we have a quorum and i would like to call the annual town meeting for two thousand and sixteen for the town of belmont to order and we will begin with the invocation reverend ruth harvey of first baptist church i'd ask you all to stand thank you please join me for a moment of reflection oh spirit of community and human fellowship that gathers the citizens of belmont in this public forum this evening open our ears our minds and most importantly  hearts to one another especially to those whose social locations whose viewpoints whose concerns are different than our own remind us that we are all incomplete without one another that our own truth as important as it is is true only in part and that we are always made more whole by consideration of the other keep us mindful that if even one among us is hurt is suffering is voiceless we are all diminished we are diminished and our human flourishing and our common potential for justice and happiness is left unfulfilled in our considerations and reflections keep in our consciousness the reality that our human family shares this beautiful community with the air we breathe the water that gives us life the soil that sustains us and the countless creatures that creep and crawl and swim and fly and who depend on us to ensure that they too enjoy the liberty and justice that is their right may it be so and blessed  harvey up please remain standing well now i have the flag ceremony and pledge of allegiance troop sixty six other three scouts here henry library and two of the three newest eagle scouts from group sixty six and belmont claymore oils and calvin rinehart erdman let's give them a thank you troop sixty six and again congratulations clay and calvin for your tremendous achievement now we want to do the check card to our electronic devices so glenn would you please display the list down meeting number three form jack and then i would ask you eat push either one or two on your voting device and hold and check for the green light come forward to the front desk thank you if if he's scrolling now and if you don't see your name in new york please come down and provided you pressed one or two all right i guess we right everybody said thank you a few administrative details as you know the limits of all town meeting members in the right in the center and laugh presenters and  in committee capital budget committee perna building committee so print ten of schools in the school committee the planning board starke district commission community preservation committee and the sponsors  of the motions under article seven any other requests all right thank you hearing on those the list i summarized will be admitted to the floor and now like to turn to the town clerk and half the newly elected and reelected town meeting members to stand so the town clerk can administer town meeting member to which you have been duly elected keeping uppermost in your mind what's best for belmont and its inhabitants please affirm by saying i will thank you thank you and congratulations let me briefly go over the rules especially for those who are newly elected in terms of the speaking from the  floor if you want to speak should go to a microphone and wait in line and i will recognize you in the order in which people come to the microphone there's a five minute limit on speaking  the and if you've already spoken once on a particular article or motion you cannot speak again until all who have not spoken who want to speak have had their opportunity i would remind you that in terms of asking questions that you address questions through the moderator and we limit that to one question and one follow question i should say to new town meeting members will take a while obviously for you to get used to our procedures i'm happy to talk you any time my phone number and e mail are available through the town and just give me a call or shoot me an email and i'm happy to explain anything and hear reading the text of each printed article el posting attested copy of the warrant on the town clerk's official bulletin board at town hall and at least five other places in town seven days before the date of this meeting in accordance with chapter thirty nine section ten of the general laws and section thirty dash one one zero eight of the general bylaws of the town of belmont furthermore i do hereby certify that i gave notice of the end of town meeting of may second two thousand and sixteen by causing a copy of the warrant to be sent to all town meeting members at least seven days before the date of this meeting and by causing copies of the warrant to be made available at the public library in the town clerk's office all in accordance with section thirty dash one one zero b of the general bylaws of the town of belmont and the representative town meeting acts of one thousand and twenty six as amended organizing this meeting the overheads and so forth so thank you in terms of the may sessions of the of the town meeting tonight and wednesday i'm hopeful we can do it in two nights so we have schedule next week as well case we spill over as you hear when we get to article six it will be a motion to lay that on the table so that we will be considering article six at the june town meeting therefore i'm hopeful that we can complete a ll business on the annual town meeting articles one through seven with six being postponed a tonight and then we have three items for the special town meeting  wednesday which begins at seven thirty and those three items i am hopeful that we can cover wednesday which would allow us to complete our business in two nights which i'm sure we'd all appreciate and then of course we have the june session of town meeting and we will have a league night and do planning for that later in the month of may so without further ado let me turn to the order of the articles  seven eight nine ten eleven twelve thirteen fourteen fifteen sixteen seventeen eighteen nineteen i don't think i've ever seen a time of you i've never seen an order in that way probably never happen again  committees for the year two thousand and sixteen be accepted and the discussion all those in favor please say i was opposed no it's a that the board of selectmen be in here by is authorized to bring and defend the actions for and against the town to submit any such claims to arbitration and to enter into settlement on the count of the same in behalf of the tim as and when they deem it for the best interests of the town to do so said power shall be vested solely in the board of selectmen as a part of selectmen have a vote on this mr williams yes we did the vote was article three repeller road forty nine two four ninety three common street four ninety five five or one common street and parcel to zero seven in belmont mass dated april fifth two thousand and sixteen appropriate by rober survey said area being a portion of the easement accepted at time meaning on december eleventh one thousand nine hundred twenty two and described in a grant of easement from mary be home to the inhabitant habitants belmont dated march shows a utility easement that originates in the location that i pointing to here which is under the proposed pomona building of the christian village development the easement itself runs towards williston road it continues behind the rear yards towards poplar street within that easement there is sanitary sewer as well as storm drain there is a portion of that easement that you see shaded in red that requires to be discontinued in order for the project to be developed and so your role this explain where coaching village now stands obviously they think it must be closer because this hasn't been presented before  they are in their due diligence phase at this point we have had conversations with toll brothers to go over components of the purchase and sale at the time with regard to the parking lot  so we have provided our information they've asked questions they're providing us some additional information and clarifications which we have not received yet but that's where we stand so the prog toll brothers and star are in the process of doing their due diligence to execute the sale and we're doing our due diligence with toll brothers to grant the sale of the property thank you thomas e mails and precinct five town meeting member through you mr moderator i just have a question for glen if that's assuming as sanitary sewer where is it going to go now if you're blocking that off or discontinuing