Planning Board - Regular Meeting

meeting to order. Uh, this is the November 19th meeting of the Concrete City Planning Board. Uh, Mr. Clerk. Sure. Mr. Clerk, could you call the role? Certainly. Chair Woodin, here. Mr. Hicks, I'm here. Mr. Fox, here. Uh, Mr. Tarbo, here. Uh, Miss Condo Matrai here. Uh, Miss Rosenberger, I think I'm here. Council Todd here. Uh Mr. Santa Cruz absent. Um member Savage also absent. We do have a quorum. And you get Fox. Mr. Fox. I apologize. That would be me.

All right. Do have a quorum. We'll move forward. Uh first item on the agenda tonight's approval of the August minutes. Uh would someone like to make a motion to approve the August, excuse me, the October. It says August. Uh [snorts] seems August. It does your second motion and a second to approve the October 15th minutes as submitted. Would someone like to make that motion? Second. Motion has been made and second. Any discussion? Any abstensions? All those in favor?

Opposed? That motion carries. And we'll move on to an agenda overview. Uh first item on the agenda overview is uh to reappointment of [clears throat] two members to the architectural design review committee with terms to expire on uh in Octo in 2028. Uh those two members are Elizabeth Dery Henen and Ron King. Would someone like to make a motion to reappoint those two members to the architectural design review committee? I vote. Second. Motion's made and seconded. All those in favor?

I opposed. That motion carries. All right, listen up if you're out in the audience here. We've got a lot of items on the agenda that have been continued at the applicant's request to uh additional meetings in [snorts] December and January. So, first up on the motion uh excuse me, on the continuances is item 6A, which is a uh 1 to 7 Meuire Street major site plan. Um that I'm going to do them all in one shot. Is that okay? uh items 6B and 6 C which are uh 65 North Main Street, Phoenix block major site plan and item 6 C which is Phoenix Avenue Phoenix block major site plan as well as item 9A which is 75 Store Street architectural design review 9B uh excuse me 9A and 9F uh which is a Phoenix block minor subdivision. Uh those have all been uh uh request

requested by the applicant to move to the December 17th meeting. Would someone like to make a motion to move those items off the agenda into the December 17th meeting? So motion's been made and second. Any discussion? All those in favor? I opposed. That motion carries. And one more [snorts] uh again the request of the applicant to move to the January 21st uh 2026 meeting at the request of the applicant item 9B minor subdivision for 131 Shaker Road. Would someone like to make a motion to move that item to the January meeting? I'll make that motion. Would someone like to second it? [snorts] Second. All those in favor?

Opposed? That motion carries. So again, if you're here for 6A, 6B, 6 C, 9A, 9F, 9B, all of those items will not be heard tonight. No public testimony on those. So that moves us rapidly on to uh the first item on our agenda, which is design review applications by consent. Uh let's look and see what we got. [cough and clears throat] So just 5 A and 5B on our design review applications by consent. If anyone's here for items 5A and 5B, uh applications by consent are done based on the feedback that we've gotten from architectural design review. The applicant uh the application that's in our packets. Uh would anybody like to request that those be pulled from the design review by consent in the audience? Any member of the board have any of those items ought to be pulled from consent? If not, I'll take a motion to approve items 5A and 5B as submitted with architectural design review recommendations. So moved.

Second. Motion has been made and seconded. Any further discussion? All those in favor? I opposed. That motion carries. Brings us on again to item seven, extensions by consent. There's none. Uh item eight. Let's read our first public hearing, design review applications. Item 8A. If we could read that into the record.

Certainly. And in accordance with section 28-94F8, request for reconsideration of the zoning ordinance uh doing a life care on behalf of TDL Investments LLC requests reconsideration of the architectural design review decision made by the planning board at their dece September 17, 2025 meeting with the board conditionally approved a new 14.3 foot square foot internally illuminated wall sign and a 21.25 25 foot internally illuminated panel replacement in an existing freestanding sign at 374 Louden Road in the Gateway Performance District. Okay. Is the applicant here? No.

I'll give a quick little update and then I'll ask Alec to provide a little bit of feedback. Uh this request asks the planning board to reconsider the decision on ADR u from September 17. Uh the that section of the ordinance reads uh that an applicant who is agreved of the decision by the planning board under this section may request reconsideration of the application by the board which shall place the application on an exec available agenda for further consideration. The applicant may provide additional materials and information in support of the request. The board may seek further recommendations from the design review committee prior to rendering decision on the reconsidered application. Uh, in this case, what the applicant is asking for is the board reconsider the requirement, the opaque background on the freestanding sign and allow the panel to be redesigned and installed without that requirement. And the staff takes no position on this request. I'll bet it's the first time I've known this a long time. I've never seen a request for reconsideration of the zoning ordinance come before us. But so, you heard the uh the overview and the you've got the information in the excerpt in your packet. Um, it is which one is it on the if I'm looking at the the one with the gray background,

middle one all the way across. And they just clarification, they want to leave it as a white white sign. It is a white sign. A white blank spot where the where you see the gray, it's a night picture. Yeah. Um, and they put an opaque background behind it and that is what they installed and they requesting not to have that background. They're basically asking to be able to redo the panel because they're concerned that the sign as it's currently out there isn't readable from the public.

Okay. So, the grays will turn to whites basically and the text that's white will turn to blue probably or some other color, right? uh just that gray block on behind the left side of the sign. They're asking not to there's an opaque background there, right? The sign itself is is white when it's internally illuminated. I gotcha. It's just the background that's sitting on the back behind it. So, the sign doesn't need to be redone. It just needs to have the opaque background be removed. Our understanding what the applicant [cough and clears throat] is requesting. Okay. Questions, comments from the board. Considerations? Yay. Nay. Anybody have a thought process? The other thing you can do with this, if you want to get further input from the ADR, you can refer this back for their recommendation to the next meeting.

That might not be a bad idea. I don't know if anybody's up has a thought either way on that. Just to clarify, it it will still have the opaque background. Will not. No, the requesting to remove the opaque background. So, white and no opaque. Yes. Okay. Thank you. [clears throat] So, I'd uh I'd be inclined to defer back to architectural design review since this is in their wheelhouse if uh Sure. If I'd like to make a motion uh to refer this back to ADR for review uh and see what they say. I'll make a motion. Second. All right. And continue to the December 17th and continue it to the December 17th meeting. So, we'll have an architectural design review meeting before planning.

Okay. So, I've made my motion to include that. Yeah. So, in the motion to include that, right? Uh, so we got a motion and a second on the table. Any discussion? Excuse me. Before we do that, we it is a public hearing, so I open it up for any public testimony if anybody has any questions regards this. If not, I'll close the public hearing. Make sure I stamp my stamp my stamp it right and do it the right way. Uh, so we got a motion and a second on the table and further discussion. All those in favor? I opposed. That motion carries. So it'll be referred back to architectural design review. Moves us on to section nine in our agenda. I believe I see is first up. Correct. That is correct. All right. Hit me.

That is Marmali Earth LLC requesting approval for a minor subdivision application and certain waiverss from the subdivision regulations for a three lot subdivision at tax map 11Z lot 52 addressed as 138 Snow Pound Road in the open space residential district.

Okay. Is the applicant here? Come on up. Uh okay. Let's get a staff update on this. Uh this application calls for the subdivision of approximately 36 acre parcel currently containing a barn and a single family detached dwelling that are in significant disrepair and will be and will be rely be soon demolished to ensure public safety. Uh the project calls for the subdividing of the parcel into three lots for future construction of single family detached dwellings. Uh staff is recommending the application be determined as complete and conditional approval per the recommendations in the staff memo.

Okay. So again, I think uh we have a determination completeness component in this. Staff has determined the application completes not a development of regional impact uh and to open the public hearing. Would someone like to make a motion to find the application complete and open the public hearing? So move second. Motion's been made. Second. All those in favor? I opposed. That motion carries. So public hearing is open. Welcome to the table. If you guys could state your names for the record, please. My name is Molly Taylor. I'm one of the You can sit. You can sit there. It'll pick you up. Good. I'm Marcia Brown. I'm the mom that bought this property for my three daughters. That's something disrepair is probably being nice, right? I think that's probably being Did you see the picture? I did, but I'm familiar with it anyways.

Been that way a long time. Yeah. The only thing I I wanted to mention is um and I appreciate that the staff uh got the review in so quickly. Um it looked like in the staffer review there was some kind of mention that we needed a consitional use permit and I don't believe I think that was included in error um that we don't need need one because we're not even in the wetland buffer. Thank you. Just wanted to make that staff note. Okay, we'll confirm that. Yeah, thank you. Okay.

Okay. So, tell us a little bit about the project if you could. So, the project is to divide this property into three for myself and my other two sisters so that we can all be neighbors together. Um, my sisters will not be in a position to build for many years into the future, but my husband and I are newly married and we are looking to build our house on proposed lot 2 in the future. Um, we are really passionate about the history of this property. is one of the original settling families of conquered and so we want to preserve that history in the landscape as we restore this property and this is beside the subdivision but we are looking to incorporate historic aspects of the original house into ours to honor that history.

I'll make note that um they are in house design. They are actively uh looking to build um next construction season and so when you say when she has said years Daughter number three will build within five years. Daughter number two will build probably within three or four years. So just not that many years, not decades. Thank you. Yeah.

Okay. Any uh feedback or questions on the recommendation from staff to deny the waiver request under uh this couple couple waiver requests that were requested and recommending denying those. We just like to ask if there's any feedback or reasons why they should be reconsidered and and brought forward.

There were two data elements that were missing from the submitted plans and that was my oversight, the topography and the soils layer. The file that I reviewed was not the same file that I printed in haste. So I do apologize for that. That will be included and finalized. There are permits that are recommended and we are happy to work with city staff on getting those for the septic and the well permit and city staff also made recommendations on the driveway design and we're happy to follow that. Overall again city staff have been so helpful in all of this and guiding us. So I I want to emphasize they've been very very very helpful and we appreciate it.

