is a covering some kind of vinyl covering that will be replaced and by doing that you maintain the integrity and the stability of that fence so it's not resting it's not a galvanized events like dia peter is saying no ok anyway that seems an extraordinary amount to spend on the fence the rest of that i will say yes and anything is a large sum of money absolutely agree with you from a capital budget perspective to roll the fence and some of these other improvements into this bond takes that money sort of out of our ordinary requests for capital budget one way or another that fencing is going to be addressed by bonding it it helps us out a little bit that it's the thirty six or whatever thirty five thousand dollars is not all coming out of one year's capital budget it's just one more point so i walked there regularly and if you'd retired is quite over then no it's actually the same it's one hundred twenty four thousand dollars for high school that will be retired and this one will pick up at roughly the same begin we need a little humor here tonight we may be here a long time ladies and gentlemen we're going to have the present tayshaun on article three the demolition delay and go through that the votes in the presentation and then we'll begin to entertain the amendments but i want to have the the motion and the presentation initially before we get into the amendment mr pole thank you mr moderator mar chair the board member at large article three moved there on the article three the reading of the proposed amendment to the town's general byelaws pertaining to demolition delay be dispensed with the same being set forth in full under article three in the warrant for the board of selectmen tommy member at large moved at the town i'm in the general bylaws of the town of belmont by adding a new section sixty three to zero entitled demolition delay a set forth in full under article three in the warrant for this meeting and further that the by a large review committee may approve non substantive changes to the numbering of this by law in order that it be in compliance with the numbering format of the general byelaws of the county belmont how does the board of selectmen vote on this unanimously recommends favorable action in the warrant committee michael vincent chair the workmen need i'll just say very quickly that there are two members of the one committee that have homes on the list and therefore recused themselves from the vote but for and also on my name is lauren my i'm a member of the historic district commission and i'm joined tonight by mike tista chair of the planning board as we are joint sponsors of this article tonight we're going to present just a few slides to really describe very generally the form and purpose of this amendment this by law allows time to consider alternative approaches to preserve we have billick tate or adaptive a historic building the ever increasing price of belmont land is placing historically significant buildings at risk this by law is for the purpose preserving and protecting significant buildings in belmont which reflect the architectural cultural or social history of the town by communicating with residents and offering alternatives to demolition we can hopefully preserve our historically significant buildings the historic district commission has for many years reviewed demolition permits and it is clear that the loss of historic buildings is increasing to to six from the last four years show that we have lost nine historic buildings documented in the files  massachusetts historical commission that's about sixteen percent of the total demolitions in the last four years with approximately eighty six hundred buildings in belmont that's a high percentage of historic demolitions relative to the total number of buildings in town there are a number of things that this by law does not do it does not prohibit demolition it temporarily causes it to allow time to consider alternative solutions it does not affect improvements owners may want to make such as renovations painting window replacement and citing it excludes municipal buildings from the delay as exists the existing public process is already open and transparent and includes public hearings here's what it does do it includes a maximum six month or twelve month delay for buildings determined to be preferably preserved that's six months for residential properties and twelve months for all others it applies to one hundred and forty nine buildings with inventory or national register forms in the files of the massachusetts historical commission it includes consideration for emergency demolition due to threats to public health and safety and that would include things like fire or natural disasters it includes  sunset provision and in completion of the town wide inventory that also gives us a chance to test this by law for a short while and come back to you with possible improvements it it up it provides an appeal process within sixty days of adoption the basis for an appeal is a factual demonstration that the building does not qualify to be a significant building based on specific criteria in the bylaw and finally it works in conjunction with the recently adopted religious and municipal building preservation by law to offer alternatives and in the case of religious buildings potential incentives for preservation there are three questions we're going to answer how were the buildings chosen how does this bylaw compare with other communities and how will the process work the massachusetts historical commission a den of fights seven hundred and two historic buildings in belmont on makris that's the massachusetts cultural resource information system you can see a little screen shot in the upper right of the slide the h d c reviewed this list and at mass historic and use this information to develop the by law list all of the buildings on the list are xtend and have inventory forms on file with m h c or are listed on the national register of historic places they are all historically significant for their architecture or for the car or for their contribution to the history and development of belmont the list includes a variety of residential willage iska mercial and institutional buildings properties already protected through other means are not on the list but just the pleasant street historic district only buildings that have been determined preferably to be preferably preserved and i explain that in a bit we'll be subject to the delay so that's a subset of the hundred and forty nine non historic ancillary structures that just garages and sheds are not affected by this bylaw and the commission cannot ad buildings to the list i would also like to to remind you that inventory forms for all of the addresses on the list are posted on the h d c web page and the list has been filed in the town clerk office these houses illustrate a few of the distinctive buildings on the demolition delay list including representative examples from four centuries of development  belmont the craftsman house on cushing avenue is noteworthy as a recipient of a belmont historic society preservation award for its excellent and appropriate rehabilitation so how does our proposed by law compare with other similar communities it is clear that belmont lags well behind our neighbors in terms of our commitment to historic preservation particularly with respect to demolition delay most to mean municipalities use either a twelve month or six month delay period and one of three strategies to define what properties are affected and that's usually a categorical description criteria or a list all of our surrounding communities have a demolition delay by law i hope that the statistics prevent presented here are self explanatory arlington which is slightly less than twice the population of belmont has more than six times the number of properties governed by demolition delay watertown has a twelve month delay period and their process starts with all properties that are fifty years old or greater before a similar process to ours determines they are preferably preserve so how will the process work first a land owner with land owner would file a demolition permit if the application is for a building on the bylaws list the commission  informed by the building inspector within seven days the commission will then hold a public hearing within thirty five days to discuss whether or not this building should be preferably preserve if the commission determines that the building is not preferably preserved they will inform the building inspector within ten days though a demolition permit and be issued if the building is determined preferably preserved the delay period will continue up experience for residential properties and up to twelve months for other buildings from the date of the initial application so i just want to remind you that that delay period does not start when the building is determined preferably sleepers or but rather from the date the actual demolition permit is filed during the delay period the commission will be available to work with landowners potential alternatives if the landowner clearly demonstrates that they have undertaken due diligence to explore alternatives to demolition the commission may end the delay period before six or twelve months is over recent article in the belmont citizen harold noted that if things continue to head in the direction they seem to be heading here is what would come to mind when one thinks of belmont history lost the planning board and the his new york district commission have presented you with this bylaw because many belmont residents have insisted that the town's historically significant buildings be preserved recent demolitions have clearly demonstrated the immediate threat though much history and character this by law will increase the effectiveness of the positive preservation incentives passed at the may and thirteen town meeting and all relevant town boards and committees to sort this by law and ask for your this is the excess in value of the renovation of town hall and the homer building and the adaptive reuse of the prehistoric fire stations clearly show the bennett the benefit these historic buildings give  belmont this by law provides time and a process for public discourse about which buildings should be preserved in belmont now is absolutely the time to pass a by law and if you care about the much history it's distinctive character and its future we hope you will join the commission and the planning board in support of demolition to lay thank you if i could just say please go ahead of the plenty but is support of the stimulus and delay by law into the compromises we were able to negotiate with historic district commission some of the main points of negotiations were that municipal buildings be exempt from this by law to the fact that a fairly elaborate public process is already in place for such buildings as lauren pointed out too that there was the ability to appeal being on the list of buildings we were successful in modifying some of the criteria to aid in that appeal and number three that due to the fact that the c p a funded historic building study had not yet been completed or even started we felt strongly that a sunset provision would give all interested parties along with the public the opportunity to review any proposed modified list that comes up as a result of that study before it was simply added to the existing list  felt that by having a bible in place albeit not perfect by anyone's standards it would give the town an opportunity to test it out and to make modifications after the sunset period in hopes to make it the best by law that it can be well making sure nothing significant would slip through the cracks in the meantime and that's all i want to thank you i'll now turn will begin the amendment process and w the words as it may be modified be substituted for the word adopted in the definition of list c h n prince so that it reads h and friends list a list of buildings in title belmont significant to take thirty seconds to explain the change yes the originally had said it the list was adopted under section d c d presents the is the appeal process and  and a little bit a little ahead of ourselves and we're a little too quick to change it and said change it from adopted to modified but it will only be the list will only be modified if there are appeals there are successful appeals of  those of some of the owners of properties that don't think they should be on the list so the language presented to us is a little bit more accurate than the language which appeared in the original  now we have only seven amendments remaining but what we've tried to do in order to expedite and focus a discussion we've group the amendments into three categories definitions so we'll first discuss two definitional amendments mr mcgaughey definitional change on the the definition of demolition and then mr  definition of structure so those will be the first to and then we have three amendments that relate to the opt out provision and appeals process and mr come next and what we will do there is i will have each of the proponents take two minutes to present their purpose of their amendment each of the three and then we will discuss the amendments one by one and that allows us i think to have some understanding of all three before we begin the one by one discussion and then finally the last two amendments mr and mr weiss is on the financial impact of that will be the sequence of the discussion i want to remind town meeting members that if you have any kind of financial interest that needs to be in this article needs to be disclosed when you are speaking and in this case a financial interest would include your home being on the list so please it's simply a matter of disclosure of any other financial interest as well an attorney consultant or whatever please disclose that that's these coming amendments yes i will call once the amendments presented i will call a need to the bodies for a vote if they've taken them so it will be part of selectmen warrant committee starkest and planning board so i move that article three on the warrant be amended by replacing section d one i'm sorry me the wrong one  definition i move that article three on the warrant be amended by changing the definition of demolition to be in conformity with the historic district commission statement as follows demolition the dismantling or voluntary the struction of a building in its entirety with or without the intent to replace the constructions so affect that for purposes of this section with term demolition they'll not include any other activities affecting the interior or exterior of the building including without limitation interior or exterior painting maintenance on occasions renovations additions removal unfavorable action and animals you want to explain briefly the purpose of the men from the beginning this definition has had some ambiguity about it cause concerns to people whose houses were on the list they wanted to know what and they do to their house freely how much flexibility do they have with their house and they modify it and they take the porch off and they put a porch on can they paint it in the color they choose there was also the question of in the original definition what is meant by substantial militia and that's an ambiguous phrase people didn't know what it meant they did know how the historic district