TranscriptPlanning Board Meeting ~ August 7, 2024

say something over here testing testing testing it's good all right it's good D thank you yay okay we'll do this if it ever happens again all right we'll write it down I do enjoy talking to you though Deon okay we've done the Pledge of Allegiance my apologies to the folks we had a little audio trouble there and we should be up and running we're on number three amendments to the agenda and we have one correct to postpone the should we take care of that you could take it as the item when we get to it okay any other amendments to the agenda um I'd like to talk about future meetings at the end just scheduling out next couple months okay so we'll add uh future meeting

have anything anybody have any problems adding that no seeing none acceptance of meeting minutes um does anybody have any comments on either one or we can do them both together actually have comments on on both okay June 5th let's start with that well it's it's just it's super easy the spelling of my name really uh yeah there's a I don't know who Mark deer is but all through though anytime I made a motion or seconded in here is Mark deer

you it's d e r r d r r is the proper spelling yep we spell check and we'll fix that okay do I have a motion to spell Mark's name correctly please please do second okay any on both of them any other comments on either one or both any objections no no

that's does anybody have any objections the spelling Mark's name correctly uh saying none any other comments on uh June 5th July 10th meeting I'll make a motion that we accept the minutes for June 5th and July 10th with the correction with the correct spelling of Mark's name second second been moved and seconded any further

raise a hand and it passes unanimously middle meeting okay uh we've done the minutes informational exchange on non-agenda items Town officials Mr thear uh just two items the first is that the code officer has issued his monthly report to date there have been six new single family homes built in Durham in 2024 there have been four accessory dwelling units added which I'm not sure if that's preit by the new state law or other factors but um as you know we're supposed to be monitoring housing starts if it gets up to 45 that triggers the discussion of a potential uh moratorium update of the comprehensive plan obviously we're not even close to getting there uh the other issue is uh codification the project to uh transform the current land use ordinance which is either in PDF or uh copy into a digital format so to be uh EAS more easily accessed that process is going to scrub the current language to try to fix a lot

of issues with uh uh confusion and we'll see how that comes out and that uh they have given me the new framework uh they're trying to organize it in a more consistent standardized arrangement of uh provisions and so we're continuing with that work the next step will be for them to do that legal review okay thank you uh anything on the vision for this corner right here3 the select board has appointed a steering committee uh some really uh very qualified people going to serve on that Architects Engineers those types of people building experiences um and we are uh getting together with G of Portland Council of governments uh their staff to kind of update the scope and time frame and we'll hopefully be meeting with this steering committee sometime in September excuse me August to get the project rolling in September okay any questions for George I have just a couple um the codification is that something we're going to vote on

like it will eventually uh go to the select board and the planning board um we're hoping that depending on how much they find and how much how difficult it is to get everything re organized it's kind of like when we did the comprehensive plan we first came in I did an overhaul of the land use ordinance it used to be pretty much illegible before that uh so I did some reorganization just kind of manually as opposed to this uh much higher level uh review and so they're now taking that format and putting it into their standard which is used by most towns in terms of the numbering system and uh and setting it up so that the town in the future will be able to add other ordinances so um and then what they will

do is help us Identify some of the key issues some of these we've been talking about for years like cell towers solar Farms so they're not going to give you the policies for those things uh what they're going to do is take your your current policies and just put them into the appropriate uh legal framework if you know if there are problems with violations of state law try to reconcile those for examp for example mobile home parks your regulations were adopted probably back in the early 1980s or even earlier and they haven't been updated to meet the current state law requirements 20 years ago the state legislature did kind of the same thing on mobile home parks as it's doing now on an accessory dwelling unit so they'll be looking at those sorts of things now if you just want to go with the state standards for mobile home parks then that that's a simple thing but if you want to do something different

as Allowed by the law with what limited flexibility you have uh I don't see that as a big policy issue but there are some others Gravel Pit management for those sorts of things that your your uh Provisions are way outdated so they will not give you they'll give you a sample or perhaps a set of examples of how different towns do it but it's really up to this town to tailor uh its ordinances to deal with those policy issues uh Durham obviously has a High emphasis on Rural Agriculture and um those sorts of

things so different towns treat certain things different like solar Farms we just went through Brunswick has uh you know they have much more liberal Provisions but they put them in commercial industrial areas mostly so uh you can tailor the the ordinance according to your uh community's values

goals comprehensive plan recommendations so they will not be giving you solutions for those things they'll be giving you examples and then we'll have to work through those policy issues after yeah so this is really just a cleanup right that doesn't really need a vote it's going to help us and then anything that comes out of that we need to look at and well I think the other thing it's going to do is it's going to identify those you know the the global list of those issues that need to be addressed and then you can do some prioritization of what you know and when you look at prioritization you look at comprehensive plan recommendations you look at you know development Trends and you know solar and uh battery energy storage system which we'll be talking about tonight those are you know those are the things that are hitting a lot of towns right now so those are could be prioritized and then um accessory

apartments are we keeping tabs on those every year or just like have we seen or monthly as well like we SE we four we see four so far this year yeah which is more than and those may be the first four I don't remember see maybe I'm wrong but I don't remember seeing them on the report before it' be interesting to keep up tabs on that yeah they are yeah code officer is going to do that and he would he runs a total for home so he'd probably run a total for been no duplexes built this year so far okay yeah so the red flag is 45 new

building permits right 45 new housing starts basically and and the accessory dwelling does not fall under new no housing right no it does not yeah so I'm wondering if that's something that we should pay attention to because the the 45 comes from uh role

character make sure that we don't get too big too fast um I'm not sure whether or not the accessory dwelling unit building permits are something that we should pay attention to in regards to that I don't think we've considered that before no no we haven't but you're not even close at this point and we haven't really been in the four years I've been watching it that doesn't mean it won't get back to it again but I think the highest was 31

maybe about 30 yeah it's just a little bit above 30 but I think that's a good point I mean because it the challenge is what kind of accessory unit you know is it just somebody converting the second floor for Grandma versus building a mini home for who I think it's a good point though and I think I and if I'm not I will when I get those I'll keep forwarding them to you yeah thank you yes so I usually get on so I should be getting out guest as dat okay uh George I guess the other one we talked about the vision I think do anybody else have anything else for oh timing on codification when do you crystal ball big guest as I said it

