Plan & Zoning Commission - Regular Meeting

anywhere down. I'd like to call this meeting to order. Special meeting Town Planning and Zoning Commission, Thursday, July 17th, 2025 at 7:04 p.m. First item on the agenda is a roll call here. Marshall here here. Roger O'Brien here here. Thank you. Next item on the agenda. Uh chair is going to ask for a motion if we can extend the approval of the minutes for February 27th, March 27th, and June 26 to our August 28th meeting. Is there a motion? So moved. Second. It's been moved and second. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I. Oppose. Extension. Chair vote sign. Mr. Chairman. Yes. We start um with the three members absent. Um um the two present alternatives alternates, Mr. O'Brien and Ms. Medwiner could be seated. Okay. Thank you.

Next item on the agenda is a public hearing. I'll read the application. Uh continued from June 26, 2025, 529 Cottage Grove Road. Special permit and site plan application per zoning regulations section 4.3.C3G. Retail stores 4.3.C.4.I. Drive-In windows in accordance with 7.11 and 43.C.4.R. Restaurants and ice cream bars to allow construction of a new one-story 15,349 ft commercial building on a 4.4 4 acre vacant lot in an I1 zone. Applicant is Aster Sterile Holding Company LLC Property Owner, University of Hartford. The chair will now entertain a motion to reopen this public hearing. Mr. Chair, I move we reopen the public hearing. There second. Second. I second that. Thank you. It's been moved and second. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I. I. Oppose. Abstension. Chair votes. I. Okay. Before we get started, just want to go over the process of how we conduct our public hearings. We first hear a presentation from the applicant. We'll then take comments from our director. We'll then have questions from the audience. We'll take questions from the commission. We'll then have comments from the audience. We'll take comments from the commission. and then the applicant will have one last opportunity before we uh close the public hearing. With that said, Jonathan, uh is that uh James here for this application? Yes. Okay. Online, James Cassidy and Mark.

Um so, good evening. Oop, sorry. Can you hear me? Yes. Good evening. For the record, my name is Jim Cassidy, professional engineering principal with the firm of House Pearson Cassidy. My address is 630 Main Street in Cromwell, Connecticut. Um I believe in the audience you also have uh Britt Green U from Oxford Architects. Can you promote him to a panelist too? Uh he's our project architect for this development. Um but I'll I'll start uh with me this evening. Uh I'm here representing Astero Holding Company uh who's prospective purchaser and developer of a property at 529 Cottage Grove Road. So with me this evening is Mark Diodavo, a member of Asterero Holding uh company. Um we initially were before you and gave you our initial presentation back in May 22nd of this year. Uh we were back before you last month. Uh which time we were continued uh because you had just received plans that night of the meeting. Um what I'd like to do is a brief overview of what the proposal is because it has been two months. Uh and then go into a little more detail on revisions that have been made to the plan uh to address uh staff and commission comments um from that initial meeting. So, if it's okay, I would like to share my screen. Actually, Mr. Chair, could we um maybe adjust the volume up a little? I I I'm having a little trouble hearing. I assume some people in the audience are also, so we could do that. I don't know if it's on. James, can you speak again? Sure. Can you hear me now? It's a little better. Little better. Can you turn it up any louder? Um, let me see what I can do. Give me one second. And it should be about my max. Can you hear that? Okay. Can you hear better? Yes, that's a little better. Thank you. What I can do is, if you don't mind,

I'll just shift my camera, which the microphone's in. Uh, give me one second, and I'll put a little closer to me. Just gonna interject a little bit. Linda Lauriano, um Mr. Cassidy, who else is in your team that we need to promote? Sure. Um Brett Green of Oxford Architects is with me this evening. Thank you. Okay. Is that better? It's about close as I can get to the microphone now. Yes. Okay. So, again, what I'd like to do is a brief overview of the project because it's been two months uh since we last um presented this to you. uh and then go over the changes that go on based upon uh staff comments and also commission comments from that initial meeting. Um so can everybody see my screen at this point? Yes. Yes. Okay. So the parcel we're talking about is located at 529 Cottage Grove Road. On this site photo, the property itself is outlined in blue. Cottage Grove Road is to the top or to the north. Um it is bounded on its east or to the right um by the Connecticut DOT railroad rightway. It is bounded on the south or the back and also the southwest the bottom left corner um by other vacant lane that land that's owned by the University of Harford and continuing on the west side is uh bounded by property um that presently occupies the medical office or Sterling office buildings or sorry medical office. Uh and then just off to the uh west is Northwestern Drive opposite Jolly Drive. Uh as mentioned, the overall property is 4.44 acres. It is zoned uh I1 uh industrial 1 has about 330 ft of frontage along Cottage Grove Road. You'll see a blue outlined area uh down in this location off the western side. That's a 50-foot access way uh that we have across other property of uh University of Harford to allow access out to Northwestern Drive. Sorry.

Presently uh the entire site is uh wooded other than a front uh right corner, this upper corner here where there at one time was an existing residence that was removed uh as part of the widening of Cottage Grove Road back I believe in the um initially when they inquired it back in the 50s. Uh to the rear you'll see a teal colored area. Uh there is a wetlands on the rear portion of the property. Uh that wetlands is associated with flood plane uh for Beamman Brook uh which is flowing in a southerntherly direction just off site. Doesn't come through the property, it's just off site. Um so that's the wetlands associated with that. In addition to we have teal areas along the access way uh or wetlands areas along that access way. uh the northerly or upper one is associated with the detention basin uh on the stling physician property uh and then there's another one in a wooded area. Uh I'll note that we did go to the wetlands commission back in March and did receive unanimous approval uh for the ultimate development of this property. uh topography on site uh slopes generally in a subly direction down to Bean R brook at a gradual grade with elevations ranging from about 84 along Cottage Grove Road down to about 78 uh down along Beam and Brook. There is a majority uh an area just beyond the wetlands at this bottom corner uh that is within 100ear flood plane. Uh we did file a uh flood management application with your public works department as part of this application uh and gave them all the required documentation as part of that. As mentioned, what we're proposing to do is to develop this um as a retail uh um mall or a retail building. Uh the building itself will have a two to 14 sorry the building itself will have a 15,349 foot square foot overall. Uh we're proposing to break it down into five spaces, five tenant spaces. Uh one on

the far left or to the west uh is about a 4,000 square ft square foot space. The ones in between uh range from about 2,000 to about 2500. Uh and then on the far end, uh this one down on the east is a small space. Um that is about 2,000 square feet. Um right now, uh we're looking at a retail tenant on the far west side. Uh we're possibly looking at a bank tenant on the far right or to the east side. So associated with the eastern portion of the building, uh you'll see that we have these drive-thru lanes. It's set up for a bank type drive-through lane. Now uh where there be two lanes one either for a teller window or what we call an ITM and then a second one for either an ATM or an additional ITM. ITM being an interactive teller machine. Uh it's a new new thing the bank is doing where it's actually connected to a hub uh where a person working in a hub actually comes up on a screen and deals with the transactions rather than an automatic teller machine uh which has no interaction. Um so I'm going to skip a couple screens here. Um so associated uh with the development of the building uh we need to provide parking uh to comply with the town's zoning regulation and parking requirements based upon the current uses uh within this building um being retail uh for the majority of about 10,000 square feet of it and then also uh either a bank or a possible restaurant at the pos at the easterly end. Uh we're determining that we need a maximum of about 87 parking spaces on this plan. Uh what we're proposing to do is situate uh the majority of the parking uh to the front um or to the north of the building and then also down to the east um with some additional parking spaces down on the south or the bottom. Uh these park spaces would generally be used for employees and also some additional parking spaces uh off to the east. Um so there' be a driveway that circumferences all around the building um providing

access to all these parking spaces. access to the site. Um the access driveway would come in at the far northwest corner or the far left corner. Uh the purposes of that is that we actually are restricted on access to Cottage Grove Road um by state DOT. Uh when they widen Cottage Grove Road, uh they limited the amount of access. So we are looking about having 85 ft of width at this location that can actually access that site because it is a boulevard road in this location. uh that all traffic would be heading in a eastbound direction. Uh if I just blow up on this quickly, uh you' be you'd be able to either make a right turn in or right turn out um to allow for access in a westly direction. As I mentioned previously, what we're proposed to do is run a second driveway out the rear and do a small extension of Northwestern Drive. Uh this would provide access to a traffic signal at the intersection of Jolly Northwest and Cottage Grove Road, allowing uh vehicles that are headed in a Wesley direction and Cottage Grove Road to pull into Northwestern Drive and then through the back drive into the site or uh exiting if they want to go back in a westerly direction. Uh they'd be able to go up back and obviously to this traffic signal and make that as a safe maneuver uh rather than having to go back down. I think it's almost to uh Kapac Shopping Center where you can make a U-turn uh in Cottage Grove Road. So, uh we figured it'd be a safer access. The site itself uh is set up um to be able to maneuver a what we call a WB65. It's a tractor trailer with a wheelbase of 65 ft uh for deliveries to prospective retail tenants. Uh we anticipate that a tractor trailer would be coming in um along Cottage Grove Road in a westerly direction, go down Northwestern Drive and come in the back driveway uh along the entire back of the building. Uh

we've got it set up with a loading area to service uh those tenants. Uh and then once they are done, they' be able to continue around the entire circumference of the building and actually can make a maneuver back out into Cottage Grove Road heading back out in Eastley direction towards the highway. Uh of the 87 parking spaces, we are proposing four of them to be handicapped. Uh there are two handicap directly in the midpoint of the building. Uh so right in the the center location here and then additional two handicap in this location here um for the tenant on the far uh west end of the building. Skip a couple pages more. Um we're going to talk a little bit more about this as part of the um comments that we received from town staff. Um but what I want to represent here um is that as part of your regulations uh we need to provide adequate queuing of vehicles. Uh what this plan is demonstrating is that whether this becomes a restaurant use or a bank uh we are providing adequate queuing. In particular, I want to read your regulations. Uh a couple things that come out and this is under section 711 of the zoning regulations. Uh it says um the couple things. Number one, under 7-Eleven uh for vehicle queuing, it says that the vehicle queuing needs to be separated from the drive aisles. Uh what we're proposing is the area in green uh if this was a restaurant, uh would be vehicles that are going from the menu board to the drive-through window. Um so the vehicles in green would represent you have five vehicles for your queuing. uh if it ends up being a bank and it's a teller window, you still have the five five vehicles for queuing here, plus an additional four to five for queuing at the ATM. Beyond that, um if it's a restaurant, the one vehicles in red will be vehicles that can queue at the menu board for an additional nine vehicles. U in your regulation, it says they need to provide queuing for a minimum of 10 vehicles. Uh so you're looking at a

minimum of in one line a minimum of 14 vehicles. We did it with 14 because this is actually a DOT requirement. If it ends up being some kind of a restaurant use, uh they have a requirement that says I can't queue any further than going back into the state highway. Uh we're easily uh meeting and underneath that requirement seeing that all the queuing is actually stored behind the building. Excuse me. Um, in addition to uh in your in your regulations, uh, it mentions that, uh, I need to have the drive-through lane, uh, as far away from the entrance drive as I possibly can. So, we have it situated on the opposite side of the building. Uh, it also mentions that if I'm in an industrial or business zone, uh, that from the drive-through lane where you exit to the main entrance, it can't be any closer than 30 feet. Uh, I'm sorry, 60 feet. Uh, it's actually about 200 feet away. So, it meets and exceeds all those requirements. We also set it up in a manner uh so that the building is slightly angled here uh so that the drive-through lane is actually kind of angled away from Cottage Grove Road uh facing more out towards the storm water management area we have at the back of this property. So, we feel that we meet and exceed all the requirements of section 711 of your zoning regulations that deal with drive-through lanes. Uh, as I mentioned, uh, this building or this site is set up to be able to maneuver a WB65. Uh, this is actually a turning maneuver for a WB67, which is a slightly bigger wheelbase. As I mentioned, they would come in in a Wesley direction down Cottage Grove Road, can go down Northwestern Drive along the back of the site, pull into that loading area, and ultimately go around the circumference of the building, back out the driveway, and head back in the easterly direction. Um, storm drainage. Uh, we've gone through extensive review on our storm drainage and storm water management system with both wetlands and also your town engineer. Um, simply what's going to happen here is that the whole site slopes away from Cottage Grove Road. There'll be no discharge to Cottage

