Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Can I have your attention, please? We'll be starting up shortly. Good evening, and welcome to the Lowell Planer Board from 05/04/2026. This meeting is being broadcasted live on channel six and on the Lowell LTC YouTube page. The first matter on the agenda this evening would be the approval of the 04/23/2026, minutes. Any of the board members have any comments or corrections?

Okay. And then, mister chairman, I with that, I'll make a motion to approve the minutes as submitted.

Motion made. I'll second the motion. All in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposition? Hearing none, the minutes are approved. Moving along on the agenda. I would like to take a matter out of order, if I may, and go right to, 297 University Ave. I'm sure mister Galey has no objection.

No objections, mister chairman.

Okay. Site plan review and special permit, 297 University Ave, because the Indian Enterprise Inc has applied to Low Planning Board and Low zoning board of appeals for the site plan review, special permit, PMES approval to construct an existing eight bay garage into four townhouse residential units. The property is located in a traditional two family zoning district. The application requires site plan review approval under section eleven point four point two two to construct a development with more than three dwelling units and a special permit pursuant to section 4.521 and section eleven point three point one for change of nonconforming use. The project also requires Vamius approval under section 5.1 for relief from maximum number of stories, minimum usable open space per dwelling unit, and for any other relief required under the zoning ordinance of the city of Lowell.

May we hear from the applicant?

Thank you, mister chairman. For the record, John Geary of Geary and Geary LLP, 32 Church Street, Lowell, Mass. There was a little bit of an issue with the signposting. So the planning board date and time was not on the sign. So we are here I am here tonight requesting a continuance to the May 20 May 18 meeting, if that's possible. The date has since been put on the sign for for May 18 today, so it's the two week time frame. Okay. And and so we would like to request a continuance. I have the form completed if you need it for the file.

Sure. If you could pass that to Mamrie, if you would. Alright. Mary, you you discussed with, staff that the eighteenth would would be available for this matter? Okay. Any discussion for the board the request that it continues to May 18?

Mister chairman, I'd make a motion to continue the matter to May 18.

I second. Motion made and second. All in favor say aye.

Aye. Chair votes yes. Any opposition? Hearing none, the matter continues at

Thank you.

Thank you, mister Gary. Okay. Moving along on the agenda. We have a definitive subdivision and a site plan review, which we'll take together so the applicants don't have to testify twice. And anybody speaking in favor or against?

So the definitive subdivision on 71 North Perrico Road, the Lowell Planning Board will hold a public hearing to hear all interested persons relative to an application by FTO Realty Trust to split the existing lot into 11 lots and construct a new single family home on each lot, the above address. The subject property is located in a traditional single family zoning district. The project requires definitive subdivision approval from the planning board under Lowell Subdivision of Land Regulations. And for site plan review, same address, 71 North Barica Road. The Lowell Planning Board will hold a public hearing to all interested persons relative to an application by FTO Realty Trust to split the existing lot into 11 lots and construct a single family home on each lot at the above address.

The subject property is located in the traditional single family zoning district. The proposal requires site plan review approval from the planning board per section 11.4 for development with greater than three residential units. May we hear from the applicant, please?

Good evening, chairman, Linnehan, members of the planning board, attorney John Cox, 375 Forum Street, Lowell, Massachusetts. I represent Steven Dougherty, is the trustee of FTO Realty Trust, the owner of the of 71 North Bellrico Road. They have owned it since 2024. We are requesting a definitive subdivision approval and site plan review in order to construct 11 single family homes. The property currently a little over 3.6 acres and currently there is one single family home on the site.

Just for a little history, you guys may remember this from from last year. The the owners sought a zone change with the city. They wanted to because their their plan at that point was to construct 11 duplexes on this property. And going through the process, they heard the neighbors, they met with the neighbors, the neighbors were concerned about density and some other concerns I I guess. And they heard the neighbors, they listened to the neighbors.

And now they've basically reduced their proposal by 50 to 11 single family homes. All all lots meet all the zoning requirements for a single family home in that district. And just on Saturday, April 11, we had an we held an informational meeting for the neighbors on the site. Four four neighbors showed up, and we had a good discussion with them. Clearly, their their concerns and illegitimate concerns pertain to mostly, I would say, water issues, but also some some traffic issues.

We have we have a a memo from DPD dated last Monday, April 27, which

the

department memo, as you and I'm sure you all have them. There are very few comments. The first on the on planning and project management comments, the applicant should include a planting plan scheduled, that highlights the use of native tree species, to offset the loss at any of the larger trees. Clearly, we we're okay with that, and, we'd be happy to make that a condition of any approval that the the the planting would be, obviously ok'd by approved by DPD. Then there were some engineering comments pertaining mostly to the porous pavement.

Our plan would be to, in that roadway in the center that you see, and Matt is here. He'll talk about that in a minute. Designed to basically consume any water that comes onto this this site would be consumed by this porous pavement. We met or I Matt met with, Dave Beatty and and Joe Cady last Thursday, and I think you'll see that there was a a memo back and forth that that I think you guys may have received this afternoon basically saying that, as I as I read it, that engineering is is is fine with with what we are proposing. As far as, these other dots here beside engineering, the proposed roadway intended to be accepted as a public street, clearly, we're okay with all with all the comments in there.

We'd have to go before the city council to have it accepted, clearly. We'll submit the as built plans of all infrastructure stamped by a professional engineer, of course, and all work, will be subject to inspection by engineering division. Clearly, are all we have zero issues with any of those. If you go through the rest of the comments, there are very few. All the way through, basically, Stormwater requested a meeting with with Matt, and I think that was kinda covered by the meeting with with the engineering department last week.

But, again, Matt Matt can talk about that. Site plans show the required intersection, site distance triangles at the at the street intersection. A conditional approval to maintain site triangles to ensure vehicles can enter is recommended, and we have zero issues with that. Clearly we'd be happy to make all of those conditions conditional upon approval. Benefits to this plan are many.

It would provide 11 brand new homes in the city. So obviously, the city is needs housing. Majority of the homes in that neighborhood are two family homes or condos. These would be 11 single family homes. Again, it's an underused lot, and it'll be a huge increase in in tax revenue to the city.

All lots have sufficient access to utilities and city services. All lots will front the street built for on by city built for city specifications. All lots will center all lots will have off street parking, and all lots will provide adequate access for fire protection as well as storm water drainage. The, we do need to go to the conservation commission. We we have on their agenda the second meeting in May.

And when we did meet with the neighbors, we asked them, you know, what what they would like this us to to do. And, the one of the one of the things that came up was along that side street on on the right of the property, I forgot the name of the street now. Putting a fence along that way all the way between those existing homes and and the the proposed new homes. We would create we would construct a fence all the way down there. I think this would blend in with the neighborhood.

Again, I we ask that, your approval, this evening, and Matt will talk a little bit more about the, the water issues and the and the, forest pavement driveway. Thank you.

Thank you.

Excuse me, Matt. Do you have the speaker on? Yeah. I just got a text saying that they couldn't hear you

on time. Oh, sorry. Should I start over? Okay. Thank

you. Did did everyone hear? No. I'll go through my presentation again. Yeah.

Thank you, miss Fischette. So here's North Billerica Road. This is Hollis Street here, which was mentioned by attorney Cox, where there's, abutting residences along Hollis Street. There's a, town boundary line here, which extends along a portion of the property, and there's wetlands that extend down to a brook at the rear of the property, which is called Marginal Brook. The proposal is to put in a four fifty foot length roadway with a terminating cul de sac as well as 11 lots laid out that can accommodate 11 single family residences.

All of those single family residences will have garages and areas outside those garages for vehicles as well. There's also a sidewalk that is proposed down one side of the roadway, which is shown on the plan. And then we show general layout of walkways and stairwells to get into each of the residences. As Attorney Cox had mentioned during the site meeting with the abutters, there will be a solid fence that will be installed along the neighboring lot line to the residences on Hollis Street. Actually, I have an aerial, that I brought, which shows the subject parcel here.

And this is Hollis Street, and this is North Billerica Road. So in this zoning district, I wanted to mention that a minimum required lot needs to be 7,000 square feet. And it also needs to have 70 lineal feet of frontage. This is the existing conditions plan, which shows the existing residents, a paved driveway, the lawn area and vegetated area. I'd also like to note there's a culvert that actually goes underneath North Road that brings water in from the easterly side of North Billerica Road which feeds this wetland area.

This is the layout of each of the lots. These lots here are approximately 7,600 square feet. These lots along this edge range from 10,000 to 15,000 square feet. So they're significantly larger than the minimum lot size which is 7,000 square feet. This is the same plan that we just went over.

I should note on this plan that we have a zoning district line that's in the center of North Billerica Road extending down along the common lot line to this area here which is a TTF, traditional two family district. And this is a SMF district here. Oh, I'm sorry. This is a TSF, okay, which is traditional single family district. And then here there's actually a SMF district.

And that SMF district to some degree could be extended into this lot at some point if this project wasn't being developed, which actually can create a much higher density if that was to be extended. This is the grading and utility plan, which has the water force main utilities and the gas shown on it. And this is a roadway plan and profile for the construction of the roadway with the utilities in it. I'd like to note that we have submitted a full drainage report and a stormwater management report with the submission which outlines conformance to MassDEP's stormwater regulations. And it also provides an operation and maintenance of this facility of this roadway post construction.

So the meetings that we've been having with the city engineering department involve maintenance of this roadway. And our proposal is that there'll be a homeowners association that'll do the regular maintenance of the roadway, which is simply vacuuming the roadway twice a year. And then also to make sure that the drainage easement is is clear. So we're gonna put up wooden posts that'll show these two neighbors that they're not able to do anything within the easement such as planting trees or doing any land disturbance at all within those areas. And that operation and maintenance of the roadway will be included in a homeowners association, which will be recorded at the registry of deeds so that that'll be a perpetual homeowners association related to the roadway, the maintaining of the roadway.

The actual right of way of the road which is this plan here, which was briefly touched upon in the email for clarification. The city will accept the right of way so that regular services such as trash pickup, plowing and those type of normal services that the city provides. People who own lots will be taken care of by the city but the roadway will be borne on the actual property owners to maintain that as well as the drainage easement. And that's my presentation.

Thank you.

Anything else on behalf of the applicant at this time? Okay. At this point in time, I'll turn it over to the public and we'll start with anybody who likes to speak in favor of this project. In favor? In favor? In favor? Hearing none. Anybody in opposition? Just come to the microphone please and state your name and address and we have a sign in sheet through there, Mary. Can you sign your name and address in there so Mary can get it right for the minute? Thank you.

Ed Chasan, 98 Gettys Drive. Where where do you want me to sign in? Do have this? Oh, on this right here. Yeah. K. So it's my first time doing this, so I might be a little bit nervous.

Well, that's quite alright.

Yeah. Well, first of all, the meeting where four people went to, never heard of it. Would have been there if I heard about it. And I'm not totally against this project. I just need to know more about it. It sounds like they're channeling the water away from these new streets that they wanna build and make a lot of money off of, but they're directing the water all down the side to in the where he says the wetlands. That land can't hold any more water. We've Gettys Drive where I live, I live on the end. So there's also another person here who corners near where I live where those wetlands are. And they're always jammed with water.