all depend depends on how it goes but they did say there's a chance that we could have this first overhaul in for the April 20 2025 town meeting so we'll see and they and we recognize that that means it pretty much has to be done in October because we're going we're going to want it run it past the town well again all you're doing is just doing the codification you're not adopting new policies right so it's nothing we vote on well well you would vote on it at me so we do vote on it but it's really not a yeah change it's not like you're going to go out and say well do you like the digital format or don't you like the digital format it's kind of like a yeah it's just basically we would still probably still think we need it by the end of the year oh definitely okay definitely by the end of the year it's not something that's strange to we and we'll be able to tell yeah they've completed the first look at it in terms

of proposing a reorganization now they're going to start the uh the legal review Okay so but you you talked about um mobile home parks earlier would they suggest that we change the ordinance to newer mobile home standard will will that raise again red flag like is it if we're going to change the ordinance to meet current standards is that something that well would be what they're going to say is that your current ordinance does not meet state legal requirements and as the code officer and I'm sure you folks would be advised by the town attorney if your uh ordinance is in contradiction of state law you have to follow the state law so it's not like there's a policy option do we want to uh follow state law or not follow state law you have to follow state law so I I think if you wanted to do something different in terms of mobile home park management within the limited scope of the law then

uh you you might want to go deep into it from a public input standpoint but again you've got one mobile home park in town um there's not really of of any applications for mobile home parks uh so it's not a pressing need that you would want and you know if you adopt come into compliance with the state law you can also always revisit the issue in the future so yeah I think if and that's something as we get into this and we discuss it um we'll just have to see what yeah what they tell us we need to take a look at and what that means yeah and if there are issues with it in terms of we just feel we should hold off until next year and get you know do more with it then you can always do that but we theoretically may be able to get this first just uh reorganization of it reformatting of it done in time for the April 2 25 town meeting and then what that would do is whatever amendments you do adopt uh that's that's going to be

the standard process now once you adopt your amendments at town meeting you send them to General code they update everything and cross reference everything so you you know most Towns now have this automatic uh process to do that and

they'll also be posting on the digital uh format and and U platform they'll be um they'll be publishing what draft amendments are there for public review so it's kind of like a contract we have with this company yeah over time yep nice yeah and I think we talked about it before I think we're going to learn from this codification process um what we need to focus on in the future yeah yeah maybe not today yep and then it comes down to how much we can bite off at one time you know three or four changes seem to be our our sweet spot or maybe even our m that we can do as a town so um

that's just something we we need to consider um so anything else on Town officials if not I don't see that we have any public uh I don't either resident or non-resident uh the next one is continuing business we have none new business the completeness review of preliminary plan application for proposed phase two of BOE Hill subdivision map 10 lot 38 public comment will not be taken um so I I think they've asked to be extended to our September 4th meeting and it would take a vote by us to do that so do have mov what's that so moved second second moved in second and any further discussion yeah can we um just a quick discussion of um did they they pushed it out right

they request to be this is their request we we asked for additional in and then they when they saw the staff report in terms of the draft compl incomplete letter they just said why not just wait hold off for another month okay yeah any other discussion seeing none uh if you approve pushing it out raise a hand I see 5 zero

and it's unanimous um the next things on the other business are some of the um land use changes that are being worked on by the town the three that George has listed here are battery storage uh resource protection and U historic preservation and uh battery storage is kind of one that we've taken on so I'd like to spend some time going through that and some of the options and then the other two back uh resource protection and historic preservation that's really more just for your info what's going on with that uh so it's really not we're not at the point they haven't brought anything to us um it is you know Allan Juliet and I are on the the resource protection thing along with members of the Conservation Commission George has done a lot of great work on different options so if you get a chance uh you need to look at it in color but I think the slides are all there for people to look at the different options

um 250 so on and so forth but it he shows in his cor me if I'm wrong the there's the pictures that show what's the what happens to this land if it's 100 feet off from the house that's um Exempted if it's 250 ft off or if you go

with a state um a recent change to the state map which eliminates bigger chunks of of land so again the resource protection is looking at that more detail but if you want to kind of compare some of the some of the changes is that where can we see that well I gave in the packet uh the the overview

of the three options I don't know if we want to wait until we get to that of the third the second item and deal with battery energy first and we can talk about the details of that also I wonder if we should wait and maybe discuss this more next meeting after we talk that's sort of my thought is it but I think in the interim though if Brian and Mark want to look at it yes where can they get get to it okay so what I've done is I've prepared um the summary in the planning board packet yeah so that tells what what the three options are and then it shows the map of the town with what the uh townwide comparison of the impact on the resource Protection District of those three different options and then I gave two examples of a detailed uh comparison between the option one which is gray uh

beginning with habitat developed areas being removed from resource protection and then there's a 250t buffer and 100 foot buffer around existing buildings that John mentioned so I just gave two examples there I've identified about 50 buildings in resource protection uh that are now non-conforming uses and can't be expanded without going to the boards um and the uh be dropping beginning with habitat six plus which the state has recalibrated that whole uh evaluation uh that will pull about 18 of those buildings out of resource protection leaving 30 something additional ones and so we're looking at options for giving relief to those Property Owners so I don't know if you want to look at this point at all because we have num you know the committee uh working group has not really decided what direction to go so I don't know if you want to wait until no I think I would like to wait because I think it's fair for both this and

historic to let them kind of do their work what I was referring to is for Mark and Brian to wait and just you could just see what we're doing but to look in the details you might want to wait okay and George aren't you you're you're having a presentation to the select board on the 13th correct yeah just the same update here were the three options and the other thing the working group has asked is they've asked for select board Direction because uh one of the three options goes beyond uh what they had originally uh targeted giving relief to land owners with existing buildings the starting place for doing that is in my uh estimation the beginning with habitat developed areas map as a as an objective comprehensive planned basis for determining uh how you define or identify developed portions of lots so we started there as the you know the the basis for identifying because remember last year we tried to do this and there was some

