we have a quorum so i would like to call the meeting to order we will reconvene the two thousand and your town meeting for the town of belmont this evening wednesday may second two thousand and eighteen and let's begin by rising with the pledge of allegi thank you will now well now do our traditional testing of the devices land and they go ahead glen i andrew plunkett at this point i would turn to ellen if there was anybody who is not only elected or reelected who was not able to be here monday to be sworn in is there anybody elected keeping uppermost in your mind what's best for belmont and its inhabitants thank you i won't review the rules of that we want over on monday and terms of amendments speaking and so forth as the only amendments only are the three  on the town clerk's official bulletin board in the town hall in at least five other places in town giving notice that the annual town meeting had not been completed and had been adjourned to meet again today wednesday may two thousand and eighteen at the belmont high school auditorium at seven pm briefly stating the business to be acted on all in accordance with the representative town meeting acts of one nine hundred twenty six as amended and section three zero dash one one zero c of the general by laws of the town of the moment thank you on let me give a little overview of how we're going to proceed tonight we'll have a proclamation will begin momentarily with the proclamation and then two reports and around seven thirty at that point we have called prior previously a special town meeting for seven thirty what we will do is a and then go back to the annual and we will begin the annual at that point with the c p a article ten and we'll proceed with that i hope it would be wrapped up no later than nine if it is running and we are nearing the end and nine will recess the annual reconvene the special and begin the debate on marijuana because i think the army would schedule it this way because the c p a have a lot of proponent i mean a lot of sponsors and individuals so having a set time was important the same time the citizens petitioners on the marijuana issue it's not fair to them the started ten or eleven so they'll begin at nine we'll see if we can complete both of these tonight if we can't any spillover would be till next monday the other major issue or the only major issue other th these for monday is the question of the board of selectmen from three to five now when we get to the marijuana issue and help of georgia myself and as we will do our best to lay it out and clarify what it is we're voting on discussing and so forth because obviously it's very much at the same level a work in progress it's clearly a lot of confusion and so we will try to do this in a very step by step way so that you understand what it is you're voting on with that said let's begin with a proclamation for david alpert mr dash you know in addition to this proclamation we also ordered you a gift which unfortunately did not arrive on time despite my best efforts to make it happen but what we did do is go and castro was so kind as to actually put it up on the board here what we did is we found an  postcard which is addressed as you can see to the belmont board of health with the original william mckinley stamp on it if you go to the next page next i know it's a little hard to read but what it says on there is and this is an original one says physicians are required to notify the board of health of the existence of typhoid fever consumption or any contagious diseases in their practice within twenty four hours after a positive diagnosis has been reached and what it says belmont february fifth one nine hundred twelve the board of health is here by notified that irene broun if age one and a half years residing on waverly street is sick with the measles respectfully e w small so well so i think i don't know how this ended up in private hands but i think it would be perfect in your hands so the original is coming i hopefully will have it to give you on monday i was hoping would arrive today but at any rate that's from the board of selectmen to you not the measles they albert has been elected and served as a member of the belmont board of health for the town of belmont for ten terms and where as dr alperin gauged numerous initiatives to benefit the health and wellbeing of the residents at belmont through countless hours of public meetings telephone and e mail contact with his constituents in attendance a continuing education training where as dr opera's announced his decision to not seek reelection as a member of the belmont board of health for the town of belmont now therefore be it resolved that the board of selectmen of the town the belmont joins with the town and paying tribute to this outstanding achievement dr david b alper has set a high standard of commitment and dedication that serves as an inspiration to the citizens of the town the bomb on board of selectmen april well thank you all very much this actually really does come as quite a surprise and i was already told to be brief so i will be briefs so i have three quick thank you is that i would like to say the first and foremost is anything that the board  longtime partner donna david and to the left we have the most amazing collection of health directors in john malone done a mole trip stefan rusa cal angela braun and our current wonderful one wes chen these folks really made me look very good because together we were able to really do our best the second thank you is to family thirty years fifteen to twenty meetings a year is forty five is four hundred fifty to six hundred meetings which is really kind of mind boggling when you think about it that's four hundred fifty to six hundred times i wasn't home for dinner four hundred fifty to six hundred times i wasn't home with my kids so i need to take my kids for allowing me to be me and i need to thank the amazing woman that i married that was able to keep the home fires burning and a warm meal for me when i came home so thank you very much pam david's gives me a family is oh my god well somebody new i didn't know what thank you sweetheart she lies to me on a regular basis i had no idea and the third final thank you was to all of you into the citizens of this town you trusted me with your most prized possession which is your health and you look to make sure that you could eat in restaurants comfortably you could walk down the street you can get a flu injection there's no greater gift that you can give to someone than the trusting your health with you so i thank you for enriching my life and allowing me to be me and for acknowledging it to seep in thank you very much tommy member at large move that article one be taken from the table all in favor please say i was no op and unanimously we have two reports as i mentioned under article one tonight the first by paul rector the chair of the committee to study the number of selectmen and i might say before paul starts i've seen a lot of reports here in this town and obviously in my professional capacity over the years and this is one of the finest reports in terms of taking a complicated subject presenting the arguments to the context and doing it in a dallas and fair way so thank you t these are my fellow committee members and the and the slide shows the precincts they represent represent all eight precincts  judy finds peter whitmer laurie graham doug john mike crawley and then read this was an excellent and hardworking group if you see one of these