Okay. So you understand when it comes through from the from our for our end, the recommendation to deny those waiverss is is is coming back and you'll you'll be able to provide that information. It's reasonable. We're happy to continue to work with city staff to make sure that everything is satisfied. Okay, great. Questions from the board? Any member of the audience have any questions or concerns about this application? Okay, hang on. Hang on just a second. Um any other comments for staff or anything else? just that uh there were no conditional use permit uh applications as part of this. So

no um yeah and sorry not to the original application showed some potential impacts the applicant had since they had continued this application for a few months cleaning up a few things and the section I think it's 2.2 two of the staff report referenced is just a copy paste error. Further in our staff report in section six, we state there are no CS required. Perfect. Thank you. Okay, we'll have you guys step back and come on up. Thank you all. Yes, thank you. Can you make sure you sign in, please? You're signed in. I'm signing in our neighbor. Oh, thank you.

Hi. if you could state your name for the record.

Sure. Uh, my name is Gina Cannon. I'm one of the abuing properties at 141 Snow Pond. So, I came tonight because I I was confused at reading the staff report about saying the conditional use for the wetlands buffer and then not a conditional use for the wetlands buffer. Um, we also have part of that wetlands buffer run through our property and I just wanted and I I had a chance to talk with Marcia ahead of time and her daughter and I are very similar in the ideas that we want to maintain that wetlands buffer. We're actually in the process of trying to get rid of pull out by hand the um invasive species trying to replant native species in that buffer. Uh we've we've talked to DEES so don't panic. [laughter] Um, but my concern was like, what's going on with the wetlands buffer? Um, and then the other thing that's kind of ironic is that Marcia and I went to law school together, so she was a couple years behind me, I think. But,

um, so I I my concern was the wetlands buffer completely, 100%. Um,

so I'm I'm glad to hear that the wetlands isn't the buffer isn't going to be touched. Um, the other piece is that those two pieces of building that are there are very very dangerous. Prior to this property being sold, the um executive of the estate of the late person who lived there um had actually asked me to try and keep an eye. We we had a heck of a time because we're across the street keeping homeless people out of those properties. Uh keeping people off the property from stealing stuff that was on the property still that was part of the estate. So, I'm very happy to see that someone bought the property. They have been very very proactive in trying to clean up that property. All of the neighbors are very happy that that property is is I mean the massive undertaking. I don't know if any of you have seen that property, but the massive undertaking to clear up that property and do something um I don't want to say constructive because construction and constructive, but do something positive with that property. So, we're all in favor of this.

Um my only concern was the wetlands buffer. So, and that's a lot of concern. So, there you go. Great. Well, thank you very much for your testimony. Thanks. Thanks. Any other questions, comments, concerns from the public?

No. Okay, we'll close the public hearing. Uh comments from from the board or staff? Anybody? Not. We'll move on to uh recommendations in our packet here. Um okay. So 9.1 again using uh the information that was presented in our packets, the testimony that we heard here tonight and the uh the information regarding the property as our findings of fact. Uh we'll base all the decisions on that uh on that information that was provided up first on our agenda is 9.2 two grant the waiver request below for the listed sections of the subdivision regulations based on the evidence provided showing that criteria are RSA 674 362N2 and section 3508 of the subdivision regulations are met and those are outlined in section 1208 for existing condition plans section 13016 state federal permits u I'm not going to list all these so we'll do A C and D under the grant waiver request. Would someone like to make a motion to grant those waiver requests as outlined?

So move second. Motion has been made second. Any discussion? All those in favor? I opposed. That motion carries. 9.3 is to deny the waiver request below for the listed sections of the subdivision regulations because the request does not meet the criteria of 674 uh 362N1 or two or section 3508 35.08 of the subdivision regulations. And those are outlined in uh say A B C uh say A B and C. Would someone like to make a motion to deny those waiver requests as outlined? I'll make that motion. Do we have a second? Second. All those in favor? I

opposed. That motion carries. 9.4 is to grant minor subdivision approval for the three lot subdivision of tax map lot 11 Z52 unadressed Shaker Road. Is that right? Or is it fund? This is a snow pond. uh subject to the following pre and subsequent conditions and that's outlined in precedent conditions one through eight and subsequent conditions one through four. Would someone like to make a motion to grant my subdivision approval as outlined? Second. Motion's been made and second. Any discussion? All those in favor? I opposed. That motion carries. You're all set. Step one's done. Good luck. We'll see you again.

[laughter] Okay, let's move on in our agenda if we could. Item 9D. This is Nobis Group on behalf of St. Paul School requests approval for a major site plan application, architectural design review, and conditional use permit for disturbance to wet buffers and certain waiverss from the site plan regulations for the construction of a 17,600 foot building addition. relocated squash courts and other site improvements at tax map 724Z, lot 110A, addressed as 80 Dunarton Road and tax map 811Z, lot 1A, addressed as 117 Dunarton Road in the institutional and open space residential districts. Okay. Um the applicants are making their way to the table. Let's get a staff update on this if we could.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the board. This application is for a major site plan conditional use permit and architectural design review was determined complete at the October 15th planning board meeting and proposes the relocation of the St. Paul school squash courts into an expanded athletic and fitness center at their campus. Uh this project is one of several planned by St. Paul's as part of their long-term campus improvement plans uh which are expected to be presented to the city for approvals over the course of the next several years. Uh the this proposal specifically consists of that 17,600 foot building addition associated site improvements and several waiver requests. Uh we note that one of those uh is something staff is amendable to changing our staff recommendation from denial to a partial waiver related to the bound survey information provided the information the applicant provides is sufficient in the area where the project is being constructed. Uh Alec will go over that a little bit further when we get a little further along the discussion. Uh staff is recommending conditional approval of ADRC and the major site plan. Further recommendations in the memo.

Excellent. Welcome to the table. If you could state your names for the record. Hi, I'm Morgan Dunen with Novice Group. Hi, uh Bill Massie, senior director of facilities and planning at St. Paul School with Gallagher Kelly and Gro. Welcome back. Tell us a little bit about this project. First time for me for squash courts. I haven't had those on the agenda before. So, it's very exciting. It's the new It's the new thing. It's the new thing. It's not new. It's No, it's not. It's We St. Paul's built the first squash courts in the US. I was going to say squash courts been around forever in St. Paul's. It's It's a prep school staple. They don't want to call them pickle ball courts yet. So, was it right after you invented hockey? That we [laughter] we claimed that as well. So,

take it all with a great All right. Well, welcome again back to the [clears throat] table. Let's uh let's get this underway and we'll uh see what we got here.

Okay, awesome. Thank you. Um so I'll just give a very basic overview of our site. This uh image right here gives a very good um aerial image of what the existing athletic and fitness center AFC building currently looks like. And um St. is um planning to expand and relocate their squash courts um right in this back of house type area. Um and so there are going to be some minor improvements to this parking lot. We're going to keep the parking lot pretty much exactly the same. I think we are adding some parking spaces. I believe seven. Um and we are going to keep the access road that goes down to the bottom part of the building. Um this will be a facility only 12 foot wide access um road to provide secondary eress for the AFC building itself and the squash edition. I will go to the site plan. Um I'm sorry if this is a bit confusing. It's hard to show uh two floors in a 2D um view, but this red line right here um indicates the second floor of the squash courts, which would be where the squash courts are actually um provided. Um and this will be at level or a little bit above grade of the existing parking lot right here. And you can see where we're proposing to do some um repaving of the parking lot. And this is to install the new storm water system for treatment. Um, this little blue square right here is the level one buildout. Um, and this

is going to be a fitness area. You know, treadmills, ellipticals, that type of area. Um, and um, this bottom space right here is just going to be an outdoor space for teams to meet up after an event and such. Um, we're still providing a access road that would go underneath the building and to the bottom of uh, oh gosh, page right. Um let's see. We did go to ZBA last November. Um and we got variances for um the reduction in parking to allow 96 spaces where 1,334 were required and to allow disturbance within the wetland buffer for um the building. [clears throat] We also went to uh conservation commission uh in October uh for a conditional use permit for disturbance within a wetland buffer for the grading um improvements that we are proposing to do. Um I can slide down that too. Okay, this is just um I know Jeff isn't here. I thought he would like this slide. [laughter] Um but this shows uh on top is the fire truck uh radius. Again, the parking lot is going to remain as is. So no changes there as well as um a charter bus for um students to get dropped off and on. So it just shows that we are providing enough access way for vehicles. Um and the biggest um civil change for

this back space is we are doing we're proposing for storm water treatment um with the addition of the building. So uh the building will be tied into a subsurface gallery under the existing parking lot um and it will treat and um we are uh hitting less of the peak flows in post development. We did submit for AOT and they only had one comment back to us. So that was good news. Um we're also proposing um just some drainage underneath as well. And I could get into this now or I could wait later about one of the waiver requests. Um, but basically one of my waiver requests was for this little catch basin that's kind of tucked away between the two buildings um for a diff to use a different detail with a a sump that's one foot versus three feet. Um, that's erosion. I can go into smaller details.

So, scroll up just a bit. Sorry. Keep going up. Keep going. Tell me when to stop. Oh, no. Sorry. One more, I guess. Oh, darn it. Sorry. I thought I saw it go by. I'm looking at the elevation and I'm I'm It is hard to visualize it when you're looking at the when you're looking at the plans. I'm looking at number two. I'm looking at number two right there to the right on the right hand side down at the bottom right corner. So, just for my own edification here. So coming out of the parking lot up on the left. So in the bottom right. Go down to the bottom right. And then just if you can zoom in on that. This this one right. Yeah. Okay.

So you're coming down in the front at ground level getting up and going under the building and there's going to be steel girders left and right and you're going to have a little driveway that comes out from the end. Is that right? Correct. Yes. Okay. Okay. Yeah. This better depicts what I'm showing in 2D. It's kind of confusing on my plans. On the other on the on the flat one, it is. And I I just wanted to make sure I was understanding it correctly. Okay. This the photo simulations on the left are also helpful, I think, to get a better picture of what it look like. And the underbuilding fitness area that's part of this as well.