concern over well you know what is the developed area of a lot is it 20 acres of field or is it just the yard around the house we took it a formal vote and yeah that lost yeah so so we I went back to the drawing board to find an objective basis and I couldn't find a better one than the comprehensive plan so that's kind of so some of the working group members were concerned that using that as an option to present to the public went beyond the scope of the of the uh Mission assigned by the select board which was to do two things deal with the inaccurate beginning with habitat six plus data we've done that and the second one was to give relief to homeowners who had their buildings put in resource protection making it much more difficult for them to do expansions of their homes so the idea of including option one which is to take all areas identified by beginning with habitat out of resource protection um the majority of the

working group felt that that was going beyond the Mandate wanted to get the select board to endorse that before it went any so that's resource protection as long as we're doing it historic preservation I think is the the historic preservation committee uh has been working on stuff they are uh working with the select board as well with George and the select board so more to follow on that and and George put some information in there on them but again I think it's premature for us to get into a detail discussion and what they're doing until they have some you know to be fair to everybody is they've got something to present uh we don't waste our time talking about things that may never be and I got to say I like George how you presented the info in here kind of like what your thoughts are and then what the commission's thoughts are they select board and town manager asked me to give a comparison yeah I don't see a map you

talked about it I don't see a map that's part of the did you bring up the link for that item that agenda this is just the agenda that I got from you all did you get the agenda did you get the packet there's another 200 Pages it's I found this the easiest if you just go to our go to theb agenda just hit the L sometimes it doesn't link to go the other way so that covers those two things if you have trouble let me know and then getting back to um and then I guess one other question George we haven't it's not on the list is the solar or the Conservation Commission working on solar I don't know that they are I believe they are I've not been involved in that other than giving them some requested GIS uh layers for their analysis and uh I understand that they're looking at uh coming up with some criteria for identifying Optimum

locations for solar farms uh and areas where solar Farms should be dis discouraged and um they're looking obviously at the power lines and they're looking at uh gravel fits there potential Optimum sites uh so that's the kind of analysis that they're doing they're also looking at uh agricultural lands as being particularly of concern that those don't end up all as solar Fe solar Farms so that's the type of research they're doing as I said I have not been directly involved in that okay and all of those like last year with solar will they'll put it together they'll hold the public information resource protection Workshop hold the public information meeting uh something will go they'll send something to the select board who will then say this is what we want send it back to us as the planning board to hold a formal public hearing on any and all that they want to see on the warrant and which I think brings us into battery

energy battery energy storage systems which is kind of the planting boards uh that's definitely in our ballpark whatever sport anology you'd like to use so George you want to kind of you've done some work on moratorium and I think where we left it last uh meeting we tended to be favoring considering either a ban or a moratorium to give us more time to work out uh the details so George has done some good research on the legal how to make how to do either of those legally and just because I wasn't here last meeting um I see the there was four options I think right or three yeah four um that you discuss the deao prohibition Express prohibition draft regulations to address safety and then a temporary moratorium so did you all discuss those and then I was the board in favor how are you thinking were some for prohibition and some for uh temp moratorium I think I think that's a good summary based upon that what George

would find and then those who were here jump in and correct me but if we go if we decide as a a board that going the ban is what we want to do we'd work with the attorney and come up with the right language for the ban the other one is at least I personally feel that given all the unknowns or concerns about uh battery storage we can't get there from here between now on the town meeting right to have really detail the good um safety rules you know solar right in my opinion was relatively easy because it's almost ancient technology I mean there's enough out there on solar farms and de decommissioning all that other stuff battery storage is still I think extremely new so I think what we we thought and again if I'm wrong the give us buy us some time to really dig into uh if we decide that hey we we want to look seriously at having it endur and versus just Banning it we need time to write the right write the right rule

uh for it and I and I appreciate that I just what I'm what I'm wondering is why those two are completely opposite from each other one is prohibition is prohibition like there's none like how can we say that right now versus the other one which is a temporary moratorium which completely makes sense we do not have time before the meeting but why even have that prohibition on the table when we don't even have time to like how can if I recall our discussion was about where our location is and how viable it really would actually bees what do you mean for storage yeah so um my I mean as the one who was pushing the prohibition uh my thought was for AI whole list of reasons rural character safety uh water supply for a whole for those reasons I didn't think that was the right thing to put into to Durham right but S I mean one reason one great example of why we're not even there they don't even need

water they're saying not to use water on these storage systems so the water supply is not as important as we might think it is so I just I'm I'm just I during the moratorium we can decide let's prohibit these things yeah that could but saying right now that we want to prohibit this type of renewable energy that I mean it might not work here but it could work like these these sites aren't huge these sites don't have to be the gorum thing they can be small compact that you can't even see like and a farmer or a landowner might want it or like CMP we have so many corridors like I don't know I just the prohibition right now like well I think I think if we really look at what George has presented to us the the first item there is the statutory Authority for a moratorium and I think we should review that because that will give us time to investigate this further and then at the end during that if we decide we do want

to prohibit them absolutely we come to that decision but same we're going to prohibit right now there was no vote on that no no no I think the remembering my thought was we could present both to the town because I I don't think there's any way between now and first Saturday in April we can get to a good set of Standards no um and so that option kind of went by the by the way side but between now and April of 2026 if that's what we elect to do we could or do we some towns have just started Banning and that and I guess we needed that's part of the discussion tonight is what do we want to do so the moratorium could be sorry I wasn't here guys last time how what's the length of time we have for that you'd have six six months initially at town meeting vote the select board could extend it for another six months and I think Juliet is really raising a good point because if you if you just go with the moratorium

route it's going to simplify your process of of public input and uh and you could end up at this at the place of a Prohibition uh or and it doesn't have to be a blanket prohibition of all battery energy storage it could be just the large scale that are end up being prohibited so the moratorium will give you it'll it'll stop it for at least a year uh and then at the end of the year you will have the language for the prohibition or partial prohibition and so is a six month start at town meeting yes so we would right now kind of keep going researching and then yeah decide on that well the what would happen between if you go with just the simple keep it simple in terms of just go with a moratorium which is a de facto prohibition until for at least a year and so what you could do is focus on the legal requirements for doing moratorium and explain to the public you know what the goals of the moratorium are so you