fine people please thank them for the work on this committee report was a team effort and this was a great team i'm going to go over the process we followed to produce a report and walk through our true recommendations and our other observations i urge you to read our report if you haven't yet there's still time before article twelve is debated on monday night and one clarification on article twelve our committee voted nine to four in favor of recommending an increase in the number of selectman but the proposed increase to five selecting an article twelve was sponsored by a separate group of citizens not our committee the task given to us by you the town meeting last year was only to produce a report and we've done the process we followed started with learning as much as we could both from other towns and from within belmont the comparable town research focused on learning about thirteen massachusetts towns that have a mix of thirty five and seven selectman and are similar to belmont we talked to leaders in these towns to learn about their boards of select men and how their towns operate from within belmont we polled all current and former selectman to get an understanding of the time commitment the relationship with other parts of town governance and their thoughts on the idea of increasing the number of  they weren't shy we got great information from them and they had a mix of perspectives on the number of selectmen though a clear majority favored staying with three selectmen we also hold a public meeting in october  questions to belmont citizens to get their thoughts on how increasing the number of selectmen might affect different aspects of our town and we pulled committee chairs and department heads about what they need from the board from all of these sources we got lots of food for thought please see the appendices of our report for the responses there is fascinating stuff there we then compiled the best arguments both for maintaining the number of selectmen and for increasing the number of selectmen and ultimately form these arguments into two recommendations lots of writing and editing and debating we strive throughout the process to work together to articulate in the most convincing ways the cases  side at the end of our work nine committee members of the nine committee members endorsed the recommendation to increase the number of selectmen and four endorsed the recommendation to maintain the number of selectmen over though we voted differently we agree on much including many of the arguments our disagreement was a hot on how to balance them i'm going to show the eleven arguments on each side starting with the arguments used to justify maintaining the number of selectmen in our report each of these arguments is outlined in detail but tonight i'm just going to give you a quick overview of the first six of the eleven arguments for maintaining the number of the general theme behind many of these arguments is the idea that a three member board has serve the town well for decades and here are the rest of the arguments for staying with three selectmen one significant argument here is number nine that it's premature to expand the number of selectmen without looking at the role of town administ now i'm going to go quickly through the eleven arguments for increasing the number of or the first five of the arguments for increasing the number of selectmen a common theme in these arguments is that a larger board of selectmen has the potential for being more representative of the town and have a broader mix of skills and experience and here are the rest of the eleven arguments for more select another theme here is that a larger board could be more accessible to residents and committees and simply be present in more places again read our report for more on all of in addition to the two recommendations on our report we also included several additional observations our charge was to study the number of selectmen and we limited our recommendations to that topic but during our work we noticed other aspects of town governance and we hope you give special attention to these additional observations in our report i'm going to cover these bullets in a different order than on this slide first i'm going to talk about the last one impact of salaries and benefits during our work a frequent question we heard was about cost how much would increasing the number of selectmen cost the town selectmen are currently paid monist modest stipends so more selectman would likely need more money for but there are potential benefits cost to under state law elected officials who are paid by the town to carry out their official duties are eligible to receive health insurance benefits this is true even if an official is paid just one dollar in practice many selectman do not opt to sign up for health insurance but some have and more selectman means more could opt to receive health insurance in our study of other towns and we noticed that many are shifting away from paying selectman to avoid the cost of health insurance for selectman i'm now going to talk about the first bill in our report we include a section on the open meeting  the ability to talk about town business outside of public meetings was a reason for the original proposal to expand the number of selectmen to five so this was a topic we wanted to look at closely in a five member board with a quorum of three it is possible for two members to talk or email or text about town business in private without violating the open meeting law but as soon as either of those two board members communicates with a third they are by the rule of serial communications deliberating as a quorum advert and are in violation of the open meeting law a five member board of selectmen could allow for communication outside of public meetings but that communication is strictly limited in any of it even those of us on the committee who endorsed increasing the number of selectmen didn't find this to be a particularly compelling argument for expanding the board to remaining topics are closely related and i want to do them last there the two middle ballots in studying comparable towns it was notable that many have boards that focus on setting policy in their capacity as coliseum makers board members to not participate directly in the administration or management of the town that task is assigned to the town manager or town administrator who acts as the chief executive officer of the town and has substantial appointing authority including the ability to hire and fire department heads the town manager or administrator is accountable to the selectmen who evaluated the administrative results achieved in contrast to belmont has never had a town manager or administrator with this level of authority several committees have studied the issue and recommended increasing the authority of the tow administrator most recently in two thousand and nine the town meeting has not adopted that recommendation the committee clearly found the idea of strengthening the role of town administrator and moving to a policy oriented board of selectmen to be worth serious consideration it may be helpful to think about the three ideas of a larger board a board that focuses on policy not administration and if strong town administrator or manager as tied together the vision would be to do all three together in sequence not simply expand the number of selectmen alone in closing one more reminder to review our review of report it's available online at this easy to remember