Conservation, Energy, & Environment Committee - Regular Meeting

afternoon everyone it is 432 430 okay so I'll call the meeting to order roll call we have Paula Jones Nancy Bowden Robert Dickinson Claudia Guardiak and David Hager here from the committee do we have anyone online at this point okay So we have a quorum, so we'll get started. And approval of agenda. Anyone have any additions? Okay. Then we will deem the agenda approved and move ahead. Approval of May 14th, 2026 meeting minutes. Can I have a motion? Okay, so Nancy moved and Claudia seconded. Are there any corrections, additions, changes to the draft minutes? All right. Are there any nos or abstentions on minutes approval? Okay, seeing none, unanimously approved. Okay, we'll move into the town planner and environmental planner reports. Mr. Coleman.

Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the committee. Most of our report will be done under the various business categories, but two things. One, the round nine, CIF application for the town center has been submitted and for about $11.7 million, I think. And we'll have an answer in September. And hopefully we will be successful in this round. And that's on that. And on the POCD, staff and the applicant consultant are finalizing the book. The commission was very firm with staff that they did not want to see any more separate sections. They wanted to see the entire book. And we are in the process of preparing that. Hopefully, have it done shortly. And good news on that, one of the concerns I had is it was in a PDF form from the original consultant that made it very difficult to modify. But fortunately, the town has that PDF account. And therefore, we will be able to make modifications using probably Nick, because I think as most of you know, Brian Wolf, who would have been doing it, his position has been eliminated. He'll be leaving shortly from the employ of the town. But prior to his departure, Nick probably, we haven't even talked to Nick. We're going to ask that Nick get trained on the use of that particular PDF. It's an acrobat. application so that we can respond to commission all their comments going forward. Other than that, it's nice to get back to work. The budget's put to bed, and we can now focus on all things planning, zoning, and environmental and economic development.

Great.

Thank you. Any questions for Mr. Coleman?

The major difference is we removed the cost of the garage, and the garage costs will now fall on any developer that's coming forward. So the costs included are acquisition, relocation, if as appropriate, and public improvements.

And acquisition means acquisition of the property?

Correct. And there's more than one property.

Which properties?

I'm not going to tell you. Yes, you are. The four properties that need to be acquired are the mall, the bank, which is separate. the liquor store, and the old farmer's exchange site.

Yeah. And I think those properties are all delineated in the center plan, are they not?

Yes, they're all. Yeah. Which is available online. The center plan that was developed and approved is also, in essence, what those of us who have been around for, is also a redevelopment plan. So that plan, in essence, authorizes the town center, EDC, to act as a redevelopment agency and authorizes them to acquire and develop property and work with a developer. Obviously, if there's any expenditure funds by the town, that has to be approved by the town council.

And the four properties are owned by multiple owners or one? The bank is...

The bank property is owned by the same owners of them all. the liquor store and then the other one are individual owners.

Any other questions or comments before we move on? Okay, did you?

I hope this is not annoying. The farmers' exchange buildings that were on the railroad tracks that people used to bring their crops to, is that all going to go away now?

Well, no, there's no decisions been made yet on the use of the property. Okay. Okay, I mean, it is, I mean, there has been discussions, and we haven't been able to solve it, how we would preserve the small depot building that's still there. That's certainly in the conversation, and I think most of us would like to see that happen.

Oh, that's great, because that's how I feel. It's a real sign of our past and our agrarian nature and so forth and so on.

There's a lot of history to that building.

Yeah. Good. I'm glad it's being treated nicely.

One other, Dave, the... There is an addition where the gas station would also be acquired. And that would require some brownfield remediation.

Garage? You said gas station. You said, is that what you meant by the garage?

No, you asked what changed in the grant. And the most significant grant application is we removed The development of a garage to the town's cost. If there's a garage to be developed, which were proposed on the northeast side of development, basically in the area where the Farmers Exchange is on Jerome Avenue, was originally included in the grant application for the town. The state is not in the business of giving CIF money to build garages. So we removed that. It's about an $8 million cost. And that now, if is done, would be a requirement of the developer.

Okay, so at this point, I am going to move on to old business. Unless, Mick, do you want to say anything in terms of environmental planner report before we get into the items? I mean, go ahead.

I can do it fast if that's helpful. Okay, so.

We're under a little bit of time pressure today because we have a 6 o'clock meeting coming in, so we want to. Okay. Okay.

Yeah, I can do it pretty fast. I guess just a reminder that the Urban Forestry Program is doing their inventory pretty soon. That's coming up. That's on a Bloomfield News Flash. So it's out there right now, but I'm just giving folks a reminder. You can find that info online. I won't go into it in much more detail unless prompted right now.

I'm going to prompt you because I thought I saw something come through email and then I couldn't find it. So I thought I imagined it. Apparently I did not. That was it, right?

Yeah. I'm pretty sure we're talking about the same thing. I can send you the email.

This is the right-of-way street tree inventory, right, that's being done, which is great because we have up to $30,000 matching grant from the state on that. So that is a good thing. That's what you're talking about?

Yes.

Okay, good. Excellent.

Thank you. I'll just move on unless there's any more questions. For the Bloomfield Farmers Market, I worked with Laura Palandra, the market manager. We officially coordinated adding the market to our recurring town calendar as a calendar event. We're also coordinating it... being posted on the town's Facebook event page, as well as other town social media. It'll also be advertised in town buildings, such as town hall where it's curling on a rotating, that screen in the middle of the atrium there. So just news on that. It's up and running and the town is advertising it because we really value it. Any questions on that? Yes.

Not a question, but I, if it's the same one I just saw over at Social Services, it has a picture It has a photo of the farmer's market being set up in the town hall parking lot. And probably that'll confuse people. It's going to be in Philly Park, I believe, right?

That's fair. I know the exact picture you're talking about. And I had a similar thought. I can see if a different, better picture could be put up there because you are correct. The current market is in the Philly Park parking lot, not a town hall. I'll look into that.

Yeah.