could really focus on the moratorium rather than trying to get to the issue of should these things be prohibited I think Juliet raises a good point that this study that you do could give you the basis for saying why it should be prohibited including all the public concerns for Rural character and everything else and then your prohibition would be much Sounder when you do it so if that's the way we want to go we're talking about 17 months do

the count off my figures so September October November December January February March April that's 8 about 20 months plus the year so from now and then the way I read this uh the stuff that was well done by George is by taking some kind of action now starting the process whether we vote on it or not that then lets it Go retroactive to a certain date so that it it's not like we have to rush I don't think we have any body before us anyway but we don't necessarily have to rush to get something done um before the April town meeting

right so we have about 20 months to say okay we really want to have the town we want to have a moratorium we can start working on um getting the information about uh these things and then you know the town approves the moratorium we then you know keep digging into it about all the issues in pros and cons and decide what we want to do make a recommendation for April

2026 is that kind of the gist of I mean I I've said my piece what is what is the other board members what are you thinking well my thinking is that we should direct judge to facilitate the sample moratorium ordinance period I mean it's presented to us and by reading through it then it will allow us to go through this process and to bring data forward and not to bring the Fear Factor well there may be a Fear Factor with the data you're not call me a coward are you can you explain no I I don't want I don't want anybody I don't think that is appropriate for this board to basically say we're going to ban it okay period no

and I don't without justification I don't think that was ever on tell why the way iall last time was to have public input there there are people that when we were talking solar arrays we shouldn't have them in town anyway agree but that's the process I mean I and I think what what we talked about what last time was we would present do you want to do them at all I'm talking about this fall MH and then or do you want to take you know take the whatever last 15 16 months and figure out if we can make it work and if that's what we want to do and if not after that time period we can ban it then um that was what it was it wasn't you know we don't get to say I mean we're not as a board it we don't get to say we're not going to do this cor it's got to go to the town so the question was do we is do we present two options a ban and a U or a moratorium I

I don't think as of right now I don't think that we have information to even be presenting a band ex exactly we would be you know what we would be doing if we ask that question right now is people that don't want them would say no people that are interested would say yes we wouldn't have any data backup at all to explain one or the other right like that's what I'm saying like just give us some time to look into it that 20 months we may come to the end where we are pushing like yeah we don't want these things here correct correct right but like right now it's just so premature I think your thoughts I mean I I agree

that we need the research I think at this point we don't have hardly any information on these things other than some of the scary stuff we've seen from New York but and we're not the only town a lot of towns in Maine are going through this like I'm talking with some of my my co-workers and like they're in the same exact boat like looking for help looking for resources and they're just not they don't have it either so we're not alone sorry to interrupt you that's that's okay your thoughts um yeah you know this this came across our table and the select board said you guys look into it and we've done squat so yeah we need to do a lot more research for sure it's a good point should we bring it up in the 13th to the select board no I I kind of over you know I think at this point particularly we're not going to make a recommendation one way or another and we're just going to ask ask them for more time well we're going to ask our

our recommendation is a moratorium if that's what we want to do yeah I mean if we're asking for more time I don't think we need to go to the maybe we don't maybe we don't I just it wasn't sure yeah I think you want to really frame it a little bit better what you mean by moror and we should discuss that now want to go in that direction could you explain the difference between you mentioned the moratorium is kind of like a de facto prohibition versus the temporary moratorium okay so option one we kind of eliminated last time was to was to get legal input on whether or not just under the adopted conditional use criteria you could deny one of these things if it came in just using a conditional use criteria scale intensity of use those sorts of generalized and I think the answer would be depending on what the proposal was yes but the difficulty with that is that some of these uh proposals are being built by

multinational corporations that have lots of resources in terms of experts and legal teams and so the town would be at a great disadvantage to try to build a case that something couldn't be approved because of the concerns for fire safety when they bring in five experts that testify that these things are perfectly safe uh we have redundant safety precautions we have all of this technology we will provide whatever the town needs if if it just would be more difficult to defend your position uh if you don't have any specific standards so that's not an

optimal approach to this it's you don't want to set that like expectation either right you know yeah and that's part of the difficulty is you're basically declaring your bias before they even Comm in Yeah by saying we're going to use our conditional use criteria as a de facto prohibition that's on the public record okay so that's what that is got it yeah yeah that's what that was well I mean that was as as a possibility I mean it could be as Juliet said they come in and W us with a whole bunch of if you're useing number one number one option say look at it is safe we're using this um you know there was something iron air that came up in the Portland paper today that's supposed to be a lot safer than lithium batteries so if they came in and said here's you know here's our track record as a company I you may very well just say you know look at I can't justify saying no on this one on unconditional use so

okay but but it is when when we look through the material that Jorge is presented to us one of the issues here specifically speically spells out statutory requirements to enact a moratorium and if you read that there are a couple bullet points here and one of them that really catches my eye one of it say well the first one says to prevent a charge of overburdening of public facilities whether it be sewer water roads the second one that really

caught my eye is because existing plans ordinances or regulations if any are inadequate to prevent serious public harm So based on the state statutes that right us a starting point to establish tomorrow comments is that what you're thinking too well yeah it clearly as Allan just pointed out this issue meets the the criteria for a for a moratorium but that would not be an adequate basis to uh to prohibit them no that's it's a moratorium it's a moratorium then we do two separate things y sir then we do further investigation so as I'm thinking through this in general we would propose a moratorium we would take that to the town for information this fall and say hey we're going to do this because you know that second bullet because we don't think we're there with enough information um and then we'll take and then coming out and we'll start but the next meeting we will start working and we can start then before then we can

start digging into hey New York this is their they have these rules that we ought to consider them um gorum I hopefully have sent that to you if but not I will the gorum uh conditional use approval for for um their big operation there had some

good uh rules ideas in it you know like which NFP the national fire protection thing to use um and there were a whole bunch of which is a start and then George has done a lot of great research and Juliet's brought stuff to us and then we just say okay which of these things do we want to do it work with the fire chief is a big player in that uh Road commissioner is I think a big one too in terms of where is you know what kind of rules do we want to put on where is it going to go um and then just as