it i just you know it's just mr clancy to moderate acclaim clancey director of comedic development tommy actually that the portion that is to be discontinued in that location contains only storm drain and there is a catch basin that is at the roughly at the end of the easement that ties into a twelve foot storm drain line as that line continues out towards her horn road there is also sea and it's a resort that begins and they run parallel from that point out toward horn but in that particular location it's just a twelve inch storm drain with a catch basin but it looks like a long stretch yes i mean is twelve inch diameter correct troubling standard type yes but bear in mind that the with of these minutes off has to be wide enough to allow for equipment to be able to get in to work as necessary the width of that easement is if you bear with me for one moment you know that doesn't i'm just i'm more interested in the length i mean i'm just worried about if we're taking away you know where's that going to go i just want to you know and you're saying it's only water it's not really a senator it is currently right now it's a catch basin for storm water ok because it is an easement the town never actually had ownership rights to the property only access rights to be able to maintain the utility we're just still giving a value we're giving up that right to go in the apartment you're still giving up a right that has economic value clancy director of community development joe the the building that exists on the site today is essentially where the easement terminates ok so if we were to overly the existing building that's on that site you would see that the back of that building is essentially falls at the and i feel like i gave away the winners at the oscars or something you know i'm freezing so hard and i apologize for that ok so joe i'm not putting that thing down so it joe so currently there's a catch basin that picks up surface water behind the building that exists there today just water that's correct that's correct so once that once the new development comes in the footprint of that building will expand in the area and encompass much of the area in re that we're looking to abandon that is because it will no longer be necessary because there may be a basement under the in place that's tried that we'll it'll be a parking garage actually in terms of drainage sightline off utility connection all that stuff has been provided for with the new development that portion of storm drain in that easement is not required for the new development ok and at the end of this red marker you'll put something to replace is the beginning of this red mosque question it would be a manhole or some other structure to terminate the utilities which would we become the new beginning point as it heads out or new beginning i'm ok so what you're doing if i may help you is taken a slide out boarding a building or a basement and then next and what you're doing is shortening the line basically correct and as is there are so all going through there also not in that location only storm drains only storm drain all the way to the williston wrote yes the question  welcome thank you mr cranston see players who precinct six the only question is the seems to be predicated on christian village going forward and that may happen and we have a lot of us hope it will happen but if it doesn't  happen we is is there something that we're going to be back here to do something else at some point mr hall george howell town council the way the motion is worded is to authorize the selectmen to release it which means t select and would sign an instrument and convey that to the developer and it would be our intention not to deliver that instrument unless the deal closes and a further discussion sami baghdad a vice chair of the board of selectmen town meeting member precinct four moved that the town vote to amend section sixty dash three twenty of the town of belmont general bylaws demolition delay as follows by striking from subsection b time limitation two thousand and sixteen and replacing it with two thousand and seventeen so that the sub so that the subsection reads b time limitation the provisions of this section shall be novel and void and void and of no force and effect on and after june thirty two thousand and seventeen yes i would like to introduce joe cornish co chair of the historic district commission pardon me i omitted i think the warrant committee mr levinson warrant committee michael eavis and chair of the work committee and tell me a member precinct one committee unanimously recommends favorable action thank you mr corn thank you joe cornish co chair of the belmont historic district commission the belmont historic district commission is seeking an extension of the expiration date of the existing demolition delay by law from june thirtieth two thousand and sixteen to june thirtieth two thousand and seventeen the extension will provide sufficient time to complete the updated town survey of historic properties and to work with stakeholders in the community to draft a new by a law for consideration at the spring two thousand and seventeen town meeting as a little background since town meeting passed the violence in two thousand and fourteen no property owner subject to the appeal to have their property removed from the list of significant properties subject to the demolition delay by law and fourteen only two properties were subject to the demolition delay by a law process two hundred fifty seven prospect street and one hundred twenty two waverly street in both cases the commission determined that the properties were preferably p properly preserved the owners of two fifty seven prospect street presented compelling evidence that they explored all options for mitigating dangerously high radon levels in their house the commission agree that all shared if the demolition works floored by the property owners and did not enact the six month demolition delay period at one twenty two waverly street there was significant community support for the preservation of the house and its historic barn the commission enacted the six month demolition delay period in hope that the owner and developer would meet with a commission to explore alternatives to demolition both declined the commission's request to me and the demolition permit was issued after the six month demolition delay period complaints that the existing by law has lowered the real estate value of anyone's property nobody's june  is there are further discussion all right where we're ready for a vote i'd like to if there's no further discussion i'd like to do this for the electronic devices so tell me glenn when the polls are right thank you polls are closed glenn you want to display the results of the motion passes to twenty seven to thirteen article removal section sixty eight hundred move that under article five the reading of the proposed amendment to article nine of the town of them one general by a was pertaining to residential property snow removal be dispensed with the same having been strawman the by law review committee does not any questions on this matter and this is simply just making this by law permanent it's been in place for three years none of the language is changing at all and this is a board of selectmen sponsored article as you call three years ago of my fellow colleague former colleague ralph jones so this is nothing more than just had a sunset provision to extend his permanently this discussion mr white joy pr for i have a question that's been asked by a number of people in and out of my precinct if one were to shovel to conform to this law i guess to maintain a assume they have their own liability insurance so for the purposes of my question it is for the residents or the designated in other words the sons daughters friends neighbors who are not contractors if i was to shovel my george howell town council the buy a lot does not shift personal injury liability in any way so a shoveling or failing to shovel doesn't impose any liability on the on the homeowner and my belief is that if something were to were to happen to the person doing the shoveling in the course of shoveling the fact that we have a buy a lot would not shift that being a distinction between tort liability and you know personal injury lawsuits lawsuits for slipping and falling or other kinds of harm property damage claims the only liability is simply the liability