you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you All right. Good evening, everyone. Time is now 702 and today's day is May 5th, 2025. Please stand for the Pudge of Allegiance. Thank you. First item on the agenda is a proclamation for National Police Week for May 11th through 17th 2025. And it reads to recognize National Police Week 2025 and to honor the service and sacrifice of those law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty while protecting our communities and safeguarding our democracy. Whereas there are more than 800,000 law enforcement officers serving in communities across the United States, including the dedicated members of the government. The government has been committed to the development of the government. The government has been committed to the development of the government. The government has been committed to the development of the government. The government has been committed to the development of the development of the development of the development of the development the Narragant St. Police Department. Whereas the names of these dedicated public servants are engraved on the walls of the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in Washington, D.C., whereas 345 new names of fallen heroes are being added to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial this spring, including 148 officers killed in 2024 and officers killed in previous years. Whereas the service and sacrifice of all officers killed in the line of duty will be honored during the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund's 37th Candolite Vigil on the evening of May 13, 2025,, whereas the Candelite Vigil is part of National Police Week, which will be observed this year, May 11th through the 17th, whereas May 15th is designated as Peace Officers Memorial Day in honor of all fallen officers and their families and US flags should be flown at half staff. Now therefore, be it resolved that resolved that the town of Narragansett will observe May 11th through the 17th, 2025 as National Police Week in the town of Narragansett, and publicly salutes the service of law enforcement officers in our community and in communities across the nation. When this is my hand in the official seal of the town of Narragansk, County of Washington State, Rhode Island, this fifth day of May 2025. Thank you to our Narragansk Police Department for all of your services to our town. So, we're going to be able to do that. We're going to be able to do that. We're going to be able to do that. We're going to be able to do that. next item on the agenda is the town manager's update, Jim. Good evening members of the council. Good evening members of the council and the public at home. And those of you here this evening are our mobile integrated health program that has run through the fire department. EMS has received an additional funding of $52,000 from the round department of health. And it's going to extend the program out to September 29th in town. It will be on the next agenda for acceptance of the grant. The NAIJIBPO police negotiations have commenced and we will be meeting this week. Also congratulations to an AirGansify captain Kevin McKennery. He's being recognized by the Round Department of Health Department of Health, Center for Emergency Medical Services. We've been informed that he is selected to receive the Excellence in Mobile Integrated Health Community Paramedicin Award as part of 2025 EMS Week. And we'd like to congratulate him for a job well done. And the only other thing we have on there is that we continue to work on the budget that's being presented this evening. Thank you. Thank you. Does anyone on the council have any questions for Jim? Seeing none. Next item on the agenda is the approval of minutes. Is there a motion to approve the minutes of the April 7th, 2025 regular meeting? Motion to approve. second. Any discussion? All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes, 5-0. Next is open forum. Just as a reminder that if you are getting up to speak during open forum, you are limited to three minutes and you may only speak on topics that are not on the meeting agenda. So is there anyone who wishes to speak during open forum? Yes please come forward. Sorry what? Oh well we'll start with Melissa and then we'll go to the list. Sorry about that. I'm going to go to the committee. Good evening. My name is Melissa Jenkins. I live at 4 Bayberry Road. Town Council members, I speak today about a matter of urgent and growing concern. One that I've raised privately before but that now demands public attention. Within Narragansett exists a subordinate layer of government, the Bonnet Shores Fire District. Though it once served essential public functions, it has long since abandoned that role, and today operates as a quasi-municipal government body with the authority to tax, make laws, seize property, and even imprison people for up to 30 days, with little or no oversight from this council. Let's be clear, the Bonnet Shores Fire District is entirely within Narragansett. While its charter was granted by the state legislature, that charter is still subject to the laws, standards, and principles of this town. And yet, the town has stood by, while rights of residents, your constituents, have been repeatedly violated. A private corporation has effectively taken control of the fire district through an unconstitutional charter using its majority voting power to grant itself special privileges. Public land for private gain, no bid contracts misused public services and taxpayer funded grants. These abuses are not theoretical. They are happening right now. Worse, residents who speak out are bullied, threatened, even assaulted. Police are regularly called to fire district, because residents are being harassed for daring to speak out against this corruption. There are 86 special districts in Rhode Island, and 81 of them use the exact same rules, but somehow we have a special set of rules in Bonnet Shores, and that needs to change. This is your jurisdiction, it's your responsibility, you are empowered and obligated to act. You can take clear decisive steps today. Urge the general assembly to close the unconstitutional loophole that allowed this takeover and act a local only Narragansett residents may vote in subordinate districts within the town. Provide real oversight of the corrupting corporations, operations, and its interactions with police. What you cannot do is claim that this is outside your authority. The fire district operates within Narragansett. Its actions directly affect our residents, their rights, property, and peace of mind. Standing by in silence is not neutrality, it is complicity. This is your moment to act for transparency, for transparency, fairness, civil rights, and the rule of law in our town. The residents of Narragansett are counting on you. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? We're just speaking for open forum. I do have the loose Daleks. Oh, I'm sorry, the list. Thank you. Let's go through the list first. Sorry about that. The first speaker is Vicki Baud. Good evening. Hi, Vicki Baud 155 Winterberry Road. I'm here tonight to express my disappointment as well as my curiosity at not being considered for one of the two openings on the Narragansett Housing Trust's collaborative that advises the town council on housing issues and ideas. I submitted along along with my application, my extensive experience of 25 years of housing in this town. I was part of the staff of the town who set up and implemented the rental registration system, which Jim Durkin, as you know, you were there as well. I then began working for the Narragansett Housing Authority and the Narragansett Affordable Housing Corporation for the past 20 years. My professional experience in housing was not considered in either of the openings, yet I was responsible for being instrumental on establishing the Clark Point condominiums. My position wasn't considered even after you had expanded the group to include an extra member. Your responsibility to us is to appoint experienced people to these advisory panels. Thank you. Thank you. Anthony Torre. I would just speak on the zoning. Not at this time. Not at this time, Agenda. Miss Torrey same thing? It was up to different. No problem? Mark and Robin Magnan. Ed Jim, can you just repeat that? Sorry. Mark and Robin. Is it Mangan. Oh, no worries. Carl Balanstein. Thank you. John Gupa, Jr. Esquire. Okay. I said the latest or legal licenses. Yep. So we'll make sure everyone gets acknowledged during the hearing. Thank you. David Fontes. Is it? Catherine Celebrito. Yes. Catherine Celebrito, 48, it was caught. Two items. First, I want to say that you hit the town clerk lottery when the town council appointed Miss Mason. She's very knowledgeable. She's not afraid to work. That's for sure. And she is very easy to deal with. It's not afraid to work, that's for sure. And she is very easy to get along with. And I say that as somebody who's not always that easy to get along with. Okay, second item is I'm trying to still try to get an answer as to why are three unrelated and three student ordinances on to being enforced. The last response I received was the new five unrelated pass by the state is what is being enforced. We have a legitimate valid three unrelated ordinance. First Judge Lampear declared it on constitutional that he vacated his own decision, which you can ask Mr. Callahan never happens. So just don't vacate their decisions. They'd rather chew nails, believe me, who's somebody who's spent a lifetime in court. But more importantly, we have a valid three-student ordinance. It was vetted all the way to the Rhode Island Supreme Court, and there's absolutely no reason why it's not being enforced and I'm still not getting any legitimate answer as to why it is not. Thank you. Thank you. Ryan Zajodi, one blindbrook drive. Michael Deluca. Sorry, I'm here to speak up Dr. Deluca. Sorry. And Michael Moran. Donnie. That exhaust the list. Is there anyone else who wishes to speak on any non-agenda items or non or non hearing items? Dr. Alba? Yes. Dr. Alba, 24-year-old, who was next terrace. I'm just calling in my concern and I respect you all. I supported you all. I felt and I still feel that you feel what's best for the town. I've heard some testimony from Mr. D. Simone and his comments. And I know you all appointed him. He got appointed. And yeah, I also hear information from sage individuals who've dedicated their lives. Many of them countless hours-stop for the benefit of the town. And my question is, it's very disheartening as a lifelong resident who has a love and passion. And I hear people's outcry saying, how does this men stay? How does he stay if you don't like to live in there against it with the future of the way it's going to be where you can just sell and move out? How can we support an individual who's basically going against the sage individuals who've dedicated so many years of their time? It's just, you know, and I want you all to get reelected. But just like when we had the library situation, where we had the Beach carrying capacity study, when we hear the outrage of these people who are telling me, what is the town council, what's their plan? What's the objective? Because you know what, the reality is, if this goes the way the people think it's going to be going, they can't support you. And I want to support you. I really feel that you all feel that this town, you wanna do what's in the best interest of the town. But, I think it's going to be going, they can't support you. And I want to support you. I really feel that you all feel that this town, you want to do what's in the best interest of the town. But when I hear the outcry of the people from the board members, the planning board, and I hear the outcry of people saying, I've lived in this development for all my life. And now, you know, what's going to happen to the, about the value of my property might significantly go down. And people are scared. People are thinking about even moving or selling. So. And now, you know, what's going to happen to the value of my property might significantly go down. And people are scared. People are thinking about even moving or selling. So I just want you to all give that serious thought. The polls online on the outtown near against page that has over 60, close to 17,000 members to the 2500 members on the town council forum page. It's like when I've taken the polls about the library and the support of the library. When I took polls about the beach carrying capacity study and other issues in the past, and people said why, or when I took polls about the town, previous town council being supported by the New York University of town resident association, why are they Michael managing? Well now we're not going to go to the other extreme. We cannot open the doors. We cannot allow the floodgates for these builders just to do whatever they want. Because it's going to be a scary situation. And I hope and pray that each of you give this serious thought. Some of you might say, well, you know, I'm a developer. I'm just here to make money. Money, I'm the steel. But think about this. Because I know that all of you are better than that. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, please, come forward. Hello. George Known as 60 Exitable of Idenar, I guess it. I'm not sure when Miss El Alberto got her law degree, but she better take a look at the expiration date on it. Her statement that the three unrelated is illegal is not true at all. The ACLU wrote two letters to the previous town council, indicating that in fact, if they pursued that three ordinance, they would be litigated. And it was clearly illegal, the three ordinance. So you can elect to continue the three ordinance, spend a lot of money, taxpayer money going to court, where you'll lose again, as its previous town councils have lost five times in court before, or you can support complying with the state law, which is the five unrelated. And while I'm at it talking about the people that have supported the three ordinance, there's some new organization that's been spreading misleading information. And the reason that they've supported the three ordinance has been that they've noted that the 4,500 students will now come back into town, an increase in 4,500 students, but I have to remind those people that those 4,500 people, students were living in Narragansett before the three student ordinances, and they were kicked out of their homes. So they're coming back to residing those homes that they had before, and in fact, the number of students that are residing in Narragansi will be a little less because of the cap on five. Thank you. Thank you. Just a friendly reminder, since the three student is part of the zoning amendments, and I did allow Miss Celebrita to speak before, please refrain from speaking on the unrelated or the three student ordinances that is going to be part of the public hearing and that is technically part of the agenda. So yes, please come forward. Good evening. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak tonight. My name is Paula Childs. Thank you. And I live at 55 Lake Road in Bonnet Shores. As a full-time resident of Narragansett and a voter here, I'm asking you to take action to rectify the wrongs that are currently happening in one of your neighborhoods, Bonnet Shores. Unlike most neighborhoods, we are also a fire district, one of dozens in the state of Rhode Island. We are also not just a fire district, we're also, according to a superior court judge, a quasi-municipality, because we collect taxes, we provide trash pick up to our residents, and we oversee several acres of protected natural resources like Westquake pond, a small harbor, and two beaches. But unlike the vast majority of fire districts in our state, we have a private company within our fire district known as the Bonnet Shores Beach Club. And they, and because of our 1932 charter, almost 100 years old, an out-of-date illegal charter, because of that existing charter that we have, it allows thousands of non-resident Beach Club Kabeana owners to vote in our fire district elections. In fact, they share numbers outnumber real residents in Bonnet by 3-1. Our charter says anyone who owns $400 worth of property can vote. And that's why non-resident Kavanaugh owners of the Bonnet Shores Beach Club are taking advantage of that. And they're electing people to our council through sheer voting volume that support the interests of the Beach Club over the people who lived here. But more than this discrepancy, this is unconstitutional and we're stuck with it because our current Bonnet Shores Council has and always has been had a majority of members who are also members of the Beach Club. We've gone through a voting rights lawsuit. We sued for a special election to get a new charter that would limit voting rights to residents only. But and that is the law of the land. But our court approved charter commission which came up with a new charter over two years ago has been undermined. It's been sabotaged by people who have their own personal financial stake in the Beach Club. This cannot stand. I am urging the Council to take action now. Please endorse and petition new state legislation that will write this horrible wrong and insist that the Bonnet Shorts Fire District be treated the same way as nearly every other fire district in the state following the Constitution which states that the right to vote lies in residency not property ownership. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Yes, please come forward. Good evening. Deb Buffey, 19 Kingston Lane and I are gantt it. Just quickly, if the three student and the four unrelated will be part of the conversation. I would ask that the town solicitor give us an opinion. I don't know if the gentleman who spoke about vacating, not vacating, it's a very complicated topic. So I think we pay the town solicitor and he should tell us what he thinks his opinion is. I think that would be very helpful. And all will be articulated during the hearing. Thank you. Anyone else for open forum? Excuse me. Yes, Mr. Frandy. Good evening, Stephen Frandy, 44, Silvan Road. I just have a statement about ethics advisory opinions. And I believe that if anyone council or anybody that's in the planning of zoning is thinking about getting an advisory opinion, if they are in the process of getting an advisory opinion about anything this evening, and they have not received that advisory opinion as of yet, then they should not be voting on anything of the that advisory opinion as of of yet then they should not be voting on anything of the manner tonight if that's between one of the council people up there or anyone else in the room. Thank you. Namely James Durkin is what I'm going to spend some conversation about him possibly getting an advisory opinion. I know with the short term rental, he has accused himself for. There's nothing of the sort for the zoning amendments. I just wanted to, I don't want to speak on the zoning. I just wanted to be able to get that statement out there before the open public hearing started. And we'll see what happens during the public hearing. Thank you. Thank you. Let's see. Let's see. Let's see. Let Thank you. Anyone else wish to speak for open forum for three minutes on any item not on the agenda or public hearing? Great. So for the sake of time we do have to anticipated lengthy hearings this evening. So what I would like to do is we go through, since we are still before 7.30, I'd like to get through the consent agenda and the regular agenda first. I think it should be pretty quick, but depending on how the pace goes, we might come back to it after. So let's move down to item consent agenda D1. Is there a motion to approve consent agenda item D1? So moved. Okay. Any discussion? All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. Next, onto new business. Is is there a motion to authorize the town manager and town solicitor to sign the solid waste and recycling services agreement with the Rhode Island resource recovery? Corporation for a two-year period July 1, 2025 to June 30, 2027 subject to review and approval by the town solicitor. So moved. Second. Discussion? All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. Next, onto the town clerk. Is there a motion to confirm the reappointment of Brian Wagner as a Conservation Commission? Tree board representative to the land conservancy trust for a term set to expire in April 30th, 20th. So move. Second. Any discussion? Any comment from the public? All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion passed, this 5-0. Next, is there a motion to appoint one individual to the Narragansett Housing Authority for a term set to expire on February 27th, 2027 and one individual for a term set to expire on February 27th, 2027, and one individual for a term set to expire on April 30th, 2030. I need a motion to appoint. Make a motion to appoint. Is there a second? Second. All right, discussion. Is there any nominees? Actually, let me read first. Is there a motion to appoint Mackenzie Babcock for a term to expire on February 27th, 2027? I make a motion to appoint. Mackenzie. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? Anyone from the public? Seeing none, all those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. And we do have one additional position open. Are there any nominees? I would like to nominate Susan Cicelybano for the position. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? Anyone from the public? All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion passed. It's 5-0. Is there a motion to approve a mobile food establishment license application for meat sweats, R-I-L-C-DBA meat sweats, Rhode Island subject to state and local regulations. So moved. Second. Any discussion? Anyone from the public? All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. Is there a motion to approve a mobile food establishment license application for Robert LeVoy, owner and operator of dig-a-dee dogs, subject to state and local regulations. So moved. Second. Any discussion? Anyone from the public? All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. Council President? Yes. Can you just go back to item F4, please? Thank you. There's squish together, so they're hard to read through the agenda. Oh, thank you Is there a motion back to item F4 is there a motion to approve a mobile food establishment license application for B and K ice cream LLC DBA barons subject to state and local regulations so mode second any discussion Anyone the public? All those in favor? Hi. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. Next is there a motion to approve a mobile food establishment license application for FYR Foods LLC, DBA, FYR Grill, Subject to State and Local Regulations. So have a committee. We have a committee. We have a committee. We have a committee. We have a committee. We have due to the road in Ariance to Rhode Island, subject to state and local regulations. So moved. Second. Discussion? Anyone from the council of any comment? Anyone from the public? All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. Last item on the regular agenda. Is there a motion to approve a victuular license application for Brittany? Squaglia? DBA? All aboard. Charcuterie 140. Point Judith Road Unit 37-C. Narragansett, Rhode Island subject to state and local regulations. So moved. Second. Any discussion? Anyone from the public? All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Ocean passes 5-0. Thank you. Now back to the public hearing. So just as a reminder that we just we already did can we did can. Sorry we did consent agenda. Thank you. And just as a reminder that we are required by law to open two public hearings this evening. One, we do need to hear and close this evening. And that is on the budget so that has to come first. And then the second, we will open, we will cover what we we can and then we will determine if we want to continue or close or whatever based on how that discussion goes. So with that being said, is there a motion to open and hold a second public hearing on the proposed budget for the 2025, 2026 fiscal year? Motion to open and hold. Second. Motion to open and hold. Thank you. That was moved by GM and seconded by Ryan. Thank you. All those in favor? Hi. Hi. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. All righty. So please come forward. Christine, we've got so much to talk about and really look forward to your presentation. Okay. Are we on? We're on. Good evening Council President Menzies, Council Members and Community. This is the second public hearing for the 2526 proposed budget. Whoops. There we go. So as of 630, 2024, we have a little over $15 million in our unassigned fund balance. That's about 22%. of that money there in the 2526 budget there is 2.2 million. That's about $2.2 million. That's about $2.2 million. That's about $2.2 million. That's about $2.2 million. That's about $2.2 million. That's about $2.2 million. That's about $2.2 million. That's about $2.2 million. That's about $2.2 million. That's about $2.2 million. of a little over 3% or about 2.25 million over the current year we're in now. The $79 that's an increase of a little over 3% or about 2.25 million over the current year we're in now The tax levy increase is at the maximum 4% Which brings the residential residential rate to 3 I'm sorry 6.79 per thousand. It's about a 3.6% increase and the commercial rate is $9.17 per thousand. As I've stated before, most of the budget goes towards transfers and salaries and benefits. There's very little for regular operating activities. So the difference from the first public hearing, these changes, we, and also the budget workshops we had talked about. So in this budget before you tonight, it's a little increase of $2,127. So what happened was we added $25,000 to be transferred to Kinney Bungalow because of their fund balances dwindling. Sunset farms of $10,000 and a transfer to payer marketplace of $25,000. We had two new requests for appropriations. That was the universal juice for $2,000 in St. Peter's Community Market for $5,000. Also, community development office wanted to include matching funds for a SNEP grant next year of $57,500. And then we got the new healthcare costs and also we had some more salary changes and turnover and staff. So with those changes, we actually had some savings. So with all those changes, again, we only increased $2,127 from the initial public hearing. Again, the budget forecast of revenue versus expenses. The top kind of shows you what happens if we only increase the levy by 2%. You can see all the way over that by 2030, you're needing a little over $9 million in fund balance to balance the budget. Basically, your revenues are not keeping up with your expenses. At the bottom, it's a 4% increase all the way and you can see over this is just for explanation at 23rd and 2030 you don't even need fine balance any longer. This is the budget forecast of levy versus the tax rate in 2025 we increased 3% 2026 we're looking at 4% you can see the difference, obviously, it's for show again, if you just go at 2% all the way across on the top. And then if you go 4% across on the bottom, you see the difference in increase in new revenues. Also in 2028, it says valuation's a new full new statistical revow There was a general law on the books that they were gonna cap that at 20% Over the last revow, but that has been held for further discussion So those you know costs won't won't be as bad And you can see the dollar amounts where looking at going at going back down to $6.5 potentially in 2028. Hey, that was something fine. What happened there? OK. So this is the tax level effect on the tax rate. We have homes on the first column, 2024 value. small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, small, the taxes are $4,863. If we go 4% to the $6.79, we're looking at $5,041.58. It's an increase of $178.20. And then if you apply the home said, it's an annual increase of $160.38. And you can follow that all the way down to 3% tax levy increase or 2% tax levy increase. So item still for consideration, the state aid and the reimbursements are still projected from the state they don't have their budget yet. The affordable housing bond issuance up to $3 million that is not in the budget. The bond issuance cost is also not in the budget. School department of 2.4% increase and the affordable housing, new requests of an annual transfer of $50,000. There's also things to consider with the narrow river dredging project, continuing the road construction. The total transfers are almost $40 million, that's up 2.4%. The library had a capital request of $30,000 in addition to the operating budget. And the special appropriations, we had the Historical Society asked for an additional $6,000 on their right normal $6,000 for a total of 12. We also have some legislative bills that we need to watch because the state is talking about phasing out local meal and beverage tax over the next four years, which is a little over a million dollars to our revenue. And full property exemptions for primary resident veterans, which is wonderful, but it's over $3 million in our revenues to the town. Items that were unbudgeted, but they just happened to appear. whoops from the last hearing is we need about $20,000 in additional requests for software. And due to legal claims and settlements, we need, I took the transfer to retain claims out of the budget initially. We need to put it back in, because we're going to wipe out that budget with settlements and claims. Next steps, May 19th is the capital improvement plan resolution, the first reading of the budget ordinance, and then the second reading and adoption is scheduled for June 2nd. And that's what I have if there's any questions. Well, I have to say Christine, once again, a very thorough presentation and a very prompt presentation. And you answered most of my questions during the budget review workshops and I have to say they were really productive. I thought it was very informative. And again, I applaud all of our department heads for putting together their presentations for us. Not only were they willing and ready to answer our questions, some of them are presenting for the first time, and I thought that they excelled beautifully. So with that being said, I'll actually turn the floor over to any council members who have any initial thoughts or questions any feedback? Councillor McNally or Councillor Torelle? It doesn't matter which end I start. Thank you very much for the presentation tonight. I don't necessarily have any questions at this point in time. Most of mine like Alex were asked and answered during the budgetary hearings about two weeks ago. Thank you. Councillor Colle, is there any questions or comments? I know there was talk about maybe putting a design initiative in for a skate park. Was that discussed at all? That was in the email that I sent to all of you. Thank you. On the parks and wrecks. It's that would be a component of it, yes. Sorry. Was that your only question? Yeah. Okay. Councillor Dirk and any questions? On all set. Thank you. Councillor McNally, any questions? No, thank you. It's really quite easy to understand and thank you for presentations and all the department presentations. They've been great. Thank you. So I agree. Can we just go back a couple of slides to what was still unassigned did not in the budget. I just want. Is this, can you go back one, sorry? Oh, forward one. I'm sorry. That's okay. That's okay. That's okay. Just can you go forward one more? Sorry. So this is all part of it. So can you just give a sound by and a reminder just while we're reviewing everything here for consideration? This is currently everything that's not in the budget. Okay, well, kind of sort of. So the Okay. So the total transfers are in the budget. Some people asked for more. That's why it's still hasn't been decided on. If that's where you want to be. The library request is in the capital improvement plan. The special appropriations additional 6,000 is not in the budget. Okay. And the bills are just the bills. Thank you. And this has to go in the budget. So we're going to add another 32,000 on top of what was presented tonight. Okay. Come on. There we go. In these other ones, the school department is in the budget at 2.4. And the other three are not. Can you just remind us what the school department is in the budget at 2.4 and the other three are not. Right? Can you just remind us what the school department did ask for? They asked for 2.9%. And we're in the budget at 2.4. Correct. Okay. And then just this is a unique opportunity where there's this many people in attendance for the budget workshop. So can you just give a quick sound bite in regards to what maxing out the tax levy at 4% actually means to the average estimate? Right, so year over year, what your tax levy is, so your net valuations, values, that's your levy. In the max, you can only by state law can only go up 4% over the previous year. So we're taking the max because it's as much as you can go and as our expenses continue to grow obviously the we have to keep the revenues growing and over the last several years it's been 2 to 3% so it's starting to outgrow our revenue so we have have to make more revenue, increase the tax levy. And usually the percentage to the tax rate to the tax payer doesn't mean it's 4%. This example, it's only 3.66% increase over the current year. I just wanted to reiterate that the 4% doesn't mean that that's hitting your individual pockets at a 4% increase. Okay. Thank you. Okay. That's everything we have. We might call you back up for some follow-up questions based on how this open or this hearing this testimony's going. Excuse me. So with that being said, is there anyone who wishes to come forward to speak in regards to the budget? Yes, please come forward. I saw the hand in the front here first. I can tell my left of my right, I swear. My name is Maria Grace Tordi. My name is Maria Grace Tordi. My first name is M-A-R-I-A-Hyphen, G-R-A-C-E. My last name is Tori, T-O-R-T-I. Thank you. My name is Maria Grace Tori. I live at 15 milky way. I just wanted to address a few things on the budget that we're not necessarily in the presentation. Just some specific things about our parks and playgrounds and those staying parks and playgrounds are not being converted to other things like pickable courts. I'm speaking to you today as a parent, as a mom. I grew up in this community. I've chosen to have my son grow up in this community as well. It's an amazing place to live. But we have to think when we're funding things, we have to think about what the future of our community is. If we take away the children in this community, what's the next generation going to be? What's the generation after that? I'm here because my great-grandfather was an immigrant from Italy and came here and bought property in 1956. I would love to be able to pass that on to my son. But when you start taking away things like playgrounds, things like parks, and we just look at things like the bottom line whose pockets are going to get the most, you're not helping the community. It's short-sighted, and I encourage you, and I plead with you to please think about the future of our community. It's short-sighted and I encourage you and I plead with you to please think about the future of our community. Just the other day, Mr. Durkin and Ms. Finale, you are at the Little League opening ceremonies with those children. Think about those faces and think about when I'm 40 years old, I'll be 41 in June. When I was here, the little league was much bigger. I'm not saying everyone plays little league, but you see the town decreasing. So I just encourage you really, I mean, it sounds cliche, but please think about the children. Please think about what your legacy is. What are you leaving for our town? Thank you very much for your time. Thank you. Applause Any else wish to confer? Yes, Miss Celebrino. I do. Catherine Celebrato, C-A-T-H-E-R-I-N-E, Celebrato, C-E-E-L-E-B-E-R-T-O, 48-E-R-G-I-S-O. So I listened to some of the workshops, of course, you know, doing it from home is kind of difficult. But at the recreation workshop, budget workshop, I heard the figure 800,000 mentioned for pickleball. Now, I've talked to Ms. Kurshaw about that. She doesn't plan to spend 800,000 dollars. But the figures I'm getting from her are still quite large. 175,000 that she's asking the town for 90, she's going to pull from other accounts. The problem with pulling from other accounts is $50,000 of that money was to replace the windows in that large building. We have a Pox and Recreation, which some of us hope was going to be a recreation center at some point, but I need still needs a lot of work. I could go on about these numbers, but bottom line is the town has put a lot of money into Pickable already. It started with $130,000 expenditure to convert the, the o'clock road courts, tennis courts into Pickable, and upgrades have been added since then. And then 14 tennis courts and basketball courts have been relying to accommodate Pickleball. I don't feel a basketball court should have ever been touched, but what can I tell you? And at this point, it's pretty much only spray parked that tennis courts that are untouched in the Boon Street playground, basketball courts that are untouched. We playgrounds need to be updated. They're working on Christophero. I don't know how much more money they're gonna need to finish that off. There's still work, there has to be done, even after the equipment is replaced. Boon Street playground is pathetic. We have one little new structure. There's that dinosaur that's 50 years old that I asked. Miss Kurshaw to have tested for lead paint. And then we got something broken down, C saw that Mr. Mendes probably wrote on when he was a kid. And then the benches that I don't know, when the gran of benches were wiped away from the sea wall, the pieces were sent over to Boonstone playground. It's not very nice. So I really like to see the money. Any money put toward the playgrounds and the parks in that building up in clock roads so that could eventually be turned into a usable recreation center. Okay, so the next thing would be the police department budget. Now, no sacred, I think we have too many police officers, my husband thinks we have too few police officers. How about that? But we have 10 extra police officers, 10 more than a town our size would usually have because of the rental issues. Now, that's fine, but I don't think all of us should fund those 10 officers when we're not creating rental issues. Two-thirds of us are not creating rental issues. Now the way to balance that out and to cover those 10 police officers would be to raise the rental registration fee to $750. Now if you only impose that on the seasonal rentals, there's about 20 to 100 of them say, you're gonna raise about $1.6 million. You'll have enough money to fund those police officers and you'll have extra money to put into the billing inspector's office and follow things. That's just my opinion about that. The school budget at 37 million, it was a 37 million but it's around 37 million right? The school budget. We only have 966 kids in the school in the school. That's the projected number 104 of them are from out of the district. Those students, they are not 100% funded. Mr. Dr. Cummings knows how to, he's a good wordsmith. He says we are receiving 100% reimbursement for those students. We are receiving 100% of what the state allows for reimbursement. We are not receiving 100% of a cost to educate those students. Just some quick numbers, 966 students, 104 from our district. We're down to what, 862 minus a 70 in the preschool. We're down to like, 893 or something. Actual Narrow against resident students in K through 12. And we have a $37 million budget. Bottom line is, I don't think we can continue to take out our district students. It's just costing us too much money. We are spending at least $30,000 per student. And that's just looking at the benefits and salaries dividing the $966 into that. And according to their own budget, right on their website, they only expect 1.4 million in reimbursement. So if you do the math, it's only coming out to $14,000 per student from these other district students and we're spending 30. I think we need to figure out what's going on really. The numbers are falling off the cliff. The enrollment is decreasing each year exponentially. It's beyond anything. I don't even want to go on the website because every time I go on, the other number is lower. It's lower and lower and lower. And those preschool kids, I swear, two thirds of them, the parents are just using it for cheap preschool. A preschool is supposed to be for children that are low income and have special educational needs. It used to be called head start. You have to Google it, some of you too young to remember through Google it, head stop. But our preschool has become, we're all a sudden like full of modeled children which that concept offends me. So two thirds of the school, the kids are going, they're high, they're from high income families and they're paying a very small amount for tuition. So we need to do something about that. We need to either adjust that tuition number up or, well don't know, they're going to have to figure it out. But bottom line is we have to get families into this town and the story and the only way we can do that, of course, is to make it affordable for families. Let's see what other budgets. Well, the rest of them seem to be doing OK. I don't know much about DPW, but Steve does send somebody down to cut the grass at the Earl's Court tower. So that's a good thing. That's something else. The Earl's Court water tower is a historic structure in this town. If you look at the budgets, it's not under anybody's department. It's just hanging there. And that tower needs work. A few years ago, Mr. Tiani got an estimate from ABCOR $50,000, just to stabilize the thing, just to repair the water and put a cap on it. And that has to be done. Actually, people actually come up the streets, they live right there. And they'll stop at the tower and they'll look at it. They have a picture on their phone, and they look at the picture, and they look at the town, and they look at the picture, they'll look at it. And they have a picture on their phone, and they'll look at the picture, and they'll look at the town, and they'll look at the picture, they're looking at each other like what the heck have been, you know? So I think some money has to be put into that. You have to find that somewhere. That's it. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, Dr. Alba. Yes, Dr. Albert Alba, A-L-B-E-R-T, Alba Alba, A-L-B-A. I do. So as many of you may recall, with the last town council, we had a push to have a playground, a modern state of the out playground. In fact, Mr. Jason Collins, or, excuse me, town council member, Jason Collins is my dear respect. He's an adult educator, he's actually administrator, and I am right on board with many of his thoughts. So thank you, Tom Counsel member Collins, with respect to, and regards to, it goes, I wish we could have a modern state of the out playground. In fact, he told me that his children, he's taking his children to the Jamestown playground, which is child, and I went there and it was beautiful, beautiful. I went to the North Kingston playground, Wilson Park, beautiful, beautiful. I went to the Portsmouth playground, outstanding. I also saw the skateboard park in North Kingston. Very nice. Kids have a wonderful time and you know there's a call for a bike ramp park as well. And in Portemouth I don't know if you know but many of most of that money was for that beautiful modern state of the outpegorn was raised by the town residents in businesses. I know when we had this synthetic ice skating rink, my dad's passion was to have a beautiful ice skating rink, not synthetic, but a real life ice skating rink. But I didn't realize the size of it. It isn't a little on the diminutive size, and it's not getting much work, use. And I hope that we can repurpose that, either a pool, a recreational pool, pool or some other novel idea which we can reach out to the parents, you know, Casey Matero, Emily Bennett, the young lady right here, Rhea, talk to it, you know, reach out to these parents, Mr. Tom Councilmember Jason Colonies, you And also, Donna Vignoli, because she has beautiful grandchildren who are like her own children. And I respect that. And we do want to make this place family friendly. When I went to these playgrounds, they would tell me the people from Narragantza, Dr. Alba, keep filming this here. This is good because we have from New York, we would love to have this in our backyard. So I really hope, you know, in prey that we look into this and we can get the funding, believe it or not. We can get the funding, we can work with the town, but we have to at least be willing to try. And not that I don't have anything wrong against pickleball, you know, I respect that. But I think now it's time to repurpose. And the five playgrounds we have, we don't have one modern state of the out playground. So, you know, and some of the people say, well, I'm just like the old type, well that's fine. We're not going to get rid of all the others, but let's have one modern state of the out playground. So that's one thing I hope that you are all on board for. And regards to our schools, I'm an educator. I've been an educator for 35 years, going on my 36 year God willing, and I support education, I support funding. And on that note, on that note, I want our schools to be ever open. I want to have nearer-against it. You know, when people say, well, maybe it's time to consolidate. consolidate. You know you hear that. You know but one of the things about near-against it and I've heard the parents and justifiably so this is our town. We want to have our purpose. And I just hope and pray that down the road it's not going to be coming to a point where so many families are driven out of near-against because of the course or they're not moving in because of the course. And then we, then the ability to fund our school systems will be cost prohibitive. We don't want that. So I think we have to work it ways to get families in. And, and, and, you know, people say, well, you know what, you know, we, you know, maybe we could do this to that to bring more buildable lots. And a person online says, well, we got to bring more people in. That might work in Providence, that might work in North Providence, East Providence, or Cranston, but in New York, in New York, it, a nearer against it, let's face it. With the cost of property here, then people are gonna expend that kind of money for a piece of property and they're gonna use it for rentals. They're not gonna use it to bring families in because if they can make, you know, $50,000, $70,000 a year, I'm renting, that's what they're going to do. So we just gotta keep that in mind. If we want to bring families in here, we got to keep the place affordable and we got to attract people in here. You know, former council member Susan Cicillino-Banano brought the $3 million bond for affordable housing. I support that. I support bringing families in our town who are needy. So I just want you all to consider all that I have to say. And we also might want to thank, I know that there was an RFP for the old library. I don't know how they're going to repurpose it. I heard Roma that you know that might be given to a fire department, a police department. I respect them greatly. I support them. In fact, it was National Fireman's Day the other day, and I congratulated them all. But we also got to keep in mind that if we have to look at money that we can make as a town, to keep us viable, to keep our taxes low. And, you know, we have the place on middle bridge road. We have those buildings on middle bridge road. And I know, and I'm all athletics, and I know that they are being used by the women's URI crew team, which I appreciate that. I like that. But they can still use that by repurposing that those buildings and possibly making them marketable, making them marketable. So we can make big money on creating maybe a multi-purpose event area over there. These are my concerns. I mean, we spend money on Kenny Bungalo as we saw today. Why are we spending that money? Because I'm sure we're getting that money back in revenue. Otherwise, we wouldn't be appropriating that kind of money for Kenny Bungalo in Sunset Farms. Right? I haven't done the mathematics. I'm not the accountant. But I'm sure we're not going to be appropriating that money appropriating that money is to Kenny Bungalow or sunset farms if we're not getting a good return on our dollar at least I hope not because let's face it none of of us, you know, have a unsee, you know, none of us are independently wealthy, at least I'm not, I know some of you may be, but I'm particularly not. But we have to think about, you know, ways of bringing income into the talent area against it. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, please come forward. Michelle, could you only know 20 Southwest Road near against Rhode Island? Sorry, one second. Oh. I do. Michelle, Cateroni O. T-R-O-N-N-Y, and it's Michelle with tools. Thank you. I'm listening to the budget. You know, when I originally built a house in our race, My family had it in 1999. It was a great town. We had an a-rated school system. Wonderful kids. There were kids. You know, of course you had the crabby neighbors and you want the kids to make a noise or whatever. There were students. There were some rentals. We knew that when we built the house when we came here. All right, and then over the years I'm watching. I know 2014 was like the worst. That's when the party started with like really bad with the students. So this restriction after restriction, and then it's never stopped. So then there's lawsuit after lawsuit. And I'm laughing, listening to the budget. In the last couple of years, they, I guess they got to start adding in all the losses. I'm curious how much we're paying out on lawsuits, on restricting everybody. And over the years, all the restrictions, it's slowly the whole, there was complaints about everything. We used to be able to go out, dance, and there were things for the kids to do. There were daycares. There were things for the kids to do. Now you've got people fighting over just to get a playground. It's ridiculous. And you know what, back then, I think it discount on homestead. We didn't even have a homestead this one. We just talked to each other. We were neighbors. We were neighborhoods. You know, it's just gets to the point that it's ridiculous. All these restrictions are just taking away from people's freedoms. And then you can't even get a playground because we're spending so much money. God only knows on lawsuits. I would love to see how much over the years we spent on sewing people or sewing the town. Or it just opens up a whole door to complain about anything. It's all about communication. You guys just, you got a bunch of new people that are from the school that we can work with, maybe landlords, residents, work together. That's what we've done a long time ago, well, to a point. But then, you know, we had associations that were getting in trouble making fake phone calls and mine ablehood, and they got arrested for it. The thing is people, they have to realize that just leave each other, respect each other, talk to each other. And then you wanna get rid of the police. If there's such a big problem, the last thing you need is to get rid of the police. I mean, they're here for us, they're for security. And if there's such a problem, and there's supposedly there are these these problems and then you have the summer rental. How much would we spend on the beach study did not get to have, because you don't want people visiting in the summer. You want you quiet time. You moved here, what brought everybody here was the beach. It's who we are. J. Durkins, been in business, let's see, 80 years now? Your family was 80 years. I think, oh, actually, what? I have a radio. All right, 80 years, Lynn, Lynn, Demet, Demet, of real estate is 61 years, and a Brian over 40 years, 41 years. Then people come in here and they want to change it. Oh, and I want all that. You know what, you came here, this is what it was. This is our roots, this is our fabric. This is who never against it is. And you know what, nobody should want to change it. You know, we should have families here. We should have a affordability. If anything, you want to blame them, They're really, you know, the rentals and landlords, all they're horrible. They again, tax left and right. They again, they pay all the sexual stuff, not just here, the state. You know what, maybe you should ask the state to change the whole tenant and landlord thing because it protects the tenant. So I know people, and actually, someone in my own family that has rented to a family's, and they got stuck with DMH, they can't get rid of the people. If they could work something out, I'm sure many families, that's what skis landlords, because you hear the horror