Grove Road. Everything will be collected through a series of catch basins within the parking lot and then safely conveyed to two storm water management basins. This one is the larger one at the back or south end of the parking lot. And then there's another small one off the far east of the parking lot. Um these basins are basically designed to treat storm water quality um which is the first 1.3 inches of runoff u from imperous areas. That's the requirement of the latest um DUP storm water quality manual uh 2024. Um so that the soils out here are excellent uh for treating and actually will be able to get a lot of infiltration back into the ground. From there there's an outlet structure that attenuates any larger flows uh and then discharges ultimately into a level spreader and then ultimately off into the wetlands. Again we prepared an extensive storm water report as part of this application uh and submitted that to town engineer and gone through a review and I believe at this point he has no additional comments on it. Other things that are going to happen we talked about site utilities. Um there is going to have to be a small extension of a water man uh down northwestern drive and a small extension of a sanitary sewer. Uh we'll be extending from that water man uh for providing domestic water and fire protection to the back of the building along with a sanitary sewer line uh that would go to the new manhole that would be in Northwestern Drive. Uh we talked about storm water basins uh unless you want me to get into a little more detail on them. Uh, I wasn't going to talk too much more about them. Um, but they have been designed and reviewed by your staff. Um, what I'd like to talk now about is changes to the plan. We'll go back to the architecture uh shortly. We have Greg Green with us uh who's the project architect from Oxford Architects. So, he can talk a little bit more about changes that he's made to the building for commission uh comments. Um but what I'd like to talk about now uh is uh comments that come out of both the

staff and also the commission uh at the main meeting. Uh revision number one um was landscaping along the front portion of it. On the original plan, we had proposed just to have a lawn area um between uh Cottage Grove Road and the edge of the parking lot. Um the commission wanted to see something a little more substantial such as a burm uh and landscaping along the top of it. Uh, a couple things I'd like to point out is number one, when I take a look at your zoning requirements, uh, the requirement is actually that we needed to have, uh, the front parking lot so it does not go over the front building line. The front building in this line in this area, uh, is 40 ft. Um, for my environmental reasons, we actually went to the zoning board appeals. Uh, we received the variance and we were able to slide the whole site, building, and all activities to the rear 20 ft forward. So this is leaving us a 20 foot wide uh area along the front. Um for landscaping uh on the plan uh what we've done is on to if you look at the grading plan we've associated two foot high burm. Uh so two foot high burm is going to be about 12t wide uh 2t high and then what I'm looking to do is put a series of shrubs uh a vigorously planted uh burm along the front with all a series of shrubs. We have about 60 shrubs. Uh we like to maintain them at a height of about 24 to 30 in. um so they don't block the view of the store. Um but we did incorporate some uh significant landscaping along the front of this site. You're going to see these little eyebrow areas. I'll talk about that in a second as to why I'd like to have those on the plan. Uh but other changes that have occurred uh per staff comments and also per the commission comments. Uh initially, uh we did not show sidewalks along the frontage of this site. At this point, uh, we've add sidewalks along the entire frontage, uh, with a crosswalk across our proposed driveway and two ADA compliant ramps, uh, at the driveway. Uh, you'll see a little jog in the end of the sidewalk here. Uh, if anyone's

been out there, what you'll find at the end is there's actually a guardrail. There is a street light pole. Uh, and more importantly, there's actually the trellis uh, for the railroad crossing signals in this location here. So, we're proposing to jog uh the sidewalk, provide DOT with a small easement in this location uh to allow uh the sidewalk if it ever is continued further to uh avoid uh that river crossing uh trellis. Addition to uh we were requested to make uh some pedestrian connections between the front of the building and this walkway that we're putting out front. So, we've done a couple things. Uh we extended the walkway uh along our entrance drive. I did offset it a bit from the entrance drive in that um for snow removal in the winter months, I like to usually have some type of a snow shelf um so it doesn't interfere with the sidewalk. So we have this little section of curved walk uh complements our sign location. It would again end in a handicap ramp uh with a crosswalk across the driveway uh to another handicap ramp and then ultimately to the front walkway in front of the building. Uh the handicap ramp is so so situated so it's just behind the stop bar and the stop sign. Um so it' be safe access for pedestrians crossing uh if the cars are stopped at this location here. In addition to um there was a comment um from commission about the pedestrians on the east side of the parking lot. Uh we proposed to saw another handicap ramp uh with a walkway and then a crosswalk area that goes across the drive-thru lane. Uh this is another requirement of the section 7-Eleven of your zoning regulations that pertain to um pertain to drive-throughs. Uh they want to make sure you have safe uh pedestrian access across and through drive-through lanes. So we feel by putting this crosswalk and a dedicated walkway uh we've achieved that. Uh you'll see that the majority of the parking spaces other than the 12 at the back of the site which would again

would most likely be employee spaces uh are set up in a manner uh so pedestrian access uh to the site would be safe uh without interf interference with the drive-through lane or any other travel uh or especially the loading area to the back of the building. Uh as I mentioned I have these little eyebrow areas on the front island. Um the purpose for the eyebrow um are twofold. Um it was brought up at the last meeting or the May meeting is how do you handle snow removal? Um what we've done is we've included a a snow management plan as part of the application. Um so what you'll see along the front of the park lot is by incorporating these little eyebrows, it opens up opportunities to have small areas for snow storage along the front of the parking lot without interfering with the landscaping. Uh in total, uh those little blue areas end up to be about 210 cubic yards. Uh we also have an area along the entire west side of the west driveway that picks up another 415 cubic yards of storage. And then along the east parking lot near the storm water management basin, uh we have some additional areas picking up about another 188 cubic yards. And then one other small area just above uh the storm water manage basin for another 98 cubic yards. Uh as that part of the storm water management plan uh we have a table and calculations on this. Uh it gives recommendations based upon other projects we have done uh as to best practices for managing snow removal uh like specifying different types of storm events when you should be using salt application uh and also training the staff that would be maintaining the parking lot. Ultimately, uh, what I like about having this table on the plan is I can actually go through some calculations and make some estimates as to what we could potentially handle for snow on the site. U, this is a a calculation that I've worked on several

times and and monitored over different projects I've done. It seems to be uh realistic uh in this uh in the numbers. Um what we do is we take the area of the parking lot and in this particular case we're estimating an average storm of about six in inches. I'm sorry. Um if I take that um 6 in and we apply it over six snow events, uh you'll see I have a total volume of about 5328 cubic yards. Um but what we find is when you're doing snow removal uh and put it into piles, you actually get about a 1/5if uh reduction in capacity um between the plowing and also uh between the storms, you tend to get some melt in the snow. So that actually works out to about 1,66 cubic yards. Uh and ultimately on the site plan in those blue areas I showed you, I had about 1,000 cubic yards. So, I'm pretty confident uh that the areas identified on the plan can accommodate up to about six 6 in storm events. Uh obviously, if it becomes more than that and it starts interfering with park spaces, then we'd have to talk about removing uh snow from the site. Um other changes uh that have occurred um for staff comments and from um commission comments, uh I would say the big one is on the uh access driveway coming in. Originally in this area, uh we had the driveway Oops. pretty tight to the norly property line. Uh the grade from the edge of the driveway down to the norly property line was about a 2:1, maybe a little better than a 2:1. Uh in addition to there was no room for a snow shelf on that side. Uh per the uh town staff request uh we've actually shifted the driveway uh six feet to the south uh to allow additional area for grading. Uh we were able to do this uh and stay within the original uh wetlands permit approval uh for the regulated activities associated

with the wetlands that we were impacting and also uh with the upland review area that we're impacting. In addition to uh your town engineer requested uh that we provide an easement uh on this property on this 50- foot rideaway um so that if a town vehicle such as a snow plow or emergency apparatus pulls down to the end of the roadway they have an area to turn around. Um so as part of the uh dedication of this extension of the roadway uh we will providing that easement. Um but that's something that's going to happen as part of dedication of the roadway. uh dedication of the roadway cannot actually happen until such time that the road's constructed. So I believe that's one of the remaining conditions uh that you'll have as part of the approval of this project. Um with that um I would like to have Brett talk a little bit about changes that he made to the plan. Uh and Brett, can you also talk about the parapit walls about on the front of the building and how they'll screen the uh the mechanical units on the roof? Sure. And Jim, do you have the the plans that you can put up on the screen? Sorry, I'm on my wife's computer. Give me a second. And um I don't have them on this loaded up on this computer. If you got them handy. No problem. Excuse me. For the record, Brett, can you just state your name and occupation? And yeah, let me see. Do you want me to turn on my camera here? Hold on. There we go. Uh yeah, my name is Brett Green. Um I'm an architect. Oxford Architecture is our company. Um, working on this project with Jim. Back up. Yeah, go ahead. You want that one?

Right. Okay. Okay. Just let me know which you're going to want, bro. Let's start with this one. Yeah. Just the latest elevations. And um do you also have the renderings that we shared with the town? Yep. I got 3D rendering here. Yeah. So, I'll start here. Um there there was one that we ended up doing with the line of sight, but I think the the comments that we received the feedback um we we removed all the split face CMU from the front of the building, the portion of the building that's built visible from the public way, replaced it with the stone um all the way around on the base. Um so that kind of unified the elevation. We also um did a line of sight study to the mechanical units. I think the most of them are screened fully with the parapit, but we looked at at the one on the right just to see if that unit would actually be visible. Um and so we did a diagram and Jim, if you got that, um like to show them that. Can you can you send it to me real quick? Um I don't have the ability to um but um it should be should have been in that same uh group of files we shared that had the renderings. Yep. Yep. Just go ahead and I'll pull up. Yeah. Apologize for that. Um yeah, I had to I had to leave the office. Our um HVAC went out at the office today. It's like a 100 degrees here and um so I didn't have my computer with me here. I figured all those were already loaded up. Um but we were able to demonstrate which

hopefully if Jim can pull up the file that um from the sidewalk and from the street um that you would not be able to see that mechanical unit on the roof based on the just the angle here. I got it now. Give me a second. Yeah. And then we did a couple renderings to kind of demonstrate that as well, but um we'll show. Yeah, here we go. So, we did one from each side on the east elevation, also on the west elevation demonstrating that line of sight. So from the sidewalk and then also from a car driving down the road that um you know you would see the top of that parapit wall but not the unit just based on that angle and then um if you got the renderings Jim we can show those too just so you can kind of see the shopping center in 3D that I have. So this is a sighteline demonstration that you have. Yes. Yeah. And that that was the main concerns that um we had adjusted based on the comments we got from the staff comments. Um so yeah the materials we have stone you got um siding and it's also important to know I don't know if you have it there uh in at the council chambers but we did um um provide a sample of the culture stone that we're looking at using on the building. Do you have that there? Can you hear me, Linda? I'm sorry.

I do have for the commission. And um Brad, can you just go over again just the um just so we're clear on the sides of the building originally was all CMU. Um right. Yeah. Most of the Waynees coat that we were showing down along the base, we were showing that as being a split split face CMU product. Yeah. And um we've made that adjustment to where we can do the whole front of the building. So it's kind of your front facing the street would be with the stone and then we've wrapped it around the sides uh to like the the next pilaster. So you kind of have a nice clear break on the side that's going to be your main visibility to the building. Um treated that with the nicer materials there and the green area, the alakava area and the white areas. Yeah, we we modified those to just be the siding as well. We're just breaking it up into different color schemes just to And it's a cement board, correct? Yeah. Right. Like a hardy blank siding. And then the the um the gray pyesters and the uh the green polyesters also the same type of material. That's correct. Yeah. Yeah. So you really only have three materials basically. the stone, the siding, and then we have the split face on the back. Well, yeah. And then you've got your stain seam metal. Sure. Standing the canopies. We're using um like a decorative sconce fixture on the pilasters. It'll be kind of the same throughout and unifies the lighting across the shopping center. Yep. So, the other thing I wanted to

mention is that um we also been working with potential bank tenant. Um so, there's been some revisions made to that end of the building too. Um Brett, can you explain those changes that have been made? Yeah, I mean the the schemes that we've seen from this particular uh bank um they wanted more of a residential looking window scheme. So, we've modified kind of our standard just u storefront to look more like a like their concept that they provided. So, that's why you're seeing more of the muttons introduced into the windows and Okay. And uh so the other thing, Brad, I've was able to pull it up. I'm just going to bring up your renderings again. Okay. Yeah, that'd be great. Here you go. There we go. So, yeah, this is just kind of looking at it in uh 3D from the sidewalk perspective as you're coming down Cottage Grove Road. Um, and we kind of did it from both angles so you can kind of see and um this is from line of sight from a human perspective. So, you're seeing, you know, and we we modeled this all in 3D. So you you would be seeing that rooftop unit if if it was visible, but clearly here you don't see it at all. So in both of the renderings, you don't see that rooftop unit, right? It's because there's a parapit wall on the front edge. Correct. So there's another rendering of the front. Yeah. Okay. Thank you, Brett. Yeah. You're welcome. So, um, as we've gone through, I had planned jumping back in at the end of Brett's presentation and could talk a little bit more about the changes are made to the plan. Um, what I can say is that we've been diligently working with both engineering

and planning. U, I believe at this point we have all their comments uh, and concerns addressed other than items that will need to be taken care of as I mentioned like extension of the roadway, which would actually have to happen uh, once the roadway is built uh, for an acceptance of the town council of that roadway. So, I believe all their comments and concerns were addressed. Uh, we have tried to incorporate comments that I picked up on the May uh 22nd meeting from the commission. Um, so with that, I'm going to conclude my presentation and I'll hopefully answer any questions that the commission may have. Okay. Thank you very much, Jonathan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, as hopefully you can tell, um, we have spent staff has spent considerable amount of time with this applicant and, um, we believe that the revised plans, um, meet all of the, uh, and address all of the concerns that were expressed at the last meeting and that staff had uh, in its review. Um they also not only our staff but the engineering staff and the um and the wetland staff all have basically agreed that their conditions have been met. Uh the project complies with the special permit criteria in 95e and staff would recommend uh that the uh application be approved uh as uh revised and presented this evening. And we have uh given a series of conditions on page three and four of the revise report and a suggested motion for approval uh at the end of that report. Okay. Thank you. At this time we'll take questions from the audience in regards to this application.

