Community Development Board 05/06/26

AI-generated summary. Written by gemini-3.8-flash from the transcript below, which is the record. It may be incomplete or wrong; it does not report votes. Every item links to the moment it began.

The Community Development Board endorsed an ANR plan and approved site plans for a convenience store conversion on Main Street and a new commercial building on Mystic Avenue. The board continued hearings on the Tufts Aquatic Center and an inclusionary zoning amendment regarding fractional cash payments.

2:23 73 Boston Ave and 94 Monument Street ANR Plan — Endorsed an Approval Not Required plan adjusting the shared rear property line between 73 Boston Ave and 94 Monument Street.
7:28 85 Main Street Site Plan Review — Approved a site plan to convert a former gas station and repair shop into a convenience store with draft conditions regarding public way encroachments.
34:58 130 College Ave (Tufts Aquatic Center) Site Plan Review — Continued the public hearing to May 20 to allow Tufts to provide detailed elevation drawings, a comprehensive corridor streetscape plan, and resolved pedestrian safety and traffic-calming measures.
2:38:59 161 Mystic Avenue Site Plan Review — Approved the site plan and granted waivers for building story height and parking minimums for Lechmere Rug's new commercial building.
3:14:36 Zoning Amendment: Inclusionary Housing Fractional Payments — Continued the public hearing to May 20 after staff reported that the state no longer publishes total development cost figures used to calculate fractional cash payments.
3:26:33 Approval of Minutes and Administrative Updates — Approved meeting minutes from February and April and discussed upcoming joint meetings with the City Council regarding the Boston Avenue zoning proposal.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Good evening everyone. This is the Medford Community Development Board meeting. The date is May 6, 2026. It's 6.33 p.m. I shall call the meeting to order. Please know that the project materials for all projects before the board can be viewed on the city's website, medfordmass.org, at https, www.medfordmass.org, boards commissions, community development board, and by clicking on current city board filings. For those on Zoom, you can also find the link in the chat. So the roll call attendance, John Anderson. Present. John Began. Present. Page Buldini.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Sorry, she can't. Somehow she got missed as a co-host, so I'm unmuting her right now. I'm co-hosting her.

[Chair Doug Carr]: And myself, Doug Carr, present. Danielle, can you introduce any staff at the meeting or on the call?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yes, Mr. Chair, I'm Daniel Evans, senior planner in the Office of Planning and Development Sustainability. Also here is Alicia Hunt, the director of our office, as well as Kayla Miros, who is our economic development planner. And last but not least, our graduate student intern, Christian Zepeda-Lepofsky.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Excellent. Thank you. I'll just briefly summarize what we're going to cover tonight. We're going to talk about the endorsement of an approval not required A&R plan for 73 Boston Ave. and 94 Monument Street, that shouldn't take too long. Then we're gonna have continued public hearings for 85 Main Street first, and then for 130 College Ave, which is the Tufts Aquatic Center after that. Then there'll be a new public hearing for 161 Mystic Avenue. And we'll be talking also on the zoning amendment and some inclusionary zoning details as well, and then minutes, et cetera. So let's jump to the first major agenda item.

second. So the first up will be the endorsement of the approval not required A&R plan for 73 Boston Ave and 94 Monument Street. Danielle, can you please introduce this item and explain the A&R? We've been through a few of these over the last six months, so it's not entirely new for us.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: They're represented by legal counsel, so we could give it over to Attorney Desmond. Essentially, The approval not required is a straightforward endorsement. So you're not approving it. You're just endorsing that the lot can be changed because it meets the minimum frontage and has adequate access. But through you, Mr. Chair, I would turn it over to Attorney Kathleen Desmond.

[Kathleen Desmond]: Good evening, Chairman Carr, board members. The ANR plan before you is fairly straightforward. The applicant in this instance, and Danielle, do you have the plan? I don't know if you want to share it. I can share it if not.

[Kathleen Desmond]: Okay, am I allowed to share? Okay, so let me see. So the plan before you, essentially what the applicant is seeking to do is to move the shared rear lot line between the parcels providing lot 73 which is on Boston Ave with a greater backyard. So they're going to add 1,250 square feet to the back of their parcel and reduce the rear yard of 94 Monument Street. It doesn't impact at all the existing frontage on either Monument Street or Boston Ave. both properties are located in the general residence district. Both properties are single family residence, which require only a minimum 5,000 square feet, which both of these have. And the frontage requirement in the general residence is 35 feet. And these are both, I believe they're both 50. So there isn't anything that's adjusting in terms of the frontage, which is what the board is charged with, reviewing, and also the lot area. Both of those would comply. So we just asked that the board approve the plan. And if you have any questions, I'm happy to answer them.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Attorney Desmond. Appreciate that. Go ahead, Sean Began.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Very good. Before you do that, I'd like to ask if anyone has any questions other than that one.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I agree. There's a motion to approve the plan from Commissioner Bagan. Anyone second that?

[Chair Doug Carr]: Very good. All right, I'll take the roll call. I'm going to go in reverse order tonight, since we've been doing it all the way for, I guess, since I've been chair. And poor Ari's always last, and I hate that, so we're going to change that tonight. Ari Goffman-Fishman.

[Chair Doug Carr]: John Began? Yes. John Anderson? Yes. And myself, Doug Carr? Yes. The motion passes, sticks to nothing. Thank you, Attorney.

[Kathleen Desmond]: And just one more item, if I could. I just want to ensure that Director Hunt is able to endorse the plan. I believe that she is, without having to have each board member come in and sign the plan. That might be a standing approval that's in existence. And I defer to Alicia or Danielle on that.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Agreed. I don't think we've done that with any previous ANR, so I don't think that's a requirement.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: So we had one before. Mr. Chair, it was voted several years ago by the CD board that I was authorized to sign an A&R plan on behalf of the board. And that is on record with the registry of deeds.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Sorry, if I just might, do we have the Mylar here in the office? You do.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: I will either sign it tonight or tomorrow morning. Terrific. And pick it up anytime after that.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay. Could you stop sharing the screen so we can see everyone else?

[Kathleen Desmond]: Sure, absolutely. Thank you and happy Mother's Day to everyone out there.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Good to see you again. All right, let's move on to the next item. This is the continued public hearing, site plan review for 85 Main Street. I believe board member Sean Began, you're accusing yourself because due to a conflict of interest, I believe. Correct.

[Chair Doug Carr]: And we'll text you when we're done. Sounds good. Ari Goffman-Fishman, did you submit the Moen form so you can vote on this?

[Ari Fishman]: I did not. I am sorry. I did not actually. Yeah, no, sorry. This week totally got away from me.

[Chair Doug Carr]: We have a quorum anyway. You won't be voting, obviously, but we still have a quorum, so that's fine.

[Chair Doug Carr]: No, no, no, it's okay. All right, so Alicia or Danielle, do you have any introductory comments before we turn it over to Mr. Schlottman?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Sure, so the applicant worked with our engineering division, Todd and Owen, and basically rectified everything. Everything is in order. I have some draft conditions for your consideration. Aiden, I sent those to you just now. They're hot off the presses, because I saw your revised plans came in a little after five. So I was very, like, trying to get this typed up quickly. The only item that wasn't resolved on the plans was the existing pole sign for the gas station encroaches into the public way. So it's not actually on the applicant's property. And our city engineer was recommending that it be moved out of the public way and onto their land or to obtain some encroachment agreement, which I was talking to Todd Blake, our director of traffic and transportation, right before the meeting started.

I believe he was saying that it's the state right of way, so it would have to be an agreement with them. And this would be at the time of moving the building permit, so I think this is fine as a condition. And then they can work it out whether it needs to be moved or if it can remain. That's all I have for now if we want their engineer.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Let me just remind everyone that this is the second public hearing for this project. We opened the first one on April 15, 2026. And the applicant who's obviously here, Mr. Schlotman, is with M&E 85 Main Street LLC. Mr. Schlotman, do you have an updated presentation you want to give us?

[SPEAKER_23]: All righty, yeah, um, so, uh, like, last time, uh. This is the 85 Main Street right in the corner, right across from the police station. Um, it was, uh, we're swapping it out for that, uh, convenience store, uh, change of use. Uh, and after addressing all the comments, we had a couple of minor tweaks. 1st outstanding, like Danielle said, I point out this is the, uh, the sign here. The encroachment is it's about a foot into the. Public right away, it's been there for 30 years and, uh. I've worked with mass and discuss the.

The redo of the road that they're doing there, and they said that as of right now, they're not going to touch the sign. And it's on the way, so I can't imagine any, any real issues with that encroachment. It's it's a foot over. It's nothing crazy, but we are removing the rest of the encroachments this vacuum here and then the pavement. That encroaches in the right away there, but the main. Differences that you'll see from last time is we push the parallel spot back a little bit just to make sure there's adequate turning distance away from the handicapped spot. We increase the length of the. Handicap aisle to 8 feet to allow for a van spot with that. Being the case, we had to remove the 2nd spot that was right next to it, but. Silver linings, we were able to pull that landscape area. Into where that spot was, and with that, we were able to achieve the 25 green score. So, we no longer need a waiver from that.

But. Other than that, really the only other difference is we're now proposing signage at the front here because we're going to be swapping this to one-way circulation. So it's really a one-way slash do not enter at this one here and then a stop and do not enter at the other. Try to pull them in as close as we can to make sure that they're fully out of the way of entering and exiting traffic. Other than that, yeah, we luckily didn't have to change much. Oh, actually, sorry.

We are now also separating the driveways here. Before, it's a shared driveway with, I think, 101 Main Street. It was a 46 and change foot driveway between the two properties, and it was requested that we separate the two and then install our own 20 foot driveway. So we're proposing a curb to break the two and then we're shifting this curb down along to provide adequate offset from the property line and then adequate driveway length. Those are really the main changes there. I'm happy to hear if you guys have any comments for me.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you. And this revised change to the curb cuts was pre approved by the city engineering and those folks.

[SPEAKER_23]: Yeah, yeah, this is sent to them and they issued a few other comments, but they didn't bring anything of this up. So I assume it's approved. They just asked that we give them a driveway detail, which I supplied on this. revised plan said that I got in right at 5, so I haven't quite seen that quite yet, but it's a City of Medford driveway detail, so I can't imagine there's much issue with it.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Understood. Thank you. I'm going to open it up to the board for any questions or comments. If anyone has, please raise your hand. I'm not seeing anything at the moment. So I will then move on to the, oh, sorry, John Anderson, go ahead. You are, can you unmute yourself first?

[John Anderson]: Yes, thank you. Could you just clarify for me on the plan where the parking spots are? I can't quite figure it out.

[SPEAKER_23]: Handicap, one parallel in the front and then one parking spot on the side here.

[SPEAKER_23]: Total of three, and then really there's four stacking spaces by the gas pumps themselves, which our requirement is three for the calculations. So we provided three, but I just wanted to show that there are these four stacking spots as well. So there is a little bit more room on site.

[Page Buldini]: Hey there, real quick. Can you just pull up the landscape plan while you have it right there? I just was looking at the green score and I appreciate that it's hitting the minimum, so that's good. But I think it's really good to show, especially because I know this is coming right out of the square and it's obviously in front of a pretty industrial little area. Do you have a rendering so that we could show the public exactly what you're planning to do with that? Because I think it is really helpful to see how it is transforming that corner a bit.

[SPEAKER_23]: I don't have a rendering. That's OK. We unfortunately don't typically do 3D renderings. The 3D rendering that we had before was supplied by the client. We could offer maybe a color up to make it pop a little more, but unfortunately, I don't actually have a 3D.

[Page Buldini]: No, that's OK. I just think it's really important, especially it being a gas station with a convenience store, that you are putting the attention to that green score and making that corner just a little bit not so concrete. So I appreciate that.

[Dina Caloggero]: Yes, I want to say that I walked by this location the other day. And I'm really happy with this plan. I'm going to enjoy not seeing Sanford and Son cars on the side. I think this is a great plan and thank you for finally doing something with this poor corner.

[Chair Doug Carr]: This might be the greenest kind of convenience store I've seen in Medford ever.

[Chair Doug Carr]: So I kind of endorse that too. Thank you. Any other board questions before I open it up to the public? All right, seeing, hearing none, I will now open up to the public. If anyone's available who wants to make any public comments, please use the raise hand feature, which may be under your reactions in your Zoom. Or if you're dialed in on a phone, you can use star nine to raise your hand. You can also message Alicia in the chat if you're having technical difficulties.

Before providing your comments, please state your name and address for the record. A reminder to all meeting participants to please refrain from using the chat function to message any comments to city staff or board members as it is not part of the public record. If you're having any audio or technical difficulties, you may message staff for assistance. Each participant will have two minutes to speak. Is there anyone interested? Jeremy Martin, I can't believe it's you, Jeremy. How are you doing?

[Jeremy Martin]: I'm good, Doug. How are you? I know you're surprised to hear me and see me. Jeremy Martin, 65 Burgett Avenue. I just wanted to speak in favor of this project. I appreciate, in particular, the improvements to the sidewalk with the narrowing of that driveway. I think it is an important connection into the square. A lot of people walking here, biking here, fixing that driveway condition is helpful and share the sentiments of Dina and others that this is going to be a big improvement on that corner. Thank you for this and endorse and hope you will as well. Thanks.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Jeremy. We do appreciate your comments. You're always a great voice on these calls because you bring A lot on the landscaping side, which we often need that skill. So thank you. Any other public comments from anyone? Seeing none, I will then close the public comment section of the meeting. Let's see. Are there any other board comments or questions not. Mr. Schlotman, why don't you stop sharing so we can see the whole group a little bit easier, if you don't mind. Thank you for that.

Danielle, would you mind putting on screen the draft conditions, which I understand just evolved in the last half hour, so we can take a look at those?

[Chair Doug Carr]: And before we get into that, are there any, we'll look at that, obviously, and go through that. Are there any other, we'll go through it, but if anyone has a concern, obviously, please let us know. Why don't you try, let's try to go through these quickly, Danielle.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Okay, so the first three are boilerplate. I'll update the control plans with the revised plans I received this afternoon. Your plan modifications, that's our boilerplate. where you bring it in, and if we find that it's minor, that can be something signed off administratively. If it's not minor, then it'll come back to you all. It has to be recorded. The only remaining, these numbers need to be fixed. Engineering division is, the engineering division recommends that the existing pole sign that encroaches onto the public way be relocated onto the applicant's property, or an encroachment agreement be created by the applicant for the sign prior to any building permit approval. That was Owen's language. I don't know if maybe member Deegan could wordsmith that.

[Dina Caloggero]: Probably should take out the recommends. No, I would keep the recommends in because one of the things I notice as work for government is when it says recommends, it's not a must or a shall.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Daniel, I think we're actually, we need to renumber again, because I think it goes from three to six up top. Yeah, you're right. Sorry about that. Yeah. I know that's very fast. So I, this is, this is literally in the last. Yeah. Yep, so this is, you know, we're winging it here a little bit, but I don't think, so we don't need to make any mention then of the state, I guess the state coordination that was referred to earlier in the hearing about that sign, you know, coordination when you put a poor building permit with the MassDOT. Do we want to say anything or just let that?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I mean, when the building permit So when the applicant submits an application for a building permit, it'll go into a CitizenServe, which is our building permit software. And that gets sent to a bunch of different department heads. And one is Owen. And Owen's going to need to sign off on this. And either the pull sign's been moved, or there's an encroachment agreement in place, which I believe is what he's requiring. I recommend. So, I mean, I don't know if if putting it in the decision is what gives it the teeth, or if he has that authority anyways. It's technically, yeah.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Can I ask a question now? What if the state doesn't want to do a written agreement, but they have verbally told him he can leave it, it feels like a really big project to move it.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I mean, I mean, it might just be an email, right? Saying from the state saying, hey, we're fine with it is that's just, you know, if there's anything, we don't need a letter. I just think we need something in writing.

[Dina Caloggero]: And it does say recommend. It doesn't say must or shall required. It says recommend.

[Dina Caloggero]: I wasn't really sure how to. Resolve this, but I agree, you can't have the email from the state. I thought the explanation was adequate.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I guess just engineering wants to make sure that the state is okay with it being there before they're- Mr. Schlotman, do you think you'll get any, do you have anything in writing from the state of an email or anything so far?

[SPEAKER_23]: I do have an email that says, at this time, we have absolutely no plans to affect or move the sign. So I have that in writing in an email that I can forward over to Danielle and Owen to distribute.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: 1 foot. Well, they're redoing that whole intersection. So there was also a question whether there are going to be any takings on their land as well. I think there are some takings right? Wasn't there like a, maybe a sliver or something here and there or.

[SPEAKER_23]: Yeah, there's a, I think there's a small utility easement and then temporary easements for surrounding areas while they, I think they'll need to enter the property to do some of the construction. So there's temporary easements for that as well, but there is a small utility easement right along kind of where that encroaching pavement is.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: And so through the chair, when you were talking to the state about the sign, Was the conversation framed as we have a sign that encroaches, and do we need to move it? Or was it around, hey, I know you're redoing this intersection, will that impact our sign? Because I don't know, did they, depending on who you're talking to, I feel like you might be getting a different answer about what the issue was.