So, and you said the under space. So, the road that goes under there and then there's going to be additional space under there for teams or whatever to gather. That's that picture right there. Oh, that's it. Okay, the rendering looks much better than looks awesome. I wish I was still in high school. [laughter] Um, thank you.

Yeah, no problem. I was just going to show the landscape plan just to briefly touch on that as well. Let's get Okay, I'm almost there. I thought I saw it. One more. Nope. It's a It's a lot of plants. There we go. Color. There we go. There you go. So, you can see where we are proposing to do some some reeding, some additional tree planting. Um, and it's it's pretty um, as you can see in this aerial image, I mean, it's it abuts the woods. So, we are trying to preserve as much of the trees as possible.

You know, Morgan, the one thing I might add is um, and uh, the the parcel boundaries um, that exist today run right through the existing building um, which is not ideal. Uh, So one of the recommended conditions of approval is to merge the lots so that we don't have a boundary that falls in not only the building but the area of disturbance for the project. Um and that led to a discussion of surveying the full extent of those parcels. Um they're massive parcels. They're all part of the campus. Uh the one in particular is largely wetland and undevelopable and um runs a 100 plus acres down uh into the lowlands. Um and so one of the waiverss we had requested was to be excused from surveying all of the boundaries of the property. Um and staff said no, you you've got to at least know where it's running through the building areas. Um, and so I think what we've hit upon as a compromise uh is to uh isolate an area that surrounds the project, the building, the area of disturbance as to be excused from survey for what is outside of that. I think it's an oval. I keep calling it a circle. Um,

I do have this I can pass this around and we can put it into the to the meeting minutes as well. So, I anticipate a reference to an exhibit and that that would be the reference to explain what's to be surveyed for boundary purposes, but then where we're going to be excused from surveying the bounds of these very large parcels that are not affected by the project. I think when we get to the discussion of the actual waiver request and staff recommendations, Alec will have a suggested motion on that. Perfect. Thank you. So, you guys discussed it hopefully. Yes. Okay. Great. All right, continue. Let's see. Trying to see if I touched on everything that I wanted to. Um,

yeah. I don't know. Does anyone have any questions? It is an oval. It is an oval. He gave me a Sharpie sketch and I try to make it look fancy. Thank you. I got a question on the underground driveway that goes underneath the because I saw that bridge get tagged by the uh boat last couple years ago and collapsed and I'd hate for you to follow. Is that been contemplated and in case there's an accident I'm seeing? Yeah. You're not concerned about that? Definitely. Yes.

It's not a regular uh vehicular uh access route. It's more for maintenance purposes to reach the far side of the building. Um, and the staff for the school will be very familiar with what vehicles can fit in, what can't. Okay. Other questions from the board? No. Any member of the audience have any questions or concerns about this application? No. Okay. Thank you very much. We'll close the public testimony and uh let's move on to our decision making phase. Geez, take a while.

Yeah. Okay. My goodness. All right. So, again, um using in our uh the findings of fact, the information that we heard here tonight from the applicant, the copious amounts of material that were provided with the uh with the plan set. Uh we'll use those as our findings of fact and uh base our decisions on those. Uh so, first up is the waiver requests below. And uh we've got 9.2 A through Q supported by Q and then I'll turn it over to Alec for Okay. So let's hit those A through Q uh with recommendation from staff to grant those waivers. Would someone like to make a motion to grant those waivers as outlined? Second.

Motion's been made and roundly seconded. Any discussion? Whoops. Sorry. Staff has some discussion. Oh, staff has some discussion.

Staff would also recommend that you add RST as recommended readers. I'll read them out loud. A waiver and these are the three waivers staff previously recommended denial for um and instead we recommend approval of section 15 R5031 property lines to not provide on the existing conditions plan the property lines of the parcel outside of the project vicinity as shown on exhibit E parcel boundaries dated September 17, 2025 provided by Novas Group presented during the public hearing S. Section 15041 property lines to not provide on the site plan the property lines of the parcel outside the project vicinity as shown on exhibit E parcel boundaries dated September 17, 2025 provided by Nova's group and presented during the public hearing. And lastly T from section 16022 construction details to allow the proposed CB2 catchbas 2 to be constructed with a 1ft sump where normally three feet is required and a two-ft diameter structure where normally four is required.

Okay. Okay. So, we'll modify that uh request for a motion and a second for our 9.2 will now be from A through T. Uh does that anybody's motion or a second? No. Did we get a motion in a second? We did. We did. We got a motion and a second. Would you like to amend the motion? A motion to amend a motion to include our S&T. Um and the second is the second is amended as well. Yes. Yes. Uh okay. Any further discussion? All those in favor? I

opposed. [clears throat] That motion carries. And that moves us on to 9.4, which is the grant architectural design review approval for the construction of a 17,600 ft building addition, relocated squash courts, and other site improvements at tax map 724Z, lot 1A, addressed as 80 Dunarton Road. uh in tax map 811Z, lot 1A addressed as 117 Dun Barton Road as submitted. Would someone like to make a motion to grant architectural design review approval? We've got a motion, second and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor?

Opposed? That motion carries. 9.5 is to grant conditional use permit. Approval for section 2843D, conditional use permits required for certain disturbances of wetland buffers in the zoning. an ordinance allow disturbances of wetland buffers in conjunction with the construction of the 17,000 square foot building addition and associated improvements. Would someone like to make a motion to grant conditional use permit approval as outlined? So move second. Motion's made and second. Any discussion? All those in favor?

Opposed? That motion carries. 9.6 Six is to grant major site plan approval for the construction of a 17,600 square foot building addition and associated site improvements. It and I'm not going to read it again. Same same tax Latin map as it was before. Uh precedent conditions one through five through five and subsequent conditions one through 16. 1 through 16. Would someone like to make a motion to grant major site plan approval as outlined? So second. Motion has been made and seconded. Any discussion? All those in favor opposed. That motion carries and I believe we are all set. Thank you. Thank you. Good luck.

Thanks. Easier racket ball is easier. It's not as not as posh though. All right. Let's move on in our agenda to item 9E if we could.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This is Richard E. Bartland Associates LLC on behalf of the state of New Hampshire to Granite Place LLC and Foxfire Property Management LLC requesting approval for a minor subdivision application for a lot line adjustment and resubdivision of tax map 583Z lots 6364 addressed as one granite place tax map 583Z lot 63-1 and tax map 651Z lot 68 in the institutional single family residential and open space districts. All right, let's get a quick staff update on this if we could.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, members of the board. This project essentially is a resubdivision of four existing lots at the former Lincoln Financial Campus. Uh the newly configured four resulting lots would be as follows. Uh two lots would be intended to be used for single family residential use. Uh those consisting of 10 and a half and 62 acres. Those lots would be accessed from Little Pond Road and Pinnacook Street respectively. Uh a newly configured 11.6 61 acre lot containing the north office building which will be sold to the state of New Hampshire and merged with the 6.41 acre lot that the state purchased in 2024. And then finally, a new 153.09 acre lot which the applicant is intended to convey to the city of which approximately 134.89 acres would be subject to either a conservation easement or similar deed restriction and the remaining 18.2 acres intended to be available for future economic development and tax base expansion. Uh the staff reports you have uh take into consideration the expected resulting ownership of these four parcels but also understands that the agreement between the applicant and the city council is being finalized. As a result, the proposed conditions of approval been tailored in such a way that they could apply to either the city or another entity being the ultimate owner of the 153 acre lot. Uh staff is recommending the application be determined as complete and conditional approval of my supervision per the recommendations in the staff memo. [cough]

Excuse [clears throat] me. Okay. So, staff has found the application complete. Uh, not a development of regional impact. Would someone like to make a motion to find the application complete and open the public hearing? Moved. Second. Motion's been made and seconded. All those in favor? Opposed? That motion carries. Public hearing is open. Welcome to the table. If you could state your names for the record, Dan Mullen from Richard Bartland and Associates. Steve Duprey, the owner.

Welcome back. Tell us a little bit about this. uh simplified. Long story short, bought bought the whole chub campus. Uh rented it as office space for a while. The state in order to build a garage needed to move the department of justice. They acquired the south building to granite place in 24

24 with a very small piece of land. Uh the state of New Hampshire judicial branch leasing the top half the top two floors of one granite the north building near the cemetery. They had an option to buy it. The legislature put through a an appropriation in the budget. It used to be continued on sale of Laconia State School. No longer they have an appropriation to buy the building. They served us notice. They intended to exercise the option. They have us doing some construction work in there. The project that never ends. Um so we're going to sell that to them in March or April. Those of you who've been here a while remember that when I bought the campus and sold part of it to the state of New Hampshire, I said I would use my best effort to uh make sure we develop tax base to offset the loss of tax dollars. This land has been appraised at a value of about $2.7 million. To be very honest, the real developable value is right up here in the front. So my plan was either to sell it to somebody who's going to tax it or donate it to somebody. In discussions with the city, the city said they would like to control the interest there. So we have an agreement that we're working on that we will donate this to the city with a condition that it be turned into tax base so that kept his word created tax base there and I don't have to do the work and I don't have to build apartments so life is good. Um, in order to get that density, we have to include all this backland, 150 acres, because some of it's usable, even though it'll be used just for density calculations. And when it eventually is developed, uh, I'm sure the development will be housed right here. There's an existing little lot right there. There's an access point there, which would be a nice nice way to access the trails. They're about, I would say, about two miles of trails out there that are used pretty actively by bikers and hikers out there. the view that you get at SW Park, but it's a gorgeous piece of land and it's a big piece of land that would be great for mountain bike park and hiking. Only two folks that I'm aware of currently that

are homeless up there and I gave permission for one to camp there, the permit of Rattlesnake Hill as I call it. And then I carved out those access and we get variances to create a 10 and a half acre single lot there. So basically this is a a minor even though it's a big piece of land subdivision to be in a position to separate out the state piece. So they'll own both halves of the campus their parking lots in the way in to give to the city all of this land but put a restriction back here that this is only used probably a de restriction instead of an eel I think is the city's preference so that it be recreation land. I think it's I think it's one of the largest donations of land for the for the city and I think it'll be a great resource going forward. It's a good use for the land. I actually had the opportunity to buy a couple houses and you could do a cluster development in here and I guess there need more housing, but I don't think that's the appropriate place for it. So that's it in a nutshell. Um the state of New Hampshire would very much like me to donate it to them. I'd rather donate it to Conquer because we're going to get some good things done here. My only goal is I need to do it and I want to do it this year. So, um, most of the waivers are in place. There are a couple other waiverss that I think would be appropriate that will help move us along, but that's it in a nutshell.