If you want to speak, you have to come up to the podium and state your name and address, please. And this is only questions. And if you haven't signed in, please sign in. I had I missed the previous meeting, so forgive me. But um my name is Melissa. I live on Prospect. Um my question, I guess my comment is this, right? So it's a new development. Um, but I don't know if the people need that, but what do we get as a town, as a city? What do we get? Um, because we're going to have pretty much a right lane on Cottage Grove that we can't use. There's going to be cars coming in and out of there, which is all good for business. I understand that. But after that light, you're not going to be able to use that right side of the road, right? So, that's more of an inconvenience for the people that live here, which I guess, you know, this is why we're here, right? To kind of figure out what the what the bumps and the bruises are. My other my other concern, I guess, would be the fact that if we have trucks coming in from the back, right, and they're making the way around, a truck leaving onto Cottage Grove, not to mention the traffic, it just seems like there's just going to be a lot of a cluster there. Um, there's a lot of talk of like shubbery and bricks and whatnot, but I don't know if you're, you know, and I and I I get that y'all want this approved, but I mean, just in terms of the people and the people that are here, we have banks, you know, restaurants, all that is cool. I dig small business, but I just I just don't know like in the morning on the way to work and all that. I just don't know if that's going to help anything. That's just going to create more of a cluster. That's my comment. I have more of anybody has something to say. Thank you. Any questions regarding this application? Please state your name and address, please. Hi, it's Ann Gustiffson. I live on

Prospect Street 21. I'm just wondering um if you have like five units on something and not all of them are occupied, does that mean that the taxes are paid on the entire building? Are they paid per unit? Like, how does that work? I'm just wondering. I believe the owner pays for the full building. Okay. So, it doesn't matter whether they're occupied or not, right? That is correct. Okay. Um are like in a development like this um are there any obligations to have tenants lined up before the thing is approved or? No. No. Um and I know this is late in the game for anything like this but and this is sort of a comment also for the plan of development. Can you can you save the comments? Okay. Well um for this too but is there any way to um have things like solar panels or something on the buildings just as a matter of course? I mean for new buildings or is that like a later comment? I don't know. I'm not sure. I can ask the developer if he wants to address that question regarding solar panels. Do you want to take a comment by comment or question by question or do you want to wait till everyone's asked their question? No, you can you can answer the question regarding the solar panels now if you like. Right now solar panels are not proposed. Um you know it's something that have to be weighed out see if it's you know feasible. Um but right now it doesn't seem appear to be feasible um to be able to use solar panels and have an economic benefit for this development to do it. Okay. Thank you. Okay. I guess that's

Hey, thank you. Any other questions from the audience regarding this application online? We do have Okay. Just have them uh come in and introduce their name and address. Hi. Uh, good. What happened? Oh, can you hear me now? We can hear you. Yes. Thank you. Todd Cooper, Councilman Chubuchcci Ridgefield. Um just I I do have a a couple of follow-up questions uh from that the audience has asked. Um are there any specific tenants who are uh online to occupy this space? I understand that there is a bank and bank lane and interactive lane that have been planned. Are there tenants who are lined up uh to occupy these spaces specifically? So, I'll answer questions one by one. Um, one of the issues I always have with getting a site plan approved and uh lining up tenants is you really got to have the product to be able to lease it to a tenant. We do have prospective tenants that we're talking to um but they're not going to commit uh they're not going to, you know, let their name be known uh until such time that we actually have an approved site plan. um we have a developer that's you know willing to invest uh in a substantial building uh and also substantial fees to get this project approved um to be able to go to that next step and actually uh get leases signed with tenants. Um so we don't have actual leases yet. Um but as

we mentioned we are looking at a retail tenant uh pretty positive on the on the far end so the the west end of the building and we're also you know presently dealing with a bank on the east end of the building u that you know if if they actually sign leases uh would make the project financially feasible to go forward with and actually construct but we need that approval to be able to go to that next step. Okay, thank you. one other probably one of you know one of the uh residents asked a question about solar panels that's not but I do want to expand on that are there any other green um initiatives that you have construction of this site uh that you can share yeah I mean so weed a lot of landscaping within the parking areas in addition to uh we have an extensive storm water management system uh this is probably one of the biggest systems I've done for this uh size site Um it's it's you know as I mentioned for the D storm water quality manual uh we are required to capture the first 1.3 in of runoff. Uh I'll be honest with you these basins are actually almost double uh that size uh and you know help treat storm water quality. Um I mean obviously when we get into the final design of the building we'll take look at other initiatives um to uh make the building energy efficient. Uh all our lighting fixtures are designed to be uh LED low energy um you know dark sky compliant full cut off fixtures. Um so we are we I can definitely commit to that. Um but we the rest of it we need to get into the final building design um and see what other items we can do. Great. Um and so with that just a follow-up question to that piece. Um there may be concerns about light about the amount of light that projects from the from the building. Is there a

uh is there will there be a a timing system um built in that would allow for the least amount of say light pollution um for that specific area? andor andor is the the uh the bill uh around the cover uh of the project. How will that help to mitigate um lighting uh overflow into neighborhoods? Yes. So, as I mentioned, um the park lighting is all designed with full cut off fixtures um you know, dark sky compliant. Um so and as part of our application, we did submit a phototrics plan to demonstrate um that we don't have spillage or light onto adjoining properties. Uh timing uh most shopping um commercial plazas that we do such as this um light fixtures tend uh to go on about uh 1 hour before open if it's dark and then off one hour after close of the different businesses that are in it. uh the only lights that would typically be on beyond that would be safety lighting uh to make sure it's a a safe uh site. Uh but we did try to minimize uh the lighting. The one uh major advantage here is uh if you look to the lower portion of this page, we have a significant buffer to a vacant piece of property and off to the east or to the right uh are the railroad track and we still have a a significant buffer uh between us and them. Uh we have that lighting along the access driveway. We want to make sure it's a secure, safe access driveway along the rear of the property. Um, but once again, those lights can go off after hours. Um, the only neighbor we have is the medical office building, Sterling Physicians, uh, which already have lighting and I, as far as I've seen, the lighting tends to be on majority of the time, but we could put ours on a timer and also photo

cells, um, so it's not on when it doesn't need to be. Okay. Um, just a second. I'm sorry. Okay. Are you all set? Yeah, I I do have one more question and I think we have a threem minute limit. Okay. Well, if I'm over my three minutes, I'll I'll save it and and let someone else go unless we have If it's a quick question, you can get it in. If it is going to be long then I would ask you to save it. Uh it it may well no it's going to be and I I think uh I will send those in. Okay. Um to to the to the panel. I think that would be best. But thank you so much for the time. No problem. Thank you. Sure. Uh Linda, is there anyone else online? Okay. So Mr. chairman. Um the I think it was Melissa who was the first person that got up and uh had some comments. If I can just try to address those real quickly if you're okay with that. Okay. And for comments, we're going to wait until after we get done with the questioning. Had some questions. I think is Can you hear me now? Hello. Yeah. Yes. Can you state your name and address please? Sure. My name is Mary Pelleter. Uh my address is 80 Elizabeth Street in Hartford, Connecticut. Um although I I work on the Park River Regional Watershed and uh most notably um on the North Branch Park River Wershed Management Plan. So I'm here as a just a citizen uh not representing any of the groups that I work with. Uh but I I am uh curious is there is there a shortage

of commercial area property? Um I there's three questions online. Um and that and the other question I have is you know a lot of properties a lot of developments are just turning away from the river and um you know the development process brings in invasive species and is there any point of allowing um the citizens or whoever occupies this site to actually enjoy and respect the nature that is surrounds Beman's Brook. Um, it turns out my doctor is just down the street. I have friends who have a property um on on the island that's at Beansman's and Washbrook. And it just it's just awkward that none of these properties really um allowed the community that occupies them to experience the nature that surrounds it. Yeah. Well, currently it's nothing but woods and it's been like that for the longest. So this is the first time that someone is making an attempt to develop on it, right? I I think I was just trying to point out like is there something other you know most of the um edge of the woods is is parking and you know maybe you know maybe there's a place for people to walk uh you know employees um you know that that's actually near the woods and I I realize that would we're we're probably past that point and I I must say I respect the amount of work that's gone into the storm water management plan. Um, and it's nice to

hear that the these features will be dark sky compliant, but I also know that when I look at the plan, there's no place no sort of viewing platform or place where somebody could have lunch um on the on the nature side of this building. Can I answer the question? Yes, please. Um, you got about 30 seconds. Um so I'll be quick. Um so number one um again uh yes there is a need for some additional uh commercial uh property. Um we obviously have some tenants. We've obviously the applicants have invested a significant amount of money um to be able to move forward with this plan um based upon prospective tenants are looking and going here. Uh we've been actually looking uh for quite a while along this corridor um for some type of commercial space for uh prospective tenants. Uh so it's taken a while to actually uh come up with this particular uh site. So yes, there's definitely a need for it. And I think uh I actually looking I was reading through your plan of conservation development that you'll be talking about um later on this evening and it actually talks uh about um promoting uh this type of or commercial development along existing uh thorougharees such as Cottage Grove Road um where you already have the infrastructure in place to support uh such a development. Uh, regarding uh enjoying the public, um, I'll mention in working with your engineering staff, one of the major reasons we agreed to add sidewalks along the front of this property is we know that the town is actually actively involved in u getting grants and actually promoting uh, the development of your greenway uh, which is uh, along a paper road that's uh, just to the east of this near Dunkin Donuts. I think it's Goodman Street. There's a paper road just off to the east. Um they're looking at putting a greenway which would be a uh a nature

trail or a a biking walking trail um all the way from almost a Harford Town line all the way up to Cottage Grove Road and ultimately across Cottage Grove Road. So we thought it was critical um that we actually add our sidewalk um to allow for future connections to that greenway system. Um so we are promoting um some kind of pedestrian connection and connection to uh nature. Uh it also is important to know as we went through the wetlands process um we were very careful with our activities associated with the wetlands being brook uh to the rear of the property uh the wetlands commission actually has a 200 foot regulated area uh from the water course itself and you'll see most of the development is outside that 200 foot regulated area on this particular site plan. Um your zoning regulations allow for up to 50% impervious coverage. um this site plan you're looking at were actually about 35% impervious coverage actually 36% impervious coverage. So we've kept about um about um almost sorry 66% of it as natural. Uh we've also gone out and we identified a lot of the significant trees produce zone regulations uh that will be served along the back portion of the property. In addition to um in the far east this is part of our wetlands approval. We're actually doing a flood plane mitigation area which consists of a lot of additional plantings. Um so we are trying to be environmentally sensitive. Uh ultimately uh it is a mature woods in the back. Uh if someone were to park in the parking lot, you know, they want to meander down towards Beanbrook. I can't I can't stop them. Uh but Beanbrook is actually not on this property. Um but it is a nice walk um to be able to go down down there and also have that sidewalk connection to your greenway. Uh that hopefully be happening sometime in the near future. Okay, thank you very much. Uh, next, is there any Do you like to state your name and address, please?

