Affordable Housing Trust - Regular Meeting

731 and I'm calling the June 4th, 2026 meeting of the Grafton affordable housing trust to order. Uh, we, uh, yeah, we need to start with the roll call. Uh, so, uh, Brian, uh, Dan Kusher here, Sarah.

Yeah.

And Colleen.

Yeah.

All right. Uh, Next on the list is public comment. Are there any members of the public who would like to comment?

Mr. Chair, the only item I had, I assume everybody in the trust got it. There was an email from Adam Lapointe in the rec department about a grafting day that got sent out to all the boards and committees seeing if we wanted to have a table. And I think they needed an RSVP back later this month. Um, so I didn't know if, if the trust had interest, I personally have a conflict that day, so I wouldn't be able to attend, but, um, I didn't know if others were interested in having a table or if we had anything to distribute.

Uh, anybody is anybody available that day and interested?

August 21st.

What day is it?

August 21st. It's a Friday, um, 4 30 to 8 PM at the high school.

So what would be like our goal of being there? Not that I don't want to participate, but just like what would be the information that would be helpful to provide to the community?

Yeah, I'd say probably some of the same handout type things that we had at the forum. But yeah, we don't really have any, you know, trust centered like pamphlets or anything, any literature already done up.

There's not many swag. Yeah. Maybe we should do swag.

But just want to throw it out there. Colleen?

To your point, though, Brian, I think we should be getting something together so when opportunities arise, we can execute. But with that outreach meeting we did, that took several meetings for us to get all organized. And I don't think we have enough time to organize ourselves for August for something like this. But we should get something together. Even like what CPC does at town meeting now has a little trifold handing out with just affordable housing opportunities or things that we've done. I think we should be thinking like that and maybe gear for something for October town meeting.

Yeah, I think it sounds good. Cool.

All right. Next on the agenda is High Point Drive. Yeah, Emma, do you want to kick that off?

Yeah, sure. Hi, everyone. So I circulated the draft number four. um with all of you well actually no we should probably start with the fact that there is this restrictive covenant um and wanted to get your thoughts and reactions to that um christian i'm really glad this came up now um carson and i had spent a lot of time on that deed website and i can't remember what they labeled it as but I'm glad you dug it up, um, because this project has had a long history and, um, definitely want to keep things on the right track. So I didn't know if you all had a chance to discuss or any thoughts or just anything. I feel like that's kind of a big change that we should probably talk about.

Yeah, I think, um, Mr. Chair, I think, uh, so Christian and I were just comparing notes a little bit just before the meeting. And I think, um, I think there's probably some good news and some bad news. Definitely good news that we caught it now. The bad news is it does appear to specify even more strictly than we knew we were going to have potentially a comprehensive permit issue or need to amend it if we tried going with the duplex route. This kind of solidifies that that really isn't going to be an option outside of, you know, I don't really think there's really any latitude to amending this issue. um this agreement so it limits the scope quite a bit um which probably makes things easier from an rfp standpoint but could obviously limit um respondents and the level of interest um but at least we at this point i think we know everything there there is to know um and it's up to the respondents to see if there's something still feasible for the sites guess for anybody that hasn't dug through the detail um it's it reads like an hoa document um really kind of um in you know putting um restrictive covenants in place for what can be built in the lots um basically restricting it to single-family homes at least 2 000 square feet per unit um you know, obviously a lot more detail than that. But, um, I think a lot of the other detail were things that we were already trying to capture. Like, um, the homes have to be largely harmonious with the neighborhood and things like that. Um, but I think the big takeaway was the limit to single family homes and the size, which I don't really think that was an issue to begin with. But those are my takeaways.

The only question that Additional question came up from that is if the settlement and those covenants, if there's anything that the settlement says that affects the covenants. I don't think so, but those are two pretty dense legal documents. So if the trust was interested in that, I think there could be a legal opinion on that, but it may not ultimately affect anything.