stories. So we need to do something to work together. I mean, I'm sure many landlords would love to have families. The more restrictions, the higher it goes, the price goes. And families can't afford it. People have mortgage. Who's going to, I get to pay my mortgage. If I didn't have a huge mortgage, I would love to rent to a family. But you know what? I have a mortgage to pay. I can't afford to have somebody come in here, not pay me, and being paying all money to try to get rid of them. You know, and even if a young kid who's gonna fit, what are you, $800,000? What's the mortgage on that? Nobody can afford that. If anything, we get it all worked together. That's all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you. Applause. Anyone else wish to speak on the budget for the town? It wasn't done so already. Speak now forever, whole your piece. All right. So I really appreciate the feedback that we received this evening. I think it gives the council a lot of things to think about, but does anyone on the council have any follow-up questions or comments in response to anything that they heard this evening? Councilor Raleigh. I don't think people want pickable courts. Sorry. Can you say that again? I don't think people want pickable courts. Well, I don't know if it's necessarily that nobody wants pickable courts. It's more so. It sounds like the priority. You know, there's a lot of areas. And again, this comes with every budget that the town puts forth. And the amount of thought and care that went into creating this budget, the department heads, the amount that has already been trimmed down significantly by everyone who's come forth to present their budget. I applaud everyone in their efforts. I do, I can just, in regards to the pickable whole thing, there's a clear service to this town. It's a growing sport. This is something that's been said over the last couple of years. We've got a number of pickable courts already in town. I myself, I know you're a pickleball player, I'm a tennis player. I know that I personally felt a little spoiled when pickleball was interfering on my tennis courts, our tennis courts. But it's really just a vibrant community and I applaud the fact that we have the opportunity to provide these services to the town. And I do look at the court resurfacing project and it was one thing that I called out was $175,000 to repave, but again, it wasn't, actually, I can read it exactly as it's written. It's 175,000 to redo existing pickable courts at Clark Road to post-tension, concrete, and to pickable courts. Now, my opinion would be that we put that 175,000 into something else. There's a lot of other services that could go towards. But again, I know that in regards to the rest of the budget and everything else that's in here, I think it's been very well thought out and that was really my only part within this whole budget. I do want to continue to ensure that we are supporting our library. And I think that there were a lot of other great points brought up this evening about the RFP and just making sure that the town and the town council is continuing to build that rapport with the library board. You've already had several conversations meeting them and recognizing them for their service. And we look forward to continuing that relationship and workshopping with them moving forward. So with that being said, does anyone else on the council have any other comments? So first I'd like to thank Dr. Alba. Yes my grandchildren are beautiful. Thank you. There's we really want to help and improve our playgrounds. That's something that's very dear to me and to my heart and unfortunately I wish I can just go like this and have it happen but it obviously we have to work within a budget and we are trying to make steps and it's probably going to be baby steps to begin with but we're going to keep trying and to make those improvements and make this so that the kids have something to do here in their diagnostic, go to the playgrounds where they don't have to go to another one. We are going to continue to do that but, there are other services within the town and we have to work within the budget, but that truly is dear to our heart and my heart and something that I will continue to work towards. Anyone else? Councillor Dirkton? I agree with everyone. It's a balance and if the kids are in need of more Dollars than that's what we have to do so We'll we'll do that I I just want to reconfirm to Dr. Albert that I am definitely into a state of the art playground and have been talking with everybody involved in it And it is not something I've given up on it is something that has to be addressed and looked at as a long-term plan. If you look at this budget, you will notice that there's a projection of putting a lot of money into our basketball courts, the following year, which is sorely needed and anybody that has children in this town know that there's a ton of children that are playing on basketball leagues all over the town. So that's an exciting part of the budget for me as well. But I assure you I am looking at the playground. Councilor Torrell, I know we've gone back and forth here already, but any final thoughts? Thank you for the work that went into this and more to my point. It's fun that can be better spent elsewhere. Excellent. So I do actually have one final thought. I too was at the little league opening day with Council's Dirkin and Vignale and it was a real unique opportunity for at least my participation in this town to come full circle. I know I've said it before but Council or Derek and used to be my baseball coach. And for us to set foot back out on the sprayed park there was a pretty unique and special moment. But I was very surprised and it's already been shared this evening. I was very surprised to see the lower number of baseball players that were out on the field. And it is definitely something that, you know, it's another thing that I brought up at the school committee workshops, the school budget workshops, is that we've, if you look at the last 10 years alone, that you can see a consistent decline in enrollment. And it's been declining even since I was in high school and graduated from Narragance in 2011. And we had a graduating class of about 120 and now the class sizes are less than 100 students down to the middle school. It's even less than that. So affordable housing, making sure that we are keeping an open mind. When it comes to the budget, we are taking all things in consideration that the decisions that we make have consequences that we want to ensure that not only are we appealing to our current residents, but also appealing to residents to come into our town because as it's been shared this evening we want to have an arrogance of the future. We want to be able to leave a lasting legacy for our kids and all aspects within this budget and all decisions that this council makes moving forward, I think we do take that with an extra amount of care. So again, thank you so much for everyone who came up to testify this evening. And with that being said, where are my notes? Is there a zillion things here? Is there a motion to... No, Is there a motion to close the public hearing? Motion to close public hearing. Second. Any discussion? All those in favor? Aye. Councillor Tare. Aye. Thank you. Motion passes 5-0. And next, is there a motion to, does anyone need, nobody needs a break, we're good, right? Okay. Is there a, she needs five minutes. Okay, we're going to take a recess for just five minutes right before the final public hearing Well you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you All right, there we go. All right, back online. All right, perfect. Thank you. So is there a motion to open and hold a public hearing on the 14 proposed amendments attached to Appendix A entitled zoning? I'd like to make a motion to hold open and hold the hearing public hearing. Second. Second. Any discussion? All those in favor? I. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. With that, I'd like to kick us off with just in the sake of communicating and transparency. I thought it would benefit the town if we could reflect on the process undertaken to get here this evening. So we're going to start off by diving right into a newly elected town council comes in, hire a new series of solicitors on January 21st, February 3rd, Town Council voted and directed our new Town Solicitor to review all of our ordinances. What was proposed? This was on March 3rd, 2025, the Town Council referred, and this is the exact language as written, proposed the ordinance amendments of appendix A entitled zoning to the town clerk, the planning division, and the planning board for review and recommendation. Now, that's exact word, that is the exact word description as it was voted on and directed and sent to the Planning Board for review. Now these were proposals were made and again also verbatim here to create consistency between the town zoning ordinances and the Rhode Island general laws and to and and or to provide a streamlined process for town residents for all land use applications. Next, the planning board received the review and it was explained to us and to the planning board so that we were aligned that as interpreted by the law the planning board had to conduct their review of the 14 proposed amendments and then respond back to the town council within 45 days. This is not a number that any of us created. This was as interpreted by the state law. And then the planning board held a series of several special meetings to review the proposals and then they prepared their recommendation to the town council in accordance with Rhode Island General Law 45-24-51. That brings us to this evening. I know that there's been question on the pace in which this review process is undertaken. I too, along with the council, are learning just how fast these reviews go. And we have within 20 days of receiving the recommendations back from the planning board, we are required by law to open the public hearing this evening, because we are required and restricted within 20 days. After receiving these recommendations back from the planning board to open the public hearing. So what we have here is a proposed agenda. Should the council determine that they would like to continue this evening in the hearing. This is the proposed series of agendas on how we would go about addressing the review of the 14 amendments proposed after being reviewed by our town solicitor and reviewing the recommendations from the planning board with the general public so that we are not rushing through this process. I think that is beyond important that we make it very clear that even though we were required to have the planning board conduct this exceptional review and get back to us within 45 days and that we are required to open the public hearing within 20 days of receiving it that we do not have any hard deadline as to when we have to close this public hearing. So my proposal to the council as a compromise would be to follow this rough structure to review and carefully vet all of the amendments proposed that we listen to the public with an open mind. And that way we can thoroughly review everything and think about the consequences of any vote that should come from any of these proposed amendments. In addition, and James, you can correct me if I'm wrong, the review of these individual amendments, we, one, have the opportunity to amend and revise all proposed amendments. Correct? We'll start the— Correct. Two, can you just clarify, because I know it's probably on some people's minds, if we We are to revise to a significant degree different amendments that have been proposed, what the next steps would be, do we send that to you or how do we go about that? Right. If you agree on some sort of amendments to the proposed language, it would come back to me and the staff, revise those per your instructions and bring them back to you at the next scheduled public hearing for review. Okay, thank you. And I wanna make it also very clear, again, in addition to my recommendation to the council, that we have this collaborative effort with the town, the town residents that we listen. If any questions that you have for the solicitor or our solicitors, we ask that you respectfully direct your questions to the town council, and then we will, after everyone has had the opportunity this evening to speak, we will follow up with any questions to our solicitor who can then work to respond or follow up. And I've already covered that slide. So with that being said, I want to reiterate that I am not in favor of this, the review of this process to go at an extremely rapid pace. That is why I wanted to make sure that we had a rough outline for review because I acknowledge that it's our responsibility as a town council to plan and communicate to the best of our ability. And if there are residents who are coming forward to speak on any of the 14 amendments, you may do so. That is your right. It is my recommendation. If you are able to speak on those items that are on the agenda to do so, but I will not prevent you if you have come this evening to speak on any and all of the 14 amendments you have every right to speak on any of them. Again, this is only a recommendation. These are going to be the only two if the council decides on that. this would be the only two that I would recommend that we address this evening. And then separately, if the council agrees, we would cover at a second continued public hearing on the 14th, the bulk regulations, discretionary ordinance, the two family dwelling duplexes, and the site plan review. And then at a third public meeting, we would discontinued public hearing. We would review breakwater village, far households unrelated and the student occupied dwelling. And I took inspiration from the planning board when they to broke down everything for their review process. So in a similar fashion, I'm encouraging the council to follow a similar suit. And with that being said, I will pass the remote to whoever on the council wants to review the proposed amendment changes first and then I would like Gild have the opportunity to Respond with the planning boards review So this is for environmental regulations regarding Wetlands of coastal and freshwater wetlands and the law for the states as cities and towns shall be prohibited from applying the requirements and existing zoning ordinance pertaining to both wetland buffers and onsite wastewater treatment system setbacks to development, redevelopment construction or rehabilitation applications submitted to a municipality. And what that simply means is that it amends the provisions relative to the application of zoning ordinances, pertaining to wetland buffers to projects for development and redevelopment. It makes clear that there could be no local regulation of coastal wetlands and freshwater wetlands beyond the requirements of the state agency. So it really puts the power into the CRMC's hands and the DEM's hands. And I think it's a pretty straightforward regulation. So that would be the first one right there. Right, James? Correct. What are we going to do next? Yeah, just cover the proposed amendment changes for this evening, and then we're gonna pass it off to Jill Sabo, and then we'll open it up to the public for common. So it's section 4.3 and it's coastal and freshwater wetlands overlay and this amendment proposes to remove coastal and freshwater wetlands overlay district to provide consistency with Rhode Island General Law 45-24-30. And the same is for, this is double the same. Same is for sections 4.3 and sections 4.4. And it does basically the same thing. Yeah. Is just one of you want to. I can talk a little bit about the alcohol. This one is more mainly for my viewpoint. I've been teaching tips and serves say for 20 plus years now. When I'm instructing the learners in this course, it's always brought to their attention that the local liquor authority is the municipal town councils and city councils. All this is simply recommending to do is to bring the power back to the town council. There are public hearings still. It changes nothing to do with anything else. We do public hearings. We hear out everybody, we listen to the public and then the town council makes those decisions. And just to be clear, Councillor Collinies, that the proposed changes here do not prevent the town council from issuing those licenses, it does not change really the current standard processes that the town council still has to open a public hearing, review the same. It's the same process. It just streamlines the approach that it comes directly to the council, streamlining it, taking away the red tape and taking away some of the costs. Okay, thank you. So just to mention that, Rhode Island General Laws, Title III, alcohol beverages, Chapter three to five, licensing general, generally, three section three, point, dash five, dash 15, local licensing authorities, says the right power and jurisdiction to issue all licenses authorized by this title within the maximum number to be fixed as provided in three-5-16 are in the town councils or the license boards of several towns and in the mayors and city councils in several cities. However, where there's a police commission exists in a town or in a city that the police commission has the right or the power. We do not have a police commission here in New York. So the power automatically turns over to the town council. It's very, very clear right within that law. Thank you. So with that being said, are there any initial questions or comments in regards to the proposed amendments before we turn the floor over to Jill? Nope. All right. So I'd like to invite forward Jill Sabo to Jill. Nope. All right. So I'd like to invite Ford, Jill Sabo, to review everything from the planning board. evening. It's going to take me just a second to get my PowerPoint up. I'm all I don't know, sir. I don't need that. Thank you. Thank you. I got just a... No. Fair with me. That, that's all right. I should have given you a better notice. That's my fault. Sorry. Excellent. Thank you. All right. Thank you. I'm going to move this. I'm going to move this. I'm going to move this. I'm going to move this. I'm going to move this. I'm going to move this. I'm going to move this. Excellent. Thank you. All right. Thank you. I'm going to move this giant binder, which I believe you'll get a copy of down here as well. All right. So good evening, Jill Sabo, Director of Planning. I'm here to present the recommendation for the planning board regarding the amendments that were referred on March 3, 2025. So Council President, as you did mention, the planning board had several meetings they covered. They had five meetings actually. And they went over all 14 separate documents we referred to them as the 14 amendments. But I want to point out that it's actually 13. 13 of those documents were zoning ordinance changes. One was a comprehensive plan change. And within that, there were at least 10 sections of the ordinance and 32 at least 32 unique subsections that were touched as part of these changes. So during those meetings with the planning board, you can see on Monday the 24th of March, they went over the breakwater village, households, you know, student occupied, so on, so forth. I don't feel like I, you want me to read the slide to you, so I won't do that. No, that's all right. Thank you. All right, so if we talk about, I'd like to just take a minute and talk about what the planning board did at each one of those meetings and what they, what they talked about briefly. Thank you. the amendments. Sure. So on the 24th they went over the Rakewater Village for area ratio. Households unrelated student occupies. what they talked about briefly. Thank you. The amendments, sure. So on the 24th, they went over the Breakwater Village floor area ratio. Households unrelated, student occupied dwelling, and restaurant, alcohol, service special use permits. So that is one of the ones I know you want to talk about tonight specifically, and I'm prepared to help you through any technical issues. We do have two planning board members here as well, who might be able to help you with the recommendation process. Thank you. But with the Breakwater Village FAR, the proposed amendments actually delete the definition of FAR and the FAR table for the FAR column for Breakwater Village and it revises the dimensional table. For households it unrelated, the planning board went over that the household unrelated actually revises the definition of household. I want to point out that this, that you do have an open public hearing which also revises the definition of household. So that might be something that the council wants to be cognizant of as we move forward. We have two open definitions. And then adds a definition of unrelated persons. Student occupied dwelling, it revises the definition from three students to five students and then for a restaurant, alcohol, beer, and wine service, especially as permits, it revises the audience to eliminate the specials permit process for alcohol service and 58 13, 14 and 17. I want to also just quickly point out that 58 12 was already removed the planning board and the previous town council voted to make that permittable in the last go around in 2024. So then on March 25th, the bulk regulations, discretionary zoning ordinance, the bulk regulations, this is by the way I'm sort of generalizing because there were a lot of moving parts and the changes interwoven between the sections and subsections of the ordinance so I didn't try to list out any of that that would just be mind numbing I think it was as we went through it so the at least the definition of floor area aggregate or gross and at least the definition of heart's. And it also deletes various components of the ordinance, including FAR, and parking space requirements for, which willings and apartments for bedrooms or less. As far as discretionary changes, it revises the dimensional regulations and components to the pre-2024 dimensional regulations, and it deletes the side yard step back requirement and parking requirements for cluster and multi-family developments. On Wednesday, April 2nd, the planning board reviewed the two-family dwelling duplex, environmental regulations and the comprehensive plan amendment. The two-family dwelling duplex, the proposed ordinance revises the use code table to permit two family duplexes in all residential zones and it changes the dimensional table to the pre-2024 numbers with As far as the two families well it deletes the development standards for residential specialties permits the arymanal regulations Which of course we can go over later this evening. I'm more detailed if you like. It deletes the sections 4.3, which is the coastal and freshwater wetland section and section 4.4 coastal resources in its entirely both sections. And it deletes the references to 4.3 and 4.4 in section 16.1, which is the staff review section. So if you're unfamiliar with that, it's an administrative, instead of a public hearing process with planning and zoning, staff can improve projects with varying degrees of relief administratively. And then the last thing the planning board did on that day was they looked at the comprehensive plan of baseline report proposed amendment, and that's because it related to the environmental regulations. that proposal deleted the references to sections 4.3 and 4.4 in the baseline report. And then on Thursday, April 3rd, 2025, site plan review. Site plan review, the proposed amendments proposed to delete the application to the transmission to the planning board for sections 11.1 and 12.1. I want to just quickly point out that 11.1 is actually state law, um, the proposed deletion, uh, and Mr. Kelley and I'm sure it can confirm that, uh, if I'm wrong. The, uh, it also, uh, proposes to delete various references to the planning board's role in site plan review, timeframes of review. It deletes the zoning board's authority to render a decision on a site plan, and it deletes section 26.1, site plan review, and its entirety. It also revises the text to shift the responsibility from the planning board. It attempts to shift the responsibility from the planning board to the planning division and the zoning enforcement office. I just wanted to take a second here. You did cover some of this, so I do appreciate that. Thank you. The advisement of both of the solicitors, Craven and Salietro, the planning board was advised, since this was one referral down from this council to the planning board, that their approval or their recommendation back to you needed to be one. But in the interest of trying to keep things clear for you and for the public and for themselves, the planning board decided they would do a consensus of these topic areas. And in fact, that's what they put forward to you. But I do want to point out that earlier you referenced the law. I put the law up here. So it is that 45-day time, so they did a planning board did get through that 45 day time frame, and that review was specifically, they were looking at the general consistency of the proposal with the comprehensive plan, and the demonstration and recognition and consideration of the applicable purposes of zoning. The planning board also looked at, they looked at other avenues and other points of the proposed ordinance that might be of interest to you as far as consistency within itself or within the other documents or other codes in the town. So I broke this out into two ways, because I did think this was important. The board actually had unanimous consensus. The unanimous consensus was not to support any regulations in breakwater village. They did not support the definition of household change or the addition of the definition of unrelated persons. They were in unanimous consensus not to support it for f---------------- the need for a special permit for homes exceeding four bedrooms. Of the remaining topic items, the board's majority consensus was to not support the changes to the current regulations for FAR or bulk regulations or to amend the student occupied dwelling text or the removal of the specialties permits for alcohol and beer wine. They also did not support the removal of the environmental overlays or the proposed amendments regarding two family houses by right without a consideration of the infrastructure and capacity. And lastly, the proposed amendments to site plan review. Regarding the comprehensive plan, the planning board actually asked that the proposed amendment be resubmitted to them separately to ensure compliance with the law, so that's where I'll in general law 