the conservation folks are doing with solar Farms where don't we want them so is there a place that is potentially environmentally sensitive because if it melts down it's going to leak into runaround Pond or you know is there some places that we as we're looking at this that we start off now saying these are areas that we're not going to let it go because they're environmentally sensitive but those those are kind of details that we then spend the next amount of time so so step one I mean it doesn't seem to be to be a lot of work George except maybe have because these things can be legally controversial to have our new attorney kind of draft something up or MMA or somebody draft something up and says this m this moratorium passed by the town at the town meeting will suffice you know against any argument that you acted MH arbitrarily or whatever the legal pain is to that does that make sense couple notes um one is like I said

main is we've got these um I don't know if they're laws yet but things are driving storage in the state but yet people are not ready for it it's just like solar similar um solar's a little pass but um I would really defer to New York is doing a lot of good work with storage like they've got um a fire group that's studying storage they've got local codes draft um policy codes that are um are really good to look at so that's one state that's somewhat nearby that's doing a lot Vermont is also doing quite a bit um so I would lean on those

States unfortunately main we don't really have any area except for Goram which is not like Durham at all no they put theirs in a Industrial Park right next to a major power plant so we don't have right anything that's that even comes close to that the one the new one I don't know if you've all been able to open it but the one up in Lincoln is going on an Old Paper Mill so those are different worlds than Durham you know they're not really worried about rural character on top of an old uh paper mill or Rumer that put it next to a gas fir power plant and and a dam so I mean that's something as we're going through this and we're getting feedback from people that you know what does this do and I would encourage anybody who's going past Rumford um the good news is in the 20th of August Mexico will no longer have a police force so he can fly through Mexico but my last piece on that is New York and Vermont they are looking at

rural towns so they're not just focused on the gore so there's some examples there the other thing um you did mention um a developer that was interested um if that comes up are we kind of safe that okay so let's talk about the moratorium in terms of the process so as

John suggested what we would do and interestingly enough uh MMA had all of these fact sheets on different aspects of the moratorium and they gave as an two examples one of those was durm apparently back in the 1990s the town adopted a moratorium uh the town of Durham and so they use that as an example of of doing a moratorium uh so that's pretty good we can use that as the template uh I will

make sure I have the right project when I do [Laughter] it um and I apologize for that that that was good right here you've disappointed me with that cheap shot George I no that was a bazinga that was see it's fair yeah but before we get any deeper usually I'm the one who's saying stupid stuff George not that that was stupid but very resembl that remark okay get back to business here um

so basically the uh we would we would draft something I would draft something and then run it by MMA Andor the town attorney to to make sure but it's pretty clear if MMA is using that as a template it it probably covers the basis so all we would need to do is fill in the current information with this specific land use that we're discussing so in terms of the goals of the moratorium because that's part of it what will you do during this moratorium period uh conceptually what I'm envisioning is that you would spend the first six months of the allowable moratorium time frame to really research these battery energy storage systems what are the issues um and you wouldn't necessarily look at it from from the standpoint of this is something that the town would never consider because of rural character fire safety or anything else I think you would want to take an objective Viewpoint of looking at these

things what are the costs and benefits so for example the town has some concern about tax base and the limitations for economic development to address tax base and so you could look at what are the economic benefits of these if they were tax exempt that's that's one matter but if they are all taxable real estate and they're in the millions of dollars then that could be a substantial benefit to the town and then you would balance that out with well what are the costs to the town in terms of rural character in terms of safety in terms of uh burden on public services so one of the things you see in these uh studies being done by States like New York as you see that you know it's one thing to have NFPA standard this that and other it's another thing to have the Personnel available to confirm that it meets those as a peer review stage but also once it's up and running you have the emergency response capability so you

certainly don't want rural volunteer firefighters going into an industrial accident type situation without proper training or equipment and so those would be the types of things you'd look at conceptually during phase one of the moratorium and then uh at that point those results of that analysis could be presented to the select board and the select board could then say okay let's go ahead and continue the moratorium and set a direction for drafting of whatever the town policy is going to be either proh prohibiting them limiting them to certain types that are within the capacity and character of Durham so I would envision as a kind of a two-step process with the first proc step being evaluation of the issue the opportunities and the challenges of this technology and land use and then the second phase being let's put together a plan for how we're going to do it if we're going to do it so we kind of I

think we talked about this last meeting getting back to the taxes part of it we would not talk about or or try to decipher what needs to happen taxes so we would have some help or we need help from yeah and I think one of the issues will be who's going to lead this effort is it going to be the planning board is it going to be a special ad hoc committee are you going to hire a consultant to do this because that's what many communities do especially with something of this technical nature and part of the concern that I would have and advise you of is that in looking at New York they most of this is being driven by the industry uh because they want to see this work they want want to see it but they have that bias of you know if there's a safety problem they can say well we we have all the safeguards involved but then that depends on the people who are operating it yes and it depends on The Regulators

do they have the capacity to deal with you know enforcement and inspections and all of those things so there is a bias there in the industry wanting it to work and I just think you need to look at that pretty much everything I've looked at was industry driven or government policy Alternative Energy policies driven which are moving in the same direction of there may be problems but we'll overcome them that's the that's the concern I have with most of the research so if the town were to hire its own independent consultant it would be representing your interest rather than the interest of the energy industry or the government Alternative Energy industry so those are just some things to think about how do you who's going to do this does the planning board or anybody else in in this town have the expertise the time the resources to do this right or should the town consider hiring a consultant and then you know

getting that report done by a professionally qualified consultant and I I think to the latter half that question at least if if we're going to go with the moratorium and do the research and we're going to hire a consultant that is maybe it's two different votes but that's a vote at the town meeting because if there no money to hire somebody so it would be part of the town's budget uh and the town's approval for that budget so we could do some of the preliminary re which was already started and start getting into that a little bit but if we decide to go to the town the select board we go to the select board with we'd like to have a moratorium and yeah for six months and then this is the phasing I like the phasing you put out there if we don't feel like the planning board or anybody in the town is is the right people to do that has the right technical expertise oh by the way we're going to want 10,000