I had a meeting with one of our legal team members just because of the nature of this document. I wasn't sure if there were parts of it that maybe weren't enforceable. And I did a search and find through the comp permit. And I think I did the settlement agreement too. And I didn't see reference to this. And the first regulatory agreement came out before this, the covenant. So if there was anything in there, the regulatory agreement would be, you know what I mean? Like that would trump the restrictive covenant, but I don't think there's anything in there. So if that's something you all wanna explore, like definitely can, but from our standpoint and a little bit of a dive in, I'm not sure that there's anything.

to overturn it.

And if it were to be overturned, my understanding, oh, Kathleen, I see you have your hand up too, that it would have to be two thirds of the, two thirds of the current homeowners would have to approve it. And that's a pretty steep hill.

Yeah, so it wasn't mentioned in the settlement agreement at all. The regulatory agreement and the comprehensive permit are recorded prior to this declaration of covenants and restrictions. So those conditions and provisions would control, not this. because those are prior. So if there's some discrepancy between the lots or whatever that are designated, the regulatory agreement and the comprehensive permit are prior to this declaration. So the declaration is subject to the terms and provisions of the comprehensive permit and the regulatory agreement. But all that being said, it still says it's a single family dwelling. It's an additional layer of complications because you could have gone back to the zoning board to look for a modification of the comprehensive permit, but you're not going to get the neighbors to sign on to, I don't think, an amendment to this declaration. which unfortunately expired in 2020, but automatically renews for 10 years. So I'm kind of stuck with it at the moment.

It's almost like it's designed to be extremely difficult to, nearly impossible, really, to get out of it.

Well, what it doesn't have is it doesn't have anything that most of the time when you see these things, there's a provision in here which says that you can apply to the developer or the declarant for approval for whatever your plans are. And they don't have anything like that. So there's no sort of certificate that says, oh, yeah, what I built is in compliance with these terms and conditions, which is kind of bizarre. I don't know how you demonstrate that. I guess the fact that you don't get sued is the way that you've complied. I don't know. It's sort of odd. I didn't see anything in it that talks about getting a certificate of approval that whatever I'm building is in compliance with these restrictions.

There is a section 4A that says no dwelling garage or building shall be built, altered, constructed, or maintained on any lot unless it conforms to these covenants and unless the owner first obtains express written approval for such construction from the developer. Yeah. But that's the closest I saw.

I don't think they've ever recorded anything. I didn't see anything at the Registry of Deeds. I don't know whether Emma did. You know, that'll say that these are in compliance. You normally record something that says this is in compliance.

Well, I think other than these units, the developer would have constructed all of the others themselves. Yeah, so they I guess would have been conferring with themselves.

But so for these units that we build, we're going to need the developer to approve of them. In addition to the settlement agreement and all of that is that

Well, yeah, I mean, the problem we have now is that the developer is out of this, you know, and is actually, you know, I don't even think he's sort of transferred his interest to a different entity than they did to us. So, you know, to a certain extent, the developer is sort of long gone on this. So I don't know how you would go through the process or who you would go to to get the approval.

So if... If someone were to violate this, who would sue?

It would be the other. It looks like the enforcement is the developer or any owner. So anybody in the association. That's in Article 7. Yeah, but I guess, I mean, I don't know whether we, how we would apply to, you know, Adams LLC. It doesn't, I'm trying to find where the provisions are in this document on my iPad. Where the process is for approval. Unless the owner... from the developer, which shall not be unreasonably withheld. Yeah, 4A.

So I think the way I see this, we're looking at either three single family homes or six duplex units. That's kind of, to me, that feels like adding three more units would be great but it's sounding more and more like it's going to be a huge lift to try to accomplish that to try to get duplexes somehow to fit with this it sounds like it's probably impossible so yeah so we're just talking about single families at this point and then

this question of whether we actually need the developer to explicitly or expressly approve right the only thing that i would think about that approval piece is that the settlement was prescriptive on what is allowed to be built in terms of those uh parcels um i didn't mention any approval from the developer although the developer was part of that settlement so in terms of building those um that seems from my perspective um would cover that piece that that's that could be the approval to build there okay

I mean, you can always think about going, you know, proactively ahead of time to just say, hey, would, you know, developer, would you release the, you know, the covenants, that condition in your covenant now? I don't know whether this person is still around, but, you know, presumably he doesn't really care. And so hopefully, you know, you could sort of say, this is what we're going to do. We need, you know, like we're going to be issuing an RFP. We'd like to be able to tell prospective, you know, bidders that we've gotten pre-approval from the developer.