u r l it's probably easier to just go to the town website click on committees and find committee to study the number of select minutes under c for committee a link to our report is in the upper left corner of our committee page thank you for your attention thank you mr director and the committee for some perv job and a very confined time beginning really from labor day to january i second report tonight under article one is on the new trash and recycling collection program on february twenty second the board selection approved the five year contract with waste management thankful that they were able to get us a truck for tonight's event this contract comes with many changes compared to what we're used to gone are the days of the manually collect the trash and recycling for trash we are an automated trash collection system using a town issued sixty four gallon cart allowing for one bulky item per week for recycling gone are the days of the dual stream recycling we are now an automated single stream recycling collection system using a town issued ninety six count cart the collection of our yard waste there is no change in the next contract a new service that we're going to be providing is christmas trees and i'll talk more about that later in the presentation and see artie's in appliances it's the same sticker system but we're moving that from thursday to tuesday  because of scheduling one of the new contract take effect as mentioned earlier collection pick up using new carts will start july first carts for trash and recycling will be delivered to each dwelling unit during the last week of june each overflow trash bags and bulky items for overflow if needed overfull bags can be purchased that doesn't need stores for three dollars per bag no other bag will be collected meaning your glad bag will be left at the someone asked me earlier a dining room set counts as many bulky item only one bulky item per regular trash day will be collected bulky must be scheduled with waste management by noon the day before regular trash within the packets that will be delivered with your carts we will provide a list of organizations changes the recycling service at the same time as you trash your ninety six gallon cart will be delivered the last week of june we are now an automated single stream recycling community this means that all recycling must be placed in their second cart no longer do we need to eat thirty six inches for cardboard stacked thirty six inches high tide or whatever if it goes in the car flat that's great place items loose in the recycling cart do not use plastic bags do not place plastics or crap film food or trash in the recycling cards and depending if you're a blue or green week you'll have a blue container with either a blue  christmas tree collection this is a new service so it's kind of like a pilot currently we send all of our christmas trees to the incinerator as trash we saw this contract as an opportunity to remove this come postal item out of the waste stream and have it recycled basically so the first collection will be done the first two weeks of january only trees must be free of ornaments or decorations or tree bags or tree stands trees will be chipped and come posts it out of town instead of incinerated i understand that this is only two weeks if it is standers an exceptions standards in exceptions of the new program means that a set of carts one sixty four gallon container cart trash and one ninety six recycling cart nicias gallon recycling car will be delivered in a sign to every two willing unit in belmont we understand that the new system may pose a hardship for specific households we get it we don't want anyone to worry about new program we wanted to work we want all residents who believe they may need an exception to contact d p w and that information's up there i'm sure one knows how to reach us but we are committed to make this work we are committed to review every one of their across and advise the residents of the decision so there is little less than two months left until the new contract we still have a lot of work to do and the next couple of slides we i would like to get some feedback as part of our education our reach plan we would like to know the best way that we can communicate information on trash and recycling with you and i will help pass one t v belmont made public service videos to social media three newspaper for mail five so just click which of the five you would prefer we redo it i would redo this is like yes sure we can redo it all right you ready to redo it all right let's redo it one through five according to this is the worst thing that happens during the transition i'll  right we'll have that record for you jay now that quickly the second one same same question but how do you suggest when farm your neighbors about this issue so you're representing your neighbors slightly all right i'm still doing all five thank you everybody all right thank you pretty clear that we believe we're ahead of our neighbors but mr daschle article one tommy member large move that article one be laid on the table all those in favor please say i oppose no it's adopted unanimously with the ams consent we will now briefly as i said earlier recess the  meeting and will call to order a special town meeting the town of belmont of wednesday may second two thousand and eighteen the only additional  person to be admitted to the floor beyond those who have already been admitted to the annual town meeting and the gregory conley and the only other bit of business is the reading of the war pursuant to the warrant for the special town meeting to be held may second two thousand and eighteen i l and o'brien cushman town clerk do hereby certify that i gave notice of said no meeting by posting in attested copy of the warrant on the town clerk's official bulletin board at the town hall and at least five other places in town fourteen days before the date of this meeting in accordance with chapter thirty nine section ten of the general laws and section three zero dash one one zero  of the general by laws of the town of belmont furthermore i do hereby sort of sort of by that i gave notice of the special town meeting of may second two thousand and eighteen by causing a copy of the warrant to be sent to all town meeting members at least fourteen days before the date of this meeting and by causing copies of that warrant to be made available at the public library and the town clerk's office all in accordance with section three zero one one zero b of the general bylaws of the town of belmont and the representative town meeting acts of thank you all we will now recess the special town meeting and reconvene the annual town meeting and we will turn to article ten the community preservation committee budget a broad movement of the funds mr common will read that motion and will have a present three presentation will vote on that motion and then we will go through the six projects one by one discussing each separately and then voting on them mr common floyd common town treasurer and member of the community preservation committee move that the town reserved for appropriation the following mile from fiscal year two in one thousand estimated receipts of one million three hundred thousand as recommended by the community preservation committee one hundred thirty thousand for acquisition acquisition creation and preservation of open space and for recreation use two hundred thirty thousand for acquisition preservation rehabilitate rehabilitation