Okay. Question from the board. Any member of the audience have any questions or concerns about this application? Oh, yep. Come on up. You guys step back just for a sec. to sign it. Hi. Hello. If you could state your name for the record. Uh Tori Ives. Great. Tori.

Um so my I'm a resident of on Runford Street. So I'm actually right across the street from the proposed property that would be donated to the city. Um so I guess our primary concern is a little more future forward can um than I was expecting to have have discussed at this meeting. Um but our concern would be regarding what kind of development we would be expected to see in that property. As right now it's we feel that it would definitely affect uh future property values as right now it's nice woods and lawn um as well as business on the street. The street is already incredibly busy [laughter] [clears throat]

um with very often vehicles speeding down the road at high speeds. Um, so that would just be our concern is making sure that that's taken into consideration that that's a residential area that we don't want to see our property values appreciate due to expected developments. Okay. Again, I can't speak to what's going to go in there because nobody has any idea, but and I didn't realize that it was going to be so far like more of a future thing. So, we'll keep that in mind. You're on the record though and [laughter] the future development of that property would have to come back before the board and you'll be noticed as a butter. So, right. Yeah, I just wanted to make sure that we understood. Great. I voiced our opinion on that. If you Great. Well, thank you. Problem. Okay. Any other questions from the audience? Yes, sir. Come on up.

And thank you for signing in, Tori. Oh, yeah. No problem.

Hi. If you can state your name for the record. Good afternoon or evening I guess it is. My name is Martin Perroso. I am one of the larger of butters of all of this property here. Um I own the property at 72 Pentagook Street which is the on the hill right shot curve not at the top part way up uh and all the way around the five properties that are across from the reservoir and past that.

So I adjoined everything that you can see along there that's purple and uh I think this is a great thing to do. Um Steve Dupri was talking to me about this a month ago when he was going for a subdivision of the 10acre piece and I do think he's a man of his word. He's been here a lot longer than a lot more times than I have. Uh and he's done a lot of things that he said he was going to do and I think that I expected something to happen down in the bottom half with development partly because we have such a shortage of housing and that fits right in with neighborhoods of that stuff. I have no idea how big the the development will be, whether it'll be cluster housing or whatever it be. And that's for the future, I guess, because this doesn't address that part. But, um, I think that this enormous piece of 153 acres or so, um, which has been wilderness for since they clearcut the place, I don't know, 1820 or something. Uh, it's been a great place to go hiking and all kinds of things in there. I think this would be an unbelievable uh use of this property in comparison to putting developments in there like there's been further up in both sides of Little Bond Road.

I'm all for it. I just want to not show my opinion has a lot of value here. It sure does. Yeah. Uh I just want to tell you as an a butter that's I think this is the best use of it. Uh way better than the parkway which I just had to give a little slap on that. [laughter] So thank you very much. Is there any questions anyone has? Any questions for Mr. Persona? Thank you very much for your testimony. Anybody else want to weigh in? If not, we'll have you guys come on back up. You're welcome. Okay. Yeah. Dina,

did you say that you purchased some of the homes that are on Little Pond Road? No. Okay. All right. Sorry. The two yellow parcels that are involved here would be become single family res. They're currently resubdivided as part of this process project to end up with those lots being developable for single families.

Okay. Other questions, concerns? Uh just a couple on the um conditions precedent. Um I just had a on uh on the staff report page 10 items I J and K where we have to get obviously the language of the easement approved. Right now it says it's approval by the clerk of the planning board, city solicitor and city engineer as to form and content. I would appreciate if we could make that the city manager or their design so that inhouse you folks coordinate that. And I just one point of contact and I don't have to be responsible for uh who's doing that. Okay.

I know I know all of you will weigh in. We'd like that to be in the huddle not out on the line of scrimmage. Typically how this will be is and you know all of that is managed through the planning division and the planning division disseminates you know sends that where it needs to go for the proper I just because we have that December 31st deadline is a hard deadline. we have some problem and I'm at December 31st. The state will I I cannot be January 1st. So I know we're all on the same team on that one. And then I mean it's not the end of the world. So just so we're clear, no language needs to change. No language needs to change as long as I understand you folks will quarterback it. I don't have to worry about going between departments to see if everybody's happy. All right. To me, we'll get it. Take care.

Dale can't beat that. Fabulous. And then um the question on the monuments. This is a huge piece of land. That's a herculean effort. You're going to own it. The state's g I mean, excuse me, the city's going to own it. Uh it would be great if we didn't have to go to the effort. Uh I mean, it's a pretty sizable donation. I'd rather not have to spend time and money between now and December 31st trying to get this monumented. Um we can blaze it or something. That's pretty easy to do, I think, relatively. Correct me if I'm wrong. Look, and I'm gonna defer to Matt as well, but we do allow an opportunity to do a financial guarantee in lie of I'd have to look a little bit more. This is And are you referencing precedent condition five?

Four. Four. Five. Five. Yes. I mean, like five allows for blazing. Uh, you know, on the recommendation of the conservation commission, I haven't got time to go back to them. I mean, if it's not being done as an easement though, that probably won't end up applying if we're doing it through a deed restriction. Bingo. It'll be a deed restriction. And do you have an issue with pressing four where the monuments will be set? Yeah. I mean, how big a challenge is that? We've got the residential lots easy.

The only uh there's quite a few along the access way coming in. Maybe a couple the conservation cut there. But that's only going to be restrict. So sounds like Dan can do it. Sounds like this is a typical present condition. So I'm a little hesitant to recommend approving that on the spot. And I'm also not entirely sure what the record the registry requirements are. Those need to be in place prior to that.

I mean the residential lots are easy to do. I'm just worried about having the time to go out. That's a big parcel of land. A long way to go. It's a lot of stones to get out there. Most of the large parcel is already monument. You think most of it is I can give you a count later on or something. Can you get this done? The question get it done, but take a while. But my question was going to be what's your time frame for conveying the blue lot to the Uh, it's going to be March March between March 1st and April 1st. Oh, 2026. Oh, yeah.

No, not not April 2nd. [laughter] Been there, done that. Would be ideal. Um, 30th of March is the goal. Uh, so you think you're pushing it off? Well, I was going to float the idea of if if it was conducive to say put up I think this assuming the city we'll know from the city council on December 8th with this transaction, but I'm and I don't want to speak about what the council may or may not do, but councelor Todd can do that if he wants to if he wishes to. Um you spot I'm going to guess no just not even looking at it. Hope it isn't a tough call. All right, we're giving you turn around. $27 million piece of land for free

because I think the the regs talk about putting a shity up and I was going to say it's a challenge to get it done between tonight in December 31st. We'll use our best efforts. Let's see what we can do. We can get to some corners. We don't need anything in the back. We don't need anything in the back right here. This front half and so the rest of them have enough monuments out. All right. Easy peasy. But I just didn't want to be December 25th and him out there. Certainly. You know. So again, for the record, Alex, we making changes to 405. Sounds like we make changes. Did um before you move on, I do have a few modifications or when we get there, let's hit them down.

Relating to uh the applicant has requested a waiver to section 1503 tabulations to not provide the buildable area and continuous area for each lot shown on the plat. Um, so I'd like staff's recommended approval of that um waiver so that we would add that in as M. We can I'll read it again when we get there. Um, also that section 128 12012 is to not provide a budding wells and septic systems. We also have section 15031 budding property. We want to include that as part of that section. That's that regulation requires the same thing. We want to add that a clarification. Um that's it and this that will strike two of the precedent conditions.

Okay. I can help when I have all the verdict prepared when we get there. What about 93 is to deny the waiver request for the uh test beds. Tests. We're the applicant plans to conform with that so we can move through deny it and everything will be satisfied accordingly. Okay. And that is essentially just to provide the soil test bits. Yes. to prove that the lots can have a septic have a septic system. Yep. Good. Good. [clears throat] Okay. Um All right. So, let's uh again using uh the information that we heard here tonight and the information that's in your packet as our findings. In fact, close the public hearing.

Don't speak anymore. So, we'll close the public hearing. Thank you for your testimony, everyone. Uh and again using uh the findings of fact, the information that we heard here tonight as well as the information that's in your reports, we'll base all our findings on that. Uh 9.2 uh Alec can help me out here. So we'll grant the waiver requests below and those are outlined in A through M now. Yep. Okay. A through Well, it's it's right now it's A through L, right? Yes. Yep. So, and we will add M section 1503 tabulations to not tabulate and provide the total area of contiguous for each lot and show on the final plat.

I would also recommend the board amend F um to include section 15031 a budding property to not provide the location of existing wells and subsurface waste disposal systems on a budding property. Okay. And I would recommend modifying H. There was a miss a typo and we want H to read section 12817 not seven. Okay. Um that [clears throat] is it for all right with those modifications. Would someone like to make a motion to grant the waiver requests as outlined? So moved. Second. Motion has been made and seconded. Any further discussion? All those in favor? I opposed.

That motion carries. 9.3 hasn't changed. Deny deny. Correct. Okay. Deny the waiver request outlined in A which is section 150312 septic systems. Someone like to make a motion to deny that waiver request. I'll make that motion. Second. Second. We got a second. And any discussion? All those in favor?