For the single family homes.

Yeah. And it could be any single thing. I mean, so he's not approving the design or anything, just sort of approving what you've done. I mean, he's, you know, he's sort of essentially kind of done that in the settlement agreement anyway, but that would make it really obvious. And you could record it at the registry, a statement, you know, that would just say, okay, fine, this, you know, this is determined, this piece of paper is my approval under this covenants and just have that on record ahead of time.

Yeah. And I would obviously defer to the lawyers. I think something completely open-ended would seem probably too broad to me, but they could even, if they structured it as, um, you know, deferring to, you know, whatever the, um, the local permitting authorities would, would approve for the site to something like that. So it's right. There are some bounds around it. This, the approval is getting deferred to somebody. Um, but it's, it's releasing us from having to go back to the developer.

Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a good idea.

Yeah, Colleen, go ahead. So I think I'm getting a little lost in the weeds here, but could we potentially be defined as the developer and not the previous developer based off the settlement? And the reason I ask that, because if we go back to the previous developer and they say no... What are we looking at? Yeah, that's true. I'd rather redefine it as the trust as the developer and we're going to give the approval. And I think I think Christian said that earlier. What what impact does the settlement have on the covenants? And could that be an impact? I'd rather explore that first before I go down a path where I get an answer that, oh, now what?

Well, let's see what it's in this covenant, which I'm looking at again. What who is defined as the developer? The very top of the first page, it's... Yeah, so it's the LLC. So I don't see how we get to step in as the defined developer, meaning the undersigned owner of the... I mean, it's just him.

But if that entity doesn't exist anymore, then what happens?

Well, that's true. I don't know whether, yeah, we could check online to see whether they're still around.

Like if the developer needs to expressly approve it, but they're not around, but then any homeowner can sue us over it, that definitely is a tricky spot.

Right. Oh, I'm sorry, Nicole. Nicole, were you trying to say something?

No, sorry.

Oh, no. I think the the settlement itself was only entered entered into about a year and a half ago, we at least have, you know, their counsel.

Yep.

On on the settlement agreement, you know, that could be a first stop if we tried to get get to the developer. Yeah.

But let's just see if they're still around. Yes, we could reach out to his attorney, their attorney, absolutely. But I like Colleen's, at risk, that's a good idea. Sometimes you don't want to ask a question and you don't know what the answer is going to be. Corporations. Okay. Okay.

And it could be, I guess maybe Emma to you, if we did nothing, if we didn't try to get any more assurances up front, went to RFP and say we get no responses. You know, this could always be a pass too. You know, I don't know if we'd get any feedback from anybody who doesn't respond saying it's like, well, you know, we were interested, but there was this curve ball that we weren't really prepared to take the risk on. And we could, you know, open this can of worms at that point to see, you know, if there's something we could do proactively to try to quell those concerns. But at this point, we've at least made respondents aware that this exists. So at least it shouldn't be a surprise to anybody.

Yeah, he's still around. He's filed an annual report last year, so they're still viable.

Yeah, I mean, I think I defer to Kathleen and you all on how you want to handle that side of it. I think that's kind of above where kind of our role is. I think it couldn't hurt. But I hear Colleen's point too.

There was one piece in the settlement, I could be wrong, but I had thought that they had given the trust the option, that's not the direction, but to use those parcels for other uses than housing, if that was what they wanted. Wasn't there some paragraph in there that mentioned something like that in the settlement, which would mean that that would not comply with the covenant and could mean something, I don't know what that means, but...

I think that applied to the town, that parcel that they had given to the town and then the town had given to the trust. I think there was some flexibility on that parcel, but I think the other two, I can double check.

Yeah. I think there has been, hasn't there always been a question about whether one of those was actually buildable?

Is that number five?

Yeah. I thought when we first started talking about this that there was always a question about one of them.