and restoration of historical resources three hundred thirty thousand for creation preservation and support of community housing for eight hundred fifty five thousand to the budgeted reserve and five fifty five thousand to be appropriated for the administrative expenses and family thank you my name is margaret vili i'm precinct eight and i'm chair of the community preservation committee so the committee is recommending six projects for funding tonight and they total just over one point three million dollars so one project the construction of a path that grove street park is in its second phase last may town meeting appropriated money for the design of the path the other projects however are all new to town meeting tonight so each october the committee begins reviewing pull him an area cations for projects and working with their sponsors final applications are due around december first each year this year all six projects that we received applications for we are recommending for funding so as background for those of you that are new the c p a is a massachusetts law that helps towns preserve open space which includes outdoor recreational facilities preserve historic resources and create affordable housing belmont adopted the c p a in two thousand and ten and both local and state money go into our fund locally we have a surcharge of one point five percent on our property taxes and this year it's estimated it will generate about one point one million dollars from that surcharge we also get a partial match from the state and we've received on average about three hundred thousand dollars a year from the state although that last fall we received just under one hundred ninety thousand dollars in the last five years town meeting has appropriated more than six million dollars for thirty three projects and the sponsors of those projects deserve many thanks for with their efforts twenty two of them have already been completed so three of the most recently completed projects include the wellington station roof restoration and that was sponsored by belmont historical society when brook tennis courts they were sponsored by j market in the d p w and the of belmont historical newspapers and that was sponsored by the belmont public library so now all local historic papers are online and they're searchable other past projects include the world war one veterans memorial the restoration of the town hall doors joeys park where we contributed about a quarter of the cost we contributed one hundred thousand dollars village that's our assisted family living housing and the exterior and interior electric coal wiring was all upgraded and then last our largest project dollar wise to date we contributed we funded the or you funded the design of the project one year and the following year town meeting and the c p a contributed two million dollars about half the cost of the total project so if all the motions for funding passed tonight after that money is appropriated on july first we will have about one point one million remaining in our c p a fund for future projects so that's floyd mention the first motion is separate from the ones for the project and it reserves and allocates next year's intice a paid receipts and then the next six motions are for the projects we're recommending for funding town meaning has the final vote on funding the projects and at this time to meeting can approve or reject funding for each project so after floyd carmen reads the motions the sponsors will give a brief presentation and then be available for questions followed by a separate vote on each project thank you thank you miss feeling  number a one hundred three thousand be appropriated from the under designated fund balance of the community preservation fun for the belmont veterans memorial of the world one memorial got together we were looking at the various memorials around town and concluded that we really needed to have a central location where veterans of all wars as well as  general could be moralized and we looked at a number of different locations and lo and behold we discover that there was in fact a veterans memorial in belmont on the corner of edward street and which would  the commons at the concord ave you side ok has an entrance to that memorial and we looked at it and we got together with the multi generational path people because we realized that they were doing a project as well and we contracted with the same designers that they're using and we talked to them about doing a memorial and we originally thought that it would cost us somewhere in the order of two hundred  know three hundred thousand dollars we have since raised about two hundred sixty thousand dollars for the overall memorial but we're here tonight to talk about the c p a portion because we looked at the existing the morial in it was in terrible shape the walls were falling apart they were overgrown with weeds the path that went from common street a concrete avenue down to the to the flagpole was  not there anymore it was just sort of filled in with grass and so forth the upper wall was in pretty bad shape there was a stone that was in in front of the flagpole that was put the a to help us we store the existing memorial into that we would add the memorial that with we're planning on putting together but tonight's discussion is on the c p a funds only we're looking for one hundred  three thousand dollars that's to rebuild a little lower wall to take care of the up a well to replace the flagpole to replace the bronze plaque and the original memorial was actually done by loring underwood the architectural so there is a store called nature to the to the overall project so with that i'd be happy to answer any questions anybody might have their discussion beacons but dematerialize be used for construct just three periods the walls are going to be duplicated to exactly the same size as they are now with the same stones in the same design as they are now so we're not going to be changing the design would be appropriate to ask mr frenzy to briefly explain how the private portion of this which we're not voting on now is intersecting with the part that we are voting on i think discussion and not all those in favor place say i was opposed no thank you very much it's a  balance of the community preservation fund for architectural drawings for the music bandstand of pace and park and   we are we we are entering our twenty eighth season there are schedules thanks to the recreation department the schedules for twenty eight season are at the back of the  hall this request is to to find design documents which will create big documents to create a bandstand in keeping with the park and unanimously to support the project and the capital budget committee and rima honea chairman of the gavel budget committee unanimously recommend favorable action great thank you no answer steve evans town meeting member precinct six i also  order pace and park so i'm just curious what is the need for the bandstand that's not being served by the current concrete stage the unpredictable list of the weather makes it very difficult to run we as you can see from this slide i do between well if you include the kids kiddie concerts which don't have their get rescheduled because parents typically take their children to the library but if a kid if a concert gets rained out it's difficult to reschedule more importantly when the musicians bring their instruments and and set them up on the concrete pad it can be sunny at six o'clock and we