Committees - Regular Meeting

Hi, everyone. I'm going to call this meeting of the housing board to order. We have two members on Zoom. And first thing to do is look at the minutes from last week, last month. I don't know if you have any notes here. I feel like a motion I can. All right. Um. Item here is our. Nothing needs assessment. No, I know Mark is not here. Space. needs assessment is live. We have the English version and the Spanish version. We're working on getting them up on the website. They'll be up by tomorrow. Actually, maybe just you want to pull up the flyer or something. Yeah, we've got a letter to the editor and the reporter today announcing this, saying that they're on the website and at the library, which is not exactly true yet, but it should be by tomorrow. So here's the flyer that is going to start going around. I'll take care of putting some of these up this weekend if anybody else wants to take a couple. um there's a business survey one and a community survey one there's a english and spanish of both of these and they have the qr code that goes directly to the survey i think we're going to put these up on the website to drive them to the survey as well you know just a visual um i think you know now is the time to spread the word and um tell people about it, get people interested in giving us responses. Taylor, I did ask Taylor about our housing needs for a survey we did previously. We had, like, 159 responses last time, which, you know, doesn't seem like that many.

I feel like you'll get more this time.

I think we might get more this time. I'd love to shoot for more.

As a percentage of people who have housing needs on the island, it might be a far higher.

That's actually true. Yeah.

Yeah. Just one quick question. Could you send me or resend me, if I can't find it, the business survey? I just came from the chamber meeting, and I'll have them send it out. put up some of the actual files, but I have to put the swap files. So just let me know, and I can just open them up.

We got some right here.

Oh, excellent. That's great.

Distribute it at the end of the meeting.

I can create a part of the library. Right.

So the actual link, I think I sent that email today.

Yeah, you actually sent it before. I actually put, yeah.

What else do I want to say about the hazard needs assessment? I guess the next thing to do, Peter, Nadine had started that spreadsheet. People, I'm supposed to work on getting that into like the town site. Right now it's just a, you know, Google Drive thing or something. But let's coordinate on who's going to take the business surveys around. You kind of volunteered, so I'm just looking at you. Definitely. Yeah, Matt, Mark, I think it would be awesome if you guys could help with that, too. I can certainly do well. OK, awesome. And the next thing to talk about is when we want to do God, this is our August meeting. So I think we want to do an event in September or early October and plan that with Taylor at NPV. So I guess we just, I've got to coordinate with them and pick a date that looks good. And I think we'll have to, Think about where to do that. Maybe the fire department, maybe the community center.

If you want to do the fire department, I'm sure David would sponsor you. Awesome.

September is probably pretty busy for everyone too.

It's a hot season though.

There's a long weekend so that's october that's columbus state weekend that's actually a good weekend because people are out right and there's also rosh hashanah in september columbus stays the 12th maybe maybe we think about september those will be after our meeting like the 19th 20th that weekend yeah I'm going to just write that down and then we can check about availability at different places. And then I can coordinate with Nelson Pope Voorhees about what we want to do. I guess we should think a little bit more about what we want to do, how we want to present this. But it's really just to have an event where we can help people fill out the survey, talk about the issues, and drive people to filling out our survey. Cool. The EDU plus one update. Let me see if I can pull up our latest.

Not too much new, I don't believe we had. No. Still the same. A couple of new inquiries. Anything new update on June? The variance on Cartwright?

It's still, we're like waiting for a letter for the town board to take it up from the county or something like that.

Any negative coming in that you guys have heard other than the two people?

Just what you would expect. So we'll see, we'll see.

The status with the ADUs is, I think, exactly the same as what we had last time.

It was a quick phone call.

Yeah, we have five that are closed out. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, so maybe that's new. 15 South Midway.

That's in compliance.

So five are closed out. One is under construction. We have a construction contractor selected. And a design start. And then we have Or five. Oh, I mean, there's a couple applications in but no one's, you know, signed on the dotted lines. I think we have, you know, at least three open slots, but some of these we still are looking for applicants. For that and We're going to talk to Casey in two weeks. Yep. 26th. Yes.

It was only I, you know, I think we both had a concern about one who got granted, closed out, hasn't rented it yet. Oh, she did? Good. Yeah. I was worried about that. Like, what are the ramifications? And then Casey's like, you know, we never thought about that. So good.