I think it was five.

So if we wanted to get clarity on how the settlement impacts the covenant, who do we get that from?

You know what? Why don't I just pull out the file again and talk to, call the attorney, who was a nice guy, and just sort of float the, in a general way, you know, Without doing anything completely definite. Just to sort of see whether they had thought about this covenant when they considered the settlement agreement. You know, see what he says. That's sort of a general question. But not, you know, legally binding or something like that. See what I can find out. And then, you know, I have a letter going to your new counsel with the files and everything else like that. So but, you know, as I said, I dealt with him for a while trying to get this all cleared up, the old mortgages and stuff like that. So I said he was a pretty pleasant person. And so I'll just ask him.

Anything else on High Point Drive before we move on?

the only other thing that i wanted to mention was um i started a draft five um so depending how all this moves forward i just wanted to um flag that we added some language on the reimbursement under the housing opportunities on public land grant as you may remember it's a forgivable loan and so we expect that many municipalities and trusts who take this on would pass that on to the developer who takes this on and they would then pay back the town for paying back mhp for the forgivable loan so just flagging that we put some language in an updated draft on that included the um forgivable loan agreement as an attachment so that the developer is able to see for themselves what those kind of terms are. And it also notes the exact amount that was expended under this grant.

And this might be kind of crossing too many wires, but one of the questions I had from the draft was there are a couple of spots where it was open as to the nominal fee that we expected to receive for the sale of the properties. Would it, and I know that the trust has kicked this around, but I thought where we had landed was that we wouldn't necessarily expect anything for a purchase price. Would it be reasonable, would that be a good place to insert that language saying, you know, in legalese that would be appropriate. The trust isn't expecting any consideration for the properties themselves other than the reimbursement of this dot, dot, dot. Assuming that.

Yeah. Yeah, that's definitely something we can add. I had put it kind of up closer to the top of the RFP just so it wouldn't get buried anywhere. But when I think there is a specific section, I remember adding something about a nominal fee. And we could flag that again there. I know when Carson and I were talking about that, we had that conversation too about how a developer, especially with a nominal fee, I mean, this was like $14,000. So when they're putting together like... That's not going to really mean much, and especially with the nominal fee, I don't see in this instance that being something that would be negative for any developer. If you do end up giving the land up for less than fair market value, you all probably know this, but that would just need to be posted in the central register just as like a, here's what we... like the dollar amount to whom and why.

And so I saw that note too. So do we need to have an appraisal done just to be able to, I mean, obviously we sell it for a dollar that's obviously below market, but it sounds like we still need to know what market value is for the lots.

I'm not sure where that comes in.

Yeah, I don't know why you would, I mean, you wouldn't be getting sort of appraisals or anything like that. Those are expensive and I don't think you know what, you know, the market value is going to be, I suppose, a discussion when you have bids. But I don't think before you have bids that you're going to know. I mean, the market sort of decides itself. I mean, you've got these terms and conditions in your RFP. That's kind of setting up with some sort of discussion on the price. If you advertise in the Central Register, you've covered yourself for any sort of price. You can always sell for less than market value because you're selling for a public purpose, which is affordable housing. We do that a lot. We issue RFPs and sell it to Habitat for a dollar. That's okay. We've advertised it. People have known about it. We have that ability to say we comply with the procurement law. But you have no obligation to sell it for the same price as the other houses in the subdivision.

So I guess do we need to reopen that discussion as to whether we leave it open-ended and so developers can come back and offer something for a selling price or if we want to go out there stating that because we've gotten other places that there might be additional support available, whether through CPA or otherwise. And so I thought where we had landed was that we were planning on more or less giving away the lots as a starting point. And then, you know, hopefully that might diminish how much additional support somebody might need. It feels kind of weird to, you know, ask for like, I think 25 was starting. We sold for like 100 grand or so, but they didn't need any additional support. it would feel weird to sell these lots for, say, $100,000 or $50,000 apiece or whatever, and then have them come back to us and say, all right, well, to get this done, we're going to need another $100,000 worth of support. It's like, well, what happened here?