can have a tarantula down four  by seven or six forty five when we typically start the june july concerts so that creates a problem for the musicians  equipment so it would be much more convenient for the musicians to have something that they don't have to worry i mean we have had musicians bring plastic bags and you know musicians the way this the concert goes is musicians don't get paid unless they play so for them to come to a concert do ninety percent of the  work hauling their stuff and then to get rained out or to have their equipment get ruined that's the reason for the bandstand and one more question so then what's so if we approve this what's the next so town meeting precinct six thank you for your work on this i just wondered of all the director butters have agreed with the plan this is the purpose of having this having architects drawings there will be i community input as well i'm just thinking about specifically the people who will be most directly influence i mean we have notified everyone in the area and they have actually imply that they all have agree i'm just trying to i think we have one person who didn't agree ok thank you very much yes david are you david up or tommy member precinct six and as a disclaimer my family has sponsored a concert every year the series so obviously it's very near and dear to us i just wanted to reiterate tommy's point that the five thousand dollars is going to not only be the opportunity to design something that fits into the nature of the park but to allow the a butters and the people in the neighborhood to be able to give input so that if it's into everybody's life i have attended and i'm sure many of you have where it has started raining in the middle when there's equipment etc hopefully it'll be something that could be utilized more for speeches lectures and things along those lines because obvious and i can be taken up and down for concerts but again this money is specifically being able to make sure that something that's designed that fits everybody's needs to try to make everybody happy so thank you tommy for bringing this forward yes ma'am corinne mchugh member precinct one i've taken my children to the concerts at the park and we greatly enjoy them i just have a question obviously this is meant to have a covering to protect  is it already decided or that it would have sides as well or is a pos not decided yet ok there's a possibility that it might well this will allow for community input but you know i can't predict what the architect will do but i will say that you know if it just something that blows through you know allows for rain to blow through that might be a problem but as i said i i have not i can't design it because that's the architects job ok i'm unity i'm put so i would just say that as a parent of young children i have two four year olds and a seven year old piece and is set up with two different playground areas one is for toddlers really in the other one is for older kids and the fantastic thing about peace and is that you can see and there's no visual blockage so there's your kids are in hiding and no people are hiding i'm so i hope that that would be something that would be considered because that's definitely one of the main benefits of peace and if you're in this open space and you can see children specifically chosen because of those two parks it's a large space i don't know if you've noticed but we also have recently seen a soccer net people have brought a soccer now and then there's a bubble man who just shows up you know so we've had a lot of community involvement which has not been necessarily planned so thank you yes man i'm johannes with me member precinct four i think this sounds lovely and i apologize if i missed this but will there be guidance offered to the architect on a budget is there any thinking i mean he could come back with you know twelve million don't know now it's not going to show me in dollars trust me i'm joking obviously you know given that many applications the c p a would be it seems like it would be a good idea to have some idea of what the budget might be before handing it over to i'm i'm sure every architect in this room would never over design something you know i had seen another structure in answer to your question it's not up on the screen because you know we need a more open ended processed choose arts but initially when i brought this to the highway department they gave me this sort of potential budget and this is five thousand dollars once for the architect species and it would be well south of one hundred thousand well south like maybe fifty that that's what i'm hoping is there an intention to ask the design firm the architect to maybe give a couple of different levels of play i haven't gotten that far so we're approving the money to give to the architect you know him direction to plan something for the town so it seems like a good idea to have as much of an idea as possible to absolutely what we're asking what we're firing them to do i don't know maybe i misunderstood your question are you saying for like two different designs or more precinct five member of the community preservation committee just answer your question a couple things that have come up one is i think that through the community input process and the design process looking at options is part of the plan we have to induce on look at options the other young lady asked about whether it would have sides i think that's an option let's look at it let's see if it does or it doesn't and the only way people can react to it and give  put is if they really understand it so looking at options is part of the plan number one the other thing that should be mentioned about this is that it's a safety issue too think about the electrical considerations of an open band during a thunderstorm or rain storm the the bandstand whichever form it takes in final form will have will be c compliant zoning compliant and have code compliant electrical resources for the bands and for you know speakers and so on so it's not only about protecting from rain but it's really providing a more safe environment to be able to do this but looking at options is part of the plan i hope i answered your question yes or a spree sing to one of my what i heard was that the purpose of the bandstand is to protect the band and the instruments during inclement weather it seems like the audience would not last long during inclement weather so i guess my question is what is the other purpose of the bandstand i guess mr roe haas provided some insight into that being safety one issue and i also wanted to know whether there would be acoustical benefits for a band performing in a bandstand potentially depending on the design the answer to your second question is yes the answer to your first question is here in new england i use the again and what i what we find is that audiences will come and put a blanket out bring a chair even if the ground is wet so it allows the show to go on as they say so it isn't it just makes it easier to keep those that equipment from and you know the electrical as it is and he pointed out thank you i appreciate the point i thought it was he did ask a more general question which is what is the other benefit so i think we should stick to that and continue thank you so did i answer your question thank you meeting precinct five and i'm also the director of the visual performing arts department for the public schools here which is great so thank you for letting us teach your kids it's