to comply with the if you do if you don't comply with the by a lawyer subject to a fine but but in terms of being able to sue somebody in a civil claim for some kind of personal injury or property damage that by law really has no effect on a january day i'm saying the liability would be the same if the buy a lot was in effect or not in effect i mean i can't we can stand here all night and talk about different scenarios where the town might or might be liable might might or might not one more mr white i think we are here the do you fine if i'm correct in my memory of reading it recently as three hundred fifty dollars for the year maximum or and it's not clear it's not a question it's and it's a statement a day the statement that what i'm trying to say is these people who have asked me are elderly i have suggested to them last year when they asked me before i came here that just paid the three hundred fifty dollars and let the snow fall where it may because the the liability of the falls on them they can't get an insurance policy one has tried one has actually gone out and tried to get a policy so she would be covered shovel in the walk you can if you can require people work on public property here why you couldn't you move it into the neighbors around the school and shovel it would save us money there also it's the same exact same thing you're stepping off your property requiring to think i stated this three years ago and apologize for laughing but was to change behavior and i think because of this by a while i would suggest that our sidewalks are safer when we have snow fall that folks understand that is a byelaw mr jones explain this is well was not to penalize or to tax i don't look at as a tax but you raise the awareness and to change behavior and i think it had that effect positive effect several at my age i don't know at what point i'm not going to be able to do it i'm not going to pay some of them right now i do far more than my own sidewalk and have done for years there was a time when in the seventies in arguments noble from my house to the school about a thousand feet so i'm not afraid to work but i'm talking  philosophy you know you i appreciate the sidewalks and be done with this but i'm technically i think it has a point but you don't all right thank you any further discussion on the article five they're me member a member of the council on aging in their very happy the people in our community but the snow shoveling because there are people who'll do it and there's a nice program of community involvement with the kids a ban on high school so between the kids about my high school it's also given a lot of people business so the council is very pleased thank you right the poll is closed gland you want to display the results two hundred thirty in favor nine opposed the motion is adopted article six  lives allison chair of the planning board count meeting member precinct three move that article six be laid on the table and is there a second yes as the moderator mentioned we will be taking up article six at the june town meeting the planning board feels we need to make several chemical clarifications to the language of the by law since we have a june meeting we feel is prudent to take advantage of the opportunity to address these issues now we have the opinion of town council and town council has assured us that the proposed amendments remain in force and but but it does require two thirds so let's use our electronic devices again thank you if you support laying it on the table yes if not vote no  we'll be discussing this is part of the june town meeting like you said in say the polls are open at the voting is complete glenn you want to display the results two hundred twenty six in favor eight opposed obviously more than a two thirds thank you now turn to article seven will be the final article tonight but there are i think eight or nine separate motions under article seven which is our annual report and budget and projects under the community preservation act carmine floyd common town treasurer clerk of the community preservation committee tonight i will read each one of the motions they really will come up and give a three to five minute presentation on what the c p a is all about as i go through each motion i will stop the sponsors will come up and give a three to five minute presentation we will  any questions through the moderator and hopefully we should get out here by the fox news at eleven thirty and clerk of the community preservation committee article seven move that the town will hear and act on all report of the community preservation committee on the two thousand and seventeen community preservation budget and pursuant to the recommendations of the community preservation committee take the following action that the town vote to appropriate from the fiscal year seventeen estimated receipt of one may and thirteen thousand community proof preservation funds as we actually voted on all the individual motions but not on the overall that's fine as that's  do you want any further discussion a presentation as to carmen under article under the first motion mr moderator i'd like to have really china's to give a three to five minute overview of the c p a right thank you thank you floyd market vili chair community preservation committee the community preservation committee has your back recommending six projects for funding tonight with belmont c p a they account for eight hundred eighteen thousand three hundred fifty dollars of a little over one million in anticipated receipts so this is the fourth year that town meeting will be presented with projects in the last three years time meeting has approved twenty two c p a projects some highlights include ok so this is the most recently completed project was the restoration of the world war one veterans memorial on common street near the lions club and town meeting approve that just last may the largest project fun to buy the c p a to date dollar wise was two million dollars that went towards the renovation of the underwood pool and that was about half of the total cost of the pool previous projects include the town door town hall door restoration and joey's park so as background the community preservation act or c p a is a state law that allows towns to establish a local fund mainly to acquire and preserve three things open space which includes outdoor recreation the second thing is historic buildings and resources and the third is community or affordable housing almost half the towns in massachusetts have adopted the c p a about forty five percent and recently it's been in the paper because boston is considering placing c p a on their november ballot belmont's c p a fund has two sources of money and the first is locally generated and that's a surcharge on our property taxes and belmont voted for a one point five percent surcharge back in november of two thousand and ten the c p a allows a surcharge of up to three percent the second money that goes into the fund comes from the state and that's mainly from real estate transactional fees that are collected at the registry of deeds although additionally the last three years the state has had a surplus and they've transferred some of that surplus money to the a fund so belmont has received a total of just over one point two million from the state in the last four years our projects are community generated and we have a two step application process in late september early october each year plymouth area applications are due this year we received eight the committee then reviews those applications to ensure that they are eligible under the state's law for funding so seven of those eight were deemed eligible this year in november each year we hold a public meeting where the sponsors present their projects and answer questions from the committee and the public so next year come to our november meeting and ask lots of questions the final applications are due in november and early december and this year one project was withdrawn and the other six were approved by the committee to come before town meeting so the first six motions on the projects in article seven will take up those projects meeting has the final vote on funding the projects and to meeting can either approve it only has two options right now it can either approve or reject each proposal so then there are two additional motions and the first additional is to set aside for later spending ten