And I luckily have never had a water standing water in my yard, but every single other house on Gettys Drive on that other side by the little creek has had lots of water in their yards. And what repercussions do we have if after the street is built, now we're getting flooding, we're getting water in our yards? What what do we have to tell us that this isn't gonna happen? It's also gonna be a lot more noise. I got nothing behind my house now.

Now there's gonna be a full street back there, the backyards up to my backyard. I just need to know more about the flooding. I'm very concerned about we were put in a flood zone at one time. I had to get a lawyer to get me out of the flood zone even though I never had water in my yard. Are these units being built on a flood zone?

Is it already a flood zone? So they're building these units proposed units in a flood zone. And they're gonna take all the water they can and move it away from the houses down the side right into our backyards, which is not going to hold all that water. I've been there thirty years, so I kind of know what it looks like back there. Is there anything else that you wanted me to bring up?

I

already I mentioned that. So I guess that's all I have to mention. I'm very concerned about the flooding, and I just can't see how that it's gonna be possible to not make the flooding worse back there by redirecting more water into the wet the wetlands because they already can't handle what they have. I guess that's all I have to say.

Thank you, sir.

Hello. My name is Fabio Betancourt. I am at 65 North Bellerca Road, Tewksbury. The house, I am actually the next door neighbor to the previous gentleman that was just there. I grew up there over thirty plus years.

I'm very well and familiar with the flood zone in that area. We have constantly had nothing but water whenever we have significant rainfall. My parents have even had damage in their basement many years ago. So we are concerned with is naturally there now and what will occur come later down the line with the construction of these new homes. Along with the increase in traffic, which is very concerning on North Burwick Road as it is, we just have a lot of concerns to see what might happen with an additional 11 homes literally on our on to the to the right of of 65 North Florida Road.

That's where we are.

Thank you, sir. Thank you.

Hi. Thank you for letting me speak. My name is Brenda Richardson, and I live at 70 North Billerica Road, which is right across from the property. And I live right on a curve. And the the new road is gonna be coming out almost directly near my driveway. I can't get out of my driveway now. Everybody that comes in has to turn around, go out forward. If there's a car coming from from the left of me down through Tewksbury Inn, I can't see it. I have to roll down my windows even in the winter to see if I can hear it coming. There's even in the winter, the with the trees bare, I can't see on that curve, and the cars come down so fast.

And I've asked for years to have, you know, a police officer come and slow them down, whatever. Never got that. Never got a blind driveway sign, anything. And it's dangerous. You know, my grandson just got his license. I I was scared to death to have him pull out of my driveway, and it shouldn't be like that. So now I'm gonna have to watch here. I have the street coming out now near too close to my driveway, watching the cars come down here, come around the corner from Hollis. They're always coming into my driveway to turn around because Waze or something misses the four ninety five route up Hollis Street. I get so much traffic in my driveway alone.

And now to have this right there, it's it's a lot. Plus, have a creek next to me that goes under the road and into north into the Tewksbury end that's right on the same property. Now when my kids were younger, they all played in in Jojad, which was 70 North 71 North Billerica, and they couldn't they couldn't play. They used to call it quicksand because it was so muddy, and they would come and it would actually be up to their chest. So now they're building this, and I know they're building it on slabs because it's wet, but I have a lot of concerns about the water and the water table that's there.

And then I I know a lot of the customers and a lot of the customers a lot of the neighbors do have water problems as it is, but I I just think something really needs to be looked at and and taken seriously with these wetlands. That's all I have to say. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hi. My name is Cindy Smith, and I live at 25 Hollis Street. With the water concern, I actually had my cellar flood to over two feet of water, right after my husband passed away. And it was a mess to try and clean it up. And it came from the back where all the wetlands are. It's never happened again, but it did happen. And, you know, I just, my concern is that this could happen again. That's the only thing I really have a concern about is the flood lands.

Thank you.

Good evening. I'm Sharon Marin. I live on 109 Hollis Street, Lowell. I am here tonight to address the apprehension about the proposed development of 11 single family homes on North Billerica Road which cut my property. Although I'm not opposed to change a development, I do have serious concerns about the ramifications to my property from the proposed development because it also butts the wetlands. I have four pumps in my house now. Two on one side, two on the other side. And it every spring, it pumps water. So I am very concerned about that. First, what precautions will we be taking to minimize the drainage and flooding changes from affecting my property?

Even small elevations of grading changes can extreme outside effects near wetlands. Therefore, I'm asking the builder to provide a written drainage easement agreement with a clause stating liability to change from runoff that could damage my property and anybody else's. Second, I would like to speak to my concerns about the water table in South Lowell. As you know, the proposed development will be located on wetlands. Many residents on Harlow Street already experienced flooding and water in their basements, and there are people here tonight that experience it.

I understand the developing developer is planning to use porous pavement, subsurface infiltration, roof drains, as well as swell at the end of the cul de sac for emergency overflow to ensure storm water mitigation. How can the planning board members have the develop however, can the planning board members have the developer confirm in writing this will not increase drainage, flooding, or groundwater to the abutting properties? Third, what control measures will be used during construction to prevent erosion of the existing properties on Holler Street that abut this proposed development? Can we expect can we expect to see silt fences and retention, detention water basins to eliminate these concerns? Fourth, what is being done to provide a buffer zone between existing properties, the development and wetlands?

When buffers are reduced, ignored, or improperly marked during construction, negative impact like noise, water pollution, and habit loss are likely to increase. I would like to request a landscaping strip with fencing, trees, and shrubs to protect my property seeing that they will be 20 feet from my property, 20 feet. Fifth, I would like to request a traffic review. Hollis Street and North Billerica Road are extremely congested during rush hour, morning and night. This is a this is complicated by tractor trailers, trucks using Hollis Street on a regular basis as in as in as well as North Billerica Road.

When traffic stalls on Route 4495, drivers seeking alternate routes also use Hollis Street. The development will certainly worsen the issue. Are there any plans to mitigate the traffic issues for the residents on Hollis And North Billerica Road? I respectfully ask you to consider these concerns before casting your vote on the proposed development. Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Hi, my name is Stacy Decker. I live at 110 Hollis Street. I've lived on the street since 1984. And my question is, when the builder comes in and puts these houses up, basically changes an ecosystem, burdens our traffic, overburdens our water. We've already had two water main breaks on Hollis Street just this year alone where we've gone all day without water into the night. The street's been blocked off. No traffic can come through unless you live there. Overburdens our electrical grid. Who do we call when our basements are flooded in 2031 or 2032? Who do we call?

I also wanted to know the poorest pavement. I'm looking it here and they even spoke about it. It needs to be maintained. I really have a hard time believing that the residents who buy these properties are gonna be out there. It says right here, proper maintenance includes regular cleaning, specifically using vacuums or blowers to prevent clogging to ensure continued infiltration. I've lived on the street for a very long time. I'm not seeing a lot of property maintenance. I'm not saying they won't maintain their property, but who's going to be out there blowing and vacuuming a street? I'd also like to know who's going to be plowing. Thank you very much for your time.

Thank you. Anybody else like to speak? Anyone else? Anyone else? Okay. Thank you. At this point in time, I'll turn it over to the board members. Oh, before I do that, Matt, anything you wanna say me and and regards to some of issues that the neighbors may have raised? I'll let you reply to some of that. Wait. We

have a letter or a question here. Thought

there was there was

Yes. So with with many projects, drainage comes up as a potential issue. And there's many different types of drainage. You can have drainage all the way to the end of a roadway with a catch basin and a drain manhole and a detention basin, and then you have a single of which there could be a failure. Okay and that all requires regular maintenance like any drainage system does.

You you have gutters, you have to clean them. Catch basins, drain manholes, detention basins, you have to clean them in order for them to function properly. One of the benefits of a porous paved roadway and I brought the engineers out to a system that's been in for ten years, which was at the Lowell Collegiate Charter School. We've also done a public roadway at Newhall Street, if you recall. There's also the Nobis parking lot, which is on the corner of Middlesex.

And if you go out to Lowell Collegiate Charter School and you look at the poorest pavement compared to regular pavement, there's a stark difference in the way that poorest pavement really holds up well with its porous consistency with the underlying soils that support that poorest pavement. So it's essentially a fully draining system. And that system drains uniformly from the beginning of the road through the ground all the way. So when it's raining, it's all going into the ground in a uniform fashion. And that's actually a desired form of drainage that is allowed by the Mass DEP stormwater regulations as a system that actually would reduce a point discharge if you had a conventional drainage system.

These roadways need little maintenance because they're a fully porous system. We have an operation and maintenance plan that has been reviewed by the engineering department. This is going to be not left up to the City of Lowell. As you know, the City of Lowell has their priorities for maintaining drainage system throughout the entire city. This is going to be borne by the Homeowners Association which will be a recorded instrument at the registry of deeds to ensure that this system gets maintained in perpetuity.

Additionally, there's roof drains at the lower end of the roadway to provide additional subsurface infiltration for the roof runoff for those dwellings at the end of the roadway. In terms of the traffic out on North Bowrica Road, this has been looked at by the city traffic engineer. We've looked it over. Yes. North Billerica Road is a busy road at times.

I think Hollis Street is more busy because it's a cut through from Woburn Street. And if you want to get off the highway, you would go down Chrisman over to Burnier than to Hollis. And that gets you over to here so you can get to the back way into Tewksbury. This is going to be providing minimal traffic to that current traffic situation. The sight lines of this project will meet the city engineer's comment for the triangular additions that we can make to the plan so we don't have any issue with that.

But I can say that this project is essentially not going to be increasing any water that's currently in the ground right now, which is flowing through sand. Want to remind everybody. There's a culvert here which also takes in water from up gradient. And I and I heard some comments from the Gettys Drive, which is actually over here. So their water is contributing this way towards that wetland on the other side of the wetland.

So they're separated from this project over here on the other side of the wetland. I hope hopefully, that answers some of the questions that came up from the

Thank you.

At this point in time, we'll turn it over to any of the board members who have any questions.

Mister chairman, if, if I may.

I have a question.

I'm sorry?

I have

a question.

No. This association that

they're talking

about I I can't hear you unless she comes to microphone.

This association that they're talking about, or the porous Yep. Pavement, road, or whatever, the homeowners are gonna be in charge of this?

I'll let them answer. They're the ones who make the presentation, not me.

Because I don't know if you ever dealt with associations, but 90% of them are broke and nothing ever gets done. Because I've dealt with them beside me for the last forty years and nothing gets done. So, I think we need something better than that.

If I may, Mr. Chairman.

Yes, attorney Koch.

The association, the lady speaks about is a condominium project on the corner of Hollis and North Billerica. And it's a 1960s apartment building basically that they turned into condominiums. This eleven home homeowners association, we made up from people with these homes are going to be very nice homes. And I I would think if somebody's gonna buy there and understands that that they're gonna be part of this homeowners association which has a responsibility for the maintenance of this roadway, then, if it were my home or your home or anybody's home, you'd make sure that it was maintained. And and, and that will be, that will be a condition of approval that that homeowners association will be set up.

And, I don't think there'd be any issue at all and and then people taking care of it. It's on the it's it's on the burden's on them, clearly.