And we have uh three minutes. Yes. Robert Dickinson, 400 Cbury Drive, Bloomfield, of course. Uh, and I uh not sure if this already has been been covered. I didn't get a chance to look at the full-size drawings and make it's clear on there, but uh is there going to be the uh um the 10-ft multi-use uh path in in front of this, which I believe is been called out in a in a previous study. Is is is that is that included along Bloomfield uh Avenue? So the excuse me not Bfield Avenue Cottage Grove Road. Yeah. So uh in working with your uh engineering department um and going through what this greenway or the multi-use path is going to be. It is actually to the east of this um again uh you have Goodman Street that is uh um to the east of the railroad tracks runs down uh along Dunkin Donuts and continues off of the subly direction to the Hartford town line. Um, that's where the multi-use path is going. And then once it hits Cottage Grove Road, from the preliminary planes, I saw it's going to head off to the east uh towards Copacos and then continue across Cottage Grove Road. I I was referring to the study done I don't know 10 or 15 years ago uh of Cottage Grove Road and that it it it it proposed that uh we h have a a 10-ft uh multi-use path on on both sides of Cottage Grove Road. That that's what I was referring to. Not not the part that's going to be constructed for the greenway. Okay. Sorry. I did not know I was not made aware of the multi-use path. Uh we are proposing a sidewalk. It's five foot wide concrete sidewalk along the entire frontage u to allow for pedestrian access. Um that ultimately would have to

be reviewed and approved by DOT because it is in the rightway. But I was notware aware of a a 10 foot wide multi-use path. The the acoustics from through the zoom uh is there's a lot of echoing it and I really can't totally understand what what you're saying. I'll have just have to go along with it. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Okay. The Thank you. Yeah. No. Sorry. If you want to write back, if they want to state their name, love otherwise they cannot. Mr. Chairman, do we allow anonymous? No, no, no. They're they're not doing that. They're not doing that. Thank you. Any other questions in this room or online? Okay, seeing none, we'll start here with the commission. Uh, Commissioner Mlette, any questions? Um just curious with with the parking um for for the size of each is there is there the overlap onto the um the walkway in front of the stores or are there those concrete barriers? I'm just trying to understand um the the layout if there'd be any any impedance on the the folks walking in front of the uh the stores. No, it's it's a Can you hear me? Yes. Yes. It's it's a raised concrete curb along the entire front. It is other than the handicap space. Obviously, we need to have a ramp in that location. Um but to ensure that no one can get up in that one section that's flush, uh what we typically do is put a ballard uh in the parking area and we actually put the

sign for the handicap uh space within that ballard so they can't they can't intrude forward uh past that sign. So, is it is there an overhang um onto the raised curve or not? I think it's either 18. Is it 18 or 20? If there's the overhang, the spaces are 18 ft. Okay. So, that there'd be an assumption of potential overhang, a bumper overhang, but we also have a significant walkway area along the entire frontage. Uh you have areas where they it could be up to about 20 feet deep. Okay. All right. So, that's significant. Thank you. That was my only question. Okay, thank you. Uh, Commissioner O'Brien, any questions? Um, yes. Um, the f first question I have is did I understand you correct tonight that you said that the trucks would back up out into the in and out going out to Cottage Grove Road? Yeah. Um, as part of the application, we submitted a turning maneuver plan. What happens is if the we anticipate majority of the delivery trucks would actually be coming from the highway headed westerly down Cottage Grove Road, they would make a left or a subly maneuver down Northwestern Drive into the back access driveway along the back access driveway and then be able to pull straight into uh the loading area at the back of the building. From there, my question is, how did they get out of there? They would continue out out in the forward direction around the perimeter of the parking lot and then ultimately out the main access driveway and back in an easterly direction down Cottage Grove Road. What do they do when you showed us the queueing plan and the cars are all queued up blocking that blocking them? How do they get out there? If there is a delivery truck there, they would have to wait for the queued cars

to be out of the way. Uh and but I want to also go back and mention uh there was a concern about delivery vehicles. As I mentioned previously, the retail use that we're looking at in here, it's a small retail use. It's about 4,000 square feet. Um retail use of that size. We'll be lucky to get two deliveries a week. Uh it's a very low um delivery oriented business. It's not such as a grocery store, Lowe's, a home improvement center, anything like that where you begin multiple deliveries. It's it's basically one. So if there were cars queued up there, they would have the truck would have to wait until there were no cars queued up there to to get out. Correct. Right. The second question is um on your drawings you still say that your stone will be as approved by the owner. Have you had an opportunity for the owner to approve the stone? Uh Brett, do you want to answer that one? It's more of architectural question. So, we don't have a specific stone picked out. We gave you a sample of what we were thinking of for a type of stone. Um but again, we need to get into a final design of the building. Uh it was What I'm saying is you're asking this commission to approve a stone that you put in front of us, but then your drawing says that the owner has to approve it. So, has the owner approved that stone that you put in front of us? Right. Can you answer that question? I believe so. Yeah, I I think that's what um was delivered with that um in mind. A yes or a no would be helpful. Um I would say yes. So, we can put that stone down and you can cross that that note in the in your map out. The other thing is you say on

hardy plank it says hardy plank or equal. Who is determining what the equal is? Uh sometimes you know when we get into bidding this out to general contractors they they may submit alternate products that may be the a similar uh look just a different manufacturer. Uh so we leave that open for that purpose. But um that's that's typically how we note. So this is a special permit in which you're representing that you're going to put um a certain type of finish on the building. So let's look. And then you say, but we go out to bid and might change it. So who's who's approving that in your opinion? Do you approve it or does the commission approve it? So ultimately uh Brett just you can clarify this the material that we're using for the siding is going to be a cementatious uh plank type siding correct and Hardy plank is a specific brand of it's one brand of a cement cementatious type but there are other other manufacturers that make the same product. So I we're committing to putting a cementatious uh plank type sighting on this. It's not vinyl. It's not metal. It's not aluminum. It's a cementatious board. Um again, Hardy Bankank Hardy Plank is a brand name, but we are the cementatious board u with with plank. And if you want to read, do you know what the exposure on this is? All right. The the other thing is you have on your drawing that you have siding color three and then in another area you say siding color four. What what is that siding made out of? And what is color three and what is color four?

So um those those final colors um we probably need to get a selection once we have the commitment from the tenants. But um what we're proposing is u you know basically a three-tone building. Um, so you have you you're going to have a white uh in a neutral beige color and then a kind of like a darker greenish color on the building. But um I guess if if if we had a certain tenant that wanted a different uh specific color, um we would maybe need to come back to the board and present that. I don't know. Well, it's kind of like a chicken and an egg because it's a special permit and we're trying to figure out what exactly you're doing, but you're telling us you don't quite know who the tenants are. So, maybe it'll change. So, we do have to figure out what it is we're approving and then if you're going to change it, what what it is, I would think. So, but your sighting, it simply says sighting. I couldn't find any other call out. So, can you tell us what that sighting is? that's not not mentioned in in any other detail um other than color. It doesn't say it says sighting color three siding color four. Yeah. So what we're proposing is a uh hardy lap siding. Um yeah and it's just we have multiple colors uh to represent that material. Um, so it's your hardy blank that should color three and four when you're referring to sighting. Correct. Okay. Um, also when it comes to uses, normally on

a special permit, you have a use for a building, you have five tenants. So, um, my question would be, what what would you consider the the process for if you're going to come back and decide that the entire building is going to be a restaurant? Jim, you're muted. Cuz what you've presented is you've presented a building broken up into five units, but then you've said maybe this or maybe that. The rendering you give us tells us it's a hardware store. I haven't heard hardware store mentioned here tonight. I've heard bank and restaurant. So what I'm saying is if once this commission approves a special permit and the other issue is it says your proposal is for a commercial use building. I've looked through the zoning code. I can't find commercial use building. I do find that uh that a retail store and a a um a restaurant is approved in the zone. So, I'm not sure what the approval is you're asking for for a commercial use building. Are you asking for a building that could be either all retail or all restaurant or some combination of that? So, we're asking for a building that could be multiple uses. Right now, we are committing that we have a prospective tenant that's a retail use. We anticipate the majority of the building up to about 10,000 square foot will most likely be a retail use. We did identify possibility of a restaurant here and made sure the parking we provided was adequate to support such thing as a restaurant. In addition to uh at this point we do have a respective tenant that's a bank. Um, so the three possible tenants that we are looking at right now are a retail, restaurant, uh,

and and bank type use. Um, if for some reason we get a tenant in there that's anything other than is permitted as a regular use or a a site plan use, uh, some other special permit use, we would have to come back to this commission such as I believe restaurants are a special permit in your zoning regulations. So right now we are saying that we have two areas that could be possibly restaurants. If for some reason the whole building wanted to go to a restaurant, we would have to come back before the commission for a modification to the special permit. The special permit that we're proposing uh is associated with the restaurant use and also with the drive-through associated with this building. Uh what I'm the question I'm asking is because what you're when you gave us traffic numbers the first time you came in, you said, "Well, we don't really know what the uses are." So, we can't just make up traffic numbers. Then, when we said, "Well, you got to tell us something." You came back and said, and you divided up the thing, and you're assuming one unit is going to be this, and you're assuming the other unit's going to be that. So, I think from the commission standpoint, we have to look at, well, what if the whole building is the most intense use? And so, that's why we then you came back with the queueing, which was based on that. And then we run into where the queueing doesn't allow your trucks to get out get out and they would have to back out into that driveway. So you you see what I'm saying is I understand where you what from from your standpoint and I think you've done a terrific job in in addressing the issues that have been raised and I'm certainly looking for a way to get an approval here. But I'm I'm concerned about exactly what we're approving and if it changes, what does that mean and where does it

come back to if it changes? So that those are my issues there. The the other thing is with respect to your drawing on and I thank you for the pedestrian circulation plan. I think it's a huge improvement over what was there before. But on the on the um uh the the burm that you have um you you give a representation for the height, but if you look at your landscaping plan, all you're planting is five gallon shrubs along the front. So I really you and I don't know if I'm going into comment, Mr. chairman, but I it's just simply saying that two and a half in that 2 and 1/2 ft with five gallons shrubs isn't going to cover those headlights from shining out into Cottage Grove Road. So, um Oh, you can just ask him if he would be Yeah. So, if you could if you could if you move that burm to three and a half feet with the five gallon shrubs, that would satisfy my concerns. Is that something you could see doing? So, let's go back on the shrubs. I mean, obviously, we're planting them at five gallons, but they're going to grow. Um, I mean, we're trying to represent that, you know, we looked at shrubs that would probably be maintained at a height of about two. From the standpoint of my experience, shrubs also get can get removed. A burm stays there. So, that's why I would feel more comfortable with that. Um, and fi my final question is clear cutting. Are you saving any trees? Yeah. Um there's a bunch of trees down the Westley property line uh that we're saving. Uh and then again, as I mentioned, um you know, there was additional areas to the rear u that we you know, so the line the line along the railroad tracks. So those trees staying

uh No, we have a storm water management basin. To be honest with you, when you actually go out there, there's no significant trees along that property. So when you're coming AC along Cartage Grove Road then uh headed west you will see the building. Yes. Um so as I mentioned previously at this front corner that that's where the old homestead used to be. So you can see the tree line. It's actually there's no trees there presently. There was a house here at one time. Okay. Um all set. I think that's it. If you just give me one second because I scribbled a lot of stuff here. I think we covered it all. Thank you very much and I do appreciate your responsiveness. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Uh Commissioner Medwinter, any questions? No question. My question was addressed by Commissioner Brian. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner G. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um actually I'll since we skipped forward I I will go back and I would like you to pull up um um part of the sheet I guess sheet C19 because that's a more uh complete uh picture of the trees. Okay. So this shows all of the trees on the upper the ones that are remaining green are the ones that remain I believe right and so this shows everything that is cut. So what percentage of the lot is that that's cut um roughly it's above 60%. Okay so we have an ordinance that you're you you know you're cutting more than 10% so you have to do replacement. What what is the um you know how is that work? Which ordinance which section of the regulations? I looked at section 6.1 C. It talks about existing vegetation, right?

That that's what I'm Hold on. Um so yes 6.1 C um existing vegetation uh section 61C8 any tree cutting and or removal consisting in excess of 10% of the tree canopy on the lot shall require special permit in accordance with these regulations which I believe um means that suitable suitable tree replacement has to occur and what's the definition of suitable tree replacement? We are adding uh trees within our our parking area and also you know again along the whole front of the property. I'm sorry. I'll ask the planner to answer through you Mr. Chair. Yes, Jennifer. The replacement um refers to um if a tree that was being preserved uh it cannot be preserved. Um that's where the replacement the language is is am is ambiguous and probably needs work on it. But we had a long discussion um with the applicant about that as to whether or not they had to replace equal calibers. period. The way the present language is written, they do not unless it was a tree that was going to be preserved and they could not preserve it. So, it's not as extensive as we would like. So, I think what I'm hearing from you is that what we thought we passed here um what the we thought the import of this regulation or this piece of our regulations was is not as active as we think it is. That's correct.