percent of the estimated receipts of or just over one hundred thousand dollars for affordable housing and by statute each year a minimum of ten percent of the town c p a funds must be appropriated or reserved into those three broad categories of open space historic for affordable housing and this is the first year we have not had projects that meet the ten percent requirement in all three categories this year we have no affordable housing projects and therefore are required to preserve ten percent of the estimated receipts for affordable housing and then the last motion is to set aside five percent for the administrative an operating expenses of the committee so i think floyd now is going to read each motion the motion for each project and then the sponsors will give a brief description and answer questions thank you before doing that we will have discussion on the overall umbrella motion that mr carmine has read the one the one million thirteen thousand and he discussion are funded i'm not aware of many grants that you can apply for where well where there's even a fifty percent chance of getting funded this is really in the nature of a comment not a question i just maybe it's a comment to two town meeting members and anyone else listening or watching i think we would be better served if there were a dozen or fifteen applications and there was a competition of ideas a competition of proposals for this money rather than having three quarters or eighty five percent of the  applications presented for funding which i think so far everything every proposal that has been presented for funding has received funding so we're early on in this still in the c p a process but it's my hope that in the future that this will become a more competitive process thank you thank you further discussion be funded is and if just have people acknowledge our say hold it say they want to discuss that image this three or four or five or six that we don't have to we don't have to go through the presentations or the else we've all received all this material but they're going to be we're going to go through or required to have a motion and vote on each of the the i have a say in that but we don't need a three to five minute presentation on each ok thank you mistakes it's drama charles time in town meeting member of precinct three i  have a point of question about a point procedure that first motion suggested that that was present only partially i might add that we were going to be appropriating one million thirteen thousand dollars of community preservation funds i presume we're not obligated to to do the one million thirteen thousand if we turned down enough i'm not suggesting we're going to but if we turned and want to more of the projects in the numbers would go down isn't that correct point cabin town treasurer if you turn down the projects the money goes back into the community preservation part yes but where s b s to appropriate one million thirteen thousand seems to me what i'm saying seems to be premature to vote on this particular motion into we voted on all of the particular items because we may have to amend the whole thing if if perchance one or more of these was turned down well i think mr rahman makes an interesting point i'm going to take the moderators parag if in agree with mr harman and say let's do the individual projects and then come to this motion at the end after we've appropriated or not so let's turn to the individual projects and the spirit of what mr khazan john asked and all of us if we could have you just bear with me one minute i want to acknowledge mr stanton's comment the board has two proposals tonight vince and i think i talk to my colleagues on the board we probably need to do a better job of thinking about additional projects in town that we can consider you moderator i'd like to introduce mary trudeau who is going to discuss this motion as mary's coming up can i just report that anne marie mahoney chairman of the capital budget committee tom any member pressing one capital budget committee unanimously next three years ago town meeting approved the expenditure of c p a funds to prepare a phased master plan for an intergenerational walking path that clay pit pond the centerpiece of this plan is an approximately twenty five foot six to eight foot wide fully handicapped assessable permeable footpath on the east south and west sides of the pond well we hope to add an additional fifteen hundred linear feet of walking path at the north end of the site in front of the high school creating a path that would fully circle navigate the entire pond this work has not been included in the proposal in front of you this evening in deference to the fact that there are some proposals for reservations or rehabilitation at the high school that may interfere with the path next slide please the project proposes the construction of a sustainable walking path as can be seen in the photos the existing footpaths are worn poorly drained and often soft  muddy while this path is maintained by the belmont public works department in its current location and condition the path really can't be kept passable and is often in assessable there are sites specific environmental issues that can be addressed in the reconstruction of a safe path system including next flooding the clay pit pond is an important component of the town of belmont stormwater collection system the pond receives all of the water from the wellington bro watershed an area spanning a section of watertown and the greater part of waverly belmont center in cushing squares the periodic flooding associated with this use is in conflict with the portion of the walking path paving the north east portion of the walking trail impassable during rainy weather or flooded conditions the proposed rehabilitation path includes the relocation of this section of the footpath further to the east up towards to injure street which would alleviate the existing conflict between the flood storage function of clay pit pond and the foot traffic at the perimeter of the water body in addition to the proposed path relocation work the path design includes perimeter drains to in crew prove ground water and surface water movement across the park  this improved drainage will allow for extended calf use and provide for safer footing for users next this is a photo of a similar path that was constructed in wellesley math this is a six to eight foot wide crush stone compacted stone bed path which is what we are proposing to build up at quite that pond next the conquered have been you have entrance to the park is one of the most important features in the path rehabilitation redesign through the restoration of  underwood path with the circular features added to expanded enhanced the veterans memorial area the path project will create a stylized iconic entrance way into the park as this is visible from concord ave the vista created through the entrance way is important it also seems appropriate that the central entrance to the park leads to the veterans memorial offering a strong symbol of support to our armed forces local veterans groups have been working privately ending conjunction with the conservation commission to design a meaningful memorial area while the paths creating the memorial are included in this proposal in front of you tonight all of the monument ation and planting of the veterans memorial area is being privately funded through the efforts of local veterans the resulting memorial area will include tributes monument ation benches and landscaping to create an inclusive area for contemplation this aspect of the project has both an educational and a commemorative component final si in crafting the design of this past the beta group overlay the historic edge of clay pit pond on to the park at each point of intersection between the path and the historic edge of the clay pit a section of frick pavers is proposed this is a subtle served the town of belmont well but its time to invest in a sustainable environmentally sensitive path to provide fully accessible opportunities within a centralized location in age of virtual communication it's more important than ever to maintain opportunities for communities to come together face to face whether it be for recreation commemoration or casual social interaction this park has provided these opportunities for the citizens of belmont for more than eighty years and we believe that the expenditure of a