4522.2-8. And that's amendments of the comprehensive plan, which if you're unaware, just like you have to hold a public hearing for a comprehensive plan amendments, the planning board also has to hold a public hearing. Okay. And then the Planning Board recommendation. I'm sure you're aware you did receive that 31-page recommendation which covers all of their reasons for the following recommendation. They did take two votes. They voted unanimously to approve the Planning Board report which you received. and they voted to recommend denial of the text changes to the various sections because they found that they were not consistent with the conference plan and they did not meet the purposes of zoning. I know this evening you'd like to talk about two of those items. I'm prepared to go through technical. We can like point you out in the the correct location in the staff report and I like as I mentioned earlier, we do have two members of the playing board here as well. I just want to say thank you for the transparency and for the work that the planning board put together. I know this was not a small task. We acknowledge that. We empathize with the planning board and appreciate all the efforts to review everything. And just to clarify, I do, and I think this is a communication issue that I think will work on collectively moving forward that when it comes to direction, at least when I voted on sending the recommended amendments over to the planning board, I was expecting to see a little bit of, you know, It was like recommendations on what could be done in order for us to move forward. And I do understand that the recommendations that came to you from the solicitors were that of everything would have to be voted down as a whole or individually. But actually, Mr. Caliand, would you mind just clarifying for the public and this council, at least your interpretation as having everything all bucked over and sent over to the planning board for review, can all of these be voted on individually, amended individually, and then voted on individually, or do they all have to be voted on as a whole or voted down as a whole? I think the expectation is that you will review each one individually. Some will be amended, there's no question, some will be not amended and then at some point in the future could be a while, there'll be a draft of the sort of final version. I expect you'll vote on each one individually and as a whole. Okay. Thank you. So then, my question, can I ask actually specific questions then regarding the two topics that I would like for us to review this evening? And I do appreciate, again, not only did the planning board put together, and you can speak as to who else contributed to this, but in addition to the council getting all of the recommendations and feedback from the planning board, but we also received a substantial background of material and context on all of the amendments that were proposed. So it's not that the council is just sitting here looking at proposed changes and not having any general background knowledge. I do appreciate the efforts of providing the town council with this very important background knowledge so that we can formulate an opinion of our own and work together to Figure out the best path forward for each of these proposed amendments So with that being said I do have unless any Counselors Vignale or any you sponsored? This, do you have any preliminary questions for them before I ask any questions? So I would just like to say that Alex had went through the process and of the proposed, how we proposed this and I need to stress that they were just proposed ordinances. It's important for me to know because I made the motion that the motion was to align with the state and streamline the process. And it was my expectation and I felt very confident that the planning board along with the community development staff would take the opportunity to help us understand how to make the necessary revisions to achieve our goals in a way that would benefit the town and the residents. It was always my intention that once the document was received with recommendations that we would continue to work collaboratively, which I hope we can do with the planning board and the town staff to create the ordinances. And additionally, it's always been my plan to hold the public forums on the ordinances and the proposed changes as we're currently doing tonight. We had constantly communicated that this was the beginning of a process, not a done deal. In hindsight, could we have managed a process differently possibly? Nevertheless, we are here this evening and we're moving forward with how we envision, I envisioned it. I should state that I do not support building 40 or 50 foot houses or removing far from break order village and I'm fairly confident that other members do not want that either. I'm here this evening to discuss the proposed amendments to the lens of my sole objective, which has been always to align the ordinances with state law and simplify the processes to enhance the residents understanding and to reduce their costs. So I think, although like you said, the process process in hindsight maybe could have been a little different. I think our intentions has always been just to align this with the state and we're looking for input from the community development and from the planning board to help us do that. So thank you for all the work that you did do and thank you for that report. It was very thorough. Councillor Colle, any comments before I ask my questions? No, not at this time. Thank you. Since you're sure. But then again, hold on. I need to ask. As a member of the planning board, does he need to be sworn in? Yes, okay. Mark, MERKR.K. Brady, B.R.A.D.Y., the chairperson Narragansett, Plentyboard. And just so we're clear I will not limit you to this one time if you want to speak. I hope I'm not divulging anything. Excuse me. I do. Mark M. ARK. Brady, B-R-E-D-Y. Thank you. I think I hope I'm not divulging anything that I shouldn't, but the chair and I had close to a five-hour conversation on a Saturday. He put up with my coffee. he's still standing, which says a lot about him. Well, it woke me right up. So, one of the things that we spoke about is communication. And I think a lot of the problem here is communication. I would like to set the record straight, and you can watch the video because there were a lot of time spent between the board, the planning board and the two solicitors that this council hired as to what we couldn't do. We felt handcuffed. We were told by both counselors separately and together that we could not make recommendations and that we could not vote. It took us almost a half an hour to figure out how to send this back to you. So the detailed information that we normally would provide the council is absent because we were told explicitly throughout the process that we could not make a recommendation. We could give a thumbs up or a thumbs down. We couldn't even vote on it. And it took a half an hour to figure out how to even send this forward to you. So that didn't help the process. We ended up having 20 days to get this done when it was all said and done. And that's just the process. But going forward, if we can improve communications, maybe perceptions would get improved. I think a lot of this has been perception. And I have found in my experience, I'm exceedingly old, and have a lot of mileage on me and top of that, his perception is a lot of times stronger than truth. So I would like you to know that what we normally would have sent back to you would have been far more detailed than what was sent back to you because we were told very explicitly and we would reminded several times that we could not make a recommendation and we could not vote. So again, communications somewhere. Thank you. And again, really appreciate the efforts, appreciate the open line of communication. And I do look forward to continue to build that rapport between the town council and the planning board. With that being said, if you wouldn't mind, Jill, if I start asking questions in regards to the recommendations or at least the voting down from the planning board, starting with the concerns of the overlay districts, Councillor Connelly, can I just see the law real quick? Right, another right there. Thank you. So at least with my reading of an understanding of the legislation, it reads, and this is as prepared by the state and written by the state, It reads, it makes clear that there can be no local regulation of coastal wetlands and freshwater wetlands beyond the requirements of the state agency requirements. So again, as it was recommended from our solicitor, literally just taking out the language, at least as it appears, to align to this state law as passed in June of last year, I'm just rather looking for an explanation or a better understanding as to where we're being misled, I guess. Absolutely. So if you go, if you open up your book, you'll see the same laws. Of course. Under, which we provided to you. Under tab, it should be on tab 4.34. 4.4. So when you get there, it's general law 452430. Yep. B, which says, upon the effective date of this section, a city or town shall no longer be authorized to adopt as a provision of its ordinance. New requirements that specify buffers or setbacks in relation to freshwater wetlands. Our regulations are not new. They've been on the books since 1986. In the vicinity of the coastal wetland or thatifies setbacks and distances between onsite waste water treatment systems. So I just wanna point out, it says you can't create anything new. So the town in Ariance didn't create anything new. We've had them on the book since 1986. Subsection C, just below that, says cities and towns shall be prohibited from applying the requirements of existing ordinances, pertaining to both the buffers, wetland buffers, and on site wastewater treatment system setbacks. So when it goes on. So I provided you with the top of that document, the definition of buffer and setback, and both buffer and setback referred to freshwater wetlands. And those are the definitions right out of the round general law. Furthermore, with regard to our own overlays with freshwater wetlands, so we have 4.3, which is coastal and freshwater wetlands overlays, which we did align with the state regulations in 2023. As soon as the law passed in, it was 2015, and then they had 18 months to promulgate the rules, and that didn't in 18 months They they finally the state finally promulgated the rules in 2022 and then municipalities had a year We immediately started working that in August of 22. We had a draft ready for the council in 23 it was vetted by our so all of our solicitors at the time and What we did was we left left the overlay section in the ordinance but removed the requirement for a special use permit for freshwater wetlands. And we left it as a special review use. And the reason why we did that is because there are other sections in our ordinance, which number one directly pertains to wetlands on site, So specifically, minimum lot area, which is in other sections of our ordinance we could get into later. And also, it allowed us the ability to formalize the information that we were providing to our prospective builder or someone who is coming through. Hey, by the way, you've got to wetland on your lot. You're going to need to go to serum and tell them their jurisdictional area, whether they're in serum, seized jurisdiction, or DEM's jurisdiction. We'd let them know, or if they were within that, they might be within that area, that buffer area, we didn't control it, but we let them know that they might want to go to whatever body that was CIRMC or DEM and get that either exemption or approval because they need that in order to come to the town. Not to go too far into the weeds with DEM and CIRMC, but DEM will issue a permit prior to 2022. DEM would issue a permit for construction in town without the town approval. Serum C is a different animal. They take the last bite at the apple and they will not issue an ascent until the applicant has all of town approval. So we try to inform and educate folks when they came through that, depending on what situation they're in. So we left that section in there as a special review use so we could continue to do that. Thank you. Does anyone else have any questions or comments on the overlays while Jill and Mr. Brady are at the podium? All right. Yes, chair if I could ask. Yes. Yeah. We provide information, as Jill said. But we also save time and money for developers, whether they're big or small, in coming in, and not being surprised when they get to DEM or CRT. It's just an education. We're not in the enforcement side. We haven't done that in over a year. But we are in the information side, we try to get them prepared and it does save them time and money rather than having to go back and forth. So it is it is a service role. That's the way we look at it. That's the way we provide it. Thank you. Thank you. So the other topic of conversation, again, I'm going to be asking just, I know that we have the information in topic of conversation. Again, I'm gonna be asking just, I know that we have the information in front of us, but just for the general public, would you mind just clarifying the planning boards opinion on the special use permit? For beer and wine? Yes, thank you. Was to not support the removal of the special use permit in the city. and just sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I especially as permit need, would reduce the public's opportunity to know about and comment on proposals of a new bar restaurant in their neighborhood. The board raised concerns about a lack of clarity and the board specifically, I does say, right there in paragraph one, two, three, four, the board found no direct or indirect references to the sale of alcohol, but they did find that the project, part of me, that the proposed amendment does not, is not consistent with comprehensive land land use goal, LU1, which is to make local understand what the planning is, the plan is based on the planning principles and with the most accurate available data. The board found that it is not consistent because it is reduced transparency. If I may, Mr. Chair. Sure. Just to relay the sentiments to the council. The council has the authority. You grant the license. As I've repeated over and over again to people to understand what the planning board does, we advise you and we advise the zoning board. Where are your staff? I've served on town councils. I know how much time it takes for you just to get through your agenda. So we don't subjugate your authority. What we do is walk through the technical sides, all the detailed size. We put together recommendations to you and findings to you. It also gives the public a viewing, an opportunity to speak, it's an open hearing. It also gives the person making the proposal time to correct things or change things that they would like and that has happened consistently. And then our recommendations go to you so you can make informed decisions. You have enough meat to go out and do your own research ahead of that but not taking up and consuming time that you are required to do for other things. So we think and in research we have found in other communities that this is a very proper and inefficient way of doing things. The sentiment was that that licences should be earned. We are in a country with a underage drinking epidemic. We are also in a community that we have a lively summer and a lively student body. And it gives us a vibrant in our character. But we also have problems with alcohol. We have deaths. We have car accidents. We have noise. And to take away another set of eyes, another process, another way of giving you detailed information, we just didn't think kept with the character and the mission of maintaining health safety and welfare of the community. We are also confused again, communication. Normally we would have had a workshop before this stuff went forward, and then we would have taken them. We didn't understand allowing liquor licenses by right and residential. We didn't think the town council would propose that unless you intend to do that. It didn't make sense to us. There are liquor licenses in residential areas and they are by right and they are held. Also the special permit allows for review. So that didn't make sense. Also again, lack of communication, but when we looked at it, the way it is worded and not that it was the intent, but the perception was that, you know, Dunkin' Donuts can come in and get a bear wine license where alcohol is, it reads that way. So these were the concerns, this is why, again, we were told explicitly, we couldn't get into the minutias and stuff, but these were our concerns, this is why we came forward. I fully endorse trying to streamline things. But to expedite things in this manner, in this particular case, just didn't seem to be the healthy thing for the community. And that's why we recommend that the town council allow us to be your eyes and ears, allow us to be your staff, allow us to do the drudgery of getting you the detailed information you need to make an informed decision. Thank you. Just so long. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Callahan, can you just give a quick sound by again in the spirit of streamlining processes? And again, I don't think anyone here is doesn't appreciate an additional set of eyes. I do understand that there are a series of additional costs that are incurred to residents who may come before the planning board to seek special consideration, special use permits. But Mr. Callahan, would you mind just giving a sound by just for my understanding, is this a general step in the process that is shared in other cities and towns in the state of Rhode Island? Sure, I did a quick review of most of the state. I think there are about 12 towns and cities that do use special permits for restaurants or with liquor. There are about 20 that do not. And there's four plus one that have a combination of that type of thing. In this situation, if you're applying for a liquor license, you apply through the planning division, you get a hearing before the planning board. They make a recommendation one month, then the next month, if all goes well, you've heard the zoning board for a specials permit, where they review it, and then has to go to the town council for the actual issuance of the liquor license. So it's a multi-step process. So with the proposed amendment, how many of those steps, just for the sake of clarity to the public and the councils, is with the proposed changes or amendments here, I should say, How many of those steps, how many like are you envisioning cost savings, time savings? What is the, you know, and again, I appreciate you providing the service, you know, you answered what the town council had asked, just providing a general context in the rationale behind the proposed amendment. Right, The liquor board, liquor control board in Narragans is the town council. You have that authority by state law. Delegation of that authority to the zoning board of the planning board is somewhat questionable. It hasn't been challenged, but that's an argument. The reduction in time would be elimination of two steps in the process, the planning board and the zoning board, and the town council has all the authority within the state law to regulate any any license issues, time, service, area, all those things that you deal with on a daily, not a daily, but a monthly basis with new licenses and at the issuance of all the licenses on December 1st or approximately that date. So again, since this seems like one that was not intended to align with any state law, but this was answering the second half to better streamline processes for residents in the cost savings it sounds like. Is there a re is there, are you able to put a number on like an approximate amount of time, Ellie saved? Like, what is the general amount of time if I were to come forward and ask for a special use permit? How long would that take? I would think it would save two or three months. At minimum. Okay. And then, uh, one other point that was brought up was the concern about issuing special use liquor licenses and residential neighborhoods. Right. That that when that myself I was confused when I heard that as a as a concern because from my understanding when I read this and this is all in the spirit of communicating, that is not what I interpreted. So if this is true, can you just please confirm that? Right, I think the concern, probably the expansion of a legally non-conforming full-service restaurant to allow a sale of beer and wine. I mean, that probably, I can't think of many places that would be applicable to, but I'm sure there are places in town where they could apply for a liquor license under this situation, where it's currently a special use permit, it'd be a license due to have to issue just straight from you. So I think, like I said, this whole situation, there are going to be amendments. And this is one that I think Jill and Mark definitely can weigh in on and give the council guidance on because I suppose if a Dunkin' Donuts shuts down, they could call themselves a restaurant and call themselves, again, later on, ask for a liquor license, that could could happen But I'm not sure if that's the worst thing or the the best thing who knows but that makes sense Thank you, chair. Yes, if I could yep one last. I mean what you're looking to do is exchange expediency and sacrificing transparency and we're asking you to consider that. Again, we work on your behalf, where your staff, let us do that. I mean, even as thorough as we do, you at the end, it's on you. You make the decision, but you make an afforn decision. You make a afforn decision that's technical, that's been researched in all areas. We have the expertise. We do this. This is what we do. Take advantage of us. And keep the transparency. That's the one thing that this council has preached. This is the reason why I voted for you, is transparency. Now, if you go straight to the council and I've seen it, it's not this council, it's an effort this council, but somewhere along the line it becomes a political thing. Some friend of a friend, yep, new problem. And it happens and it will happen. I'm asking you to look at your legacy and see what you're going to leave behind. Thank you. Thank you. Does anyone on the council have any other questions or comments for Jill or Mr. Brady? Council have any other questions or comments for Jill or Mr. Brady? I'm good. I would just ask Jill and Mark the same question that was asked to solicitor Callahan. What is the length of time between receiving especially use permit before the planning board zoning boards and that will be turned around? Sure. So when you get scheduled for the planning board it is a one month turnaround. It depends on when your application is submitted. It could take a month to get onto the planning board. If you submitted the Friday after a planning board, of a planning board, you're not going to get on for another three and a half weeks. And then it does because there is a public hearing, notification requirement for the zoning board, that we can't, well, well, we might be able to actually streamline them and do them back to back. But typically it's a public hearing notification. So once the planning board makes its recommendation to the zoning board, once they vote, they find completeness and conformance with the conference plan and then they vote to make a recommendation to the council to the zoning board. Then we have to know how we have to put it in the paper. The butters get notified. There's and that takes time. That takes about 20 days because we have to put it in the paper and the paper wants it 14 days in advance but the paper wants 20 days in advance. It's a little bit time consuming. Councilor, I will tell you as a practice, we expedite anything to do with the business in this town. Oh, we do. Expedited on fire. It always goes before. Do we cut corners with it? No. We do our due diligence, but it is always a priority. Things are moved off of our agendas to make room for business. Any business, business is a priority of ours. We work with them to try to move things along as efficiently and as quickly as we can, not just because it costs them money and time, but it benefits the town to have new business. We thrive on that. Outside of tourism, commercial is our bread and butter. So we expedite things. We do do coordinate with the zoning board and we do try to do back-to-backs if we can facilitate that, we will make it happen. Thank you. Thank you. With regards and thank you, Jill, for mentioning that. I'm just streamlining the process in the back-to-backs. If we were to stream my things, what would be that window of time where we could have a zoning review? I'm sorry, a planning review, then a zoning review. So, five days a week, two weeks a month? Well, so without changing any meeting dates, right? It would be the public notification prior to the planning board having met. So, sometimes do that. There's a couple of towns they do planning one week and then zoning the next, but they've already pre-advertised for the zoning. That's, it's good and bad, right? Because it's good, because it streamlines, it moves things along and you're done with and you could be done within two days and we oftentimes we will do that for business. We will put them on, we will schedule them for the public hearing portion of it doing all the notification and then do planning and zoning in the same week. It sometimes can get tricky, especially with residential because there's a lot more moving parts things tend to change a little bit more. The site plans change. Certainly with restaurants it's a basic basic site plan with a parking and it's the interior floor plan. Things don't generally change. The kitchen is where your kitchen is. You're not moving it. So the short answer, Mr. Toriel, is it could be streamlined for businesses to move that to that Tuesday, Thursday meeting. It would just require the pre-notification. And if something got held up, then the public hearing in two days could get held up. Okay. I would like to relay a smackdown I got from a judge in my younger days. I once made the statement to him because I knew better. My client has the right to do what he wants with his land. And the judge immediately looked at me and said, your client has the responsibility to make sure that the people around him have the right to enjoy their property also. That's Councilor Tariyall is- I apologize. Just go through his question. Just