I'd like to add something, to that Matt Hammer, Landplex Engineering. So I've spoken to, Gordon Bergeron with the storm water team for the city at wastewater about this, maintenance. And essentially what happens is is they're required to keep yearly records that can be readily available to the city stormwater team at any moment's notice if they request those records. So those documents in the keeping organized documents is going to be part of the homeowners association's responsibility because if they're not maintained, then they're gonna have to, you know, hear from the city's storm water team about that. So I've met with the city.

Everyone's an understanding, and it's actually becoming very common now that drainage systems are being borne by homeowners associations, so it's not a burden on the city to maintain those systems.

So for the maintenance, if anybody had any question for the maintenance for the road, they call the stormwater department in city of law.

That's right. You have an entire department that's for stormwater. Every project is required to get a stormwater permit, and the stormwater permit is, facilitated through the wastewater, division for the city of Lowell.

Thank you, sir. Yep.

Hi. Ed Chase on again, 98 first of all, like he talks about the drainage, which is probably the drainage is probably going to be great for the people on the street. He's talking about the road, how it takes drainage. That doesn't do anything for the wetlands off our our properties. It might keep them dry, but all that water that right now is running underneath that land and going in its own little way out the other way, they're gonna be pushing, draining all down to the wetlands. And yet the water everything does run the other way. But how do we all get flooded? It's because the marginal brook can't handle all that water, and it backs up into everybody's yard. So he can say we live three miles away, whatever. I live right at the end, right next to those wetlands.

Gettys Drive curls all the way around, and I live right next to the end of that development where he points to the wetlands where all that water's gonna go. So he can say we're way over there or we're way over there, but I know where I live. I've been there for thirty years, and I'm right next to those wetlands. So if that marginal book can't drain all that water, it's still gonna back up on everybody. So now they're pushing more into one area instead of it it naturally drains you know, water drains downhill, down away from everything. There's a lot of underground water in Tewksbury. I have a well. It's only 10 feet down. I can put pump more water than the town Tewksbury does. There's a lot of water under there, and this water has to run away.

But we don't know what kind of changes it's gonna they're gonna drain their new property pretty well, it sounds like, but that doesn't really it doesn't help our situation. It could make it way worse. It could make it better. I don't know. But what precautions do we have if all of a sudden I'm starting to get flooded and I'm getting flood water and these guys build their property and they're gone? Then what do I have?

Well, I believe that they said earlier in the presentation, they have to get the approval from conservation as well. And they should be able to answer all the wetlands issue. They have to go before conservation. Right?

Right. Well They

said that they're being under presentation. So no matter what we I mean, approve, they still have to satisfy conservation.

Right. Well, and this is Lowell. Right? I live in Tewksbury, and I'm right next to this project. Mhmm. So if they Lowell approves it, they're just okay. Too bad. They're gonna build the street, and now I start getting flooded. What what repercussions do I have? I've never had a standing water in my yard ever. It's been all around it. Mhmm. But if it backs up anymore, it's coming right up. You know? And I hope what he says, all this drainage is works, but I have we'd have no control over that.

No. And that's why we just go by the recommendations of our city engineer to make sure whether what that what they're saying is applicable.

Mister Linnehan, so as you know, the stormwater regulations are very strict. Mhmm. Okay? They're the same regulations whether you live in Tewkesbury or you live in Lowell. When it comes to the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection stormwater regulations of which we comply with.

The water that rains down on this property will go into the ground in the same regular rate as it does today. The same water will be in the ground the way it is today and after this project is constructed. And it's our responsibility to make sure that we comply with the Massachusetts stormwater regulations in that regard. And a full drainage report and stormwater report has been submitted as part of the submission.

Thank you. Okay. Alright. Back to board members. Mister chairman.

Thank you, mister chairman. Now the public hearing has been closed to Whiteland. So very familiar with the the technology and over the years I've actually brought in documentation for the board members. UNH is probably was on the cutting edge of this type of technology. And I personally was involved in looking at a project in Pelham called Boulder Hill.

It's 55 Enola and they were using the technology. It was actually relatively new at the time. And it really is to do exactly what Matt Hammer has stated here. I guess and we've seen this in projects I I I guess this is the is the largest application I've seen on a on a roadway that would be and I'm just trying to understand if it's accepted by the city. The intent is for the city to to accept it as a roadway. Is that correct?

That's correct.

Yeah. So if if the maintenance is not kept up with, and it deteriorates, who is responsible then to rebuild it?

It it would be the homeowners association. The homeowners association is responsible for the maintenance and and upkeep of that road.

And that would I I mean, I think that's that that is a distinction we have to make very, very clear. Problem is is that if in fact and and the other thing is is that if you use salt on these on these surfaces too, that's a real problem. Right?

Salt is a problem with concrete. You might have seen that application, be applied for porous pavement. In this case, it's bituminous pavement that's porous. In fact, I welcome the board to go down to the Lowell Collegiate Charter School.

Well, I've been there a couple times, counsel, for oh, yeah, counsel, but for for presentation, so I'm aware of it.

So I like that came before us at least six times. Yeah. We approved that. Like you

to go again because I hadn't been there in some years. And if you go down to that roadway, you'll actually see the bituminous pavement compared to the poorest pavement, and you're going to see a stark difference in the way that the poorest pavement holds up almost like it was put down ten years ago. So I do welcome the board members to go and look at that if you need to. And that's what became a deciding factor with the engineering department because it does hold up well. It's it's not affected by salt, and it leads it needs little maintenance to maintain.

I I I want a little bit further clarification on that only because it's a it's a it's a responsibility of the city to to My concern is if, in fact, there is some real problems with it. The Because if it isn't maintained properly, regardless of the responsibility is with, and the liability is with the association, ultimately if it does result in having some problems and it's not functioning properly, then you're going to have water problems, right? So just I have some concerns about that. I want some further clarification on that from engineering as well. And then engineering typically, and we in every instance try to have new development with granite curbing.

And I noticed you're using Cape Cod berms here. Again, a perspective of upkeep, that's just not the best application. And I know we have we have always had comments from engineering. Matter of fact, the standard comments were not in this letter because they they did, you know, basically, I don't know where that One, two, three, four, six paragraphs more about the the the poorest pavement. And so, again, I I would be looking really at that, as well.

And from the especially that there there's quite a bit of infrastructure with with this drainage system on the subdivision, definitive subdivision. I mean, we don't have a lot of these come before us, but performance guarantee, is a requirement. And I'm I'm I'm asking, do we have cost estimates of what the the the infrastructure road would be? Or if if the instead of requiring the guarantee, the board may, at the election of the applicant, prove the definitive, plan on the condition that no lot in the subdivision shall be sold until the work on the ground necessary to adequately serve such lot in accordance with these regulations has been satisfactorily complete pleaded. I mean, that's I mean, we've got to address that as far as what

Yeah, can do that. So, I think to answer your first, question Sure. Essentially, this system is about the same in cost as a traditional paved roadway catch basin drainage detention basin system. We found that it was a little bit higher at the beginning technology and where this technology is being used a lot more with public awareness, low impact design, we're seeing the cost come down.

I guess the point is, Matt, even if it was regular pavement, I I wanna see a performance guarantee or

Yeah. So that that is required no matter what you put into a roadway that's gonna be accepted by the city. This roadway would have to be completed before the, transact of one.

Not with them accepting before we would sign off on any lots.

No. For an occupancy on a lot. All on a lot. Right. And there would be a a as as you know, there'd be a a meeting with the director of DPW and engineering to come up with a bond amount to finish whatever would be necessary to finish, to their satisfaction in order to have a bond in place before they would release an occupancy permit. And then that estimate's, prepared. There's escalating costs

Well, you typically go one or the other, which is which is I mean, we either would have a performance guarantee. Well, you could Yeah. Then you can reduce the performance guarantee based on work that's been completed.

Yep.

In this case, the whole road's gonna be done. Mhmm. Okay. What may not be done is the curb cuts to each individual lot and possibly the shade trees and finishing off the the side slopes to the roadway.

Okay. Yeah. And then I I did see the email late this afternoon, and I don't know if it's acceptance by engineering. It was an email from you to Joe Katie. But one of the other things is those wooden posts you know, I was around on the other side of this when the development at the Rollies Farm went in. It was a planned residential development and there was to be put there was to put markers for the wetlands and what was required was granite postings because granite posts.

We'll put in whatever the engineering requires if they wanna

No, you'll put in whatever we say we'll call. So what I don't want is I don't want a wood

post. Oh yeah, if you

want something specific in

there, we most certainly can.

Yeah, I just don't think that that's something, you know, a a wooden a wooden post alerting no planting area is not going to last.

So the other thing, there's, there is concrete. We have to figure out a way to get a sign attached to it. Yeah. There's metal signs that we can put in as well that can be hammered into the ground in a sign affixed to a metal post.

Right.

Which usually works pretty good.

Yeah. I mean, want something better than a wood sign. It's just not gonna last. Right? That'll the first people that buy in. Yeah. It's like when you put deed restrictions for fertilizer use, that'll come from conservation, like things that go in perpetuity Mhmm. Orders of conditions. After the first people buy it, know, they and it gets sold, that never gets followed, unfortunately. But that's just that's always a challenge. That it is a challenge of that. That's more of human behavior than it is anything else. But and then the so this was just this was presented this afternoon, right, to engineering, the the email we received as far as

I mean, we've been discussing the roadway since last Thursday. The nice thing about this best management practice for drainage is what it technically is, is that it's not a new science like it was ten years ago, Right. Fifteen years ago when we were doing these. This is a very common acceptable drainage practice.

I think, you know, we've done

it on, again, on interior roadways on projects for the most part, or not a long stretch of road. So this is, as far as I can recall, this is the largest stretch of roadway we're looking to apply this here.

Yeah. I think Lowell Collegiate Charter School is pretty long. Newhall Street, I believe, is close to 300 feet, if I'm not mistaken. And this is four fifty.

And then, again, I'd be looking, let's see if have the board members, either vertical granite curbing or angled the granite curbing, either way. But I'm not a big fan of the Cape Cod Burn. I just don't think they last with the plowing. I think for the time being On the the triangle for And I understand the the person that spoke that lives at 70 North Burwicker Road, that's just an awful spot. And you're right on the curve.

As you're pulling out of this property, you can actually see the sight line a lot better than coming And out of that and I've got a picture of the the mailbox of that home because I parked in the driveway of this house on this property for that very reason. Matter of fact, I think you're gonna make it better because there's some trees where that driveway is that even coming out of the subject property is a little tricky with the trees there, they'll come out. But I, you know, I think maintaining the triangles and really keeping that so the sight lines clear from the site, that appears to be reasonable based on our traffic engineer's comments. I I do want I do wanna hear from back from engineering based on your memo that went out this afternoon.

Oh, they did respond. They did respond? Yes.

Okay. Did we get that response?

At the top of that. I have a copy for you if you want one. I printed

Yeah.

I don't have a response. I just have FYI, it was passed on to us from Mary, and it was the email from you to Joe Katie. That's what I have. So I guess I wanna read this. Right?

So it says, hi, Matt. Thanks for taking the time to go over by the way, this was at 03:51 this afternoon. So I I I don't know if we got forwarded to us, but I I didn't because I'm looking at it for the first time.

I think I only got the first one out.