[SPEAKER_23]: Yeah, I, I, I remember I discussed it kind of right in the early phases of this project to make sure we didn't need to. So I said, hey, The exact language, I'm not sure if I'd be able to 100% copy. But basically, I just said, hey, there's this sign here encroaching. I want to make sure that it's no problem. And he said, as of right now. And he sent me over the plans. And the plans, the sign is right there. And the sidewalk goes clean around it. So it didn't seem to be an issue at the time.

[Chair Doug Carr]: So Danielle, I think we need some language at the end here that it's an encroachment agreement, which is unlikely, I imagine, or some basically consent to leave as is by the state. I'm not sure the exact wordsmithing here. We can't ask Sean, obviously, because he's recused himself.

[Dina Caloggero]: Oh, that's right. He's not here. I was going to ask him. I go, Sean, please. Yeah, I know.

[Chair Doug Carr]: We normally go to our star wordsmither there, but not this time. But we want to have basically, if we can't get a consent, an encroachment agreement, we want to be able to say a written approval or as-is condition.

[Chair Doug Carr]: It's not a variance. It's really a variance. It's basically leave it alone, you know, essentially in writing. You know, that's what we need to close the rules.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Or other written permission to allow it to, you know.

[Ari Fishman]: What about written acceptance? Because I feel like, and I don't know if that's true, but I feel like in writing that it is acceptable that this is there at this time. feels slightly different, but that may be a difference without a distinction.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Like the word acceptance in road language. You're right. Yeah. Forgot about that. Yeah. Sorry. No, that's OK.

[Chair Doug Carr]: So, Danielle, finish your thought there. What's wrong with acceptance?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Well, because when you accept things like you are now, it's. Responsible for it will maintain it like not accepting their sign. They would if they need We just need some written acknowledgement or permission that the sign is allowed to stay. But I mean, there's no adverse possession claim against the state. They could change their mind, I think, and say, get your sign off our road. This is impacting how wide we can make our sidewalk. Or, I mean, it's not, at the end of the day, the sign is not on the land. And generally, you can't put your stuff in the road. It's a foot. It's a foot. Ideally, the property owner would just get their sign out of there. Right. I mean, all of the investment being made on there, and they can't move the sign. I know. I mean, ridiculous.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: It's not on their property. Why? I think they're actually maneuvering around it with their sidewalk, the sidewalk to accommodate it. I thought I saw something with that.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Back to the condition, would written acceptance of existing conditions be language that would cover that if the state, if that email is acceptable?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Or how about like an encroachment agreement and then in parentheses for similar written permission or something?

[SPEAKER_23]: I did forward you, Danielle, the email, but I was able to dig it up. They said at this time, we're not calling for the sign to be removed and it is called out as retained as we are not impacting the sign as a part of this project. You should note that the state highway layout line is not being altered along the property, further clarifying that the layout at the end of the project along the property will exist as it is existing today.

The survey does have that the sign trespassing onto the state highway and both the existing and proposed conditions. To me, it seems because it's one foot and it's also on and off the property, they said they're essentially not altering the property line. I was able to take a look at the plans and it doesn't look like they're snaking the sidewalk around the sign at all. It seems pretty a pretty straight line and it goes around the sign. But that right there, it says that as of right now.

They, they're okay with the sign and they're calling for it to remain and they're not calling for it to be altered as part of the project.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Well, Through the chair, I'm not sure if the city engineer has seen that. So if, that's why I think if we have like some kind of parentheses or like other similar permission in writing and if he needs something in like a memo format, then I think it would behoove the applicant to just get that.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: But I know that this board doesn't have the authority to say, you can keep your sign here forever, guys.

[Chair Doug Carr]: No, we're not, that's not a condition. We're just acknowledging that there is an issue, I think, with this number four, which needs to be resolved. All right, so are we leaving it as is? Are we moving on, or what are we doing here, Danielle? What do you think?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: All right. The following are. Conditions of the fire department. Extinguishers, decommissioning service garage, emergency electrical disconnects. The health department put some of their boilerplate conditions about food plan review, drainage, sewage management, demo construction, solid waste, and pest management.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay. Does anyone on the board have any questions or comments about these draft conditions? Seeing none, I guess I will if people are, if the board is ready to move forward with approval. I so move. Thank you, Joan Anderson. Can I have a second?

[Ari Fishman]: I don't believe I'm eligible to vote because I didn't get the money.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Sean Zracuse himself, John Anderson? Yes. And myself, Doug Carr, yes. The motion passes 4-0. Thank you, Mr. Schlottman. Appreciate it. Looking forward to that corner of Medford being improved.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Very good. Thank you all. All right. Moving forward. The next item is the continued public hearing for site plan review, 130 College Ave, Tufts Aquatic Center. This is our second public hearing for this project that was opened on April 15th, 2026. And the applicant, Tufts University, will present new information they have in response to city staff and board member comments from our last meeting. I'll ask Alicia or Danielle if you have any introductory comments before we move to the presentation.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Mr. Chair, can we just wait for Sean to... Oh, very good.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I should have. But once you started voting, I was like, oh, God.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I'm back. Thank you, Sean. All right. We're just starting on the Tufts Aquatic Center.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Yes, if you have any comments before we turn it over to Rocco and his team, they'll present some revised information.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: So since the last meeting, they took the concerns and comments about the facade design and came up with some revisions. I have renderings, but I don't have full elevation drawings. So I believe those are not ready yet, but we can have the architects talk to them about that. So one of my questions is, if this was to be approved tonight, how would we do that without the elevation drawings ready yet, if there's a way to condition it? So I know the renderings aren't always, I mean, if you think that they're completely to scale and would translate directly to elevation drawings, You could approve tonight, but.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Sure. No, I imagine we're talking about either Revit or SketchUp models. So elevations typically can be extrapolated from those pretty quickly if they haven't already. So I personally don't have any concerns about that. I'm more concerned that the design improvements are acceptable to this board if they are. So let's proceed and let's get Tufts to give their presentation and we can talk through the issues then. So Rocco, I'm going to turn it over to you, sir.

[Rocco DiRico]: Thank you, Chairman Carr, members of the board and city staff. We are here tonight. Oh, and if I could just, if we could make Tom Neufeld, CSL, a co-host as well, that way he can share his screen. Tom's gonna help me out with the PowerPoint tonight. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So we are here tonight to talk about the Tufts Aquatic Center, which we're proposing to build at 130 College Avenue. We heard a lot of feedback at our previous meeting, and we took that feedback very seriously. And we've spent the last few weeks making significant changes to the design. And we also wanted to discuss our plans to manage parking and traffic. And lastly, we'll focus on the community benefits associated with this project. So here is a really quick agenda. As I said, Shea from Sasaki is going to walk through the updated exterior plans. Nick from Tufts University is going to go through our parking and transportation plans. And then I'll wrap things up with our community benefits. We really want to try to present quickly tonight to give you, the board, and the community, the opportunity to ask any additional questions that you may have. And again, just want to thank you for taking the time to learn about our project. I will now pass it to my colleague Shea from Sasaki, who is the architect on the project.

[Penelope Taylor]: Thank you to whoever unmuted me. Thank you, everyone. I'm Shaylina, an architect at Sasaki. Thank you to the board and to the community for the feedback from the previous hearing. I wanted to say that over the course of this project, we've come to better understand the great need for this athletic facility for the swimming and diving team. Adam, the swim coach, has spoken really eloquently about what a difference it'll make for the swimming and diving team and also all the great ways that will benefit the community. At the same time, at the encouragement of Tufts, but also as a design team, we really value the feedback from the neighborhood. We heard at the last hearing that the scale of the previous design of the building, particularly at the south facade, which faces baseball, was feeling unrelenting. It was noted that the brick was feeling very monolithic, and we received encouragement from the board to find ways to break down the scale of the building, particularly at a pedestrian level. I know that there were some questions about additional glazing and planting strategies, and it was suggested that we look to bring more transparency where possible in the building along with relief to the facade. So I'd like to take you through some of the revisions we've made in response to this feedback. So this first view, we're taking a look at a view from the existing crosswalk at Tisch. So this is as though you're crossing College Ave at that existing crosswalk to the left, just out of view would be the existing trees that provide a buffer to the neighborhood. From this vantage point, we are looking toward the main entrance. This northern facade that you see sort of receding to the left, which has smaller scale windows along the lobby and the corridor to the locker rooms, we've largely left that aspect of the design the same. The feedback that we heard was that this side of the building breaks down the scale pretty well. At the entrance itself, we have refined the design to be more like a three-sided glass box. We did this to make the entrance visually feel lighter, more transparent, and just a kind of special moment right at the entrance. And when we go to the next slide, we can see at night how adding that extra transparency provides a nice glow to the plaza. In the other windows that you see, we get a few glimpses of the activity inside and really just kind of highlighting the prominence of the main entry. And as we move to the next slide, we're going to kind of move up College Ave just a little bit. So we're still looking at the main entrance. but at more of a frontal view of the building from the street. From this vantage point, the added glass shows us a glimpse into the lobby. We see a little bit of the check-in desk and even the main circulation stair that leads to the second level in the nighttime view on the next slide. We also start to get glimpses into the pool area with a bit of that light sort of washing onto the plaza as well. As I mentioned from this view, the changes to the design were primarily focused on the entrance, but as we move to the other side of the building, we'll see much more significant changes on the south wall. So when we look from this view, this slide we're looking, coming from the cousins lot, We can see at the left-hand side of the image, the main entrance, this short wall is on the left. This is what faces the street along College Ave. The long wall faces baseball and the parking lot. In this view, as I mentioned, we see the main entrance, we see the transparency through it, the south facade.

has been reimagined to provide relief in multiple ways. First, I'm just going to mention from a kind of technical standpoint, it's worth mentioning that there is a fire department access lane required between the building and the baseball field at the right edge of this image. So there are some spatial constraints to what we are allowed to do here, more at the back end of this wall. But that said, we've introduced a series of openings angled along the length of the wall, particularly at the front corner where our constraints are less.

and also at a moment that is much more visible to the public. These angled panels allow the additional windows that the community has been asking for, while still controlling the direct light that can cause unwanted glare in the pool during competitions. This orientation that we're seeing also provides some protection from baseballs, which was one of the points that was mentioned in the previous hearing. Additionally, by introducing this angled orientation, we're really maximizing the impact of that relief. So there's a deeper shadow line along the facade. The second gesture in this wall is striking a horizontal datum that is at the top of those new windows. So this height that you're seeing is of that horizontal datum. is at the same height as the single-story volume at the entrance. So you can kind of see how that lines up with the height of the main entrance.

This sort of horizontal datum breaks apart the length of the facade, and we sort of break down the height of the wall, better acknowledging the pedestrian scale. Lastly, this horizontal datum provides an opportunity for an additional window to pop up above that datum. It's sort of a thin sliver, you see that sort of two-thirds down the way of the image, while still respecting the fire lane. And then the third gesture is adding a bit more detail and refinement to the brick wall by providing this vertical rhythm of recessed brick and a darker color This breaks down the length of the wall, adds a finer grain of detail to the design. And then what you're seeing sort of around the edge of this long wall is a kind of metal frame. We feel like this is an important way to distinguish the street facade from the long facade. And really kind of breaking up those two planes from each other sort of helps it feel less monolithic.

And on the next slide, we'll see the impact of this new design at night as well, where the light from those angled windows really washes the angled panels and provides more glimpses into the pool. And then we're on the next slide we're going to get a little bit closer to the building. And so now we're sort of. walking along the length of the building toward the athletic fields. And this is where we can see that full depth of the angled panels with these new windows. In the last hearing, we heard a lot about adding windows or adding trees. Now that we've revised the building design, we feel that added windows are really effective and that adding trees in front of those windows sort of detracts from their impact. So the planting strategy here continues to have lower plantings along this wall. And we're really letting the plaza be the place where the trees are more densely planted. And when we look at this image at night, on the next slide, we can really see how the angle really highlights that cascading effect. that kind of sawtooth pattern of the revised design where we actually get more light and more glimpses of activity along this pedestrian path.

And then for our last couple images, we wanted to take a step back, see the whole building as you're coming down College Ave. We feel this view really emphasizes the importance of defining the street-facing wall along College Ave a little bit differently than the south wall, which faces the parking lot. Looking at the south wall coming down the hill, you can see the relief, you can see the detail, and hopefully the scale is a little less daunting.

It's also from this view, you can see how the plaza design leads you to the front entrance with trees on either side. All the trees that you're seeing sort of along the front of the plaza and within the plaza, these are all new proposed trees. So what today is a parking lot, we're proposing as a kind of a lush green space. And finally, with the night view, we can really see how this starts to glow at night, both with these revisions, looking at the entrance, which is almost a lantern as we're coming down College Ave. And really, we're really excited to hopefully get this project built. And we just wanted to thank you all. So with that, I will hand over the presentation to Nick Piscitello from Tufts. Thank you.

[SPEAKER_18]: I need someone to unmute. There we go. Thank you. Thank you, Shalina. First, I want to acknowledge that we heard the concerns about athletic events during the last hearing. This is something we want to address and get right for the community. Since the last hearing, parking has worked with Tufts Public Safety, athletics, and athletics to develop an internal event management plan that is based on three principles. The first principle is that we do have adequate parking. And this past weekend, we had athletic events and we did do counts of open spaces that are near the athletic complex that the aquatic center is being proposed. We found that Darling Garage was 75% vacant. So only 25% of Darling Garage was being used this past weekend. And we had additional spaces in the two additional lots that are adjacent to the athletic complex.

The other piece that we're working on and we put a plan together is we're going to be approaching athletic events slightly different. We're going to be working with public safety and our parking team where we're going to enhance our wayfinding signage and provide additional parking staff during the large events that happen at that complex. And more importantly, I think we're trying to be more proactive with our communications. So athletics is going to be communicating to the attendants of the events. that Darling Garage will be the primary parking location, and they'll be sharing that address to help with the GPS and wayfinding methods for getting to Darling Garage.

And so I believe that these three principles will help improve our overall management in the fall, and we'll be monitoring and seeing how the plan works, and we'll be making appropriate adjustments as needed. So thank you for your time, and I'd like to pass it over to Rocco.

[Rocco DiRico]: Thank you, Nick. I appreciate that. We also received a few questions about community benefits. Our last meeting, so we spent the time in between the two meetings speaking to members of the Medford School Committee, Medford Recreation, and other neighbors. Currently, our swim team practices about six to eight hours per day. That's because our pool is too small to accommodate the entire team at once. In fact, some of our team has to go over to MIT to practice. The new aquatic center will allow the entire team to practice together for a two-hour period, which obviously opens up the rest of the day for more activities. So this will allow us to increase recreational swim hours, both for Tufts students, faculty, staff, but also for our neighbors. In talking to Medford Recreation, they talked about the need for additional lifeguards in the city of Medford, so we're happy also to host lifeguard certification classes.

One event that I've been really proud to be a part of is the Medford-Somerville Basketball Classic, which we host every year at Cousins Gym, and this will allow us now to bring that tradition to the Medford and Somerville High swim team, so looking forward to that. In talking to the school committee, they mentioned the need for a place for the dive team to practice for Medford High School. So they'll be able to work with Coach Hoyt to have their practices at our facility.

Adams team also runs incredibly popular computer community swim lessons for children that's what's pictured here under the current pool we can only do that during breaks, but now we'll be able to do that year round. And then, you know, we just in talking to Medford Recreation talked about a lot of other possibilities, you know, the possibility for a master's swim team or water aerobics or adult learn to swim programs as well. So with that, I will conclude our presentation. I want to thank you, Chairman Carr, the members of the board and the city staff. And we are happy to answer any questions that you may have.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Rocco. Much appreciated. I'm going to open up to the board for comments. I just want to make a few comments about the design. I think this is an incredible improvement. You did pretty much what I asked last meeting, which is to kind of reimagine this building, soften it. make it more transparent. I think the sawtooth windows are really a superb and creative solution to addressing the issues of transparency, but also making things work functionally and aesthetically and still living within the vision of the building, which I think this does. It's a very modern building. very simple geometries, but I think it's a very strong design. I think it's been much improved. So I really appreciate that. I do agree that the pedestrian experience has been improved by these changes. And I think before our last meeting, I was kind of leaning towards maybe more trees would be better, but I don't think that anymore after seeing this because I think You have improved the pedestrian experience, and we're not looking to hide this building anymore. We're looking to celebrate it. And I think that's really the difference between those 2 approaches with that improved design. So, I think that's great. I do see the opportunity, the increased glass around the building is washing around the pedestrian experience around this building, which is great. And I think I mentioned that a little bit of accent light at some of the reveals that don't have windows would actually improve that experience even more because that would function even if they can't fit those windows in some of those smaller reveals as you go further away from college. I would ask you to look at that and to see if we can, again, just try to make it even stronger as a design. So I think, again, all of that is really, really positive and I'm very excited by this project. It's a great building now, I think, for Medford and for Tufts, and I'm hoping we can get over to the finish line soon. So saying that, I will go first to Page Buldini for your comments. Go ahead, Paige.