Yeah. And now that we're looking at one market rate and two affordable single-family homes, that also changes it.

There was language you all probably saw about how price won't be scored, which I think does in terms of the pressure for them to put a competitive price on it, lessens the pressure on that, which was kind of where I was coming from in terms of including that language. But if there's something you would like to add that's more explicit in terms of like what you define a nominal fee as. We can add that.

I think what I'm probably hearing is less might be more. And so maybe we just leave the reference to the nominal fee in there and see what we get back. Hopefully we get back something and see where it lands without being too explicit up front.

Yeah.

Can I ask a quick question? I just want to confirm what our overall goal is with this, and that is we were given these lots as the caretaker to ensure housing got built. We're not trying to now make a profit or anything like that with it. It's to get these houses there, and we're just trying to get it across the finish line, right? Are we all agreeing in that?

Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense.

And then Emma, as far as a draft five goes, I did have some some comments throughout, but it probably makes more sense. I can just send you the markup that I've got. Most of them are fairly non substantial, or non substantive. If there's anything more detailed, we could bring it back to to a future meeting, but rather than going through all the detail now.

Okay. That sounds good. Yeah, if anyone does have comments that would be helpful to discuss, glad to discuss. Otherwise, feel free to send me your marked up draft and I'll include it in this updated draft five that I'm working on.

All right. That's all I've got. Anything else on High Point? all right uh thanks emma thank you thanks and just you guys aren't meeting on the 11th is this the june meeting yes this is our meeting okay thanks so much see you next month thanks all right next is uh updates on 25 worcester street uh so andy was just in last month um so there wasn't a huge update but i did include that email from him in the packet

But if anybody has any questions about anything that he said in there, I'm happy to reach back out to him and get more information.

The only item that I wanted to throw out there on 25 Worcester, it had come up in some of the conversations I had, and I saw that at the most recent CPC meeting, I believe it was the chair had a similar comment, that especially in this neighborhood surrounding this development. I think it's going to be extremely important to have a site visit with and invite neighbors and people from the community to see a presentation, see something. And I wasn't sure I'd like to get Andy's thoughts on when the best time to do something like that would be. You know, Obviously, even once they file and they have an application in front of the, you know, things aren't set in stone, things can still move. So, yeah, I don't think there's really kind of a too late in the in the process, but. We've seen some developments go through. where developers have done an extremely good job with community outreach and some not so much. I definitely want this project to be on the side of over-communicating, over-engaging. You know, I think town meetings already spoken, you know, six odd years ago to put this this parcel in our hands for this explicit purpose. So hopefully that's a certain degree of community buy in. But now I think the next step is making sure that the neighbors on on board now that we've got. tentative plans, and I know Andy said that those are still in the works a little bit, but just want to make sure that's on people's radars and I'd like to get Andy's thoughts on when he thinks that might make sense to do that sort of outreach. That's all I have.

Just going back just on that point, but just going back to the original thing that you brought up about that August event of having the table. And maybe we aren't ready to have kind of all-encompassing update. Maybe more October is a better timeline. But I wonder if we just kind of zero in on 25 Worcester and use that table as an opportunity to share information, kind of highlight that project. and then have just kind of brief general information about the trust. I think that's probably feasible. I don't know. That'd be an idea just to kind of jump on that opportunity. Um, or if that's too soon, I know this project is going to take quite a while. Like, are we thinking more of like a, like what, what was your timing, Brian? What were you thinking in terms of kind of a site visit with the neighbors?

Yeah, I don't, I guess it's, I don't want to say we've gotten mixed messages from anybody. I think it's been somewhat open-ended in terms of, I believe he's at the point where he's thinking of reaching out and filing with the state to get the project eligibility letter. To me, as soon as, it sounds like he's working through a revision of the plans now. I think as soon as we get through that next iteration and have something that he would be comfortable presenting and sharing with the broader community, you know, I think the sooner the better, you know, the sooner you do it, the more chances you have for followup and additional meetings or, um, you know, you can kind of gauge off of that first kickoff, um, as to what else might be necessary. But, um, but yeah, I would really, I would defer to, to Andy and I like the idea for the August event. I just don't know if we would have a good enough sense from Andy, um, as to his thoughts around that before we might need to RSVP on the event. Um,