So

Alright. It's thanks for taking the time to go over your proposed porous asphalt roadway last week. The proposed signage and HOA provisions address our concerns and are generally acceptable. We will need an updated plan showing the signage and the details of the HOA, including maintenance responsibilities prior to construction. Otherwise, I have no other objections. So that was a response to the email that we had gotten earlier from what you had sent out. Alright. So that's that's what I was looking for from engineering. So at this time, mister chairman, I I don't have any other questions right now.

Thank

Thank you. Caleb? Thank you, Chairman. Just want to learn a little bit more about Stonewall. So when will the drainage easement part of it come to units? I mean if the porous pavement is going cover most of the situation.

So the mass DEP stormwater regulations require you to have an emergency overflow if for some reason something failed. And that's what that, drainage easement is for.

I see it.

So I I like to say that, you know, all of the drainage is going into the ground for that hits the roadway. It's the grassed areas off to the edge that are that exceed that. Doesn't exceed the predevelopment condition, but that's what the easement is for.

Okay. So within the regulations requirement, there's well, within that parameters, like, let's say, a one hundred year storm or whatever it is, that is required. Now that that drainage didn't see much water in it. Right? If the road is

No. It's gonna see no water.

Okay. And And the requirement is that you match the existing drainage pattern?

Yeah. Match it or less. Okay.

And is this project match it or less?

Yes, it is. There's a summary chart in the stormwater report that shows the that it doesn't exceed the predevelopment condition.

Okay. Thank you for that clarification. Mr. Forschacht might know a little bit better, but can explain whether the porous pavement, how is different in terms of winter maintenance and plowing and all that?

Just regular plowing. In fact, the system the nice thing about porous pavement is that's different from regular pavement is regular pavement bless you, Mary.

You

have compacted gravels. You have fill, compacted gravels, and then you have pavement. And that the compacted gravels and the fill are subjected to frost. Typically, it's two to three feet. Maybe you'll have an extreme winter like we did this year, where that might go down to three, maybe four feet depending on the subsurface conditions. But that's essentially one solid system. Porous pavement is just what it is. It's porous, meaning the water goes through regardless of the temperature. And it's hydraulically connected to groundwater. And in our case, we have sand.

So you have groundwater. We have sand. We have porous gravels. Okay? And then you have your porous pavement. So it's not affected by frost.

Okay. So essentially, the road is new, but then it doesn't change the way that the rain falls onto the ground right

now.

The system is uniform throughout the year.

Yeah. If I remember seeing some video where you pour on it and then water just like

It just goes right through.

Goes right through. Right?

Yeah. Okay. This is not a experimental system. Ready Mix and there's other manufacturers guarantee the functioning of the system after it's installed. And that's partly some of the documents that the city is going to require when the project's done that the mixture is meeting the poor specification.

Okay.

Thank you.

Moving on, I see that your plan is to have private way and then probably not the official name yet. Do you have any information on that?

Yes. So we weren't sure the nature of the roadway. So it was labeled as private if if if it needed to be. The if you if you were to make the entire roadway private, you're gonna have property owners complaining that they're not getting trash, pickup, or some services from the city. So right now, the right of way is going to be public to have all the services normally given to people who own homes in Lowell.

And some of the, portions of the of the roadway will be private in the way of the utilities in the roadway. We haven't come up with a name yet for the roadway. A lot of times, we need to come up with a name. We'll come up with two or three names. We'll run those by the, city fire department to make sure they don't sound like other names in the city and is accepted as a name by the fire department typically as well as the engineering department before that name is approved.

Okay. Thank you. Let's see. Moving on. How much grading would need to be done for the site prep? And I heard a butter mention about building a slab. Did the house going to have basement? Are they going to have split floors? They're

crawl spaces.

Say it again?

They're going to have crawl spaces.

Crawl spaces? Yes. Okay.

Yes, there's going to be no basements.

No basements. And are the roads like are they going to sit on a

pad, for example, or like? They'll sit on footings.

Footings, okay.

Cross wall footings to support the house, the homes.

Do you anticipate they have entrances both in front and behind? Yeah, Behind. Okay.

They'll have little doors to get underneath.

Oh, no. No. I mean, from from the homes.

Inside the homes. Yeah. There'll be a stairway that'll get you down to that crawl space.

Okay, to the crawl space. Yep. Let me clarify. Are there going to be doors into the homes from both sides, like the front and the back of the house?

So the answer to that question, likely yes. Okay. The homes haven't been fully designed for each of the lots. Some of the lots on the right hand side coming in the road can be however they want them to look as long as they conform to all the zoning regulations.

Okay. And remind us again how tall can they build it here? How tall can the house be?

Here. There's a case on

the side button. Yep.

I don't have the answer to that in front

of me.

We got it right here.

TSF. Right?

TSF.

28? TTSF.

TSF?

2 And A Half. Right?

Yeah. 2 And A half stories.

Two and a half stories. Yeah. Okay. Getting back to the site prep part. So in order to lay the, I guess, the land for the footing, like are you how much how what's the scale of excavation going to look like?

The foundations will be five feet in-depth to the bottom of the footing.

Okay. But I mean, with the current slope of the land, like, do you have to move a little dirt and

Yes. In fact, this project is not gonna be moving a tremendous amount of dirt other than when we put in the road, we're gonna be excavating out approximately two feet of material in order to get the, porous gravel system put in and then the porous pavement to come in. If you'll notice on the grading plan, there's more grading in front of the foundations towards the road and that those grading elevations are approximately two to four feet in the front of those homes. In the back of the homes, they're maintaining essentially the same grades in the back of all those homes.

Okay. And how about on the other side of the road? Towards the wetland?

That's what I'm saying. Oh, That's Most of the grading is so that the grading is pitching towards the roadway if need be.

For the drainage? Yep. Okay. Thank you. Think that covers the grading question. So lastly, traffic. I I so were there I know you mentioned about traffic, but but are there any concern safety concerns, like, when when you are talking with the traffic engineers just regarding this intersection?

Bless you. This is gonna generate, as you can imagine, little traffic out onto North Wilricke Road. Mhmm. Okay? So this as you can imagine, this is gonna be a quiet subdivision, 11 homes. You know, you're gonna get your normal activities with bringing children out to the end of the road for the bus, people going to work at various hours in the morning, pretty quiet during the day, And then more vehicles obviously coming back more in the evening when people are getting home from work. But this is a low generating project from a traffic engineering standpoint.

Okay. And what about the distances from nearby driveways and the curve that we mentioned? Does that influence where you put your driveway entrance here?

It most certainly did. Mhmm.

Can you explain a little bit

of Yeah. Unfortunately, for 70 North Bowrica Road, yeah, that resident comes out onto a roadway and has to look left at vehicles coming around the corner, k, which is a precarious, place to have a driveway with, people. Okay. I'm just trying to speak. So yes, it would be precarious coming out of that driveway, on both ways.

Okay? Our driveway is on the other side of the road, so we have the benefit of looking up to that curve. So we see that from a much longer distance than at the 70 North Billerica Road driveway. But there will be no impact to our development related to the curb cut that we have proposed out at the entrance, and we'll provide those sight line triangles, which are going to be fully clear for this curb cut location.

Okay. Thank you. That covers all my questions.

Thank you, Thank you, Thank

you, Mr. Chair. Going through this, I was looking for where the water was going to run off to and I didn't see it and that must be the porous pavement that you're talking about the Right. This this street. Why aren't we just looking at a regular system where all the water dumps into drainage catch basins or whatever they're called and dumps out into the city?

That would seem to take away the problem of dumping all of this water. The grade looks like everything dumps everything to the back of the property. That's what it looks like back and to the left. Why aren't we looking at a regular drainage system?

Well, one of the reasons was is that we're you know, we've been listening to the neighbors about drainage. This is the best sort of best method of drainage for this particular situation where you do have wetlands around you and you have a floodplain.

Wouldn't the best solution be to take the dam water and put it into the pipes of the city of Lowell? That would seem to be the best decision. I mean, once again, I know little about this, and we rely on the engineers. But I'm looking at this, and I actually like the project. I wrote likes and dislikes. I do like the project. I don't like the drainage, and it doesn't make any sense to me why it wouldn't be caught into a system and then shipped through wherever it goes out into the river.

Yeah. So we're required to look at all alternatives before we directly pipe water into the city's municipal drainage system.

Mhmm.

So as you may or may not know, the city's going through a drainage sewer separation project. It's a massive project. And the last alternative is to convey water in that fashion. They want the water on the site draining the best way possible on the site. So let me just finish, mister Tanzar.

During my presentation, I talked about bringing water to a one point source point, which would be directly at the end of the roadway behind the residences. Okay? That is if anything fails in that regard, now you have a different problem. And now you have a lot of water entering that, stream with nowhere else to go. This system provides a full uniform drainage system that distributes the water into the groundwater uniformly.

This is the best system you could put on the site. And it's more expensive. Yes. I said that it's generally about the same, but it is a little bit more expensive. It's not the preferred method to do it. And they're going to bear the responsibility of taking care of this roadway and the replacement through a homeowners association. So that's a win for the city as well.

Yeah. I guess I'm looking at it from a totally different perspective. I'm looking at it from if I was in this complex or if I was a neighbor, I would want the water shipped out, not shipped in.

That's that's just Yep.

Just my view of

it. So I'm not gonna explain to you how water works. You can't ship it out. Okay? It's gonna go down into the groundwater, down to the wetland, and through the culvert. You can't change that.

If you had catch basins and whatnot?

Nope. It doesn't change that.

It doesn't change it at all? You don't

ship. There's no shipping out.

Oh, really?

Yeah. And and when you're in Downtown Lowell

Mhmm.

And there's no way where to put drainage like most of Downtown Lowell, we put it directly into the sewer system, and it goes over to Duck Island. Mhmm. That's shipping it out.

Yep.

That's now this because when it rains, there's so much water going into the municipal system. The sewer system can't handle it, and they've been mandated to separate the systems.

Yep. The CSOs.

We're required to do whatever the city of Lowell tells us to do with the very least alternative, and the last alternative would be to put it in a municipal sewer system, especially when there's in the process of separating the system.

Okay.

And then they have to put in like, on every project now, where we have no other choice but to put it into the municipal system, we have to put in a separate drain manhole so that when the separation happens, it's an easy connection for them to pick it up. They only allow us to do that as a last alternative.

Yeah. I I don't know. I it it seems to me it apparently is done. Water is shipped out. It's not preferred, like you mentioned. But I don't see it how it helps. I really hate the idea of the porous pavement because I don't think there's any way, Jerry mentioned the fertilizer. I think it's the same thing. This isn't gonna be kept up. This isn't gonna be a flow through system.

And at least if it was, a regular roadway, the city would be responsible. And that's the other question that we have is, is this a private or a public way? And realistically, I would categorize it as a private way because somebody else is being responsible for taking care of it. So I'm troubled by the and maybe I don't understand the sewer sewer system or the overflow system but it would seem to me I think you would want to take it off this property and not add to it. I'm with Jerry on on the granite curbs.

That seems to be what the subdivision rules call for, or prefer. They were meant there was mentions of two to three lots per, two to three trees per lot. I forget whether anybody else brought that up. One of the wastewater engineers said something about a forced main. Don't know what that is, but they said it needs to be upsized to four inches.