Okay, the last thing I wanted to put on people's radar because I'm aware that one of the goals, so to speak, on the categories for CEC priorities. In terms of nature-based solutions for environmental health, I see here continuing artificial turf education, health and environmental impacts. I just want to make the CEC aware here that the proposed plans for Rockwell Park have come across the desk of our department. Those plans, the proposal does include artificial turf fields. Staff is going to make recommendations that if they approve, if any commission approves artificial turf fields, that there is something along the lines of a decommissioning plan, maintenance plan, et cetera, and just advising per CEC's guidelines here about the health and environmental impacts of such a field. But I just want to put that on the radar out there.

Thank you. Any questions or comments?

I just don't quite understand. Instead of not doing artificial turf, we're going to do it and just tell people it could be a problem. Is that what you're saying? I didn't understand.

Yeah. I think I wanted to make the committee aware here that a turf field, artificial turf field is currently being proposed. Right. And I guess I sort of want to open it to discussion of people's reactions, but I know the time is limited.

Yeah, I will make a comment in terms of what my current understanding is, and other people can jump in. My understanding, and I have not been following this closely lately, but I've asked periodically, my understanding is that the original... proposal had the artificial turf field in it, there were concerns raised by this committee. There was a webinar with some experts. And then in terms of getting the CIF grant, To start working on the park, the plan was phased and the the original phase, the first phase on had nothing to do with the playing fields and so. the materials of those fields were not kind of in play. That was the last thing I understood. And every time I've asked, oh, are you going ahead with artificial turf? The answer was like, well, no, no, no. Those are the original plans. We haven't made any final decisions on that. And that's kind of where things were left for my understanding. And I'm seeing a little bit of nodding around the table. So if somebody has a different understanding, that would be good to know. And I see, is Mr. Merritt coming to, is the counselor coming to the table? Okay, go ahead. I'm sorry.

That was my understanding as well. Okay. But the plans that were presented to us for staff review indicated an artificial turf and not. So that's why we were reporting that to you. Thank you, yeah. You know that. And I have had just a preliminary conversation with Nick, and we haven't had a full staff conversation on it yet. Right. But one thing, you know, we want to obviously get your input. If they're going to stick with, you know, with artificial turf, We wanted a remedial plan on the backside, but...

It costs $2 million more to put in, at least those were the original prices, and you have to replace it every 10 years. So I'm sorry, I'm interrupting, I apologize.

You know, my preference, obviously, and I've indicated many times, is real turf. But it's not my project.

Mr. Goff, and if, actually, so I just want to make sure members of the committee, does anybody have any questions? And then we will invite members of the public. Yeah.

Go ahead. I asked my question, which is, it was my understanding, I've been here at almost every single meeting, that we had all decided that artificial turf was not good for kids. You know, we had evidence, we had testimony, and I didn't actually know what the final decision was, but I just kind of assumed, well, CEC has done its work and presented data or opinions or whatever, but... I'm surprised to hear that it's still there as a plan. But if it's not your thing, I don't know who we should be talking to.

Mr. Goff.

Yeah. Is this on?

It's on.

Okay. Yeah, I'm very unclear as to what plans have been submitted because as the chair said, the original CIF grant was a phase one project and this has been also discussed ad infinitum at the Parks and Rec Committee. So I don't know what plan, if you're looking at the overall, are you looking at a phase one plan or are you looking for the overall thing? for the overall Rockwell down the road if we got phase two and restored the fields.

So for the A24 submittal and potentially getting it towards the TPZ eventually, they are submitting both phases at once. But with the idea that phase one, I believe, has funding, but phase two is TBD, I think.

I think that's correct. I think that's correct. And What really bothers me here is that the Rockwell Park Committee, they were told – well, they made a decision to take artificial turf out of the plans for Phase 2 as an undetermined – and as I said, they got a – Estimate from the company that did the plans. Who is the consultant? Fasano Neal. Fasano Neal. And it's to, I think it was Fasano, whoever did the plans. And it was, and the number is in the final plans. It's basically $2 million less. And in terms, $2 million less to do natural turf. And they should not be submitting anything. I mean, the Rockwell Park Committee has not made a decision. I'm not even sure the Rockwell Park Committee has met since any of this happened. So, I mean, that's my understanding. I mean, what needs to happen, I think, is phase two plans need to be pulled. And nothing needs to be submitted to the TPZ at this point that would involve making any kind of decision on the type of fields. This committee, the Parks and Rec Committee voted unanimously for an ordinance to ban all future artificial turf and to not replace the high school field with artificial turf.

Correct.

And that has been in limbo. because of concerns by the school system about replacing their field. So, frankly, I don't understand where this is coming from. People who are not friends of the town yell and scream about transparency This is a transparency problem. This is a big transparency problem because we seem to have people in departments in the town submitting things that are unknown to committees in the town and are contrary to understandings and directions that have already been indicated. So, you know.

Okay. So timeout and Councilor Merritt.

Yes. I share your concerns. And I remember hearing from you and being very impressed about the argument for not having and thinking that we need to put this on the Sound Council agenda. And that's the only way to really shut the door. And I think that's quite possible. And I think if you would speak to them, the council, about, as you've spoken to me, for example, it would be very convincing. There are people that feel very strongly in favor of artificial turf. And I know there are arguments going the other way. And I've heard them. They almost convinced me at one point, but then I said, no, come on. If it really does cost more to have artificial turf, why are we doing it? Even if you say it, they're saying it's not as dangerous as it's portrayed. And they don't know that. I think you very eloquently have made that argument that it is dangerous. And I would suggest that we put it on the town council agenda and have this out because that's the only place it's going to be settled. I know towns have gone both ways. And the athletic lobby in this town, the school system, for example, really likes that artificial turf. And they have... Probably David in the recreation department has... I don't think he has been against artificial turf. No, he has not. I think he is probably the one who's leading it down that road. And... So I think, you know, I'm going to stop that. If you think it's important, and I think you do, I think we need to put it on the town council agenda.

Okay. Okay. So at this point.

I just would like to note that we are just the messengers.

We appreciate you delivering the message, actually.