On, I think that Grafton Day is a great idea, but the one downside I see is that we're going at such a targeted audience for 25 Wood Street, and there's no guarantee that audience will be at Grafton Day. And that's the point I wanna make sure we hit the neighborhood that is going to be impacted by this and have the most. And like what I'm seeing with George Hill Road, we are over communicating with that and people are still feeling like they don't know what's going on. So Brian's hitting me on the head right now. Like we, we could, we got to do a ton of stuff and I don't know how to do it all, but we're always going to find people who say they didn't know and it stinks, but.

So it sounds like, so Brian, just getting back to what you said about the, like the letter that Andy wrote, is securing like once that's kind of ready and like the project is like more public or i don't know i'm i don't really even know what what exactly that is but it sounds official and so that maybe sounds like the starting point and then colleen to your point about kind of lessons learned from george hill maybe it's maybe we should have even like a separate meeting that is all about planning the communications to the worcester street neighborhood and kind of that timing and coordinating with andy Like that. So one of these, you already answered my question, Brian. It's unclear. We have to talk to Andy about that letter. And then, yeah, because maybe it's even as early as this fall that we have something, whether it be an event or, I don't know. I'm not sure what, but some type of communication.

Yeah, I mean, if I'm, you know, if I put myself in Andy's shoes for a second, I think I would say as soon as I'm fairly comfortable that barring any other input from, say, ZBA or anything that might come out of this outreach, that things have stopped moving for now. So if he's confident that they know everything they know about the environmental issues or potential issues, that they know everything they think they're going to need to know about, you know, the grading. And he had some questions about that the last time he was in. and impacts that might have on the building i think once those kind of open ends are are settled um to me i think you know we probably have everything we need to start communicating um in that project eligibility letter that's just kind of the the documentation that he's going to get from the state that allows him to really kick off the process um to file with the zba um for for a comp permit so um I think this outreach can be done at any point in the process. It could even be done after the ZBA hearing opens. But I know just having seen developers that have done it better than others, I think it would certainly be helpful for Andy and, you know, to the extent the trust is interested, obviously, to be able to note at the opening of that hearing that we've already done some degree, if not a heavy amount of outreach and what the impacts of that have been.

if anything should we potentially look at putting a survey out to that neighborhood asking what type of outreach would be most effective for them like do they want a meeting do they want a newsletter do they want an email like what do they want and then we'll just do that

I'd be open to it, but I'd also be open to doing all of it. So let's send a letter. Let's have a site walk. I want to be sensitive to Andy too, and we can pay for things like the mailing and those sorts of things, but I don't want to commit him to necessarily being out on site to respond to questions multiple times or I'll let him decide what's too much there. but yeah, to me, I think asking for that input might almost be, I think what we get back could be more kind of thoughts about the development as opposed to like, they might not necessarily understand what we're asking for and just start sending back things that we weren't necessarily asking for. Um, but if we use that sort of, I also don't necessarily want to pay for a mailing, you know, multiple times if we don't have to. Um, but, um, But yeah, to me, I think we try to do as much as we can. So, yeah, I guess if... If you want to just follow up with Andy and try to get his thoughts in, it's like, you know, community engagement is probably going to be critical and see if he has any thoughts on timing or when he thinks he might be ready for something. And then we can, once you have a better sense of timeline, we can start thinking about what we want to package and how.