[Page Buldini]: Thank you so much. And I do really appreciate the design, because I think you did listen. So thank you. I do have two quick questions. One was, and I don't know if it's possible to see, when you have the nighttime view of the far not the best with my orientation, but the far left is I'm sure we're mindful of the Hinsdale residents and then the residents that are over on Windsor because I know that that's those homes are. Do you have a picture of that? I know you showed us the other sides, but we didn't really see a nighttime view. Were there additional lights or windows over there that would be illuminating that neighborhood?

[Rocco DiRico]: Yeah, thank you for that question page and we were, and if they're not the best views in here, we may have a good view from the previous meeting, because we really didn't make too much changes on the neighbor side. When I spoke to the Director Butter on Hinsdale, the preservation of those large mature trees were very important to her. So what she and the team was able to do was not only preserve that that row of mature trees which blocks the view, but she also added in some evergreen trees in between as well, so that during the winter months when the leaves are gone. it would provide additional blockage. Then we also lowered the building on the neighbor's side as well, because we were thinking the exact same thing as you. We wanted to make sure we provided proper landscaping and minimal light pollution into the neighborhood.

[Page Buldini]: Perfect, thank you. And then my second question and last question is just quick about parking. It has been brought up to me by other residents in the neighborhood. Did we take in consideration with the use, and I appreciate you looking at Dowling parking lot, during a busier time, because I think that's really important. But I do know that the dorm that is abutting Dowling doesn't have parking. So when we did our parking study, did we look at the packeter in place and what that might look like in consideration to the aquatic center? Because I know parking is specific to this neighborhood, and we're very mindful of it. So I just didn't know if that was part of the study. I just didn't know if I missed that.

[Rocco DiRico]: No, that's a great question page. And because the packet in place isn't completed yet, it's difficult for us to gauge fully what the impact will be of that. So the current parking study is not going to reflect that. What I did want to mention is I know Dina had asked us at the previous meeting, you know, can you do some parking counts during an athletic event, because our athletic events are typically on nights and weekends. So Nick and his team did do those parking counts and. during Saturday during the baseball game, there were no spaces occupied at 80 George Street. There were only 14 spaces occupied out of 63 at Elliott Pearson. Then Cousins was the most full out of those three.

And then Dowling, which has over 520 spaces, only 131 spaces were occupied. So we do feel that because our athletic events, particularly the swim meets, happen on nights and weekends when our staff and faculty are not parked on campus, that we do have adequate parking supply within Dowling Garage, as well as the other surrounding lots that we talked about.

[Page Buldini]: Perfect, thank you, because I think that's really great, and especially where we're going to continue after this meeting to talk about what we want Boston Ave to look like. Now we have those counts, and now we know. So I appreciate that.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I don't remember. It's either Ari or you. I think Dina was first. OK. Why don't you go, Dina, and then we'll go to Ari.

[Dina Caloggero]: I appreciate the event. parking study. Thank you very much. I was watching things this weekend too. I know there was a bunch of events going on and I appreciate that. A couple of things I noticed. I'm still very interested in safety with the additional traffic moving in and out. It's wonderful you opening it up to Method Recreation and a lot of the neighbors along the way to enjoy the center as well. And I noticed in one of the drawings, it looks like you're moving the crosswalk. And I saw a very nice crosswalk. Well, one of the things with that crosswalk, where it is right now outside of the Gatra Center, is that people don't see it. And I see people crossing the street, and they nearly get hit by the cars coming down the hill from College Avenue. Are there any proposal to maybe have a lit crossing walk, like it would flash or something? I think it's a safety concern, especially if you're going to have the small children coming from the Elliot Pearson School, or if you're having parents that perhaps park somewhere else, or the darling coming across with their children. I'm concerned there is a huge, there is a problem with the speed of the cars coming down the hill from that center. That's my first point. And the other thing I wanted to address with that, if you are going to do road work, can you please put a speed table in or something to calm the traffic down. I think, and I remember I brought this up at the last meeting because I have my notes, but I think I also requested that a speed study be done. You know, that is a school zone, right? It's a school zone near the Elliot Pearson. And the cars come down really, really fast. And I think that would just support the idea to put some type of traffic calming measure up there to protect the students as well as the residents that will use the site as well.

[Rocco DiRico]: Thank you, Dina. Yeah. And Shay, can you clarify the crosswalks? Because I know we're adding one. I just wanted to understand if we're eliminating another one.

[Dina Caloggero]: You have two right now. There's one There was one temporary that's put up that is a little bit at the cousin's gym site. There's a crosswalk there. And then there's one directly in front of the gatcha center that comes directly in the little walkway that's built with the birch trees.

[Rocco DiRico]: OK, Shay, do you mind just quickly addressing that? Because I know we talked about that before.

[Penelope Taylor]: Yes, so the larger crosswalk right in front of Tisch that is existing that goes to that plaza that's there in the trees, that will remain. The other crosswalk that is right in front of I think it's Ranger.

[Penelope Taylor]: Yes, that crosswalk we are proposing be relocated to where the new curb cut to the parking lot will be.

[Dina Caloggero]: And my other thing is that I think they should be lit. And I would also, while you're going, it looks like there's gonna be some road work. Please put up a speed table, something to reduce the speed of the cars coming down from College Avenue. It is incredible. And I think Alicia, I think we mentioned this, that we would put a request into traffic to monitor the traffic again. It's really terrible. I hear it from the neighbors all the time, all the time.

[Rocco DiRico]: Thank you, Dina. Yeah, and I believe Alicia did make that request to Director Blake. And what we've done on the Boston Avenue dorm project is put some rapid flashing beacons.

[Rocco DiRico]: And that has been very effective. We've gotten compliments from both our neighbors and our students on how that has improved pedestrian safety in Boston Ave so we can look to do something similar on College Avenue.

[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, and maybe, and again, I'm going to say it again, some type of speed calming measure, speed bump, something. Please help us. Please help the College Avenue residents and the neighbors. The second question, the other thing I wanted to bring up, when I walk through the Cousins Gym lot, I see that there's areas that are going to be used in staging. My understanding is a staging area will be behind the baseball field. That looks like where it's going to go.

[Dina Caloggero]: OK. Now, the other areas which uses for recycling bins and everything else, will that eventually be moved and perhaps be repurposed for parking since we're losing 115 spaces?

[Rocco DiRico]: That's a great question, Dina. I'm going to defer to Nick on that because I do believe that we're moving some of those materials as part of our effort to increase parking in the lot. Nick, could you answer that? I'm going to unmute you. Go ahead, Nick. Thank you.

[SPEAKER_18]: So that is something that we are working with facilities on to see how much of that we can reclaim. So we are actively working on trying to reclaim some of the space, but not all of that space will be able to be reclaimed.

[Dina Caloggero]: Right. As I remember, it used to be where the old facilities building was where the Cummings Center went. So it looks like it's, and it looks like facilities has eaten up more and more of the Cousins Gym's parking lot. So I think they really need to consolidate and repurpose that space into some needed parking.

[Rocco DiRico]: I think that's Nick's nice way of saying he agrees with you, Dina.

[Dina Caloggero]: All right. Sounds good. Lit crosswalk, speed table, and repurpose the junky. It looks terrible anyways. It really does. It takes away from the whole beautiful athletic facility that you built there. You have this trash bins and old refrigerators and tires, whatever's back there. It looks terrible.

[Ari Fishman]: Thank you and apologies that I haven't had the chance to watch the old video. I'm still digging it out, so I have a bunch of questions and I'm just if any of them have already been answered, just tell me. The first one is looking at the first two are about the community benefits. Is there any look at community open swim hours and I noticed that the is possible language is very. vague and doesn't commit to anything, I would love to see a bit of a stronger commitment to community access to that pool, especially as it's getting larger. It's something that I'd really love to see the community be able to utilize.

I'll ask all of my questions at once and then we can go through them. Um, the next two are related. Um, what are the expected light pollution and sound pollution effects? We talked about those very heavily with the baseball field, which is obviously open air, um, and enjoining, but there, you know, is going to be strong light coming out of the windows, um, and the sound pollution, would probably be from teams and athletes kind of talking outside at night, but I'm kind of just curious about where we're at with that and if there's been discussion about how that can affect the neighbors and how we can limit it. Next is What kind of looks have been done at chlorine and chemical spillage? Obviously, no one ever wants that to be spilled, but maintenance of a pool of that size and caliber does involve a lot of chemicals and regular deliveries, so just want to make sure that we're being safe for Again, the neighbor is the land. I do want to co-sign the interest in a speed table and significant traffic calming. The last one is a question about the shuttle, which I believe currently stops right outside there. If there's going to be a designated permanent spot, that's a bit more permanent than I think it's currently just like a laminated sign. and how that will interact with the traffic pattern. Thank you.

[Rocco DiRico]: Thank you, Ari. Those were all excellent questions. And yes, I'll start with community swim because at our community meeting, that was something that the neighbors were most excited about. Right now, we have an abutters pass program where the neighbors that surround the athletics fields and the whole area and live behind Gantra can purchase an abutters pass. they'll have access not only to the pool, but all of our fitness facilities at Tufts. And then, you know, all the other things that we talked about, again, you know, we use the word possible because it requires staffing and it requires things like that, but we're always happy to host it. Um, I just don't want to commit Medford recreation to things that they don't have the staffing for. Um, but if they have a proposal and they want to meet with, uh, with, with coach and I, um, we're happy to meet with them and host them. Definitely the Medford Somerville swim classic. That is something that Adam and I are a hundred percent going to do. And I think the Medford. high and some real high coaches will be excited to do it. We do it across several sports and thrilled to be adding that. We were very thoughtful. Shay and her team was incredibly thoughtful to light and sound pollution. So you'll notice we really tried to minimize the amount of windows, particularly on the neighbor side of the project. At the first meeting, we were actually told to add windows. So we added windows on the tough side, but we were careful to not add any window on the neighbor side because that was important to us. And then also, in terms of sound pollution, the mechanicals are wrapped with sound enunciating boards to make sure that that sound doesn't get to the neighborhood or is muffled by the board.

Chlorine spillage, we have comments from the Board of Health, and there's a whole set of procedures that when you operate a large pool like this, that you have to follow. And we will work very closely with Marianne O'Connor, she submitted her comments, we agree with all of them. and we will comply with all the Board of Health requirements in terms of managing the safety of the pool. The Medford shuttle, I'm going to look to Nick because I don't know if we do we have a spot. Do we have a stop on College Avenue? First of all, my first question. And then if you can, so if you could answer Ari's question about the stop.

[SPEAKER_18]: Perfect. Thank you. So we do have a stop on College Ave for our SMFA shuttle. So that is a what I call like a stop and go. stop, it's not the shuttle will stop there all the time, only if someone is there and needs to be picked up or if someone needs to be dropped off. So we don't have a permanent stop for that since it's similar to like a city bus stop where it's a stop and go versus staged like it is on our campus.

[Ari Fishman]: And can I just ask a quick follow-up on the bus specifically? Will buses bringing competing teams be parking kind of in that lot or will they be stopping on College Ave there in terms of the traffic pattern?

[SPEAKER_18]: That's a great question. What they currently, I can't speak about what they'll do in the future. What they currently do is they drop off on College Ave. And then they relocate off of College Ave to right now, they usually go to 80 George to that area.

[Ari Fishman]: Okay, because I've definitely seen kind of very multiple large buses parked there for substantial periods of time on the street, which I think does not improve the difficult traffic pattern.

[Ari Fishman]: I think that's it for now. Thank you. Oh, actually, one more. Sorry. I know you mentioned the Butters Pass. I don't live immediately adjacent to Tufts, but I would also love an option to be able to go swimming there sometimes. And I know that is a feeling shared by the community. So I will kind of throw that in as a thing that would be lovely to see.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Ari. All right, I'm going to move to John Anderson next. Go ahead, John.

[John Anderson]: Thank you. First, a quick question. Dowling is the big multi-story parking garage right on Boston Avenue, right? Yes.

[Rocco DiRico]: Oh, that's a great question, John. I've probably done it 1,000 times. I would say it's three to five minutes, depending how late I am for my meeting.

[John Anderson]: Okay. Because I had heard some people complain that that perhaps was too far. People are funny about parking. If you could park 10 minutes away from Fenway Park and not pay more than 50 bucks, you'd jump for joy.

[Rocco DiRico]: As an avid Red Sox fan, John, I totally agree with you. That's why I take the green line.

[John Anderson]: That's right. Now, in terms of access to the community, you've indicated a lot of great intentions, and I'm sure they're sincere. Is Tufts willing to make any sort of quantitative commitment about the number of hours that would be available to Medford organizations and Medford residents that we can look at five years from now or seven years from now when most of you have gone on to other activities?

[Rocco DiRico]: That's a great question, John. I'm going to defer to our swim coach, Adam Hoyt, because I know that there's a certain amount of hours that he needs for the swim team. But I'm going to try to unmute coach.

[John Anderson]: But I think I'm looking for something more than that because I'm sure his intentions are the best as well. But he's not going to be here forever either. And his needs will change from time to time.

[Rocco DiRico]: That's a good question, John. And that's why I just want to get Adam's perspective on how many hours he needs versus how money would be open to the community. And I think that's a good starting point for us.

[Rocco DiRico]: Yeah. Adam, if you can, and thank you for beaming in. I know Adam's away at a meet. So we appreciate Adam joining us today.

[SPEAKER_25]: Yeah, thanks, everybody. Thanks, john. Um, yeah, currently, we offer five to six recreational swim hours a day, Monday through Thursday, Fridays are a little shorter at four hours, same with Saturdays and Sundays. The biggest issue with the current rec swim hours is the pool so small that everyone would love to swim at lunchtime, but there isn't space for everyone to swim at lunchtime. So if I'm speaking candidly, John, I imagine the hours I've been told are great. It's just the capacity is not great for the need. So this bigger, beautiful pool, I don't know that there will actually be a need for more recreational swim hours. I think the biggest need is a space because right now we go six 45 to 815 in the morning. I'm hoping we could go a bit earlier, but that's a great time before work to swim. Then we go 1130 to 130, kind of a lunchtime swim, and then a 730 to 10 at night, kind of an evening swim. Weekends are a bit different, 12 to 4.

The issue I've seen isn't the hours or even the quantity of hours even if we were able to get approval to open it up to, you know, all Medford residents are a larger group of people, this new pool will accommodate it and I think that will be the biggest impact not so much necessarily more hours but the space during these kind of critical prime hours and uh even looking at additional you know programming needs from the university standpoint those specific hours i believe they would stay intact um because they're they're truly most needed for for for rec swim during that time other programming it wouldn't make sense to put it at lunchtime or late at night uh or early in the morning um So that's that's my biggest take on it. And I can appreciate the idea of kind of having some sort of written contract, you know, that kind of if all of us move on, you know, you can say I said it, but if there's a new guy here, maybe that changes. So I can appreciate that. And maybe that's something Rocco can look into with with the university folks who make those decisions. But that's that's kind of my take on on the Rex win.

[John Anderson]: A quick follow up question. How many lanes in the new pool versus the old pool?

[SPEAKER_25]: Yeah, so this new pool right now we've got six 25 yard leads. It kind of depends on the orientation of this new pool. Simply put, the pool is instead of like our curve pools 25 yards long, by 36 feet wide, this new pool will be 25 yards wide by 50 meters long. So it moves us from six lanes to 22 lanes. It basically, you know, over triples our capacity from a lane space standpoint.

[John Anderson]: All set, John. Final question. I noticed in the drawings, there were a number of Tufts banners displayed on the side of the building. Is that a sort of a design feature? Or is that something that would be done when there were swim meets? I mean, everybody knows it's Tufts.

[Rocco DiRico]: That's a great question, John. And you're right, everyone does know it's Tufts. Those, I would say, are kind of holding banners, right? We put the signage to say Tufts. But for example, when we're hosting Tufts Community Day, we'll use those banners to advertise Community Day. So we'll say, Tufts Community Day and it'll say the date for it. Or maybe it'll say NCAA tournament this weekend or something like that. So the banners can be rotated and can be changed and we can show other things other than Tufts, but just for the sake of presentation, we just put Tufts on the banner for that.

[John Anderson]: Okay, thank you. Because I appreciate that in the new design, the really giant Tufts sign on the brick thing has been reduced to a more reasonable size.

[Rocco DiRico]: We heard that message loud and clear, John, and that has been removed. So thank you for that feedback. And we think it's a better product, frankly, after hearing that feedback.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Rocco, just to pick up on that, this is going to be like most or many buildings that tell us a donor building. So I presume there will eventually be some naming on the building once that's resolved.

[Rocco DiRico]: That is correct. We do have a lead donor for the facility. I should say all of our athletics facilities are donor funded. So we spend the majority of our financial resources on academic buildings and on residence halls. So there is a lead donor. We haven't made the announcement yet, but at the appropriate time and once the donor gives us the green light, there will be a name attached to the building.