Um okay. But um so well let me go to my first question then sort of getting to um getting to uh what Commissioner O'Brien brought up. Um, and I this is just a general question because when I read through the um hearing, we're on an I1 zone, which does appear that most of the what they want to build here is by right, but it also requires a special permit. Now, my thinking was that the special permit uh reading the regulations only referred to the basically the drive-through windows. Um what particular pieces does the special permit uh apply to? Does it now apply to just a special permit is needed to develop the site period because it is um it's over 10% tree kill tree cutting. In can I answer that? Go ahead. In addition to um any soil disturbant of 10,000 square feet or more also requires a special permit. So the special permit is for the development itself and also um if they wanted they had mentioned for restaurant use um so for restaurant use and for retail. So it applies to both the development and also for the uses that are mentioned. So this is not actually approval by site plan. It is it it also requires a site plan approval. Yep. as part of the development. Okay. Yeah. Um yeah, in reading the original thing as I said I well it's not a question so I'll come back to that. Um I am I was curious when you u mentioned well a couple of things um the access on

Cottage Grove being restricted uh due to the fact that it's a state highway and then um the question I think one of the first questions that was asked was about the um amount of traffic that would be going down Cottage Grove. Have we actually seen a do we actually have a traffic study on this or is I got the impression we don't have a traffic study because we don't know what's going in here. Is that correct? That that's correct. But so we have no idea about regardless of whether the trucks can get around uh or and interfere with queuing. We don't really know what the backup would be on Cottage Grove Road just with having a commercial building here. So we did share um uh customer accounts for the perspective retail use. Again uh those are typically very low uses. Um the rest of the uses um again without having a specific time we we can't do traffic generation. But we also repeat um that you know um ultimately uh this is Cottage Grove Road. Uh it is a major collector road through town. Uh and then when you're going to read through your plan of conservation and development, um this is where they're talking about promoting uh this type of commercial development utilizing that existing infrastructure that's in town. I'll also mentioned um we ultimately need to go to DOT um for approval on this. So ultimately, um they're going to have the final say if we need to make any uh traffic improvements as part of this project. Mhm. Yeah. I um I just will note that the second thing after this tonight is talking about our plan of conservation development and I think there is going to be quite a bit of discussion about uh what our future of Cottage Grove uh road is as a commercial uh alleyway. Um so I want to go back to the truck question

that uh Commissioner O'Brien asked and ask in the reverse uh order. Could you walk me through what would happen with a truck going? I I understand most of the trucks. I I understand you you the assumption and why you um you believe and I would agree with you that the majority of trucks probably coming in will be coming from 91 or or uh so going west. But what if a truck does come uh going east? Could you walk me through how that how they would go through the uh the driveway setup is a right turn in only u right part of our application u not only to um um I'm sorry our application to do uh we are in the process of actually trying to obtain an approach permit for the work in the rightway but we can't obtain until we have approval from this commission. Um but we did have to do a turning maneuver showing that exact maneuver where we actually head east on Cottage Grove Road. uh the driveway is sufficient enough uh to allow for that tractor trailer to turn into this driveway. I think we talked about this uh pre at the previous meeting um that in the center of the island we have a our center of the drive we have a small raised concrete island uh that allows the tractor trailer actually to ride up on it uh be able to go down the west side of the building once again pull into this loading area and then make that maneuver out uh through the east side of the driveway and then ultimately back out to Cottage Crow Road. So it is set up to have uh appropriate access for a tractor trailer in both directions coming from the coming from the west or going to the west and uh going to the east. Okay. Um so I want to go back to your the question Mr. Dickinson asked and and you did answer but I asked I had the same question. Um you are proposing for the sidewalk in front of the the structure a five-ft sidewalk. Uh I think um while he mentioned 10 foot, I think our regulations for a multi-use path uh

sort of recommend 8T. Uh do you have any objection for making that 8 foot wide sidewalk? Um I'd have to run it by the applicant. Um I'll see if I can get an answer. Um but again, ultimately we got to go to DOT and get approval. Um, one thing I would like to point out, um, is you do have, if I blow up on this area down on the far east end of the property, um, you do have a restriction in that, uh, you again have the trestle, uh, for the railroad crossing. Uh, this is the structure that's this square structure here. And also you have a major utility pole u providing um um support for a high um um a high tension line that runs through the railroad right away. Uh ultimately you're going to need to get the sidewalk through those two items. There's not eight feet to do it. There is five feet to get between those two items. Um that's another reason uh we're proposing the five foot walk in this location, but it could be five foot in that small area and eight feet everywhere else. If we if we go to an 8 foot walk, would it be a batumous walkway? Like a path? I'm I'm sorry, I didn't hear that. Sorry. If you went to a if your multi-use path, if it had to go to an 8 foot wide walk, would it be a batuminous uh path? Batumis. Oh. Um I um And you right now you're proposing what? You're proposing uh concrete, correct? Um I can look um I don't know if we specify and I'll bring up also again ultimately need to be approved by DOT. It's in their right uh hold on a second. So just out of curiosity are there any other areas along Cottage Grove Road that have this multi-use path presently? Well, no there aren't. But that's, you

know, the the pro the the problem is unless we start building them, we never will, you know, um the uh ones on the uh the one you're talking that was talking about the East Coast Greenway, which will be further down. Ultimately, this would be um you know, a a connector to it. Um hold on, I'm trying to I'm trying to find this even as I talk. Um it's under section 610F. Yeah, that's why I'm not quite down there yet. 65 sidewalks or Yeah. So, do you know the answer to his question, Linda, about uh whether it has to be concrete or by it? I can read it. Um so, six uh section multi-use path. Yes. The sidewalks and multi-use pass is um a requirement for new development. Um and that was recently approved I think within the last year. So developments prior to that were not required. Um 5T sidewalks or 8 feet multi-use path shall be required along the street front of all new site developments or redevelopment. But I I don't think it I don't think it spec I'm looking at now and I don't think it specifies the material. Doesn't doesn't specify the the construction type. Right. Right. You said it's it's 5 foot sidewalks or 8ft 5 foot side sidewalks or eight 8ft multi-use paths. And I think that I think the I think the I think the um preference uh as much as possible especially out in this area where we are going to be ultimately connecting to the bike trail uh would be to have multi-use paths as much as possible. Um so have that extra 3 ft. And I do understand the you know I understand the issues with obstacles such as trussels etc. But um I just asked that question. Uh but so you would be willing to consider that. Is that correct?

Uh our preference would be we do concrete sidewalks. I mean it's a better product in the long run. Regular sidewalks. Um that's what we proposed on the plan and that's what we we prefer to do is a five foot concrete sidewalk. But but would you make it 8 ft? Um, again, I I would have to go to the applicant and talk to them about that. Um, I mean, if you I I don't know how to answer that question right now. Okay. Um, one thing I was curious about, and this goes back to the question of the burm and the plants, uh, you showed us some, um, uh, some, uh, what specs or some some visuals of from the sidewalk looking at the building. Yeah, they did not have the BM. I didn't see any BMS or or plants in there at all. The renderings were done prior to the Burm. Okay. So, so those renderings are actually not what we would be seeing now. Correct. the BM is something that was added as part of your comments and also some staff recommendations. Okay. Um let's see I think that's about it. Um I guess I would ask um well the question that came in about the access to Bean's Brook and sort of trails more more access from the back of this to a wooded area. Um my understanding is this is University of Harford property and I think the property behind it that does connect to Breman's Brook is also University of Harford property. Um you know is there would there be any opportunity to acquire some of that property and include a more of a um you know walking trail from the back of this to make at least the public uh have access. So as I mentioned previously if you were to go out there this is a mature forest. There's not a lot of undergrowth. It's

easily walkable in its present state. Um I not preventing people from walking back there. I mean there's parking along the backside if someone parks in that space. They would easily be able to walk down to Beanbrook. I can't commit to a piece of property that we don't have under contract um as to whether or not we can let the public go on beyond that. Um but it it is open right now and you know it is possible to walk directly down to Beman's Brook. I think that's something to bring good to bring up if they if there's any future development of this additional property that's to the south. Uh maybe uh that's a good point to bring up and promote some kind of an access along Beanbrook. Right now Beanbrook is not even on this property and we don't have any right to uh grant such access. Right. No, I I realize that that's what I said. you know, since since it's the same property owner that I guess you you folks are buying this property from, you know, is there any would there be any and I realize you can't answer that probably on the spot, but um just seems to me that that's a thing. Okay, go. Uh so that those are my questions now. I will uh pass them off. Thank you, Commissioner Marshall Neely. Any questions? Thank you, Commissioner Lester. Uh, I most of the questions that I had were previously answered by Commissioner O'Brien and Commissioner Goff. Thank you guys very much. I I do have a couple of questions. As far as signage, is there going to be signage anywhere on this property? Uh, we are identifying a little Sorry, let me go back. Blow this up. So along the main access driveway, we're identifying a location for a monument sign. Uh ultimately, it needs to come back to the commission for approval. Um we don't have uh the the sign, the actual final sign uh figured uh with

tenant areas and spaces and what's actually going to look like. Obviously, it' be similar to complement the design of the building. Uh in addition to uh on the elevations, uh we are proposing uh tenant signs uh along each space, but ultimately it needs to come back um before the town for approval of those individual signs, but nothing specific yet. Uh once we get further along and we have tenants, we'll come back with those individual signs. And um I have another question. We you talked about the restaurant, but I thought when you first came, you said something about outdoor seating with the restaurant. Did I not hear that? Sure. Um what the question was asked as part of the original uh presentation that I made is if we did end up having a restaurant. Um I believe the question was do we have area that we could promote outdoor seating? uh what it represented. If we did end up with a a restaurant in one of these uh these sections of the building, there is ample sidewalk area in front of the building uh to promote promote some outdoor seating. Again, the sidewalk at the max is about 20 ft wide which would allow that opportunity. Uh that was something that would have to be ultimately approved by the commission. U but we don't have a specific tenant and know that they would actually want outdoor seating at this point. Okay. So, if there was a tenant who wanted outdoor seating, do you would the trucks drive around there while folks are outside? Okay. I just want to make sure most likely be in this front walkway at this point. So, they'd be separated by parking spaces and also uh the drive-thru lane. The trucks are going to be on the far outside lane, nowhere's near where the outdoor seating would be. Okay, those are all my questions. Thank you very much. Okay, thank you. This time we'll take

any comments from the audience. Any comments regarding this application? Please step to the podium and state your name and address, please. You have three minutes. This Robert Dickinson, 400 Cbury Drive in Bloomfield. Uh just a comment on well it's not definitely not safe to ride a bicycle on Cottage Grove Road and uh I think sometimes I see that uh concrete sidewalks is kind of a has been an old standard and uh buminous black top is self-cleaning in the wintertime to a great a great degree when the snow falls or the you have a freeze overnight, black top will clean itself off in a couple hours of sunlight where where the concrete will retain the ice and and require salting, etc. And uh and that certainly 5 foot is not enough for bicycles to uh pass pedestrians walking walking along there. And so I I really urge uh that we go to an 8 foot by two minus which by the way I believe is actually a little cheaper than 5 foot of concrete. Okay. Thank you. Anyone else in the audience with any comments? Anyone online? Any comments? Okay, we'll start with the commission and we'll start with Commissioner Marshall Neely. Any comments regarding this application? Mr. Chairman, can I interrupt for one second? Sure. I believe you have a couple letters uh

that were in um in support. Um so I that's why it's waiting to come under comment section. I think there's a chance. Can uh they be read into the record? I believe they were entered into the record. Okay. Sorry, Mr. Chair. We we got how many? We have one from Mark Hassler. Okay. I'm not sure how many. Oh, okay. He just said that there were some letters. Yeah, they've been entered. Uh, Commissioner Marshall Neely, any comments? I do have a a comment. I love the greenery. I love Bloomfield, but I get the sense that Bloomfield is starting to turn into a um uh what do you call it? Uh Berlin turnpike kind of thing. uh with trucks and you know increased traffic and we're doing it looks like more of a concentration of businesses or retails all along the same area in Bloomfield as opposed to I know this is not going to change anything but as opposed to you know spreading out businesses in different areas in Bloomfield. Um, I would I would shudder to think that our beautiful town is going to be a drive-thru or something more like um the Berlin Turnpike. But I do understand progress and I understand development uh and what the town could benefit from by something like this coming into Bloomfield. But I just wanted to share uh with anyone who's in earshot that I kind of uh am always reluctant when I

feel as though our 218 218 is turning into something where, you know, we're attracting more traffic to come through the center of our town. That's my comment. Okay. Thank you, uh, Commissioner Goff. Uh, thank you, Mr. Chair. Um well, first of all, I I do want to thank the um the applicant and especially Mr. Cassidy. I I you know, I think you've been you've been before this commission before and uh in terms of an engineer and and someone uh talking about the technicals, I I think you do an excellent job and I appreciate your um you you and your clients taking a lot of the comments to heart of of the uh of the commission. Um I I am I I am a little um coming in tonight I thought I had understood the regulations. This is an I1 zone. Basically everything you were asking for except for the drive-thru I thought was in fact a um uh you know a sort of use by right. And I certainly agree with town staff that um in terms of the drive-thru and all of that, I think you've addressed that as adequately as you can. Now, whether town needs more drive-throughs is a different question and not one you need to answer. Um but um and you know, some of the other traffic issues would be taken care of with the do DOT approval. However, um if this site and this development requires um special permit approval, then I think we are at a whole different level of of looking at things because part of it is suitable location for use. And you have mentioned several times that the um the draft plan of conservation development we're looking at does recommend Cottage Grove for development. It also not notes

already that Cottage Grove is our worst traffic um congestion accident area in town. So I I I'm I'm hoping before we approve of the plan of conservation and development there may be some changes to that, but that is forwardlooking. Um the problem I have a bit is with, you know, I I I'm not sure we need any more commercial development in in locations other than the areas of town that need to be redeveloped. So when I look at the special permit conditions, a suitable location for use, we have we have a town center redevelopment plan and you're you know we're proposing businesses here that are really only access accessible by automobile. Uh again in an I1 zone without a special permit condition, which I think I guess is generated mostly by cutting down all the trees. Um the uh you know that would that would be a use by right. Um you know I'm I'm concerned about that. I'm concerned about the environmental issues because of the amount of uh tree destruction without replacement. Um and I'm you know I'm concerned about long-term viability of the continued type of automobile uh development we we we seem to be stuck with. Um, again, I like what you're trying to do, but I'm not sure that it this is the right location for it. Um, so those are my comments right now. I'll be interested in hearing what my other commissioners have to say. Uh, but again, I you know, I I do commend you on uh this. I do hope if we do approve this that we do require an 8 foot wide multi-use path at least where possible, recognizing there may be a problem at the trestle. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, Commissioner Medwinter. any comments?