great we have had a few concerts over the last few summers at pase and parker we've had student groups and community groups perform there and i will say that i don't know that any of our groups would actually fit in a proposed ban shell or whatever is but a covered space that is acoustically sound would make the pace and park concerts one hundred times more enjoyable for audience members just in terms of acoustics it would allow musicians to get in and let's say there's a rainy morning or afternoon but the evening is going to be really nice musicians can actually go set up their it's their equipment and have it be covered and then when the sun comes out there 's no problems word is now they can't the concrete slab that's there right now with i think like two plugs for electricity is not at all conducive to the kinds of performances that come every summer so i'm i'm in support of this obviously and i'm appreciative of you tommy for putting this forward and for your support of music in our community so thank you so i'm hoping you'll come next year thank you sir i read gandhi meeting member precinct one hopefully an easy question is this designed for the exact same footprint as the yes ok just for they for the concrete slab which was donated by a town meeting member bryan safer i don't know if he's here today and the highway department did the work brian i mean we have done a lot with volunteer and some which of the in fabric attacks have that spec specifically that they need to build it yes twenty four by twenty i think  cold i am in precinct three and i will be talking just for a couple of minutes about the request twenty five thousand dollars so that we can have develop and design documents for an application for a full project's next year so we very much in taming shoes are really looking for phase one now and next year will be coming back for phase two and again it's for the town field playground if you're unfamiliar about where the town field playground is it's at the intersection of beach and  dense population about much many of us live in two family homes our backyards are fairly small and this is where we go to meet and play with our friends and neighbors we're looking just at the playground itself we're not interested in touching the courts there's pickle ball court the ball court on the side and there are soccer fields and a baseball field on the other side and that is you know anything that we're discussing now and we don't expect to talk about it next year so this is really just the area of the current playgrounds here's what the plate on currently looks like what we could find in time documentation is that it has been updated in one nine hundred ninety five to one nine hundred ninety seven so if you're doing that math or playground equipment is more than twenty years old and that's for the newest equipment in the playground  t sort of physical examples of why we would like to replace and upgrade this playground on the top right you can see that amazing fire truck and it's very rusty the steering wheel is very loose it's a wonderful place to pinch little fingers on the top right that is that saucer again a lot of structure and extremely rusty the bottom two photos show the water fountain which has not worked and that he recommends to remove it and not replace it which is fine currently it's a place where people put their garbage and on the bottom left you can see a bench which is pretty splintery there's only a couple places to sit here it's a very hot playground that sits in the sun we like to put some shade structures and additional seating in the area so what we're looking for now is just twenty five thousand dollars so we can go forward and get the formal process moving and next year we would come back with a couple of different plans to show you and talk to the community about thank you discussion under  to create the site plan for grove street part which was approved and we've been working on that this year and so we're coming to you this year to request the funds to actually implement the plan and to create the various elements at the park so that's an overview of the park you can see just very quickly that much of the park is taken up by existing facilities and there is not a plan to remove any of those facilities there's a plan to enhance it a little bit level out some corners of the soccer fields for example but by and large we're maintaining the three ball fields the large soccer field the tennis courts are actually a different c p a grant and the top lot is remaining and of course some of the unofficial facilities which most vocally we've heard is the sliding hill will not be impacted x actually the park very quickly i think if you've been to the park recently there's facilities and the playgrounds right now is fine the real issue is accessibility into the park  of the entrances with the exception of the one entrance from grove street that goes into the top lot but they're all inaccessible because of erosion tree root unlevel areas and so if you are looking to come into the park and you have some degree of access and access issue be it you know of course a wheelchair but even if you're elderly if you're walking with a if you're walking on crutches it's almost impossible to get into the park so that really was the most prominent concern that we had and then of course there were a few others in terms of limited vegetation at the park even since in the in the short time that we've been working on this you know trees are coming down two large trees came down just in the last couple of years and so there's actually within the body of the park there's actually only two standing trees right now and if you've been to the park you see people are huddled under them on a sunny day so we could use a little more shade next like so the proposed improvements include a six foot wide path that comes into the park from various entrances and is accessible and of course to make a path compliant the american with disabilities  act when we say compliance it has to be graded a certain way so that it's safe for a wheelchair or somebody with a mobile a mobility issue that's a primary concern was to make the park accessible and then also to create some seating areas to seating areas little seating passes and to plant a number of shade trees and when we talk about vegetation in the park we really are concentrating on trees in the park to lend some shade in addition we've been working with direct commission and there had been an a baseball batting tunnel approved so we are working to incorporate that into this plan so that all of this major construction is happening at once however baseball is funding those elements as a donation the entrances this is the current entrance into the park right now that will be maintained into the top lot and this is the path that goes around the park it doesn't go around in this area here however the tennis courts will be accessible from a path over here and then you'll notice there's landscaping trees are here this area here that's called a bike circuit is sort of a fancy name for little kids this is an area right now that's an unused basketball court and a lot of times children learn how to ride their bikes there so we wanted to maintain that because it's also another popular feature of the park that's right there by and large there was a lot of concern from our committee to make this a simple project and of course there's no such thing but the there was a great concern about open space and not