30,000 whatever the the budget is to to hire somebody to do this for us um and so that's you know that's one vote two votes at the Town um to say okay would and I would suggest that you do the moratorium bot question warrant question and then if you get the resources to do it you can do a better job if you don't get the resources you can still do a job it won't be as as solid it won't be as convincing it may be limited because one of the things you might want to do is a fiscal impact analysis to say this is one of the things that I learned many many years ago uh when they did started doing fiscal impact analysis and You' probably heard you know the analysis residential always costs the Town Money open space pays all of those kind of generic Impressions that people have but we did a study of uh of because fouth was updating its comprehensive plan like back in the 1992 992 recession and uh so obviously

everybody was thinking Economic Development because you're in a recession after building boom and bust and uh you know we hired a consultant uh planning decisions to do a fiscal impact analysis and what they found was that um the the communities that had the highest rates of tax increases were Freeport and Scarboro and You' think wait a minute they're getting all of that Economic Development all of the commercial industrial why how come their taxes are going up faster and what they found was that the uh school funding formula is that when you increase your ta commercial tax base you can uh the state says well they've got a lot more money now they don't need as much from from us and so they cut School subsidies and state revenue sharing which then led to all of the Tiff tax increment financing proposals and then you think okay well we can Tiff it and that way the state won't take that money uh and won't keep

that money that they Pro usually give us but then the problem is with Tiff is that when you create a tax increment financing District whatever taxes you shield from or tax base you shield from the state has to be dedicated to the Tiff District so it cannot be used for other purposes you usually use that to pay for the infrastructure which 20 years later 30 years later after those improvements are paid off then it has the long-term tax benefit but not the short-term tax tax benefit so that type of fiscal impact analysis could be part of this you know would a 10 10 million

battery storage system placed in Durham be great for the taxes well maybe yes maybe no yeah and you want to include that in this analysis you have to make sure that in no way shape or form does it ever go to a nonprofit ta status yeah which is hard to do but if somebody says oh you know we're a nonprofit we've we've given this to the to the harbor seals of Camden uh well more likely what you end up with you might have a state Institution or educational those are the types of big impact uses that are tax exempt uh it wouldn't be necessarily NE need to be a not for-profit it could be just tax exempt U I'm not sure exactly with the utilities where that line starts and stops but uh that's just something you would again that's all part of a fiscal impact analysis and the question is should this moratorium if you want to find out reasons why the town would want it should that be part of it it and then that argues for a

consultant with expertise to be able to do that kind of analysis along with the safety the technology and all of those other things it's a big deal so I think what we're saying is is that going forward in the in the near term we work on the moratorium language yep we start doing some more research uh again we've already got some going but what we take to the town in information meetings and in the town meeting is

here's the moratorium and here's what it means and here's you know what we're going to do over the next 12 months that are left by the time we get to April yeah to get to get there so and we we may come to you with it don't do this we may come to you with do it but do this and oh by the way this is what we'd like to pay to do that and I think you got to be upfront with that this is what we're going to ask you to pay to to do that yeah so so I think just conceptually going into a public participation process on this moratorium what you might be able to do through the public participation process is kind of identify what would the town support in terms of of a study you know would it want to see a fiscal impact analysis to see if it could be a tax benefit to the town um obviously you'd want to see the the safety aspects and you know there's also a component of the constituency of the Town that's very much Pro

Alternative Energy uh so you could kind of gauge public input on you know are all of those equal in terms of public support or are some priorities over others and some people don't really care about or aren't interested in so that could be your public participation process would be to try to refine the basis and the goals of the moratorium so those 15 people who come to the public information meetings 109 who come to the town but they all represent a lot of people in the community so what if we like plan on the moratorium starting in April but from now till then we reach out with like an advert

you know like hey we want to get to a best group together we're looking for engineers we're looking for people in the space we're looking for really anyone that's interested too right we do want that other side M as well but like form a working group unless if you had that all ready to roll right after the town meeting that would be well no I'm talking earlier than that like so no what I'm saying is you get get that groundwork of organization done so that when the town meeting approves it you're ready to roll but what do you all think about that instead of unless we all want to work on this as a planning board along with everything else we're doing this is going to be a lot um and I and I feel like we're all really smart SM people but I would love to see who El I think we have some people in town that um might be able to help they could be totally involved with this in their professional career yeah I'm thinking

engineers and who those people may it it is amazing me the talent that is here in this town that yeah we just have to tap into it but how do we do that and you all we all could be part of it as well if you wanted but but it would be an outside thing it wouldn't be a planning board it' be more than you could handle with everything else yeah just need to keep it on track I mean in terms of timing and stuff kind of like solid waste's that that's right on track uh or the Downtown Vision

um I'm okay with that I think but I don't know why you couldn't if you got that together in SE say September since it's you know close to the middle of August where they would start but they would start say hey look at we this may no go nowhere but we'd like to have you start taking the New York stuff and the Vermont stuff and the gorm stuff and and so on and so forth and the industry stuff and start putting that uh together educating yourselves absolutely yeah and and so that you can start um I mean there's a lot to do it but I think there's you find some ordinances that you like and you just start cutting and pasting you know whatever they are ordinances or draft ordinances or whatever so I'm fine with that and um

but I also like your idea of kind of getting a cost together for a consultant like to see what that would be if we want to go to the consultant thing we're going to in soon because the town's going to put their budget together starting in like December and so I anybody a swag of what we're talking about it's $5,000 that's one thing if it's 30,000 yeah it depends I it's going to be it's probably going to be more like yeah what I would do is I would start contacting some planning firms uh

uh there's one at Pineland um that's doing a lot of planning um and so I would talk to them about this type of a study yes is that something you you yeah I would I would get in touch with the fiscal impact study well the overall study of uh you know the moratorium goals and what we're looking to do and just kind of see what they their thoughts would be and you know if they're not able to do it from a capacity standpoint or an exper then who do they know that could I could probably give you some names too yeah that would be great yeah to get an estimate just a wall Park estimate kind what are we studying you know what other Studies have been done yeah even if they're not interested or don't have the capacity they could give you a rough ballp Park as to what you're looking for for cost and I think you know that's the that's probably the first if you get a certain amount and it costs more you can