I opposed. That motion carries. Uh 9.4. Uh, I'll give you a sec, Alec, but grant minor subdivision approval for the lot line adjustment and four lot subdivision of tax map 583Z, lot 63 and 64, tax map 8, 583 Z, lot 61, 63-1, and tax map 651Z, lot 68, located at Granite Place in the single family residential RS Open space residential district. Wow. Uh would someone like to make Oh, sorry. Uh then those are in the minor subdivision has precedent conditions outlined in one through six, but we're taking

six but we're changing that. How are we changing that? Um staff would recommend that precedition 1 C instead of 12087 read 15027 to appropriately match the lot numbers requirement. Yeah. Strike F. Strike one F and strike 1G as those are recommend. Those are approved waivers. Approved waivers. Yep. And that is it. And so that creates it. Precedent conditions 1 A through K. Still going through K. Right. I thought you were done. Sorry. And then subsequent conditions 1 through three. And then subsequent conditions one through three. So I'll make that motion. You make that motion to

to approve that. Uh do we have a second? Second motion and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor? Opposed. That motion carries and we are good. Thank you. Good luck. Okay. Moving on. And again 9F is off the agenda for tonight. So move us on to item 10 A, other business. review of proposed master plan requests for proposals along with the report from the deputy city manager of development. We'll welcome to the table deputy city manager of development, Mr. Walsh.

Good evening, uh, Mr. Chairman, members of the board. So, uh, at your October meeting, I said we were working on the draft request for proposals for consulting services for master plan. Uh, the board expressed an interest in looking at what that scope of work is. Um so we provided that to you with a cover memo. Um and uh essentially what I was hoping to to garner from the board was um the master plan is the board's process. It's a perview of the planning board and uh this is the first time that the city is doing a comprehensive master plan in 17 years. Uh the last one was adopted in 2008. So it's been a long time. And um recognizing that conquered is a large community and I think there are uh several uh boards and commissions. I think I had a count of 19 uh that are probably going to be in involved in the process and I think the community is going to want to be very engaged. Um it's wise to check in with the board to see uh how we think we're going to move forward before we start going out to engage a consultant. And uh there are two ways of doing a master plan. their their consultant services RFP. The first way is hey we're going to have these chapters consult we're not going to tell you what's in the chapters and uh we also look to you the consultant to come up with a public participation plan and there's all sorts of different ideas of how that could be done. The other way to do it is to be a little more prescriptive so the consultants understand what our intentions are for moving forward which might make the process a little more efficient and transparent for those that are proposing to to be involved in the project. Um, and uh, so we've taken the approach of trying to be a little more prescriptive so that way everybody understands what our intentions are. I anticipate that some developers uh, some developers, excuse me, consultants will will want to propose some tweaks or some alternatives or things to think about, but we at least wanted to give them a good foundation for where we think we

were going to go. So, what I was hoping for um, I guess to give a little bit of an overview. So what what's before you and in the in the the uh the report it talks about um the intended approach here which is really you know calling this the 2050 master plan talks about updating uh kind of building upon plans and studies that were completed um as part of the 2008 master plan process and they're listed there on page 203 um talking about what the the public partition public participation plan for the project would be. uh which I'll just walk through here quickly. First is um uh Mayor Champlain and the council have uh appropriated funds to have a citywide visioning session uh or two of those sessions with New Hampshire listens. Um and I provided you with the report and resolution for that. So that's going to be baked into the process. Um recognizing that conquered is a community with really six primary neighborhoods. Penuk, West Conquered, downtown and the West End, the south end, the Heights and East conquered. Uh this scope of work calls for doing individual neighborhood or village forums to get feedback uh at the neighborhood level. Uh beyond that, there will be a community survey. Um we're talking about this will be a comprehensive survey that will look at u many of the major topics that people are going to be interested in. housing, transportation, parks and recreation, land use, um economic development, things of that nature. Uh we're talking about translating the RFP into multiple languages because there are multiple languages there. I'm sorry, translating the survey into multiple languages uh that are listed there. Those are the primary languages that we understand are spoken in the community in consultation with the library and the city's human services department. on the survey would be both digital and paper u to try and make it as inclusive as possible. Uh

having sub uh subject matter focus groups um the three that are suggested are housing, economic development and new Americans. Uh the new Americans group is really intended to try and help include that population which is diverse uh in the process. Um so uh it's it's uh that's really what the intention is there. Uh given the focus in this uh in the community on housing and economic development, um the goal there is to bring stakeholders in from housing uh all aspects of housing uh all the way from the unhoused to market rate housing, affordable housing, uh developers of all sorts um to try and have a increased attention on housing to come up with housing policy for the next 15 or 20 years. Uh to guide us forward as we look at land use regulations and then uh economic development as well. um as we update our 2005 economic development plan as part of this process really having uh a complement of stakeholders from the business community um working with us in addition to the economic development advisory committee which is a standing committee of the city council of the city um there's a project website there will be multiple social media platforms I think there will be some tweaks to that I think the project website will actually be hosted by the city and in talks with the city's public information officer. I think there will be probably uh three primary social media feeds which I think will be Facebook and Instagram and um likely Twitter or X. Um if you flip the page, you can see that we're talking about having uh 14 individual chapters which are listed there on the bottom of page two and then on the page three. um and really probably doing those chapters. They'll be worked on simultaneously, but I think you'll see them kind of land in a phased fashion. And what I've got here is really starting off with what I keep calling the uh the more data related chapters.

Um at the beginning of the process, which would be, you know, vision, population, housing, utilities, community facilities, parks, and recreation. Building on that would be more of the resource chapters, which would be historic and cultural resources, natural resources, and open space, as well as energy and sustainability. Building on that, I think you'll we'll then probably move to economic development, transportation, and land use because those three chapters really require the what comes before them to be able to have good policy. And at the very end, I think you'll see that there will be um um a final phase of chap of of chapters, which would be ironically the introduction chapter as well as the impleation chapter for the plan. Um there's a schedule that's out. There's a process in here about the boards and commissions. I think um the board the planning board will need to give some thought. Uh and we've got a little bit of time. You don't have to figure it out tonight or or maybe even December if you decide you want to continue this conversation in December. But uh there are some chapters where I think the board is going to rely heavily on this. I think the board's going to rely unless you want to do something differently. I envision that the board would rely heavily on your social your subject matter experts. So, for example, um I can see the board working extensively with like the recreation parks advisory committee on the on the parks and recreation chapter and maybe the board appoints one or two board members to work with ARPAC on that along with city staff and the consultant. I can see a similar model for um uh the natural resources and open space chapter. Uh it would be the conservation commission uh probably with the with a couple members from the board and staff and a consultant. I can see the same thing for uh historical resources chapter. I think the heritage commission would probably take the lead with some you know involvement from board members. I think there are some other chap I I can see the same scenario also for the economic development chapter um which is you know EDAC uh the economic development advisory committee would probably take the lead. There are other chapters

transportation I mean it's almost all of them are

so transportation transportation is a little more complicated because I think um in some cases I suggested you might want to think of a steering committee um whereby transportation is a good example so I think you're going to have a transportation policy advisory committee which has subcommittees of it by the way that deal with other issues there's a traffic operations committee at the at the city staff level um I foresee that uh the airport will be part of this chapter so the airport advisory committee will probably want to be involved Um, uh, Council Todd, I apologize in advance, but I think the parking committee will probably be part of the transportation chapter because, [laughter] um, because, uh, how we use our streets is going to be a big is the discussion, not the only discussion in the transportation chapter, but a big one. Um, and if we're doing if we're starting with this, you know, hey, how do we use our streets? It's going to feel to what we do with land use. Parking is going to be part of that. Um, and there's a couple others that I've probably missed there in the list. So, you know, in some of these cases, it might make sense for the board to say, "Yep, we want a steering committee of so many representatives from these individual groups, but I can also foresee the board telling the staff and the consultant, I we still want you to go and meet with those individual bodies as a group to make sure they're all all the voices are heard." Um, there's a schedule that's laid out in in the RFP here, um, on page 66 of it, which I can pull up here quickly. Um, if you just give me a second, I'm all the way through there. Actually, yeah, Tim, if you can pull it up on the screen, that'd be great. Thank you.

At the bottom, it will shoot across to the bottom. Where are we? Here.

Oh, yeah. Look at that. Look at that. Huh? 66. So smart. February 26. Huh? Late February 26. Tim, if you could uh I tried typing it. It's not

It's not going to do it. Yeah. Oh, there you go. So, so this is obviously subject to change. Um, but this was the the master schedule that we were talking about. So, you know, if the board decides they're comfortable with the RFP tonight, we would get it out on the street uh in early December. Um, it's not on here. We are looking to get proposals back from consultants in mid January and we would like to have a consultant on board by the end of February. Uh, we would go into a data collection period. So before we do public participation, um we're envisioning this as uh a two-way street to learn. There's an opportunity to educate the community here about their community, things that they don't know about. Here's the condition of your utilities. Here's some information about your transportation system. Here's your economic base. Here's what your housing stock is. Here's what population actually is and what it might be. And so as we go through the public participation process, we want to have the opportunity to inform the community so they can give us good feedback that's that's based on on information. So there's a processing here where we envision the consultant team will be pulling together some housing and population economic data as well as putting together some existing conditions plans that we can show people about this is what your community is today so you can think about where you're going to go in the future. We would take a couple months to do that. Um we would probably in late May uh finish that process in late May at the schedule held. Uh we would launch at uh the city's master plan website in May of 26. Uh we would then uh move on with our public participation process. Um the survey would probably launch in mid June of 26 concurrently with what we believe the the visioning sessions would be. We're trying to do it in mid June for a couple reasons. One, we're trying to get

through the city council's budget process, which is a big staff lift. We're also trying to get something done before people disappear for the summer for the holidays. So, we really want to try and get something done in in midJuneish before, you know, graduation season and the Fourth of July and people disappear and come back at Labor Day. Um, I wish