I missed it. We're going, if we were to streamline things, we would go from roughly a 50 to 60 turnaround, turnaround period down to Because of public notification. I understand. So the application has to be submitted It has to be reviewed. We have to write a report There's still things that happen behind the scenes before meetings are scheduled So you're still looking at between 30 and 45 days depending upon when the application is submitted Sometimes it's a lot less, but depending on what our workload is. Like I said, if you submit the day after the planning board meeting, it could be 30 days before the next planning board meeting. Okay. And one of the things we have to do is as board members, we go on site. We go, any proposal before us. We go to the property and we we walk we can't go on private property but we'll walk the neighborhood's that's part of our research so it takes us we need some time to get out there but again we flag these we try to get these through as quickly as we can okay thank you thank you council of McNally so one of the concerns that came to me in when I have been doing my research, someone actually, some of the people who I've spoke to were talking about Monahan's and how long it took them to get their wine and beer license. I was wondering how long did how long of a process was that? Monahan's, Monahan's applied twice. I'm sorry. They applied twice. The first time they were denied, I could go back and look at the reasons, but the zoning board denied the specialist permit. OK. And then the second time they came back, I believe it had to do with alcohol security. OK. I just curious. I don't want to get the particulars of a particular project. No, no, that's fine. I don't have to find you offline about that. No, that's fine. Just someone had brought that to my attention. I just wanted to inquire. It's been brought to me, too. So I guess the last comment I would make is, again, I appreciate the planning board, the zoning board, all of the efforts that you guys and all the projects that are undertaken. But I also see and hear from you guys and from a lot of other members in the public that it is an extensive amount of work that you guys do. So again in the spirit of trying to streamline processes, I would ask that while there's a consideration of continuing this public hearing, if it's the consensus of this council, if there are ways in which you can think of ways in which we can streamline these processes to help you out, you know, where I'm all ears, because again, in the spirit of streamline processes, not only are we trying to appeal to the residents to try to help out the residents, but we're also trying to take some of the workload off of your plates. So I think that is something that we need to work on outside of this. I don't think that's a stand-up here and start throwing stuff up against the wall. I think we really need to go through and we have the people on the board to do it. Our board has a billion years where there's experience in this. In many different settings at many different levels. I feel very confident that we can look at systems and we try to. Right now we have frankly we've been trying to deal with a fire hose of the state making changes every other day. And not throwing stones. This was, this prose, everything for us. We're about six months behind right now trying to deal with this. So on a day to day basis, we're not drowning, but I think you're right. I think it always helps to look at how to make things more efficient, not streamlining, for streamlining, sake, but how to make things more efficient, less costly, et cetera, so forth, and so on. And I think there's always room, even if it's small. And we would commit to doing that. But I don't think that's something we can be throwing out here at Hock. It would be irresponsible. on and I think there's always room even if it's small and we would commit to doing that but I don't think that's something we can be throwing out here at Hock. It would be irresponsible. Appreciate it. And Mr. Brady, since you are up here and I don't have any additional questions or comments to say and since you've been sworn in and to allow other members of the public to speak as well. Is there any additional final thoughts or comments on either of these two? No, I think we've tried to give you here. Well, we couldn't give you before, but again, it's still not detailed because we weren't given the leeway to vet it completely as of or. I don't feel, none of us felt good about what we sent to you in the quality of, in the level of work that we are normally known for doing. But we worked within the confines of what we did. My recommendation would be, and I'm just throwing this out, guys, don't get everybody get upset, and don't you guys get all excited. My recommendation is vote the whole thing down and then send it back to us. Let's have a workshop. Let's go through, take the low-lying, three stops. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop it back to us. We can have hearings. We can vet them. We can get back to you and we can work together as a group. That would be my recommendation. short of that we will try to provide you each night with what we can but again we were limited in what we could do. Yeah understand that. Thank you for your patience. Thank you. And just so that I'm clear again I understand and it's been shared this evening could the process have been improved from the start? Yes this public hearing was advertised there's a substantial cost due to the length of how it had to be advertised. I did come into this with the desire, same desire to kind of share my opinion about how everything should be considered individually, but while we are faced with a public hearing that we've opened and we have the opportunity to at least review and discuss and use the public hearing as a workshop. And there is no hard deadline for when the public hearing can close and to my discussions with the solicitor, we can workshop this while the public hearing is open. You know, I think again, as long as everyone is willing to come to the table, I'm certainly willing to encourage workshopping through the public hearings and then maybe separately as a result. But again, I'm also mindful of your time as well and I understand that this is put you guys back a little bit as well. That's fine. Okay. You know, we all are trying to do it right and as we committed to each other, you know, we'll do whatever we need to do, whatever you need us to do and we'll do the best we can through this process. You might get frustrated in the fact that we're going to have limited information because that's what we were given as direction. And I'm just clarifying that. I'm not throwing stones and I'm blaming anybody or anything. I don't want any of that crap. It's not constructive. I'm just telling you, we will do the best we can on your behalf throughout this process. Excellent, appreciate that. Thank you so much. And with that being said, we will open the floor up to the public to come up for testimony and just as a preliminary reminder because I'm sure there are many present who would like to speak this evening that I am recommending and you are not required to listen to my recommendation but I am recommending for the sake of getting through everyone who's come here this evening to testify to focus your feedback on the general process if you have anything to say about the special use or the proposed amendments to the overlays I I would ask that you please consider sharing your feedback on that first. But again, if you want to talk on any of the proposed 14 amendments, you have every right to do so. I will also remind that again for the sake of continuity that we ask that you come up and speak once this is usual this is what we do for the public hearings you will get one opportunity to speak so when you do come up please make sure that you speak and say everything that you need to say at least for this evening if you do wish to come back if this council does decide to move forward and continue this hearing to the date described, I think it was May 14th, then you may come back again at that time and speak again during that open hearing. So Mr. Kellyan, can you just confirm everything that I said there was sound? Exactly. OK. Thank you. So with that being said, Dr. Ravel will start with you, and then we'll work my way back. Or, and then after Dr. Ravel actually I'll raise my hand first with whoever has to leave. Testing? Okay, it's on now. What if everything wasn't on? My name is Dr. Albert Alba. 24 Egos Ness Terris. Would you like me to spell it? Are you good? Okay. Thank you. So as you know, I've done a lot of work on Galilee and the Procciante Paleano Lighthouse in situation. At the time of my fight, people were outraged and were happened to the lighthouse in. It was abandoned by corporate billionaires. Corporate billionaires, they created a health, safety, environmental hazard. I brought it to the attention of the RIDM. After repeated pleas, the town of New York, the United States issued a demolition order. A town manager, James Channey, said to the effect I went in there and saw the squal conditions. It was horrendous. It was awful. And then he issued demolition orders. And then Proxyantia and Pilar had the audacity to sue the town and air against it, saying they do not own the property. And then I went down to the town hall and chucked the property records card because they said proxie antepelling us that they did not own that property, but they did. They did own the property. And then finally an RFP was issued. The town put forth a viable RFP, but it was rejected outright, without even consideration for the town. And then after long and behold, the RIDM, well the RIDM ended up terminating the lease because of the violation, because Prokzeantin Pailinou did not maintain their hotel. And then all of a sudden the RIDM orders a demolition with tons of debris and waste on RIDM land, tons of debris. And then to make matters worse, the RIDM pays pays for the demolition over $1 million. Dan cost his name is on it. I had many, many request for proposals. I couldn't believe what I read. And then, a proposed 20-year street level parking lot was put up. And I went to the town, the state properties committee meeting. And I pleaded with them, how can you people who are over-sought? How can you allow this to happen? You cannot allow this 20-year-olds to be extended. You cannot even grant them this 20-year-olds after the harm they did to nearer against it. Dead seagulls were in there. I was interviewed on Brian Crandell on TV. When I called the RIDM about the dead life seagulls, they told me, well, call the owners. The RIDM is telling me this life, I'm saying that's a dead chain of life seagulls there in there. And now we have a street level, we have a street level parking without a special use permit. It's in violation of our zoning. So now we have to look, unless we fight this, we have to look at a 20-year street level parking lot which is gonna make corporate billionaires multi-million off of our dime. It's very frustrating when you see this. If we do not have a system of checks and balances, if we do not have these sage individuals working for the town, putting countless hours in, then it will lead to problems in the town of Irrigança. And I fear, and I like you all, every one of you. But if this continues, I don't see any of you getting reelected, sadly. And that's the reality. And I don't want to say that because I like you all. And I feel I voted for you because of your transparency. We saw the previous town council when the Narragansett Pierre Residence, Narragansett Town Ressociation called all the Chakne, tried to micromanage. When I were going to the other extreme, We need to have a system of checks and balances. Mr. Brady, Dr. Brady, he's a licensed engineer. We got people on that planning board who were well respected. And yet Mr. D. Simone, when I saw those meetings, he was in opposition to every single valid point they brought forth. We cannot let this happen in arrogance. When my cousin, who owned Iggy's doughboys, when he was building his place on one of a, he was a former tenant of Mr. Durkin. Mr. Durkin basically reached out to the planning board. Reach out to the zoning. How did his lawyer there? And it went on. And the litigation went on. And on. And on. And my cousin had a doubt all his eyes and crosses cheese. And my dad and I had to go testify saying, why is this happening? Why is Mr. Dirkian putting so many roadblocks up? And the planning board says, carry on. Keep doing your diligence, even though we have to have a lawyer, he was doing the right thing. He was doing the right thing. So Mr. Dirkian must understand that he wanted to make sure that my cousin's eyes were dotted and the teas were crossed. It crossed my cousin a lot of money, a lot of legal fees. And I don't really know why Mr. Durkian proceeded in this manner. And I don't, but he wanted to make sure, maybe he wanted to feel that he wanted to make sure because the planning boy had to go out there and make sure that the setbacks were correct. My cousin, he was challenged on the setback. He was challenged on the size. He had to contact the neighbors. So if this is the case, Mr. Durk... the setbacks were correct. He was challenged on the setback. He was challenged on the size. He had to contact the neighbors. So if this is the case, Mr. Durkin, you should not support the elimination of these owning ordinances. You should be supportive of these owning ordinances, not elimination of them, because you yourself make sure that my cousin, when he built Iggy's, Iggy's, the rest of why. You know that, sir, you were there. That he followed every eye in doubt every teeth because you said he had to make sure that he complied, make sure he didn't encroach upon the neighbors, make sure it wasn't too big of a building. So we need, we need to have these policies in place. We do not want to have these, these people build on wetlands. As the ladies stated, these are not new restrictions on wetlands. We do not want to eliminate the wet lands. We do not want to eliminate the wet lands. We do not want to eliminate the wet lands. We have to safeguard. We just, the town council just supported conservation, using some money for conservation monies. So you guys know about conservation land. So if you guys support conservation land and a transfer, possibly a transfer attacks to be appropriated for conservation land, then to me it's counterintuitive for you now to want to get rid of the restrictions we have so that people cannot build on wetlands. That's conservation land. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And just a point of clarification that in, it to my understanding, correct me if I'm wrong, Mr. Kelley and nothing that's being proposed here would allow for the development of any property on any wetland, is that correct? No. Thank you. Mr. Zonfrallo. So, help me, God. Paul Zonfrallo, seven, Wynwood Circle, the ZON, FRI, LLO, P-A-U-L, for the first name. I don't think you intended to gaslight the whole town with this process. I think it was a combination of you being new and some people definitely had an agenda to drive this forward as fast as possible. It's pretty clear that this is not about saving money or stream lighting. That's kind of like the covering argument. It's opening up a whole lot of zoning. So a very little that was under state law in there. I'm just curious, people in the audience, how many oppose all these changes by hand? So it's 9.45, oh my goodness, on a Monday night, I'm sure everybody was dying to come here. You had 175 people at the community center. You need to pay attention because it actually doesn't matter about your legacy or whatever. If you're truly about what the town wants, it's pretty clear that this train started rolling. And I think you owe the town an apology because this was botched. It feels like I should have brought my dancing shoes because there's been a lot of dancing around. We've heard a lot of dancing around, and I'mman, Humman, I didn't mean to do this. And I still can't believe that Mr. Durkin can vote on all of this. He's not heating the warnings of the ethics committee in 2017 that said to watch it in an advisory opinion. And quite frankly, I know the solicitor told me that hopes everybody hurries up because we've got to get through this. So the train has been stopped from rolling through, right? The train has been stopped. You need to vote it down. All of it. And I want to thank Mr. Brady for his courage. And it takes a lot of guts to come up here in the first place. I would remind everybody his appointment is due for renewal. So the hundred or so people that are here, I would encourage you, I think it's in October, because I'm not sure that this council will keep him on. And that would be a tragedy. Applause. This is so complicated, all this minutia. There's so much money in the building codes. There's so much money to be made and to be had. And it feels like more of a generational wealth plan than what's good for the town. It feels like it's going to make this town so develop or friendly that people who are making money are going to make a ton more money, in turn, into billionaires and we're left behind again right we're left behind in the name of what efficiency saving a hundred bucks on a permit nobody wants that in this audience this is about remember it's about money it's about money I hear all the sob stories from the landlord saying oh you know I'm grinding it out Now, you're all about money. I hear all the sob stories from the landlord saying, oh, you know, I'm grinding it out. You're all making money. I don't care if you're retirement, you're cancer, or whatever. It's revenue generating. And we pay the price in this town. And it's not just the kids. It's the traffic. It's the overdevelopment and developers look at things differently than we do. Look down your street. Imagine where there was three people, the three bedroom that now 15 or 20 people can be there. By right. Let's streamline that. Let's load them up. Load them up. And that's what's going to happen. So please do the right thing. You move too quickly. It's time to start over. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, please. Important. Thank you. I wish I could say that I was surprised at that One second certainly not my name is Patrick Dirty. I swear to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth So help me guide I've been a resident of the town in arrogance since 2002 I moved my office down here in 2007. I've raised three children and put them through the Narragance at school system, and I love this town. I love the people to make up this town. I don't like the misinformation that's going around here, and I don't like the buzzwords that have been promulgated over social media that misrepresent the truth of what you're attempting to do here by virtue of amending the ordinance. I think it's very unfortunate. You know, it's funny. I've been practicing law for an excess of 30 years, I've probably 35 years. I've been involved in it exclusively. What I can tell you is that the general population and of lawyers, let alone people in the general public, they don't understand zoning. It's a specialized field. There are laws that oversee a conceptual framework for the enactment of zoning ordinances around cities and towns, everything has to be compliant with the powers that are given in the Rhode Island Zoning Enabling Act. And the zoning ordinance also has to be compliant with the comp plan. And if the comp plan is inconsistent with the zoning ordinances and vice versa, it's gotta be rectified. I've heard a lot of buzzwords here and I've seen a lot of stuff out on social media and frankly I'm shocked by the level of vitriol and the level of misinformation and I talked to Mr. Duluc earlier tonight and he asked me if I was going to use the word hyperbole and I said I'd hope not but that's a great word for it. Hyperbole, over exaggeration, just the end degree of taking a concept and bringing it down to absurdity. What I'd like the council and the public to be aware of here is that there is an overwhelming problem with housing in the United States and the state of Rhode Island and the town of Narragansett. I want to say also that I have probably opposed more development than I've promoted in development as an attorney. I've done residential, I've done institutional, and I've done subdivision and development over both four and against. So I'm not speaking pro-developer, pro-homeowner, pro-butter, whatever, I've done it all. The context in which we are situated when you're deliberating over whether or not to make these changes to the ordinance is shadowed by the governor and his housing secretary Goddard's press conference about a week or two ago, right in the state house, where they unleashed a 79-page report entitled Rhode Island Housing 2030. And it recognized the dire situation that the state of Rhode Island is in in terms of affordability of housing. They proposed through the initiative of Rhode Island Housing 2030 to add 15,000 units of housing to the state of Rhode Island's housing stock. And that's just a drop in the bucket of what the state needs. We're losing employers. No large employers want to come to the state of Rhode Island because there's no housing for their workers. They can't put their workforce in affordable accommodations. So the governor and the housing secretary got it. We're making no bones about it in their press conference. And you can look it up on Google. I think it was carried by WPRI, WJAR, all the new stations. You can go look it up. And you can see that they made no bones about it, that they were going to take a carrot and stick approach towards communities and town cities in the state of Rhode Island with regard to whether or not they were going to embrace the staples of promoting housing, of promoting affordable housing and attempting to make this state a place where we can continue to raise our families where where second generations can continue to live in the state of Rhode Island. And all these arguments again are particular as well to the town of Narragansk. So they made it a point to say that those cities and towns that are not going to espouse the ideals that are set forth in the goals in Rhode Island Housing 2030 are going to be punished and they're going to be rewarded based upon the way that the authorities in the towns adjust their laws and their ordinances and they're planning and subdivision regulations in order to promote these goals. unequivocally said if the city or town is in line for a state grant or they need subsidies or they need road funds, they're going to look at what the city or town is doing with regard to addressing the goals in Rhode Island Housing 2030. And they're going to punish those communities that are not doing their job, and they're going to reward those that are. So that's one of the things that is overarching on this whole thing. I believe that the town of Narragansett for a couple periods of years has been at war with the state and resisting the initiatives that have been put forth in state law to promote development within the state of Rhode Island. Responsible development too. There are always safeguards in play and I don't think that you're doing away with any significant safeguards in what we're talking about with regard to the zoning amendments that are before you here in this package. And I can give you the reasons why, and I will. But taking in mind that whole idea of streamlining the processes and promoting responsible development, I think that that's what you're doing here. I was very, I had, I believe a good relationship with the previous town council. One thing that I was very open and honest about was my steadfast argument against them passing the ordinances that they passed with regard to wholesale changing, all the dimensions in the state of Rhode Island, to thwart the state initiative, to give the zoning and building official discretion to grant up to 15% of a modification or a dimensional variance provided none of the abutting property owners to that property objected and provided that no one objected to the notice that was put forth in the newspapers. Well, I'm here, not necessarily on behalf of any developers, but I'm speaking in terms of property owners whose rights have been harmed by the enactment of those zoning ordinances by the prior council. I went to the August or the April 22nd meeting at the community center and I said, you know, if you really want to vet these issues, instead of just having this anti-group over here, you should have had another table over here to let a counterpoint be made. I was booed. I was, I had jeers thrown at me at that, but I'm used to it. I'm an attorney. I think I'm a weather back, you know, whatever. But the whole matter is people only want to hear what they want to hear. But in order to understand and to attribute importance and value to the words that are being spoken, you have to have an understanding of what you're talking about. And I think a lot of the people are reacting to knee jerk reactions and scare tactics on the part of the opponents to these ordinance revisions. I'd like to address specifically the two that are really in concern right now. But before I do, though, I want to first of all, thank the Council for fully funding the Department of Community Development and Planning. They're finally fully staffed. We've had years where that department was just a log jam because not being able to have the support staff on hand to process all these applications, they've required a mandatory site plan review by the planning board prior to going to the body that had the authority to grant the relief, namely the zoning board. It's an unnecessary step and the Rhode Island zoning enabling act that allows the zoning board to ask the planning board to weigh in on an advisory opinion if they choose to seek that. For some reason, this town long ago enacted a mandatory site plan review of everything that was going before the planning, the zoning board, virtually everything. And that added a layer of cost, expense, and delay. When you go before a board, you want to be respectful. You don't want to just show up and give a half presentation of what you're doing here. You want to be respectful to the board. But nine times out of 10, the zoning board really didn't take a lot into account of what the planning board was after. They were focused in on their own issues. There's no need to have a mandatory site plan review. Any applicant that needs