My question is, what is the goal of the community outreach? The general concept of the development is kind of set. are we asking people to give additional further input or is this just to make sure people are aware of it so that if they don't like it, at least they're also not blindsided?

kind of yeah i think i think if we show up with uh you know andy shows up with um plans the architectural drawings and those sorts of things um to me i think the biggest benefit would be let us let's hear what your concerns are you know when you show up to the zba hearing what are you going to be complaining you know are you worried about privacy because you're in a media butter and you want to know what there's going to be for screening ARE YOU CONCERNED ABOUT HOW IT'S GOING TO LOOK IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD? AND ARE THERE THINGS WE COULD DO ABOUT THE APPEARANCE, YOU KNOW, KIND OF TWEAKS, RIGHT? AND IT'S LIKE, YEAH, I THINK OVERALL, YOU KNOW, AND THE PROJECT ISN'T OVERLY DENSE IN MY OPINION, YOU KNOW, SO I DON'T THINK WE NECESSARILY GET, YOU KNOW, PURE DENSITY QUESTIONS, BUT I THINK, YOU KNOW, DESIGN But yeah, I think we'd be looking for ideas for tweaks and ways that we can... LISTEN TO WHAT CONCERNS ARE AND DO SOMETHING ABOUT THE ONES WE CAN AND THINGS THAT I'M SURE WE MIGHT HEAR SOME THINGS THAT ARE JUST LESS REASONABLE OR LESS FEASIBLE. AND THEN THOSE WOULD END UP BEING UP TO THE ZBA, BUT AT LEAST WE WOULDN'T BE SURPRISED WHEN WE HEAR THAT FEEDBACK LATER ON. you know, we might be able to have time to build a case for why we can't be responsive to a certain request. But yeah, I think it's, you know, tell me what your concerns are and we'll kind of do something about the things we can. But yeah, if somebody has a problem with anything going on that site, you know, obviously we're not going to be able to do much about that.

Right. That makes sense.

Hi, it's Nicole.

Hi.

So I think it's a great idea to like more communication, the better. I love a lot of Brian's ideas and things like that. But I think if when we get ready to go about doing this communication, that we message it more like, education, like why this is great for the community. Concerns are going to come out regardless, but I think if we message it more from a perspective of like education-based, we'll have less, we just won't, like the message won't get lost.

yeah i think that's fair i think you know kind of framing it as um educational or or you know we want to share kind of our status we want to share what the current draft of the plans are um i think if people some people have feedback they're going to provide it whether you explicitly ask for it or not um so so yeah i think that's a great way to frame it is you know like listen This is to show you what we're currently planning, and I'm sure that's going to elicit feedback. Um, yes, but yeah, because I, to your point, um, I don't want it to seem like we're soliciting feedback. Because we're at a point where the whole project could be overhauled or like, we could make drastic changes. I don't think we're necessarily looking for that sort of thing. Um. But I think we want to hear concerns and I think those concerns are probably voiced whether we ask for them explicitly or not.

Yeah.

Colleen.

So I just hopped on the 25 Worcester Street page under affordable housing trust and it doesn't look like it in the maybe I can't see it but it doesn't really it's really been updated lately. So like even the latest renderings and like that all that little black box all that fun stuff that we've been talking about and seeing can we get all that up there on Amber? Sweet. And then that's just another resource that we can point to to say, hey, here's this. And maybe people are checking that and thinking, oh, it's stalled because it hasn't been updated. You never know how people are trying to follow this. But that's something we can do just immediately and have that available for people. Or Amber can do and have that available. Thank you, Amber. Thanks, Amber. We.

Yeah, I think the goal of this is to just bring people along on the journey with us. The decisions have already been made. The train has left the station. It's a community. We can have open discussion, but these decisions and plans are in motion. rather than just being transparent and open with it. Because, I mean, I've experienced this. Rumors start to fly. Things start to spiral. And that's where then we get kind of potentially more negativity versus if we're kind of like upfront from the start and people are kind of a part of this with us. And Andy and that whole group, I think, will just be better off for the progress and support as it goes forward.

Sounds good. All right. Anything else on 25 Worcester Street? All right. Treasurer's report.

So another fairly easy one this month. The only activity was payroll and interest. I did add, and I'll keep it going in the future, Next to the last line of investment income or loss, what the year-to-date cumulative total is. So I know last month we had a pretty sizable loss. So just to keep that perspective in there, year-to-date, we are $72,000 ahead of where we started the year, investment income-wise. So yeah, other than that, it's been quiet. I don't know, and we've lost Kathleen. I'm kind of surprised we haven't seen anything else from GSX 1727 wise but oh sorry but I think Kathleen might have

Do you want me to repeat that in case she didn't hear it?