we would probably start our our stakeholder groups during the summer. Uh, if we can do if we can get those groups organized and if people are around and that would continue probably throughout the fall, there would be social media updates and websites continuously. Um, task number four, um, because again there's at least 19 boards and commissions that we think are going to be involved once we come back from the summer. We would have a kickoff meeting with all those boards and commissions in one room. got to find a venue that's big enough um and it will be probably the most epic public notice that we've ever had for legal purposes. Uh but um to have everybody in the room and say, "Okay, here's what we've heard from your community feedback. It's on you now to start putting together the chapters and here's the consulting team." And so again, educating the boards and commissions, taking questions, laying out how we're going to move forward, try to everybody start on that same page, and then we would move into actually developing those those individual chapters, which are would really take the better part of a year there. You see, uh um we we'd start some of that before we get the boards together because we can get some of this existing condition stuff done, but it would be really starting in September. We go through June of 27. Uh we present the final draft of plan to the board in July of 27. Uh the board may want to make revisions. Uh we're going to keep you well informed as we go along here. So we're not just going to give you the whole thing like you've never seen it before. As chapters get done, we'll probably give them to you so you don't get inundated with 14 chapters that you have to read at once. Um uh but there might be some revisions or questions or things that the board might want to think about. So, we've allotted some time there, July of 27 through November. It'd be really nice to have the board have a public hearing in December of 27 and the final document gets published in in January of 28 and we're done. So, that's that's the layout that's there. Um,

but again, uh, this is, you know, staff's suggestion. We're, you know, it's the board's process. If there's things in there that you want to tweak or you think, uh, you want to change, you know, please, please tell me that. Um, we're happy to work with you on it. I guess I'll stop there. Okay. Well, thank you. It's a hell of a long document. I know that read and and again, I guess it needs to be a long document. I think there's anything and everything that could be put in is we put it in to figure out or you put it in to figure out, you know, kind of where we're going from there.

Yeah. Um, my my overarching concern of all this is um, you know, the city's the city council's appropriated a healthy budget for this project. Um, I want to make it clear what to to the consultant community what our expectations are. I don't want to get stuck in a position where where a scope an RFP is too vague and we end up arguing with a consultant going, "Hey, I did what you asked me to do and we're going to say, "No, you didn't." [laughter] And um, not that that's ever happened before. Uh, but you know, that's that's why it's done that way. It's also to try and make sure that everybody knows which direction we're going. So,

so my original thought process was that, you know, we we we get our first peak at it with the with the posting of it here. We can take a look at it. Um, defer it out to to the December meeting. Uh, looking for public feedback on the RFP process. I've heard and I know I was talking to Council Todd on my walk in. I know he's been hearing from people. I've heard from several people, you know, I want to make sure that the RFP is perfect and I want to make sure this and I haven't had a chance to read it and I want to weigh in and are you going to have public testimony? So, my original thought was we we you know, make sure that it's on for public hearing. We put it put it out there for public testimony. And I'm rethinking that after spending a little time reading through the the the document today and then hearing your conversation here tonight. Um, I want this to be as open and inclusive as as possible. Um, I don't want it to be so open and inclusive that we just keep, you know, hashing things through and hashing things through. The RFP process, if I'm not mistaken, even if things are missed, u, what I don't want to have happen is we get the RFP out and someone says, "Well, how come you didn't do this or how come you didn't think of this or how come you didn't think of that?" And I'm sure there's going to be some of those in there. Those are things if we didn't think about those, those aren't going to preclude them from being put into the the final plan, right? I mean, if we if we, you know, forgo public testimony or we and I don't want to say forgo, if we if we post the RFP without really putting it out there and getting public testimony, do we still have, you know, a second bite at the apple even if the RFP is out there?

Absolutely. I'll defer to Matt, but having done, you know, land use planning for close to 30 years in New Hampshire and been involved with four different master plans in three different communities, the RFP is it's the framework. It it's not the plan itself. The community and the consultant and the public have the opportunity and should modify the process as you go forward to tailor the information and what's done to the community and what the needs and desires are that are expressed through those public processes. So, I don't think that the RFP itself is the avenue for that. It's the plan. It's the public participation in the plan where that takes place. Matt,

I concur with Tim. There's a certain amount of a flexibility that we're going to have to it's got to be the right touch. There has to be enough detail in the RFP so the consultant knows what the expectations are and where we're going. There has to be enough flexibility for there will be things that will come up during this process with our community, which will be wonderful, that none of us around the table have thought about. and and somebody's going to bring up some med something's going to come up at a visioning session, a neighborhood session, the citywide session, the survey, and and we'll say, "Huh, we really need to bore into that." And the consultant, if they're a good consultant, will probably agree. Um, and and so I I think there is a certain amount of flexibility that will be allowed for as we go forward. The other part of all this is um there might have to be a negotiation with our consulting or team of consultants. It's not going to be one consultant. it's going to be a lead consultant with a bunch of subconultants. Um, and there might be a negotiation. So, if there's um too much effort and time spent on the RFP, some of those things might get jettisoned as we work through with a consultant that comes in and says, "Hey, I'm happy to do that, but you got to double your budget." Um, and or that's an extreme example. Um,

so, you know, again, it's up to the board. Uh, we're we're flexible. um you uh typically RFPs are done at the staff level, so it's unusual that the that that a board's involved in this anyway, which is okay. Uh it's your process. We want to make sure you're comfortable with it. You want to make sure that we're on the same page with you, right? Um and [clears throat] uh you know, if the schedule has to be adjusted, then the schedule's adjusted. I leave it to the board. You you have no obligation to have a public hearing on an RFP. Um if you want to, that is that's the board's prerogative. Um I guess with that I'll talk talk among yourselves. What do we think? Any thoughts, concerns, questions? Provide Thanks. I'll provide

some feedback which I think is I like the schedule. I think that's really very very well done. Uh as best we can predict now as you say, right? We don't know. U but it's great to have at least some kind of a framework to to work toward or work with. Um, I also, uh, I like the idea of, um, uh, I'll just speak for myself because I don't know how other board members feel, but, I like the concept perhaps of having some of us actually working with some of those key groups and committees um, and just kind of being there to observe and listen, even if we're not going to like heavily participate, but we'll be there to

to kind of understand what the what the concepts are that are talked about. So, I think that is also a very good uh idea. Um, I you know, we uh, Mr. Mr. Wash and I had a informal conversation recently about this and and I described the current master plan as u providing good guidance but that um it it seems to read a little bit more like a collection of short stories than a novel. And so and sure enough, so I got I got some some compliment some comments already and u someone said um the by chapter organization organizing of the plan gives all these interrelated topics their due but can undermine the interconnectedness and perhaps set up silos or competition. So are you comfortable with the way and I know Mr. Thompson just made comments that's just one example. Are you comfortable with the way that the RFP is written so that uh we will be able to impose additional requirements about the connectivity and the kind of connecting the dots concept of the master plan despite the framework that you've set out for them? I our intention is yes um our intention is to make sure we want the chapters to weave together to row the boat in the same direction. Are there going to be some cases where um there might have to be some compromises made or or the board may have to decide what policy is going to be? Um and and that's going to be part of the process. Um

uh and but I you know our over our goal is not to have everything in silos. Our our goal is to provide data that will lead into these chapters that really have a lot to talk about it. Like you can't have a really good land use chapter unless you understand what your population projections going to be, what your utility issues are, what your transportation issues are, what your housing issues are, where where the world's going with housing from a policy perspective, what your existing goals are for for for land use, uh the urban growth boundary. Does the boundary stay as it's set now? Are we changing it? And then how do you make sure that that's all weaved back that oh um you know the land use chapter is talking about doing this for certain zoning changes. Well what does that do to your population chapter? So so I think there's going to be a certain amount of building these chapters but then a loop back going oh wait when we put all this together did this so we want to revisit something but I I our goal is not to have it in silos. Uh it's it's to have everything move the move towards a uh wellthought out comprehensive policy that moves the city in the same direction.

But but aside from the you know the urban growth boundaries and the downtown and the Manchester street and the Lowden road pieces of it, you look at to councelor Todd's point of of the silos, you know, what's good for Pentecost? Is that good for the south end? Is it good for East Conquered? Is is it good for the Heights? And and there's there is distinctive neighborhoods, but they're really the I mean, the functionality should be the same, right? I mean, you're talking about still, you know, CAT transportation and utilities and all the, you know, parks and reccks and all whatever whatever happens, it doesn't matter what silo it's in. It just it needs to kind of permeate through all the individual groups. Yeah. I think the overarching vision will pro will permeate through everything, which I think are going to be very I don't want to call them mom and apple pie, but that kind of stuff.

But every neighborhood's going to have its own issues. I expect um uh Pentacook will probably want to have a good conversation about what happens at the Rivco site which is baked into this RFP. I'm sure there will be uh good discussion about what happens uh out at the exit 17 area and what may be coming out there in the future. Um I think in the south end there's going to be a lot of conversation about for example everyone's going to probably be focused on the Key Square down there. Um, I think there will be some other conversations about uh what happens with some of the land use once you get out of some of the established neighborhoods in the south end. Um, uh, I could see that similar conversations in East Conquered. Um, on the Heights, I imagine there'll be lots of interesting discussion there. Uh there's been some recent press on the steeplegate mall, which I won't comment on, but depending on what the status of the mall is as we get into public participation in these chapters, I can see the folks on the heights really wanting to have a robust conversation about the mall. I can see them also wanting to talk about um um park and recreational land up there because the major facility is Kee and there's been some discussion about doing other facilities up there as the as the neighborhood grows. So

getting back to council Todd's comment about integration of chapters and that's one of the things I think we have an advantage with the way we're proposing to fund and structure this plan. My first master plan I did as a professional planner was back with the city of Rochester back in the late 1990s and that was a funded on a chapterby chapter basis. So what happens in that situation is you're so focused on that one chapter that when you combine all the chapters together they don't connect and they don't have that comprehensive feel to it. So I think one of the advantages of the way we've approached this is looking at it from the comprehensive 30,000 foot view to make sure that we're making sure all these chapters work together so we don't have that siloed effect as we move forward.