making the park feel terribly different than it does now because it is a beautiful space but  again for those of you that have been there it's a little rundown and there's no way to get in and and there's no trees next likely that is the proposed temporary tunnel that will go in they will come down in the off season next slide and this is the breakdown again when you're looking at a project with a big price tag which this is you start to see where some of the safety fencing these are big parts of this project in addition to laying down the walking path and the vegetation and because it's such a large project it will require a project manager and that was included as well next slide please we have through the generosity of three groups in the community baseball and soccer as well as the disability access commission we have forty thousand for this project right now and then the last we've had support from a number of organizations in town who have seen the value of  the value of this project and i will say this is a park that is so widely used by everybody in the community and we're just so excited to present a plan that will be of value to the entire community thank you town meeting member precinct eight i'm also vice chair of the recreation commission for the last five years have been the recognitions representative on the community preservation committee and i want to take just a few minutes to express our support for this project it's an important project to us at the recognition our charges develop main is to develop and maintain programs that provide town residents with an opportunity to participate in joyful activities in their leisure while i know we have a reputation of catering to sports we actually take  town which are not under control the school department so we're major stakeholder at this at this facility we've been an active participant in this process and the project that donna rouleau outlined supports our mission in several key ways it adds a new recreational resource intergenerational walking path that will serve a broad cross section of belmont residents and does so without interfering with any of the current or it or anticipated organize athletic programs and this is one of the key considerations for us the past can't interfere with soccer it can't interfere with baseball and it has to leave the place open because i think that high school be using a lot too it provides upgrades the baseball facilities these are also important the recognition that we've been seeking for a while material from the regrading necessary for the a compliant walking path  enhance the sledding hill while we don't regulate sweat sledding we certainly support it as a recreational activity and beautifying the park and providing some shade is also you know just makes it more beautiful place which is important if you're going to provide people with access hundred thousand dollars or not i can trace her i think that's a question for the high school athletic director i give him a call ok that's good but my point being let's not go ahead with  seven right now all of the existing feels so specially the soccer fields which is probably the one where you would be most concerned because the baseball diamonds might be too small for regulation baseball although i'm not sure right now the the feel the soccer field is as far on the margins as possible so it's not that we would be building a a smaller field in fact what we are trying to do with soccer is to make that space a little bit leveling out a space and making it is big as possible so we don't know what's coming down the pike with the high school but it was our goal to be working with that with the athletic department in case the field is already used sometimes for ultimate frisbee and an occasional rugby practice so right now that's fine i don't just saying if if there is a relocation of fields and dimensions don't fish if we're not going over something we spent money on that's also called an intergenerational path i don't know if it's a technical name you can jump in on that but i think it's to to denote first of all that this is a path that is created hopefully compliant which our path will be and it's also too whether it's a deficient term or not but to let the public realize that this is a facility that is for everybody most of the most this is the cell it is in the park with the exception of the tennis courts and the basketball courts are geared for organized sports and this is not ok i just find that a little confusing because  i think what you're trying to say if you're talking about it being eighty eight comply and it's accessible or universally accessible but i mean are there walking paths in town that are not that are restricted by age part of it obviously but it's really more than that it's really you know i look at people like my parents their primary activity is walking they're in very good shape but you know they're thirty years older than i am so they're not young anymore you know you start to lose your balance a little bit as you get older you start to my father's case he fell because his per for allision is gone so having a safe place where you can get into a park into our public facilities and actually circle navigate the park you know get your daily exercise is a valuable thing it's a valuable recreational activity whatever whatever we choose to call it so it's good for you know older residents it's good for anybody you know with a bad hip or a bad knee it's also good for young people if you're pushing you get in a stroller so i think accessible and less busy is kind of weird to say the least it's on a bank absolutely have you have you given consideration to making that trying to improve that or obviously you want to have handicapped parking as well to make it accessible moderator this is not part of the plan but if i could just answer that question that's an excellent point and that was a big part of the conversations within the community although c p a funding is is not permitted to fund those particular concerns we are working very closely with glen clancy this is all being done is one project and the parking and the designated handicapped parking of course is a part of this plan there will be which there is not now van accessible parking by the tennis courts that will be able to eat grass into the park has meant helen bakeman precinct four i'm wondering if this new path and it was our plan to make the park as this plan as simple as possible maintenance costs will be to maintain the walkway there's a there's a walkway in the park right now that goes to the and i don't i don't know if it needs maintenance now or if it's what the maintenance issues are with that in this park or in any park i'm sorry material that was that to our understanding is available and it requires the least maintenance it's what is in the park right now as a walkway into the there is going to be some main insists that edging more to be done by our internal parks department when they do the fields anyway those are speedy you know some more edging to do it is going to be an asphalt like duties for public works so jay what i'm asking is like not if you can edge the grass along a pretty you're going to back that with loman grass is that how you're going to end oh yeah yes we are going to do that so you're going to back the side of the asphalt with just low i believe it's going to have a some type of inner compatible material and then you know it's going to probably i can't remember the plans exactly i