It's good to know. We have made it a commitment to keep this committee informed of any issues that we believe you should be aware of. Yes. But we have not been involved in conversations regarding decisions on the use or non-use. of artificial turf. We all have our opinions and it gets TBZ. We'd probably, we would probably, uh, voice that certainly a staff. Um, but at this point we're just the messenger.

Okay. Okay. So I am at this point, I'm going to move on. Um, But this is on the radar, and Councilor Merritt, we will have a conversation. And actually, you can stay up here if you would like, Councilor Merritt. I'm going to move into old business. And before we get into old business, I want to recognize our guests today. We have Betty Jane BJ Hardison. We have Julie Peck. We have Sharon Mann. They are interested, I know, in certain items on the agenda. And definitely as we get to those items, please feel free to come up and participate. We have kind of a standing public comment. you know, item on the agenda near the end of a meeting, but I think it's more productive to try to get commentary on agenda items as we talk about them. So please come forward when we get to something you're interested in. Okay.

And welcome to Jessica.

Hi, Jessica. Oh, So let's see, getting into old business, landscape zoning regulations and ordinances, particularly the tree piece of that. Hopefully everyone had a chance to take a look at kind of the latest iteration that Nick had shared. Nick, if you'd like to take it away.

Yep.

I'll just do a brief intro. I promise. You should all have received the draft proposed amendments to existing regulations, 6.1.C, existing vegetation. These were reviewed by staff and are here for your review. We're hoping to hear any comments so we can make it stronger or more in line with what you think is best as the committee. Another note that what will go along with this regulation is proposed amendments to what's being called the tree ordinance. I think the exact name for the ordinance is something like tree removal. And I'm sorry, I can't recall it right now. There's an existing ordinance that we're proposing amendments to as well. Together, they will be, for lack of a better word, stronger and more comprehensive. But because this was ready now, we wanted you to all take a look and get your preliminary thoughts. The proposed amendments to the ordinance were reviewed by our tree warden so we can get his thoughts on how they impact his job, because they certainly do. Now that we have his comments, our staff plans to review the entire package this Thursday. And then hopefully we can get that out to you all shortly thereafter. Then you'll have both pieces of the puzzle and can go from there. But I still would like to take this opportunity to hear your initial thoughts.

So anyone from the committee and any of our guests who have questions or comments are welcome to come up. Anyone? David?

This has to do with town trees, right?

Yes. Trees which are in the town right-of-way or on town property.

The right-of-way is how much? Five rows.

Okay. I'm sorry, I will also clarify in the regulation, it also accounts for removals of trees on private property, which must be accounted for in a site plan being reviewed by the TPZ. So the regulation is both private and public trees. The ordinance will mostly concern the trees owned by the town.

So a lot of trees are removed on private land with no oversight. How is that managed?

So currently for large, let's say large scale tree removal, usually that would disturb a certain area of earth that would then become an erosion concern. That's when it would be need to be reviewed either by our zoning enforcement officer or Or it may kick in the need for a special permit or site plan for like, say, a large development. For those kinds of tree removals on private land, that is when it needs approval from, say, the TPZ that they must approve, that they must run by... which trees are slated for removal and which are not. In terms of private land, if a tree needs to be removed on private property, that's kind of up to the property owner otherwise, if it's not disturbing a large enough area.

So enforcement on this, I don't understand how that works.

That is partially why we're trying to make these regulations stronger because there seems to be a lack of clarity in some ways and potentially a lack of enforcement. So as far as zoning, they'd be enforced by our zoning enforcement officer. If they were also to not be in line with a site plan or special permit by the TPZ, they would follow the channels for that. And then they would also need to be, in line with the parameters of the tree warden and what he or she or they permit as far as their permitting process.

Right. And go ahead. Actually, I'm going to make one comment just because I got an email text from a resident recently who was very upset because three houses down, a lot of trees are coming down. And she knows Nick. So by the time I texted back to contact our environmental planner, please, Mr. Gabuzda, She had already done that, and he went out with the zoning enforcement officer and looked at the property, and I think it turned out they really did need to do a permit because of the area, but they weren't out of bounds in terms of trees on public or in right-of-way, correct?

Yeah, I can briefly summarize. That's kind of a good case study, if you will. So they removed trees on private property. All the trees which they removed, they were allowed to remove them. They didn't remove any trees that were in the right-of-way or on town property. However, they were in violation because in their tree removal, they disturbed an area of earth larger above the threshold, which would require a zoning sign-off. So they were in the zoning violation because they removed trees that were in excess of earth disturbance permitted. However, other than that, they also dispose of the trees in a proper way. But other than that, there were no concerns with wetlands or the trees which they removed. They had the right to remove them, the trees themselves.

So it's an interesting example because it was dependent on somebody complaining about the resident. The system really is on the honor system. in terms of residencies are are concerned yeah mr coleman do you have yeah david it's complicated it sure is yeah um there are a variety of things one you know we have the most best control over our own right-of-way in our own properties

When we get on private property, there are a variety of things. One of the ones that got my attention right away was all the solar installations and the tree cuttings that were resulting of the solar installations, which to me made it a wash. We lost the canopy, but we got solar. So the issues are if they have to come in for a site plan, then we can have a pretty good idea because we're going to require them to indicate to us the trees that are on the property, their scale, and what they intend to do. We also want to get to a point, and we haven't fully solved it yet because it's expensive, is okay, if you take down a heritage tree or a large canopy tree, we would like replacement either on site or on another location selected by the commission in equal diameter to what was taken down. Now, obviously you're not going to put up a tree that's four foot in diameter, but if there's one that's four foot in diameter, you got to put up a number of four, you know, four inch diameter trees to match it. That's where we're trying to get to. The area, the, the, So the other two areas that we're struggling with and are challenging under both our zoning laws and state laws is enforcement and penalty. And that is what Nick is trying to resolve in his investigation of a variety of ordinances in a variety of locations. But we hope to get to the point where One, we can get a better idea of when someone wants to cut the trees down. Two, what's the scale that they're going to cut the trees down? And what are the makeup of the trees that they want to cut down? And then next, what's the follow-up to that? What is the remedy to the removal of the canopy? And then how do we enforce that? We don't have those answers yet.