mission or the building inspector might view that this was resolved that warrant discussion and night october twenty eighth questions about this were directed to the historic district commission and the answers words follow the process would start only if you applied for a full demolition term this  reiterated that only full demolition was to be the issue here that arsenal demolition was not involved part was people ask what can i do to my house and i change the color can i add wind change the roof line and the answer was you have full flexibility to make whatever changes you want one party at the warrant discussion night asked the question so i can make changes to my house freely even if the changes would render my house not  historic looking and the answer was yes if you have not applied for a demolition permit you have full flexibility so that night watching the red sox in the eighth inning i drafted this definition to incorporate what had been said by the historic mission that night i tried to faithfully incorporate the things that were mentioned the word painting by the way shows up in this definition it also showed up in the presentation but was not in the original definition i went over to the belmont media center this afternoon and i appreciate your help and i reviewed the record of that meeting to make sure that they but had been made that the process only begins if you apply for a full demolition permit so with that my purpose here is only to put words on paper that represent the intent of the historic district commission thank you ms miers would you like to respond for their starkest or commission or thank you mr moderator lauren meyer historic district commission the language that is in the bylaws right now which refers to substantial demolition is standard language that is used in demolition delay bylaws throughout the commonwealth well the intent of the bylaw is primarily to deal with large scale demolition there may be situations where the actual construction project falls lightly less full demolition for example a historic building where all but you know the front hall and remain would not be complete demolition the historic district  commission supports the wording in the by law and we are opposed to this amendment and i will add that the decision about interpreted the  will be made by the building inspector in the building division thank you thank you will now have discussion on mr magoo amendment discussion mr balsam fred thompson precinct one i remember back in june when the demolition delayed by a law came up and there were many many amendments and now the historic district commission and the planning board have had the opportunity to review those series of amendments that's been a public meeting we could go up about these amendments and the various represents a compromise and as part of the compromise is certain language it's been done the list has been reduced in terms of the number of buildings that are affected there is a sunset provision the six months rather than the various boards av said that this amendment and i think probably the other amendments are objectionable and i think the town meeting ought to object to this one as well is there further discussion on this amendment saying none all those in favor police say i was opposed the amendment is defeated we now turn to the second definitional amendment from roy obscene on the structure rights thing definition of  how much time i'm sorry how much time do you want me to take well as brief i mean no more than three or four minutes perhaps ok well it might read the motion first and then we'll have the votes  emotions you can read the words in the definition definition of a structure but excluding a building that is a detached garage or other access to restructure on a residential lot and write please identify yourself for the right roy town meeting member precinct six the owner of a house on the list member of the ward committee who week used himself from all the liberations by the warrant but he let me take the votes now and then you can speak to the issue in my or historic district commission to start district commission unanimously recommends unfavorable action mr battista for the planning and favorable action now mr epstein you want to briefly explain your amendment sure i thought for a moment that my amendment was unnecessary because i thought i heard in the presentation that the by law would not applied to garages but in fact listening closely the explanation was it would not buy a rajah's that were not considered historic so in my mind that raises the question what's the historical raj and also the raises some issues about the process let me just say that when we were also told that there is a list of specific criteria in the bylaw that explain what makes just as store structure if you review the lists of the first one is whether the building is associated with an important event well that's one thing the last cri the list is the integrity of the historic building and i ask myself what is this what is an operational definition of the integrity of a historic building because for example if you want to engage in the appeal process you have to engage in a factual demonstration that you're building lacks integrity so i went to the state historic the historic district commission in pulled the file on my house thirty four cushing avenue and it says the survival of the properties carriage house as measurably to its integrity that's a shame because we actually tore down the carriage house when we moved in after extensive consultation with a team of architects recycled much of the many of the components and a new garage the old building was completely unusable and i think actually the property is far better off for it and integrity has been increased but this word seems to be widely used in historical circles because furthermore in the analysis if you want to call it that of our house it says the house stands out from its neighbors for its continuing visual integrity and i'm a loss to understand how i could argue by a factual demonstration that my house does not have integrity it's really it's an impossible burden to meet and i make an issue of this i suppose because we took our marriage house down after a lot of thought a lot of expense a lot of consideration and a lot of design and that was twenty years ago however  house remains on the list as far as i can tell as a kind of historical accident there's another house that had been on the list in the spring it's across the street from me it's not on the list now it's an eight hundred ninety victorian it has a hundred twenty s sears catalog garage now sears catalog houses were actually well known in other parts of the country i could easily and my neighbors have been talking for several years now about taking that garage down and making a new garage i could see an argument that a sears catalog garage is a historic structure that had the integrity of the neighborhood i'm now speaking on behalf of my neighbors who are exceedingly busy they spend a good deal of their time in singapore on business and i don't think looking to the future because an after the sunset provision i can assure you that there will be very strong pressure to begin ific and we augment the list of one hundred fifty and bring it back up to where it had been in the spring or beyond they should not have to argue i would say about their garage from singapore or wherever else they might be in a ten hearings downtown it's really nobody which will also not destroy it but move it back take it off its foundations and move it seventy five feet to the left which again is something that i would like to spare them from so i'm speaking in anticipation of the sunset vision thank you very mired would you like to respond for the historic district commission thank you mr moderator a lauren meyer historic district commission the historic district commission as voted for  unfavorable action on this on this amendment right primarily because the list includes a few posts effect historic ancillary structures that with this amendment would therefore be eliminated from the list we have consulted with talc ounce and i might ask the town councils opinion on this but it is my understanding that non historic  structures ancillary buildings that are not mentioned on the list would not be subject to demolition delay but can i ask your town council mr moderator george hall town council the proposed demolition delay by a law is drafted protects buildings not properties and it protects buildings that are on the list and as ms meier just said there are a number of accessory structures that are explicitly listed on on the list and in many other cases or in what most other cases it refers to the house or whatever the other principal structure is so the fact that a principal structure is listed does not mean the protection would be extended to a different building that's not listed so the effect of this amendment by really be to eliminate section for the excess three buildings that are listed seeing non all those in favor please say i was oppose nay the amendment is defeated we now turn to the three opt out burden of proof amendments and in order to try to clarify and expedite as i mentioned we will have the three proponents if brief two minute descriptions of their proposed amendment and then we will go through them one by one so we'll start and then i will get votes from the boards one by one at that time but first the brief presentations of the three respective amendments and i'll begin with mr ma robert mugabe precinct one i actually do this amendment last spring and it was never discussed because the demolition delay article was withdrawn i learned that people expected me to reintroduce it though i have the brunt of this article falls on private property owners many of whom are unaware of this article and the bigger issue is whether your building should be on the list the current list is based on the field owners of properties that are on the list to stay on the list if an owner wants to keep their building on the list i applaud that but less give the owner a choice the other versions of the demolition delay article allow for appeals this amendment voids the time consuming appeals and lets the property owners decide whether to opt out renovated extensively i follow my amendment to allow targeted homeowners to opt out because i believe we should have the right to choose to become subject to this by law or not my memon also reverses the burden of proof to the h d c appeal no one from the town has ever called or visited us to explain this by law or the potential negative or positive impacts on our property each d c should should have reached out to each of the impacted homeowners to talk about the impacts of the proposed by law they should have used an opt in rather than a forced in process at the h d c public hearing on the boiler last week a commissioner called this bylaw a baby step toward a much more comprehensive bylaw that would include more houses and perhaps more restrictions this is a slippery slope but a town demolition delay by law was cited then and tonight as an example watertown's demolition delay covers all houses over fifty years old with a twelve month delay if this concept were adopted in belmont it would cover six thousand seven hundred thirty five houses or eighty five percent o all homes and buildings in town i spoke with watertown's community development director he said developers are now walking away from watertown because of this bylaw they don't want to carry a project for twelve months just to have the town approve the demolition anyway this is preventing houses and buildings from being sold in watertown today which is not fair to homeowners from an economic standpoint renovation and or rebuilding property only increases the tax base but it isn't joe well i would urge you to defeat this pileup proposal in total at the very least please give current and future targeted homeowners at some point perhaps including many of you the right to choose to opt out of this by law to preserve the value in our homes thank you thank you and mr smith finalized proposed implicitly places the burden on the building owner to appeal places the burden on the owner to use it to factual showing of a negative show that the building is not historical using the six rather broadly phrase of my proposed amendment is simply too but the burden on the commission which is the proponents of the list to show that the property in fact is properly on the list as historically significant again using the same six that it needs to be a showing of historical significance and obviously is a contrast with the opt out amendments because it keeps the building on the list during the pendency of an appeal otherwise it actively gutting the whole purpose of something that's  come and read your amendment and we'll begin the deliberations please thank you and then we'll take the votes  dish yourself again please for the record robert one i move that article three on the warrant be amended by replacing the subsection d dot of the proposed articles sixty three to zero with the following paragraph this section shall not be applicable to any building on the list of until the commission shall have by certified mail return receipt busted notify the owner of record of each building on the list of the owner's right to remove the owner's building from the list but right to be exercised by the owners signing in filing an election which we call a removal election in quotes in prefaces with the town clerk within sixty days after receipt of such notice the commission's notice they'll also include a copy of this section if the owner duly files such removal election then the owner's building shall be removed from the list now mr plummer why don't you give the votes of all three amendments i think that would be helpful or that the that's agreeable on the l word stand amendment the work committee recommends and unanimously recommends unfavorable action and on the smith amendment the work committee recommends unfavorable action by a vote of nine to three thank you the starkest or commission moderator loren meyer historic district commission on the amendment the historic district commission unanimously recommend unfavorable action on the smith amendment  the district commission unanimously recommend unfavorable action and on the stand l word amendment the historic district commission unanimously recommends unfavorable action in the planning mor board the planning board unanimously votes on favorable action on all three men thank you well now i have discussion on mr magara amendment i will allow questions on your amendment as the most recent speaker said it completely undermines the purpose of of the of the by law itself if the speed limit for example were voluntary on an opt out basis then i would probably all opt out of it  and we would still be able to go under thirty miles if we wanted to similarly why would anyone choose to opt into this rule when they're perfectly free not to demolish their home of their own volition for this reason i think this is  is you know this this amendment is simply a vote against the by law and does not modify it in any way that would make by law better is there further discussion yes mr sandals precinct six town meeting member i have a question and that is are is the language in any of these amendments these article