[Mike Caldera]: Hello and welcome to this special meeting of the Medford zoning Board of Appeals we're going to take a quick roll call and then we'll get started. Jamie Thompson. That the less. Mary Lee. Andrea the room president. do not see Jim Turani, so I believe he is absent. Mike Caldera, present. So we do have a quorum of the board. My understanding is that there was a request to continue this matter, so we're just gonna have Dennis read some of the procedural items, and then we won't be hearing any testimony tonight if that's indeed the case. But Dennis, will you please kick us off?
[Denis MacDougall]: On March 29th, 2023, Governor Healey signed into law a supplemental budget bill, which, among other things, extends the temporary provisions pertaining to the open meeting law to March 31st, 2025. Specifically, this further extension allows public bodies to continue holding meetings remotely without a quorum of the public body physically present at a meeting location, and to provide adequate alternative access to remote meetings. The language does not make any substantive changes to the open meeting law other than extending the expiration date of the temporary provisions regarding remote meetings from March 31st, 2023 to March 31st, 2025. Thank you. And can you read the first matter?
[Mike Caldera]: 970 Felswade case 40B-2023-01 continued from January 30th.
[Denis MacDougall]: The resumption of consideration of petition DIV-Fellsway LLC, the Davis companies, for a comprehensive permit pursuant to Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 40B for multifamily six-story apartment development located in approximately 3.4 acres of land at 970 Fellsway, property ID 7-02-10. This proposal will be developed as approximately 289 units consisting of 278 units of multifamily housing and 11 townhomes, with 73, 25% of the total units of them being designated as affordable housing to low and moderate income households.
[Mike Caldera]: Thank you. All right, so I see we have Pat Noon for the applicant. So Mr. Noon, my understanding is that there's a request to continue this matter. If that's indeed the case, we will not be hearing any testimony tonight, but if there's a brief statement or update you wanna provide, please go ahead.
[FGwns8hP0DA_SPEAKER_00]: I would like to make a motion to approve the motion. have the ability to turn around the completed traffic study with enough time to review it internally, present it to the board, have everybody, members of the board and peer viewers have the opportunity to review it. We didn't want to rush it, and understanding that it's an important topic for this project for everybody to have fully digested, we wanted to continue this matter to the next hearing.
[Mike Caldera]: Okay, thank you. And Mr. Noonan, just so I'm clear, so is the intention then on March 14th that the sole topic will be traffic or will we be hearing other topics as well?
[FGwns8hP0DA_SPEAKER_00]: To be honest with you, it's a good question, Mr. Chair. I think we can certainly be prepared to speak on other topics as well. Given the fact that the topic for this hearing tonight was supposed to be traffic, the expectation is that much of the attention will be focused on traffic, but we have offline made contact with members of the beta team to convene some peer review sessions dedicated to civil. So it's possible that there could be time on the agenda for that evening to discuss civil as well. I don't want to necessarily promise that. It's hard for me to predict I know it's a topic that is sensitive and it's a topic that everybody wants to dive into very deeply as has been discussed at previous hearings. So I guess not being able to give you a definitive answer, we can prepare ourselves to be ready to discuss both and see how the hearing goes if that is sufficient for you.
[Mike Caldera]: Yeah, that sounds like a plan. So as I believe Dennis conveyed, the board appreciates you reaching out, letting us know that you didn't think tonight we would have the full information for a productive hearing. We certainly want to make sure we're making the best use of the time. an urgency here to get all the details out. There's a lot to go over for a project like this. And so, yeah, my intention is that on the 14th, traffic will be the focal topic. We'll do a time check at the end of that. I think if we're I don't want to commit to an exact amount of time, but I think three hours is probably getting to the max of a productive meeting before it starts to unwind. So depending on how long traffic takes, if you could please come prepared. At least with updates on the status of the project, we could focus on engineering. I don't know if we'll get through it all, but I want to make sure that if we've got time on the calendar and we've got information to review that we're using that time well.
[FGwns8hP0DA_SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, we can certainly be prepared if time permits to jump into some other topics. All right.
[Andre Leroux]: Mr. Chair, I have a question. It sounds like next time we probably won't be revisiting the new design, but I just want to ask if the team could take advantage of the extra time here to reconvene with the neighbors about the landscaping issues as they requested. So I just want to reiterate that.
[Mike Caldera]: All right, thank you, Andre. Yeah, so Andre made that request. So it's not the board's purview to decide what you do and don't do with the neighbors, but I echo his sentiments. If there are opportunities to engage with the neighborhood about some of the issues from our last hearing, please do make use of those.
[FGwns8hP0DA_SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely, will do.
[Mike Caldera]: All right, chair awaits a motion to continue this matter to March 14th at 6.30 p.m. Do I have a second? All right, it sounded like a second from Mary, and so we'll take a roll call. Andre? Aye. Mary? Aye. Vivette?
[Andre Leroux]: Aye.
[Mike Caldera]: Jamie? Aye. Mike? Aye. All right, so this matter is continued to March 14th at 6.30 PM. The intended topic is traffic. And then if we have additional time, we will start to go into some of the initial engineering peer review comments. Thanks for your time, everybody, and we will see you in a couple weeks. Thanks, everyone.
[Andre Leroux]: And, Mike, do we have some motion to adjourn?
[Mike Caldera]: Yeah, we got to adjourn. Sorry. I got a little ahead of myself. Motion to adjourn. All right. Do we have a second? I don't need a second. All right. Jamie? Aye. Yvette?
[Andre Leroux]: Aye.
[Mike Caldera]: Andre? Aye. Oh, no, go ahead.
[Andre Leroux]: Aye.
[Mike Caldera]: Mike, aye. All right, we are adjourned. Now I'll see you in.