Sharon, do you want to come up? Actually, come to the table and speak into the mic, please. Thank you.

So I had a question about, I was reading, we talk about heirloom trees, but we don't talk about champion trees. And I was wondering, have there any studies been done on how many champion trees there are in our community and if there's any way to protect them? because champion trees are usually based on size, because I tried to look it up and say, so what's the difference? And I mean, I know I've seen a lot of private homes where they cut their trees and then ask forgiveness afterwards. And it definitely is an issue. And I'm very pleased to see that you're trying to find ways to do it. And I also asked with Dave, you know, how... can these people be penalized? I was talking to someone about it who's an arborist and the question they asked was, well, yes, it's very important to protect heirloom trees and champion trees, but we mustn't forget there's some mid-sized trees that will be our trees in the future and how do we protect them also? So that was my question to, you know, are these concerns at all being thought about or developed?

The short answer is yes. Whether we get, you know, get to answer all of them in the first go rounds is challenging. But yes, they are. And I would think that, you know, and there are, you know, the first area where we can really get control is in the right of ways and on a town property. And there are both heritage and champion trees in the right of ways and whatnot that we can protect. In terms of inventorying on private land, good inventory is going to be a challenge. And one of my thoughts on that is we all know this town pretty well, and we probably know where most of the heritage and champion trees are located, unless they're really back in the backlands. And my sense is we're going to have to use that network initially to at least map out where they are and have an inventory of them. So if a property owner comes in and we know there's a champion or heritage tree on that property, we can have the conversation right away.

Just one suggestion. We could get at least a partial list, I think, of notable trees, big trees, by going to the Connecticut Notable Tree Database, because you can sort, there are various filters, and you can filter by town. So if we filter by bloomfield, it will bring up all of the trees that have been measured. So that's a starting point.

I also think sort of an educational program. A lot of the community doesn't really know. And, you know, if we had something, trees mean something to us in this community and had something out there so people could learn more about it, they might be more concerned. Because I think people do care in this community about trees. It's just that maybe we need to tell them, you know, here are the do's and don'ts and let's try to think about the future, you know, what the next generations will have to deal with.

Okay. Kevin?

One quick question for the environmental planner and the planner. Are tree companies that cut down trees required to be licensed by the state? Are they required to be licensed by the town? Do we have an inventory of those? I mean, how does that work?

As far as I know, Kevin, they're licensed by the state. They are not licensed by the town. We don't license many things. And I do not believe we have a complete inventory. I'm sure that the Department of Public Works has some form of inventory because they use – we have a vendor that does, you know, tree trimming – for the town in certain areas.

Right. Because the one thing I'm really wondering, listening to David's questions, and I know that's the problem. The problem is like both enforce, you know, we write something and as pointed out, you know, except for the stuff the town actually controls by being on town property and or the right-of-way, whether we can do anything depends on what the level of disturbance is. that's hard to know up front. But on the other hand, if you have these tree companies coming in and they are aware that we have an ordinance that says, you know, we have certain provisions if you disturb more than X percent, you know, they're in the position that if they ignore that and we find out, then can we do something about that and say, you can't do business here? Or I don't know. It, it, It seems to me that while I agree with Sharon about educating property owners, both to the legal requirements and to the value of trees, and that's extremely important. But at the end of the day, a lot of people, when they hire somebody, they're just assuming those people are going to take care of the permitting and whatever is needed. And so it's really important that we anything we do addresses the people that are actually going to be cutting the trees down and know that they have to take, you know, to the degree we can put some responsibility on them.

Yep.

Actually, I'm going to comment at this point because I think, first of all, I just want to acknowledge that this work in terms of strengthening regulation came out of the Trees for Bloomfield initiative. David Mann is the one who worked with Director Coleman to get something on the books in the first place. This is another iteration to try to improve it, which is great. You know, it's... It's a step, which is a good step. But to the comments about trying to get more information out there, this would be a good thing for Trees for Bloomfield to do again because five years, six years ago, we did some educational webinars and things like that. And maybe it's an opportunity once we have something to try to do some education around it publicly, you know, more public facing just as a starting point.

And one other thing with that education effort, and we've talked about this a lot and Director Coleman mentioned it, I've talked to so many people and even solar companies that will start talking about the effect on your electric bill but they will not talk about the thermal effect of cutting down trees. They won't tell you that to get to generate this electricity, you will need to run your air conditioner a lot more in the summer potentially. So we probably need to get some actual information information out there about the trade-offs in terms of solar and thermal the thermal effect of deciduous trees on your home when they lose their leaves you get an extra heating effect in the winter and you get cooling effect in the summers okay so um david and then last last comment the

the individual tree cutters do not have to come and get a permit to cut down trees on residents. Is that correct?

Depending on the size. Depending on the scale of what they're doing. I want to say if it's over 10,000 square feet, over 5,000 square feet, they need to get a permit.

They need to come to the...

Right, and tell us they're doing it. But what concerns me at the moment is we're hanging our hat on the disturbance of land. And it seems to me we need to be more direct and we need to hang it on trees directly, which is a little more difficult. But right now we're hiding behind how much land are you disturbing? If you're disturbing too much land, then we have some control over you. But that's an indirect way to get to something that David wanted to get to directly. And I think we all want to follow through on that.

So at this point, we'll move on. I think we have a couple takeaways from this, though. In terms of where you are, I think is at a better place than we were at. So I think that's, you know, the takeaway. If anyone has comments and they want to send them along, please do so. But we'll talk about doing some outreach. And maybe that's a trees for Bloomfield thing. And I'm looking in Sharon's direction. Yep. Nod. Yep. So Sustainable CT, you want to just give us a quick update? Good news.

We're certified.

Yay.

Is that too quick? Yeah, we're certified bronze. Yep. There's going to be a ceremony later this week, which I'll be attending. I'm pretty sure, Madam Chira, you are as well. Chiran is. Awesome.

And Brad Huskin. Yeah, there's at least four of us from Bloomfield. So, yeah.

If you can't make this event, there is a second one in October where we get our official plaque. We put on Town Hall, you know, where we have the current one. It's our first certification in seven years.