community preservation act grant to rebuild a safe and fully accessible walking path is a great legacy for the next ninety years thank you cunningham precinct four this is an information question i know that when the library was looking at the land there i was braised that it was a conservation area and or a wetlands or it was subject to environmental  approval and i realize that the conservation commission is directly involved in this what cup but what kind of official hoops have to have had to be passed or will need to be passed to make this project go ahead i  work within one hundred feet of a jurisdictional wetland area requires the filing of a notice of intent application and this will need to be filed for this path the path that we put before the conservation commission will show the commission that the project meets the performance standards of the wetlands protection act and hopefully a permit approving the work as proposed will be issued mr cunningham and if such a permit is not granted or adjusted how would that affect the project with the whole thing be lost to where text neck doesn't prohibit work within that one one hundred foot jurisdictional zone it just regulates the construction so that it would be very unlikely that this would not be permitted in some form or another i can't think of a circumstance in which that would happen truthfully ok thank you thank you ms lambert and marie lambert precinct eighty one point of clarification my concern is the reference to flooding of around into pine and secondly i've had some concern about the extent to which the source of the flooding line is influenced by whether or not the conduit between a pond and wellington brook on the other side of brighton is blocked and i wanted to ask for a comment from mr clancy on and spec sion of that kind to it in and its role in the vulnerability of this area to end up in the state of the photographs that were shown earlier mr i just don't want the design to be making assumptions that may change if if there is a blockage in that conduit to moderate england clancy director of community development emery we have inspected that cover it's actually a dual pipe that comes out of clay pit right discharges into a box cover it it's sort of an interesting design because the two pipes that come out of clay pit actually are inverted so they're they're pitching down from the from the pond and then comes back up into this the box called it where you're probably aware of that it makes it a little bit difficult to inspect because a lot of times the the pipe inside is underwater because of just the level of the pond in the way that you know water sees its own level inside the pipes and we've never seen any obvious blockages otherwhile say as i said because of the unique design that we have never actually taken the sort of formal step of trying to figure out how to inspect that portion that is always under water but everything that we've been able to see in the past has indicated that that structurally everything is ok i would just ask the team developing this path to make sure that the assumptions are stable and from the shorelines there have been people reporting that  arboretum and you know with lots of specimen trees i don't not very well marked or no longer marked but sinclair weeks was involved in selecting those trees i think many years ago and so have you been back in touch with him do you know what and how much of the budget goes to trees and shrubs and things like that mr duffy the work in front of you this evening is only for the construction of a permeable path that circuit navigates the southern part of the park the phased master plan that was developed by the beta group does include a section that deals with the tree walk and it does recommend rehabilitation and enhanced meant that the path as we have designed it runs through the tree walk and i would anticipate that in some point in the future a scout project or perhaps a garden club project would involve the retaking of the trees that there would be other grant monies available at some point to replace vestment trees that have gone by the wayside i think it is a long term goal to restore and enhance the arboretum thank you  in the fall two things have happened belmont high school was selected for the massachusetts school building authority feasibility study process and in december the select the community path implementation advisory committee to in the feasibility study that will be started in july to look at routes along concord avenue in addition to the r had been most highly recommended by the previous committee the community path advisory committee both of those new  those new projects tension affect the use of this land the high school i guess if the high school is just to be reconstructed and the new high school is located in a different place  than the existing high school would that affect the vistas from concord avenue is that is that an important part of the plan or maybe if the plan works regardless of where there's a kind of center of the high school is and then the question with respect to the community path is whether this could be or should be considered as a possible to use path i understand that was ok to the first question we believe that the work at the high school is independent of this project that the twenty five hundred linear feet of path that we've proposed on the south side of this park would not be impacted by any project that would occur at the high school as far as we know as to the second question about combining the usages of the path we went into this thinking that this would be a path that would have not only multiple users but perhaps bike access and when we spoke with the landscape architects and worked on the final plans we realize that it's more than just a simple decision of whether to let different users use the same path and that it really was more appropriate for this particular path pedestrian walkway that we do plan on at some point stalling bike racks at either and you know encouraging bikers to come and use the property but i don't think that riding through the property is the safe course of well that's their judgment and i think that's that's reasonable unfortunately the option that the committee path implementation advisory committee is left with would be to have a path perhaps along concord avenue itself that's as close as fifty to one hundred feet away from from this path but i don't have a proposing meeting number i'm delighted that this is going to be moving forward as one who has dodged puddles i'm delighted one of the elements that  seen is that it looks as if there are stones large stones at certain parts along the way that seem to have been where it was used when it was a clay pit and it's a carriageway of some sort and i'm wondering if that some remembrance of that can be included in the walking path that's one and number two i  i think that six to eight feet wide is really insufficient to have as a generous walking way i would think going eight to ten feet wide would be far more comfortable for people walking that's  second and the third is where there's a lot of mud and those stones show in that old you know driving track will it be elevated from where it is on the ground that ground level  and perhaps slow biking path mr ok address that and see if i can remember as to the eight to ten foot with we have price this as an eight foot wide path and what we had planned to do was lay out on the ground both a six foot and eight foot wide with and practice walking on it and i think that our landscape architect has been pretty clear with us that they think the eight foot with is the appropriate with so to that end i believe you are correct that we will end up with an eight foot wide path in terms of paying tribute to the history of pond as a brick making facility one of the things that we anticipate doing is having educational kiosks lee throughout the park and we think this would be an ideal it will scout project or high school history class project to do and we would like to support that at some point in time that we really see this as an educational facility between the proximity to the high school the extensive history of the area and the features that already exist we think it's just a natural combination and i forgot her question was mud oh much ok we're dealing with mud in two ways the worst area where the where the flooding was shown were relocating the path