[Sean Beagan]: Yeah, a couple of questions, I guess, and maybe a comment or two. I do like the design a lot better. And again, design is not really my thing, but even to my untrained eye, this is a much nicer building. In regards to the space where the current pool currently is located, what are the plans, if any, for that space?

[Rocco DiRico]: Thank you, Sean. That's a great question. I'm going to defer to Robert Corbett. My understanding is it's going to be continued to be reserved for athletic purposes, but no longer be used as a pool. But Robert, correct me if I'm wrong. You should be unmuted, Robert. Oh, sorry. Go ahead.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, thank you. You are correct. We have no current plans for the existing pool. However, in the long term, we will backfill it eventually and reutilize it for recreational space.

[Sean Beagan]: So thank you. And the reason I was asking that question is because I am Thinking about this idea in the request for some sort of waiver of parking or shared parking. And that's why I was wondering if there was some other type building going into that space that would be another, you know, heavy use. Because we, it seems to me that. Tufts wants to be in control of its own destiny in terms of parking and manage its own parking, which I'm not necessarily opposed to as an idea, as long as there actually exists sufficient usable parking for the uses. I think I read the parking plan and You know, not all of the parking lots mentioned in this plan are really feasible to use as parking for this aquatic center. And I think it all keeps coming back to that Dowling garage and kind of Dowling garage can cure every parking issue. And I'm just wondering how long that is gonna last. And Paige asked a good question about the new dorm. and I don't know if that new dorm is going to bring additional parking requirements with it or is it just going to be moving kids who are already on campus to a different building and the same amount of cars are going to be there. So there's just there's unanswered questions in my mind about parking going forward. I don't know if it's not going to prevent me from moving forward with this plan at all but I'm just going forward I'm thinking about this concept of of parking as and how Tufts is going to you know be in control of its own destiny for parking yet kind of somewhat seems resistant to want to build more parking. I don't think the Darling Garage can forever be the answer for every project that comes forward. We're just going to park cars in the Darling Garage because you can't park all the cars. It seems like the Cousins lot, based on the report I'm reading, is pretty full most of the time. You're losing quite a number of spaces there. You're also not bringing in any of the required spaces for the new building. So not only are you negative 130 something spaces because of the building, you also don't have any of the spaces that would otherwise be required for the building. So it's really like a negative 180 as opposed to a negative 130 or something. So those are the things I'm thinking about in regards to parking.

I guess just letting Tufts know where I'm thinking going forward on that issue. But I do think it's a beautiful building. I'm glad that the community is going to have some use of it.

[Rocco DiRico]: Thank you, Sean. I appreciate that. And Nick and his team are constantly thinking about parking. I think the athletic space that's going to be repurposed, it's really going to be space for our existing students who typically walk to the Tisch Fitness Center. That's the most prominent user. We are looking at other areas on campus to create more surface parking. So I don't think we're going to be building a new garage, but there are other spaces where we can make space by using underutilized or unused buildings and converting that to surface parking. But as I said at the previous meeting, we don't want our students to bring cars to campus. Freshmen and sophomores are not even allowed to bring cars to campus. For our SMFA students, we pay for their T-pass 100%, so they get free access to the Green Line. We're adding two blue bike stations on Boston Avenue. We also have a master contract with Lyft, so our students get a discount on Lyft. So we're really trying to be thoughtful and think of alternatives to driving. We've also, what's changed since we built the garage, COVID has really changed things, right? So a lot of our staff now is remote or hybrid. Certainly the faculty are still in person, but that's provided us with greater parking flexibility.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay. I guess, just to comment on a few things I've heard, I agree with Sean that I think, you know, there's obviously a larger discussion coming separate from the aquatic facility with Tufts about zoning and parking. That's going to be happening over the next few months, so that there's going to be a much bigger conversation to solve, I think, the long-term concerns that Sean's talking about. I don't disagree with anything he said. Um, you know, because I, I agree that if there's, dialing can't be the answer to everything. And if you have a plan, I think that helps us to see that that's part of the, I think the open communication rocko between you and Medford and trying to have that conversation, um, as we go forward on zoning. I did hear pretty clearly from a few people on the city board that the speed table is something that they want to see studied. I don't believe that's part of the current design, right? We're talking about crosswalks, but we don't actually have a speed table proposed. Is that correct?

[Rocco DiRico]: That's correct, Doug, and I'm going to just go to Robert on this one because he's the expert in this area.

[SPEAKER_02]: It should be good, Robert. Yeah, thank you, Rocco. Yeah, so speed tables are becoming more and more a traffic calming measure. I would say that where they are generally being provided, though, is in neighborhoods where the approaching speed is much slower than a main primary road. They have civil implications. That is that when you get high rates of rain, because they're a built up area, they tend not to drain very quickly. So there's a real possibility that there'll be built up stormwater adjacent to the tables.

The biggest concern is that on a primary road, there just will not be an expectation from a driver that there'll be a speed table. You'll have approaching traffic that will just not be, there'll have to be a lot of signage that'll have to identify that a speed table is there. We're going to have a lot of visitors who aren't going to be familiar with these streets approaching. Then also on the maintenance side, This would be maintained by the city, would not be maintained by Tufts. Our experience is that similar to new traffic people, there are snow plows that are going to regularly come through the area and they will have to be given very cautionary terms around a speed table.

I don't think we're objecting. to the speed table as much as we just want to caution the city that it would not be our recommendation to do it.

[Dina Caloggero]: Can I make a point on that, Doug, on the speed, on the speed table, please? So, yeah, I just want to comment on, it is in a school zone. Okay. So there is signage right near the Elliot Pearson that says the school zone where there is a restricted speed. Nobody pays attention to it. Okay. It's on a hill. So I don't think there'll be a drainage problem at the same time. And I think that we could do, they can do speed bumps, they could do humps, they could do different things where it wouldn't prevent too much of a problem for like emergency vehicles. And you have to remember that College Avenue, as it comes down the hill, goes directly into a residential area that is in a school zone. I mean, I think that College Avenue coming off of Tufts is the perfect location to address some traffic calming measures.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Dana. I guess, Alicia, Danielle, could you chime in on this a little bit? Because obviously, you see this a lot. I mean, this question has come up. multiple times. I mean, I think on Powder House Circle, the other side of campus, there are 10 speed bumps between, and a mile and a half between 16 and Powder House Circle, right? It's not like there's not a precedent for that in this area. But Danielle, do you want to start maybe?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, I was really confused by that response because we have raised crosswalks and speed humps on main roads. That's precisely where they need to be. And it's 20, it's supposed to be 25 miles per hour in the whole city. Um, and then as, as member Calavera was saying with the, the school zone, it's, it's slower. Um, I know that with, I know that there are drainage concerns. You have to, um, take that into consideration, but we have them everywhere. Like the idea of not putting a speed hump or a speed table because it's college ave and it's supposed to be. driven on fast.

[Dina Caloggero]: Thank you, Danielle. Kind of like, have you been to Medford? That's why I wanted the traffic study with just measuring the speed. It would prove my point.

[Rocco DiRico]: Yeah, I do know in Somerville, and Danielle probably knows this as well, the Somerville Fire Department has raised concerns about the speed humps on Powder House Boulevard.

[Rocco DiRico]: So they've gotten some attention for that recently. So again, I think, as Robert said, we're not fighting this. We're happy to work with the city and the transportation engineer to figure out some pedestrian safety solutions that are good for the city and good for the university.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Mr. Chair, I decided while this was happening to back channel our city engineer and just check if the city would have concerns. And he says that the city would not object to a raised crosswalk. So I think that there was a condition that tops would, I think there are concerns about the exact location, how that works with crosswalks, how it works with drainage, the details, is it a bump or a crosswalk? Those things need to be determined. We do have speed bumps in Medford. that you can cross safely at 20 miles per hour on Lawrence and Winthrop. Whether that's appropriate or a different thing like a raised crosswalk, I think that that is actually a more detailed conversation that could be worked out. And the city does have standards on raised crosswalks. So the standards already exist. So if it was some condition that said you had to work with the Director of Traffic and Transportation and City Engineer to come up with something that worked for the city that, you know, with our standards, I think that they would actually really like. We've been trying to add raised features on our streets where we can.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Alicia. Thank you. All right. I believe that's all the board comments, so I am going to now open it up to public comments, if we could. So let me just tune that up for a second. Those who wish to provide comments can use the raise hand feature, which may be under reactions on your Zoom. If you're dialed in on a phone, you can use star nine to raise your hand. You can also message Alicia or Danielle in the chat if you're having technical difficulties before providing your comments. Please state your name and address for the record. A reminder that all participants to please refrain from using the chat function to message any comments to the city staff or board because they're not part of the public record. If a participant is having audio or technical difficulties, please message staff for assistance. Each participant will have two minutes to speak. Would anybody like to speak from the public about the Tufts Aquatic Center?

[Jeremy Martin]: Good evening again. Good to see you, Judy, too. Thank you to the members of the board and especially the city staff who work hard to facilitate these reviews. I know it is a lot of work. I support this project, recognize its value for the university. It's really good to see the improvements to the building design and more detail on the community benefits. One item missing from that list is an expansion of the map of abutters who are eligible. For example, I can see the gym from my house and I can hear all the music and announcements from the sporting events, but we and many of our neighbors are not actually eligible for that pass. So I hope that Tufts will look at expanding that. Two other areas where I would ask this board to press Tufts for more action in your conditions is first in something we've heard a lot about tonight, which is active investment in improvements to the city infrastructure beyond the immediate project site. Tuff should commit to these safety improvements to streets and sidewalks since they're relying on them to move their community to this building.

That looks like more crosswalks, raised crosswalks, better sidewalks, safer street conditions generally. And thank you to the board and staff for pushing back on that last response we heard. This is a great place to be putting in speed humps, and there are several on George Street just on the other end. Secondly, I want to keep asking Tufts to give stronger weight to the community comments and requests that are made in an already narrow review process. It sounds like some things are acknowledged and that's good, but I've also heard loud and clear obviously concerns about street safety, but requests for better plantings, opportunities for public art, and of course reasonable parking for events. Some things have been done to address these, but maybe not adequately.

I hope coming out of this conversation, we're addressing improvements to the street. I will say that the rendering showing the new building include landscape that misrepresents what's actually in Tufts landscape design plans. If you look at those closely, it's trees and lawn. Those renderings show a lot of shrubs and plants that aren't in there. I know Tufts can do better. The request for public art has been ignored, and I know that our neighborhood is going to see an uptick in Tufts visitors driving and parking on our streets leaving the city responsible for enforcement. As we've heard, those Dowling garage counts don't include any of the cars that the 600 juniors and seniors living in the apartment building are allowed to bring with them. The study for the parking for the apartments did project the anticipated use by those residents, so I think it can be modeled. So I'll just close by saying I hope you approve this project. It's a great project. I hope you improve it with conditions that make it the most beneficial for Tufts and the entire Medford community. Thank you.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thanks, Jeremy. I appreciate it. Judith Weinstock, name and address for the record, please.

[Judith Weinstock]: Hi, Judy Weinstock at 144 Burgett. What he said, Jeremy, thank you, Jeremy. I think that the new design on the south-facing wall is a great improvement. I am really pleased to see it. I think that your architectural firm is talented, and we should let them go on all sorts of projects here in town. I also like that the upper area of that south-facing wall is partitioned perfectly for some artistic pieces to go up on those individual parcels. Should Tufts decide in the future that that is something they would like to embark on, there could be some lovely mural work above That line on the second sort of 15 to 30 feet or 20 to 35 foot stretch above the windows. I also agree with everything that folks have said about the crosswalk in front of Gansher. And Tish really needs to be illuminated in some way. I, I'm on that road all the time and they actually the students as students are want to do almost never look before they cross. So, giving, um.

And usually they're on their phone too, so it just sort of adds to the concern that we're going to strike somebody one day, and it's going to be ugly. And with little kids coming back and forth, I think we're not used to seeing that kind of traffic, pedestrian traffic, going across that street once the pool is open. whether it's raised for traffic calming, certainly illuminated in some way with flashers. And then the only thing we have to do is make sure everybody pushes the damn button before they cross. So with that, I really support the project. I think they've done a lovely job in responding to many of the community concerns. So thank you. And thanks to the city and the Community Development Board.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Judy, appreciate it. Thanks for the very thoughtful comments, as always. Are there any other public comments about the aquatic center before we close up the public comment sections? I don't see anything. OK, so I will close the public comments section and I think I wanna go back to the board for any additional comments based on what you heard from the public comments or other conversations we've had starting with you, Ari.

[Ari Fishman]: Thank you. I would be interested, I think, and kind of correct me if I'm wrong anywhere here, not voting today. I think there's some It sounds like they've been very responsive to many of the comments that were brought up last time. But there are still some remaining very significant community interests in traffic calming, in community access, and in, it sounds like, public art we haven't talked about. So I think those are beyond the scope of conditioning. And I would want to give that time and ask them to return with a proposal.

[Page Buldini]: Yes, quick question. In the public art thing, I know that I think Jeremy had brought it up at the last meeting, too. Is that something, Rocco, that you can share if Tufts does share in their vision? And if not, that's okay, too, for public art. I know what we were looking at, the Tramson the Transcend proposal for Mefford Square, there is initiative to work with a really cool group that does bring in that to bigger facades. So I don't know. I know that there's probably a design element in which Tufts does their design. So I don't know if you yourself or that I'm blinking on who was here before.

[Ari Fishman]: I think it was... They have the SMFA too. Yes, that's right. That's their students. That's true. And professors.

[Chair Doug Carr]: There's a lot of talent over there for sure. Rocco, do you want to address that?

[Rocco DiRico]: Yeah, I appreciate that. Yeah, thank you, Paige. I think we are happy to have the conversation as Ari points out, we actually have the School for the Museum of Fine Art, which is part of Tufts University, and those students reside here on the Medford campus, and we actually have a public art committee. So I think we would want to work with our, obviously the experts that we have in-house, both student, you know, students, faculty, and staff to figure out what would be, you know, the kind of most appropriate for our community, but also for the community at large.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah, if I could just say a few comments about that. I, you know, when it was a blank wall 300 feet that, you know, I was not in favor of I was certainly open to all kinds of artistic interventions, but I don't feel that way anymore because I think it's been designed better. And I'm not saying there's not room for art in the building, there is, but I think it might be smaller in scale. I don't think a piece of art 200 or 300 feet long would actually make this building better. I think there might be opportunities near the entrance and the lobby. I think there are opportunities. I think Rocco and his team, they can look at that, but I feel the exterior of the building is at a strong point now. And I just don't think, you know, murals are often done on blank walls that people want to improve. And I just don't think that's where this is right now, but that's just my opinion, obviously. But I guess, Paige, if we could go back, if you don't mind unmuting again, Do you agree with Ari's comment, or are you comfortable moving forward tonight based on what you've heard so far?

[Page Buldini]: I think it was awesome to talk about the art, but I do think that a little bit more information comes to the traffic calming would be helpful, especially with what the Medford side and the Somerville side look like in the same area. And if there is a hope that there will be children using the pool, I think that would be very helpful. And I know hearing from the city, Thank you, Director Hunt, for sharing that, too. So yes, more on the traffic and the safety, I guess, of the streets, what we can do. Sure.

[Dina Caloggero]: I completely agree with just what Paige and with Ari said. I would like to see that.

[Sean Beagan]: You know, I'd actually be comfortable moving forward today with conditions. I think we have to be mindful of what this board can actually mandate as a condition, specifically on a Dover amendment project. We can't mandate that they put art on their building, and we can certainly suggest it here in a meeting, but we can't make it a condition, I don't think. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong. And I would be comfortable with a condition, you know, in terms of traffic calming or traffic measures that said that if Tufts would be comfortable with it, that they would accept the recommendations of the traffic, of the engineering department, of the traffic engineer for the city of Medford in regards to traffic calming measures on College Ave. I would be comfortable, you know, moving forward tonight on that, but deferred, you know, majority rule here, so.

[Chair Doug Carr]: All right, let me go to Rocco and then Pat, I want you to chime in after this. Go ahead, Rocco.

[Rocco DiRico]: I appreciate Chairman Carr and I appreciate all the comments and would agree with Doug's comments about the artwork. We tried to have the architecture be the artwork. And as folks have said today, I think Shea did a great job improving that facade and that was our goal. Secondarily, I agree with attorney, with Sean, we are certainly open to installing a raised crosswalk there, provided that's what the traffic engineer for the city wants us to do. So if that helps move the vote forward tonight, we can commit to a raised crosswalk at that location.