So pretty great.

Yes, I think moving forward, again, time is short here, but I will just say we want to go bigger. With your support, we want to try to aim for at least silver by spring of 2027, so about a year from now. I have ideas of ways to get more input from the community as to which actions Bloomfield wants to prioritize. Do you want to see more things with pollinators, more things with renewable energy? Now that we're certified, we have three years of breathing room. I don't want to dilly-dally too much, but we can get that feedback. In the meantime, there are other actions that I think are more low-hanging fruit that we just didn't get to because we wanted to submit during this cycle. So with your approval, I'll continue to work on those things, racking up points. at a later time, if not now, getting some kind of community survey out there, getting feedback as to which actions we want to prioritize as a community. I think that's the next evolution in this process. That's all.

Okay. Excellent. Extreme heat update. I'll look at Nancy and Jessica and Claudia. Actually, Claudia for that. Yep.

i was supposed to do something i didn't get to it i just need another month but look into the corey stringer institute at uconn see how we could connect i apologize about that okay good nancy anything to add um the i guess i did look quickly at corey stringer and they're mostly concerned with no i didn't really call anybody they're mostly concerned with um

sports, athletics, and things like that. I think so they can, you know, I think it's a question of what do they have to offer us in terms of education. And other than that, I didn't do anything more because I was waiting for the other extreme event to extreme heat to calm down known as budget.

Extreme budget.

Okay. we'll move on. Um, let's see. Uh, so next under old business, um, I circulated something yesterday that Nick has been working on with director Coleman's input and direction, um, proposed agricultural resources support and, um, Nick and I generally try to talk like once a month prior to the CEC meeting to, you know, just talk a little bit about the agenda and kind of what he's been working on. And I think this is kind of an effort to kind of start working into some of the things that will be related to agriculture, the agriculture, maybe ultimately an agricultural zone in the POCD. So Nick, correct me if that's not fair. And, you know, please. Yep.

Again, I will try to be brief but elaborate as requested. So the initial prompt to make the agricultural zone, obviously that is a initiative to promote and support agriculture here in town. As I was getting into it, I was crafting the zone, I was doing a lot of research trying to understand policies in Bloomfield, other parts of the state, the country, et cetera. And then I went back to things like the 2012 POCD, the current draft POCD. And I think instead of just focusing on an agricultural zone, I think if we can take this opportunity to look at the several items on POCDs of 2012 and 2026, to do a better job of the research and outreach to understand current practices in town. What do people need? Having dialogues with local farmers while doing that kind of outreach and inventorying and understanding all of which are priorities on the BOCDs concurrently then doing a policy review to see where the gaps are and how the best type of zone, best type of agricultural policies can be designed to fit Bloomfield. So I know I've read the Conway study. I know there's been developments and research in the past, but I think a 2026 list or something in the present that shows exactly what's happening with agriculture, I think that will best inform and support a zone, a regulation, an ordinance, et cetera. So that is the idea here.

Right, and I think Lynn is screen sharing. So for those of you who don't have a copy in front of you, Basically, the first item is basically developing and maintaining an inventory of agricultural practices in town. So active farming, what properties are currently registered as PA 490 under PA 490, which are being currently farmed. how many people are employed, and just the economic value. And again, the comment I made to Nick, and I want to open it up. I'm sorry, I'm kind of hogging at things here. But because I'm involved with the Land Conservancy, we get not infrequent requests for people looking for land to farm. And it's hard to find it. So I think trying to get an idea of the... demand or the wants for farm property would be helpful if we can do that. But anyway, you know, there's four items. Hopefully you all had at least, you know, 24 hours to take a quick look. So any comments, suggestions, other input?

So with respect to just those things you mentioned, how do we get that information? How do you get the survey? How do you do the research? How do you get the outro? How do you find out who wants to farm but can't farm because they don't have the land? I'm interested that you say people are calling in. I want to farm. I don't have a place to do it. Just that part requires some creative surveying and work.

Well, I'll just throw one idea out. I would start with Laura Palandre, who is the market manager. And she has started networking with farms locally. The Land Conservancy gets requests through, and I'm drawing a blank. There's literally an organization that tries to act as kind of a clearinghouse for farmers or people wanting to farm in the state. And we could go to them just to get an idea of what here is going on locally. I know of a young couple who lives on Philly Street. And long story short, they're leasing land from the land conservancy in East Granby. They were looking for something and were hoping to buy a farm in Windsor, and that didn't work out. But, you know... That will be a couple who are farmers who live in Bloomfield, but are actually farming on property in East Granby.

So I just learned of a couple who were very interested in it, and the land they could find was in Bristol. So they're leaving Bloomfield. But, I mean, there are a lot of resources that I don't know if you want to include here. You know, I don't know how you get the high school ag center involved, our farm involved, Lisa Lane involved, the community gardens involved. There are three or four or five community gardens in Bloomfield. There's a garden club. Yep. I mean, all these...

Number two, engage in a dialogue with local farmers, local land conservancies, community groups, and nonprofits to identify additional needs and support, as well as people looking for land. I mean, this is a guidance document, and it doesn't have all the answers, but I think the suggestions you're throwing out, David, are great. You know, I think those need to be kind of captured, and that's where you start.

Can I add something? So I just remembered I wrote some notes down here that perhaps say what I meant to say a little more eloquently. So as I mentioned, we've been working on the agricultural zone. At the same time, we've been working on tangential regulations like the backyard chicken regulation. We're going to talk about that later. Moving forward, though, to best inform these policies, I think it'd be best to have a thorough understanding as to what's happening. And you just mentioned a bunch of resources and practices that I think if we can... Write that stuff down. You learn what's happening there to not only inform drafting policy, but then use that as a justification when it goes above a committee, a commission, a council, what have you. I think having that makes it stronger because there are some folks who say, you know, there's no agriculture happening here or there, but I think that's not true. From what I understand in my department, that's not true. But I think doing this inventory, having these conversations is one way to kind of beat that A, stigma, and B, make the regulations or policies stronger. I will also briefly say all these items here, I essentially took them from the POCD. I didn't pull these out of thin air. So this is stuff that was, you know, workshopped with the town in the past. Lastly, many of these items, as you can see, I wrote, you know, aligns with this, aligns with that. Several of these will help us get points for sustainable CT. So it's not only just for Bloomfield's agriculture. It's not only for the POCD. It's for sustainable CT. So there's several ways to extract value, if you will, from the things listed up here.