There's some guidance. We met with Gwen, so we'll talk about that, too. um she said there's some guidance they're gonna do you know they have have now talked to the state about that and they're going to be sending it out to the people who are you know the homeowners so they updated the parameters yeah or just you know reminders and you know how what they're supposed to be doing i'm glad that got rented yeah okay 114 rental project update I think the big exciting thing is we had a site visit this week with Matt from Latier and Gwen from CDLI, most of the town board, myself, and Ken Lewis from the highway department. looking at all three sites, thinking about what the Highway Department can do to support us moving stuff out of South Ferry and possibly clearing some of Manwaring and North Ferry, 69 North Ferry. So that's all great. We still need a test well on Manwaring.

Yeah, and did you get all the settings today?

Yes. So we're going to call some drillers, whatever they're called. Yeah, we're going to go talk with them.

They're probably the ones that... Yeah, we had like one, and then like a couple of them are coming in to test our town engineer and their... Yeah, because Gregor... Yeah, there's going to be like a couple of people for it.

And what do I, what do I ask them for test? Well, I don't see it.

We can talk about it. Joe gave me, like, the specs. Yeah, I'll tell you exactly what you're going to know. Yeah, they already know it. Yeah.

All right, so we're going to have make that happen. Do we, they have, you know, preliminary site plans they've given us in the RFQ response. So we kind of marked those up and talked about things. They're going to come back to us after Labor Day with a little bit more final, not, you know, just ideas with that. And then we'll talk to Ken some more and figure out what they can do over the winter. and make sure that the lines are marked, they're served, you know, state. Yeah, all that. So that was very exciting. Good to see on the properties and think about, you know, slowly moving them from wooded vacant plots into construction sites over the next, you know, couple months, half year. And then, in legal and contract news, we're making progress. Miriam has just sent us a revised management agreement?

Yeah. Actually, I just got it before the meeting. 6.49 PM. I sent it to the town board to get it out.

All right. So that's great.

I was like, it's just the edits. We talked about it in executive session.

And then the ground lease is coming next week.

The ground lease we should have tomorrow. Weekend reading for everyone. So exciting. Yeah. And then the town board will take it up in executive session on Tuesday.

I make sure we all have the books sent out because I don't believe I'm on that.

Yeah.

I will forward this to you.

I can do it.

And then we had a little work group this week with Espen, Nadine, Liz, and I. And Ben, you weren't on that. that was it we talked about the marketing plan um which we we and you know the developer will have to fill out it's a complicated form um so there's definitely some questions we have about how you know to pick the people that yeah this is more more about like how you advertise it um You have to be in compliance with fair housing and all that, and they need to see that you have a written plan of where you're going to put notices, where you're going to advertise, what demographics you're reaching out to and all that.

And we've reviewed some of the methodologies of some of the surrounding partnerships that we've been doing and kind of trying to weigh their methodologies against what kind of work here. There's a scale difference, obviously.

And I have the blank forms, which I'll upload. We can start working on kind of dummying in some of that. And I think the main thing is to talk to CDLI and see how they want to work with us on it. So we'll keep going with that. What else? Anything else on the 114 rental project?

The only other thing that I would say is from our notes after the site visit is, you know, we were talking about Ken doing some of the clearing. He thought he could do most of it in-house with the exception of on North Ferry there was some trees, you'd have to bring in the arborists that they use.

But I think he said he has a guy on contract.

Yeah, he has a guy. He has a guy. Yeah. But he would, you know, it would be like an internal billing situation, but still, they'd be tied at probably the best price. So he's going to get, he said he'd get a scope and a number to you.

Next week? Next week.

So he would get, yeah. So I was texting with him today. So you should see that soon.

okay so we're going to get an estimate on that we're going to do the test well and we're going to get a civil engineer to do the site plan after we get that stuff back yeah that could be their guy or it could be right okay what we could do you know what i mean i think we just have to it seemed like they were gonna kind of come back to us with like

Signing based on what our discussions were when we were there and then bring it back to community housing. This is how I understood. It was like community housing board in the town board just to make sure that like, yeah, that's right. Like, we're clear in the right spot. We want them there, you know, and then.

an engineer back to the test while you're doing just the one on man wearing or n114 i think so we just see what ferry one is done we just need man wearing i guess the other two are done the one and it came out good on yeah one yeah we just need the men wearing one that should be fine yeah it should be fun we just move on and we can check these plans with the building department i presume just to make sure oh yeah yeah

Yeah.

And the fire department, right? Like, that was a big thing.

Yeah.

Make sure there's clearance to get in.