Yeah, I guess if I could. Yeah, because I that's um that's probably an overarching concern and I guess the uh you know Berlin New Hampshire's master plan is about three years old and different community. I recognize that but they have uh guiding um guiding principles and practices and strategies and actions. So, uh, I guess what you're saying is that we could we could develop a similar absolutely kind of approach or or and we don't have to put that in the RFP, but we can certainly say, well, this is what we'd like to have as a as our and of course, last time around, as we know, it was the um 2020 vision report that was a lot of that was kind of copied and pasted into the master plan and and that also served I think the intent was to have that serve as the kind of connectivity piece where you had the concept of a city of villages, right? Um, so that may change. We that may people we don't know yet, right? We'll find out. But whatever it is, we could we can have that cohesiveness still imposed onto the final product.

So, are we comfortable with the with the RFP as it sits or do we I mean, again, I Matt to Matt's point, I mean, RFP process just is kind of the kickoff piece of it.

Do we really need to have public testimony? And again, I my thought was yes, we do need to do it because we want to hear from people, but by the same token, we're going to give them enough on the on the downs slope here as we as we move past and get it out into people's hands where they can say, "Hey, you didn't remember this and you didn't talk about this and how come we're not addressing solar? How come we're not addressing wind? How come we're not addressing electrical charging?" And you know, all the all the different things that we know we're going to hear are going to be in there, but we're going to miss something. You know, somebody's going to have some some comment that's going to strike a chord and we're going to be able to put it in. But I think we can put it in. So whether it's, you know, space folks or whether it's the, you know, however, whoever we're hearing from. I know that I just don't want to squaltch anybody's opinions and but I don't know that they're going to change the RFP process at all either.

That I can may Yeah, thank you. That Yeah, that's the that's so I another comment that I received is um how do we encourage the creation of a master plan that has energy and and excitement to it to avoid a redo of the current plan which was described as like a boring read. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, so that's that's that's I think, you know, I think what some folks that I've heard from so far are talking about. So, they're they're looking at things like, um, you know, making sure that we have elements like the aging population of New Hampshire, the housing crisis, the explosion of AI, climate change, electri electrification of transport or autonomous transport. Right.

So, these are the things these are the comments that I've been getting. Now, that's I think those are very specific comments. Absolutely. Um but and again I think that what what we're hearing so far though is that we are not procluded from touching on any of these and in fact these are the kinds of things that folks will bring up right during the outreach process.

And again so I think I think you look at all these things and say okay that belongs in chapter this that belongs in chapter this that belongs over here and and and start filling in those chapters with that type of information because I'm hearing the same types of things but but it doesn't it's almost like the the math it's almost like the RFP is too much detail. we want to just say these are the chapters that we want to address and and we'll go from there. And to Matt's point is is is you know, you you go one way or the other. We want to give them the detail to be able to then kind of cohesively form those chapters and and come up with then be able to come and say, "Okay, here's how this is going to work." And whether and like I said, I had a conversation with someone on the green space side of it. You know, it it might bend over into the other area. the transportation piece of it might bend over and say, "Well, why aren't we putting these areas in and green and putting some green space into these transportation corridors or things like that?" So, again, it just I want to make sure we're open and and transparent, but by the same token, I don't think if we had 10 people here giving testimony, it's going to change the RFP at all. Would be my guess. I I yeah I I think um I think some of the the uh the concern well I think that what's happened is that because there have been some specifics gotten into in the RFP that then I think some readers are looking at that as well wait a minute you left this out but what about that right

so for example um stakeholders um and I guess the comment that I received was that uh business and property owners and those who work in concrete but don't live here weren't specified and the county and the state wasn't specified and So um but that again that does not preclude us from getting that feedback from getting that feedback that so in essence what we're trying to tell the public I think you've read you've read the RFP first of all good for you right because [laughter] that's

but uh but if you have then um you know keep in mind that um that this is sort of more of a sampling of data that we're we're giving general guidance on but it does it's not uh it's not uh a a full uh uh view of every single point and every

to that point I think it's it's what I didn't want to have happen is well well that wasn't an RFP so we're not going to address that and and that's I think we heard loud and clear that that's not the case that we can we can address anything that comes up just a matter of plugging it into where it's going to belong on the on the process and the state the state piece of it I guess is obviously an important one uh because they have a major your you know piece of the puzzle here and you know what are you going to do with this property this property how you know how is it affecting this and that so I think that's all valuable information I I did if I may I did get one comment I'm not sure where the what category this would fall in but someone suggested that um there is an additional uh small area master plan that does not appear on page 12 of the RFP but might have some relevant components and that's the south conquered redevelopment area study from 1997 seven. So that might I don't know if that's something that again do you

felt that you potentially left out or you thought maybe that doesn't have value or

so the 1997 south it's a south end rail study railard study and and in my mind that got uh updated and replaced by there is in the 2030 master plan there is a concept plan there's a lot of discussion about the south end railard and going for a mixeduse neighborhood there with a variety of uses and there's a plan in the chat there's a graphic that's included that was prepared by Dwan Associates that shows what that could look like and and so I was working with that as the latest thinking for what that might be which is different than the 1997 plan which was more um less mixed use and and more I think industrial kind of reserves uh

so which I think we're going to sit with the community and say okay we have the south end area. Um, it's a hodgepodge of uses right now. Uh, it really is

and the question is going to be which way do you want to go? So, the development that's occurred there over the last 17 years has been residential. You have the south end, you have the the railard project that happened. You have the Evo gym that happened. Um, but you still have other uses down there like conquered Trailways and a large warehouse that's owned by the Steambeck family. And you also have like a hairdresser. And then you have all the small um I'll call them automotive uh uses that are affiliated with the Sandal family and in Sandal Napa and you know is is what's the vision for that area going to be? Is it going to be one or the other? Is it going to be is there a way to accommodate both and becomes more of a flex zone? Um which might be appropriate considering I don't see some of those other uses changing anytime soon. um and and how to thread that needle. But that's that's the answer of why I left out the 97 plan.

I guess if your if your opinion is that there aren't any relevant components uh that remain in that plan other than those that were covered in the 2030, then I have no problem giving it to the consultant. I think the consultant's going to get uh boatload of information, [laughter] boatload of information. And um they're gonna have to tape their eyes open so they can read. Um yeah, but

right. So the the only other piece uh with a general question is um uh if we if we get into this and let's say I'll just pick an example. Let's say folks that live in the north end uh say, "Hey, how come we're not listed in the RFP, but we we still feel we're on our own separate neighborhood or community. Is there still an option to be able to add a different an additional area?" So someone someone actually commented that um in the current master plan the west end neighborhood is actually broken down into lower west end and upper west end but the here it's it's put together with a downtown west end so that's why I was kind of asking that question do we still have some flexibility on that as well depending on how that might move forward or should we augment that listing

if you want to if you want to call out a specific one separately I I merged them together because Um there's residential in downtown but not not a ton of it. And and there's a fair amount of residential that's in the west end as you go up the hill here behind city map. And are they a little bit different? Yeah. Uh but are they interconnected? Yes, because a lot of those folks walk down the hill and vice versa. And so that's why it was done that way. I think also I'd have to look at the map that's in the 2030 master plan which slightly different than what was in the the 2020 vision. If you want to If you want to separate them, that's fine. The other thing is I'm trying to get I want to make sure that we have enough people show up at one of these that it makes sense. And if we do downtown by itself, if we define downtown as uh

I don't know, Main Street, State Street stores. Yeah. If you defined it by, you know, Center Street to Spring to to uh the intersection with Water Street and and somewhere between Green Street and Store Street,

I don't to me that doesn't feel like there's enough critical maps there. Um, so that's why we're trying to merge some stuff together and and given that there's an interface between the downtown central business district and and the neighborhood that's behind it. Um, some people on the hill might be concerned about downtown creeping up the hill. Uh and and so there was some logic of saying, well, if we put these two groups together, maybe this might help when we talk about neighborhood character of nope, we want a hard and fast line of downtown ends here and the west end starts here and they're too different and they're separate and we want the city regs to recognize that and and how to carry it forward. So that's that's one of the reasons why putting them together in my mind made sense.

There's that we will do whatever the board wants to do. Is that plus [laughter] the over the overlap with the interest groups and the citywide? But won't it come out in discussion too if people think that they're their neighborhood which hasn't been considered historically a neighborhood should be considered and that will come the discussion anyway over the year. Yeah. Yeah, I mean you might, you know, we're we're working with the list of neighborhoods that we've traditionally have had which are are listed, but you know, um, you know, ironically, 2020 vision talked about trying to create maybe another a village somewhere else. And through this process, people might say, well, you know, we're part of such and such area, but we're really distinct from them and we want to and and we want to be called outly.

So, I'm sorry, I was going to just follow up on your comment if I could quickly, but because that that's all I was really asking about is is there flexibility, which I think trying to [clears throat] say and as long as there is then I don't think there's a an issue as to as so what's in the RFP right now we can and I think the other part on our end will be to try and make sure that we um our negotiations with the consultant about budget leaves a certain amount of money uh available to deal with things that are going to pop up along the way. So we have the resources to to to to you know if it requires a certain amount of extra effort there there are dollars available to deal with that extra effort. Basically there needs to be contingency like you do in an engineering estimate any other project. Yeah. Matt.

So I just have a couple questions that you can briefly answer tell me answer later. Um the role of the RPC or me or do pay member of the RPC. I go to these meetings every month. we are and and one maybe it's not clear enough in some of these chapters um there is a discussion about just for clarification the regional planning commission

we have the regional planning commission which I am an alumni of from a long time ago um uh we I do intend on on on having is talked about in the RFP in different places about talking about understanding regional plans and how they feed into this um so they do need to be included one of the things that I I'm glad you mentioned that uh Mr. Hicks because um many years ago there was a citywide transportation model that was built. So u we could literally model what certain things would do to our transportation system if we made certain policy decisions. And uh one of the things I need to do before we issue the RFP is have a conversation with Mike Tardiff who's the executive director. Uh and I believe the Central New Hampshire Regional Planning Commission is the keeper of the model. Um because depending on how some of these conversations go, there might be a need to have the model updated accordingly. So we can say, well, what really happens if we extend Whitney Road south to Souls Falls Road or what happens if we build Sto Street North and South or what happens if we build other roads that are in the master plan? Um so that's that's one piece I need to talk about with Mike, which I I haven't done yet.