Could you just define what an agricultural zone district is?

Is that a quote?

Yeah.

Yeah, I don't mean to laugh, I'm sorry, but that is kind of the question, right? It's like, you know, what does that mean for Bloomfield? The state of Connecticut defines agriculture, and it's a very long paragraph. I don't have it in front of me, but we can either default to how the state defines it and then talk about what those practices being in Bloomfield, or we can kind of go our own way as well. That's part of this research in my mind.

Okay, so Nancy and then Sharon, and then we're going to move on. And Bob, did you want to say something? Okay, so Nancy, Bob, Sharon, and we'll let Sharon have the last word today. Okay, go ahead.

I just wanted to throw in, and maybe that's assumed in 1A or somewhere in 1, that there is such a thing as a farm license that people can get, probably have to get in some cases, but if somebody wanted to, I'm going to throw something out, have backyard chickens, have a, large um group of bee boxes any bee boxes you can apply for a farm license and and part of that is just to register the fact that you are a farm and the part another part is um kind of a political influence aspect to it by if you have a farm license you're you're entitled to certain kinds of I think maybe with the Farm Bureau or something. I'm a little vague on that part, but I know there are farm licenses that you can apply for. So maybe there's the Department of Ag.

Farm Bureau? The state?

Well, I don't know. I think it's the state, but it could be that.

There's a state organization or there's a nonprofit.

There's a Department of Agriculture too. So I feel like it's more state. But anyway, those are places to just look for the inventory. Okay.

Okay. Bob? Just a question. Now for agriculture, if somebody is farming, they get a tax reduction because of the use of the land, correct? And I assume we would have access to a big list of all those properties.

Yeah, we know which properties are PA490. Is that what you're talking about? PA490? Yeah. Right. Right. Yeah, there's some federal lists and I think some state lists too, for sure.

And that's part of the inventory in number one. Okay, Sharon.

So I wanted to know about further criteria for what constitutes a farm. For instance, my neighbor has a garden that's longer than this room. He has a beehive. And is that a farm? Is somebody who takes their front yard and grows all their vegetables on their front yard is that a farm i mean it is growing vegetables and stuff do you have to sell them to you know uh farming you know do you have to sell what you grow in order for it to be constituted a farm i'm not against all those things i just wonder you know what's the criteria because if someone you know especially with the way The economy is today, many people may start to want to use their front yard if it faces south as a garden with larger areas to grow things. Is that permissible? I remember a few years ago, there were people up in arms because people were growing stuff on their front yards. So just wondering how that's defined.

Okay. May I respond to that or? You may, and then we will move on. Yep. I'll say briefly for the initial kind of outreach and round tables, I say we have a big table. You know what I mean? Anybody who says I farm, you can join the conversation. That can mean one box of produce. That can mean you're growing acres of corn, you know, and everything in between. That's what I propose for the initial conversations personally.

Okay. Good, so if you have feedback, please send to Nick. At this point, I'm going to try to be... fission, I guess, is the word. Solar regulations, in terms of pesticide use, I want to save that because we're going to get to new business and we can take it there. Okay. That went through by the TPC, correct? Our updated solar or our new solar regulations. Brand new. Good. Yep. So any comment before we?

Yeah, I wrote three bullet points. It was voted on unanimously by the TPZ to approve. I forget the exact date, but it was filed with the town clerk on June 5th. There will be an official notification of its adoption by the TPZ in the June 10th issue of The Current. That is tomorrow. Once it is in The Current and the public is notified, it becomes effective. So it should be effective as of tomorrow.

Which is great. So we have something, which is good. Good. All right. Revision of chicken regulations. Is there any update?

No staff updates.

Okay. Plastic-free July daily activity calendar. I just wanted to mention that again, that our CEC friend, Brad Huskinson, is involved with... basically reducing plastic usage. And there's an organization that has a daily activity calendar. We voted last month to get that out on the website so people will take advantage of it. He could not make today's meeting, but he will be working, I think, with Lynn to make sure she has what she needs for links to get that up and running. Go ahead. Yeah. I met him at Shred Day.

Yes.

And on September 15th, there's gonna be a big plastic seminar

Right, and it's on the events. So we've got it, but that's good. So you've already, that's good. You've already kind of gotten to that. So that's good. So that's one of our upcoming events. Okay. So without further ado, I'd like to move to new business and have some time to spend on that item, which is pesticide use in town. I just want to give a quick preface as to how that landed on the agenda. I got an email from Bob raising questions about the adopted solar regulations. Actually, I don't think he asked that, but I asked myself that. Just in terms of prohibitions on, you know, like restrictions, prohibitions on use of pesticides in solar, larger solar arrays. Because again, to the extent you're trying to encourage pollinators, that's problematic. And then I got an email from Julie Peck just asking about what the town's policy was around pesticide use. That's something this committee and the BBC has talked about before. I mentioned all of this to Nick, and Nick said, oh, the Pollinator Pathways Committee just met, and we're talking about this as well. Um, so it seems like it's a good time to talk about it again. So, um, Nick, you mentioned that you had gotten some information and then Sharon had sent an email about, um, kind of what the town's policy is. So maybe we can start there and then invite others come up and participate. Yeah.