a dimensional variance, it would have to hire the lawyer or go it on their own, which I wouldn't recommend anyone doing, because of the morass of regulation. But they would have to hire a lawyer, get their experts, go before, file the application, wait for staff to process that application to give a report to the planning board, then you would have a public hearing before the planning board that was advisory only in nature. The zoning board could wholesale disregard anything and everything that that planning board set. So then after that you had to wait for the staff to draft the report and recommendation of the planning board to the zoning board, which was advisory only, wait to have the hearing before the zoning board advertised when they were properly prepared and ready to process that through. And then bring the whole dog and pony show up for a second time before the board that had the voting power to do it. I think it's wrong to require people to do that in every instance. And I think the zoning board is well suited to make a determination as to whether or not they want the planning board to weigh in. What I've seen in this town from practicing law, and I say this respectfully because I've had good experiences before the planning board, I've had bad experiences on some applications as well. But that's what appeals are for, and that's why you take it to the Superior Court or the State Housing Appeals Board or wherever you seek review. But there's no reason for the planning board to have so much involvement throughout the process. It's not in the interest of transparency. There's transparency at every public hearing. These applications are posted in the town hall. They are put on the agendas. They're advertised in the newspapers, they go through a whole transparent public hearing every step of the way. You're just doubling down on that. But there's no need for that in many, many, many instances. I've had people come to me since the passage of some of these ordinances. I assume we all want to get out here in a reasonable time. Now I just ask that you please respect. He has every right to speak on his position, just as the rest of you will have the opportunity to speak yours. So please continue and I apologize for the interruption. Thank you. I'll try and speed it up as well in the interest of letting everyone speak as well. Thank you. But people have come to me since the passage of the Boke's owning regulations and the ordinances. And as an attorney, you know, that's money in my pocket to go before these boards and to try and seek relief. And I can't tell you, there's been no fewer than 15 or 20 people that have addressed me in my office and sought my retention. And I've told them, no, you can't get it. An example, someone in Bonnet Chores wanted to put a roof over their porch. They couldn't do it because they would be in violation of the FAR. Before that was passed, they wouldn't have been able to do it by right. I've had many people that came before me who had projects in the works that had been, that they saved for, they finally were able to afford the architects and the engineering designs, and then lo and behold, the ordinance changed and now they can't do what they would have been able to do by right. That's what happened with these dimensional regulations. Anyone that built out a house in an R10 district with a 10 foot side yard setback is now dimensionally non-conforming. Anyone that built out in accordance with the dimensional regulations that anyone else in this town did by right prior to the enactment of that disastrous 2024, 2025 reduction or increase in the dimensional criteria has been harmed and they've been made illegal, unlawful, well they're not illegal, they're non-conforming now, which makes it exponentially harder for each and every one of those homeowners in Metatuxed, Harbor Island, Riverdale, Forest Lakes, Petacquamps get, all those homes are going to have to go through a veritable morass of regulations and seek exceptional relief in order to do anything, even if they can get to that as a result of the non-conforming that has been thrust upon them. That wasn't right. That was absolutely wrong. I was interviewed by the Boston Globe, I called it a knee-jerk overreaction, and that's exactly what it was. You don't penalize, and you don't make non-conforming an overwhelming number of structures in your town just because the state says that they want to allow for some discretion. That movement of itself put Narragansett in the dog house up at the state house with the speaker of the house, with the housing committees. We're in the doghouse and we've got to get ourselves out of that doghouse, especially in light of Rhode Island housing 2030. Now, with regard to the two specific things that are before you this evening, I want to address the liquor. Liquor is not a use. There is nothing in the Zoning Enabling Act that allows liquor to be characterized as a use. Zoning ordinances regulate uses of land in a city or town. Alcohol is not a use. I heard it said at the meeting that now you'll be able to have a liquor license by right in a residential zone. That's hogwash. There is transparency in the form of the hearing before the town council sitting as the liquor licensing body. There are extensive regulations. The town has a handout. It's over in the Clark's office. You can get the regulations for liquor licenses that this council enforces. And it gives you broad authority. There's no by-right liquor license anywhere. It's up to the City or Town Council to weigh whether or not an applicant, not a piece of land, weigh whether or not an applicant and his description and portrayal of his future operations or her operations are going to be compliant with those regulations. It allows the City or Town Council to put any kinds of conditions upon those licenses. It allows you to have a probationary period. I mean, you're going through that now with the Boone Street Cafe. You're checking it. The City or Town Council is the only body along with DVR, the Department of Business Regulation and their alcohol licensing department that, that has any authority over the grant of right to serve alcohol anywhere in the state. That's a fact, that's the law. I have no idea how no one has really gone to the trouble of challenging these ordinances. I've had a couple of occasions back 10, 11 years ago, to address it with a prior counsel, and I made the same arguments. And the whole thing that underscores the idiocy of having a special use permit for a liquor license is that special use permits run with the land. That's a tenet of zoning. You get a license or a special use permit granted by the zoning board. That doesn't attach to a particular person or entity. It's illegal to attach a special use permit to a person or entity. That's a condition that's gotten thrown out in court ever since they've even had these things in the zoning ordinances. But what you have here is an authority of a licensing board, namely the town council you sitting in that capacity. And you have a leash that you can put on to anyone that you wish you a liquor license to. You can take that away from them if they violate your rules, your conditions, your regulations. You can take that away from it. And it's been done in this town before. So removing a special use permit from consideration of anyone that wants to serve alcohol does nothing to allow for alcohol by right. That's a farce. That's an nth degree hyperbole that was put out to charge up the masses and make a misrepresentation as to what actually is going on with what you're doing here. There's no need to have a zoning board having an upper down on a liquor license. What they can do is if it's in the, you have a use table in your ordinance, R10, R20, R40, R80, BA, BB, you have all these different zones and you have a use table. And restaurants are allowed by right some places. They're allowed by special use permit and others. But that's up to the zoning board, whether or not to have that. But whether or not that restaurant can serve alcohol and what type of alcohol has nothing to do with the zoning board. All in you in you as the city or town council and sitting as the liquor licensing authority. So with regard to licenses too, I made the point about the special use permits running with the land, all right? Liquor licenses are issued to a person or an entity. So when that property gets sold or someone else comes in and they want to operate some kind of a gin mill versus a nice fine Italian dining restaurant that was there before, they still have to seek to transfer that liquor license. And you have the authority to say yes or no. There has to be a menu supplied. You have to give a description of where you're serving the alcohol. You have to give a description of what your authority is over controlling the distribution of alcohol within your premises. And that makes it that much more clear that it's vested in the City or Town Council and the DBR. Now with regard to coastal and fresh water wetlands overway. In 2015, please, the last bit, everyone will be given the same opportunity. You're just delaying my comments. I'm ready to finish up. There is no law that allows us to cut off, but please get through the comments. Yes, I understand but also please provide the same courtesy tonight interrupt someone when they're Providing that oh again that testimony again, you will all get your opportunity, but again understand the uniqueness we did have two public hearings Tonight and note none of us wanted it to this long. With regard to the coastal and fresh water wells overlays, there is no authority whatsoever in the town to authorize any kind of regulation other than what is vested in CRMC and DEM. In 2015, it was a law passed in response to the disarray in the regulation of wetlands, coastal, and freshwater in the state of Rhode Island because cities and towns were all over the map as to what they were doing. So the state decided to enact a uniform set of regulations that would apply to all cities and towns with regard to freshwater wetlands, buffers, coastal overweigh all that. The reason that it took until 2022 to get implemented because DEM was supposed to put forth regulations is because DEM was going way over what was in effect in other cities and towns. And there was a big pushback going on between the lobbying groups up at the state house. And those regulations were... going way over what was in effect in other cities and towns and there was a big pushback going on between the lobbying groups up at the state house and those regulations were delayed in passing. They finally made it in 2022, that's when we ran into a bump with the state law. Because the draft of the law that was originally passed failed to include coastal wetlands in the last paragraph. Last year in 2024 by House Bill H7982 the state added coastal wetlands to the prohibition. And it said cities and towns shall be prohibited from applying the requirements in existing zoning ordinances pertaining to both wetland buffers and onsite wastewater treatment system setbacks to development, redevelopment, construction, or rehabilitation applications submitted to a municipality. So they made it clear. And furthermore, in Section D of that law, they put in that cities and towns, shall, that's mandatory, act to amend their ordinances and regulations to conform to this section within 12 months of the effective date of the state regulations referred to. So you've got an obligation under law to do what you're doing with that. This town, and the reason that they did that too, and it's in the legislative record. I'm gonna finish it, real quick. The reason for that is we don't have a wetlands biologist on staff here in the town. We are not suited to get into these types of specialized areas where they have an entire staff at CRMC and at DM to do that. So they're not saving money, they're not doing anything, they're just interfering in what the state has set forth as their sole jurisdiction. So I don't think that by taking them out, you're sacrificing anything. The state has got our back on wetlands and coastal and freshwater wetlands. And if this thing about bigger houses and whatnot, if you're building anything, you have to get a septic permit, onsite wastewater treatment system permit, or you have to get connected to the sewers. And you're not going to be able to build a six bedroom house where you can only fit a three bedroom, ISDS. So this is all scare tactics. It's hyperbole. I thank you very much for your comments. I have a lot to say about the other ordinance amendments and I'll save that for another night, but I urge you That only applies to please correct me if I'm wrong that only applies to elected officials Doing points of order from the crowd. It's the council only Thank you Again, this is the public hearing. This is the public hearing. Everyone has the opportunity this week. Thank you. Thank you very much. If you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer them. Appreciate it. I think we're all set. We're going to try to move it along and get it through everyone. Thank you. Thank you. Hey, man. Hey, man. Hey, man. You're doing it, man. You saw me just looking at you. You're not around here. You can just look at me. You're not around here. Thank you. I do. Barbara, Maricanda, B-A-R-B-A-R-A, M-A-R-I-C-O-N-D-A. So just for a little context, we listened to, you know, with all due respect, the filibuster that basically had half the crowd leave that may have had something to say. Just for a little bit of context, I think it's important that the group here, I think that Council probably knows it already, but that the public here knows that the gentleman that just got up here and spoke so eloquently about the need for affordable housing and we're not going to go, you know, pass the setbacks for wetlands and so forth and so on. Actually represents a developer who is trying to shove 21 or 22 units into an area of land and my neighborhood that is zoned for three dwellings. And the reason is because if they agreed to put in, well, I was supposed to be I think three, but then they had to eliminate one. So maybe one unit of affordable housing. Now, you know what that's about. Everybody knows what that's about. It's really about allowing developers to make a lot of money using affordable housing as a convenient excuse. So you got to take what he says with a grain of salt because a lot of self-interest there. But what I want to say is I am no expert on any of these ordinances. There's a lot of lingo that goes with it. I mean, we see these PowerPoint slides. It's like section, I don't know, S for whatever. I mean, you got to understand we're looking at this. And the slides are going by this quickly. We don't know what that all means. It's a bunch of mumbo jumbo for the most part. So I think if we're talking transparency, and that's a word that's been bandied around here tonight, an awful lot, if we're talking transparency, I think the citizens here deserve explanations of all of these proposed ordinance changes that are understandable. What's the definition of an overlay district, for example? Then, anybody here know? I mean, some of you might, but most of us don't. Am I right? So that would be important if you really want transparency. The other thing we've heard an awful lot about all night is alignment with the state, alignment with the state. So I haven't heard an explanation about why that's so important. Is it a necessity by law? Or what we haven't heard is what is the benefit of each of these proposed ordinance changes to the people of Narragansett who live here year round So What is the benefit to the people that are sitting out here the people that own property the pay taxes here, that live here year round in eliminating the planning board. How is that in our best interest for expediency? Streamlining? To be perfectly honest, it sounds a little bit like doge, doesn't it? Like let's just streamline everything. That doesn't help anybody either. You know, how about are there 14 ordinances that are supposed to be changed? Dis-14 proposed amendments. 14 proposed amendments. How about putting out a document that lists those proposed changes with a statement by the town council of exactly why this particular ordinance is the proposed changes and how that benefits the people of Narragansi. I want to know why. I haven't heard that. How is it an Augustan tourist? That would be simple enough to do, wouldn't it? In layman's terms, put it out there. And then we can look at it and really decide is it in our best interest? Or are we really addressing problems here that don't exist? That doesn't make any sense to me. So those are my suggestions to you. Put it out there, ordinance by ordinance, layman's terms, and you explain to us how that's in our best interest for home ownership. You keep talking about we need more children in our schools. How does this help that issue? How does it help the people in this town? That's what I would like to see. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, it's important. Oh, sorry. Yes. Christina Decomas, CHRIS, TINA, DICOMES, 130 Daytona Avenue. I was taken aback by the comments that I heard this evening, especially pertaining to the fact that you as a town council referred all of that to the zoning to planning for as I've been told they couldn't recommend anything to you. They were thumbs up thumbs down. Why were they stifled by the attorneys? I sat on the planning board in Johnston. We dealt with very complicated issues there. We had a lot of affordable housing before us. We had a lot of projects that came before us that were sent to us by the town council for recommendation to apply. We were charged with obeying the comprehensive plan, the zoning ordinances, the subdivision regulations. Why was the planning board stifled? Can the attorneys answer that question? Well, the questions are directed to the council. Okay, well, could the council please get that yes for us. I think that the residents deserve an answer to that. It shouldn't just be that they are and for the sake of transparency that again the direction was clearly articulated to the planning board to provide us with the recommendations and then it was additionally communicated to the planning board by our solicitor, at least one. And I don't know if it was Mr. Callahan or who, but it was communicated to the planning board that they did have the authority to provide the recommendations and I do acknowledge that there was a communication gap because on record. Is it a huge communication gap? Right. If you want to talk about a communication gap, I signed up to speak on open forum. I was passed over. My name is on the list. I was not called. The reason I wanted to speak in open forum was about transparency. Ms. Fingnally, you live in my neighborhood. Neighbors have been calling you. You have not returned their phone calls. You have not returned their phone calls. You're lucky. You're lucky. I'm very active in our neighborhood and I have heard so much about the lack of transparency, the lack of communication, and then hearing this from the planning board that they could not do their full due diligence to give the town council the recommendations that they need to go forward and make an educated decision is appalling. It really is appalling. And I think that you as the town council owe the residents an answer to that at the next meeting. Thank you. I do. It's Carl Valentine's time, C-A-R-L, V-I-N-V-I-N. I'm a resident at 13-hyle point. And I can say I'm a full-time resident, have been for 10 years, and I don't own any property that I lease or want to develop in this town. So I'm speaking tonight as a resident. A couple of things. I think when we moved here, we rebuilt our house and we went through the zoning process. No one loves the zoning process, but it's an important balancing act that takes into account the needs of the community. And so, even though it was a long and arduous process, we got through it, we built the house, we wanted it, but I was comforted by knowing that everybody else had to play by the same rules and that I wasn't going to be living next to a five-bedroom dormitory during the year and an Airbnb hotel during the summer. And we really enjoy this community with residents and families in that. And I think the proposals on the table are not a simple modification of the zoning laws. They're a comprehensive change of it. And I don't understand why we are rushing. You talk about the need for speed. Well sometimes moving fast and breaking things is not the right thing to do. You didn't run on this. This was not your campaign. You don't have a mandate to do this from the people. I think you've heard from the residents tonight that there is no mandate to do this. So slow it down. It's very clear from what's been heard tonight. You have a flawed process. You didn't give the planning board enough time to do their job. And they're offering now, they're offering now to consult and do this. What you've outlined is multiple hearings where you're gonna tinker with and revise and material respects this without any role for the planning board, without any consultation of a professional body that actually understands zoning laws. There's something wrong with that. And that needs to be corrected. Applause. And you have an opportunity to correct it. And don't get twisted up in the procedures of 30 days, 45 days, et cetera. On the issue of affordable housing, I think it's simplistic to think that building more housing is going to create affordable housing. I've spent a lot of my professional career doing affordable housing projects with Habitat in the city of Boston. If you want an affordable housing project, you need a private, public collaboration, you need subsidies for rents or mortgages. You need actually a plan. I don't see any plan from this town's council regarding affordable housing. We have a bond that's been approved, but there's no proposal on the table. What this will do is create an opportunity for people to develop, essentially five bedroom dormitories. I think we have to recognize that the opposition to this is effectively killed, the three unrelated, the four unrelated, and the short term rental. And we're in an environment where there are no guardrails on this. And so we're going to have massive building. And if you read the planning board report, it's going to have a real effect community. And I want to read a paragraph. I think I want to commend the work of the planning board. They under a compressed schedule. They did an excellent job. They gave a very technical report, but I want to read a paragraph because I think it sums up the effect of these amendments on the community. The proposed changes to the housing occupancy standards together with a proposal of eliminating development standards will not create new or affordable housing. Instead, it will incentivize five-bedroom student rentals, expansion of short-term rentals, increase prices for a majority of the properties in Narragansett. Investors will squeeze out families and widen the gap between market, rate homes, and affordable or even accessible housing. Further, the proposed changes will increase the tax burden on seniors with fixed income and reduce state school funding as property values accelerate. In addition the expansion of two family houses by right to all residential lots in town when it's resulting creating a reckless burden on the town's infrastructure. Those are serious allegations and serious conclusions from a professional body. You can't ignore this. You need to slow this down and really get their professional opinion on this process going forward. There is no need to move fast and break things. The question has been posed. Why are you doing this? Who drafted these things? And the planning board comments that they're badly drafted. You've never answered that. You really have an obligation. If you're not going to answer it, then the adverse inference that we will draw, which I think is a fair one, is that the same people that have been suing the town, the Narragans, a 21 hundred, are behind these, and they're drafting these. And there's no need for speed here. Speed is not the right thing to do. And finally here, I want to address issue of conflict of interest of Councilman Durkin. This issue has been raised. Apparently, he's not sought an advisory opinion because he probably knows the answer. And the reason for that is he did get an advisory opinion from the Exx Committee when he served on the town council back in 2005. And I'm going to read it. In that case, he was in a butter on property and he was sitting on the town council and he asked for an opinion whether he could speak as a resident. And I'm going to read the conclusion here because I think it's relevant for this. Consistent with these prior opinions, the opinion of the commission, that the petitioner may have addressed the town council regarding a change of zone application for a budding land, as long as he does not receive access or priority, not available to any member of the public. And it goes on. We further caution the petitioner that he may not in any way use his position to influence members of the town council. Finally, his previously stated the petitioner must recuse from participation in voting on the matter in accordance with Rhode Island General Law's 36146. Notice if recuse will must be filed with an arrogance at town council in the Rhode Island Ethics Commission. It's well documented. He's the largest landowner and stands to benefit significantly from this. I don't see how he can participate in prior hearings and this hearing as well. And I'd like the town solicitor to address the conflict of interesting. I think this is an egregious violation of ethical rules. You guys need to do the right thing. You need to slow this down. You need to consult with the planning board and you need to make sure that we're free of conflicts of interest. I'm not addressing whether any of the other people on the town council have conflicts of interest. I don't know. But if you do, you should disclose it. And if you're not sure, you should ask for an ethics opinion. Because I think if you proceed this way, you've tainted this whole process with conflicts of interest. And you're not fulfilling your fiduciary of care to the town resident. We are living in a beautiful coastal town. We've We've loved every minute of being here. Let's keep it that way and not rush, move fast and break things that we regret. Thank you. Thank you. Wow. Yes, please, important. Oh, I'm sorry. I promised her first, and then I'll go