I think on one of the plans, saw something that said two inches. So, I'm not sure, what that is for. I didn't see any street lighting, but it could be that I couldn't find it on on the plan, mister Hammer. It might be there. I just didn't see it.

Mhmm.

I

it's It's not on the plan, but we can provide street lighting. I'd like to add Mr. Tenzar related to the comment, if you don't mind going back.

Do you want to go back to the water? Yes. All right. Let's go.

So with environmental awareness and water quality to wetlands, low impact designs are preferred. Now with especially with the, City of Lowell's Conservation Commission. And I think you'll find that the City of Lowell's Conservation Commission is gonna see this porous pavement as a preferred method of drainage than other solutions to drainage that you can provide. So, I just wanted to add that.

Okay. One of the things that I was reading through the site plan review, and it says something that Jerry, member Forschette, loves is it says that we're supposed to be getting architectural plans. I don't know if I missed them. I I didn't see them, but it's supposed to include a ground floor plan and architectural elevations of all proposed buildings. Those were those part of the submission or no?

Well, like I said, no, they were not.

Okay.

As I said, the lots most of the lots are going to be able to be constructed as long as they conform to zoning. Okay? They're going to be conforming lots that enable the people who buy those lots to construct homes that comply to zoning. And the flow through foundations are simply a flow through foundation design, okay? The actual look of the house is not something that we're proposing in terms of how they're held to the way that they look.

So let me go back a second. You mentioned flow through foundations. I thought somebody mentioned the slab. Is there a difference?

Yes. Can you

explain that?

These won't have full basements.

Okay. Yep.

Conventional houses are just gonna be float you know, the if if there is if it is inundated with water, some of the foundations will able to have the water flow underneath the the the house through a throw flow through foundation if need be.

Okay. And I think Caleb mentioned this, that that thing on the bottom right or the top right of the plan, it looks like there's a it says drainage easement. The idea is is is what with that?

That's an emergency overflow.

If

it's needed needed, we have to have a conveyance of water. If for whatever reason, the roadway gets inundated in some way, we're required to show and provide an emergency overflow conveyance for water.

Now would that only be with this porous system?

It's only for an emergency. Right. Yeah. For the porous system.

It's for the porous system. If you had a regular system, you wouldn't you wouldn't put that in.

Oh, you would need that as well? You would.

Yep.

No matter what. What's that? No matter what, you would need it.

You have to have you have to have a way for the water to get to where it wants to go Mhmm. Which is in the groundwater and that stream behind the project. Okay.

Just bear with me for a second. The nine pro proposed shade trees, I I saw that. We saw the Cape Cod Berm, but member Frijette mentioned Greenock Kerbing. I I still think public private is is an issue. I think that's it, mister chairman.

Thank you, attorney Finta. Mr. Sagh, you have any questions, Tom?

Yeah, don't worry about

it. Most of my questions has been asked and addressed. Thank you.

I'm sorry, what was that?

I just asked him if he had any questions. He said most of the stuff is addressed by board members. So he had no particular question. So, obviously, spent a lot of time on water.

Yes, we did. Sure.

Yeah. And, obviously, as I indicated earlier, know it has to go before conservation. And, obviously, if you don't get their approval, it's a whole different set of conditions that may be imposed. However, what I have heard is that it does comply with the mass storm water regulations. You said you've got the okay from the City Of Lowell storm water regulations.

And when it comes to the roadway, obviously, I rely on engineering. Engineering is the one who tells us whether it's gonna work or whether it's not gonna work. They're the ones who have the expertise in that matter. I'm not an engineer, so therefore I defer to them. And as we did receive a letter tonight saying the engineer was happy with the poorest pavement.

They said that was okay. They're finalized with that. I understand that the water that goes down to the far right is, like you said, is a backup and is necessary. I understand that the water can't be taken off-site because of the CSO combined sewer overflow, which is mandated by the federal government, I believe, not just the state. So, therefore, you're trying to keep it on-site as much as you can.

So and the way you indicated, it's gonna stay and it's gonna go right through the ground. So whatever water that exists there now will continue to stay on-site. So therefore, I'm like I say, so I go along with the engineering when it comes to the roadway. And usually, on the Definitive Subdivision, my concerns are whatever the engineering is for the roadway. So because of Definitive Subdivision, majority of the concerns are the roadway.

So engineering is happy with that. That satisfies my concern. Like I said, traffic did not have traffic engineer did not have a problem with the volume of houses being put in there. They did ask for you just to have the condition of the siding coming out of that driveway, which is gonna help you. Unfortunately, whatever happens here is not gonna help the woman across the street.

That's just there and it's gonna stay there. Whether So this is developed or not, sight lines are still going to be pulled regardless. There's nothing we can do about that. The traffic, we're not concerned of the volume. It was just the sight lines, which was indicated.

Traffic engineer requested that we make that a condition of approval. The site plan should show the required intersection site distances, a condition of approval requested. And then also engineering talks about the street needs a street opening permit. Also, I understand it's going to be a it's gonna be a public public roadway to be maintained by the cities, and you indicated that you have to wait before the city council for acceptance of the roadway even though the homeowners association will maintain the street. But the city will make sure that they it's plowed and has trash pickup.

What was the other thing? I think Also, as indicated, obviously, the request of lighting plan and also you could work with division of planning development for them. They mentioned that how many trees they wanted. I believe attorney Clark indicated he had no problem with working with DPD. And also DPD said they do qualify for free trees we put on the site.

And obviously, as Matt indicated that the type of trees on-site they would refer it to DPD on the trees that they would like to put in and get the okay from DPD which we've done several times in the past to have them approve the landscaping plan for any trees that are going in there. So we don't have any heat islands as they talk about constantly from DPD. And I think they'll I mean, and this is a single family zone. So they're complying with the single family and they meet the zoning for the square footage for each lot. They meet the setbacks.

They meet the side yards. They've indicated all the zoning is in compliance. Like I said, they'll all be single family homes, not duplexes, which I think was something that was came up in the past. Those are only comments I have at this time. Anybody else have any further additional Sure.

And then I just wanna know to the fire department, any comments? I see a fire hydrant. And are you all set with the swift path analysis and and any concerns that fire department has had? No no concerns. Okay. Thank you. Yep. And maybe to mister Fichat. I think I think if we're considering granite curbing, I would just suggest that the drainage easement means granite as well.

For the that

For the post.

The post. Yeah. I mean, that's that way

Since they're cutting stone already.

Yeah. And I and I just think it just it's not gonna go anywhere. That's what we did up at Rowley's Farm, the development, that planned residential development. And that

I I I'd recommend the slope.

The slope granite curb? Yeah. Yeah. I'm I'm I'm fine with that. Yeah. Yep. Yep.

Do do you foresee any issues with the porous pavement? With with a granite curbing?

Not I just I just would want it to be left open to whatever the engineering department wants us to put in this road, we're going to put in. So it's not that we're trying to convince to put in bituminous to sloped. So as you know, the city engineering department is very diligent on their requirements. And I I just would wanna leave it open for them to continue to do so as we,

It was odd for them not to comment one way or the other.

Yeah. And and it it it doesn't matter if they didn't comment on it. We're not gonna get the curb cut permit unless we put in exactly what they want, regardless of the approval. We don't tell the city engineering department anything but what they need to have us do.

Well, I think well, I mean, what we find in the past, if we if if it was a condition that was put on here that engineering had an issue with Yeah. It had to be revised and would Yeah. Be revised. That'd be fine. That would be fine. Yeah. Yep. I think that would would be

fine. I would recommend sloped. Yeah. For tire's sake.

Yeah. I just and again, it's it's more from the durability of of the granite on that because it's just they do the Cape Cod bourbon just doesn't hold up. It doesn't.

Once the plow is in it,

it's fine. You can drive all over the city and see where that went up.

We're we're fine with

that. Yeah. Yeah.

One more question. This Mr. Tensa brought it up. Can you explain the forced main and whether the homeowner have any responsibility to maintain that?

Yes. They take full responsibility to maintain that. It's a low pressure force main. So the roadway is going down in gradient. So we're they're low pressure pipes that bring it up to the Wicker Road and deposit it into a sewer manhole just off the entrance.

So there will be a pump?

Yeah. There's a pump for every residence.

Okay. Yep. Yeah. Pump your sewer contents up the hill.

So you can't do that with water?

Water comes the other way. Right? Excuse me? Oh oh, you mean the storm water?

Yeah.

No. We're not talking about storm water. We're talking about

sewage. Sanitary sewage. Yeah. Not water. Not not storm water.

No. It's a low pressure pump for sanitary sewage, very common. Multiple low pressure sewer systems within the city. And in this case, we're going to need to utilize those for this development.

Thank you.

And I'd like to add, Caleb, that all low pressure sewer systems within the city are are born the responsibility of the residences and not the city.

Gotcha.

And I I mean, I just will add that these these systems are the preferred systems at this point. There's no question about it. I mean, as far as the the porous pavement versus the impervious surface and and trying to drain that into a drainage system and and out into the I I mean, this is the this is the preferred, this is the preferred method, especially in this type of situation. So, I understand that, and and engineering is the one that has to make sure that they're comfortable with, the calculations. I've got the drainage stormwater report.

Conservation's gonna have to review this as well with their concerns. So I just I I guess the the concept of the city providing the services and the HOA being responsible is just I'm just trying to make sure we have that addressed properly.

We're finding

Just trying to eliminate issues down the road.

We're finding in many of the communities that the community has to take care of the drainage systems now. That it's just it's drainage maintenance for a city is a big expense. It's a big responsibility. So they're pushing in other communities as well for the property owner or the developer to maintain those drainage systems than to board to the responsibility of the city or the town. And the way they do that is, there's they hire a company.

This company is specifically for stormwater, maintenance. They get the O and M manual and the management company is responsible for maintaining that operation and maintenance manual. And then in this case, it's actually not that much work to do this system as opposed to trying to take care of a detention basin.

Right. Right. Oh, and then the city came into problems with or retention ponds or or, you know, whose maintenance is responsible for that, liability and everything else. Yeah. Yeah. There's yeah. Those those have always been a challenge.

Yeah. Okay. So we have must request the board, we have the first, we have to vote on definitive subdivision before we can vote on the site plan. But if we don't have the definitive subdivision, then you can't vote on the site plan. So we'd need two votes starting with what the request of the board is for the definitive subdivision.

Mister chairman, I'll make a motion to approve the definitive subdivision with the following, conditions, that the applicant will, work with DPD to finalize the landscaping plan, using native trees, tree species, aiming to plant two to three trees per lot to offset the loss of lodge trees. And that the applicant or the as a for the condition is the applicant shall maintain sight triangles to ensure vehicles can enter and exit the project without conflict. And that the, applicant will provide, sloped granite curbing, on the, in replacement of the proposed Cape Cod berm, on the sidewalk infrastructure of the subdivision. The applicant will, in place of proposed wooden signs alerting residents no plantings, will replace that with, granite post noting no plantings in the subject area, the drainage area. The applicant will and at this point, as part of subdivision control here, is the applicant will provide a performance guarantee.

We have asked for for well, it's been a long time since we had one of these come before us, but we have asked for actually what the costs are. But, we'll actually provide a performance guarantee, acceptable to the engineering, division, and will ensure that the infrastructure work that was approved for the definitive subdivision, is complete prior to the release of any individual lots. The as proposed, but I wanna make it a condition, the HOA will be responsible for the maintenance, upkeep, repair, and replacement of the roadway. Is that my understanding?