further up towards it and it will rise up on the hillside i don't mean just i mean conquered it on the other sections of the south where we've had more drainage and mud both the construction of the pathway which is cut in insights into the ground and then compacted layers of stone created will help with the footing but we've also a plan to install a series of almost like french drains that will tend to divert and direct water more quickly to the clay pit pond we're never going to have four season access to this pond but we feel that we can probably get three reliably with the improvements that we've proposed bring in fall not plowed in the fourth season that's true ok the other question i had was if you done any kind of study of use how are people getting to this is this based on current use or do you imagine new users com  to it with with with this new plan we would like to attract new users currently the path is used by a very diverse group we have walkers we have dog walkers we have mothers with carriages we have high school students and we also are a part of the high school cross country running team track all of those uses will continue in the future we assume and we're hoping that we will attract more users as we improve the quality of the park so the primary motivation years because of the flooding that you need to relocate existing path because it strikes me that this is just you know a few feet away from existing sidewalk all the way around the impetus for this work was that it's a very well used walking path and we had we were inundated with phone calls when the path would become impassable or muddy and people would ask could we improve it could we maintain it could we fix the problem and we differ had a comprehensive view of how to do that and so when we came before the meeting to get a landscaping plan done it was with that in mind that we really wanted to build a sustainable path that would cut down on a roshan that would make better a better footing make it a safer path and that's been our goal for this project one last question is yes thinking about one hundred year storm do you know that she's talked about before have you looked at it in that context absolutely we incorporated both fema mapping and local lore in our location of the path and we do suspect that there will be extreme storms that may impede foot traffic along this path but it will be better than it is today and to the extent that we could mitigate by shifting the location of the path we have done that very very few were time if we were to not allocate for this that funding would go back to c p a and could be used for other paths potentially correct know i think i think it depends on the amount of rainfall and the type of year that we've had it's not due to any one particular incident you know if we have a year where we have heavy rainfall groundwater is high the pond dries out more slowly  very large storm event you know a nine inch rainfall in two days will flood the pond and bring it up i don't have a day to day count on any particular year i would assume some years it doesn't flood at all and others may flood regularly  accessible it's yes it will be fully wheelchair assessable we have ramps at the different access points from other sidewalks that was really one of the reasons that we started this project that a few years ago there was a student at the high school who was in a chair and really wanted access to this area to hang out with his friends and that got us thinking that this really shouldn't be something you have to ask for the should just be a right thank you slumber and relented precinct quick note i'd also like to request that the team their city of cambridge posted climate change or ability study which shows clay pit particularly vulnerable during sea level rise in the year two thousand and fifty and just take into account the great detail modeling of flooding that was done both for this motion the two hundred twenty eight thousand and three fifty four the construction of the walking path all those in favor police say i was oppose nay  and mary mahoney chairman of the capital budget committee tommy member precinct one the capital budget committee unanimously recommends favorable action mr carmen like to introduce at santa saying and julie crockett they're going to give me three to five minute presentation on this particular part thank you  polo road some neighbors and others have come together to form friends of p q park and what we are looking to do is appropriate twenty five thousand dollars to do a design of  is quite dated there's safety concerns there's outdated playground equipment there are locations within the playground area that have appeared to be old old uses old asphalt areas that render portions of it really useless at this moment in time so we're looking to hire a landscape architect firm and have a survey done of just the one acre playground area to look at ways that the playground can be up dated and areas that are under utilized currently can be better positioned for future uses whether they be picnic tables other more active uses or an expansion of the playground in addition to some of the outdated equipment there's also flooding that occurs in the playground area and that will be an issue that will  addressed as part of this project as well the slide here you can see was taken last year i believe in the march timeframe and shows the playground pretty and in dated with with flooding two would move into construction typically your design and surveying costs are going to be in the neighborhood of ten percent of your construction costs so this phase one would be our first step to identify the issues work with the neighborhood surrounding p q part work with the various stakeholders give them an opportunity in the design phase to come to the table with their issues their concerns with the park as it is what they would like to see improved in the playground portion of it and then move from there to design plans biddable plans that would position excuse me position us for construction for the next phase thank you thank you is there discussion of this motion on the articles   precinct four members and asked me what the story was with the doggie daycare and that leads me to it and you have stated in here that it is also a place for dogs to walk so that leads me to my questions on the doggie day care and one question that i have is you going to fence this area raaf is that a major plan according to the b have a by law that has been circumvented through two or three different agencies i don't understand how or why you do that but you do it so if you go do it are you going to secure that area and it's  but we will look into that please come to the public and that means we have and as to any dog permits i think those are done through the health department the off week at least documents and they would be in charge of any rules really i just went through it i just went through school and i would ask if there's somebody in the room that could answer the because of the doggie day care i was remiss in asking what a permit they're allowed two hundred i have the paper in my pocket but it doesn't does it need the feed and does the fee offset the damage and is that somebody in the room from the recreation or health care or whoever i think with seem to be moving beyond the scope one a two part question i understand you obviously wouldn't be coming before us if the expectation wasn't to follow this up with doing work so i appreciate that but i'm curious as to why if this vote is just for design why the contract with the landscape architect includes construction bidding construction oversight and administration seemed to me that that would be part of the request to go forward with the construction so that's part one and related part to that is if we approve this as it is are we assured that we don't have any obligation to that landscape architect under that contract if we don't go forward and do the construction related components of that work sanderson precinct five to your first question typical engineering landscape architecture design contracts have a component of it in component usually that is part of the design contract as opposed to a separate contract at the construction phase for both a contractor and a design or you'd like to have your design or kind of carried through bidding assisting the town with that process  to your second question you know we