Especially because some of those lots are weird sizes. Like, I think they had, they were, they just wanted to make sure.

They could turn around.

Like, yeah, like, especially, like, it was interesting. It wasn't, I actually thought it was going to be Northbury that they were going to have concerns, but they're going to, the way they're doing it, the roundabout addresses it, but, like, the Mandalorian one, they weren't. It's very narrow. They just need to be thinking about how they can move the truck around.

Okay. Moving on. I'm starting to disappoint with no slideshow again this week. I'm really slacking on this. There's too many other pieces of paper happening. So our fund update, this is very exciting news. For July 7-1 to 7-31, we started at $1,896,600. What was that online? $1,896,600. We made $175,511 in purchases, was what they call it. In dividends, we made another $35,000, which brings us to a whopping total of $2,078,160. $2,078,160.91. That's a milestone for you. So yeah, that's pretty exciting.

Then there's currently about 38Million in contract. We had 2, we have 2 big 1 close 9Million closed. And then there's another 10Million that just went into contract. So that's about 190, another 100, but accrued. It's not all going to come in at once.

But another 190 or so. Yeah. Excellent.

What's the closing rate these days? How many days to close? Typically, just 60 to 90. 60 to 90. Depends on financing, how they're financing, yeah. You'll see a big push at the end, November, December, of a lot of closings coming in.

Great. We'll be needing the money.

So next item on our agenda, is the Green Expo, which is August 22nd, Saturday, August 22nd. I will be there. I will have a table. We might even have a banner this year. If I get my act together, I'm gonna get a banner so we look like a real thing. We are gonna have our, housing survey there, for sure, clipboards. And we will also have KC, probably, KC from CDLI talk about ADUs. So a lot to do that day. If anyone can come for an hour or two, I think it's like 11 to 3. I know I shared the time.

Isn't that the same day as the draft fair?

Yes, and the county fair.

It also is somebody we could walk down to the country fair with clipboards.

Yeah, that's actually a great idea. People are always like, I will be collecting money for the barbecue. That's where you'll find me. But there's always a big line because people are milling around.

They probably want to fill out some forms.

That's what I go for. While you're holding this ice cream.

So yeah, that is coming up. I think Nadine said she could come for a minute for a little while. I know Bill and Mark, you guys have come in the past. If you're down, come join. I guess the other thing we should think about, are there other events we can do that kind of thing at table at, or, you know, do we want to talk to the IGA or something and tape, you know, set up a table in front of there.

I still call it the historical society. Don't that they do something around Columbus day, like a scallop thing.

Does anybody know? I don't know. No, not a scallop dinner, but like oyster.

Don't they do something in like beginning of October?

That's like a big party though. I think.

I mean, the only other thing is just I was thinking about like, what about having folks at the cast food pantry? They just had 1. But maybe doing they do it every 2 weeks at the potato barn. Yeah, definitely put that on our, you know, list of people to hit up, but I can be able to ask them. I know that the lions have a lot of volunteers and basically what happens is that they have a lot of volunteers to unload and load, but the volunteers don't really have anything to do. In the meantime, like, you know what I mean? So I wonder if you could talk to cats and the lions to see if, because they're already there. maybe they could do the surveys with the folks. Anyway, it's just that it just was, it was just this Monday, so it won't be next Monday, but the next, there's actually a listing of the dates.

Okay, so I'll go to the next one and talk to them.

Yeah, and I can connect you with the folks. The other idea that I had was maybe the clothing swap. I was just trying to think of like folks.

Oh, do you know anyone in the clothing swap?

I do. But it was just like, it's a, you know, it's a cross section and there are folks that,

We have our pantry here. Carrie Wood is still doing it, I think, so I can talk to her. Maybe we just have a flyer there.

Oh, that's a great idea. If anyone wants to come, the swap is this Saturday. It's this Saturday, and it'll be a big one. It'll be a lot of people.

Yeah, I mean, even if you just have these, the flyers.

Yeah, that's right.

Somewhere on Smith Street.

What?

Somewhere on Smith Street.

You can tell.

By the way, whoever trimmed the hedges on Smith Street, turning left onto Smith Street from School Street, thank you.

Yeah.

That is much appreciated.

Okay. Awesome. Town Board. Got anything else for us? Anything else coming up?

Any update that you guys know what you're doing? I haven't heard about the school street house.