amendments currently in the law in any city or town of the commonwealth in other words has any of this language been adopted by his city or town and is currently in in place as mayor do you know the answer to that question george howell town council i'm sorry to say that i'm not familiar with a demolition delay byelaws as they occur in a lot of other towns i'm only with a couple of town of lexington's specifically but  moved at the first paragraph of subsection deep paragraph one of the proposed article sixty point three two zero be replaced with the following paragraph one upon the effective date of this section the commission shall notify the owner of record of any building identified on the list as originally filed of the owner's right to remove the owner's building from the list by filing a removal election with the town clerk within sixty days of such notice after the owner s the commission at its option shall have thirty days to appeal to the board of selectmen to have the building included on the list the appeal shall be based on a preponderance of the evidence of the building's significant historical importance presented at a public hearing at which the owner of the commission and the public may all present evidence that the building qualifies or does not qualify to be on the list based on the following considerations thank you we've had the votes on this so there is there any discussion on his trail words amendment is mayor please respond yes thank you mr moderator lauren meier historic district commission this amendment is effectively a version of the opt out provision and further defeats the purpose of the by law the language of the proposed characters or commission and planning board  law already allows owners of recognized historic buildings to heal the inclusion of their building on the list based on a factual demonstration that the effect it building is not historic furthermore at the time a demolition permit is filed the historic district commission will hold a public hearing that allows the community to weigh in on whether or not a specific building should be preserved thank you discussion on the amendment mr cohen or and call in the precinct three as i read this it seems to have a significant foreign it doesn't say how the decision is going to be arrive however i think that in fact the main effect of the bylaws is to prevent someone from selling their house to a developer or two and inhibit somebody from selling their house to a developer is interested in purchasing it as a tear down if you're interested in tearing down your own house and replacing it with another house by the time you went out and hired an architect to design interviewed builders got bid picked a builder and were ready to go with the project you'd be doing very well if you could accomplish that in less than six months so i recognize is a burden however  it's also the case that quite a few economists have looked at the effective demolition delayed by laws and other historic preservation measures on property values and in the aggregate this revisited at that time i think it's two and a half years from now so there certainly is a chance to review that situation so again i would urge people to reject it thank you mr aylward did you want to make a appreciate that but i also want to say that the article itself has not got the entire bylaw it gives people who would like to opt out the chance to walked out not everyone will do that  and then it will it gives the edge to see the opportunity to appeal to the board of selectmen so it just kind of reverses the appeal process so it's not something that you're going to kill the entire body law and you kill the whole process by doing this so  it's a little bit less than a full opt out of a half and then there's an appeal still but there is that opportunity there so again it does not get the entire bylaw mr owens now no one's time remember precinct seven sixteen years ago when we bought our house the next door neighbor the first thing is she just a neighborhood said came over and asked me what do you think about mclean i said well i think it's their land they can do whatever they want with it sh destroy the town so i really think the homeowner should have a right to do whatever they want with their home but every question for their store commission what how does someone actually demonstrate that their house is not historically significant  preservation act and they include significance because a building is associated with an important event an important person because it is architecturally distinctive and representative of a particular style or period whether or not the property has historic integrity or its historic context so you would need to take those criteria and make inventory form that was on fire well at the massachusetts historical commission which is what this list based on those are on the h d c web site where you could download  town wide inventory don i will remind everyone as has been stated that we do have a c p a project that was approved by town meeting that will look again town wide at the town's historic resources and we will work to review those hundred forty nine properties to make sure that they should continue if they should continue on the work of the hundred forty nine properties everyone is under the one nine hundred eighty two study i know some were evaluated more recently not all but but many were done in the one nine hundred eighty s so it is technically possible and that's one of the reasons for the  that a property could have changed significantly since nineteen eighty to render it no longer historic and that would be an appropriate grounds for appeal thank you for further discussion on doing i don't think that should be in for a why we should vote yes or no on a certain thing i think the important thing is if other towns are doing something and there's evidence of advocacy and so my question is you know you showed this list of  and you know number of properties and population whatnot my first question was one you happen to know whether or not other demolition actually preserved but what percentage of homes that were  didn't get demolished because of this bylaw if you happen to know that whether or not this is actually acacias and preserving these homes and the second thing is i forgot someone just mentioned sort of the economics behind  these is this by a lot i'm wondering as someone actually with proof not just saying that the economics are good but in talk to you know what would be the unintended consequences economically speaking of a byelaw like this buildings reserved in any specific community massive story commission does have good examples of places where the idea the concept of a demolition took the demolition delayed by laws have actually succeeded in preserving historic buildings because it provides a time really mandates time really to explore options and sometimes those options you know don't occur to the original to the owners until there is a chance to really you know talk about those options but in terms of actual numbers from other communities i don't know the answer related to the question about watertown i will say that this bylaw that we have presented to you with the planning board is significantly different than the watertown by law it is very specific it focuses only on one hundred  forty nine properties and the criteria that are listed are the victory for the process the last thing i would say is that the historic district commission does believe that the preservation of historic properties in general benefit immunities economically and there is a very nice paper on the historic district commission website that i would encourage you all to read that cites a number of store studies nationwide related to economics and preservation thank you is there further discussion of this amendment saying no on all those in favor place a i i was opposed the amendment is defeated and now mr smith the third of the  category of amendments precinct six moved at subsection d one of the proposed section sixty dash three twenty the amended by deleting the phrase vote the basis for this appeal shall be limited to a factual demonstration that the building does not qualify a significant building close quote and substituting there for the phrase vote in any appeal the commission shall have the burden of showing that the burden is of historical significance by a factual demonstration  meyer did you have a comment on this mr moderator lauren meier historic district commission historic district commission has done due diligence the list historic buildings that have been documented and evaluated based on information filed at the massachusetts historic commission and which we feel meet the criteria the appeal process that is stated in the by law is specifically intended for cases where there may be due cause to be removed from the list not an arbitrary desire by the property owner the board of selectmen will be the final decision makers of the appeal process finally town meeting has funded a historic inventory project will help the stark district commission we evaluate properties to ensure we have the best representation of historic buildings on the list we double negative straight and voted against ocean to disappear other words i approve this motion and i hope the rest of you will prove that we heard tonight that most of the properties on the list come from a list that was homeowners i suggest is a terrible in mission by the historic commission that they think if they have the burden of proof they're going to lose and it seems to me they have the expertise they have the study this is their list they ought to have the burden it just seems to me you shouldn't be guilty before you can prove you're innocent you shouldn't have it assume that they are right the burden should be on them prove their list is accurate and i hope you'll prove this and thank you resides more with the district commission and they are the ones who created the list it i think i am fully supportive that we didn't just have the opt out that anybody could say they want to be off but if an owner does appeal it seems to be a pretty low bar in my judgment to have the burden of proof lie with the commission rather than lie with the homeowner and so i would urge approval of this  amendment and a little awkward because i'm generally not terribly in favor of the demolition delay concept and i did draft an extensive amendment several years ago though when the original version of this was proposed by the just a commission had the fifty years every building over fifty years and one year delay and all that which i thought was an overreach i think they've hit a nice sweet spot with this particular compromise as being proposed in these amendments across the board and my feeling at least  disturb that equilibrium a bit in this particular one putting the burden of proof on a volunteer committee like historic district commission seems like an awful lot to put on them and if people wanted to opt out and wanted to swarm this dark district commission with oppositions to their house being on the list but does it just to see if the store just a commission could happen the way it doesn't seem like that's necessarily the right way to do it for instance if i went to get a building permit and i were denied the building permits i needed to go get zoning relief i don't go to the building commissioner and make him justify why denied me anything it's my burden of proof to go and get that taken care of at the zoning board or ever the case may be the list that we've got in front of us on this now which is one of the reasons why i actually am in favor of the demo delay now is that this is the low hanging fruit in town this is the very small very narrow very specific state approved a long time thirty plus year a long standing list of buildings that we most people i think would agree and the state is blessed would be buildings we want to keep in that it's going to be i think very difficult with that particular list to appeal that unless there's been some said some major change have you know the building's been so drastically altered it's got no historic character at all anymore that seems to be that would be fairly easy to show with a photograph and i think that's a very difficult burden to meet for the homeowner as far as putting the burden on the commission i think on this marriage showed you the macro's web site from the state you can click on there you can click on any of the properties it's got a picture it's got a whole big series of sheets that explained why the building is on their state list which is why it's on our list so honestly to put the bill for i guess to put the burden on to be fairly if you want to know why your house is on the list you go on the web and find out it's not very difficult to figure that out you've got an issue with what happened there back in history or that it's a particular georgian file or whatever i think it's a very difficult argument to make as a general of the demolition delay i think in some of the comments this doesn't stop you from tearing your house down just so we're clear i mean i think maybe we're overthinking this a little bit the all this does is as you have to wait six months or you tear your house down it doesn't stop you from doing go mr stanton said is exactly right because as an attorney i do a lot of development work and i deal with these in other towns what you do is you file for the demolition permit start the delay period running right doing the rest of your running around of it generally doesn't impact you that much at the six month level if it's gets to the one year level and to start getting into prob it looks month level going through some sort of zoning to build a new building on the site or something like that's clearly going to take that long a huge impact doesn't prevent you from tearing your house down it doesn't mean you can't tear the porch off it doesn't mean you can't repaint it doesn't really have a huge huge impact it's actually an extremely weak preservation tool to be honest with you because it doesn't really preserve much of anything it just kicks the can down the road six  nevertheless there have been instances i've been involved with where kicking it down the road six months does get you something people can go in and take the doors and door knobs or historical mantles off you can get a photo essay you can put up a plaque eve of the building gets torn down you get something sometimes the building gets moved that is the rarity but it does happen sometimes people just wait the six months and tear it down but we are an anomaly it as a town around here in that we don't have this all the towns around us do most of them about stronger than this and i don't i don't know i've ever seen this particular language in any of them to be honest with you but again as our town council so i haven't read every single town in the states that were delayed by a lot but i would oppose this particular amendment and all the eight and i respectfully just agree with the speaker if when people buy their homes they know that there is owning laws there is if they there's a process this is a new process is unfair to expect people to be the ones coming in and having the knowledge having the expertise argue against the historic district commission especially if some of the information is thirty years old it just doesn't seem right yes