Well, I want to say thank you so much for taking the time to prepare um such an extensive report and presenting it to us, especially prior to even um owning the property. I realize this is a lot of work um and it is by no means um it's very expensive work. Also, um I know there's a balance that we need to try to create for the residents of this town wherein we look at creating revenue um from property um generating more revenue for the town and easing the tax burden for our residents here. Um and so I do appreciate the fact that you have taken this step to present this um do all the work that is required and in addition to make all the amendments and corrections that um we required at your last hearing. So I really appreciate that. Um I do wish we had a traffic study um to ease the concern. I personally do not have a concern of the traffic, but I think it would have been helpful. But I understand that it's kind of putting the the the the cart before the horse cuz you can't get that before you get the approval. Um but my experience with going into that um area um I've never seemed to have either a long wait going in um at the traffic or getting out of there. So, I I don't suppose that um a traffic study would reveal much different given the type of um businesses that you're proposing to be there. Uh so, I just want to thank you for the proposal and I wish you luck. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner O'Brien. Any comments? Well, I think Commissioner uh Couch um brought up the point that it's an industrial one zone and it's kind of an anomaly, but it's tied to the industrial park that's further to the east. Um so in an industrial zone as I read those regulations you could come in and build a manufacturing plant there by site plane. So um you know it is a special permit. We do have to consider what's the most intense use of the building. There is no commercial building in our zoning regulations. So, we need to approve a a restaurant and retail building. Um but with four or five changes or additions to the approval um as drafted by staff um I think that uh the applicant has um and if those are acceptable to the applicant um and I don't see them as game changers to a developer then um I think it's something that uh will um contribute tribute. Uh right now it's a follow piece of land zoned industrial. You're not going to want a a factory built there. You're not going to want um you know anything that would be allowed in our industrial zone by right. So, um actually it um you know this commission has has scrutinized it uh and then scrutinized it again and then

scrutinized it a third time and all in all um um it's a difficult site and you know it it is what it is at this point but it's much better than if it was developed industrial. Thank you. Uh, Commissioner Mallette, any comments? Um, I I would say on on the on the design of the building, we talked a little bit about that and I realize we don't have a design review board for for Cottage Grove, but I I would just ask, you know, the applicant and the, you know, prospective uh developers, we we'd love to see a tasteful design. um and and that addition of the stone um and those type of things. The upgrading of the landscaping is all helpful. This is a you know, as it was brought up, it's a particular piece of property that's kind of transitioning from our industrial to our professional office district to residential to we've got the north branch access. Um, so having a tasteful design, um, making that possibly eventually having, you know, some kind of relationship to a greenway. Um, I think it could be a good development. um with those upgrades. Uh and just of note, I think next door uh I have seen um backing up to the north branch, I think I've seen a couple paths and in picnic tables for the for the other uh offices. Uh so, you know, that may be of of interest. Um but a as uh updated um I think it makes it a lot more

attractive than than the first go around. So thank you. Okay. Thank you. And u I'll make my comments. I'll I'll first thank the applicant for putting on a very thorough and professional presentation. Thank you for that. Um, I do understand some of the concerns regarding the traffic. However, I do believe that, you know, the site has been there for years and years and years and there has been no attempt whatsoever to develop on it. Uh, we finally found someone who wanted to come in and actually do something to the site and I think it's a a vast improvement to what it is now. So, I don't have a problem with it. Um, I look forward to hopefully seeing the finished product and um, I'll be supportive of it. With that said, uh, the applicant, Is there anything else you'd like to say before we close this public hearing? Yeah, first of all, I'd like to thank the commission uh, for working with on this application. Uh, I agree. I think it's going to be a um a a a great new asset um to Bloomfield uh in that um you're getting a commercial development that would offer additional tax base to town. I think you're looking at a a small commercial development um whereas it's not going to have a impact on the uh transportation system uh and respective tenants that we're talking to I think will be good and complement the town of Bloomfield. Um, we did review uh we've been going back and forth in a text message here regarding the multi-use path. Uh, if the commission feels uh that is more appropriate, then I guess we will be acceptable to considering a multi-use path of a batuminous 8 foot wide uh pathway similar to a bike path or a um or a

walkway. And I again I appreciate the commission's time on this application and all the due diligence and hard work uh that you have done along with your staff has been excellent to work with. Okay. Thank you. At this time the chair entertain a motion to close the public hearing. I move that we close the public hearing. Second. It's been moved and second. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I. I. Opposed extension. Chair votes side. Chair will now entertain a motion on this application. Mr. Chairman, I would move the staff recommend uh recommendation uh motion on um which which has uh three three conditions to prior to the signing of plans. Four uh three conditions uh met prior to issuance of permits. uh two conditions met prior to the issuance of senator gal compliance and then 9 to 18 for general conditions and um I would like to add some others. Can I add some others? Sure. So, I would like the synthetic stone as presented tonight to be specified. Um, and any changes would require coming back to the commission. I would like the hardy plank or or I would like to delete the word or equal and substitute uh any changes to be approved by the staff director. I would like the additional condition

that the burm be extended to 3 and 1/2 ft with plantings uh the burm screening on on um grove road. Um even though it has been represented that the rooftop mechanicals are not visible. I think we should add a condition that says the rooftop mechanicals uh must be screened and not visible. so that there's no misunderstanding. Um, and that the sidewalk in the front be extended to a multi-use path. Okay, applicant. Uh, you heard the conditions. Do you have any issues with those? Um, I guess we're okay uh with all all those conditions. Um I'm just looking for a response here. The one can I just bring up one thing about the general conditions. Um so just one question uh on the the screening uh we were proposing to screen with the parapit wall. Um if what we get it up and it's determined um you know we we presented a a demonstration of the sightelines showing that those units would be screened. If we find that the parapit walls are adequately screening them, is that sufficing that that condition? Would you repeat that, sir? Sorry. The condition about the screening of the rooftop units. We're proposing to have a parapit wall that's high enough so it actually screen those units. And we presented a a sighteline diagram to show you how that would work. uh when we do it and u it's actually constructed and it's actually demonstrated in the field that that is adequate does that suffice the requirement of screening of the rooftop units? Yes. Thank you. But it I just wanted to articulate the

fact that um the rooftop mechanicals need to be um screened. I I have had experience where parapit wall was not built sufficient. Sure. And I understand that. The only other thing I would ask is in the Linda, I don't know if you want to chime in on this one, um, but we had one question on the conditions of approval that were issued by staff on condition number eight. U, it seems like there might be a portion missing from that sentence. So, we're just trying to find out what the zoning enforcement um, that's correct. I did add um it was a it was a sentence that or a condition that was not finished, but it should have read, "No certificate of compliance or other final approval shall be issued until the zoning enforcement officer confirms compliance with the approved plans." So So it was missing confirmed. Sure, we'll be okay. Confirms compliance with the approved plans. We'll be okay with that. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Sorry. Okay. Second the motion. I was going to say there's been a motion on the floor to approve this application. Is there a second? Second. It's been moved and second. Are there any further discussions? See none. All those in favor signify by saying I. I oppose. Extension. Chair votes I. Motion carries. Congratulations. Appreciate your time. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you all. Mr. Chairman, yes. Before you go to B, um you may want to just take out a order item new business 5 ABC because there's basically no discussion on them at all. They're just they're just um information. And if there's anyone here for that um they may not want to sit through the planet

conservation conversation. Okay. For anyone that's here for agenda item under new business, A, B, or C. Yeah. A is the application for 620 Cottage Grove Road has been withdrawn. That's the proposed zone change. C the set the I'm I'm sorry. B has been extended to the August 28th meeting, right? And so is C. B is the text amendment that won't be heard until the August 28th meeting. And C is a new application submitted by a different applicant uh for a text change to um for proposed zoning text change um to um professional office district. Has that been extended also? that that's just been submitted. That will not be heard until the August meeting. Yes. Um Mr. Sure, Mr. Chair. Um the very last one, can you because I was talking to the assistant planner before 5 56E3 is in the DDZ zone, I think. Yeah, it refers to the DDZ zone and it also may involve the PO zone, but that refers directly to the DDZ zone, right? And I think it should be F, not E. Yes. Okay. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for the correction. Okay. Next item on the agenda is a public hearing regarding the town of Bloomfield Plan of Conservation Development. Uh once again the way we conduct our public hearings is we first hear a presentation which I'm sure will be by

the director. We'll then take questions from the audience, questions from the commission uh planning I mean I'm sorry comments from the audience, comments from the commission and then the uh director will have any last comments before we would close this. I'm going to ask the commission before we get started here um to reserve your questions and comments on this PLCD until our next meeting. I want to solely focus on the public because this is a public hearing for them to comments and questions and I want the sole purpose of the meeting to be for the public and not the commission. So, if you can just reserve your questions and comments until next month, I would appreciate it. With that said, uh Jonathan, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'll try and be brief, but um first I'd like to thank the public uh for all the folks that have um taken the time and made the effort to review the proposed plan of conservation and development. Been a long time getting to hear and for submitting their comments. We received um a number of written comments. Uh all of them I think um very uh very well considered and uh I think will be very helpful in moving moving the uh plan along to its uh its final um document. I'm going to spend a couple few minutes just going summarizing all the written comments we received. Uh for those of you who may recognize some of these comments, uh I will not be addressing the actual specific cross the eyes dot the tees of which we received a lot but um just goes through what uh Lind and I believe were a summary of um from the editorial organization perspective um a lot of comments where we had inconsist there are inconsistent charts

and tables. Uh there are significant editorial and accuracy issues. Uh there's inconsistent and outof-date data, graphics, and pictures. There's a lack of relationship between goals and strategies. There's a lack of hierarchy of strategies. There's a lack of priority of actions. There's excessive data. It requires more specificity and examples of goals and strategies. what they would actually look like as opposed to just stating them. And there's a lack of a good concise executive summary. That's sort of the overall editorial comments. In terms of the substantive comments, we've lumped these into some categories. Natural resources and environmental concerns. Strong support, very strong support for preserving open space, undeveloped land, and farmland. Specific request to mention federal a federal designations wild and scenic river metacomic trail highlands region community designation process calls for more reference to align with the north branch park river w waterershed management plan requests to address storm water management and its impact downstream specifically from high density development like capekco. suggestions to prioritize maintaining Tree City USA designation and finalizing implementing the 10-year forest stewardist plan regarding agricultural and farming need for a complete inventory of existing farms and updated farmland loss statistics. Calls to formally create a farm commission and explore agricultural overlay zones. Suggestions to link farming more directly with economic development, cultural identity, and tourism. interest in using farming as a community

anchor, for example, farm-to-table initiatives, food hubs, and the like. Concern that farming goals lack concrete actions, implementation plans, and funding strategies. Regarding housing, Cap Region Council of Government recommends a clearer support for diverse housing types beyond single family homes. Some residents expressed discomfort with language protecting single family zoning at the expense of housing diversification and re their request to align Bloomfield's housing strategy with inclusive zoning and state level best practices which I think we've already begun with our inclusionary zoning regarding mobility pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure support for prioritizing pedestrian and ble bicycle mobility townwide suggestions to explicitly set long-term goals for off-road infrastructure for walking and biking. Calls to better label and update maps, photos showing trail and bike path locations. Regarding the plan structure, format and priorities advised against using the term quote character unquote in land use regulations due to state law. Concern about excessive volume and repetition in some sections. Suggestions to including consolidating data in appendies and making the structure more hierarchal, which we said before. Recommendations to rank actions priority and clarify which goals each strategy action supports. Request to update maps for accuracy and consistency. Regarding cultural resources, feedback suggests this section feels vague or like an afterthought. Recommendations to focus more on the town's diverse cultural history, including unrepresented and underrepresented communities.