Yeah, Kathleen, I was just saying, yeah, so we were just going through the Treasurer's Report. We haven't had much activity. The last time we got anything from GSX was back in January. And I guess with the sale having closed at this point, I guess I was a little surprised to not have seen anything else from them recently, but...

Well, I discouraged them from jumping into your, you know, jumping into your treasury quickly right after buying it. I thought they had, you know, they had some points that they have to reach before they could sort of tap into some more cash from you folks. So I'm sort of happy that they haven't done that. But I don't know what the, I haven't seen the site to see what, how they made, how they started. Have they made any progress with the construction or? Have we seen anything going on there?

Some site clearing, but they had started that even before they closed, unfortunately. But yeah, that's about it. I think the last time Brendan was in, I got the impression that he was going to try to pull together a schedule of potential future uses of the rest of the grant funds. So even if we hadn't gotten any requests, I guess I'm surprised we haven't at least gotten that next line of feedback from him.

Yeah, I mean, he was all set to sort of ask us to go to the town and get them to waive all the sewer connection fees and other sort of permitting fees and that sort of thing, which I said we wouldn't be the party asking for that. And it's also not appropriate for us to be paying those fees to another town department. So I'm sort of surprised that nothing has happened. But before I pass this off, I will reach out to his attorney. Okay. And see, just find out what's going on.

Sounds good.

And then I'll probably just be sending you folks a bill before the end of the fiscal year. Probably send it next week. And it's just only going to be a couple hundred bucks. But it's not enormous.

since we probably won't be meeting until after the fiscal year can we preemptively approve that up to a certain dollar threshold or something um we should see the bill and then just yeah do you need it before the end of the fiscal year you do no but you you need payment oh no i don't need i just need to submit it oh

I think. So I'll do that next week. I had a whole bunch of closings this past week. Very complicated and every single one of them turned bad. So yeah. Anyway, so I'll send the bill off to the Treasurer's Department or whatever and copy you on it. So I think it just has to get in before the end of the fiscal year. I don't think it has to be paid before the fiscal year. But as I said, I think it was something like $450. It wasn't any more than that.

I KNOW I SAW SOMETHING FROM MARY ON THE TIMING OF DOES ANY OF THAT REQUIRE OUR APPROVAL OR IS THAT JUST GETTING SO THE OTHER TOWN DEPARTMENTS HAVE A VERY STRICT LIKE DEADLINE YEAH WE DON'T OKAY UM THE TRUST ACCOUNTING JUST KIND OF IT'S NOT THE IT'S NOT TIED TO THE BUDGET OR ANYTHING SO IT'S RIGHT YEAH OKAY YEAH ALL RIGHT COOL ANY UH

Any questions, uh, or anything on the treasurer's report? All right. Uh, we have a bill to, uh, approve. Uh, I will entertain a motion to, uh, how do we, how do we phrase this?

Authorized payment?

Authorized payment, uh, of the, uh, Invoice from Harrington and Heap in the amount of $180. So moved. Okay. All right, motion and second. Any discussion on that? Hearing none, vote by roll call. Langevin, aye. Dan, aye. Colleen?

Aye.

And Sarah?

Aye.

And Nicole?

Aye.

All right, motion carries. And then meeting minutes. Any corrections, concerns, questions on the minutes? Any of them?

Mr. Chair, I move that we accept the meeting minutes for November 12th, 2021, December 11th, 2025, January 15th, 2026, and March 12th, 2026 as presented.

Second.

All right. Any further discussion? Hearing none, vote by roll call. Ryan?

Langer, aye.

Dan, aye. Colleen? Aye. I think that was an I, I didn't hear it though. No, aye. All right, Sarah? Aye. And Nicole?

Aye.

All right, the minutes are approved. And? Thank you, Amber. That's it. Is there a motion to adjourn? So moved.

Good.

All right, Brian? Brian, aye. Dan, aye. Colleen? Aye. Sarah?

Aye.

And Nicole?

Aye.

We are adjourned. Thanks, everybody. Thanks, everybody.