do what you can with what you got exactly y but at least you'd have something to work with yeah and we can see what the town thinks about that yeah and you're assuming that there are folks in town that even though they have the professional capacity they might not want to be interested well that and it's going to be a lot of work but also really no one is doing this in Maine like it's not it's it's something that people are talking about but it's not it's hard to find people in Maine that are putting a storage battery remember if gorum just expertise to even there's yeah I think the engineers can help there's you know fire um the other thought I had was this you know we've kind of started this as a new process the idea of a fall public parti participation process and I think if you're looking for people that might be qualified and interested if you advertise you're going to be doing a public information on battery energy

storage systems you might get them get them right there yeah yeah yeah I think okay I think that's a good so you're talking about a um what you is kind of say hey we'd like to come in and talk about battery energy storage not to have something to present them no what I'm talking about is is announcing that you're going to be considering working on a moratorium and then here are the issues why the planning board is considering this and just put out some of the information summary of the information that we've come up with and then put that on the town website uh get it out on the news flash and everywhere else say on whatever the date's going to be you're going to have a public public information meeting on battery energy storage systems people might come to find out about it uh Pros cons otherwise and from that pool you know that input you might get Identify some people but I also think we could be more proactive

and be like we're looking for people to be on this in that c in that advertisement sure because I think what you when you what you don't want to get with a announcing a search is just somebody who is either very you know see I really like this idea or I'm really against this idea but I don't have a clue what I'm talking about that's what you don't want is somebody screening process that the select board should go through people appointing people to the commission or make sure that looking for people with experience or knowledge in Energy Systems battery energy storage and that are objective yeah that's hard to hard to U quantify you can get a general qualitative sense uh and one more aspect of this to consider is the retroactivity and so from what I read of the MMA materials uh this could be retroactively applied even as a moratorium um you know obviously for many decades the state of Maine has

allowed retroactivity of ordinances so that if someone generally under Maine law in Most states if someone files a development application and you start a substantive review it's like we have this completeness checklist not substantive once you start your substantive review they are basically grandfathered against any new regulations you might adopt as a community so that's the general principle it's been in effect for decades but in recent years the main legislature has supported retroactive ordinances uh under certain conditions so and now the MMA materials indicate that that also applies to moratoria and one of the uh issues is the the

public U announcement of you whe whether you're adopting an ordinance or drafting an ordinance for consideration by the legislature or a moratorium if people are on notice that this is in the works then they can make a business decision of whether to invest in what they're doing or not or to what level they're going to invest in it and so the courts have recog Iz that if this if a town announces it's going to be doing a moratorium say for example if you went to the select board Labor Day and and propos to the select board at a public meeting um it's on their agenda it's on the on the website that the select board will be considering planning board recommendation to propose a moratorium for consideration at the April 2025 town meeting then that's now public record so if there's some bigan company in California that's looking at property in Durham uh and they're in negotiations on an easement or lease or purchase of the

property uh and they do that once that public record is established and they don't do due diligence they can't claim that we went in Reliance on the ordinance we spent all this money the town's liable you have to give us our permits on whatever other claims they might try to make so so getting it on the public record apparently according to the MMA information we looked at uh would be important in terms of your ability to sustain a retroactive moratorium because between now and town meeting you can't do anything from a standpoint of adopting either a moratorium or an or ordinance okay so on that note um we should be you know ready to talk about it like maybe next month

September Labor Day after Labor Day right like announcing necessarily have to be the proposal it could just do a report to the select board indicating over the summer you've looked at this issue and you think that the Town based on you know the research that we've looked at the uh MMA guidance on moratoria we think that the planning the planning board would like to pursue preparation of a of a Mortor moratorium warrant article uh for consideration at that's what we would like to put out to a public uh input process and based on that public input process then we would decide to go forward so we just get it on the record now that the town is looking at this so we could do that in a letter or just show up at the select board meeting there last one in August I think next Tuesday is a little early a little yeah I think we should look at have your have your September meeting uh and maybe I could draft a memo uh for

you to consider the what you want to say to the select board at this point and then we can bat that around at the September meeting and then if you make a motion at that meeting to Comm send a report to the select board uh with some of this information that we've collected uh and indicate the planning board's intent to conduct a public participation process over the fall uh and draft a moratorium for the April town meeting then uh then I think you'd cover that base of making it public yeah and maybe

um note that we want to start a committee or commission recommended two or three bll yeah so that would be September our meeting is September 4th M September 10th would be I think their first meeting so we'd be shooting for September 10th yep and again if you vote on this at that at the September meeting that you're going to do a report to the select board and you you've already started the public notification process okay well yeah we do

that because a moratorium is different than here's the land use article with standards you know that's an odd duck if you will that may or may not uh draw attention I mean who knows if somebody's going to show up next week and say I I beat you to your your moratorium idea why isn't this discussion well that's what I going to ask could we go thank you could we just go on the 27th of this month should we

make it as kind of formal as you know I think you should I think you should have a report that you all review endorse and make that formal request to the select board that they they give endorsement to going forward with this so if we added this to the meeting minutes of tonight can that just count well we should I think we should have a motion that gives George that direction ask me to prepare a report but maybe if it does come down to it like someone comes in the next couple weeks we could be like well actually we did talk about it a couple weeks ago so right on July 10th when you look back I think it's like when we had an appeal go to the board of appeals people were trying to get their lot done new resource protection came in so the appeals board looked at yeah what actions had you taken at what specific times so that's why I'm trying to say let's do it formally uh thoroughly because if it ever does go to court the

better the record you have as opposed to oh the select the planning board just discussed it as an idea at a meeting and then told the town planner uh to start working on it so that's not solid in my mind well could we get us and this may not be the most solid thing but do we start the process and by some protection with Allen's comment why don't we just have a motion right now tonight that says we want to we will ask the select board for a moratorium that's what we in whatever the right term is there and say we discussed this as early as July 10th look at our meetings we had a vote uh and then do the more formal thing on September 10th well we really didn't the July 10th we basically had a lot of discussion about it I'm sorry I not tonight I didn't mean July 10th right well there was no vote on July 10th I think we should have a vote with Direction T tonight yeah tonight yeah I'm sorry thank you that's what I was