to you. I'm sorry. I'm going to, sorry. I forgot I promised you first and then I'll go to the gentleman. Sorry about that. Michelle McGowan, MICH-ELLE, MCGOWAN26Lambert Street. I have to begin by asking who specifically would benefit from the proposed changes to these ordinances? Who is asking for these changes? Are their residents lined up outside the town hall with plans being refused by the planning board? The only answer that makes any sense to me and the majority, if not all of the people in this room, would be the obvious, the developers and the investors. We already live in a town that the rental properties now have a slightly higher percentage over the residential properties. None of you could argue that these sweeping changes could only tip the scale further in the direction of the rental properties. When the five of you were running, many of you mentioned you wanted to bring this town together. Make changes that would benefit everyone. Some of you spoke passionately about the school community, which the population continues to decline every year. How would these changes help our school population? How do these changes benefit the residents? I've been a resident of Narragans for 17 years. I've listened to many voices that have strongly opposed one another over these years in this town. And now I've watched them unite and join forces to oppose these ordinance changes. Many of the residents of Narragansett could not afford to buy their houses they live in in the current value, yet on social media they're constantly referred to as the leadists. Miriam Webster Dictionary defines the word as giving special treatment and advantages to wealthy and powerful people regarding people as inferior because they lack power, wealth, and status. Well, isn't that exactly what's happening here with these changes? When you have members... When you have members of the town council that own over 30 investment properties and more undeveloped properties that could benefit from these changes, the current council even used their power to appoint its newest member of the planning board, Mr. D. Simone. Mr. D. Simone stood in this room and stated if we weren't in favor of the changes happening in Narragansett take the profits from your homes and leave. It is of no surprise that he is the only member of the planning board to vote in favor of these changes. I do want to applaud and thank the other four members of the planning board for voting against these changes. Last year I was stuck in a Philadelphia airport and started talking to gentlemen sitting next to me from Connecticut. He asked me where I was trying to get back to. When I told him arrogance it, he responded, a buddy of mine from New York owns eight investment houses there. He rents them to your I students during school year and Airbnb's them in the summer. He's making a fortune off of your town. These are the people you are benefit by making these changes. A buddy from New York, a guy from Connecticut that a resident of Narragansett, Mount Enfila del Fia Airport. Thank you. Thank you. I do. Daniel Piver, Dianne, IEL, P-A-I-V-A. My name is Dan. I'm here to discuss my situation which would be in support of the change to the coastal overlay. son and daughter on the property next door at 3 East Pond. It is currently a vacant lot with has an old foundation. We, and I'm very involved in the whole process of the construction, the planning. Our plan was submitted in February And we were denied because we were in the coastal overlay. And we told we needed to go to planning. So our plan met all the town's setbacks. There was also an approved plan on the site with the previous owner and he he had an ascent from CRMC. Our plan brought the house seven feet further away from the coastal feature. And we thought that this process would be pretty straightforward, and we didn't expect to have to go to planning and zoning. We tried to get on the March planning board meeting, we were not able to get heard until April, just so the planning board approved our plan and moved this on to zoning. This caused a delay and we're now scheduled to go to zoning this month and two weeks. I feel very confident that our plan will be approved and then we'll be off to CRMC. But because of this, the construction has been substantially delayed and will be lucky to get the construction started by the end of August or early September. The process has caused a lot of effort, aggravation, time, and money. I'm just an average guy, postal worker, that was crazy enough to work day and night to have their ability to purchase the property on the water and narrowing it. Now, I know there are different situations and circumstances to every plan that gets submitted. And sometimes this is a pretty straightforward plan. We're proposing a very modest house on this property. And it should be streamlined because we met every town set back and there is a previously approved plan on the site. I just feel each plan should be looked at specifically and someone should be able to say, This this plan was already is a plan already approved on this site and I feel it should be like a staff review and a modification to an already approved plan and saving town employees, town officials time and let's face it time and money money and I thank you for your time. Thank you. Mr. Scofield, SCHOR, FIELD, 9 Atlantic Avenue. Good evening. So I've sat here and listened tonight and, know, accord with the chair's request. I'm going to limit my comments to the two items that you plan to cover tonight. You know, starting with the wetlands. And what I heard about the wetlands is that the town is already compliant with state regulations. So I don't know why we would need to go any further with the wetlands than just to say the town is compliant. Part of your purpose or stated purpose is to see where the town is and isn't compliant. It's compliant. Leave it alone and let's move on. with respect to beer and wine, first of all, I also want to compliment many speakers tonight, and certainly Mr. Brady and the planning board in general for the job that they did on the service to the town. And just to recap, some of his comments with respect to beer and wine and why you want to go through the process we go through with the planning board It is that it is consistent with transparency It does give residents more of an opportunity to react When the planning board is publicly addressing an issue than to having to go as was suggested here a few minutes ago and look for something posted in the town hall. So public transparency is important and the public works and doesn't have all day to spend on these things and so they like to know when there's an abutting problem and the planning board process helps with that. And as has been said, we know we have an underage drinking problem in general, not here but everywhere. So we need to be careful where we give our liquor licenses. It seems to me that should be obvious. And so making it easier to get a liquor license, that doesn't make any sense to me. I mean, do you really want to be the backstop with no prior pre-approvals of someone coming to you for the first time and you're on the spot to make a decision without the help of professionals on the planning board and the zoning board You really want to be in that situation. I really don't think you do and And you know furthermore We you know what I heard tonight was well, we you know, we want to make things more cost-effective, more expedient. Remember that the people who apply for these licenses are the ones spending the money. The planning board is a volunteer organization that's free to the town. Are you saying we want to save money by canceling a free service? I mean, take the absurdity of that, ridiculous. So we get people who dedicate their time and lives to doing this work for free. And by the way, the people applying for these special provisions and licenses have a lot to gain. And as far as whether or not land use comes into this, Mr. Dirty suggested that it didn't. That's also ridiculous because where something is when you hand out a legal license has altogether to do with the effect it has on the neighborhood and you don't have to look any farther than Boone Street market and the effect that's had on that neighborhood to recognize the absurdity of Mr. Darden's comments in that regard. You know, we just heard tonight from our finance director that we're going to see a steady increase in taxes going forward. As has been said over and over and over again, and it should be obvious to anyone with more than a third grade education that this is nothing to do with affordable housing and altogether to do with development. That's obvious. And the fact that we're facing the tax hikes we are, and the expenses and the increases in the services, says that we do need to make some changes in this town that focuses, we need to get our heads above the gutter of development and fighting with landlords and cowtowing to the interests of landlords, and try to bring some, you know, and again, with respect to legal licenses, they're moving around a little bit here, the town doesn't need more bars. It doesn't need more clamshells. It's got plenty of them. We're thriving with them. Terrific, they're great, I love them. What it does need is some professional businesses moved in here. High-tech businesses, like some of the other towns in Rhode Island are getting blue economy businesses that can pay professional salaries and bring families in here that can afford the houses. That's the way we're going to get more kids in the school system. We're not going to get more kids in the school system by countering to developers and nibbling around the edges of zoning rules that have been carefully thought out over decades in the interest of cost-efficiency, cost-efficiency, when we have basically volunteer boards to vet these issues for you and give you the benefit of that expertise. So, I mean, just think about all these things. Just, you know, I'm not going to take a lot of time more than I have because a lot of the things that need to be said have already been said tonight. But I do want to address one other issue before I leave. And that is the chair of the Narragansett Town Residence Association. I have to say I'm tired of hearing, purposes and agenda misrepresented in the interest of grand standing. And I'm happy to see, in fact, that Mr. Alba is on the same side we are tonight. I'll remind him and others that the Narragansett town residents association, it's just simply residents who banded together because, you know, multiple voices are better than one, and we simply want improvement to the neighborhoods. All the things these ordinance changes will worsen. And so that's who we are, that's all we are. We're not anti-business, I've been in business all my life, as most of you know. And we're certainly not anti-tourism, we all enjoy the same benefits of the restaurants and the beaches that everyone else does. So I'll just leave it at that. But suffice to say, as a group of neighbors, we clearly have not been in the position to micromanage, quote unquote, a Tom council. So I just want to point out the absurdity of those comments in the hope that this will end them. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, please. We'll start with you and then Jesse will go to you next. Sorry about that. It's hard. I look up the centerE-S, 41 Hollywood Avenue. Thank you, Council. What a night. So I apologize after read off my phone because I came here to the whole other set of notes, but all this conversation gave me more questions. First of all, and I have a copy of it, but I sent an email to the town council, and maybe it went into spam, asking what the intent of these ordinance amend was, and I did not receive a reply. So when I know you can't reply to that now, but it'd be nice to get that reply somehow. The other thing I saw on the screen for the first time, one of the reasons for the proposal amendments was to be consistent with the state. And I'm not a lawyer with all respect and whatnot, but there's a lot of things that have nothing to do with the state that are in there. Also, I'm not sure if a lot of the public or if the council knows that, you know, there's property management companies out there that are presently renting six bedrooms. What's going to happen with that? And there's also a fire code, it's a state fire code that relates the congregate living facilities, which is a facilities where there's unrelated and there's sheer kitchens, bathrooms, and so forth. And there's regulations that I believe are not being here to with that fire code. I live in Berg's Farm, couple of five bedroom units went up, couple of years ago, three years ago. So I'm not sure what the regulation was then. I'm not part of any group, I'm not part of Narragans at this or this or this. I have neighbors that live there year round. I have neighbors that rent. I've had issues over the years. Things are a lot better. I have to commend the Narragans of police department. They do a fantastic job. Also have to commend the claiming department. It's my first town council meeting at Benay, even though I've lived in the town quite a few years. They did a fantastic job. But the real question is, why raise the height? I mean, I'm 68. If I was 28, I'd be buying up two bedroom homes, taking the roof soft, making them into five bedrooms, and I'd be retired at probably 55. Duplexes, the six bedrooms that are out there now, are those all going to be converted into duplexes? If I own the six bedroom and you're going to tell me you can't have a six bedroom, I'm going to convert it to a duplex. Is that what the town wants? Is that the landscape you want? Raise these little cottages. It's happened over the years. And again, you are I students and whatnot. I don't, the three bedroom thing I thought was a joke trying to do that. I think four bedroom homes. I haven't had issues of my neighborhood over the last years with that. But it's really what is the intent? It's not, with all due respect, it's not consistency with the state. You know, you look at other towns across this state, what are they doing? Do they have elevated homes? Is that what you want? You're the town council, is that what you want? You're a town to look like? Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Fue. Just a point of clarity. Have you already spoken on this hearing this evening? I'll add one up three times on the set. On the budget hearing and one stirring this hearing. Yes, and I did speak during this hearing at all. I spoke during this. Okay, I just thought that's all I'm asking is because there's been a lot of people. If someone gets to speak. Nope, if you have not, no, if you have not spoken during this hearing, you may come forward. It's just my clarity, thank you. I do. Maria Grace Tordi, M-A-R-I-A, hyphen, GRAC, T-O-R-T-I. I know everyone is really tired at this point. I think to just ask for a couple of minutes. Just generally zoning is really important. It's really important to our communities. It's what makes it a community. It keeps our community safe. It keeps our neighbors safe. It keeps our kids safe. The biggest things that I look at with zoning and I look at these things, I work as, I work in an environmental lab, I do environmental testing, I test waters, I test soils, I test paints, test all of that. I see every year what happens to our sewers, what happens to the beaches, why everything stinks. We've had businesses close because they can't tie into the sewer system because it's too overloaded. Those are the issues we need to think about right now. I understand there's developers and we need that in our community but it's a balance. When you're talking about putting these five, six, seven bedroom places, you're not talking about houses for families. You are talking about motels and you're talking about dormitories. If you look at my house, if you look one direction, there's one three-story house, one direction, two big ones the other direction. They're not for families. Therefore, people to make money. And our town is not there to be sold. What's gonna happen if we sell out our town? People come here from New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts because we're different. Because our community looks like a community. But you guys keep letting them build these massive McMansions.. They're not a mick mansion people. This is very important. They're not a mick mansion would be for one family. Not eight students. And I urge you, I beg you, to really, really think about this. These amendments are so important, and we do need to take our time with them. If that means voting it down and starting again, that's what we got to do. If we can... APPLAUSE If we could salvage what we have, that would be amazing. That would be great. But let's try to make it an open communication. Let's not be the developers versus the residents. This is a town. If we don't work together, it doesn't work. Thank you for your time. Thank you. And Mr. Pugh. Thank you for waiting. You're proud of me. Yeah, good evening. Good evening. I do. Yep, Jesse Pugh, G-E-S-S-E, P-U-G-H. Great. Thank you. Long night. So, I'm going to say what a few other people have said. And I'm not going to get into the specifics of any of the amendments because The problem with what is happening right now is it's really all about the process There's a lot of people in town here who want to be engaged and they want to be part of this. And because of the way that this is how it started and how it's continued tonight, they're not able to. There are at least a hundred people here tonight. Half of them left before they got a chance to speak. It's in my opinion it's an injustice to the way government should be running this town. What you've proposed are a few extreme ordinance amendments sandwiched with some other smaller ones. So the ones we talked about tonight, the wetland overlay and the liquor license are two amendments that don't really need to be changed. You know, I know that we talk about consistency and compliance with state law. We've heard that we are compliant with state law when it comes to wetlands and for the liquor license, we're gonna lose a check and about a check that the town has for things like non-conforming businesses in a residential zone. So two bodies that the person have to go through to get that license. We're gonna to lose that process so that you save a couple weeks, a couple hundred dollars. So now there's an operating business potentially in your neighborhood, serving alcohol, and that only gets approved by the town council. So again, not something that has to happen. So the question is, is this really the process that this council wants? The way it was sent to planning, we've heard, it didn't go the way that maybe the council was looking forward to go. What What you received back are not recommendations. So you basically have no recommendations from the planning board. You have no additional insight from the planning board. None of the knowledge that the planning board has has been passed on to the council. So what we're doing tonight is we're workshopping this live with the public without any of that expertise. Typically or always that is not the way that this is done and as others have said it doesn't have to continue. So nobody here is committed to anything. No one here has said we have to stick to the schedule that we outlined earlier in the night It takes one of you one person here one person on the council to say I'm making a motion to close the public hearing tonight and Then the next meeting you have an item on the agenda to vote it down It solves a lot of problems. It doesn't compound a mistake that was made previously. It avoids another issue, which may or may not render this all useless anyway, which is at least what I've been told is that multiple, at least one section in the comp plan were left out of the advertisement for the public hearing in the first place. So if that is true, if that's the case, then any decision that's made out of this public hearing, any amendment changes, they could be challenging court because this would have been run improperly. So just another reason to end it now. Seize proceeding in something that clearly the public is not asking for. I know that I've heard from the council that you do receive emails, a lot of emails, a lot of complaints about zoning. That may be the case, I'm sure you do receive some. I know that there's people aren't here tonight. I know that the people out of here tonight are against this. So at some point, you need to face the reality, I believe, of what's in front of your eyes. So you have a large amount of people here. The majority of them are all of them live in town. They're telling you exactly how they feel, exactly what they want. And now it's up to you to make the right decision. So there's really no need to drag this on. Anyone can make a motion tonight. You can end this. You can start over, you can send whatever you want to planning. Start fresh. If you decided removing floor area ratios, not the right thing, drop that, don't send it. Send the items, work with the planning board, do the process correctly, use the resources that you have, and you'll get people here and you'll get public feedback and you'll do it the right way So thank you for your time Thank you I do. Karen Karrie N. Killing KILLE. When you were running for election, you said that you wanted to be leadership that would listen to the people of Narragansett. We've been here four hours. The room was packed. People are tired, they've gone home. But we have spoken and we're continuing to speak and we need you as our leadership to listen to what was just said by the previous person, as well as the others saying to you, we don't need to do these amendments. I'm going to read something that we have. This is our government in the town of Narragansett, the zoning ordinance. The purpose of the zoning ordinance is to promote and protect public health, safety, and general welfare to protect the character of this town and reflect current and expected future needs to provide orderly growth and development and to promote environmental and historical preservation among many other factors. We do not need delete, revision, delete, delete and revise. We have what we need. We need to move forward and this needs to be put to rest. Thank you. Thank you Miss Solar. Oh Miss Solar, Miss Salar. I'll miss Salar, yes, sir. I do. Jill Lawler, 63 Sarasota Avenue, L-A-W-L-E-R. Long night, but but it is after 11 so I'm not quite sure if we're still in a legal meeting. I think after 10 you need to actually uphold but I'll, there was a second reading where the council, I was a member of it, voted on text revisions to be in compliance with state law. So council president, can you please ask the town solicitor if we currently are in compliance with state law on all the amendment changes you're trying to make right now. I'll just let you finish your open, your testimony, then I will ask this. Okay, because we are. Yeah. Because we are. And I also just want to state that the three council people that voted in 2023 on this, we took a lot of heat from the speaker of the house. I've never had my name on the front page of the pro-joe as many times before. I think Steve will probably say the same. He took to talk radio to talk about us, how dare we not comply with the state of Rhode Island law, really basically what he wanted. But as I've learned from listening to Mr. Brady, there is an enabling act in this state and this town does have home rule that we are as a body able to take our own zoning and create the type of town that we want to live in. And that is what this planning board did in 2023. And I was proud to stand behind them and vote in a way that had my name gone through mud by the speaker of the house in print in our radio and I would do it again today and from Mr. Brady tonight what a man of courage to come here and to so eloquently speak about this he's trying to save our town. Now many of you have stated that there was a mandate you were given a mandate to go through with these ordinance changes and. And I know Councillor Wagner, you mentioned that when you campaigned, you heard a lot about the fact that people wanted changes to the zoning laws. Well, I don't know whose door you knocked on, but Steve and I knocked on doors for eight weeks, four to five hours a day in the weekend. So that's between 64 and 80 hours total knocking on doors. From those doors of actual registered voters in Narragansett, we barely heard any complaints about this. I know Donna, you've had issue when you tried to expand your deck. And that maybe we heard a little about too. Maybe there should be some changes. And I'm not saying there shouldn't be. There should be. But the changes in wiping out the zoning of 40 years is just kind of crazy. You know what we heard a lot about? We heard a lot about the fact that our community is deteriorating. We heard about the fact that when there are, we tell people there are 33 kindergartners in our school system right now. And I'll never forget knocking on a door when the parents said to us, you know what? That's one of my kids. And we're scared. And I heard tonight talking about the fact that at some point we might have to go to regionalizations of our school system and nobody wants that. We want to be able to have a community that is active and thriving with our families. But right now, if we can't get our hands around the short term rentals in this town, If we can't actually have ordinances being enforced, I forget which speaker is static, because it was such a long time ago, after Mr. Dory tried to break Cory Booker's record, right there. Someone said that we're not enforcing the three student regulation, and that's true. There is currently a three student, which is illegal abiding, has never been, and the providence have been held up three years. not enforcing it. Now, no, myself many others have asked you, how come we're not? There's never been an answer to that. So you're not protecting the town. You're not enforcing our laws. And from that is much more, is changing our community. We're not gonna have young families here. A lot of talk about playgrounds. Hey, it'll be great if we had the best playgrounds in the state. But if we don't have kids in those playgrounds, what good are they going to be? We need to concentrate on making changes to bring families to town so that we can have a thriving community, that we can be proud of the Mariners graduating class. I forget how many you said, um, Pr and so president, it's down to less