[Patrick Gallagher]: Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I would just add to what Rocco was saying. I think I'm hearing from members of the board that in some areas, it would be helpful to have more concrete information. And I just wanted to highlight, I think given the nature of the institution here, and there are a lot of stakeholders who need to weigh in on these questions, So I think, for example, in terms of public benefits and opportunities to expand access, we can very unequivocally say that there will be expanded public access. It's hard to say today, when it's just more than two years until this facility would be open, exactly what that will be. But I think I can speak for Rocco and the team that we are very committed to this, and that's an important pillar of Tufts membership in this community. So I appreciate wanting to have those specifics. Um, I think some of that is is a challenge, but I think other areas can be conditioned and, you know, certainly to rockers point and others. On a race crosswalk, we're proposing relocating across walk. So we're. We're already doing work in that area. So, I think that's. Something that, you know, we're certainly.

agreeable with, and we just need guidance from the traffic engineer. And that's normally guidance that would come while we are preparing permit drawings and getting ready to pull a building permit. So I don't think it would be unusual for that conversation to be happening post-approval by the city board.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I actually just wanted to ask a clarifying question because I was consulting with some other staff and they asked me a clarifying question that I couldn't answer from tonight's presentation. So I apologize. And I just wanted to understand. So there is a stairway that there's a kind of controversial and part of the concern is that people jaywalk to it. And one of the requests from the city had been to move the crosswalk to be close to that stairway. There'd been talk of maybe a blue bikes pad there. It would be about 40 feet from the stairway. And I'm not sure if you showed us on the plans tonight where that crosswalk was in relation to the stairway. And I think that was part of the safety issues we were concerned. And I thought it would be helpful to see and to understand that. Because one of the questions is, is that the raised crosswalk they're talking about? That would even be better. And although they wouldn't object to another one at another location, this was, and so I thought it would be good for us to all be clear where it's currently proposed. And I will say that the city is saying that if there isn't a sidewalk or crosswalk for safety near that staircase, then the staircase should be closed off so that students stop jaywalking there before somebody gets hit, so. And we want to be on the record that if you don't close it off, that it's not our fault if somebody gets hit. We said it was a problem.

[Rocco DiRico]: Sure. Yeah, Shay, I guess, Shay, can you bring up a plan that shows where the crosswalk would be? And that might help clarify things for folks.

[Rocco DiRico]: And again, we are open to Dean's suggestion of making it a raised crosswalk, provided that the city is OK with that.

[Penelope Taylor]: Thank you. So this is the landscape plan that we showed at the previous hearing. For clarity, the relocated crosswalk, so there's currently, you can see it. I'm going to zoom in really far just so that everyone can see it. This is the existing Tisch crosswalk. There is an existing crosswalk here. Given the new curb cut and seeing this as a primary pedestrian path, the design team is proposing relocating this crosswalk to this location at the new curb cut.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: And so if I might, I think that the city's contention is that the desire line is not actually there, that the desire line is from people who are coming from Boston Ave, and they cross earlier, or they're coming from the Cummings Center, and that there's a staircase further up closer to the Boston Ave intersection that we have seen is a very active desire line, and that if that there should be a crosswalk further up. And if that makes it another crosswalk, I mean, this is a campus.

Or if that crosswalk that you're suggesting there should come further up. I assume that's where you're showing now where that bright white is, that that might be the staircase. It's hard to tell. It is the staircase.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: And that's. You can see actually a bump across the street. I think that's a new bump.

[Dina Caloggero]: There's actually two staircases. There's that really large one that goes all the way down, and then there's that small one I think Alicia's talking about.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: I don't know. We might actually be referring to the one that's very closest to Boston Ave.

[Dina Caloggero]: It's two. Very tall one and small one. It seems like Danielle may know.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: So I had conversations today with director Blake and also with attorney Gallagher. And there was confusion about which crosswalks are we talking about because there's the big wide one. And then there was another one that was gone for a long time during the construction, but apparently it is back. I thought it was gone completely because I didn't recall the second one being there. Um, it's back so that one's back. So, when we're talking about, or. I don't think that these are these are in the plan set. So, it was difficult to see any improvements or changes that were in the right of way. So. I believe Todd thought that, um, or his. 1st, comments about moving the stairway and putting the crosswalk over there.

wasn't to be like in addition to this one. It was to add a crosswalk in general. But yet there is a desire line at those stairs. In fact, he came into my office right before this meeting. He showed me and he snapped a picture right before the meeting of someone who was jaywalking across to those stairs to get to his parked car. And so apparently it does happen often. So he was saying that you're so you're 1 of the conditions that was recommended by the engineering division and was agreed upon by the test team was to extend that bump out. That's kind of. sort of lines up with that stairway to make room for a pad for the blue bike station that would be installed by the city at some future time.

So we weren't recommending anything be done to the stairs, because we're like, that's close enough. They don't need to move the stairs and open up that can of worms. But now that the crosswalk is actually in front of the cousin's gym, We're now we're now we're concerned again about that design. So, Todd was proposing that. I mean, he thinks that location is actually quite good for the crosswalk because it's further away from the intersection and. The, the slope, so it's actually safer to be in front of the cousins gym, but that doesn't remove that. You know, that desire line of crossing to the stairway so.

I'm more and more convinced that those should be closed off. Extend the fence and just bury them or something, because it's not safe for them to use it.

[Chair Doug Carr]: You mean the stair be closed off, is that what you're saying?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, but there's another one up at the, there's two sets of stairs, so this isn't the only set of stairs. And also he was saying that It's also not great from a accessibility standpoint for there to be these stairs right here. But the ADA entrance is way, way down there. So you're giving this drastic shortcut for some people and then not for others. And that shortcut is actually encouraging unsafe crossing behavior, which was observed tonight.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I'm going to go to Paige next, and then Pat will follow you up right after that, if you could.

[Page Buldini]: Thank you, Doug. I think Pat might have a follow-up, if that's helpful. I have a different question. I don't know if Pat has a follow-up.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah, why don't you follow up first, and then we'll go back to Paige. Sorry.

[Patrick Gallagher]: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Ms. Maldini. I guess two responses to that. One is that if Director Blake, if it's his view that those stairs should be closed and that that would reduce the safety issue, I am very certain that we would be happy to work with him. to either close off those stairs or to improve just the condition of that so that it's not a hazard. I do also think, and we have our traffic engineer, Brian Zamolka on as well, and he may be able to speak to this as well. But I think that by relocating the crosswalk further south and by putting the rapid flashing beacon there, part of the goal is to encourage people's behavior to go to that crosswalk. And so I tend to think that that would reduce jaywalking risk as well. But I think if Director Blake says, we think that that staircase is too much of a risk, we're going to listen to him on that.

[Page Buldini]: Yep, real quick. And just kind of while we're sitting here and thinking about it, well, we just have everybody here. And I appreciate what Attorney Gallagher said about expectations. I was interested about hearing about the Butters being able to use the property. And I forgot that that was something that Tufts offered, which is really wonderful. So I don't think where we live on Winter Street is close enough, but it would be very interested to see. And Bronco, I don't know, it was already listed. on your website what it butters could and if there was potential to just think about expanding it. I think that was a really wonderful option with this beautiful new pool. If we could just put it out there while we're all here and so close.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay thank you Paige. Ari next and then we'll go to Rocco. Go ahead Ari.

[Ari Fishman]: Thank you. I want to raise some concerns about the flashing light pedestrian crossing idea. I live very near to the Salem Street one, where I have personally almost been hit multiple times. I see people almost get hit on a weekly basis. And I think that this crosswalk has a lot of similarities in terms of both car behavior and user behavior. I will defer to the traffic experts, but that does not seem to me to be sufficient based on other experience. I did also want to make sure that we didn't lose track of the point that Jeremy made about the plantings. that we're in the drawings not lining up with what's in the plans. And we do want to make sure that there is sufficient appropriate native greenery and that that is being done. I also kind of, I do take Sean's point about kind of what we're allowed to require, but I think Tufts is trying and I will give them credit to work with the community and this and our, Welcome and able to agree to things that are beyond the bare minimum of the law to which we all have to abide. So I think that mutual negotiation as part of the community is deeply appreciated.

[Rocco DiRico]: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I just want to if it's helpful I can share my screen and show the, the, these are all the houses that are eligible now to buy in a butters pass to the fitness center so it's everyone on. It's everyone on all these streets. The only street that we limit is College Ave because it goes further down. In speaking with Adam, since we're obviously expanding the pool, right, we're definitely open to expanding access to the pool. since the fitness center is not increasing. I can't promise that we could also expand access to the fitness center because there's not additional room there. But now that we have a new pool, Adam and I have been talking about expanding beyond this net of neighbors that are eligible to purchase in a butters pass to the pool.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Rocco. Just to circle back on the whether we're going to be debating or accepting a proposal tonight with conditions, I tend to agree with Sean's approach here. I think The building has settled down and is in good shape the parking seems to be something that people understand now, and all the all the debate appears to be largely about the street in the street design of the of the traffic calming. which I think Rocco, you are committing to solution, even though it's kind of a moving target tonight, because there's a lot of different factors. We're not gonna solve that on this call, but I think it is solvable. So that's my position is I'm also with Sean willing to move forward, but I think John Anderson, I don't think you've actually spoken about this, whether you wanna proceed or not. Go ahead, John.

[John Anderson]: Thank you. I agree with Sean, About the artwork. I just want to say that soon after the Cummings building open, I went in there and the artwork in the Cummings building is quite impressive. I didn't love all of it. But that's the thing about contemporary art, you know, you take what you like and walk by the rest of it, but it was a really very uplifting, positive experience going in there. And there was some sort of art exhibit going on at the lobby at the same time. So I was quite impressed by that. So I'm pretty confident that Tufts will be on board with providing opportunities for artwork. I agree the public safety thing is important. It's just a question of, Can we really nail, can we nail down all the details tonight or we can we put something together that approves it providing the solution is approved by city engineering?

[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah. I think that's what we're talking about, but I guess we should, it seems like we're getting close here, but I think we need to actually talk about the conditions. I think that's where, you know, I think that's the next step here. And I think I'm going to, you know, Danielle and Mr. Gallagher have had some initial conversations, which is our normal process for any project. Because if the board's not ready, we won't do it, but the board appears to be close. And I want to put those on screen and see if folks are feeling comfortable with some of the more detailed ones that we spent the better part of an hour talking about, which is really the traffic safety crosswalk. That's really the hardest one or the most challenging one. We're probably going to need some wordsmithing from Sean and others to make sure we can get it right, if we can get it right. So Danielle, would you like to put that on screen, the draft that you've been working on?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: OK, so the first conditions, these are the The original submitted drawings, these would need to be updated. We don't want to approve those drawings. We would need to, new ones. The plan modification boilerplate, recording boilerplate, so the engineering conditions. that they agree to the roadway restoration that's in accordance with Engineering Directive 3. The applicant shall perform curve-to-curve pavement restoration with respect to the specific portions of College Ave, within which the applicant performs subsurface work in connection with the project. Restoration shall include micromilling of existing longitudinal lane lines and crosswalk markings prior to the application of new pavement markings.

Five, in accordance with city standards, proposed driveway entrance to the existing parking lot must include a cement concrete driveway apron as shown on the landscape materials plan. The applicant will coordinate with the engineering division to determine if the installation of a new sewer manhole is necessary in order to facilitate the project's connection to the existing sewer main in College Avenue. Seven is kind of like a reminder that a separate stormwater permit will be required for this project at the time of construction. And then this one is in coordination with the engineering division and subject to receive all applicable permits and approvals for work within the city of Medford right-of-way. The existing curb bump out immediately adjacent to Halligan Hall shall be extended within College Avenue by the applicant by up to 35 feet in order to accommodate a future blue bike station within the College Avenue right-of-way. said future blue bike station would be installed by the city utilizing funding procured by the city.

Nine, a relocated marked crosswalk across College Avenue shall be located adjacent to the relocated curb cut as shown on the control plans and shall include compliant curb ramps and signage with rectangular rapid flashing beacons. And so this was the confusion of where is this crosswalk?

[Chair Doug Carr]: But isn't it also that we're talking about the potential for that going, potentially to be going to a raised crosswalk again, which was something we're not going to decide design tonight, but I think Rocco is committed to studying it, to looking at it, to, to working with, with Todd and the engineering folks to come up with a solution. I think the language there, if we're, if we're going to keep that one needs to be kind of broadened a little bit to, to, you know, have a couple options and let basically like engineering kind of choose a lane, so to speak.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yes, because it was going to be this one if it was going to be a raised crosswalk will be this one. But then there was also the question of if it goes in this location, then Todd wanted those stairs blocked off. But if it was going in the first location by Blue Bike Station, then they would say don't bother touching the stairs.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I won't speak for Pat Gallagher, but I think they committed to basically if those stairs need to come out, they'll take them out. Right, Pat?

[Patrick Gallagher]: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would say either remove the stairs or block them off so that they could not be used.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I think that needs its own, maybe another. We'll come back to that, I guess. The fire department ones are about the exterior mechanical access, radio coverage, fire alarm, Reporting site access and hydrants fire command center and they're agreeing to all of the fire department's requirements.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Health department kind of has their boilerplate conditions. The pool plan review, drainage, sewer management, demo construction, solid waste and pest management. And then There's these additional conditions. The one was to the maximum extent feasible, the existing trees located along the northern boundary of the site shall be preserved. That is kind of in conjunction with the possible underground utility work for the water main for water main loop or moving a conduit to

[Chair Doug Carr]: So Daniel, that one seems like it's actually a little light, because that buffer is critically important. Rocco's mentioned it numerous times in the butter. We want to make sure that, extent possible, I feel like that's the bare minimum. I feel like that language could maybe be strengthened a little bit, because I feel like that's almost a deal breaker. Go ahead, Alicia. You had a comment?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: PB, Lisa Smith-Miyazaki, she-her-hers. PB, Lisa Smith-Miyazaki, she-her-hers. PB, Lisa Smith-Miyazaki, she-her-hers. PB, Lisa Smith-Miyazaki, she-her-hers. or as absolutely few trees as possible because the city doesn't actually want them to take out the trees. So rather than having something saying, if we said they had to preserve all the trees, it might become in conflict with engineering's requirement under the building permit with the water loop. And so that was something that they needed to figure out and they needed more engineering and stuff to get the root of it.

[Chair Doug Carr]: That's fair. I just don't want them to come back to this board, or you, or Rocco, and say, I was promised trees and they're gone now. That's going to be bad for everyone if that happens. To the extent possible, we have to figure out a way to not let that happen.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I don't think anybody wants trees removed. Departors don't want trees removed. Tufts doesn't want to remove them. Engineering doesn't want to remove them. But if there isn't the redundancy and the flow, I think I talked to Owen today, he's like, if the Joyce Cummings Center went up in flames, I don't know if there'd be enough water pressure there to put it out based on what they have. That's what he said, so.

[Chair Doug Carr]: All right, well, I think we're all on the same page, that language, let's leave it as is then if you're comfortable with that.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, I feel like that is, That shows that we want the trees kept and it really would be kind of like a last resort thing of some had to be removed. All right. And this is a condition that attorney Geller put in. So prior to the issuance of a building permit, the applicant shall provide a written construction management plan for review and approval by the building commissioner and engineering division. Safe and ADA compliant pedestrian cyclist access will be preserved along College Ave during the duration of construction. 24-7 contact line for construction related questions or concerns will be established for the duration of construction. The contact line number will be posted in a highly visible location at the project site. And I think that was, carried over from the dorm decision, and it is, you know, it worked out and it's good, so we should have it in this one. It just makes sense to include it.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay, thank you, Danielle. Are there any comments from the board about the language of any of these conditions? Go ahead, Dina, and then Sean.

[Dina Caloggero]: Yes, I am really, really concern. I really want the traffic calming measures. I've seen College Avenue. I've seen the speed. I think the the raised crosswalk, which Rocco has mentioned, should be in front of the Gatcher Center on that large crosswalk, because that is the one that will be used by the Elliott Pearson students to come across the street to use the pool area. And it will also see lots of traffic of the students coming across from the Gatcher Center over to the aquatic center when they change and when they go into their locker rooms. It is the speed on the street is unreasonable. And we really, really need at this point, since they're already going to tear up the street, we need to put something in place. And I want to see it as part of the conditions. I really do.

[Sean Beagan]: Yeah, in regards to Dina's concern, I sent some additional proposed language for item nine over to Danielle. I messaged it, I think I did, to Danielle. Did you get it?

[Sean Beagan]: John, do you want to read it to us? We could listen to it. Sure. What I would propose putting at the end of condition number nine, would say that the applicant shall accept the recommendations of the Medford Traffic Engineer as to the number and location of crosswalks, raised or otherwise, and such other traffic and safety measures on College Ave, which may include but not be limited to the closing of access to certain staircases located on College Ave.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: So this would be referencing which recommendations, because I don't think we have any written recommendations about a raised crosswalk. Would this be a future recommendation? So are we asking the applicant?

[Sean Beagan]: Well, I think the discussion was, could there be a raised crosswalk on College Avenue? And what I heard Alicia say is that the city's not, can't remember who she spoke to, but they wouldn't necessarily be opposed to that. So what I would be saying, what I guess what I'm saying is I'd like Tufts to, in order to move forward tonight, say, yeah, if the city engineer recommends that, then we're gonna do it. We commit to doing it. If they don't recommend it, then we're not gonna do it, but it will be the city's call on that. Uh, obviously they can't do it without the city's. Okay. Anyway, it's a public road.