No, I think they just they just cleared it out. Um, so, or we need really to, like, there's like, we kind of get through the facilities master plan. brother to know what we're doing but the good news is like I said they're clear they were just clearing it out is it habitable or not really like can you slap a coat of paint on it and you know fire it up there was a lot of stuff that they had to take out of the house so it was like it was hard to do a real assessment so they just they literally the trucks were there um Tuesdays so I think you know I haven't I haven't seen them since then but the other thing that I did talk to um Anne Marie today from CDLI. And I told her that she actually really needed to, we were talking about something else, but she'll be calling you. They're going to change Casey, the contact who like doing the working with forever is going to law school.

So our Casey.

Yeah. Yeah. Our Casey. So they're going to change it up. So they need to like get in contact with you about like, do you still want your monthly call? Do you need to, you know, like, how do you guys want to do the updates?

Yeah.

And I said, I said, well, first of all, I'm the wrong person to ask. It's like, I'm not doing them. But I did tell her that I think like, it was like the spirit. I was like, I don't think that they, like, we haven't really cared if it's like a call or an email, but we need actual information.

I like the calls. Yeah.

So I said, so anyway, so I said, do you, but you need to, you know, when I was like, if you give me a call and nobody knows anything, like whatever, but I said, you need to talk to Bram and Peter. So I was like, so she's going to reach out to you to figure out, like, they might have to change the time or whatever. Um, so there's that there's, um, when I talked to Gwen at the, when we were at the site visit and she and I, and our Suffolk legislator Rick Dorowski and Leah from the county are going to get together around that kind of additional county funding that we talked about. Because although we will qualify for it, but it'll have to go through like appropriation. So he's going to like help us with like making sure that that happens or you know, there's like something like, yeah, stuff that needs to happen there. So we're like, he's, he's super on board. Um, we had a, I had a talk with him, so he's happy to be a champion for it. I was really excited that we're doing it. So I'm going to actually, I was thinking, especially if he's going to like really champion it, maybe the next time that we have them out and they bring the engineer. I thought, especially if he's going to put a bunch of work into it, I thought it would be really, I thought we could invite him to come out for the site visit just so he like knows what he's fighting for. It'd be fun. So, yeah, that's like my update.

And all of the rest of the community housing board will make sure.

Yeah, everybody at the party.

Walk around.

But don't wear sandals like I did. That's my note.

Oh. My God, we're speeding through our agenda here. I don't know. This is a good thing. Yeah, anyone with old business that we... Well, just something to think about for the Smith Street House.

I know you guys are going, but if it's going to take like a year or two, is it worth it maybe to clean it, paint the inside, and rent it out for a year while you're deciding just to get some money recouped?

I wonder if that juice is worth the squeeze.

report back from clearing out the houses that structurally it's fine so um whatever the plan ends up being at least the renovation cost will be a reasonable amount yeah but instead of having it sit empty you know yeah maybe get 3 000 bucks a month or that's 36 000 a year I mean I did I did bring it up with I I brought that actually up with Ken but he was just like I kind of need to like

Yeah, he wasn't ready to talk about it when I asked him, like, 2 weeks ago, he was like, the stuff out of the house. And, like, then I can tell, I think it was like, there's a good code of paint, but, like, do you have to do anything with kitchen or bathrooms was like, for real.

Question, because, like, that's a bigger, I'm sure the heating system too.

Exactly.

So just kind of like, it hasn't worked in the car evaluate the cost.

Yeah. Just a thought.

No, I like it.

Maybe the school, instead of building those little sheds, might want to do some trade work in the house.

There you go. Get the shop kids in there. Did they say, was there any mold in there? I mean, I couldn't imagine that there wasn't.

I'm not sure, but we almost need a home inspection. We almost need a home inspector to go through it and do a home inspection as though it's... Yeah, but they don't test for mold. They can do a visual, but if they can see it, they can report it anyway.

All right, anyone, new business, anything? Anyone, any good ideas anybody wants us to take on? I think we do. Got a stack of it right here. Any questions? Julie, I see you're out there. Got any?

You're on mute. Quick clarification question. I'm a business needs survey. How do I get a copy of that?

I can hand you a physical one right here. Yeah. Or they're online. You can do it online too.

That official looking piece of paper. All right.

No one has anything else?

We could make a motion to adjourn. Sure. Sounds good. Make one. No, fast one.

Mark, you're on mute. Or are you voting? You're voting aye. I'm voting on it. Seconding it or voting, whichever is required at this point. I'll vote aye. All right. All right. All right. Thanks, everyone. Thank you. Thank you, Brian. Bye, guys.