That's that's correct. Okay. Lights.

And, yes, the revised plans working with the engineering department to provide the appropriate street lights where indicated by engineering. And also the applicant will work with engineering. I I know they had put on on here the the four inch pipe. I would just say that they would they would have to comply with engineering request regarding the the storage system on this on the site. You'll be working with engineering quite closely, I suspect, Don?

Yes. So all the comments that were provided to the Board can be, listed as a condition.

No. No.

So and I guess we would then, to that end, we would, from the memo dated April 27, incorporate, all of the engineering requirements, because at this point, that's that was the correspondence that took place this afternoon Mhmm. With a great deal of that address. So unless there are any other further conditions from board members, mister chairman, that would be it.

Any comment, Kano?

Okay. No, sir. I second the motion.

And come defendant subdivision, we have a motion with several conditions. It's been seconded by Caleb. All in favor say aye. Aye. Chair votes yes. In opposition? Opposed. Opposed? So we have four in favor and one against. Now we need a vote on the site plan.

Chairman, I'll make a motion to approve the site plan with the same nine conditions.

And so we have a motion to approve the site plan with the conditions the same condition that was approved by the motion for the defendant subdivision. We have motion to approve the site plan with the same conditions. I will second that motion. All in favor say aye. Aye. In opposition? Opposed. We have four in favor, one against, so the site plan is approved.

Special permits.

Thank you, everybody. Appreciate it. Was How are gonna make

get the special permit? I'm sorry? Did you get the special no.

There's no special.

There's no special. No. Right? No. Thank very much.

Thank you.

Site plan. No special permit. Nothing. Okay.

No problem. Never be so sure sometimes.

Yeah. Thank you. Okay. K. Moving along on the agenda.

We have a special permanent amendment. 165 Nelson Ave, 33 Dash 113 Addie Way. The lower planning board will hold the public hearing to hear all interested persons relative to an application by Residence First Development Corporation to amend the special permit for the planned residential development known as River's Edge. The amendment pertains to the area of the PRD at the above listed addresses. The applicant seeks approval to create 16 additional lots within the planned residential development with all lots being occupied by duplexes.

This would increase the approved number of units from one eighty one to one eighty seven. The subject property is located in the traditional two family zoning district. The special permit amendment is required under section eight point two point one of the City Of Lowell zoning ordinance.

Mister chairman, before you hear any testimony, I do have to recuse myself on this application.

So mister Bishop will not be voting. So one, two, three, four. So it's a special permit. We're gonna need vote. Well, the special permit. So may may we have any applicant, please?

Thank you, mister chairman. For the record, John Geary of Geary and Geary LLP, 32 Church Street. I'm here tonight representing the applicant Residence First Development Corporation, which is a nonprofit developer. With us tonight, we have Brian Melissi of Haley Ward. Brian is the engineer for the project.

And we have Dennis Connors, the project manager for Residence First. So, mister chairman, we're here tonight requesting a positive recommendation from this board to the city council in order to amend the special permit that was issued relative to this project initially back in 2004. As I said, the initial special permit was issued in 2004 for a planned residential development known as River's Edge On The Concord. That is the reinvention of the Julian Steel housing development, if you all recall. So that's what we're here tonight requesting.

The special permit, again, was issued in 2004. Units for this development started to sell in 2006. The last unit was sold in 2016. Around that same period of time, funding sources dried up for this nonprofit developer, and the project became dormant. So the final phase never got constructed.

Since 2021, Diane Silva, the longtime president and treasurer of Residence First, has been working tirelessly to bring this final phase to fruition. So to get to this point this evening, we had to do a couple things. We had to come before you and the city council to amend the zoning, to do a zoning change for the property, to zone it back to the traditional two family zoning district, which was done. And we had to get the overall development plan approved by the amendment to the development plan approved by the Economic Office of Housing and Livable Conditions by the city council and by the Board of Commissioners for the Low Housing Authority. So that was signed off on in February.

The amended development plan now allows for this river's edge to consist of 187 dwelling units, including the 32 dwelling units that we are proposing as part of the final phase. For funding purposes, we will be applying to the Commonwealth Builders Grant Program. That is a very, very competitive grant process. Diane and her team, Dennis Gonas, have been working diligently over the last few months to get our ducks in a row so that when that grant application process opens up, we are in a good position and ready to submit. The goal of this final phase is to create 16 lots consisting of 16 duplex buildings for a total of 31 dwelling units.

The property will be the units will be sold to prospective buyers with income levels of between 70100% of the average median income for the area. All units will be deed restricted for a period of thirty years. Within our application materials, we have submitted the prototypical structure that we're going to build, which includes three buildings I'm sorry, three bedrooms, one and a half baths, and about a little bit over 1,300 square feet of living area for each unit, each dwelling unit. In terms of the specific changes to the special permit, so again, we're reconfiguring the lots a little bit so that we get 16 duplex lots that will allow for the 32 dwelling units. The roadway is basically staying the same.

Brian will go over the details of that in just a few minutes. We are dimensionally compliant otherwise relative to 8.2, which is the planned residential development portion of the code. The project continues to meet the relevant criteria of the special permit. So in this case, the project achieves two of the primary goals of the Low Forward Housing Production Plan. We are increasing housing units within the city, and we are increasing affordable housing within the city.

So we check off that box. In terms of the character of the neighborhood, the duplex is aligned specifically with the character of the existing residents' first neighborhood, River's Edge neighborhood, and more broadly with the neighborhood in general for this area, the two family units. There's no adverse impacts to any environmental conditions on the site. We are simultaneously with what we're doing here before the conservation commission so that we are sensitive to any wetland areas. And we will also meet the stormwater standards as determined by MassDEP.

In terms of traffic access and safety, the project continues to allow for a safe traffic flow through the site. There's residential. There's sidewalks for pedestrian walking safely through the site. There's sufficient off street parking for each dwelling unit and the typical on street parking that's associated with residential development. There's adequate access for fire and other first responders.

In fact, the plans that we submitted include a SWEP path analysis that shows that the largest fire department apparatus can flow freely through the site without any issues. In terms of impacts to city services, there'll no doubt be school aged children living in these homes, but we are, again, increasing the real estate tax revenue stream coming into the city by developing these 32 units. And I would suggest that if there are any negative fiscal impacts associated with this project, they are offset by the fact that we are creating additional housing, and we are creating additional affordable housing within the city. In terms of the staff comments, they are supportive of the amendment. The project development team inquires as to how long the deed restriction would be in place.

As I mentioned, the deed restriction would be in place for thirty years, which is actually a great tool. It's a sunsetting deed restriction. That allows for prospective homeowners of these units to create wealth through equity if they hold onto the property long enough, which is a tremendous advantage to get into a property at an affordable rate and build equity over time. Project management team also requests that we plant 32 trees. Our landscape plan I think shows 20 trees.

We're happy to any landscape plan being subject to DPD approval. So with that, I'll turn the presentation over to Brian. He can start to go through the plans and educate the board as to exactly what we're doing.

Sure, absolutely sir.

Sure. Press the button.

It's not on. There

you go. Yeah. Along with them. You have the green I got the green button.

Perfect. For the record, mister chair, members of the board, my name is Brian Melissa. I'm a civil engineer with Haley Ward. So very briefly, I probably should have turned this around a little bit more. Good with that.

This is just gonna kind of an overview of the River's Edge, development. It originally came off of Gorham Street down River's Edge Road and kind of winds in with a few of these roadways. The orange outlined area is what we refer to as the final half of phase five or the the undeveloped portion of the 80 Way circle. I point out that the, the red hatched area here, was a cul de sac with a few lots on it that was that was eliminated from the project due to I believe some conservation commission concerns or whatnot. I wasn't the engineer for that.

But this area here is no longer part of the development program. So it's this here. So these are just very simply colored up, plans that are included in the package, the submittal package, just to kind of let everybody know what's going on. So the 80 way right of way remains exactly the same from approved plans. We don't differ from that.

The pavement system remains exactly the same. Again, the lots were reconfigured such that they would meet the zoning code for a duplex lot. Driveway layouts, we talked to DPD some time ago. We've been kinda at this for a little while. But with the driveways are on the sides of the units, three feet from the property line, three feet from the building, and they're long enough to support two parking spots for each each unit.

One of the other regulations as far as the DPW goes was we could only have a total of 15 feet of of curb cut. So there is a detail on the plans, maybe not on this plan, but in the set where we show the curb cut at the streets equals if there were two of them, it equals at 15 feet and then it bows out a little bit at the property line in order to be the eight feet wide, to meet a parking spot. So they're a little bit reconfigured that way. This the area is serviced by municipal sewer. Again, the sewer system, remains almost exactly the same as before.

There was a sewer pump station here. The mains will be continued, be installed, flow to the pump station, and then it flows out into the gravity system. The the, area serviced by municipal water. Again, the water mains will remain in the right of way. Hydrant locations are, as close to the original approved plans as we could.

We had to jockey up the position of a couple of them around just because of driveways and house placements and whatnot. The one difference to the infrastructure for the for the project is the stormwater. The original plans called for an open swale and an open detention basin in this area here. And what these plans propose to do is, replace that with a with a subsurface or a below ground recharge system, that will have proper robo flows and whatnot, so that this area can be filled in or or or made level and utilized for backyards. But system will be underground, but it will be usable area.

As the councilor said, we are in front of the conservation commission. We did have some wetland areas, with proper buffer zones and whatnot and we are going through that process as we speak, dealing with local CONCOM and DEP. I do have while I'm not the architect, but we had made this board, that's the second floor plan. This was included as part of the submission. The typical unit layout, a duplex condominium, as as the council said about 1,300 square feet, two story, one and a half bedroom.

One and a half baths, three bedrooms, in which the entrances to the buildings were here. Again, we'll be parking on the side. I know I'm going through this real quick. If you have any questions, I can put these boards back up. But these units are identical in shape and size as to the duplex units that have currently been built in the neighborhood.

Again, 2nd Floor. This is really a conservation board about some of the, not differences but some of the, impact areas from a conservation standpoint that took place in the approved plans. Again, I know I was very quick, but that is really the proposal in a nutshell. Again, we're developing the last part of what we call Phase five in the construct these 16 duplex units.

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you, Brian. So mister chairman, we believe that we this project continues to meet the criteria for issuance of the amendment to this special permit With a positive recommendation to the city council, we would be before the city council on May 12 for their vote to amend the special permit. The vote actually comes from the city council. And as I said, simultaneous with that, we're working through the Conservation Commission. And then if we're successful with the city council and the Conservation Commission, we will come back to this board at a later date for amending this definitive subdivision plan.

Can't do that pursuant to the code. We cannot do that until we get the special permit amended. So that's the process that we need to follow, and we're respectfully requesting a positive recommendation to the city council this evening. But we're here. We're happy to answer any questions, address any concerns that anybody might have.

Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. So at this point in time, I'll open up the public for anybody here this evening who'd like to speak in favor of the project. Anybody in favor? Favor? In favor? Hearing none. Anybody in opposition? In opposition? In opposition?