[Sean Beagan]: I guess what I'm, what I'm, what I'm asking is that, uh, Tufts be willing to just accept the recommendations of the city as to what, because there, there seemed to be, there's, there's people on this board who are much more familiar with that street than I am. And there's some significant safety concerns that I'm hearing both from our city employees and also from the members of this board on that street. So I'd like Tufts to just commit to adopt the recommendations of the city as to what they'd like to see on that street and hopefully it'll be in line with what the board is recommending because we can't compel them to put a unless the city agrees, unless the city okays it, and it's not us to okay it, I think it's other departments within the city that would have to okay it.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Ari, you raise your hand and I'll go to you, Pat, afterwards. Go ahead, Ari.

[Ari Fishman]: Thank you. Um, I do think we're very close, but I do agree with Dina. I don't think we even know where we're talking about a crosswalk. I think we're debating multiple crosswalks in multiple formats and multiple kind of dependencies of if then I don't think that's a level of detail that. The city is likely to mandate I think there's a range of options that would be acceptable and I think it actually is partially the responsibility of the CD board to.

provide guidance on that. I am very familiar with this area. I think this is the last remaining thing, but I think it is not clear to me that this is a simple traffic recommendation. I would like us to have one more meeting with a clear proposal and a clear map that we can look at because we're talking about Elliott Pearson on one side and we're talking about the kind of T on the other side, and we're talking about the crossing from the gym in the middle.

And I don't get the sense that we're all in agreement even about which ones we're talking, where we're talking about.

[Patrick Gallagher]: Thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank you, Member Fishman. I think that just in terms going in order of the language that Mr. Beegan proposed, You know, we would be open to that language. I don't have any objections to that. I think that, again, these conversations are happening ordinarily. with city staff as part of preparing building permit drawings, as part of submitting with the building department. These are getting reviewed by the city's engineering division. And so I just think that when we're talking about, do we have enough information today to be specific about what these conditions are? I think what we're saying is, we are going to follow whatever the recommendations of the city's engineering division are. And I think they would be together with the city's traffic commission. They'd be the ones who, you know, we'd be reviewing those questions with regardless.

So, you know, I think we've had these conversations with director Blake and with the city engineer, you know, we understand what their expectations are. And so we're comfortable agreeing to a condition that whatever they recommend for College Ave outside of the project site, we'd be willing to make those part of the project.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Pat. Shaw, let me go to you for a quick question. What is highlighted on screen here is your draft language, was that intended to be in addition to what this nine is or replace it? The original condition that we started with.

[Sean Beagan]: I think it's in, if that's a specific, if they've already agreed to that, the first sentence specifically, if that's already been agreed to, then my sentence would be in addition to that specific requirement.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay, I see Pat agreeing with that. Danielle, are you in concurrence as well?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Are we saying that it should be a standalone condition or? I think it's cleaner that way.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I do too. I don't know, is it? Want to make it 9A? 9A, maybe 9A.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I mean, I could just renumber them all, but I'd wait to do that.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Sure. Let's do it once. Alright, so what's? Let me go back. For when we start with page and then I want to go back to Dina and. Are you made it pretty clear you don't feel you want to move forward tonight? I believe. But Dina, what is your? Well, let's start with page first and then we'll go to Dina.

[Page Buldini]: Thank you. Can I ask director Hunt and planner Evans? How do you feel? I know that you have such experience working with TAFs and nothing against TAFs, but this is a activity of trust. So what do you?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I can take a stab at answering that. I understand the tight timeline and I know that they want to break ground soon. So I never want to delay that. However, I'm always uncomfortable When we don't have final drawings, I like to have that buttoned up and writing conditions on the fly always makes me uncomfortable. But I mean, if ultimately it's up to the board. So the next meeting would be, well, there is the weird meeting on the 13th that we could use.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: That's a joint meeting with the city council. I would strongly advise that they can leave after that.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah. Or it's either that or another week because that was just a referral. It's not even a public hearing. How much can be discussed? I don't know. Unless we want to push it to the 20th. I mean, if we can't, if we can't hash it out tonight, I could go either way. I don't feel strongly either way.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I just want to check on one of the things. You mentioned the exterior elevations. Rocco, I don't believe we have those currently. Maybe your architect, Shay, could address that because I think it's all been focused on the renderings and the vision and all that. Are there actual set of drawings that reflect the renderings that we've seen tonight available?

[Rocco DiRico]: That's a good question, Doug. I will also rely on Shay for that answer. But what I would say is we are committed to putting in the raised crosswalk. We are committed to these enhanced pedestrian improvements. And what has happened on other projects is They have approved the additional safety measures like we're doing in this case. And then no matter what, the exact location needs to be approved by the Medford Traffic Commission. So usually what happens in these cases is we work with the city engineer based off the plans that we've submitted. And Todd may ask us to move it one way or another. And then because it's a public way, it goes to the Medford Traffic Commission, which ultimately approves the exact location. So like I said, in other projects, the addition has been accepted and then and made conditioned in this case so it's required us to do it and then the exact location ends up being approved by the Medford Traffic Commission.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay thank you Rocco. Alicia did you have your hand or you're all set? I thought I saw your hand raised.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: I am a little, I don't want to contradict people. And this is a little odd, because I'm on the Traffic Commission. But I am actually pretty, so it is my understanding that the DPW Commissioner has care and control of the public ways. and that the DPW commissioner in conjunction with the city engineer has the ultimate say on where crosswalks and raised features go on our roads. I believe the traffic commission gets involved only if parking is going to be changed or removed. So the parking, so if you had to remove a parking spot to put in a crosswalk, that has to go to the traffic commission. But I was gonna say that because even if this board said we want it in X location, and the DPW commissioner said that's not okay for some reason, he would override it. It might need to come back here, but it might come back with that, like he said this, and so by the way.

It's rare, right, that people override each other, but the idea that this final condition would be that DPW and engineering have to approve it, I think is actually highly appropriate because they also have very strong opinions about this and about the public safety. And we all have opinions about public safety, but it is their job to know about the traffic public safety, so.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay, um. All right, I, I think we're heading towards look, I, this is probably the 1st time. I think since I've been chair and since I've been on this board where I don't know where this is going, which is okay. on this, but I think I want to propose that we make a motion to accept this and then let people vote their thoughts on this and see where the, because I don't actually have a strong feeling if this is going to pass or not. Go ahead. Before we do that, go ahead, Paige.

[Page Buldini]: real quick with Shay, were you able to find anything for us to see? I think one thing that I really am impressed by what the members of this board have been really open and confident in sharing their thoughts, but I do know with the past zoning that we've gone through, we've always just really wanted a clean copy with everything that is out there, whether it's These elevated drawings and it's it's not to stall at all. But I think we've just set a really good precedent of every box as possible. So if we have that, that would be really great.

[Sean Beagan]: Yeah, as much as I'd like to get this done tonight, I'm getting the feeling that I've perhaps should take my foot off the gas based on what I'm hearing from the other committee members. And I'm fine to do that. But there are a couple other, I don't know if we should continue to go through these conditions tonight and make some, I mean, there's definitely some additional edits that need to be made, even in terms of item number one. I think the, Mr. Martin, a community member, made a very good point as to even the landscape plans matching the exterior drawings or presentation that was made to us today. That has to be addressed. It would have to be addressed either in a condition or either by providing an updated landscape plan at the next meeting that would be the accepted plan.

We also have a number of waivers that the Tufts needs that we need to vote on. They need waivers, some lot waivers in terms of setbacks that we need to vote on, and they also need a parking, a substantial parking waiver. We have to decide if we're going to waive parking or if we're going to allow them to fall under the shared parking. And if they're going to fall under the shared parking, they need a slight waiver from the language of the shared parking because the Dowling garage is well over 500 feet from their new building, I believe. So there's a few more votes that we actually need to take as well in order to get them to the finish line. So having kind of talked all that out loud, you know, perhaps I'm moving too fast on this. Perhaps we need another as much as I don't want to perhaps when do you want more me in.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay, I'm seeing that the wisdom of that I agree, actually, because I think what I'm hearing I actually we haven't actually talked about the setbacks and the other wave is that we needed to as well. and the point about the landscaping and the final set of drawings and elevations, which I don't think exist at this very moment in time. And also, were you talking about one week or two weeks if we were to continue this hearing in terms of actually being able to wrap this up?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: If I might, Mr. Chair, the intention, so we had, Danielle and I had a conversation with the, with Councilor Leming about next Wednesday. And so his intention was to have the Boston Ave zoning presented to the CD board next week so that the board could start to consider it and understand it so that when the public hearing opens in two weeks, that would not be the first time the board is seeing it. So that it would be a full presentation of basically what would then be referred to the board for the public hearing. And partially that was because this board likes to take their time to think about it, to sleep on the presentation and mull it over for a week or two. And they were concerned about our contract with the consultant. And if this was the first time the board saw that was the 27th of May, they would feel unduly needing to pressure the board to speed up because of our contract with the consultant. So that is the intention for next week. In theory, you could hear that, have that presentation, and then vote on this, or take this first. But it is intended that that meeting starts at 6 o'clock rather than 6.30 as a joint meeting with the city council.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay. But if it, if it play this out, if it doesn't happen a week from tonight, for whatever reason, what is the actual next date? It would be, it could logically be.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: For the continuance of this would be the 20th. You have a meeting scheduled for May 20th.

[Patrick Gallagher]: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the board's feedback. I think I can probably make this question a little bit easier for you. My preference, as I think you all know, would be to get a vote tonight and to have conditions for submission of updated plans, but I hear what the members are saying. I think if the expectation is to have updated plans prior to a vote, I don't think it's realistic to be back here in a week and promise you that we're going to have everything submitted. So I think in that case, a continuance of two weeks would be best. I request, if I may, that If there is any additional information that the board is looking for Tufts to provide, if there are any questions that we can address. it would be tremendously helpful to have those tonight because what I would like to really avoid is a situation where we are back in two weeks and there are more questions that we can't answer on the spot because we are running up against timelines here. So if there's, I think what I'm, hearing and please let me know if there's anything else that the board would consider critical to have information submitted is to have more specificity around crosswalks and more guidance from the engineering department as to what their expectations would be having updated plan sheets that incorporate what were shown on the renderings. And I think the reason why we don't have those tonight is we wanted to get the board's feedback first on those changes. And so having detail on crosswalks and traffic safety, having details with respect to elevation drawings.

Is there any other information that that would be considered kind of critical for two weeks from now that we haven't provided yet?

[Chair Doug Carr]: I think the one that obviously comes to mind from the character of this conversation is a focused drawing that goes all the way to Boston Ave, showing the green line and everything in between that has the entire streetscape beyond the aquatic center showing proposed crosswalks and or raised walkways that we're talking about with and without the stairs, one focused drawing that shows all those elements so we can all see them together. Because right now, it's a little bit of piecemeal. And your plans just didn't show that amount of context. They shouldn't have, but that's what it's become as of the conversation. So that one drawing, I think, would help a lot.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay, very good. All right, so I think there's a clear consensus emerging that we're talking about a continuation for this for two weeks from tonight. So I will entertain a motion to that.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Sean Began. Yes. John Anderson. Yes. And myself, Doug Carr. Yes. We will see you folks in two weeks. Thank you very much.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Much appreciated. Thank you. We're going to take a break. It's already been a long night. Alicia, usually you remind me on this time, right? We'll get 10 minutes?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Get the timer. I'm doing it this time. I set one the other week, and then I didn't start it.

[Chair Doug Carr]: All right, we're good to go. Moving on to our next agenda item. This is a new public hearing, site plan review for 161 Mystic Avenue. This is an application by Lechmayer Rug for site plan review to hear about the proposed construction of a new Lechmayer Rug headquarters on Mystic Avenue. The applicant intends to construct a new retail establishment by demolishing a portion of the existing building and building an addition of approximately 4,700 square feet and creating a new parking facilities. The subject property is located in MX2, Mystic Avenue, Corridor District, Zoning District at 161 Mystic Avenue, Medford, Mass. And I'll ask Danielle or Caleb, Miros, if you have any introductory comments before we move to the presentation for the applicants.

[Economic Development Planner Kayla Myros]: Thank you. I will say that Le Chimay Rug is a retail and service establishment selling area rugs and carpet installation. They currently have a storefront at 322 Mystic Gap and are going for us today to seek a permanent space 161 Mystic Ave. The team here, KDI Architects, are here to walk us through their plans for this site and share all feedback on the comments and how they intend to meet those requirements. So knowing that it's a long night, I will let them get started. Thank you, Will.

[CAS00002557_SPEAKER_07]: Thank you, Kayla. Good evening, Chairman Carr, members of the board. My name is Will Chalfant from KDI Architects. So, we are representing Leach Mirug, as mentioned, who I'm sure, as you all know, is a family-owned and operated business. I think they just passed their 50th year in business. Uh, for the longest time, of course, for located off McGrath highway in Cambridge, but more recently, they've, they relocated down to 322. Mystic have in Medford, so they are now in Medford business and are, as we mentioned, looking to create a new headquarters here. Um. on mystic mystic ave so just to familiarize yourself with the the lot and where we're talking about the the existing building is a former auto parts mechanic shop uh located on the corner of white street and mystic uh the only thing of note in these photos i'd like to point out is the garage here shown in the lower right hand portion i'm hoping hopefully you can see my cursor uh or in the top left uh photo here at the rear that is a A later addition to this building, which we are intending on salvaging and refurbishing to go with the rest of the proposed store. So the existing site plan. As shown here, as you can see, it's a somewhat a regular shaped lot. 1 item of note is there's an existing memorial. headstone business located, and you'll actually notice that part of their building is actually on our property. But I will say that the ownership has had many good conversations with them, and they have an amicable agreement to maintain business as is. But they are obviously understanding that they're on their property, so we're going to have to be making some revisions to that portion of the property.

So, we can get into the nitty gritty of the civil if you'd like. We do have plans here as far as how we're going to handle stormwater. There is an existing 10 foot wide sewer easement that runs through the property. We are not building on top of that. We are avoiding it. We will be putting a new parking lot over part of it, but the entire site is effectively covered in asphalt right now. So we will be greatly improving the permeability of the site as well as the sort of the softening of this section of Mystic.

Just a diagrammatic site plan to orient everyone. We've got White Street to the right-hand side, Mystic Ave below. The gray portion at the top right here is the existing garage piece that we are salvaging, and then everything in red here is the proposed new building. In the interest of time for construction, we are intending to construct this building utilizing a general steel, a pre-manufactured building, and then we are creating a skin around that building to So it doesn't look like a pre-made building really for lack of a better explanation, but also just obviously to beautify it, but get the most bang for the buck for the client. We're proposing a new oriented parking lot. As many of you may know, this stretch of Mystic, it's a bit of a free-for-all as far as where curb cuts have occurred, where signs have been, where parking has been created.

tenant here actually had parking in this front area that wasn't on their property. We're proposing to allocate all of our parking and functions on our site. Obviously, as part of that would be closing up the former large curb cuts and creating a new centralized one oriented on our parking lot. Trash will be handled at the rear and then this entire section of White Street here is currently a continuous apron. There is no curb there. So we're proposing to construct new sidewalk along the section of White Street to the extent of our property, along with new curb cuts for the loading bays and the trash pickup. From a zoning standpoint, as was previously mentioned, this is in the new MX to mystic corridor, which has a minimum requirement of 3 stories for the building. We're proposing a single story building, but I will note that it is 3 stories in height. It'll be a 30 story 30 foot. Excuse me 30 foot tall building with.

at minimum 18 foot ceilings on the inside and a lot of that is necessitated by the equipment, the forklifts needed to bring the carpet in and out and maneuver that adequately. There's also a base height minimum, which we are asking for relief on, but we believe we're meeting the spirit of the regulation. And lastly, I believe that there's a parking requirement based on square footage per the zoning, which would necessitate, I believe, 14 vehicle spaces we're providing 11 and maybe 18 excuse me you can correct me Kayla on that but we are providing less than that but I think we are our traffic memo outlines that this is not a high volume establishment most of the customers are by appointment and it's it's not a I wouldn't compare this to say a Bernie and Phil's furniture store or something this is more of a you know, individual customer. And so there isn't as much traffic flow, but we can obviously address that if that question comes up.

So we did do a landscape plan, obviously want to meet the new city green score requirements. We did get some initial feedback related to some species we were calling for a tree species adjacent to the handicap parking space. We have changed that out per their recommendation to an Armstrong maple. But otherwise we are, we are really significantly changing the, Greenery on the site is there's currently none and so we'll be, we're really adding it wherever we can along the front of the building along the rear here adjacent to a few residential butters. And then, of course, just sort of signifying the entrance to the parking lot and just trying to green up. this section of Mystic. I will point out that you know we don't own this stretch of property. Our property line ends about 20 to 25 feet back from the existing sidewalk and I know all of Mystic is like this. So that's owned by MassDOT. We have spoken with the city and they have suggested and sort of encouraged us to look at removing that asphalt and loaming and seeding this area so that it is more of a meadow, and then at least it's greenery. And maybe further down the line, when MassDOT and the City has some grander scheme plans for Mystic Ave, this can be as part of this beautification, maybe additional street trees.

benches, et cetera, but I don't want to put the cart before the horse on that portion of Mystic Ave. So quickly, just from a plan standpoint, it's a very basic layout inside. It's basically wide open. You can go to their current store now, and it's very similar. This is more about the product back on the shelves and meeting with the sales folks. And then this Now that I look at it, sort of razor blade shape here is actually just a large swinging gate with the drape similar to any furniture store really, the large rugs that would be hanging there. And again, this is all to accommodate some of the equipment that will be used within the store. We are providing some public restrooms as well as just a small office for staff and then some storage space.