sir roger ruble creasing five i don't quite understand mr dashes argument because he said how can you ask a volunteer a committee to go around gathering the facts and then he said if you wan find out all you do is click on the web and the facts are there so i actually think what's going to happen in these situations is that there's going to be a discussion between the historic mission and the homeowner and the historic commission is going to explain why the things that are in that inventory make it historical and they may find that some of the information is not very persuasive for example my house is not on this but they have to with the buildings of my employer or on this one of them is clearly a historic building and it's and it's well described in the inventory why it is the other one has almost no information in it and that in it in night i'm very familiar with that building and scratched my head about it a little bit so i think that if i went to the historic commission there would be a discussion between us and maybe there's some information that i'm unaware of but there also may be some information that the historic district commission is  the historic commission is not aware of that may persuade them that maybe this building really shouldn't be on the list so i do think that the that the i support mr smith's amendment because it makes sense to me that the historic commission has the expertise and they should be able to explain to the homeowner why it's on the list has meant evening but evening michelle banker  very clear from our discussions that a lot of us are i'm way uncomfortable with details of this by law we have to remember that this is a bylaw that has a sunset provision are going to be trying out how this process will operate over the next two years i think it will hide all of us with opportunity to shape the language of whatever will be the i will consider it a final five with specific language and two more two or three more years from now so i think we need to take that into consideration whether we vote yes or no on any particular of the of these amendments thank you and any further discussion mr paulson fred paulson precinct one a several things that i'd like to add in to this discussion in terms of burdens of proof and so forth this is not a court case it's not even similar to a board of appeals case it is a situation where a property is on a list the reason that it's on the list has been stated what's at issue is not all addition against building a new house it's not a prohibition against doing what you want with that house it's talking about having a discussion between the star commission and the owner and then having that go before the board of selectmen which is not a traditional board  or it's a political board to come up with some resolution and so to stop to say that the commission which is a volunteer board ought to have the burden to coming forward to show that it she belongs on the star commission i think is misplaced in this situation we're talking about real people in belmont sitting down and getting the problem solved and i think that the language that we have without the amendment should stand a further discussion right is just method you want to make a comment of course eric smith six i agree with mr dash that this is not a tremendous imposition but it is a limitation placed upon specific homeowners properties by the town and for that reason i think it is only fair that the town undertake the burden of showing that the property belongs upon the lists when that is contested i don't  n but when he places a limitation somebody is property and it's contested it seems to me the challenge is the one that should have the burden of proof to show that the property is worthy of being placed on the list and should be placed in a list rather than have the homeowner have to disprove  that to refer back to the thirty miles an hour analogy her a little while ago if you're charged a violation of the speeding but law a driver doesn't have to show that he was not going over thirty miles an hour the state needs to show that he was going over thirty miles an hour at the same principle should apply here you know it's not a criminal context there further discussion were residential that is not any of l by number that is true but many of the most important buildings on this list commercial or is that if we believe there would be many evils we see there is this will have a considerable impact on the ability of the board of select and to deal with the range of other issues the board of select these will be time consuming procedures and that many of them i predict will move forward his or further discussion seeing none we will vote on mr smith amendment all those in favor please say i was opposed the amendment is defeated will have a standing vote so all those in favor of mr smith's amendment please ari all those who oppose mr smith's amendment please ri the final vote was one thirteen yes one twenty seven zero zero the amendment is defeated we now turn to the last two amendments which relate to financial impact and i'll call on mr magara for his amendment e i guess i say bullet reasonably participate in the investigation of preservation alternatives believe the word opt for the preferably preserved building and now there's a there previously was a second well it to this and i went to withdraw that second bullet because back why is has  much better worded second bullet that he's going to present so i'll let him present the second bullet let me go ahead and get the votes from the various committees at this point  the other change was to change op to alternatives options could be a legal option then lay and give you an option to buy my house and things like that so to get rid of that word inserted the word alternatives because that is the current word used in the second bullet where it talks about reasonably cooperate if you read through the second bullet reasonably cooperate alternatives so i'm using the word alternatives of both places and putting the reasonably in both places so the nice and tidy and parallel mr moderator is this amendment being treated as two separate amendments or as a single combined amendment no the amendment is what you have in front of you the weissman is a separate amendment yes the work committee unanimously favors a recommends favorable action favorable action discussion on this amendment bullet in deference to other amendment and the motion as i heard it and as i'm looking here still says changing the last two bullet it graphs the read as follows but then there's only one bullet that follow yeah i think if we go to the motion mr castro and it by changing its but that's ocean we've got this is the most thank you because i think the other one came up this is the motion the second to last  but and this is free standing and then we will not go beyond the second vote i asked mr dash as adam dash precinct one member of the war committee wanted to state earlier i'd said i was opposed to all of the amendments and then i we the work that he just unanimously recommended this one and i wanted to explain that we could go to the amendment the one slide that the basically i'm in favor of this amendment only because i think it doesn't change anything in the ordinance  all things in the world option two alternative i think is doesn't change anything and i don't see how they would unreasonably make anyone participate the second bullet point the second point below what actually says reasonably cooperate with the commission so i think th castro can you know the weiss amendment man's reasonable in another man is another man's unreasonable not to be sexist about it and when it comes to whether we should say option or alternatives it basically why should we bother with this is there any just further discussion any further discussion on this amendment  follows reasonably cooperate with the commission and any interested parties in seeking alternatives to the demolition of the prefer preserve building provided however that neither the owner nor the applicant shall be obligated to incur or suffer out of pocket financial costs or expenses beyond the cost and expense associated with attending and participating in the commission's meetings to discuss the application or in my or straight district commission the historic district commission unanimously recommend unfavorable action and the planning board michael battista chair of the planning board the planning board has taken no action on this amendment amendment i proposed an amendment to the amendment the language before the word provided is what was in the original warrant  provided is what the new amendment was and originally the language said provided that the owner applicant incurs no cost and expense what i try to do was narrow the scope of that absolute no to say wait a second if you have a particularly recalcitrant owner who is not inclined to cooperate  that town shouldn't be saying and providing that person with an avenue to say i'm not going to cooperate unless you pay me gas mileage to and from the hearing or my time is valuable unless you reimburse me for my time i'm not going to cooperate so i thought we needed to narrow the absolute of no cost and expense bob and i had a brief e mail exchange i am not an attorney but we talked about the challenges and fuzziness of materiality and so instead of trying to introduce substantial or material or adjectives like that we came up with the specific language and this is partly based on how the article was represented again at the league of women voters hearings now with that disclaimer said i happen to personally think that it is a reasonable amendment bob's original amendment to narrow the exposure the financial exposure that a homeowner or a building owner might be subject to in order to address this issue so i'm supportive of the amendment broadly speaking because i think you think it is a reasonable expectation that an owners and mantua liability in addressing this issue be limited but my specific amendment was trying to  nor requirement that an owner incur any expense and no enforcement language in the by law to that effect participation in the public hearing and in follow up questions with the commission would be in the best interest of the applicant because the the commission has the ability to shorten the delay period if they feel owners is simply explore alternatives other than demolition so their hire a lawyer and you know that's obviously going to cost money and therefore you don't have any obligation to reasonably cooperate because you had to hire a lawyer so i'm trying to understand if my interpretation is correct or mr  weiss i'm not a lawyer so i will identifiers of sorry jack weiss precinct one i am not a lawyer so i do not claim to know the answer to that it would certainly seem to me that this amendment would allow owners to incur those costs that they wanted to if an attorney was absolutely critical to answer the question it would seem to me that the owner could say  isn't coming out of my pocket you cannot require me to hire that attorney i will you know be happy to address the issue if the town will reimburse my legal fees to do so that would be my interpretation but i'm not an attorney the idea here is so that the commission and the town can't put owners in the position of not being able to address the merits of the appeal with out or unless they incur those kinds of out of pocket expenses mr dundreary a town meeting member precinct three this amendment is well intentioned but i believe that it just doesn't make practical sense if you're an owner of a piece of property and something happens and you need to take action to protect your interests i expect that it's going to cost me some money of some kind or other and the other thing is if this passes i'm wondering what the legal implications are if someone says take i'm going to take the commission to court because i can i have to spend money to to prove my case and and this out of says that i don't have to so i'd like to have the town council give  give us some some help with this mr hall george hall town council will introduce the vocabulary word of the evening which is more to tory h o r t a t o r y when you see the word shall in a byelaw but there is not an unforced mechanism there's nothing in the by a law that says there are any particular consequences to the failure to comply with shell it's often or to tory or the same root as the word to exhort i read this as basically expressing the hope and direction to the homeowner to cooperate demolition delay byelaws after all are are really the entire success of them are based on cooperation and the only consequences of not cooperating are that the only thing the historic district commission can do is not shorten or waive the six month period and i don't see there being anything in here that would allow the sort district commission to otherwise compel warren force anybody to spend any money as currently drafted i certainly wouldn't counsel them to attempt to do so because at that point you've basically failed in whatever benefit you're going to get from this kind of a byelaw and my concern with this amendment is that previous speaker noted does this sort of muddies the waters and we get off into a discussion about what level of suspicion is reasonable as drafted the only thing that that historic district commission is being charged with is to decide whether to waive the six month period or not so the only consequence of not operating is maybe you don't get the result that you want which is a short on all those in favor of mr wise's amendment please say i was opposed to the amendment is defeated we now turn through the article mean the full motion of the bylaw as amended in the only amendment was the five word amendment by the bylaws review committee otherwise we're discussing the motion as presented to you by the historic district commission is their dis we now let's take a three minute stretch break  please take your seats we're going to turn now to article five this is a citizen's petition the motion in a moment state precinct one move that on to article five the reading of the proposed amendment to the town's general by laws pertaining to yard sales be dispensed with and same having been move that i'm in the general bylaw of the town of belmont by adding article nine section sixty dash nine hundred and title yard sales as set forth in full in article five of the warrant for the meeting and further that the bylaws review committee may approve non substantive changes to the numbering of this bylaw in order that it may be in compliance with the numbering format of the general bylaws of the town  think we need to do that in fact we will that was circulated to town meeting members so we will go ahead and approve the substitute and and debate the substance motion that was circulated to the town meeting members and that will be the official motion thank you mr hamann and i think at this point no other committee votes mr denning you want to make a presentation as to the purpose of your citizens petition thank you my name is steve gannett precinct eight i live at eleven hurley street and my neighborhood is just one neat neighborhood we know each neighbor we look out for each care for them and we get together a couple times to group each year i'm a lifelong member or president of belmont and i'm concerned about the continued quality