think it's two or three inches off the sides and of like a crust on type material and it will be grass members of the warren committee who voted against this proposal me member precinct six i was actually going to get up and explain at least my views because i was one of the four i can tell you that the warren committee discussed this project at and i believe everybody on the committee was supportive of the general goal and certainly accessibility and the other improvements that were described were supported by members of the committee the principal concern simply the cost seven hundred eighty thousand dollars is a very very large amount of money and you know compared to what while it's more than half of the end of the capital budget for the entire town for the path that's at least four years worth of sidewalk budget there's a hundred thousand dollar landscaping budget which is about ten years of the tree budget a couple of years ago so it's it's on a scale where we thought at least the four of us were hopeful that it could be done in a way that would conserve resources a little more and it came down to that and i think you heard mention that the original path was designed to be eight feet wide eight feet going to six feet as we were told at the presentation that the warrant committee reduced the budget for this project by two hundred thousand dollars a standard sidewalk is four feet wide and the landscaping budget of one hundred thousand is a lot and if you look at the paving plan it's not just asphalt there's actually a cobblestone feature in the middle and all told we realize that it's late in the game because the design has been made it's been discussed for a long time but we felt in good conscience it was actually just too much money to achieve the purpose particularly you know the baseball improvements are good but they're a very small feature of this it's about twenty thousand dollars most of which is contributed actually in terms of an amenity it certainly struck me since i walk an awful lot in this town that in the immediate vicinity of grove street there's going to be an interest in intergenerational pathet clay pit fresh pond is right there the pace of park reservoir is very heavily used not to mention just walking around town so the key concern of accessibility we thought could be addressed simply at a significantly lower cost and we voted our conscience on that thank you mr friday so i have been a ferrante time meeting member a couple of points this project is actually an example of the c p a process working exactly as it was intended the application was initiated by a citizens group but they were instructed to work with the recreation commission we have a seat on the c we took our our role seriously to help prioritize and guide recreation projects we consistently sic breck amended to strongly that the applicants work with all the stakeholders so with us we're one of the major stakeholders the schools soccer baseball and there's a whole there's a whole list so we can see and we ended up i think with an excellent project that meets the needs of the of the recreation commission and i think we came up with an excellent plan donna and her group again came up an excellent plan on top of that what wasn't mentioned is there was actually a public master planning process at grove a few years back so every element you see here the really the tennis courts that will repeat rebuilt this spring and summer the path the batting cage everything you see on there went through the process with activity there were many other a number of public meetings i attended every single one of them so this is been an extremely well vetted pride project and when it comes to  excess ability you know again i've heard you know you can just go over and walk around fresh pond but that's you know what is the you know what is the minimum we you know we need to do to comply with a da i mean i can answer that question you have to provide access to baseball fields a soccer field in the but that's not really the question i think we should be addressing the question we should be addressing is how do we provide access recreational opportunities on access to all our facilities frankly to the broadest number of people possible that's really what i think is important and that mr moderator just for you please don't lose sight of the fact that the war committee does support accessability we are not we are not in any way opposed to that yes yes ma'am that's the li in precinct six don i just want to commend you on this and i will just say that you know you know i have three boys they all played soccer over the last ten years my dad his declined in mobility and so now he's in a wheelchair and he was the guy who would have to sit in the car thank you ellen shriver town meeting member precinct eight member the work committee i supported this project for a whole host of reasons accessibility certainly is one of them i also applaud the committee it's been a very very long process they've spent six years working on this through the master planning process through the design process which we did help to fund and so here they are with the results of six years of work and i  appreciate the work that they've put into it i also want to say when you're looking at the money it's a big park so to put a good sized path around a very large park is going to cost a lot of money  regardless of what you want to do so anyway i wanted to toss that out and also that you know there's a lot of other factors that are included here one of which is hiring a project manager which is necessary because we don't have people internally who can manage all of these projects these projects are being brought by citizens and as we bring more and more projects by citizens playgrounds walking paths veterans memorials everything else the staff has to be part of all of those projects but we're bringing them in it's not necessarily projects that were originally in their priorities so we as a town need to recognize that when we do that we need to elizabeth on town meeting precinct two also a member of the warrant committee i voted in favor of this project i do support it but i do want to know one other aspect that was of concern and a matter yes the funds stay within projects that qualify for c p a but we are very concerned about projects coming down the path in particular the community path and high school fields so we really had to make a decision of weighing this not just against this and it is a worthy project in particular as you know the mother of four children who played there and concern about accessibility issues again i support this but just the real concern that i think was legitimate about not having that money available for later projects that are also very worthy and necessary and actually i did appreciate the arguments of the four members of the work committee raised against the project simply because we do need to be critical and not accept anything that comes across our path that these things can take on a life of their own that may still merit a tough problem but again i say this on the context of supporting the project going to have to recess the annual town meeting because we do not have time to do the last two and the last two items they have and we have a commitment to the sponsors of the citizen petition and all of us to have a full debate on marijuana so let's take a fact so we will recess the annual town meeting let's take a five minute break and we'll come back and turn to the special