So on the roof, again, this is going to be a pitched roof, but we are sort of shielding that pitch based with our skin. But that pitched roof gives us an opportunity to put some solar as well as some additional branding. The thought being, you know, folks look on Google Earth, where's the store? And if there's a painted sign up there, it's only going to help them way find to the To the, to the store, so that's just a minor portion of this, the, the exterior we are proposing right now sort of an exterior with a split face block at the base.

The key to having the split-faced block at the base is obviously to deal with the inevitable snow and salt. We want that to be a hardy material at the base, whereas up above, we can have a little more freedom with colors. Obviously, we can manipulate this to create a primary cornice and then a secondary, but we have this large expanse of glazing along the front to sell the product obviously, but also get some attention and sort of activate this stretch of Mystic as best we can with what we're proposing.

Further just elevations, this is the existing garage back here. We're proposing to paint that to match the rest of the building. We have some new signage. And what we're showing here is just sort of some relief within the EFIS, just to give it some, obviously for expansion joint purposes, but also just to break up the facade and give it a little bit more impact. We have done some renderings as to what this proposed store would look like. Obviously, the curb cut hasn't been updated here really. We're showing the former one, but it kind of gives you the idea of this free-for-all that exists now, and we will be formalizing that and making it a little bit easier to access.

Another view here. And then I believe this aerial gives a good example. And I think this points out really how much greenery will be added, albeit it's not a lot, but what's there now, there's none. And then this black swath here along the front, this whole portion here in front of the building is where we're proposing to put the loam and seed. So again, just to sort of create a little bit less of a concrete jungle along this stretch here and soften it up.

And just lastly, we did do a photometric plan as well, just to ensure that there was no light being shielded onto a butters that will all be contained. We do have light fixture cut sheets if requested, but being cognizant of everyone's time and it's already late, I will kick it to the board for any questions.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Will, appreciate it. Before I go to Paige, Alicia, could you unmute for a second? This swath of D.O.T. land, that's that Mr. Sorry. Jelaphon. Jelaphon. Thank you, sir. Referenced along Mystic. Is that on both sides and it's all the way down? How far does that go?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: It's it's pretty long. And when you look up, look from Google Earth at Mystic Ave, You can kind, and you realize that that's what you're seeing. You can almost kind of see it because the buildings are set back in this weird way, the whole way along. Um, I was to see if I can.

[CAS00002557_SPEAKER_07]: Yeah, there's almost a seam you can see from Google earth, just that.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: And some properties have encroached on it, but you can also realize that that's why we now have so much front yard parking along there because DOT never objected to people parking there, but they do object to building. It's, I will tell you that years ago I thought that our GIS was just not really precise, right, in where it was showing property lines, and I have since started to look at some of the easements and and the language and deeds and stuff. And in fact, yeah, it goes a long distance along there, the DOD is protecting that.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I think Danielle has some- Yeah, I want to hear what Danielle, but this does seem, I never knew this and I've lived in Medford forever, right? And it does seem like, this is a possible way to actually transform what is a very unattractive generally landscape, you know, experience into something that could be really green and tree-filled and of completely different character of what it's been for the last hundred years. It's just, am I wrong on that?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Well, we would have to, so the difference is rather than us conditioning buildings, which we absolutely have the ability to do, We have to convince DOT that they should plant trees on this area and shared use. Why they need a bike lane, right? Although they realize that they would have to disrupt all the parking for these existing uses. So what we are trying to do is as new uses come in, sort of protect the space for green for a future bike lane, you know, a protected bike lane for a walking paths for those sorts of things. and basically move the parking off of them so that it's not a disruption. Right now, you could imagine that if DOT came in and said, we're taking over this whole area, it would cause massive problems for businesses that rely on the parking directly in front of them.

[Chair Doug Carr]: That makes sense. It's more complicated. Danielle, I'll go to you next, because obviously you can comment on this, and then we'll go to Paige.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah. When we first were reviewing this project, this is really the first time that I learned that there was this really wide right of way that I think if it was anywhere else would be grass. But over time, my presumption is individual property owners just went ahead and paved it on their own with no permissions and just started using it as parking. So, yeah, it's just, it's nuts. It's just a free for all, lawless, forsaken stretch. Within the city and they're really and 1 thing that's great about having that big right of way is it actually shows there are opportunities. For street trees, or, I mean, we could have an actual dedicated bustling. We could have real. It wouldn't have to be shared. There's literally a lane that could be. You know, there's room for 1 so.

At some point, I don't know if we need to get a state rep or somebody to talk to MassDOT, like, hey, what are your plans here? You can't just keep it like this. You can't just allow private property owners to just pave these with no repercussions.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Right, I agree with that. But I think one way to might start that conversation would be for Medford to have a vision of what they want, like, you know, to actually say, we would think this would be a good idea, rather than a blank slate, you know, because you would actually be asking them to come to your side of the table. I mean, it's a long, we don't want to get into it tonight, obviously. So I want to, I'll leave it at that. It's clearly a major opportunity to transform a really tough street to something that could be very different. So I appreciate that. Go ahead, Paige.

[Page Buldini]: Thank you. You just nailed on the head what I was going to say, Doug. I think it's a great opportunity. I was interested in learning more about the vision when the zoning was decided, but I do appreciate the existing businesses who utilize that for parking. But my quick question was, I'm so excited about this, especially because we know people that live on Goldsmith, just to know that it's going to get cleaned up and there'll be some greenery. I think that's great. Um, and I do love that you're working with Oak Grove Monuments, who is such a longstanding business in Medford, so that's great to be so neighborly. I do know that, and I think I saw on one of the renderings, they have their, um, the monument equipment that is like that big crane. That, is that going to be kind of hidden behind the parking? I'm assuming that's, is that staying or is that going?

[CAS00002557_SPEAKER_07]: Well, then they've been sort of. parking where they shouldn't be.

[Page Buldini]: It's in between. It's closest to the back of Butter. And it's hard to tell. But actually, when you have the aerial rendering, and maybe Mr. Curley might have something to add. But not that it matters. I just was fascinated. Yeah, right there. It's that thing.

[Page Buldini]: I just was interested if that was something that was staying, because I'm assuming it's essential to their business. But I mean, it sounds like the neighbors are working together.

[CAS00002557_SPEAKER_07]: I mean, we're certainly not looking to hinder their business at all. So I think we'll work with them wherever they need to put their equipment so long as we can accomplish what we're looking to accomplish here. But I think they do have some space off the back here on Goldsmith where that can go.

[Page Buldini]: And then my last question, and we'll keep you again. Very excited for this. Thank you so much. Adding solar love that. So on the back where it's I think it's white. Is that how we pronounce the street? There is right now it shows really, really tall trees, which that is obviously this Google imagery. But I saw the trash receptacle right there. And I just want to make sure that we do everything possible self Medford has a pretty bad road and everyone does but A significant rodent population. So I think having the trash back there with neighbors residential right there to just be really mindful that we do everything possible. Um, because there's little kids that live in that backyard right there.

[CAS00002557_SPEAKER_07]: So, absolutely. So I think 1 advantage of this proposed business is that the trash is going to be, uh. more cardboard in nature, you know, than say like fast food or something like that. So, I mean, we're obviously understandable, but we were showing a large enclosure around that just so that people aren't looking at a dumpster. I know Patrick can probably speak to their trash pickup regularity a little better than I can, but obviously we want to keep that as clean as possible.

[Page Buldini]: That's perfect. And thank you for picking Medford and sticking around. We appreciate that.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Harmon Zuckerman, PB — He, him, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his,

[Dina Caloggero]: This site looks great with the trees. You're going to redo the sidewalk, which is absolutely wonderful. And then Paige stole my thunder on the crane. So thank you for that. I think it looks good. Thank you, Tina.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Appreciate it. John Anderson, any questions or comments? No, thanks, Doug. Okay, thank you, John. Appreciate it. Ari, do you have anything you'd like to comment on?

[Ari Fishman]: No, honestly, it sounds good. I don't know if something will come to me after thinking about it, but nothing at the moment.

[Sean Beagan]: It sounds like the applicant needs some waiver on the parking. Did I hear that? How many employees does the applicant have at any one time in general working in the store?

[CAS00002557_SPEAKER_07]: The owner is actually on, Patrick Curley. I'm not sure if he can be unmuted. He'd probably be the best person to speak to it. Or Patrick, hold up your number of fingers, maybe. Oh, yeah, there you go.

[SPEAKER_24]: Thank you, Chairman Carr and the rest of the board. I appreciate your time. I know it's been a long night. So we have five employees, but at any given time, there's typically three of us in the store at one time. So three of those spots will probably be taken up by us. and then the remaining spots, I think there's 11 total, would be available. At our previous location in Cambridge, we were there for 47 years, we had six spots, and parking was not an issue for us.

[Sean Beagan]: Very good, yeah. I think I drove by that old location probably a million times on my way to Middlesex Probate Court, right at the corner. That's where I would take my right-hand turn, right at the corner.

[SPEAKER_24]: Yeah, it was a great location as you came over that horizon. You couldn't miss it.

[Sean Beagan]: You couldn't miss it. Yeah. No, that's awesome. I'm glad you guys are coming to Medford. That's great.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay, very good. All right, so that sounds like all the board comments that I've heard so far. I'm going to open it up to now public comments. So I'll give my usual preamble here. uh those which provide comments can use the raise hand feature which may be under reactions in your zoom and if you're dialed in on a phone you can use star nine you can message alicia if you have any technical difficulties before providing comments please state your name and address for the record reminder that to all participants to please refrain from using that function the chat function to message any comments to city staff or board members as is not part of the public record you'll have two minutes to speak. And if you have any questions, technical difficulties, you can message Alicia.

Would anybody like to speak on behalf of these projects? Not seeing much right now. Okay. All right, so that was easy. I will now close the public comments portion of this and go back to the board. Anybody have any final comment before we start looking at some of these details? And Sean, I think we start with some of the relief we need when we get there. All right, hearing none. Daniel, did you have draft conditions here? And I guess, Sean, do we have a list going of what the relief is so we can start making motions on those?

[Sean Beagan]: As far as I know, the only relief they're seeking is for the parking, unless you want to tell me otherwise. Number of stories. Number of stories.

[Chair Doug Carr]: That's right. One story, but really 30 plus feet tall. So three stories in volume, one story in reality. That's an easy one.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, when they were designing the project, making sure to kind of meet the spirit of it, even though it wasn't the story. So it could read as like a taller, more story building.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah. Is that a storefront system or a curtain wall system for the front, all that glass in the front of the buildings there?

[CAS00002557_SPEAKER_07]: I believe it's going to be a storefront system, but it's going to be determined. I mean, the size is pretty substantial, but I think we can do it out of storefront.

[Chair Doug Carr]: It looks like you kind of had to limit us to our front in terms of height, I think.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Panel size, right. Very good. All right, so we're looking at two issues then for height relief and parking from 14 to 11 is, I think, the two things we're talking about, correct? Okay, very good. So those will be I guess, do we take them one at a time, Sean? What do you want to do?

[Chair Doug Carr]: So entertain a motion to, I guess, waive the parking requirements from the zoning of 14 spaces to the proposed 11 spaces.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Seconded. Very good. I'll do the roll call. Ari Goffman-Fishman?

[Chair Doug Carr]: PB, Peter Vitale PB, Peter Vitale PB, David Ensign PB, Harmon Zuckerman PB, Peter Vitale PB, David Ensign PB, Harmon Zuckerman PB, Peter Vitale PB, David Ensign The next relief we're talking about is the number of stories. We're going from, again, from the zoning of three stories to the one story, tall one story, but still one story. So we'll have, if I could entertain a motion to make such a waiver.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Page Buldini? Yes. Sean Began? Yes. John Anderson? Yes. And myself, Doug Carr, yes. The motion's passed six to zero.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Very good. And now we need to, I think Danielle will talk about conditions. Do you have something drafted on this one as well or not?

[Economic Development Planner Kayla Myros]: Yes, we have conditions drafted. Okay. Do I share my screen?

[Economic Development Planner Kayla Myros]: OK. All right. So the first bit of language here is the boilerplate. We have the

[Chair Doug Carr]: Could you zoom in a little bit tighter to see some screens? I'm actually on a laptop.

[Economic Development Planner Kayla Myros]: Better? All right. So the first bit here is the boilerplate language saying we have the plans when they were dated by KDI architecture. And then here we have going down to the first set of conditions from the engineering department. Um. The applicant shall construct a sidewalk to the full length of the property on White Street. Um, but the updated driveway aprons that meet the city standards and. Based off of mental correspondence from their engineer, it be.

Then following the fire department outlined several conditions, which we can further discuss. Do you want me to read every single one?

[Chair Doug Carr]: No, I mean, NFPA sprinkler is a standard boilerplate. That's pretty standard. Fire alarm system, I don't think there's much there. I mean, it's all It's essentially fire department boilerplate.

[Chair Doug Carr]: This is just straight out of the code. There's nothing here that it's really debatable.

[Economic Development Planner Kayla Myros]: So then moving to the DEI office, I might change this language so that the accessible parking space was requested to be made 11 foot wide. So taking into that hatching, I believe the Um, plans have been updated, but this is just to make that. What singular parking space van accessible. Um.

[Chair Doug Carr]: And then how is that a condition if it's already in the plans? I guess would be my question.

[CAS00002557_SPEAKER_07]: Well, I think if I could, please, we're showing an eight foot clearance adjacent to it, which on every project I've ever done has been perfectly acceptable per 521 CMR for van accessible space. Uh, they're requesting 11, which we can do. It's just going to take a little bit of landscaping away. Um, I, I'd be happy. Yeah, sorry. Sorry.

[Economic Development Planner Kayla Myros]: I think he was suggesting. eating into that hatching space. So leaving everything else as is, but the hatching space being, what would that be? Three feet less to accommodate the 11 foot.

[Chair Doug Carr]: the eight foot space, whether it had a five foot for normal ADA, another eight foot for a van accessible, but I've never done anything more than eight foot space, but it's the same thing, just it's paint versus not paint, right? It's so.

[Economic Development Planner Kayla Myros]: Perfect. And then I think this was updated that the planting right next to the van accessible space will not be a red maple but a different tree. I didn't catch what was the tree that it was.

[SPEAKER_20]: I believe to an Armstrong maple. I will double check that. Well it was

[CAS00002557_SPEAKER_07]: The review was a little odd because it sort of started by saying that it didn't recommend this, and then its ultimate response was it recommended the exact tree that we were proposing. So we will plant whatever is encouraged by the city there, whether it's a red maple or a morning glory. We will adjust that with a shallow root base that doesn't interfere with the parking.

[Economic Development Planner Kayla Myros]: Perfect. That is what we need. So then I don't, that is the end of our.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Should we just revise it? So it could just be like a tree or the tree proposed approved approved species.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Any questions or comments from anyone about the conditions so noted?

[Sean Beagan]: Not hearing any. just check the numbers, just check the numbering of the conditions. I think you were missing a five maybe.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Anything else, folks? Otherwise, I'll entertain a motion to approve the project with the conditions noted. So moved. Thank you, John. Second? Yep, second. Thank you, Sean. I'll read the roll call. Ari Goffman-Fishman?

[Chair Doug Carr]: Sean Began? Yes. John Anderson? Yes. And myself, Doug Carr, yes. The motion passes 6-0. Thank you very much. Great project. We're looking forward to it. Thank you very much.

[Chair Doug Carr]: We're starting the trend on Mystic Ave. That's right. You were the pioneer. It's going to be the Shopsie Laissez when we're done. It's going to be great.

[Sean Beagan]: Thank you so much. Don't tell Tufts it was so easy tonight. I won't.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you again. Thank you all. All right. We just got a few more things, folks, and we'll be done. This has been a long one. The zoning amendment and inclusionary zoning. Danielle, did we actually agree that this was going to not happen tonight? I thought this was something that was in the works still.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, so there was a bit of a hiccup with this one. So we based this language on the fraction. Well, let me back up. The concept of the fractional payment in lieu of rounding up to the next full unit has been something that we've been talking about for a long time. As you know, developers will kind of structure their unit counts based on, you know, the next cliff they fall over for needing to provide units. So you don't get a lot of situations where there's roundings. You get a lot of, while this wouldn't help with like the nine unit cases, it would help with situations where maybe they would provide, you know, 16 units, you know, instead of, you know, not doing, not even going above nine or, I don't know.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: You know what I'm saying? Can you, sorry, Danielle to interrupt. Big picture. There was a legally advertised public hearing for tonight. Oh, right. You should open it. We'll give you a little bit of information about it. The recommendation tonight is to continue it. Okay, for the reasons that Daniel was going into, but legally open your public hearing.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Sorry. No, no, that that's perfectly fine. I agree with that. I just wasn't sure this was going to be on the agenda at all. It's okay. So we'll conduct it. We're opening a public hearing tonight for. for the proposed amendment to the city of Medford zoning ordinance amendment section 94-8.1 inclusionary housing to include a new provision to allow for a fractional payment. I don't think I need, do I need to read the whole thing as part of the hearing?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Usually you have to vote to waive it, but the vote takes just as long.