of life belmont as i know it that's why i have submitted this petition to limit the number of yard sales resident and have each year unfortunately is taken one system specific what has happened is it was increased traffic in our street parking side the hydrant parking on both sides of the street blocking walks in driveways and increased noise and my ninety year old neighbor across the street had a walk down of the houses in cross the street again yet to the  ride i thought this was awfully unfair our neighbors are not against yard sales not at all we feel that it should be limited to boise year let's say one in the fall and spring  the time should be consistent from eight thirty four thirty that's reasonable and there would be recourse in the event that someone takes advantage of in terms of the number of yard sales that they have this petition is based really on the foundation of it based on what is similar to lexington weston no it's nothing original to belmont we gathered one hundred twenty signatures from the residents of all the precincts in belmont and ellen cushman mentioned that it was evenly distributed to all precincts in belmont and not just from b c eight i realized when gathering the signatures that my neighborhood was not the only one who is suffering from this problem it pops up an other precincts in town so i imagine that i have hit a  nerve because people have been faced with this problem and even though you think your neighborhood is safe it can be hit by one and they will be person that's why i have this this issue to limit the number of yard sales a person can have to an amount of hours from eight to four thirty  and is recourse in the event that someone takes advantage of the situation to i hope you all will you know agree with this prediction and pass it to i say thank you so much thank you we have we have three amendments under this article mark smith jennifer page an etiquette sangean all of which have been distributed to you so we're going to take them in that order and then we would come back after the we've reviewed those three come back to the full motion so we'll start with mister smith's amendment yes mr believe are keyed to the review committee version of the of this that's correct i accepted your amendment ok it was and that and so we'll put that amendment i'm sorry you saying it wasn't up wasn't on the screen oh ok well we'll put the revised your advise amendment but that was made early on it was circulated to town so rather than going through the process we are debating the bylaws review committees  proposal which we should have had we should have had a motion as and move to amend article five by substituting for the text of article five as printed in the warrant the text is set forth in document labeled substitute motion for article five yard sale journal by a law text after amendment by by law review committee that was distributed to town meeting members find we can go ahead and we can go ahead and vote that is if the way bill moves is there any discussion on the amendment thank you mark smith precinct eight to amend article five by substituting for the text of article five both substitute motion for article five yard sale general byelaw text after amendment by the by law review committee the text as set forth in the document labeled vote amendment to the substitute motion for article five yard sale general by a lot of text after amendment by mark the smith precinct a town meeting member that we distributed that was distributed to town meeting members and further at bylaws review committee may approve non substantive changes to the numbering of the bylaws in order that it be in compliance with the number numbering format of the general byelaws of the town of belmont has a board of selectmen have a vote on this looks like when you see recommends unfavorable action mr smith you want to describe purpose of your amendment please yes thank you my amendment is a very simple amendment just to eliminate the licensing requirement i guess i should start by saying that based on a previous discussion i do have a yard and in the past my family has had a yard sales so i have an interest in this but when i first read this by a law proposed by law i wasn't sure that we needed it all but and i still look forward to this question on the overall by law but i do think that the licensing requirement and having to apply to the town to have a yard sale in advance is both unnecessary and burdensome to both the town and to the residents i very much understand the need and sort of agree with the need that if we don't have an ability to control someone who abuses these are their privilege to have a yard sale and does it consistently and all the time that we need to make sure that we have an ability to control that my view is that the bylaw will do that without having to get a license in advance because it sets out as was explained the hours how often you can have it and it includes enforcement provisions of how people can take action to prevent someone from having more than they need so i just think it's  a lot of big hassle for both the residents and the town to have to in the middle of the week go to the town clerk get a license have it available and have it displayed so it's not at all to undermine the intent of this proposed by a law to really make it easier for residents to comply i think the last piece i'll just say is that what this does is you can also get in trouble for just not having a license of the whole point is to prevent people from having too many i understand that but above all side you can start being in trouble just because you didn't have time to get a license during the week and you have a yard sale so much as up and says where is your license now you're at risk for some penalty so again my amendment was just a red line strike out to remove the requirement for a license and all references to the need to  do not take a position on the substance of the amendment and will leave it to others to talk about the policy behind the ilo review committee in the original version versus the no license provision of mr smith as presented main article it seems to me that the mate one of the critical components of the main article is to track the frequency with which people have yard sales and i'm curious mark how would the town go about tracking that frequency in an objective way if there wasn't a licensing requirement smith thank you mark smith precinct a i think if there were complaints about a neighbor having too many yard sales it would not be hard for  whatever office is responsible for the enforcement of this provision to go and verify that that is indeed happening and just do it by visual inspection based on complaints by the neighbor and i think it would sort of therefore i mean i think that's the way it should be work if there's a problem we should address it make everybody who wants to have a yard sale get a license just seem like an unnecessary requirement so it didn't seem that hard to document multiple yard sales over time and even the neighbors could maybe do it and then present that evidence but whoever is responsible for this that i don't think i'd be that hard to document someone who's really  certainly i don't believe the police department will be circling the neighborhoods counting the number of times that someone has your seal there has to be a mechanism in place in the licensing mechanism that is in place to count the number yard sales that someone may have no willy is probably a possibility that someone might have a yard sale without a license and we are going to ask the police department to somehow enforce this i simply would go up and say do you have a license and then you wouldn't understand at that point and we let us know as a particular individual would have had so what all d respect to mark's concerns about the inconvenience we decide no way to measure the number yet so some would have we're just not going to be having our police department or others in town go around and count in any particular you know days of the year the number yet so that someone might have it's just going to be impossible to do that as a planter there oakland or precinct eight this whole thing is though exhausting to me i'm a huge yard sale fan and anybody who ever goes out will know they see me often going to yard sales is just a little hobby i have and this just seems like overkill to me i suspect that the problem is extremely limited and i have to wonder couldn't it not have been addressed or could it not still be addressed in more of a limited fashion so i don't mean to speak to the whole thing i know that's not appropriate right now but the licensing just pushes me over the edge and i appreciate what ellen just said that it could be done online because i know i work full time if i want to have a yard sale i would do it at the last minute you know i might not get around getting a license it's all very informal you know slap up the signs i think the removal of the well again i'm going beyond the point but the licensing thing just seems like such an  just so formal and i just think it's a shame that we have to turn it into that kind of a thing so i would urge you not to oppose it thank you yes sir  or precinct six i'm raising in support of this particular amendment i think that the we have definite overreached when it comes to building at least in structure and the police in any way they're busy enough with other things throughout the city they have to even worry about where there's a license or not i think there i understand that there should be some mechanism or possibly reacting to and that can be up to the neighbors i would like yard sales arguing for or against the original restriction which i think has some merit and i even sign the petition but i think this is incredible overreach and to me rises to the level of licensing of lemonade stands i think is not something for a city to do mr gannon if you want to comment or was  who take advantage of the system but take advantage of the situation in that's not right in this is one way to track them into make sure that they will be woods which hopefully will be on the books thank as david alpert time meeting member precinct six i think the focus needs to be brought back at the fact that this is being done to protect the neighborhood at large no one stopping anybody from having a yard sale it's the fact that it should not be impinging upon the neighbors who may not want to have yard sales on a regular basis it needs to be tracked appropriately as far as the numbers goes and i think it's extremely unfair to ask the neighbors to be reporting on neighbors that's when neighborhoods really have a problem by putting it through ms cushman is office and it's awfully nice support it's take on yet another small task like this it removes the neighbors from being the ones that have to be tattling it's very simple you can do it online and quite frankly if they can take the time to go around the area to hang up signs which they do during the day they certainly will have the time to get a license i really strongly oppose this in my mind this takes away the whole idea of being police station is open twenty four hours a day there's a could be a slogan as simple as a slip of paper in the police station they sign on with their name and the date is the police the one who is going to be responsible for tracking this in the papers will be there to come up with when they have more than two in that paper the police if they want to they could turn the paper over to the clerk's office and this would release relieve the pressure on the works office with the work they have to do who would simplify it because there's no money involved and the policing agency is going to do the police are going to the policing anyway so why not just have a simple piece of paper went in clerk again when mr gana could propose this we sort of noodled about how we could do it without increasing our work and so we actually very much like grocery stores we're putting the work back to you the people who want to run the yard sales so using software that we already have we're actually are not even burdening the police to keep a list they would actually be able to access this it's a web based program that we use and we use it to track all of our pets now so it wouldn't be a huge burden and i'm sure that the police could say whether they would think that that would increase their work it's being able to check in or out so we don't anticipate a huge increase at all with how they're going to operate if they don't have the computer and i think we're getting beyond the scope we're i think it's an interesting concept to register for sales but how are we going to get all twenty four thousand people in this community even know that you have that and i think mr political said it himself and if if the police aren't going to be circling the neighborhood checking for yard sales hour we're going to know if i'm one through five or six yard sales and didn't sign up for any of them it's almost like you can't enforce this and and then it goes beyond where we even get started we're already presented with with impossible task of mind i totally agree with this amendment it's a ridiculous concept that we might actually believe that everybody who puts a yard sale on their front yard is actually going to get online and sign up for it and therefore be able to  i think of yard sales really much the same as lemonade stands and these are just community organic events and it just seems like we should be able person to person a community person the person too to the un officially regular yes ma'am christabel precinct one i'm sorry it sounds like it was an annoying situation in the neighborhood of the gentleman who goes by law name it couldn't have been taking care of  i in the community but i feel like this proposal is really very large regulatory overreach to solve a situation that maybe happens pops up to time and should be able to be addressed amongst neighbors directly rather than imposing really a use of public resources ms cushman has indicated that she's bigger it out a way to not have her office be burdened which is great i think she actually has a lot more frankly in my view important it with regard to elections and voting and many other things that are much higher priority than regulating yard sales and then in terms of enforcement me it would be a terrible idea to have the police spending any amount of their resources at all force us around and check to see if they'll have their permit but their yard sales i do think it's a slippery slope to having them in need and other things like that regulated but i would encourage people to vote in i just want to say something about the sad story about the people being non neighborly at that particular base that happened just relate to the proposed the men well just one say one thing about being neighbors and it does i think it does we do that during the full discussion rather than i want to focus discussion on this amendment ok and this amendment yes it does focus on that let's just say that it's to make neighbors get a license doesn't make them be neighborly i think everybody should have at least two yard sales every year right back this has bass thank you sue bass precinct three and i support mark's  amendment and in fact i support the other two amendments on here but as the previous speaker said then i hope you will vote against