could talk to the d p w this process would be good through the d p w bidding process so if there was discontent with the design firm i'm sure we could figure out how best to address that issue that's not exactly my question and part b my question on part b is should we decide for one reason or another not to go forward with the work which ever contre design firm that we gauge will they be saying well that's fine that's great you decided not to go forward but you still owe us pick a number twelve thousand dollars for the component of the contract that was related selectmen and the town administrators office and it will be reviewed by town council too so these are the kinds of things that we will take notice and pay attention to thank you and a further discussion saying no on all those in favor of the motion for the park revitalization please say i suppose no the motion is adopted now turn to  of the capital budget committee town meeting member precinct one the capital budget committee unanimously recommends favorable action mr carmen carmen town treasurer clerk of the community preservation committee i'd like to introduce j marcotte our director of department public works mr  in two thousand and eleven town meeting voted to use funds to do some much needed repair and resurface work at all town owned tennis courts the work that was done was done in the fall summer fall of two thousand and eleven for an estimated cost of around twenty four thousand dollars this work there was performed has an estimate in life expectancy of three to five years it was a little bit less backup for the work that was done in two thousand and fourteen the conditions of the court were so bad that the contractor would not warranty the work that was done due to the conditions so what you have before you is sixty four thousand temps and contingency and thirty five thousand for design and specs this work if proved would be done for performance in the spring of two thousand and seventeen and the estimated time frame for this work would be around thirty to sixty days pending weather and say conditions things of that nature someone explain the divergence of the vote at on the community preservation commission i was actually the one pushing for additional discussion my concerns were that we're in the process of developing a recreation master plan strategic plan for the town  we're in the middle of assessing use of the various tennis courts and i thought it was important to see since when p q was rebuilt this spring how that affects usage and i thought that all of these things should probably be done before we spend money on an additional set of courts i figured that they might let you know they think there's a good chance they would last an extra year so and i know some people were concerned because there are going to be modular classrooms on the on the general court so we're to lose two courts there and ultimately we're probably going to have a bunch of staging at the high school but for the high school portion i figured there were that that's not going to break around for a while so i really it was really for me it was more of an issue of  wanting that longer range planning a more comprehensive planning to come first and the money could be spent the following year i'm also as i said a member of the recognition i think the vote there was five to two in favor so i hadn't planned on getting up tonight so i was but thanks thank you yes ma'am and janssen town meeting member precinct three i just have a question on the budget for the courts you see there's that for eight to follow without question because i think the fencing is there's a gigantic hole and kids go in and out and it's used for multiple other uses other than playing tennis whether there is going to be a budget to help maintain that fence because i think that's part of the problem and with deterioration people can speak in and out and use it to skateboard or other activities is to market to market director of public works that has been discussed and the  based upon our consultant the best measure practices for maintenance and upkeep of the of asphalt tennis courts would be the three to five years there resurfacing and it's all pending where and tear and the estimated life  resurface would be three to five years so that cost is you know for four courts now it's around twenty five thousand dollars so it's something that we need to plan accordingly to clarify though would that be part of maintaining the fence as well so that it can be used properly for just tennis this is going to be multi use we're looking at you why ten tennis we're also looking at pick a ball so pending the schedule for through the recreation we're also looking at tennis programs as well so the friends i understand that based on kids jumping or climbing the fence even one more hour long moore's or  hitting the fence could bring it up and dented up and we tried or hairs as you know based on funding and as far as of you know that part that's part of a administration maintenance part that we need to deal with on a daily just to clarify there there is a gigantic hole and the fence right talk i understand and that's kids cutting you know it's vandalism it's you know we repair it and you know something else might have and we try to do the best we can with and you know with our budget and our maintenance and repair lines thank you any further discussion joy creasing for a question on the if this generous court and i don't recall when it was left majorly repaired but how long do you figure that if you're going to do this whole from the ground up from sub were owned up along do you figure this base is going to last and is the lead is the base going to be something and to a foundation i know those wetlands there and there's a lot of the water system which would prevent damage through to whatever kicking it from the inside of a new one you know what i mean it's we can look at something like that operationally i don't know how that would or we could put in as a bit alternate but i anybody from using it but there's no activity the there was grinding done today said again there was grinding down today that is gone i should make it an every day project all right mr baghdad if you want to and i would i would ask i know that i've been here before and this is a side maybe correctly from stepping too far out i know i asked before about the parking lot at the at the rectory area is an opportunity to move the tennis court twenty and the bids came and seventy five to eighty thousand dollars lower than expected and budgeted  me memo from freezing to you all know i love tennis a lot of us have been working on it we want to see the courts used to answer your question jay i was with did bats a nine hundred seventy and we looked at the courts that's when they were reconstructed so that's a long time and the reason lot of them are being used is when you have a crack and you think you got to break a leg or something you won't play so they have to be safe and one thing peter cassidy you know said it tennis meaning that one of the screens one of the fences p q was so rotten it had wasted away it literally fell down fortunately it didn't hit any cars in the parking lot and it didn't hurt anybody so when you do these tennis courts or you do any of these fences you really should check the life of them because they are we are in a way in the connors and you do need them as i s our precinct meeting and we had a town meeting member present many there are only four cloyd's on one side of the tracks precincts to tracings a precinct three they are taking away what was for middle school to zero the high school originally had ten they took care of probably six or seven ignoring nine and ten they disappearing and the other ones we have to save for grove street so each playground needs their tennis courts and as one person reminded me today this is one sport you can play at my age and i can play even longer if my any further discussion of the under this side i'm seeing now on all those in favor please say i was opposed no the motion is adopted now i budget committee town meeting member precinct one the capital budget committee unanimously recommends favorable action ellen good evening i hope i'll be very quick ellen o'brien cushman town clerk  have an extension request to our original vital records project which was involving digitizing our vital records that go back from eight hundred fifty nine to the