saying too is like we have it in the record for today but formally we'll do our thing can you vote reference July just to bring it back a little further well the good I mean I think it's only an issue if they if theyed about an application nobody's filed an application yeah I mean I I want to be careful that um we don't say well we

tried to do this just to prevent something right what we're trying to do is say we're not ready for battery storage as of whatever tonight is August whatever we decided we're going to seek in a moratorium and we'll provide the formal request to the select board on what they say it was 10th or what September 10th 11th yeah does that make sense yes so um I would make a motion I'll

second that okay oh were you going to say what the motion is sorry sorry okay what's your motion I would make a motion that I get paid more for mon we have a second um uh give me a sec second to uh I will make a motion that planning board has uh

decided that the way to go forward is a moratorium and that uh we as of today and we will provide a formal request to the select board no later than September 10th I think whatever that day is the first Tuesday second yeah first Tuesday second second Tuesday just say the the first select board meeting in September in September is that good enough do we think go ahead Julia I I'll second that we have a motion in a second sounds great we'll let George finish writing who seconded I did jul

writing it down George because it was so BR brilliantly phased that I don't want to lose it okay so the motion is that uh the planning board will recommend a moratorium and we'll ask the select board at the uh first select board meeting in September for formal endorsement of that uh proposal do we want to say something about the the planning board believes the the best way forward is more time I mean if that's that's good that's good with everybody else I I don't well yeah it is at this

point okay I don't want to have an all outright ban at this point yeah that's fine so all those in favor of the motion that I vote for this one so now you guys have 20 months to convince me how you will you will listen to us won't you I I am 20 months you got a chance to sell me I think it passed unanimously yep what else

had added something to the agenda yeah just to talk about schedules um I know I'm going to be out I believe our November meeting um I just wanted to make sure we'll have a quorum right for for everything so if folks are going to be out any anytime the next couple months maybe we should talk about that I think I'm going to be out November meeting I know that's far out but I just wanted to doesn't hurt um to anybody out so we need obviously the Quorum is three if we only have three then anything gets approved has to be unanimous because our rule says it's it's the you know the total five I I think the best thing to do is have at least four so that you know something doesn't die on a two to one vote um good bad or otherwise or or gets

approved on a two to one vote when it shouldn't be or maybe we could do this like via email everyone's really active on it like if you're going to be out the following maybe let folks know and then we could plan on letting the alternates know if we need more someone to come we're getting into the holiday season and I will add something U about the alternates too but is that um I don't have any plans so you know the first first Wednesday almost almost always works for me October is iffy for me

might not be here for the October meeting okay is there anybody else that may miss October at this point no I should okay so that would um not not you guys get a bunch of texts um are you going to be out anytime soon no okay how about you so we have four and I can try to get Tyler or uh Ann so we got at least four for October I'll know more by the end of the month but right now it's not looking like I'll make it well and if people have plans I you know we should always we should always go with it but I think I guess to go back just a step in October for sure I would expect we'll have uh there may be more we'll have Boe Hill uh want to anyway tentatively we have Bo Hill uh I would tentatively I think we'll have um Ruby Lane Ruby Farms

whatever it may be so we have those two um subdivisions coming in uh dayare condition site plan review daycare site plan review uh and so that's at least three it would be yeah I mean it' be nice if we get some of these first you know done here um like the site plan review if they're ready to go in September that'd be which I don't know when they'll be ready to go um so September we could probably count on those three or expect those three what'll be left in in in October at least two of them probably of the three uh and then whatever else comes in afterwards uh November we should start whittling that down but somebody again could come in with uh a big project so October probably four November probably four I will ask uh Tyler and an in fact

I kind of been pushing this down the hill as long as everybody's here I'll throw this out um they both have been great but I kind of think it's kind of like you got to start coming you know commit to me now that you you're going to start making meetings and if we need you you're going to be there I mean an always has when when we've gotten down to Quorum or below she has she has come but I recognize it's difficult but coming for a meeting and voting is difficult because you got to watch the movies and everything else and so somewhat problematic if that's the best way to do it so I will tell both of them are they you know are they committed to doing this and I don't if they're watching I don't mean to offend them because they've been great participants in the past and then if you know anybody else who's interested in in stepping up to the plate as a alternate to the alternate or just as an alternate we can

we could go with that uh that too so uh I will try to keep filling stuff so I like that idea um the alternate excuse me could sit at the table right and and participate so I think that just that right having another person at this table with us I mean absolutely both of those bring good ideas they just you know haven't been here here uh they just can't vote I mean if if we if there were if there were three of us we would move and Alternate up there were four of us we could decide if we wanted to bring an all but by being here as you know Mark was uh stepped up and Tyler and Tyler did before you when it if Boe Hill comes up and you you sit through the first phase and when the second phase comes up you can say yeah I I was there I heard what you all were saying my questions got answered I can vote yay or nay on this project because I'm familiar with it um so maybe put a an ad out I know there's

a there was a couple I don't know if they've been filled but let me ask let me ask both of them then I think yes we putting something on all things not all things dur the town's website and say planning board is looking for alternat kind of deal and and generating that so yeah I know Tyler mentioned I think Wednesdays were just really hard for him it is um but I don't know if that was a longterm thing or shortterm so uh yeah good question because I don't I know that was for wherever he was going in Boston he was spending all day or day plus and it was difficult for him to to make it back for 6:30 y um all right

well thanks for talking about schedules yeah and if you if you have a problem uh just let me know you know if you God forbid get any of the various viruses that are out there even if they short notice just let us know and I hope that's not the case but people do like to take vacation and stuff yeah I can't afford it so I stay home so I tell my wife I got to go to platty board as George will tell you I passed up an opportunity to see an old friend of mine to go be there in September wow Dedication that plus I can't hang with them

else I will take a motion to adjourn so move second all the favor raise a hand let's turn everything off please turn your mics off thank you all very much this is this was a good good meeting yeah