the overall proposal and let me give you one example of why and and can we come back to that when we discuss the full ok we're trying to focus on this amendment please yes precinct one i also support this amendment i think that th things that are all that has problems are really very likely to be all enough places around town are doing this as some kind of commercial undertaking i can't even imagine organizing a yard sale twice a year and i think those people had imagine organizing a yard sale more than twice but the people who were doing this are really outliers and there was a discussion about you know this is going to require i mean in the end have an uncooperative neighbor that's what it's going to come down to somebody is going to happen they know whether they were licensed or not all are on their third yard that's what it comes down to  and putting them through this whole hassle to get it at three or four people and mr roberts you you actually next but paul roberts town meeting num we're debating the amendment here not the actual article though i think what i'd like to say about that is even though a it will all have more to say about the article itself in the wisdom of the article itself i am a little i am kind of with a select book there who said that this notion of registering for it to get approval to do the yard sale is something that it's very difficult to separate that out from the rest of the art of the article and have it work really about registering for yard sales and the registration is is an integral part of that  worry that by separate bag by dispensing with the registration component then we're left with this kind of half constructed article where we have limits on how many you can have a year and guidelines about what you how you can conduct yard sale but just not the requirement to register it and frankly i worry that that might make the article itself more palatable to this body so i would actually say let's stick with the registration component as that's library from my experience working at the library i can tell you there is believe it or not a small segment of town up a lot older folks but some not so older who are not can do not work well with  computer do not have computers so registering online would be a problem for them in my question is how would they apply  cushman again this our technology solves a problem in general because you all haven't voted it so i have not gone down that path however the board of the now clerk's office is always available as is the library to assist people with that and if someone comes into our office we would help them by registering it for them so we get lots of visitors who don't know how to use a computer and they need that extra help do we have any sense of whether other towns regulate yard sales and if so is licensing a part of that process pages or is the question i don't know whether anybody  precinct eight i did want to say that this this yard sale this is based on arlington's lexington use in lexington so the others do it without the licensing that what you're saying no i'm sorry that he said the licensing was part of that is what is part of it and all of those yes ok thank you yes or mark wagner precinct five now going back to the issue of enforcement if we're really trying to catch elsa trent stubborn people who are trying to turn their yards into a commercial business you can catch them if i'm going to have a yard sale and i may or may not register because i'm not going to have more than one every three years if i can possibly help it and i think the majority of people in town are going to be in the same boat whether you register or not is irrelevant because nobody is going to drop a dime on you right they're going to drop a dime on the person who's running a business out of their yard and then the police can come and ask them if they have a permit and that's how the enforcement takes place these men don't need to ride around town thing in checking people don't need to register if they know they're not going to run afoul of the law that's it i oppose this amendment because as mr poole said there's there's no way to track it otherwise i don't think it introduces a stop without putting much of a burden on anybody way but the thing the main reason why i stood up is how are we going to notify all the town people in town that they have to have a license when they've been doing this before without licensing they're up to get out there get the whole thing set up and then the police come out and shut them down because they didn't know they had to have a license how we want to inform one hundred percent of the population mr k forth in the substitute motion offered by the by law review committee as follows first bullet amend subsection c by adding the following additional definitions immediately after the definition of managed a state sale and the definition would be neighborhood yard sale yard sales organized by the residents of a neighborhood in which the yard sales occurs simultaneously on the various properties of the participating residence within the neighborhood second bullet  subsection d for and by re numbering subsection d for as appearing in the substitute motion offered by the by law review committee as d five new subsection d for to read as follow application for a license for a neighborhood yard sale will be made by one representative of the neighborhood acting as neighborhood yard sale coordinator on behalf of the neighborhood in this instance the applicant will delineate the streets that will participate in the neighborhood yard sale if a neighborhood yard sale includes a portion of a street but not the entire street the range of house numbers beginning and end within that street included in the neighborhood will be stipulated this application will be submitted at least three days before the event d for to read as follows five no fee shall be required for the issuance of a yard sale or neighborhood yard sale license amended subsection the e by adding immediately following subsection eate the following new subsection in on nine except as otherwise provided in this paragraph  limitations are nard sales included in the foregoing paragraphs one through eight to also apply to neighborhood yard sales and the obligations imposed thereby chil apply to all persons participating in the neighborhood yard sale only one neighborhood yard sales will be permitted each calendar year for any one neighborhood for purposes of applying this limit on neighborhood yard sales no overlap of neighborhoods will be permitted this limitation on the granting of neighborhood yard sale licenses shall not affect the limit on the number of yard sales that may be conducted by individuals and the last bullet amend subsection f one read as follows one the following the town clerk is authorized to administer this section and issue licenses for yard sales and neighborhood yard sales and may promulgated regulations from time to time to administer this section including procedures usable by persons without access to internal to internet or printers is to paula for the board of select certainly thank you mr moderator i have to tell you that it gave me great joy to hear the testimonies for all of the of neighborhoods in the context of even one yard sale this amendment this really series of amendments i mean it what's a little sections is it saint let me start again it was suggested initially that it would be easy for a neighborhood yard sale to fit into the existing proposal about individual yard sales and i felt that and some of my neighbors felt that this is rather like trying to pound around peg into a square hole they simply don't fit now a little background for you i live in kendall gardens and kendall gardens is a rather unique neighborhood  because we don't really we're really almost isolated we consist of one hundred eight houses spread over eight mostly very short streets and we don't have any other connection to the town except as we get in and out of our neighborhood by a mill street so we really do value the sense of neighborhood and  annually we do have a block party in the fall in september and also in september we have a neighborhood yard sale and it's one of the ways that we bring the community into our neighborhood and that we explore one another's lives in the neighborhood who benefits from a neighborhood yard sale well first of all the buyers do because there are going to be a lot of houses participating not all hundred  eight i assure you but generally twenty twenty five casually maybe up to thirty but it's enough in our little streets for people to have a wonderful time walking along the streets and looking at these various yard sales and possibly buying things it also benefits the neighborhood yard sale also benefits the sellers because since we advertise it as a neighborhood event it attracts people  you know to come to lots of ielts are to yard sales especially people who really love doing yard sales and most importantly it benefits the neighborhood because it is a wonderful way for us to learn about one another's homes we go and visit each other's yard sales all over this neighborhood and we we participate by learning more about each other which i think is a very important quality in a town of this kind so we think that it basically a neighborhood yard sale is a very different animal and in order to get into the spirit of what  what the main motion is and without destroying what we treasure and what i hope some of you will experiment with we thought that we would have would ask that instead of having individuals sign up one coordinator would do it by signing up the streets and we don't count to each house because not all of them participate in maybe participating by attending but not necessarily by giving but by not having the three day limit it does something really important for the neighborhood yard sale and that is that allows a lot of other people to jump in at the last minute what i call the hey honey jumpers because it starts out friday night with somebody saying hey honey you know that part of the garage that we haven't looked at let's pull some of that stuff out so it also is good for children because kids who are little entrepreneurs suddenly discover they might be able to sell some of their stuff and get a little money too so what we're suggesting is that if the main motion goes through that we want to preserve and encourage the possibility of neighborhood yard sales by making sure make i hate to say this but amendment to the mint for to change one word for consistency with the main motion but what is the amendment  on this article in section four it says the application will be submitted at least three days before the event and in the main motion it says at least three business days the by a lot of review and the proponent ms paige you object to that change d that the moment to article five by jennifer page precinct three section four would be amended to say this application will be submitted at least three business days adopted universally to i suppose now discussion to miss pages amendment on a martin oh increasing three i would like to move a grammatical amendment to paragraph four of this amendment dinging that word will too shall in four places i'll read it if you like but i think i totally illegal and thanks to miss question that  and posts around town and since i can't dictate what people can do on their own property and i can stop somebody from doing something on my property the only polls imposed we're talking about are public ones and now that you've sent out my picture in my admission that i have now hung signs on public posts i've already applied just to the chief of police he's going to research what the penalty is  in and to the extent that these things happen in other precincts that that's really terrible that's not no one's supposed to conduct a business you know in his front yard or his in his garage either  selling selling things this is this is clearly against the law and it's against the law already probably you know but if turning turning made becoming a neighborhood nuisance like this is is something that we we do need to deal with however i think that this by law is is overkill and and is not has not been thoroughly enough thought through i mean you can see that to some extent just from the fact that the whole neighborhood yard sale issue hadn't been thought of but also for example could you put up the section g exclusions the language there can you do that of the this is of the of the main by law we're on the main motion and that's just the substitute motion from the doesn't obviously this is one law that's not  well we want to substitute motion i'll read it to you i'll read it to you under the under the under section she says exclusions that this section is not applicable to any of the following one is made manage the state sales the other is activities conducted within residential buildings in connection with private sales of individual personal property made through newspaper advertisements want ads private online or web based auction sales or the like with a provision that i want to underline that does not in problem viewing inspection or purchase of the items by the general part of blick at the residential premises and does not have any signs or advertising on or about the premises well i'm all in favor of no signs or advertising it on or about the premises but i don't see how i can sell a couch to somebody on craigslist or who ever online without allowing the person who's interested in buying the couch to come to my house look at the couch if they buy it pain me and take it away i mean this phrase i did ask the moderator if we could get excluded he said i wasn't in time but this this phase to me suggests that this whole bylaw has not been thoroughly enough cooked you know that if if there had been more people involved in the drafting and redrafting of it the way so many of our kids do involve a lot of trouble by a lot of people as we noticed with the demo them or delay by law some of these problems would be worked out and and so what i suggest is that you  publicize this by law if it passes and i suggest that it would not be any real more trouble for him to get together or to have some member of his staff get together some of the people who thought about this already and come up with a revised by law if they think that's necessary or another means of enforcement if that's possible to solve it quickly  by by next spring before next spring before next year it's still season so please vote no on this and let's come back with something better if we still need to thank you  oakland or precinct eight i misspoke earlier gave up on correcting at i think it's past my bedtime but really just wanted to aggravate everything sue just said i think this is totally over kill i think there must be other ways to deal with those extreme circumstances and the one thing as a yard sale enthusiasm the one thing i would say is that i think people should be held to account for removing their signs because that's the one thing that i find so offensive about people hold yard sales is that they leave their signs up and people like me go around and take them down to try to keep our community looking lovely but that's not a reason to go wild like this so i hope you will vote against this thing mr roberts paul roberts town meeting precinct eight i think i should probably start by thanking