As far as legislation, I did a review of zoning regulations and ordinances. I couldn't find anything that specifically regulated herbicides or pesticides outright. So in many ways, town rules default to the state standards for such applications, which are fairly thorough. that's mostly surrounding things like applications near schools, agriculture, waterways, who's licensed to apply pesticides, that kind of thing. In terms of what the town currently does, myself and the chair of the Pollinator Pathways Committee here in town discussed with Dan Carter, the director of public works, as to what the town currently does as far as town managed properties. Per the director, the town engages a vendor who spot sprays herbicide. There's no broad spraying that we know of. And they spot spray areas and flower beds at town facilities. They are not broad sprayed. A vendor also sprays guardrails and select areas such as fence lines once per year. When he was asked if the Pollinator Pathway Committee could designate certain town properties as being a native bed, one that would not be sprayed, the director said that as a possibility. So essentially that's currently happening. That's what broadly we've discussed. And that's mostly it for now. But I want to hear people's thoughts and see if we can put some of the books going forward.

Nancy is leaning forward and I know Julie wants to say something. So you want to start?

Yeah, I actually forgot to look, but, um, person i live with said he noticed a sign in the field that's right across from the end of uh duncaster the on ramps to 89 189 187 that said this is a wildflower um preserve or something like that after they mowed it and it actually did have a bunch so yeah i don't know i'm like i wonder where that came from So we don't think it's official or somebody just did it and threw down some seeds maybe?

I'm sorry, where is this?

Go to the end of Doncaster. If you're going to get on 189, 187.

So the northern end of Doncaster.

Yeah, right across the street where they had mowed it down. They'd take a bunch of those.

They took the trees out. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And so then just in the first triangle as you're going to go on the south direction. I think that's where he saw it there. That state. Okay. So there may be a way to do it. The state's doing it, I guess then.

Interesting.

Oh, I see. Is that what they're doing? They have a long way to go, I'll just say that. Okay, Bob, go ahead and then Julie, go ahead.

I guess if you own a piece of property and you decide you want to encourage it, you can put up a sign saying you're doing it.

Well, I came mainly to listen, but I have been trying for seven years to get Seabury to stop applying pesticides on our lawns and garden beds. and I haven't won yet, but I'd like to hear more about what Bloomfield might do. I'm interested in, well, what I call residential lawns, but that, in my lingo, means just about anything that isn't farmed, because that's a different issue, I realize that. But are they putting them on the town-owned lawns here? Like around Town Hall, for example?

We have a vendor who is spraying, and I think Sharon can probably... Either last year or the year before, we had to have a direct conversation with them because they were improperly spraying in Philly Park. And so I think we... But the general response has been is they're not trained in... and the expertise of what is a pollinator and what is not, and what is a pollinator area and what is not. I think there's a variety of courses of action besides regulation. One is to see how we can get the private contractors educated in what they're doing. Secondly, and Sharon's been working at this for years, get our own town staff educated. And then again, probably a public education because we have, you know, limited control, again, and enforcement on private property. But I think we have had conversations, Nick and I, just recently, of whether or not, I don't have the answer yet, whether or not we can actually have the council adopt an ordinance that restricts the utilization and type of pesticides. I know the state has that authority, and they exercise a little bit. Whether we have that authority, I don't know, but I think that's one area we'd have to go to.

Well, the state did pass a law a year ago, exactly, and the governor signed it into law that it doesn't go into effect until October 2027 to give people time to adjust.

Mm-hmm.

But it is outlying the use of neonicotinoids on residential lawns as of that time. And we use them at Seabury. And I've noticed quite a decline in the bird population. It's a real problem. And I'd like to see them eliminated. I don't really see the point of them. I grew up, as maybe two or three other people here did, when what you did with your lawn was seed and clover and grass together. Nobody put pesticides on because they were too busy using chemicals for the World War II.

Right. Then they made fertilizer.

Yeah. Then, you know, the war ended. Oh, what are we going to do to make money now?

Yeah, right. Yeah. I mean, one of the things that... the environmental planner and I talked briefly about just in terms of, you know, getting this onto the agenda and just the general conversation around how, you know, there's a lot of different people for different reasons interested in it. And, you know, Part of it, I think, is, you know, is this something that is an initiative that we want to pursue in some way that kind of ties into sustainable CT? Is this one of the things the community would like us to work on? And, you know, there's lots of different things you can do in terms of generating points. And Nick mentioned the idea of doing some kind of community survey to try to get input from different groups to figure out what they'd like to work on. But, you know, everybody likes bragging rights. You know, if the town adopted better practices, I think at least in terms of modeling what we would like to see in terms of the community and what makes sense, you know, that leading by example as a town would be a good thing to do. So, you know, I welcome working with the, you know, I think CC beautification pollinator pathways, I think all these groups would welcome trying to work actively with Seabury and others to try to think about how we want to, you know, this is the first conversation like what might we do um and i think it's great that the pollinator pathway group has been talking about it too because um that's nancy you want to say something right in bloomfield we have an organic landscape company called harrington's um off woodland um

And I know there are others around, but they're right in town now. From what we all know about organic, anything labeled organic, it might be more expensive than who we have now, but you're looking at dollars and cents, and often you do save money down the road with some organic method. So it's somebody maybe to talk to at some point or invite a quote, proposal, whatever. Very nice. You'll probably enjoy it and you'll probably learn a million things.

Yep. Go ahead, Sharon.

Mosquito sprays also being included with this?

We can add mosquito sprays to the list. Buckets of doom. Yeah, we want buckets of doom and not, yep.

I would ask that when, so I asked not to spray at the town and they did it in And whether you call it spot gardening or not, we ask that it not be done. My question is, is there any way for you, because you're the people in charge, to ask what are you spraying? What exactly are the sprays that you are using to determine are they poisonous, are they herbicides, are they pesticides?

We can certainly ask the question whether we get an answer. Yeah, I know. But I think that... I think that knowing the Director of Public Works, I think we can get an answer.

Let me be clear. This is not recorded.

Yeah.

It is recorded. Yes, it's recorded. 330 Park spent $250,000 on their landscapes when they were put in.

Sharon, talk into the mic. Oh, sorry.

The 330 Park had an investment of approximately $250,000 when their plants were put in, and both the east and the west side were planted. At one point, the weeds began to grow, and I don't know who manages the landscapes, but the nutsedge and the weeds have taken over, and last year, I believe, a non-selective pesticide, I think it was an herbicide, was sprayed and killed everything on both sides of the building. Okay. Now for something that to happen, who gives that approval? If there was a committee that set it up and there were plants put in, who determines that? And can that be, is that part of the ordinance to determine those kinds of things of you know, how and when sprays like that are applied.