Hearing none. So just as a matter of clarification, so they're coming before us tonight for a favorable recommendation to the city council for that special permit because under the planned residential development, the city council gives the permit. I can give you history on that, but I'll leave that part out. How that all came about. I think I've mentioned it in the past.

But I can remember when this came before us a long time ago, I know mister Connors had been here at every one of the meetings. And one time, I'm I'm sure he recalls, they had one chance that they were talking about putting boat ramps in down by that Conker River, right? Yeah. They were gonna put them all in by then, have some boat ramps and all in the Conker and all that. That was part of the presentation we heard prior to 2004. And then that didn't come out, but it sounded good at the time, didn't it? You do anything with money. What's that? You do anything with Yeah. Yeah. That was part of it.

Did they mention a gambling vote?

No. They didn't mention that part. I don't think it was legal back then. So but now, it's you see it on every commercial whenever what you whatever you're watching. So so, obviously, I was here when we approved this before.

I know I don't I don't believe you gentlemen were here back in Opho. So I'm in favor of it. I was in favor of the original plan. I remember what the what the plan looked like before they come in and did all that work up there, you know, when it was Julian Steel and what that looked what looked like and all the hurdles that attorney gave me mention. Because if you remember, they were back before us back in the fall, and then they realized they had to go before everybody else before they didn't come back before us, then they were here in October, they came back in He signed by the January Yep.

Then he had to come again, then he had to go be counseled, then he got approval of two other matters. In February, as he indicated, I mean, little housing authority and the other agency you mentioned. So What's that? Yeah. So Would you have to what degree? So he's been I mean, this has to go before a lot of steps before so so just as, you know, for the background, we're not voting on that special permit amendment. We have to vote almost like a zone change, you know, a favorable recommendation. So the our our board members are familiar with what we're doing instead of I mean, when you look at it on the agenda, you think, we're approving the site plan. Yeah. So, mean, not special permit, I should say.

So, basically, we're not. We're just basically voting for a positive recommendation, and then if it gets passed, as attorney Gary said on May 12 by the council, they'll be back before us a couple more times.

Hopefully just one more time.

Okay, hopefully, yeah. So, that's basically more of a background on what I've proceeded with this tonight. So, I thought I'd start off by going first by mentioning all that to bring the board members up to date, which requested of us this evening. Saying that, I'll start with Caleb. Do you have any questions or comments, Caleb?

Mean I've seen the plan relatively new to the other board, but I've seen the plan before and thank you for putting all that effort in there. It's probably more than we need to know at this point. But am in support and I'm happy to hear about the trees that you're willing to work with DPT on that. Thank you. Attorney Tenza, questions, Conn?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just briefly, it mentions that for residents, 70 to 80, 70 to a 100%, is that Lowell residents only?

It it's who's ever, in the pool. Right?

Well, it's Greater Lowell area.

Yeah. It's gonna be won by the first time homebuyers program. Yep. They're gonna do a lottery.

Okay.

Anyone that meets those criteria could buy one of

the homes.

So somebody in the area, probably. Yeah.

It's the Merrimack Valley Housing Partnership that will oversee the lottery.

Okay. Okay. Drove through there. Loved the project. Remember the literally, project growing up. And then what it what's happened to it. A lot of the people take great pride in their properties when I was driving through. So, I'm excited to see 32 more units. It's a great job by miss Silva, Diane Silva, and mister Connor to shepherd this along for so many years. It's much appreciated. And I do appreciate the presentation, from the engineer and attorney Gary. Thank you.

Thank you. Mister Slach, any questions, comments? No. No? Okay. Alright. I'll make a motion to give a positive recommendation to the city council.

Second.

Second. All in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposition? Hearing none, The vote carries. All in phone all in favor? Yes. Good luck and wish you all to city council. Mister Connors, pleasure seeing you again. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Mister chairman, can we take a brief recess for a second?

Sure. Yeah. We'll take a ten minute ten minute recess until we hear from Jerry with his plan. From them calling.

Oh my god. I had to read that thing. It's only 60 pages.

Oh, yeah. I want that take a while, Yeah.

I think it was like two or three hours.

Yeah.

I

mean, on that note, I reckon, mean,

the poor lady across the street, know. She did. She's gonna That's why.

I said I said

I said in the in the driveway of this house

Okay. Moving along on the agenda, we have other business. We have At Home in Greater Lowell, which was a housing strategy for the Greater Lowell region, which is put up by Northern Middlesex Council of Government, housing strategy. Mister Bouchette gave us all a copy and asked in our spare time, we're nothing else to do to read through it. Quick read.

So, Jimmy, I'll let you start off with

Thank you. Thank you.

Your presentation to us.

Thank you, mister chairman.

I did read it. I did make some notes. So.

Oh, good. Thank you. No. I I Good

thing you reminded me today. Make sure I get my notes.

No. I appreciate that. Just a quick, again, background on this. This really came about from a strategic planning session we had a couple of years ago at NemcoG. And, you know, I've been the planning board rep for the last, say, seventeen, eighteen years now.

And, all of the communities, the the planning board representatives in the, board of selectmen, city council, well, expressed one of the the the challenges that all the community had was housing. And and I'd been was very vocal that it it you know, we can't be the the community creating all the housing, here in the city of Lowell. And it was really the idea was to come up with a regional housing plan that obviously each community has to take back elements of this and see what they could use. You know, it can't be dictated, it can't be But it really is to say, you know, look at these are some of the tools that we could have in place. What And it says it right in the plan.

What may you know, what may Some parts may work for some communities, some other parts may not work for other communities. So that With that in mind, the first stage, this is the This was the first step now in the plan. And the ask was for the planning board representatives of NEMCOG, for the respective communities to go back to their respective planning boards and report back to the to the the council, the the NEMCOG council, on discussions and possible elements of the plan that the planning board feels that they could adopt or at least support. Understanding there there are some policy issues here that are beyond what the, you know, planning board would do. It really has to come from board of selectmen or the city council.

And I think that'll be the next step with that as far as from from that perspective. So it outlines this first stage outlines six goals with 17 strategies. And I had appreciate, folks looking at it. I did provide hard copies for everybody, and, did ask for, us to I I will reach out to Lucier as well because I I wrote in case she had some comments as well, mister chairman. But I know from my perspective, I was looking at low lying fruit on section 5.2, fair housing training program.

I I think it's something for discussion, even if we were to add fair housing training in the bylaws of the planning board, that on a regular basis we would have fair housing training be presented to the board, especially if we have new members come on. I think it's it's it's it's I come from the lending world where we deal with fair lending and it's all part of the Fair Housing Act. We did have training a couple years ago, maybe I think it was the director of two years ago, director of NEMCOLI. And she does provide that for the community the citizen council citizen planner training that is that is available for land use board members. And so she does that for that organization and she did provide it for us a couple years ago here.

I again, I fill that out as a for discussion purposes as well as one of the items was support. It was one of the the support strategies with develop transit oriented master plans. And we did do that with the MBTA zoning here in the city. But I mean from a planning board perspective at least supporting kind of that concept of that type of housing and I think we have with development that's come before us. And there there were other elements in here that clearly we're going through a zoning review here that I think more, you know, would be addressed within that.

There are some policy items in here as well that I think will have to be discussed at a at a, you know, in a different format, not exactly the planning board. But there's there's I think there's some elements in here that are that are useful. And I'm just At this point, I open it up to get feedback. I just threw those out as discussion items, but curious as, you know, what people got out of the plan and and thoughts as far as from a planning board perspective.

Some of the things that, I mean, they talked about it, things that I think we all know about is the high home and rent prices making more homeless people and people moving out and especially younger people, that middle age. And also how we're getting an aging population. The numbers on the aging population, I thought, was very high. You know, when when you looked at that. And then when you read further on, it talks about when you have that aging population, they use more of the city services when it comes to health and other matters of that nature.

And some of them could be more disabled, which affects homelessness. But a lot a lot of it contributes to the homelessness because they can't people just can't afford it because which can happen for a lot of reasons. And they mentioned just a lost job. It doesn't have to be, you know, people are always equated to mental health or substance abuse and more and more we're seeing that's not necessarily the issue. As we know, the numbers of homelessness have gone up dramatically.

I think the numbers I talked about here in the city of Lowell over the last few years went way up and then it came down recently. But it was staggering how quickly it went up. And I know we do actually want a lot of taking care of the homeless in the city of Lowell or other cities and towns. The police just drive them to Lowell and drop them off. It's too rich.

You know? So here you go. But I think a lot of it some of it was I mean, and like if you mentioned, I think a a lot of the housing, you know, that falls into the MBTA, which we've accepted, you know, how you want it near public transportation and how you want it to it's all all those matters. Some of the stuff, I think, you'd have to look into each city and town for the zoning where one of them talks by cottage dials by right. I think that would have to be addressed by zoning. Right. It couldn't be just anywhere in the city. Right. And I think a lot of that comes into zoning. And a lot of that that comes before us.

I mean, we don't decide where they're going. We just implement the rules of regulation of the zoning that's put upon us by the council. But I mean and some of these things towards the end about housing supply accelerator, the loan constructions and all that. It really needs a lot of partnerships with a lot of people to step up. It's gonna take a lot to meet those numbers to bring that housing up to where it wants to be in the future. You're you're talking about ideas and projects to get there. You know, it will show us example where some places have have implemented it, You know, they'll give you example from time to time for

them. Right.

But I think if you try to put in like, you know, what's it, the infrastructure growth plan, now you start talking about, you know, the sewage and the all all that, school, all that. I think that's a major plan that you're gonna really consider. I think that one merely jumped out. What was the other one? The loan guarantees. For banks to come up with that and financial institutions. I know Joe, you know more about that, a lot of it. But you're gonna have to mentions that, what, a place in Boston does it, but how many of them actually willing to do that? Right. Know, I mean, on a banking business, mean, their job is to make money and if they're giving out low interest, they're not gonna be making what they expected.

But it's nice to see that some places are stepping up to it. How do you encourage more people to do that? Obviously, have examples of places in Lowell that does some of that stuff, which in the non profits that you congratulate. Like I said, talked about a lot of funding and partnerships. Think housing training, I think a lot of those matters, you know, you're gonna need a lot of people to step to the plate to work things out on those.

I think when they talked about, in some situations, putting two families, three families, and four families into a zone single family zone by right. I'm not big on that, but then I think it'll destroy the single families. If you start destroying single families in the city of Lowell like this, you're gonna have a lot more people moving out. Mhmm. Not just the middle people, middle age, you're gonna have a lot more. I think, you know, you still need zoning. But I mean, to put things in by right, I mean, you have ADUs by right, now they're talking about duplexes, you know, four family, three families by right.

And I and I think, mister chairman, to that That

can basically eliminate what we do.

I think part of what they were looking at I think part of what that was suggesting though is that and and and here in the city of Louisville, we have multiple zones that have that by right.

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, okay. Have a budding towns.

We have a budding towns

Oh, don't okay.

Don't have that by right.

Oh, I hear what you're saying now. Right? Yeah.

They don't have that by right.

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

You know, so I will from what I read in Drake it, you cannot by right build a two family Okay. Okay. By right.

I don't have a problem by right if it's zoned properly.