sarah for taking down my yard sale signs from the arsenal and i should also note that i still have some lovely items weekend ad infinitum i have seen some my neighbors and precinct date doing that although not semi permanent yard sales but certainly multiple weekends and all day long and it's gauche but at some level i support the right of my neighbors to be gauche i think at certain i think it's at a certain point and i would maybe ask the planning board for some clarification on this at a certain point your semi permanent yard sale would probably be some considered some kind of a business that you're operating illegally from or from a residential district and then maybe that could be the grounds on which you could approach as person and say you know what you're doing isn't really legal but outside of that there are many communities in this country particularly those with housing associations where all manner of private conduct is regulated and enforced by the housing association and in which all these types of conversations between neighbors like hey you're being goshen stopped having the long yard sales all every week and are instead handled by a board of elected or appointed poll and i tend to agree with mani's comment that these are really conversations that should be clarification in section any with regard to no more than two separate yard sales what the definition of separate is is it a week a month spring and fall is described before i personally asked that because even though in the next section it says a yard sale may be held in no more than two consecutive days if i'm allowed to can i put one run after one right after the other and cover a long weekend so you know without a definition of separate so i'd friday and saturday eight thirty to four thirty five my understanding thank you and i think you have an answer i think i just think it's kind of undocumented right now how far apart they have to be so forth and avoiding excessive regulation on the other that's really the crux of the issue i wonder if i could ask through you whether counsel could tell us whether in fact other town or state law regulates your ability to conduct a business on your property if the factors that there are are existing laws that could be used to prevent what mr going to amendment see moderator george hall town council there was a reference earlier to zone ng but i think that there is a pretty good argument that a yard's and occasional yard sale would be considered an accessory a ctivity to a residential use and so i there isn't any kind of bright line test that would would urge me and mr clancy to drag somebody into court for having a yard sale that lasted too many days  of the idea behind this bylaws that there is a bright line there's a explicitly delineated number of times you can do this so i think even in the situation that's been described where there were regular and activities i know i'm not aware of any slaw that allows that would suggest we had a particularly good zoning claim can't any other state or local law we i greatly respect this is bastion we had to say but i think that point is something that might be a separate question one provision of bylaw is not  that later be correct but if we write for the perfect every time we never have any legislation mr dunn in town meeting member precinct three i rise to speak in favor of this article this is a town homes people live here because they want to enjoy their home especially on a weekend when they're not working and if there is someone in the neighborhood who continues to have you had sales that some disruption in the neighborhood as a lot of traffic make it difficult for people to come visit you at your home i think we should do something about it  i think that's that's a reasonable consideration it's just for example if someone were to be playing loud noises late at night we have a by law that covers that so i believe we should have a by law that covers yard sales and we don't we heard tonight that there are other communities that have such by laws so what's working ok so i suggest that we we we vote this in and then we'll just pick up and see how  terry precinct three i also support it i have to admit i thought of this already i've been abiding by it but it must have been other any i lived in other similar byelaw  one yard sale a year and it's unlicensed i i don't think we're going to tattle on them i think funding a message to the ones who are doing excessive yard sales and i support it and i  really would like to ask this and not postpone this for another town meeting i think that shouldn't spend the time thank you david upper tommy member of precinct six and vice chair of the town's board of health number one i'd like to say that my house is filled with many of your possessions and my children play with many of your kids toys so i'm not opposed to yard sales but i think once again we need to realize that this is a recourse for neighbors that maybe have tried and i think most of them have dealing with it within the neighborhood and it fails and let me tell you from the board of health it happens more than you would think if i could put this in perspective here's another little fun law for you you may not know but we actually set a limit to how love tall your grass can be and most of you probably don't know that but there is in fact a law on the books i assure you that the health director does not drive around town with a ruler in his hand checking to make sure that everybody obliges however we have had many cases where people have gone out of town for several months or people that own houses that are renting where the grass has become to a point that it's harboring rodents and it becomes a problem in the neighborhood and it gives the neighbors recourse that they don't have to have confrontation in the neighborhood but they can use their town to resolve something appropriately this has worked we don't do it often i can count on one hand we have it this is the same type of thing this is not the police going from yard sale the yard sale picking up a few odds and ends for the department house and saying how many of you had this year this gives neighbors an opportunity that if they've tried to clear it up themselves and they cannot that they can use the town to resolve an issue and that to me is the intent of this it's the same intent we have with how tall your grass can be i really strongly support as and giving people a tool to be able to solve a situation thank you yes think there are more than a few cases for example where we talk about care must be taken to avoid creating traffic that's on enforceable reasonable size a number of signs what does that mean these are our vagaries is part of this that i think will make will make any kind of enforcement is difficult and i think lastly that this is again something that i deliberately did not go and seek out or go to any place that had a homeowner's association is what this feels like and feels like someone's ask of overreach although i understand and appreciate it dr out there has said i think i'm probably having all sorts of notes all over this about language that i would change ababa going to end up voting for  it and then thinking that we should probably go back and amendment at some point because i think there's a fair amount of language in here that doesn't work as i spoke earlier at the war at night i don't think words like tolerate or cheerfully belong in byelaws i don't think the by a law box at all about whether or not if the weather is or i'm not sure that if i take out this permit and it rains that day that i have already used up my permit or if it rains and an hour after receiving this permit what happens so i think that depending upon how this works out things like that be changed i feel but we also have not it says under here into sections and under three the licensee shall produce the yard sale sign it does not tell people that they have to exhibit our sale sign too so to the very exact point that i can't just show up and see that yes they've got the permit i'm going to have to ask for it so i think that's a failure of it as as written and i would hope that that would be fixed at some point and then finally the way in the reality of how these things work after someone has a yard sale and they have a little bunch of freebies they're going to throw it on the curb and people are going to come pick it up you're not actually going to be storing it out of public view but i think we want to protect people but there's a fair amount in here that just really isn't functional and also to sue bass is point that obviously has got to come into your house to get the couch let's approve it to have something now and and it's got to be i think rewritten at some point thank you yes ma'am rachel berger precinct  two i oppose this amendment i think we probably have adequate laws that just need to be enforced if someone's parking in front of a hydrant should be told if someone's blocking your driveway they should be ticketed or towed i drove by this house after i read about this in the paper and the garage this stuff is is that a fire hazard i don't know but maybe it should be inspected i think you know what's the definition of pornography you know when you see it i think if someone is running a secondhand junk store out of their house and they're buying things to sell then they should have a license and be fingerprinted didn't we just to prove that last town meeting so i think we have resources are ready and we just need to use what we have to enforce them i have no idea when my parents who have lived in their house for forty nine years already on long island whether i'll need two weekends or twelve of yard sales so i think this is a little much yes met chris christie oil precinct one i mentioned before that i'm opposed to this but there were just three things i wanted to ask about and mention one is i'm confused as to the exclusion for a state sales that seems unfair my second question and point is it seems to me that this would exclude many of the yard sales that occur around town or in fact for charity so they ask for a donation after theirs for example after hurricane sandy there are many yard sales that book donations for charity i'm mixed assuming those are excluded from this is the seems to involve things for sale rather than donations and then my third thing is i think it's only a matter of time before there's a fee to obtain the slice and say no there's not one right now but eventually there will be a fee for this just the way there is for block parties and other things so i think that and then soon that he will exceed sometimes what people's intake is for the yard sale so those are questions and also comments and i would urge people to vote  against i don't know if anybody i mean weiss i'll be i will take more than my full ten minutes no this is jack weiss precinct one i agree with absolutely everything the jean mooney said right up until the point she said we should pass this and correct it i think we had an example tonight with the demolition delay by law of how we can have better legislation if we reject it the first time and say it's there's a lot of flaws to this and so i just think that given the flaws here that this is premature at best even for those who would agree that the the objective is correct so i'd urge people to vote against it any further discussion my skin has been moved to terminate debate all those in favor please say i was opposed the debate is terminated more than two thirds majority we will now vote on the main we will now do the final for me the final vote somebody didn't hear the final vote yes one fourteen no ninety eight so the motion is adopted article four will complete action on this there is no there's just one tiny by law amendment so we can go straight ahead in this keep comments to a minimum and avoid coming back on wednesday ralph jones racing to article four movement under article for the reading of the proposed amendment to the town's general by laws pertaining to residential snow removal be dispensed unanimously moved at the town amend section sixty eight dash eight hundred general byelaws of the town of belmont by inserting a new subsection i told presidential snow removal as set forth in full under article four in the war t for this meeting and further that the by a lower value committee may approve non substantive changes to the numbering of this byelaw in order that it be in compliance with the numbering format of the general bylaws ladies and gentlemen thank you very much for staying the c evening i hope that this article will be seen as one that has been heard and discussed before it was raised in april and the last town meeting and then postponed until june and then postponed again until now in november and we may see snow this winter and i'd like to get a hearing on it also unlike the previous article i don't think that there can be substantial argument that this is regulatory overreach i think what this is is the town meeting getting together and deciding that in the interests of public safety one ought to encourage residents to clear their sidewalks so that they can be used by other residents these sorts of ordinances and bylaws have been an effect in new england for over two hundred years and that i think speaks to the fact that they are what citizens meeting together decide to do that citizens ought to do things like provide education for your children revive police protection and also help clear the sidewalk that is the basic underlying essence of the article its purpose is people who are obliged to clear sidewalks under this bylaw or owners a record of residential property or their designee in the case they have made a contractual arrangement with someone else deadlines for removal of snow and ice are eight pm following a weather event rules and regulations about this are going to be made by the board of selectmen and i have heard at each of our league of women voters meetings both in april do and again in october a number of situations that will need to be settled by rules and regulations we could not amend this by a lot of cover every single instance but i think we will be able to undertake rules and regulations that will prevent hardships there will be exemptions granted to those who are either physically unable or from angele able on a will to clear their sidewalks we will under rules and regulations take under consideration situations like corner lots where the snow plows are piled five feet of snow we're not expecting you to cover that by yourself but work these things out with the department of public works and citizens and this is to be enforced by first of all a ticket and noticed in the warning and then second by a fine of fifty dollars within that maximum fine of no more than three hundred fifty dollars per year also just to be  safe side to make sure this really works there's a sunset provision this will be null and void after april thirtieth two thousand and sixteen so we'll try this out and see how it works its in effect in a number of other towns as i said i think it should defeated ninety four yes ninety eight now so for the record i will now turn to aren't you glad you stayed to now turn to discussion of the article for like to call attention to as a runner i very often find in front of town properties that the walks are never heard and so that's not a pleasant and now we have rules i'll get