present we have finished all of the digitizing and we are working on preserving the actual books of the ridge original records themselves to make sure that they don't waste away and so that's what this money is to ask for we will be following the priority list that was developed in the first phase of the project clerk this is a second project we are trying not to be too greedy but we are getting a lot of public records requests and a lot of research requests that aren't necessarily public records requests regarding when certain votes of the town happened such as the high school or when pond was converted over from being dumped to the beautiful landscape the front or rock meadow etc and so what we are recommending through the second project is the  digitizing of our annual town and town meeting transcripts and our annual town reports so it will track all of our votes that your legislature has performed back to eight hundred fifty nine  are about seventy thousand images and it's kind of tough sometimes to do the research for that thank you discussion under this motion mr moderator may i this we do anticipate ultimately these will be internet based images and you all will be able to help search for your own information eventually thank you mr wife ellen weiss precinct one  for both this article and actually reaching back to the previous one you mentioned that this is the mult the part of a multi stage is this the conclusion of the digitizing or are we on the path to no further parts in future they've already been digitized we already have them in a p d f form so you know there's a very unique set regarding this particular type of vote i can see in a number of years i'm not sure i'm up to it next year but the board of selectmen votes that go back to hundred fifty nine as well which are quite valuable and eventually perhaps some of the meeting notes for our statutory committees such as the planning board of zoning board appeals i can see that that would happen but this is a discrete project underst clerk regarding vital records which is the one that we had previously approved all of it is done at the end of for digitizing it's done and so we're picking and choosing individual volumes to  restore with the northeast document conservation center's recommendation who looked at every single one of our books so that will be the reducing the iron oxides there that will be an ongoing project that will probably wind up bringing every few years to town meeting until we finish it but this particular project is actually a more discrete item further discussion saying not all those in favor please say i was opposed no thank you opted  speaking really is not my strong point although i know it's part of the job in fact i think the last time i spoke in front of this many people was about twenty nine years ago and i have to say that was i do and i'm happy put that's worked out ok so  additionally i talk fast when i'm nervous so three and three to five minutes should be no problem as part of an ongoing effort to maintain the town hall exterior in terms of efficiency and sustainability and historic accuracy of project goals we're going to preserve the assets maintain its functionality and we're going to as you can see in some of the subsequent photographs for service improve the ascetics of this system the project description i will get to a little more detail at some  so that is the overgrowth in the condition of a portion of the railing we have consulted with the building department to make sure that the historically accurate railings a lot they're not up to today's current code which calls for different size o acceptable and that's been proved the project has been adores by the belmont historic society and government historic district commission they want committee asked us if this project would require any additional maintenance and the additional majors in the future be minimal just the basic up anyways you can see the elevation there for the concord have a new side with the work will take place next year this way this is this is the readings that we are past there has been a replacement project because these are in much better condition but really it's at the landing in the whole system and on the stair are deficient but not so bad that they can't be refurbished so those will be refurbished the railings from here t curve on down to the to the street or carpet ave next one go there pretty bad and i think i would note that the the overgrowth here has contributed to in this condition over the years so with different funding part of which of the sources made a generous donation to the town we're looking at the landscaping around the tunnel complex in general anyways so just the last thing i want to point out you can see some of the sari club and see some of the younger railings here i'm sorry this item here which we've been calling it i call that a decorative bollard others have referred to it as pedestals thanks to the membership of the historical society i learned that these are two of them these are civil war canons that would donate to the town in  six and after some lively debate apparently it was decided that they would be buried facing up at that location we will be refurbished they we've ever seen these as well too they really just need a little bit of a grinding and priming and hall then we came back and did windows because the first contractor did bad job and we came back and we did doors like a year or so ago then we did stained glass windows in addition to that a week coming to the end of this project that we funded now several times in a what next is coming up in this forty feet of railing which comes to about i don't know nine hundred dollars a  into these railings the seems like all this stuff should have been done as part of the original project why is it and i'm hoping that you can tell us that this is the last time we're going to hear about doing something at town hall i sim what really bothers me is the overgrowth of all of the weeds and things which cause the railings to deteriorate even faster and we continue not to do maintenance in belmont that the maintenance and upkeep of a building is ever complete buildings a living breathing entities and over time they will wear out it will always be doing some manner of work to them so i can't say this is the last thing we'll have a do number two i agree the overgrowth is is a bit of a problem for because facilities people aren't necessarily landscapers but i think we've been we've already had discussions with the department public works we're also going to be engaging a landscape architect for us to architect to help us take a look at the tunnel complex in general and try to find some more mr more sustainable and more manageable greenery moving forward so this this particular issue won't be repeated mr white precinct for those railings in front of us historically correct going forward you know is there they're younger in a much better shape so we're presuming somewhere in the past somebody has replaced the original ones with those and short of something that person to hell for what he has done all she has done can we do the same thing on this side and not put those elaborate fence up and put just a functional railing as that one is just a boy in my in my opinion that would not be historically accurate because we believe the ones we refer to she now are regional to the building so our goal is to put back in place ok and with this school with your goal to putting this up is there are maintenance project in place to prevent what the previous speaker mentioned that you don't show it overgrown in this picture as you did in the other picture but  who maintains that road dundrum is our body i guess mr moderated the maintenance of the grounds adjacent to the public buildings is the facilities department responsibility so as part of the landscape plan that we develop manus will be  surcharge within the town of time meeting members will recall i sent out a detail package that lists all of our ministry of expenses within that package and any further discussion under the initial motion that was read into the record seeing now on all those in favor of police ai i suppose no it's adopted unanimously come one comment we did this record time fourth year we get this done in an hour and five minutes thirty here for the special town meeting on wednesday and there are three articles i urge you if you have questions to check with