So I mean that's that's unbelievable when you think about what's surrounding us. And like with the cottage style homes, it's to build smaller homes on smaller lots, but we have lots that go down to 4,000 square feet. But again, our abutting towns, you know, half acre, acre, two acres, and they're saying, at, you know, maybe you can explore some of this and you can preserve more open space but provide for some of, you know, this type of stuff. So that's why there's certain things that each community it's meant to be like a regional. There's tools for everybody.

Now one of us, like for a big city, and I was on the committee for the inclusionary zoning to look at that and say, hey, when you have a large development that come before you, can you mandate a certain amount of those units have to be affordable. Right? Well, what and and they Citi's hired a consultant and this was one of the best subcommittees I've ever served on and it was just a small group of us. And they had a spreadsheet to work with and a formula, was really fantastic. And the reality was is that based on the return on your investment for for a builder to build housing here in the city of Lowell, and based on the cost, it was the formula didn't work to require that a certain amount of the units have to be affordable.

Mhmm. The numbers didn't work because the cost was so high. Mhmm. Right? So But that's something that you wanna revisit from time to time because those numbers are gonna change. But that's what, I think that was the beauty. There's things in here that for each community to take a look at. And what I didn't mention, and you mentioned, Mr. Chairman, and that's a good read you looked at, there's a tremendous amount of data in here that's really, the statistics are interesting to just read, to kinda see what's happening to the population in the greater Lowell area and the trends. You know, and then trying to address that.

But yeah, and that's the whole idea. And it does say there are elements here that what may not work in one community would work for another. We're it's trying to trying to address the the region because it's so different. Right? Dunstable versus Lowell. Mhmm. You know, Peppel versus Lowell. And then you've got the the towns that the populations are increasing but they're still resisting some things. And and what we're trying to say is like, you you don't have to destroy the character of your town, but you have to start looking at how can you create more housing. Now, one of them is the reuse of existing structures.

We've done a great job of that here in The Lowell, mill structure, churches. I laugh, think Mayo Wu was in front of a church and I think it was a Jamaica plant, can't remember. And everybody patting themselves on the back because they're gonna do a reuse of the church. And it's like, wow, we've been doing that. Oh, We've doing that effort.

And now they're looking at the courthouse too. The one on Heard Street, the Peoria Court.

Yeah. So I mean, that's something here in Lowell. But that's something there's some towns I mean, I know I looked at somebody I financed, a builder looking at a a church in another town and they it's in single family zoning and gosh darn it, you can only fit two houses on this property and that's how you're gonna get. And it's like, you know what? That's crazy. Mhmm. You know, so it really is meant to be kinda thought provoking in that manner. But from what I looked at too is like, I'd like, you know, what could we adopt? I think again a simple thing. I think fair housing training for the fourth fourth fifth largest municipality in the city of Lowell, have that in our bylaws for the planning board. I I think that makes sense, right? That's something we could adopt.

Yeah, because we had a presentation before about racism and a company for equal opportunity. That was a few years back. So we've had that training. We've had NEMCOG give us other trainings. And I know NEMCOG, like you talked about, coming back to see us again soon. Yep. When Dylan was trying to put on the agenda when it worked for everybody. Yep. So I know we're open open to listen to the afro, what meets the needs of our community.

Now, and and and I guess and curious to hear from other folks too as Sure.

Any questions? Dan, we'll start with you.

Yeah. Read the whole damn thing.

Appreciate it.

I spent billable hours doing it.

Oh, there we go.

The attorney speaks.

I was happy to hear that UMass Amherst participated in it. I'm an alum and it was nice to hear that. And it was nice to hear that this was funded through a state grant, this this process.

Can I just say, NEMCOG, the people that have done a great job getting funding from others, you know, from sources grants that are available? As the treasurer, I've been big on that because a lot of NEMCOG is funded through transportation, you know the tip. But if we wanna do other things, we need to get funding sources. And so I just Yeah.

I thought it was interesting that it was funded and I'm like, okay, I guess that makes sense because there's a lot of information here. They were they're talking about, well, the chairman mentioned, households aging shrinking, which I was surprised at. When I when I saw those two things, was like, interesting. You know, they're they're basically saying that that we're spending generally from our incomes, we're spending the majority, if not 40 to 50% of our income is being spent on housing, which is apparently a large burden. And if you look at the cost of housing out there, of course, it's it's it's crazy expensive.

Know, I think a small cape on my street went, you know, a couple of years ago for $5.50. It's like, what? You know, how can a young family afford that? But, I was impressed by the time that you all put in, into this. There was a lot of time. There was a lot of not only information, but there was, they were let me get away from the strategies. But, I was I was looking at it and I'm like, okay. They first did a public process. They had a kickoff summit, then they went to a survey, then they went to another summit. And I'm like, how are they spending all of this time?

And and it's much appreciated because I do think there are many things in this, that could help. And one of the things that I did take away from it, was that they were mentioning that, if we can get the the greater Lowell area to share in the burden, like, the chairman mentioned, with homelessness, that, they were looking oh, no. What did they call it? Permanent housing.

Right. Permanent supportive housing.

Permanent supportive housing. Yep. So I did read it. I I just the the I thought that was an interesting concept that, you know, back in the day, and and, we remember, you know, we had the place over in Patuggerville. What's the the the the center? We we would house people there because they had issues whatever they were. What was right next

mental? Solomons? Solomons. Yeah.

We had Solomons. We had

Vendfriend moved over there, by the way. And so because I lived there there. Oh, They were providing services.

Yeah. And and then we had Tewksbury State. If if if they were really disturbed, they would they would be on a locked unit in Tewksbury State. But I thought it was interesting that they talked about sharing the burden and every community should come up with some sort of, whatever they call that, supportive housing. And I thought that was interesting.

And I thought even Lowell, I mean, Lowell, I think sometimes we look at it like, okay, we've got the shelter. We've done our bit. But realistically, that model might not be working, and so we may have to have a different model. I know they talked about wraparound services for some of the people that those are the serious problems. Let me just try to get through, if I could have a moment.

When I went through it, I tried to make notes on each page. I was trying to figure out what TOD was, but it was later on in the in the in the process. It was transportation, transportation related. I also asked about this inclusionary zoning. What was that? Incentive zoning. And then later on, it explained, what they were and and how they work. And and one of the goals, like like you said, was identifying permanent supportive housing in each community. I wrote, is that realistic? But if you could get like, it it's starting.

Like, one of the things they talk about in this is they they need and I thought that was an interesting idea. They they need storytelling. Mhmm. I'm like, storytelling? For what? I thought it was an interesting approach because if you can relate to people, if you can let people touch base, and share their issues and whatnot Right. Then then potentially, you can sway them, you know, and maybe they will spend the time, to, you know, look at these different things.

That is the next phase, Dan, on this too. That's they're they're actually putting a lot of time into that because it's more relatable to people rather than talking about strategies and Yeah.

No. I thought that was an interesting approach because look, let's face it. If we don't talk about it, it's not an issue. Right. You know, so I thought that was interesting. They talked about well, the Middlesex Superior Court, I saw that, trying to reuse that. But they talked about this housing navigator. Can you can you explain what that was? Because I thought it was kind of like, you you pull all your resources and you say, all right, this is what we have in stock. This is we have housing, this is the duplexes, this is this is what we have available. And and these are the areas where we might need further infill. Is that what its purpose is?

Well, no. So, I mean, you think about it and and if you go to the, I guess sections, page 55, right, section 6.1 under that housing accelerator communities. And it's actually it it it really is about and and the chairman talked about collaboration. Right? A lot of things in here are really about collaboration.

But regional actions, right, identify partners to implement those plans through creation of housing, accelerate, create a steering committee, engage core partners and provide material for outside partners, develop opportunities to involve residents to shape development decisions, weave partnerships into annual summit structure with awards. So the accelerator is more Think of it as a process so that you can kind of connect all of these kind of these resources. Yep. And, you know, you have one place kind of to go, the accelerator committee to actually facilitate all of that. You know?

So that is really kind of a that would be a partnership with the communities in the area. And then that can actually track and create, you know, again, as it mentions here, if it's on track, create regional coherence and bridge the gap between planning and action. So that it really

That's the accelerator?

That's the accelerator.

Yep. Now what's the navigator? They talk about a housing navigator and it felt like it was a software program or not maybe not a software program, but it it felt like a database where you're you're you're kind of, like, doing an inventory of all the the area housing.

Yeah. Well, if it's what you know, one of the things that matter of fact, NEMCOG is working on this right now with helping the communities. There's a lot of communities that actually, believe it or not though, that are below the affordable housing, you know, requirement. But yet, they're not they don't have a good job of of identifying what they have. And actually, NEMCOG's been able to help some communities in really inventorying what they what they have.

What they have that's actually affordable, they didn't even know they had. Right? So, you you know, you you you've you've gotta have kind of a baseline as where you are. And and and is that's part of it is just identifying the what you have already for for housing, especially affordable housing. What you have for housing stock? What is your housing stock? Right. What do have for singles, multis?

Well, and the interesting thing with some of the data was is they were talking about that we're we're having a shrinking labor force.

Yeah.

And that as a result of that, so if we if we're not developing housing for younger individuals and also at the same time taking care of our older, citizens with smaller units or, things that are all one level. They indicated that potentially employers could relocate. And I thought that that was interesting, not something I I And I

mean much

thought too. That's what happened with the mills. They moved down south. They moved down south. Right? So and then eventually they moved overseas. But I mean at the end of the day, you know, people will because of the cost of I mean, of the reasons Draper Lab is coming over here is because their workforce can't afford to live in Cambridge. That's that's one of the attractions to come here. Now, as we make it more attractive, it it comes we make it more attractive, we're gonna increase the cost of of living here. Right? Because there's gonna be more people come. So it's a tough it's a delicate balance. Yeah. It's it's it's real tough.

But it was amazing too that they said we need anywhere between ten and eighteen thousand over the next ten years. Yep. 18,000 units.

Yeah.

I was like Yeah. Are you kidding me? Yeah. That's a lot. Yeah. That's a real lot. That's that that's to make things reasonable. Yep. So, I I was just amazed at the time that was spent, and I liked the idea of the storytelling. I thought that was a neat way of trying to connect with people and let them know that, it's all of our problem. You know, government is for those that can't help themselves oftentimes.

And Well, you know, I I I was at one of the summits, and I was sitting at the table with people from the House of Hope, it was very interesting. They they said something that I thought was interesting is that many, many times, by the time a family somebody comes to them for help, they've already exhausted living at relatives' homes in the basement, you know, from from from one relative to another. Maybe even living in their car for a while or by the time they get to them. Right? So they've already kind of exhausted that type. So there's that type of thing going on as well where people are living with relatives because they can't afford to live, you know, on their

own. Mhmm.

So it's just it's it's there's a lot of that going on that we don't even see that the agencies don't see. You know, they go through that stage first before they even go to an agency for some sort of help.

I I also the chairman mentioned it. They were talking about infrastructure and they were talking about doing a study. I don't think they were looking to do the infrastructure, but do a study as to what we're gonna need. If we're gonna try to grow the the in the area, we need to see what we're gonna need, like porous pavement or what are we going to need? What are we going to need for infrastructure to support this increased housing demand?

So, thought it was well thought out. My main takeaway was the storytelling and and it feels like a lot of this, know, specifically like Meramec Valley Housing Partnership, first time home buyers, the LDFC, those are things that we presently do.

Right. Correct.