[Chair Doug Carr]: All right, so Fractional units, where the required number of affordable units results in a fraction of a unit at the election of the applicant for the development, either A, the required number of affordable units shall be rounded up to the nearest whole number, or B, the applicant shall make a fractional cash payment to Medford's Affordable Housing Trust Fund. The fractional cash payment shall be equal to the fraction of the unit multiplied by the equivalent value of an affordable unit. The equivalent value of the affordable unit shall be based on the then applicable total development costs as articulated in the EOHLC qualified allocation plan for low income housing tax credits for the areas described as within Metro Boston slash urban area as adjusted for the type of project and the number of units. This value should be reviewed and confirmed by staff of the Office of Community Development. The applicant shall make their election prior to submitting a site plan review application by notifying the Office of Community Development in writing. The payment to the Medford Affordable Housing Trust Fund shall be calculated at the time of the building permit application. and due prior to the issuance of the building permit or as agreed to in a fee payment agreement. That is the text that we're debating. Go ahead, Danielle.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Right. So basically, the big snag here is that that number that we're relying on, the total development cost, which has been published in the QAP, the Qualified Allocation Plan for the Low-Income Housing Tax Credits by the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities. They're not doing that anymore. So they're just, they're not publishing that number. They're just, because the numbers are too crazy. They're not gonna set the limits because this QAP isn't for the purposes of doing like a fractional payment or cash-in-loop calculations, but it's worked out to be a good way to get that dollar amount, the total development cost. But since they don't want to put limits on what they're giving for the tax credits, they don't want to publish these limits because costs are crazy and they can't keep up with it, that they've elected not to in the most recent QAP, which came out during the time that this was being drafted. So there was a draft version that was available while this was being workshopped and talked about in the Affordable Housing Trust Fund. They had opined on this, all the research that we've done. And then it was actually in February that they released the new QAP.

We just expected the number to be in there. And then when I yesterday was looking at it, it was like, well, let me figure out what the cost would be if I calculated it. And I go to the page, and we're not publishing this. It's like, you're kidding me. So we're going to have to find a better way to see if there's some third-party source that publish a total development cost that would make sense, because we had all agreed that the total development cost makes more sense to use for a factional payment than the subsidy gap, because that's really hard to do for rentals, to figure out what is that subsidy gap.

So I'm recommending that you just continue it, and while it's late, we're gonna do more research.

[Chair Doug Carr]: There's no one here that I can see other than Mr. Curley, who would be public comment.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: So Mr. Chair, our housing planner is actually doing some research on what other communities are doing. Turns out there are other methods of getting an appropriate number. We need a week or two for her to review what other communities are doing and come back to you with a recommendation, which is unfortunate because we had already done, Danielle had done all this other work already on this. So yeah, so I don't know that you need to open this to public comment. There is literally nobody on here to comment. And actually there's nothing to comment on. Yeah. Right.

[Chair Doug Carr]: We don't have anything to comment on. I agree. So are we continuing?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: If anybody happens to be watching and has recommendations on how to calculate this, just email us here in the office and we'll take that into consideration as we do.

[Chair Doug Carr]: What's the date certain we're continuing this to? 2018. 20th. Okay, so on it's in a motion to continue this hearing to the May 20th date. Hold on before you that join Edison. Did you have a comment?

[John Anderson]: Yeah, just a quick question. Who's response? This is this is an ordinance which would be passed by the city.

[John Anderson]: It's a zoning ordinance. So did the city council write it? Have they already acted on it and that's why it's come to us?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: No, no. It was a resolution. Right, the way zoning works is that somebody refers it to the city council, the city council refers, city council asked, they said, we'd like to be able to do this fractional payments because of what Daniel explained. They said, affordable housing trust, will you please write this for us, figure it out. They worked with Danielle and Catherine Buckingham, our housing planner, and debated it, came up with language. They wrote it. The city council said, great, we trust you, affordable housing trust. They have now referred it to you for review. You'll review, you'll make recommendations. At this time, we're recommending that you're gonna change part of it, sorry. Two weeks ago, we thought we were gonna recommend you just pass it as written. because basically we wrote it here in the office. Danielle and Catherine wrote it.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: And they're relying on us, Affordable Housing Trust, the planners to come up with the details here.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Oh, it won't come back. It won't come back to you. They referred it and this is, the public hearing for this board to recommend, make a recommendation about it back to them. And so just like with other zoning amendments, I mean, it can sit here continued for as long as it needs to be, so.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Because we might have an answer and get it done and then people can start using it.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Right. We actually think it could be helpful to some of the smaller developers, like who are doing 14 units and finding that they're having some cost problems.

[Sean Beagan]: That's it. That's exactly what the developer on Salem Street said to us. It was 1409.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: If this is approved, it could actually solve some problems that he is running into.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Does that mean we would get something that could be 12 units because it's now financially viable?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: No, we'd still get 14. Right. Right now with 14 units, he has to do two affordable. If you pass this, once we have the calculations, he could do one affordable and a payment into the Affordable Housing Trust.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: that equal to 40% of a unit. So it ends up being, instead of him having to modify his project to nine, because the numbers aren't working, he can still do 14. And now we have some cash into our housing trust, which we desperately need to further capitalize.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Oh, it's it's the norm, really, to have a calculation. Rounding up is completely bonkers. Yeah.

[John Anderson]: The only reason I ask is, I mean, this is just one data point, but I was over in Chelsea reading the Chelsea newspaper and they have something like this, but it's been ongoing for several years and so far the contributions are zero. But, you know, that's probably just the way they wrote it. Who knows? But I would appreciate some education on this issue before we act on it. Because, I mean, you were sort of speaking Greek to me.

[Chair Doug Carr]: All right, so we actually had a motion to continue this public hearing until May 20th. I think that was May. Second. All right. Ari Goffman-Fishman.

[Chair Doug Carr]: John Began. Yes. John Inneson. Yes. And Doug Carr, myself, yes, six to zero, it passes. We will, I guess, take that up in a couple of weeks. All right, we have left, it's just a couple of minutes, and then some admin and adjournment. So any edits to the draft minutes stated? I guess it's February 4th, February 18th, February 25th, and April 15th. That was quite a cache of minutes that were issued. Any comments or questions about those? If not, I'll accept the motion to accept the meetings as is.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Very good. Ari Goffman-Fishman. Yes. Very good. Dina Calgaro.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Sean Began. Yes. John Anderson. Yes. And myself, Doug Carr. Yes. Motion passes six to zero. Danielle, Alicia, are there any updates on zoning or admin updates?

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Well, I guess the meeting that we found out what that will happen next week. First, I wanted to ask, are people available for this?

[Ari Fishman]: Because it can you tell me more about this? I don't have a meeting for next week on my calendar.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, I didn't send it to because I didn't think there was 1.

[Ari Fishman]: I have to look on my. I would say it would be very difficult for me. M has parent teacher. We have the baby. The baby has medical appointments. Yeah, it's tough.

[Dina Caloggero]: I have to look, I have to look at my work calendar. Let me just grab it.

[John Anderson]: That would be fantastic. This is the joint meeting with the city council. Yes, it is.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: But it's not a but it's not a public hearing because there's nothing Um, nothing was ready to be advertised. It hasn't even been referred out. Alicia, did they actually refer anything out last night or?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: So what they did was they referred it to the whole city council. Okay. Their intention would be to have it presented next Wednesday night for you all to hear it and then all hear it. And then for them also to legally refer it to to this board.

[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: You can't discuss it because it's not a public hearing.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: So you absolutely could discuss it because it's just it's an illegally advertised public meeting. That's not a public hearing for the matter.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: So why would they not refer it? They would refer it to the CD board on Wednesday night. So part of what the city council needs to have quorum to have a vote to refer it so that, and we would trust that they will, and we would like submit the advertisement because for the 27th, it would have to show up in the paper on the 13th. So we would just trust that they were gonna refer it the next night.

So they have to have quorum. But that was one of the things that we discussed, that because it's a legally advertised meeting, this board could be there, they could talk about it, but if this board didn't have quorum, it's okay because you're not actually expected to vote on literally anything. Hal Hallstein, OSBT, Karen Hollweg, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OSBT- Dave Kuntz, OS because the 27th is when you would be expected to have thoughts and comments and opinions.

[Sean Beagan]: Yeah. Is there really? So I guess I'm wondering, is there a need for a joint meeting next week?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: So the intention would be for you to have clarifying questions and not opinions, right? I don't understand that. What does that mean? Like that kind of thing. The rationale is because if they only send it to you on the, if you see it for the first time on the 27th, that they felt that the board needed to have it presented to them and not just, here's some documents, go read them and look at them and show up with opinions.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Fair enough. All right, Paige, and then Dina, go ahead, Paige.

[Page Buldini]: Thank you. So real quick, a few people on this have seen an email that I sent to some of the people on this meeting to hopefully be shared to this board. I have some serious questions because there's a bunch of dates that are in conflict with the high school project, including May 27. And we're asking the hillside neighborhood in South Medford to focus on zoning. and the high school. And I just feel like they're two really important things. And to have to tell a little part of the community, but part of the community, you have to pick a meeting. And they're adults, they're allowed to do that. But I think that's a really hard ask. The mayor did respond to me and say that she was open to changing meetings. And I also appreciate Ennis' contract. But I think if that is one of the main reasons why we're keeping specific meetings, it's hard for me. And now I have a bunch of residents that are reaching out to me also.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: So we have a request. Sure. The city council and this office has only ever heard from one resident. And whether she's actually speaking for other people or just feels in her heart that she is speaking for other people, we don't know that. They should reach out to the city council as well. Thank you, Director Hunt.

[Page Buldini]: I also am a person and I reached out. I am too. So I appreciate that this person is quite polarizing to some specific city councilors, but she is also a resident and she does have a point. And I think you will all see, unfortunately now this week, residents who are on this call tonight will be reaching out because they are focused also on the high school. So I'm not trying to put a specific person up on a pedestal. And unfortunately, I've now heard from city Councilors that that's who they think I am. But that's the politics of Medford. I do want to advocate, though, the hillside in South Medford truly is the only neighborhood that has to focus on this right now. So I think that needs to be noted and really thought about.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: So, so I would encourage to have other people additional people reach out to the Councilors who are scheduling the meetings, they are.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Yeah, so, I mean, you should tell them that you personally want that.

[Dina Caloggero]: Oh, I'm glad. Let me say I'm going to do it too, because I think the meeting scheduled for May 20 is extremely important for the high school. And I know we can submit comments and listen, but I really do believe that when you're at a meeting. Everybody hears the comments, they hear your submission. They are far more effective than sending an email with your comments that is read by that. So you will, I'm going to write an email too. You can't juggle both balls at the same time. And him hearing from residents too, there will be emails.

[Sean Beagan]: Is there any expectation though that the Boston Ab Zone is gonna be approved on the 27th?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: No, that would be opening the public hearing, where you would then ask for changes, ask for edits.

[Sean Beagan]: I would go to the school committee meeting if I had to make a choice.

[Sean Beagan]: I agree, it's the first round, it's not the last round. I think there's going to be, it sounds like there's going to be, I think we'll probably have our own discussion about the Boston app zoning at one of our meetings. I would assume like we did with Medford Square.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I plan to, yes, 100%. Okay. Well, let's see if those dates can be sorted out if possible. I think you guys should all get some numbers.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Can I ask a question then around scheduling and all? Because part of this is that the mayor did not want there to be zoning meetings with consideration and changes during the summer. And so I don't see how you could hear it all for the first time on the 27th. And now you're saying not on the 27th. So then I don't know when. And then in so the first week in June, and then make some thoughts later in June. And then, like, do we continue it to September? Like, how do you do we envision this is going to work? Because somebody and I think it's going to have to be me is going to go back to the city council and the mayor and saying, I'm proposing this. Like do we, does the board then envision that there's a meeting or two in July on this or how does that work? I don't know.

[Page Buldini]: Just because I brought it up, I can happily speak. I was hopeful that the school committee would be the ones because these meetings are set and I know how much, how your office has done such a great job. And that's why I put that in my email, booking these out before January 1st. So that was my hope. It was not my intention to move these meetings, it was my intention to try to create a conversation around high school. And that's why I put in that about the MSBA and their timeline. So it was never my intention to move. And that's why I tried to be clear in my email. Maybe I wasn't clear enough, but I'm trying my best, you know?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Right. I don't think anybody really contemplated the idea that I think they kind of said, oh, we set these meetings and we can't move anything and this is what it is. And that's the impression that I've really gotten, but I'm not on those committees. I only talk to them on the side, I'm not.

[Sean Beagan]: I think it's a good discussion topic for the working group meeting that we have in terms of scheduling. Oh, good idea. How are we going to meet? Because the Ennis contract runs out in June, doesn't it?

[Sean Beagan]: Is that? That's correct. I think the expectation was that we would have Boston Ave done by the end of June, or at least that was the expectation of city council. I think.

[Chair Doug Carr]: No, Matt brings that up literally every meeting we ever have with him. So I'm pretty sure that's the case.

[Dina Caloggero]: But I do think that if you limit the public comment by having two very important meetings at the same time, you're really not going to come up with a very good proposal. And, you know, here's the transparency, right?

[Chair Doug Carr]: But here's the other factor, right? Ines is smart enough to know that what we're looking for is an extrapolation of what we did in Medford Square, right? They know what we care about, about daylight, about historic preservation and about parking. So they should come to the table with a much better product on the first round, because otherwise we're just recycling things. We've made it quite explicit that we expect there'll be differences, but the framework will be the same for Boston Avenue in terms of major issues. And so if they do that and they keep the boundaries where they belong, This could be done in a couple of meetings. It really could be, but if they.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Yeah, I don't draft. I don't think with council planning and permitting committee meeting last night, but it's not a finished draft. Yeah, could see that.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Well, look, I'm not married to this June 30th date. Councilor Leming lives and dies on this date, right? But if it passes and it doesn't work, the world is not going to end. True, true.

[John Anderson]: Can I just comment that I don't know, Doug, I kind of question your assumption that the issues on Boston have will be the same as Medford Square. I think Medford Square was very special.

[Chair Doug Carr]: I maybe I misspoke. I think, I think they will be I think some of the issues we care about will cross over. There will be unique things to Boston Avenue. I don't disagree with that. And it's not cut and paste, but I think it's a starting framework, that's all.

[John Anderson]: And one thing about Boston Ave is we have all these tough zone properties and our zoning sort of has to accommodate the fact that they're a special case.

[Chair Doug Carr]: We know that Tufts is looking for some, they have a shopping list of requests, which we haven't even talked about yet.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Tufts zoning is separate. There's two different things. We've been talking about them at the same time because you have to decide, is this going to be in the Boston Ave or is this going to be in the Tufts? But there's no intention of putting the tough zoning in front of you in May. I'd be stunned if it came in June.

[John Anderson]: You're saying there's no intention of wrapping up the tough zoning by June 30th?

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Right. So there's the map, there's sections that are Boston Ave, and there's sections that are tough institutional zoning.

[Dina Caloggero]: Thanks. You have to set the district. You have to set the boundaries of where they are. I get it.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: Right. But the planning and permitting committee of the city council has been meeting about it. It's been having meetings and having discussions about it. And then they're making, they're sort of putting it forward a their recommended draft.

[John Anderson]: Because we spent many meetings redoing the boundaries of Bedford Square. Right. And West Bedford for that matter.

[Director Alicia Hunt]: And they expect you to do this on this one, which is why they want you to see it sooner rather than later.

[Dina Caloggero]: And just one more thing. You can expect that the public comment is going to be quite robust, because I did listen in to the Zoom meeting that was done at the library, which I thought was quite good. So there were a number of people very, very concerned and some very good comments coming from them. So I do not think that based on what I saw at that meeting, public meeting, that it will be quick. I think we're going to have to listen. I think if you have a meeting, a meeting about the high school with huge tax implications at the same time, we are really going to limit ourselves to hearing from the public. You'll get an email from me.

[Chair Doug Carr]: It's been the philosophy of this board from the beginning of zoning that we are not going to be held to a schedule if we don't think it's the right solution. I think we've got to stick by that.

[Dina Caloggero]: We really need to hear from the people, the abutters, and the people that are affected by the zoning that we propose. It would be ridiculous not to.

[Chair Doug Carr]: All right, anything else on that issue? I think that is the end.

[Chair Doug Carr]: Otherwise, I will entertain and endorse a motion to adjourn. So moved. Seconded. That was fast. Ari Goffman-Fishman.