Suggestion to relocate some farmland topics to natural resources or economic development growth sections. Climate action and sustainability. Request for stronger integration of Bloomfield's 2022 climate emergency energy plan, C. Pacific requested regular updates on greenhouse gas emissions, formation of a combined POC CE task force, prioritization of green building codes and renewable energy initiatives, addressing the large greenhouse gas footprint from board of education vehicles, especially diesel school buses. Finally, a regional plan alignment. Crog finds the plan aligns well with regional goals, especially regarding historical and natural resource preservation. Crog recommends greater emphasis on diversifying housing and refining the use of language around land use quote character unquote. Those are sort of the summaries. I'm sure we left something out. No disrespect to that, but um we were getting comments in till um 7 o'clock this evening. So we did the best we could could summarize what we what we have received in written comments. We have forwarded all of the written comments we have received to the full membership of the commission. Thank you very much for that summary, Jonathan. At this time, the chair will take questions from the audience regarding the ELCD. Uh just go to the podium, state your name and address, please. Hold sir. I think she's going to be first and then Yeah. And then you'll you'll be second. Uh, good evening. My name is Claudia Gardiac, 75 Doncaster Road. My question is,

is this a plan? And I'm asking that is the is plan the right word for the title of this document? And I'm asking that be because when you get to the implementation section, you realize that a lot of this depends on funding which is not necessarily clearly available. And even in one place um uh it suggested that you know people look for grants outside of Bloomfield and so forth. So I my question is is it a plan or is it um something different? I'm not sure quite what to call it. Um but that is my question. Um the document is a plan. It's not a regulatory document or statutory. It's a guideline that that we would use uh in trying to envision Bloomfield's future. Mr. Chairman, just for clarif is pretty much dedicates by the state statutes. State statutes say a community shall prepare every 10 years a plan of conservation and development. It also requires that the region prepare a plan of conservation and development and that the state prepare a plan of conservation and development. So the title of the document comes from the directive of the statute. We didn't you know so whether whether you want to consider it a plan or not it's called the plan of conservation development because they direct us to do so. Great answer. Hey thank you.

Yes, Robert Dickinson, 400 Cabbury Drive, Bluing Field. Uh this is a question uh concerning the land use map and that is has it been considered to designate uh areas of town that would be suitable for solar development? Otherwise, possibly uh agricultural areas that uh uh where the land is not as good for farming as as as uh and and rather marginal for farming and uh anyway would it would be good to have such designation for solar developers to know where they should apply because otherwise they're going to be trying to build on good agricultural land, but if we specify areas that are we think are suitable, uh it would give them guidance. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Uh any further questions? Yes, please just state your name and address, please. Jane Nadell Klein, 82 Terapell Road. Um the summary um that Mr. Pullman read was very encouraging to me. Um, and the the goals that a plan of conservation and development, whether it's a plan in the sense of something that we're already able to implement or a an aspiration. I think this might be called an aspirational plan, but that's we need aspiration otherwise how do we move forward? Um what I uh would like to see explicitly addressed in the plan are um not just issues of um uh traffic and um uh and uh appropriate land use in terms of you know there are all these different dimensions to land use storm

water runoff all of these things are tremendously important. What I don't hear explicitly addressed um is noise pollution and light pollution. And those two things are incredibly important for quality of life. Um we know that light pollution is directly responsible for the decline of all kinds of pollinator species which also leads to a decline in bird populations. Um and u we know that noise pollution is a health hazard. So moving forward with such a plan, I would like to see language uh or research or some focus addressed to those dimensions of development. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Yes. Just uh come to the podium. State your name and address, please. Hi. Michelle Kriscowski, 37 Cliff Mount Drive. Um my question is um will the north um North Bridge Park wershed management plan be consulted and incorporated more so into the next stages of development of this plan more explicitly? Jonathan, you take that to the extent we can. Yes. Okay, good. And given that there are some gaps of information that we have with the watershed and the waters because as noted here, you know, it says that um regarding the water quality and support of aquatic life, there um needs to be further study in order to draw um more explicit conclusions, especially with the comments that um the North Branch Park River does not support aquatic life is concerning. Um, is there

going to be um, and this might be hopeful aspirations again, but would there be consideration for further studies of these water bodies like the north branch? I think there'd certainly be consideration. It's obviously a funding um, issue. Um I normally I don't think a municipality of this size undertakes that kind of a study um in terms of funding but it's certainly we can certainly look at but I it um it would certainly be in you know in competition with other funding requirements if could it be listed still as a hopeful aspiration though in the plan we can put all the aspir irations you want in the plan. I I think it would be a great one. Um because if you put it, you know, then maybe you can get the help, right? Would you like it in bold letters? Yes, please. And and well, yeah. Thank you. Hey, thank you. Any further questions? Uh anyone online? Oh, I'm sorry. I'm one. I'm sorry. Oh, no, no, no. Excuse me. You can uh if you have a question, go ahead. If you have a question, yeah, just podium, state your name and address, please. My name is Ed Ed Blackman and uh I'm from School Street and and I just had anformational question. I I don't understand the exact

meaning of agricultural clusters uh and and why aren't some areas designated as for agriculture as well as some areas that are designated for industry and for residents and commercial and I don't know what is meant by a cluster and and is there a way of of spec or recommending for for the public to recommend certain areas to be included that are not uh outlined on your map. Thank you. you've you've struck one of the more challenging issues we're trying to deal with um in terms of um of of indicating areas that would be appropriate um potentially to remain for agricultural preservation uh while at the same time um not stepping on um some of the legalities of of land taking and we have to be very careful of that we can that um we do not overly restrict property while also indicating the desire of the community and of the commission that um the preservation of agricultural properties is is a high priority. Um but unless when all is said and done um um from the advice that I've been always given that um if you want to ultimately preserve the property as it is now, you either have to get a development or conservation easement or you have to purchase it. Um and um so we have to be careful because um the plan of

development um the statute um guiding the plan of development changed about 10 years ago. Up until that time, the plan was basically just a guide and and it's and it and it could be it could suggest, for example, that uh a piece of property be um used for residential purposes, but if someone came along and said they wanted to put a office building on it, the commission could do that. 10 years ago that statute was changed where the plan has a lot more teeth and that um it it uh guides much more specifically the zoning regulations so that it now requires that the zoning regulations be in harmony with and accord with the plan of development particularly the future land use map. So we we're trying to figure a way because I know there's strong interest on this commission to preserve farmland and encourage agricultural retention and and particularly development um without um getting into the uh the issues of taking. But your point's well put and um we are we've started it. I'm not sure we're going to come to a solution that is going to make um everyone happy, but we're going to move in that direction as best we can from a staff perspective. Don't know if that answers your question. Um it it does doesn't part is there a a way for citizens to participate participate in this process, you know, or is it a legal matter? Yeah, I guess a question.

I guess he's asking you to didn't I didn't quite understand the question quite frankly. Is there a way for to participate in what you're doing? We would welcome your input at any time and and and in what uh what group is this? In what manner? Um, if you want to just directly visit our office and meet with me and Linda is probably the easiest and most direct way. Um, I'm sorry, I don't know who who you are. I'm the I'm the uh I'm the director of planning of building and land use in the town. My office is right here in town hall. Okay. And thank you. Is that that true true now with the change that you said 10 years ago? Um that is that in an industrial area if somebody wanted to build a house they couldn't do it because it would be it has to be used for industrial depends on what we put in the industrial regulations and what uses we permitted. Okay. But it would it could be a challenge. It's it's a lot more complicated than I thought it would be. Hey. Yes, it is. Thank you. Any further questions? Okay, we'll start with comments. Any comments from anyone from Oh, I'm sorry. You said there was someone online. Okay, just have them identify themselves and their address. Can you hear me? Hello. Yes. Oh, good. Thank you. I'm Mary Pelleter and I'm at 80 Elizabeth Street in Hartford, Connecticut. And although I live in Hartford, I've worked on the Park River Regional Watershed and the

North Branch uh Park River wershed management plan. I'm here as just a resident, as a citizen, not representing any particular group. But I wanted to point out that's interesting that this uh discussion about the plan of conservation and development is following the detailed review of the University of Hartford property south of Cottage Grove Road which really highlights the sort of problematic relationship between the the kind of conventions of the Berlin Turnpike planning strategies that seem to pervade much of of Connecticut. I must admit I'm not a resident of Connecticut and I'm sharing this insight because I've recently spent a lot of time with my family for various um reasons and observing the landscape and urban design in the Kansas City metropolitan neighborhoods. And I want to point out that Kansas City um metropolitan neighborhoods, you know, uh they are based on George Kesler. George Kesler um was recommended to Kansas City by Frederick Law Olmstead who of course is from the Hartford area and I'm sure um was very familiar with the Bloomfield landscape. At the end of Olmstead's life he moved away from these kind of square plans that went anywhere and focused on um developing ideas around conserving whole riparian corridors. the emerald necklace in Boston which transformed the muddy river from a stinking sewage swell you know um it you know has been a longevity an an example of successful conservation of the wetland corridors Rock Creek Park in Washington DC is similar it was completed by the Mstead brothers over a hundred years ago I want to point out that when we're looking with those plan of conservation and development that there's this weird

disconnect between your residential clusters which tend to be in wetland areas and your conservation areas which are primarily along the Talit Mountain dis overlay district and I I feel like I hope that as you know this plan might evolve a little bit but also as Bloomfield continues to develop which I'm sure it will that you begin to focus on creating hubs of commercial um services that maybe people drive to but are also surrounded by residential neighborhoods. And that those neighborhoods, for instance, where I was in Kansas City, which is a suburb of Prairie of Prairie Village, Kansas, I could walk down um get coffee, a smoothie, do yoga, go to the hardware store, the bank, um the uh restaurants, of course, ice cream, and a grocery store. but other people could drive there as well. And those are um kind of peppered throughout the metropolitan area. And I feel like that that's a much more successful um strategy for laying out your for land use rather than these strip these these what again the Berlin turnpike um commercial layouts. um 30 seconds. That's really uh that's really my observation is I I'm of course I'm rep recommending uh the or the the the North Branch Park River watershed management plan be respected and further reviewed for uh uh details that could be um added to this iteration um of of the of your plan of conservation and development. Okay. Thank you very much.

Just, you know, this is about flooding, right? The flooding isn't going to Excuse me, Mary. And yeah, it's it's not going to end. You need to start to address the flooding issues, not only downstream, but in your own neighborhoods. Okay. Thank you. Um, there anyone else? Okay. Hello. Yes, if you can, Lois, just state your name and address, please. This is Lois Hager, 8 Doncaster Road in Bloomfield, and I want to thank you all for getting this far with the plan. Um, my basic question is that I uh comments, Lois, you told me it was for questions. I thought this was the question period. That's fine. And I can I'll be glad. No, I'm sorry. Fundamental question is um how do the proposals that are recommended in this plan um link to the population growth that's mentioned? It's very confusing. I don't see really much need for changing any regulations to increase density if we are not not expecting population to grow more than 100 people between now and 19 uh 2030 and then to decline. I think what I'm missing in the plan is how much population growth does the town want and why until having those without that question answered I think everything else that follows except perhaps the environmental protection portion is is I'm I'm unable to understand it. I'm sure there are lots of good reasons, but there is no population goal here and there's a clear

statement that we don't expect any population growth. Um, I will have comments later. That's my basic question about the plan. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. We've we did start already. Yep. Good evening and thank you Paula Jones, Five Bear Ridge Drive. Um, first of all, I want to thank um, Director Coleman for his summary because um, my comments will be brief. He hit a lot of topics here. Um, I previously submitted pretty detailed comments and so he did hit a lot of points, but I did want to um emphasize how blessed we are with some amazing natural resources. Um, he mentioned the uh wild and scenic river designation we have for the Farmington River. The fact that the Metaccom Trail is um part of the New England uh National Scenic Trail. I mean, seriously, Bloomfield has a wild and scenic river and a national scenic trail in our town, and that's something we really should stress and kind of emphasize in the plan because um that's part of what makes this town so special. I was also very happy to see um that or hear that uh the Highlands Vision uh community designation was mentioned. That is something that Bloomfield was approached recently to seek. East Graanby has it. West Hartford is going after it. We're a month ahead a month ahead of them in terms of the process. The town council passed a resolution at its last meeting um