even more angry about that and then i'm entertained by a nine the one that says after we find you for creating a hazard that can't be used by somebody who wants to sue you does that really work that's a simple statement of a state law basically we can regulate by ordinance what we can ask our citizens to do but bad or to clear a public way is not something but that action cannot be brought against you in a state court thank you that was either one serious good first two points we've we've actually thought about and we're going to try to rewrite all of this to try to take that into consideration and after thinking about all of those items we decided week leads us to rule making under this by law there are a lot of situations like the one you've mentioned and one of the nice things i think about this by a law is that if everybody in fact whopper rates were going to be able to have some i have a question in the framework of a scenario this by law passes i do due diligence and i i have someone who clean my sidewalk i go over the by law very carefully with them bronx some reason that person is unable to clean up the sidewalk on time because it broke down if something happens so what happens in that case in case you don't think of it with what number one nothing is likely to happen in the first instance but if something does happen and you feel that you were unfairly treated because of an obligation that you had with someone else bring it to the board of select i mean i don't think that's going to be something they're going to have to take too much time worrying about as i am palmer precinct three i just have a question in a situation i sixteen years here the overpass over the railroad tracks entre palo road just where you get to super market has never been plowed it's never ever clear and whose responsibility would that be well that certainly is not the public works responsibility right now because their primary responsibility in terms of sidewalks is clearing the major routes to school but i think what i mentioned earlier about this perhaps providing us with additional resources i think it gives us an opportunity to come together as a community and discuss how we stood and good allocate the resources of public works if we have additional staff and personnel to operate the sidewalks no fighters that are not necessarily now being used to clear sidewalks to school because citizens have already cleared those i think it would be perfectly fine to talk with the department of public works and the five by ways talk about during that as well while they clear the sidewalk up to the bridge and they clear the sidewalk on the other side of the bridge they just simply stop on both sides and don't do that so what would make them start hearing it now by this body i would think i i really don't know the specifics on that and i here pretty casting director public works i assume you're talking about the sidewalk on the bridge in the same side of shahs and the other side as well neither side has doubled or we we routinely i believe we routinely do all the or around the commuter r actually all around the commuter rail and waverly square at the bridge not the not the side wall pay particular attention to that this winter that's the case but that is the intent the other side is another matter in the sense that commercial property is already commercial snow removal by law so i think that may get lost on the shores side because shukla is there sidewalk the business is clear on the other side but that little piece may be lost will also look at that and clear that as well thank you mr samuel so much joel samuels precinct six town meeting member as a person who walks around town all during the year i guess there's nobody more in favor of everyone blaming their sidewalks but i have a couple of questions especially regarding the enforcement of this byelaw it appears that at a previous town meeting mr carmen said there are approximately five thousand welling's in town and this appears to require either the police department the d p w or another town employee who makes cognizance of a violation to promptly send the alleged offender a non criminal written citation so does that mean that this town employee the day after a two inch storm or a twenty two inch storm is going to have to go around town and write down two thousand addresses and then send out two thousand citations which those people will then come to perhaps mr carmen's office to appeal their citation and if they've been away temporarily under this by law it appears that they can say we were way temporarily and we have until eight pm the day after we got back to plow in which case there would be a lot of expense for the town going around writing the citations sending out the letters and then discovering at the appeal which would also cost time and money that the person didn't have to plow anyway because of this requirement mr jones no ok no no to what the simple answer to the question really is that what we're going to try to do is see how well we're doing with this the community development department we'll have building inspectors who are available to inspect but we are not planning to drive around to see whether every sidewalk is cleared it's just not something we're putting in any money for it's going to be i think what will happen to predict is that there will be some people who simply are going to refuse to clear the sidewalk and the community development department will get a call and they will go out and issue a ticket i mean that's sort of the way these things generally work right it's seems to me that the language says that the enforcing person shall if once they take cognizance of it and the enforcing people are are fine police department are d p w or another town employee so it appears to be on its in its language placing a burden on them which you couldn't regulate because not in but we've addressed that already at the legal women voters and town council advised us that that is not work on public property that requires a bond that sudden neighbor toppling property i finished police are still public property and  there's been a court case that i know personally rono those those over a question my mind about that they're asking people to put stuff on the sidewalk to prevent winding somebody slides on that barely put on the sidewalk the seventy eight i went from one street down to the down the school of my stillwater done my elderly neighbors i'm seventy six years old now i don't know how long i'm going to be able to do any of it i still do more than my own b s so it's not i'm going to i may stop i don't know remove that snow that's part of the law which he doesn't  regard to the legal aspects of all of this this issue had been addressed by town council during the league of women voters night the explicit provisions a you asked about and the town council reminded all of us these sorts of ordinances ha fact these ordinances go back two hundred years i went back and re read will section about towns in new england in democracy in america and one of the things he said very clearly was the essence of democracy in the united states as best exemplified by towns with town meetings is that citizens freely can get together and impose burdens on each other for the benefit of the common good that is the essence found mr moderator jenny fallon meeting member precinct one i very much am in support of this by a law it's well past time when we should have passed this i've been a town meeting member now for nearly twenty years and i can remember exactly how long ago but about if for fifteen years ago this sort of by a law was raised by a group of p t a s in town because it had to do with safety of children walking to school and it was not passed at that time because people were obligations on one another and this has to do with safety it has to do with all of us being able to get around since then i've been on the capitol budget committee for six years and i learned a lot more about sidewalk buying from mr kasson you know as he came to us to request more equipment for getting rid of snow on sidewalks by the town the town now plows twenty eight miles of sidewalks and if this by law passes they would only be plowing about seven miles because it's seven miles that are abutting town property and then as mr jones said we would be able to allocate those resources of manpower and equipment power to do the things that people are concerned about about corners and too much snow from plows and what do we do for you if we have a blizzard there are all kinds of things that might go wrong in this town there are lots of by laws the zoning by law for example has a provision that hedges that are corners and not be more than three feet high now if you go around town you will notice that that is not always unforced it's enforced when somebody really has a problem with it and comes to the town and says we've got to do something about this so there's an obligation to treat hedges appropriately on corners and the town as dr albert said earlier and be called upon to enforce it when it really becomes a problem and that's going to this is going to be like that but this way over time for us to do this we really have to pass this this is a reasonable obligation to put on most of us do it already and we really need to pass it thank  you just a couple comments one identifiers are i still be curious how meaning precinct five once again i don't think a valid argument has been on the books for two hundred something years there have been lots of laws and are and she's history that have been on the books for a long time that that really something that the pope and i go out for and they're looking at do so part of me just says then why why bother like it if it's not something you're out to inforce why bother putting up all of this effort in the books  someone said you know it's something that people do anyway it just seems to me you keep using the words like co op it does seem a bit like a version and i do think mr mercer does raise a good point in that in maybe i'm misunderstanding this here are the sidewalks public property these are public ways yes they are public ways and so once again it does seem a little fundamentally wrong in some way to force people to do something that should be the responsibility of alan i mean that's just i mean we're paying the public works department is this once again i understand probably going to be one only person voting may i just fundamentally just seems like i can't think of another example where you are forcing people to do something that is the responsibility that they paid for their paying taxes for the public works department to be doing thank you mr roberts  piles of snow and slipped and fallen as have many runners in town and as across street resident i will attest first of all that mr mercer does do a great job shoveling his sidewalks i agree every snowstorm and however some of our neighbors as don would freely admit and in some cases that may be because they are overly unfortunately in many cases it's because they don't feel like it and when you're talking about kids walking to elementary school and having to jump over as i've seen them do jump over a pile of snow just to use a public process walk and cross the street safely you know it's a really dangerous situation and i think that this if properly implemented  would go a long way towards fixing that problem i will say you know speaking just to the technology piece of it and the enforcement piece there's been a lot of really great work done in the private sector around crowdsourcing and around using the eyes and  e belmont citizens to locate and identify hotspots and problem spots so that we don't need somebody driving hundreds of miles of town roads to find the problems and i would really encourage the town's i t department to and matter of safety and i've stumbled over the sidewalks in the winner walking to the center of town walking and it's a relatively small amount of work or that benefits more more people than just yourself you know i'd also like it's kind of the cost of price of living in new england really can't go watch the red sox on duck boats in october and expect to shovel a little bit and in february march my my only regret with this is that it doesn't go a little bit trasted with our votes his rise to level public safety i just want to bring up personal testimony about i live on a street just perpendicular to chen arena and i don't know how many times this last winter i saw students having to walk in the middle of streets while cars are creaming down a very steep hill and god forbid them got hit but there are numerous times the walk in the street because they could not walk on the sidewalk was not just a theoretical issue it happens every single snow really urge us to thank you thank you ma'am baskin precinct eight i also rise in favor of this article for twenty years i live on monroe street and that's channel four bars and elementary school children are making their way to when brooke i have to say the side the sidewalks when they're not there the kids are coming out into the street make their way to the next place where they back into a driveway and knowing they're at the same height as no banks and they're judging out into the cars at the same time that the moms and dads are bringing their kids to schools so it's a dangerous situation not only that once the kids get a little bit bigger in the wind brooke area they walk the high school and they take brighton story and for eight years mike walked on brighton street in the winter house the sidewalks were not here and so i think it's an extremely important public safety measure that we adopt yes sir  pushing for a just need a clarification it says that the obligated persons would be the owner of record or residential property now what if  the people living there are tenants with the owner have to go from one place to another place to an up another place after clearing his own his own area his own sidewalk and then have to go out and take care of the the pendency property that's a good question the by law provides that this obligation can be delegated to a responsible person and in the case of the landlord and tenant i would think that the best way to handle that would be to delegate that to the tenant in a legal document that could show that and it was then the responsible party then the delegated person does not mean someone you hire contractor interfere could mean that also i mean i think there are probably going to be some people who are unable to play or a sidewalk but are quite willing to pay someone to do it and in that case the delegated person becomes the responsible party  landlord but said in the lease that it is their responsibility yes then it takes the burden off of him absolutely that's what thank you yes ma'am time meeting member and seven i rise in favor of this article and i want to add a long time and i think any of those who are advancing their couple pieces that make this can be it's an accessibility issue i think it makes by having cleared sidewalks having more children walking just to get to know their neighbors in a in a different way by fully versus article and hope will pass tonight yes ma'am question is moved all those in favor of terminating debate please say i was oppose nay passed by more than a two thirds majority we are now going to vote on the main motion as amended slightly by the by