You know, I'm speaking not from complete knowledge, but I believe the process is that Department of Public Works contracts with a vendor, and that vendor is basically doing their thing. I'm not sure there's, and I don't want to misspeak, but I'm not sure the level of guidance that comes from DPW to that vendor. They assume the vendor knows what they're doing, and that's why they were retained. I think, as Mr. Carter has pointed out many times, the landscaping designs for the town buildings are done without his input, so that he has handed a... a landscape that he's not trained or equipped to maintain. And therefore, you know, they have a vendor that does all over. One would assume that that vendor was knowing what they're doing. That assumption may not be entirely correct. I think there are two issues there. One is the actual application and what they're doing, but I think there's an upfront issue when we design our public buildings. such as the library, such as 330, any schools and whatnot, we need to be going forward much more alert to what is being proposed so that we know whether or not we have the capability to maintain it. I think there's an initial issue that you're handing the Department of Public Works a landscape that they are not horticulturalists. We haven't been able to hire one yet. They don't have the skill set to maintain sophisticated landscaping implementations.

Excuse me, but with all due respect, I have been chair for 10 years. And this has been going on for 10 years, that same statement. And if this town is moving forward and brings in designers to put in new landscapes, then I find fault with the council that they aren't willing. For instance, we've asked for a horticulturalist for the last six years to manage some of these properties because we realize that the DPW isn't knowledgeable to handle these projects. But yet the projects keep being built But no one knows how to maintain them. So either we eliminate having landscape and go back to a few bushes and a lot of cut grass, which isn't, I don't think, a solution either. But I agree with you that there needs to be some sort of oversight and maybe some discussion on what gets maintained and how long and when. We are reaching a crisis, I mean on the backside of 330 park it went from a landscape design to rock now rock still gets weeds and how do you stop the weeds, you have to spray so. it's still an issue. Where does the spray go? It goes down into the water, into the...

Okay, I'm going to cut you off. But you're bringing us back around to a good point because you said, what do we do? We spray. So I think what we want, I mean, where I would like to end the discussion for today is, what are our next steps? Because I want to walk away with a next step. I mean... Where did we land? And I'm trying to figure that out.

Several years ago, we did have this conversation with Dan Carter. And I'm pretty sure I have something more in here about schedule of what and when we spray. Yeah, that's right. But he does have the names of what they're using. And We looked up one. I think it was the Philly Park controversy. So the information is available. If we can't hire a horticulturist, maybe we have a consultant that comes in and just looks or suggests things. And then we go forward with that. That's what I...

Okay, so that's...

I'm not adding a position.

Right.

I will have a conversation with Dan. If you don't know, you ought to know that he's a short-termer. Dan will be gone by the end of the month in all reasons. So he's catching up on a lot of things and advising a lot of us on going forward. But I will endeavor to have a conversation with him.

And I think we want to try to maybe kind of collect thoughts, which we've started doing from the different groups in terms of what the concerns are, and maybe even look at sustainable CT in terms of is that a direction we want to pursue in you know, for a next step. So let's stop there for today. We've got about five minutes. So just getting into the very end of the meeting, I just want to share, I want to thank all the people who helped with Shred Day and electronics recycling. It was freaking cold and rainy. It was really cold out. And the young people weren't there to help us because they had another event, so it was resident volunteers and some very diligent directors and a couple town staffers. We filled the shred truck, 40 bins, about 12,000 pounds of paper. shredded and will be recycled. And since I've been tracking a new record in terms of weight for electronics collected, 4,305 pounds, which is good. By a couple hundred pounds, it exceeded the previous high. So that was a good result. We filled the truck with about 15, 20 minutes. And I think we just want to remind people, don't bring your magazines. Don't bring your junk mail. If you're concerned about address labels, just rip off the address labels to save a little space.

And otherwise, I think we would have made it to noon.

So we were close. Didn't turn very many people away. Claudia has already mentioned the story of plastic screening and panel discussion with Prosser on September 15th. Prees for Bloomfield. The photo contest is open, and we're launching it. So the town's pushed it out, and there will be the flyer and the messenger this week, June 1st through October 22nd. That's it. Any other last licks? Any other public comment? Yes, Claudia. Yeah.

we had if we wanted to do more flyers and more we want to do more flyers and more posters to expand our public relations work which we sort of end up needing to do right could we get money for

making flyers and... We have a budget that was approved. Can we use that per... We can use some of that, but what we will do, and I will try to collect more information. The shred truck cost went up by $86 this time. So it's almost $900 now. When we started, it was $600 to rent that truck. Well, gas, just think about it. They're driving this big truck. Think about the cost of gasoline, right? So basically, we need to think about if we do two In a fiscal year, if we do two shred events, we need to allocate about $1,800 for that. We are going to do the photo contest. We'll have some expenses for that. All that being said, we will have some additional funds available because I want to talk to India about making sure we could do flyers, you know, that kind of thing and have some money available for that. Okay. I don't know. I don't know what you have in mind. Okay, I don't know what you have in mind, but maybe, I don't know. We'll talk, yeah, and we can circulate. Any ideas that you would like to propose, we can circulate so that people can see them. We will do that. Good. Yeah, can we have a motion to adjourn?

Yeah, well, I did want to say you have a budget. What we have is a line item in the budget.

Right.

I haven't seen a budget.

We have $3,750. No, no, no, no, no.

We have $3,500 allocated to us. But we should have an itemized budget so we know about how.

Correct, which is what I'm talking about in terms of if we do two shred days a year, which people.

I mean, I've never seen it.

We've talked about it in meetings.

Correct.

Yeah.

I'd like to see it. I'd like to see it. We could just write it down and we could all have it in our folders. That's all I'm saying.

Okay. I mean, that's fine. It's not, it has the, the budget for the next fiscal year for CEC has not been an agenda item. We can make it an agenda item next month. Okay. We'll do that. Okay. Motion to adjourn. Second. Okay, first and second. Okay. We are adjourned. Thank you.