Yeah,

that was one. And the second one, I think um councelor Todd mentioned this a little bit um sort of other groups because it gets to the regional nature of conquered and what we are as a capital city um groups like the chamber, right? And how and so that's the real economic you know sort of group in the city um in involving them. They've been more involved lately with their local government affairs group. Um yeah and I see Ari in the back and you [clears throat] know and making sure that the folks in the chamber and members of the chamber are involved and then question what what is the use of AI in this process and I certainly don't have an answer for that I just I don't know it's going to come up

it already has in our economic development it already has uh so I I the chamber needs to be involved certainly in the economic development portions of things I was envisioning them more as one of the the stakeholders that we have. We can um I have no problem, you know, having our consultant meet with the Chamber of Commerce multiple times to talk about things as we move forward, but I also um so we can work that into this other organizations like the in that um

that was councelor Todd. He read about sort of economic side of it and the businesses, right? And I think that's really important to make sure um even though we want all the residents of conquer to be part of this, many people do work here, they don't live here and they pay a lot of taxes and they create a lot of jobs in the city and they should be included. Absolutely. Yeah. The AI piece I I don't um it's such a new thing. Uh I'm anticipating some of the consult there was an email that councelor Slasher asked us to send to you which we did um about AI

and uh you know there might be interesting ways that AI gets worked into some of these things like um analysis of community of feedback that we get which you know make the process much more efficient

um and and it made it approachable and I think it it just went like wildfire if you if you read the article and it was about Bowling Green Kentucky and if read through the article and the amount of feedback they got for a 50,000 person, you know, city, they got tons and tons of feedback that the AI was able to kind of boil down and and put it into into bite-sized pieces that they were able to then action on it and put it put, you know, listening groups together around this or around this or around that. It was very I mean very visionary in some cases but you click on the links that were in that article place in Seattle I can't remember the name of it but whatever it was that was kind of the aggregator it's open source it doesn't cost anything so it's not you know feedback survey monkey or something like that it's it's you just click on the link and you you know write from a Facebook site or whatever and you ask you ask your question and it's not you don't go through a survey you ask a question what about this what about all the questions that councelor Todd that then become part of the of the record and then if three or four people ask them it kind of it kind of migrates up. It's good stuff.

Yeah, it is. And I I can't confirm this but if anybody took the parking survey that was involved with the state street state garage that survey depending on how you answered certain questions asked you different questions. So I think that's also part of the role that AI is going to play is you know tailoring specific feedback through the response process. Do you park and conquer? No. Thank you for your testimony. [laughter] Have a nice day. Okay. Yes.

I would just say having responded to a lot of RFPs in my career and also um working with clients to respond to a and to RFPs and watching how they do it. I would put in here maybe in the beginning or in the end, but in the beginning um one the flexibility that that this is not because it reads wooden and you know when you read something that reads wooden because you want to get it you answer it wouldn't. And I think if you're going to spend city money you need to hire consultants who are creative

who are innovative and who are really flexible. And I think they can do if you get really good people they can do a lot working with the community groups etc to really get them excited about some of the innovations and some of the things that can go. So I would somehow or another in your beginning your opening paragraph say this is not even a framework. It's a barebones skeleton and encourage them to be creative.

Encourage them to be creative. Encourage them to be innovative. It'll be interesting to see how many come in with AI components. really will be and there's so many Yeah. Yeah. And there's so many other things out there now that people are doing that's it would be you could get some really interesting stuff. My only other comment kind of following on councelor Todd and I did I haven't read closely but I'll read it closely and give you comments but um I know what you're doing and you're visioning but I just wonder to the integration all of this totally I mean I think in a very integrated way in a strategic way but it's all integrated and so your housing your economic development your taxes all integrated But you've got the vision at the beginning and how do you know how I know as a reader how you got to the vision. I mean, I've got these chapters, but it goes vision, chapters, and implementation. And I kind of want to I want you to lead me down the path if we, you know, we have this chapter on housing and this chapter on and his his, you know, the natural and cultural resources and all that. And when you integrate them all together, this is how we see the city and things moving forward. And hopefully, you know, I think you they have certainly it looks like they'll have in each chapter recommendations, but I'd really hope if you hire a good consultant, they've got experience. They really equate some of this to the experiences they've said in other places. Yeah. I mean, you got a good framework. I just would make sure you're telling them they're more creative for the better for the less.

We can we can emphasize that. We can emphasize uh hey, make some suggestions about AI in the public process.

I wouldn't even tell them. Let's see what I Yeah, I you know, if you ask me stuff, I'm going to sit there and think if I don't know what you want. I mean, I know kind of what you want. I'm going to be really creative and kind of go, "Oh, I hope nobody else thought about this." The other thing, too, is, you know, for for a project like this, this is, but staff, we're planning on having a pre-proposal meeting with interested consultants. It will not be mandatory. Sometimes it is. um but to to get some feedback from consultants similar what you're providing tonight of hey and they'll ask what do you mean by this what do you mean by that have you thought about this and then usually there's an addendum that gets issued by the city to try and clarify or expand so that will also happen as part of the process here

so if I can recommend it I I I agree 100% with what Teresa just said about the the creativity and the and the and the preparation piece and it's it's right at the beginning in in section 8 proposal proposal preparation. Uh it's on page nine of the of the RFP. If if we took that proposal preparation and in the first paragraph say, you know, we want innovative, you know, we want we want some innovation. We want to be able to look at all the things we're doing, how we're how we're changing, what we're going to be 50 years from now, type of thing. So, some little just one little paragraph and then everything else is fine. Other than I'd get rid of the bold underlines. I don't like that. Other than that, it's it's just and I get why why it's done, but it's a little it's a to it's a little wooden to to use Tesa's words, but that's a perfect spot for, you know, we we encourage, you know, non-traditional thoughts and what you know, yeah, not I don't want to say that, but come up with some verbiage that basically entices people to to take a shot through and read the 80 pages and figure it out because, you know, we we we want to see some we want to see some different ideas. We don't want to just see the same boilerplate proposals that you know you're going to get.

Not bag on RPCs. You don't want the regional planning commission proposal for a master plan. No. Yeah. I love those. Yeah. The other thing I was trying to drive home in the RFP is is we might not feel this way because we live this we're here. We've all Many of us been here for a long time.

An extremely well planned community. there there's a a a mountain of documents that that are out there and we're going to stand on the shoulders of those and we're going to say yep that idea is still relevant and let's build on it and that idea is not anymore and let's cast it aside and and um but that's the other thing I'm trying to drive home to the consultants is you know concrete is not your average community when you you know have a history of planning that goes back to the 1930s and you've been very diligent about it. Yeah. So it creates if there's no other questions, are we comfortable having staff go ahead and get this out to the to the street? Um, yeah.

Just I guess one thing is I'd like to ask staff if they would enter because I had some folks, as you know, we talked about this uh reach out to me and I kind of expressed to them that there might be a a period of time where they could provide comment. I did as well. So to to accommodate that, I'm wondering if we could work with staff and see what they would be comfortable with, like having a certain time period. You and I could notify the folks that have contacted us directly that are very interested in this and that way at least those folks would have a chance to provide their comments and thoughts and so forth. It it may not materially change the RFP, but I think it's a good process to

I was thinking the same along the same lines where if we gave staff the ability to stay on schedule and and get this out um but fed back information to the groups that we've been hearing from and have a public hearing next month, have a public conversation next month at the meeting and if something material comes up, if staff determines, hey, this is material, let's do an addendum to the RFP or so. Are you Amable to that? I I don't think there's any problem with that, is there? No. That keeps us on schedule and gives the board an opportunity to if that's if that's acceptable. That would be fine. Yeah. Better actually to just continue as you suggested with and then six months from now maybe, you know, hey, we're getting some feedback on this. Let's let's talk about this a bit.

So, if we can put that on the schedule for next month, we'll put on the schedule for next month. Um, and again, welcome the folks to come in and just just I and again, I think a lot of us just haven't had a chance to review it. I want to think about it. I want to look at other RFPs that are out there. I want to look at other documents. So, if we're good with that, if I don't know if anybody has any thoughts other than that, but if we're good with that, we can give them the nod and say get it out and and we'll we'll go from there. My one question to the board on that is when and where would you like to put on the agenda given what I believe is going to be a very full agenda for December? Yeah, I think it's going to be too long to inter because if it's at the end of the night, I don't know how how many people are going to be willing to sit through a lot of stuff to do that.

Could we limit the time like and start 6:30 6:30 to 7 as long as we have a quorum and just limit limit it to a half hour? Yeah, we could do that. Get a timer. Remember, we can only speak 30 seconds. Yeah, I'm I'm amendable to coming at 6:30 and having just a public meeting. I don't think we want to be here until midnight. Yeah. No, I don't either. And it's going to be a busy meeting next month, the date of the board's meeting in December 17th. 17th. You can also do what they do with the state rules. You can say, you know, public comment should be in by by, you know, whatever December 12th and if you can't do public com written comment, you can come to the meeting hearing, right? Yeah. Well, that's right. That obviously should be an option still for that.

Sure. Please encourage people to send us electronic electronic communications and be part of the record. Encourage people to do it because if you've done it electronically then you've got time to you all have time to digest it. So you can say at the meeting you know we've heard from a lot of people who want this included or this that and another. So yeah I'd encourage people to send in public comment by a certain period. Everybody okay with the 6:30 start on the 17th? We just had to record some people can't be here then I mean you have to run a little long that's fine. We just start our other meeting a little bit late. So, yeah, Mike, you don't have to be here at 6:30. So, [laughter] okay, we good. You got direction? We're good. We're good.

Everybody's good. All right. Um, I think that's it, right? Any other business to come before the board this evening? I have nothing else tonight, Mr. Chairman. Okay. With that, we'll take a motion to adjurnn. Uh, we have a second. Second. All those in favor? I opposed. We are adjourned. Thank you.