seeking the designation and the next step is deep. So, um I just want to point out that in the last plan, the 2012 plan, seeking wild and scenic designate, wild and scenic river designation was an objective and we did that in 2019 with our neighboring towns. So, um I just think you know highlighting that in the plan is very important. Um a couple folks have mentioned the importance of at least mentioning uh the Park River. we kind of overlook it. I know I'm guilty of that. And 74% of Bloomfield lies in the North Branch watershed. So, it's a big deal. Um, I do think we could even add a point um under strategy five in the natural resources section with a reference to the watershed plan. I mean, even something as simple as that in terms of protecting our waterways, I think would be helpful. Um the uh importance of you know preserving our forested areas and agricultural fields um conserving undeveloped areas because especially in the face of climate change carbon sequestration storm water you know um control things like that. our unconscer our undeveloped land is really undervalued in terms of those um benefits that they offer. So I think we need that. Um and then finally I do want to just stress that I was actually encouraged by there's things in the plan recommended actions we've already done which was really wonderful. We got tree city um designation recognition. We have um we have a 10-year forest stewardship plan 2025 to 2035 that will help us with our urban canopy

and um I'm really pleased and applaud the uh both the town council and TPZ for the 30 seconds focus on affordable housing um the inclusionary zoning as well as the um the uh help me out here guys um the trust. Thank you. the the the trust. Um and then my last comment is I hope you can do some debriefing kind of after this process is done. Last goound you had a um steering committee with stakeholders. I think if you'd gotten a lot of input along the way in terms of developing a draft, there'd be less work to do at this end of it. Okay. So, thank you very much. Okay. Thank you. Any further comments? Step to the podium. Name and address, please. My name is Peter Russell. I live at 60 Ller Road. I've been living in Bloomfield about a year and my wife and I are delighted to be here. We think it's a fabulous town, great natural resources, and a vibrant, diverse place. Um, I want to talk a little bit uh in my three minutes about farming in particular. The draft recognizes how preservation of Bloomfield's historic farming character, not to use character, has been set back by the loss, the prime soils, farmland, development pressures, and the business challenges facing remaining farmers of the town. John Coleman captured a lot of the comments that I think I and others had, but I just wanted to emphasize a few things. uh I don't think uh there's any real

quantification of goals to preserve farmlands, the budgeting for acquisition of farmlands or any of the financial aspects of supporting farmers or for the promotion of farming business. There's no call for a process to create a realistic and achievable overall policy and program for par farming in Bloomfield that would engage farmers themselves, the whole community, and other potential stakeholders in reviving the town's historic his agricultural base as a unique anchor for future economic development. In the separate document, the future land use map has been provided which includes preliminary agricultural clusters in the town. But there's no detailed discussion in the draft POC of how the map would be implemented and what the impacts would be for farmers and other land owners or for the town's finances. And John Coleman illustrated um or talked about the the the legal complications. Here are some suggestions going forward. Move ahead on the draft PLC's high priority action to complete an inventory of Bloomfield's current farming and farming related resources. Provide a broader perspective on how farming could be linked creatively with related businesses including restaurants, breweries, distilleries, other food producers and distributors. and with community goals reflecting food security, local sourcing, nutrition, training, internships, and employment. Give thought in concert with the Chamber of Commerce, farming operators, and relevant town committees to how Bloomfield's historic agricultural

character again can be highlighted as a destination, a magnet, and a special feature for restaurants and others in the town center plan itself. For example, the Farmers Exchange building could be renovated and relocated so as to become a welcoming hub for visitors and a way station for bikers and outdoor enthusiasts using the Splunk greenways through Bloomfield. You have 30 seconds. Thank you. Oh, you still had 30 seconds. Okay, thank you. Any further comments? Um, okay. Next, Robert Dickinson, 400 Cbury Drive, Bloomfield. Uh, one quick one is I I like to see more goals in in in the plan. One might be a uh a net zero community and to set a set a future goal for it and work towards it. The other is much more general that I think this type of hearing um we should consider combining questions and comments because uh just the arrangement of the words changes it from a question to a comment and vice versa. Thank you. Okay. Thank you.

Hi, Ann Gustoson, uh, 21 Prospect Street. So, the first thing I have to say is every time I try to do anything like this, I am consistently blown away at how fabulous Bloomfield is. Like, everybody is so intelligent, has such intelligent comments. I'm always blown away. I'm so thrilled I live here. Anyway, um really really so um I guess the first thing is that I hope that going forward that we can ask development of whatever sort to be as close to net zero as possible to be as energy efficient as possible to consider and maybe require some sort of um mitigation for their usage of power like solar panels. There are things like small vertical wind that people like Jay Leno had on his building that are really successful and really quiet and small and don't have to be high up in the air or use more than like two or three or four miles per hour of wind, which is virtually everywhere. So, it's entirely possible. I know I've heard something about a data center. I'm not sure really what, but that ought to be forced to use a fuel cell just like uh Pepperage Farm has. There's a Connecticut company that um is has been in that for a long time. That's the first thing. Um the second thing is uh the center of town plan, which I guess kind of goes along with this. I kind of liked what I heard initially. Although the more I think about it, the more it strikes me that I mean it's like going through a tunnel now when you go

down Jerome. It's I I'm not sure we really want to be a town center that's built around an apartment complex because that's kind of what that gigantic thing was. And I mean, I guess if there was a bunch of retail or some sort of thing underneath it, it would be better. But it's kind of like this is a small town more or less and to Miss Hager's comment um probably going to be and most of us are here because we didn't want to live in Hartford and now when I like sit at the light and I see the library which if it were somewhere else I'd it be okay with but like when I look at it I feel like I should be in Hartford and I'm kind of annoyed with that. So, um I'm hoping that we kind of try to keep some of what used to be a small town here because that's why people want to live here. And that I guess brings me to open land and farming, which I'm really thrilled to hear that other people besides me are concerned about for a thousand reasons. Um Okay. Thank you. Oh, is that it? Yes. Okay. But thank you very much. All righty. Thank you. Um, did you say someone Oh, good evening. Lori Julian, 43 Maple Avenue. Uh, for almost 27 years, I've made Bloomfield my home. So I am like other people uh very saddened to hear about the decrease the

actual decrease in farmland that has been lost between 1985 and 2015 uh these agricultural fields and this is in compare I'm sorry did I say 48.5% I think was in the in the plan uh this is in comparison to Connecticut the state the whole state which has only lost 16%. Uh so I would strongly suggest that we do follow the agricultural cluster plan and that uh the the um importance of open space that it provides the community uh you know the gateways we we see Bloom Farm as the gateway to Bloomfield uh one area and then we see um Dunkcaster farmland as another gateway. And I think just the the sense that it brings um is just vital to the community. I think someone spoke about the small town character of Bloomfield and how we identify with that and what it's becoming with more urban sprawl and unchecked um excuse me, unchecked housing subdivisions created. Our open space, which promotes well-being, is forever being chipped away. We see it. We see we've seen it with the Sigma development plan, the Duncaster expansion, potential Bloomhill plans, and numerous subdivisions all over. Uh second, I would um suggest that we or stress that existing plazas

be fixed up, you know, not only from a visual sense, you uh and you know, blight and um it destruction of our prime farmland or other land uh should be sort of off the the the um choices and and and have some type of consideration that there are no really no other alternatives. Uh and so it should have 30 seconds. Okay. Redevelopment should be steered toward the steered toward these areas already developed. Uh we have empty plazas. So and third I'd like to see more focus on bike lane designations like other towns have already have already implemented. And uh that is pretty much it. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Just someone alive. Okay, thank you. This is Lois Hager, 8 Duncaster Road. I have um I I do think that we need to define how much population growth Bloomfield wants um in order to understand the other recommendations in the plan. Um with respect to the future land use map um there are some sub substantial omissions there. I think we need to define better about what agricultural clusters are and how that idea would actually be implemented. And then the definitions of low, medium and high density res residential are too general to be workable. There needs to

be some kind of reference to how many units per acre would be allowed in each category. And those units should be the definition should be modified by discussion of what kind of housing types would be proposed, not just the number of units. Um because if you have one housing type which is an apartment and you have so many units per acre, it's very different than if you have single family houses on the same acreage. And finally, I think the regulations throughout the document, it talks about reviewing the regulations. I think that should be one of the highest priorities for the town. I think it's important for everyone. The lack of clarity and consistency are expensive and timeconuming for everyone, developers, commissioners, staff, and community members. And I think it would be worth the town um to expend the money necessary to get the professional help to help the planning office to work on these refining the regulations. They're trying to work on applications, specific applications that come in. They need some help in the overall what are the regulations going to say. I think it's repeatedly as it was in the earlier hearing tonight. there's lack of clarity about what our regulations actually mean. So I think it would be very good expenditure for the town to hire somebody to help the planning office do this and I'm very hopeful that the plan will be edited um as summarized um by Mr. Coleman. I think obviously there have been wonderful comments given and I hope that everyone panel I hope that everyone on the panel

will take the time to read all the comments. Um I know they're voluminous and I do appreciate the time that you've spent on it already and the time that you will spend in the future. Thank you. Thank you Lois. Luke Miles at 540 Simsberry Road would like to see more plans from the conservation development plan regarding decarbonizing and electrifying town-owned buildings and requiring new housing of any type to include solar wind onsite. He's also happy to see the library nearing completion. Thank you. I mean you can have a threem minute followup plus 30 seconds. Um it was suggested earlier that the only way to uh uh preserve farmland is uh for direct acquisition or agricultural easement. Uh and of course there is some of that that's happened in Bloomfield with the Trap Rock Land Conservancy over on Duncaster Road. Uh there's another way which has been happening and uh is is is workable and could probably be done more here and that is for landowners who have agricultural land to make it available to farmers to use. The town is doing this itself for example on Lassellet where a local farmer is uh cropping the couple of the upper fields. Um there's another landowner on Mountain Avenue who's been doing that for many

years with a local farmer and it has been a a good relationship and it continues. So when you turn left, you turn right off of Ller Road onto Mountain Road and go toward Duncaster Road. Uh all that land on the right side is being um plowed and crops are growing there and it's done by a local land owner making the land available to a local farmer. Okay. Thank you. Hi. So, my understanding is that I I could have Excuse me. Can you identify yourself? Sure. I'm Mary Paliter and again in Hartford. Um, Mary, this this will be your last time. This is like your third comments. So, go ahead. So I wanted to point out that this discussion about the conservation of riparian zones uh which are your streams ought to be the baseline of your plan and that that your riparian zones are your most valuable properties for uh for for floodways for the volatility of climate change And what I'm seeing in your plans is there's a lot of emphasis on your your bicycle trails or your roads. Um, but there's not a lot of emphasis on the relationship of your of your neighborhoods and commercial hubs uh to distancing themselves and protecting and developing relation

positive relationships with your riparian zones. and which also feed your farms. It's nice to hear people emphasizing the farm. So, I just wanted to follow up with that because it's it's a visual description that I'm offering. It's very different than what is happening in Connecticut, but it's very successful in in um a strategy. It's it's a it's a 19th century strategy, frankly, a turn of the century strategy. And I hope that in in the future um maybe there'll be a chance for us to further discuss how this would work especially in relationship to the res recommendations of the North Branch Park River wershed management plan improving water quality and uh protecting the community from flooding. Thank you. Okay, if everyone is commented, Jonathan, uh do you have anything else to say before we close this uh public hearing? I would just reiterate, Mr. Chairman, um our tremendous appreciation for all those who have taken the time and effort to review the plan and make comments both in writing and this evening. And um please rest assured that um the two authors going forward will um endeavor to incorporate um as best we can um both responses to the questions and um utilization of the comments we received. I think they all would contribute to a uh greatly improved um document when all is said and done. I also like to say thank you for coming out. uh your comments will definitely have an impact. Uh with that said, chair entertain a motion to close this public hearing. I move. Mr. Chair, I move we close the public hearing.

I second. It's been moved and second. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I oppose. Extension. Chair votes sign. Okay. Jonathan, as far as the agenda goes, that uh seems to be it. Is there anything else you like to say before we uh adjourn? I'd only like to say um again, thank you to the commission for all the time and effort you put in. And I'm sure wondering, you know, people are wondering what are the next steps um on the plan of development. It is the staff's intent um to work with um the consultant we have used before to in to take a good hard look at the document and and do a what I think is going to be a fairly significant in part rewrite. Um schedules um do not permit us to really begin that till uh the first week in August. Um, but we believe that we can uh have it done in time for uh getting it to you so you have some time to look at it prior to your scheduled August meeting. Okay. Thank you. With that said, chair entertain a motion to objourn. So moved. Meeting a jerk.