than 100 this year. That's pretty sad. I mean, Christine Wilson, our finance director, talked about our budget. We spend half of our money on education in this town and it's going to get lower and lower as we go through. I mean, I don't know about you guys, but I'm kind of tired of having case in Montenoro have to run fundraisers in town to try to find people another rental property to live in, because the rental property they're currently is I don't know about you guys, but I'm kind of tired of having case in Montenoro have to run fundraisers in town to try to find people another rental property to live in because the rental property they're currently living in is being sold out from underneath their feet because people recognize how much money they can make in this current environment. So we have good people like Casey that want to be able to help and bring families to town, but unless good people like you want to help everybody here who's talking, it's just not going to happen. So please, I agree with Jesse. One of you, please have the courage tonight. You all ran in the fact that you wanted to have courage and you wanted to be open. The one thing you didn't run on is we want to wipe out the zoning laws. I went back to try to check what did you run on. So I looked at your website and I apologize if I don't get everybody's website, everything you wrote. But Alex, you said you want to support local business. You want to strengthen the schools, protect our environment, and restore a welcoming community. Dr. Ms. Vagnell, you said you wanted to be fair, inclusive. You were a club, club, community, and active listening. There's one quote that I read from you in a letter you wrote to the newspaper that I must read. I choose to start with what's working and then find solutions to adjust to what isn't. Your name was on the motion to start this whole overflowing. That doesn't match that quote. So people who voted for you voted for that quote because you never said what I wanna do is wipe out the zoning. Applause. Mr. Durkin, you wrote on the fact that you wanna be able to have a balanced solutions for short-term rentals. You wanted to talk about parking accessibility and for all tax paying residents of the town. You want to protect coastal assets in Galilee. Don't write and forget you're Ryan. Because actually, Ryan, you were pretty much the only person who said anything to have to do with these ordinances. You said you wanted to listen. You said that you wanted to repel every place of short-term rental. Congratulations. You're the only one who said that. Nobody else did. Jason Yuzel's more vague. You wanted to support our schools. Protect our beach and river. And then Jason values kindness and compromise. That was it. Nowhere here did anybody say, I've got the great idea to get rid of 40 years of zoning that has been thought by multiple councils of multiple partisanship. Nobody thought that. You know, one voted for this. So, you know, who voted for it? We all know that the University of Students got involved in this campaign. It's great for University of Students to get involved. We had 968 college-aged students vote here. This represents about 10 percent of the elector who voted, because about 9,100 voted here this year. They're not here tonight. You're not representing them. It's kind of crazy that they can vote here to begin with, but it's legal. Our former police chief had a saying that just kind of made me smile sometimes. That's lawful but awful. So here's what the State of Rhode Island allows for. If a university student wants to go here, they just need to come down to town hall, show their university ID, provide their last four, the social security number, and then state their address, state their address here in town. If Michelle Quote was here tonight for Parks and Rec, she would tell you that any person that rents here, your round in near against it and wants to get a beach pass, needs to come to the beach facility with at least two proofs of address on a bill coming in, utility bill. So it's crazy that that can happen, but it did. And there's no way, there's no mechanism in effect to stop to see if they're actually registered in another location. So there's no way of knowing that. So if it happens in Narragans it could happen in any other college town. And this could be a dramatic, dramatic change for our state. But we need to fix this. And I don't want to say not allow university students to vote in town, but they came. I showed, I had a breakfast meeting I was at with the council president, and I showed him a screenshot that I was given. I was a lonely person out here the day before the election in town hall out there campaigning. And some universities, we kept seeing them come, dropping in the voting box, coming in and voting. And so one of my friends who was with me said to one of the university students, why are you here? What's going on? And she showed him a screenshot from the, for that she was sent by her sorority where it said to vote for the five of you because they are the people that are for the students. And then it also said, please vote for these other bonds or URI bonds. Perfectly legal. I'm not saying that you weren't elected rightfully. You were. But I just want to point out who elected you. Because you take away that 10%, you'd have three different people up there right now. So we need to fix that for future, because if we don't, the university is going to dictate to this town what's going to happen. And having on that, and just one more point, because I must, as far as our solicitors, Council President, you did have your beginning slide of talking about how do we get to this point? Well, we got to this point, after you were elected, we had a formal council had to have one additional meeting, just because of nothing that you did at the town did. The state hadn't actually officiated the result so far. So your first meeting was on the 25th of November. And then on the 2nd of December, we typically go ahead and your point solicitors was brought up by Mr. Durakin that he liked to hold off on appointing solicitors. Now, Mr. Tierney, if you could schedule interviews for the very first meeting in January for the town solicitors, which of course Mr. Tierney obliged to. So on the 6th of January, you met at 430 for 2.5 hour meeting, which also included an update on collective bargaining for the fire department and during that period of time you interviewed and then met and discussed solicitors. So with not having even worked with a solicitor for the zoning or the solicitor for the town council and I must add that as far as the zoning solicitor and the planning solicitor, I have been told that every single member of the planning board, every single member of the zoning board wrote to you saying, please, please keep this attorney we need him. Same is true about the town council attorney. I've heard that department heads, the current town manager, the former town manager, all wrote to you and explained how much Mr. Davis was needed. Mr. Davis had a unique ability to be able to get back in a timely manner because the town was this largest client. And there are often times where the department heads are held with making a decision on the spot and they need to have a really quick response. So for some reason, without having worked with these individuals, who the town and who the planning board and the zoning board begged you to keep in, you decided not to. So who did you bring in? Mr. Callahan is a fan favorite. He's been here a lot. But you also brought in Rep Craven. Rep presented Craven was in a picture last week, standing next for the speaker of the house with his arm around him. Too over from from them was the University of Rhode Island president. So we kind of see here that the University of Rhode Island now, as well as the speaker of the house, really kind of have a hold in what's going on here at the town council. And the last thing that I want to say was I hadn't even thought about it until Mr. Dardy spoke this evening is about the race for governor. It's obvious that these zoning changes are a way to either have the speaker of the house win and have the town be able to overturn and have his view or have the governor, the current governor get his view of the 2030 hadn't thought about that. But I think there's going to be a third option coming. I lose to hope. Near again, it's own, Helena folks. Hopefully she'll throw her hat in and we'll have more more to talk about. But please guys, do what Jesse suggested. One of you be brave. Be brave. Just say, we went too quickly whether it be on getting rid of slisters, trying to get rid of all your zoning. have the courage to say we want to quick let's slow it down and let's just work with the town. getting rid of slisters, trying to get rid of all your zoning. Have the courage to say we went too quick. Let's slow it down and let's just work with the town. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Brandy. I do. Stephen Ferrandi. First name Stephen STV. The end last name Ferrandi. FERR, ANDI, 44, Sylvan Road. Thank you, councilmembers. As everyone's stated, it's been a long night. And just in the side, these three amendments right here, well, in my opinion, more of the benign ones than the rest of them in the issue here, the next two meetings. So I'm glad that a lot of the speaking was for all of it, a good part of it, even though we're only just gonna start on this. But, like people have said, listen, it didn't have to happen this way. You know, that's really the point. And it's not easy being up there, but you have to have some intuitiveness and when you're campaigning and you have to go to the meetings you have to understand a lot of the the processes. And you know we know Mr. Durkens up there one of the biggest land on it on us we realize that so you know he's going to have some influence everybody's going to have some influence up there. there. But, you know, to town zoning and the Rhode Island General laws to make it similar to that, and the proposals to provide and seek process for the residents of the New South applications, that's to benign. You know, the planning board isn't going to give you all the answers. You guys have to stand up and understand what you need. Study the previous councils. There was nothing wrong with our zoning. Absolutely nothing. We're a matter of fact, we're on the way to helping the town between the short term rental getting started. The three student, the college student. I've lived with six students across the street for me for probably the last 20 years, at least. Now there's three in there. So they're following the rules. So what I'm getting at it, it didn't have to happen this way. You know, maybe you get, I don't know how this came about. Everybody wants to know what happened to Solicitor. I'm not going to direct it to him. But if you could ask him, listen, is this everything you meant by what you're going to do? Did you get any other influence from some of the other solicitors? Did the town hire anybody to help them? I mean... If you could ask him, listen, is this everything you meant by what you're gonna do? Did you get any other influence from some of the other solicitors? Did the town hire anybody to help them? I mean, these are all things you could have done. And look at that. No, first thing that happened, short term rental lined out, bulk zoning lined out. I mean, that's drastic. As much as they talked about the other council about oh it's too much what they're doing. This is worse. You can see the result of what's going on. So please take a note from Mr. Pugh Mrs. Lawler Ms. Lawler that this is definitely not ready for prime time and you're lucky you have a lot of understanding people in this town but I'm glad they showed up you've been to the before. You can see that this is not the right thing to do. So have the courage to vote it down. One person Make the motion second it have to Authority to write it get it Taken down and then move on from there. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. Good evening. Of course. I do. My name is Michael D. Luca. M-I-C-H-A-E-L, D-E, capital L, U-C-A. Good evening, Council President and members of the Council. Some of you know me, some of you don't. I'm here as a resident. I live at 21 Middlebridge Road. But up until last May, and for 18 years prior to that, I served as your planning director. I oversaw the generation writing, reviewing, editing, and portrayal of draft ordinances many, many times. I can't give you a number as to how many ordinances I might have written, but it's a lot. And let me give you a little background for those of you who don't know me. Before I worked here, I worked for the City of Cranston. I worked 19 years there. I had nearly 40 years of experience as a town planner. I probably know more about the town zoning ordinance than anyone else in this room. No disrespect to Mr. Callahan, but I have been working with it for that long. So it's a little disconcerting to me to see the kind of wholesale change that has been suggested with the 14 amendments that have been proposed. I want to tell you a little something about the way ordinances have been written in the past and over the years. Typically either the planning board, town manager, town council, or sometimes internally, an idea arises. It's a positive idea. What we need to write an ordinance to do something good. Breakwater Village was a good example. There was a great deal of trouble trying to get them building permits to renovate their homes. So we wrote an ordinance that made more sense for them. Sometimes it's bad. We need to, there's a problem. We need to regulate it because this problem is getting worse and worse. You might say that the short-term rental issue would fall under that heading. But in the end, the process we would undertake would involve doing research, first identifying the problem, whether it was a town manager or you folks or your predecessors, the planning board themselves, identify the problem and let's first flesh out that problem. If it's an opportunity, let's flesh that out also. Then do some research. our department and still to this day with Jill Sabo at the home, the department does the same thing. When the problem is risen, you research it. You research internally. What are our existing regulations? How is this little issue that we've identified related to so many other things? We research outside the town, other communities in the state. South Kingston is the first one we look at because they're our neighbor. We also look at a handful of other smaller communities. Third, we look at the similar issues nationwide. For instance, with the bulk zoning regulations, we looked at, I think, somewhere in the range of 20 ordinances that span the realm from Chilmark, Massachusetts, which is on Malthus Renid to Honolulu, Hawaii, and anywhere in between. Then, after we've researched all that, we try to find the combination of regulatory provisions that makes sense. And that comes, that starts the internal discussion with other department heads going back to the town manager engaging our town solicitor at that point. And trying to pull something together that could look like a first draft. Then we bring it to the planning board. First we introduce it as an idea, it's a discussion item, it's not even on as an action item. And more often than not unless it's a very simple change, the planning board initiates some public engagement. It seems like that process has been somewhat short-changed here. We never brought an ordinance to the town council that didn't follow those steps. So tonight you've heard a lot, I'm not gonna reiterate reiterate much of what other people said. Ms. Sabo gave you a good overview of what you've had in front of you. So what I want to tell you is that I've read the ordinances several times. They've been advanced presumably to bring the town to compliance with state law or to create more efficiency. But no details have been provided to the audience as to how each of these objectives are being met for at least 12 of the 14 regs. Two of them actually have some parenthetical commentary in them that explain what the general purpose is or says something about trying to comply with state law, as is the wetland. So what I want to do, and those of you who know me, I want to give you a little bit of technical review. This is dry, this is boring, it's late, but I'm going to do it. I think I hear Jill just laugh. Chapter 1108 was the first item that you brought up. And that's the one that eliminates coastal wetlands definition. It also tells us that from the state law, what the definition is. And then it eliminates the entirety of the text of the coastal and freshwater wetland overlay. That's section 4.3. One of your new proposed chapters, it doesn't have a number, but it's section 4.3. It the very same thing. So you've got duplication here, I'm not sure why, cost a lot of money to advertise these things, but it also incorporated section 4.4, the coastal resource overlay, and it eliminates the full text of that. What I wanna say about these two items is that, as Ms. Sabo mentioned, the Wetland Ordnance was brought into compliance with state law a year or two ago, a year and a half ago. We took out the regulatory components of it, we left in all the advisory components. We We spoke with our solicitor and we asked the direct question, is the coastal resource overlay? component of it, we left in all the advisory components. We spoke with our solicitor and we asked the direct question, is the coastal resource overlay caught in this also? The coastal resource overlay is not about wetlands. Now, coastal resource can be a wetland if you have a marsh running right down to the waterfront. But it can also be, or the edge of a coastal resource can be a bulkhead, like a duck. It can be a rocky shoreline. It can be the edge of someone's lawn. It can be a lot of different things. And when this regulation was put in place in 1987 with the other four overlays, it was put there so that we could make certain that our zoning board has reviewed the application or that our building official has ensured that the 200 foot setback from the coastal feature edge is being met. There's no need to remove section 4.4. The regulations provided by DEM reflectively the 2015 law that Mr. Dory referenced does not reference coastal resources. That's one thing. Secondly, and related. You're asserting that the proponents, Mr. Collins, Ms. Vanjali, are proposing to streamline our processes, but you want to take something out of Section 16.1 of the code. Section 16.1 is the staff review component that allows people on the town staff to review very minor revisions, very minor incursions into the Coastal Resource Overlay and the wetland overlay. The wetland overlay component has already been removed. We already talked about that, but the coastal resources overlay component That allows for someone who is doing work outside of 50 feet, but inside of 200 feet To be able to get relief through the staff That section 16.1 Revision is proposing to take away that so now one foot of relief will have to go to the zoning board. Moving on to the liquor license thing. I know Mr. Daredi says the liquor is not a use, but in our zoning code, whether we like it or not, whether it needs to be improved, corrected or otherwise, as it sits today, the regulation that Mr. Pimentel has to enforce every day lists four uses that are restaurant or lunchrooms or whatever with alcoholic beverages. It's code 5812, 5813, 5814, and 5817. And each one of them says alcoholic beverage. So that is the youth, the Tavern Club Cafe, Tavern Cafe Club Bar or cocktail lounge with alcoholic beverages. Lunchroom or restaurant without alcoholic beverages. Expansion of legally not conforming full service restaurant just to allow sale of beer or wine only. So these are uses, these are land use codes and they have either an X and S or a P. P is permitted, X is prohibited, S is special views permit. So if you want to change those that are located in the business zones, BABBBC, to permitted, makes sense. Not, too long of a stretch there. But in the residential zones and in the IB zone, for those of you who don't know, that's the general business, general industrial zone. So we're okay to have a restaurant in the middle of South Ferry industrial park. I think that's questionable and we need to rethink that. Give me one moment. I have a lot of notes. I guess what I want to do is just conclude with a couple things. I reviewed these ordinances so many times I had to print a second set so I could read them again. And I identified six different categories of problem. Technical errors, something I called Swiss cheese, but I think really should be described as a detached regulation from the related policy. Unneeded changes, procedural confusion, stricter standards, and potential violations of procedural law. together I found somewhere in the range of 20 different areas of problem. There are two with technical errors. There are two with stricter standards that we have today. There are four with detached regulations from their related policies. And that's very important. If you detach the regulation from the policy, not the policy has got no grounding. And the regulation or you detach the policy, you leave the regulation and the regulation has no grounding. There are four that have confusing outcomes where you just, reading them is, doesn't make any sense. We There are nine with unnecessary changes, one which I just pointed out to you. And there are two that I believe are in violation of state law. So I could go on and explain every single one. We're very late. You've given me 10, 15 minutes. I don't want to take any more of your time. I just do want to say to you that I believe in the planning board, as your former Tom Planner, I've always felt that working with that group can make an enormous difference in getting a good idea to become a better idea and turning that into a workable, enforceable, defendable ordinance. I would suggest that you do that and that you either table this and go right into workshops or as other people have said, just decline all of these and start over. I wanna make one last statement. I just said I made one last one. I have one last last one. And that is that I did attend all five of the planning board meetings last month. I wrote specific comments that I read into the record at each of those meetings. I addressed all, I addressed the eight topic areas that the Miss Sable had broken down. And I've got a copy here for you all. I believe it's in your packet, but I want to turn this in as an exhibit. And I'd like to just to make sure that it's on the record of your record. I appreciate that. With that, I will close and I hope you all have a good night. Thank you. I really appreciate it Yes, oh, I'll go with this gentleman first and then Mr. Haley. No, please come forward I do Tom D Dolan D.O. L.A. and 990 Ocean Road. Trust me, I didn't feel I'd be here this long and someone asked, someone asked me to show up and now I regret it because they're not here. That being said, I saw how long everyone else got to talk so you people deserve to be here this long. But I will not be that long. But I did learn a lot tonight. I was taking a look and I looked at some of the proposals and just looking at them, I said, this is like a death wish for nowragansett. I just couldn't understand some of the proposals they were out there. Someone was talking today about wetlands. You know, and not as knowledgeable as he is, I just know that the Kondo Association behind me cleared the wetlands about six weeks ago and cut down the trees. That being said, I also heard people saying that they love Narragansett. I think they love Narragansett for different reasons than I do. I think maybe it's a love of money, maybe it's a love of just wanting to be here. For me, it was a lifestyle. I came down here for a lifestyle. I came down to get the shellfish off Black Point. Or I came down here to surf. Came down here for the beach. A lot of that has changed, you know, changed in the times. I know the affordable housing. Well, I won't skip ahead to that. But the things that we could do 20 years ago are not allowed. I'm not allowed to get the shellfish from Black Point. Scarborough Beach is polluted in September and October. And it was good surf there. A lot of the college kids were in there. People don't realize that there's more feces going in to the sewer plant in September, October, November than there is in the highest point of June, July, and August. But everyone overlooks that. No one has addressed the members of the State Rep to have them propose more housing at URI. I know they're building dorms over there now, but there's companies that will build dorms over there for free, and then it'll also manage it. So where's our State Rep. representatives? Hopefully the council here would probably advocate for that. You don't have to have sophomores living down the line. But that's what's happening. As far as the liquor license in the residential area, I think that'll be something. I can't wait. Hopefully I'll be dead by then. But I can see a fraternity now under the guise of saving the turtles or something, you know, running a liquor license in residential neighborhood. I mean, they do it now, ones are the guys that they have to pay for their damage deposit and they charge everybody $5 for a red cup. So it's actually been around. I just, I didn't prepare anything but I was trying to write a few things down but as far as affordable housing, I mean, it would be nice, but any housing. As far as getting kids back to the school, I'd love to have that, but it's not going to happen. Not when you can get $1,000 a bedroom in the winter. And it's sad to say. It's also sad that I'm sure 40 years from now, they're all going to be the high rises. They're going to be 60 feet high or whatever they're going to be. And that's going to be our style. I won't be around for it. But your legacy for you guys is an opportunity to maybe halt to some of it. You know, someone was talking about being in Philadelphia and talking about an airport. I also was an airport and when I heard I was from Rhode Island and of course in all the travels I have and I've said this before We're only known for two things the ocean and crooked politicians and what's happened now is People are looking at us as a great place to come and it's ideal If you've got a house here and you want to sell it or you've got investment property, but I think it's the lifestyle that we're losing. And I just hope that, you know, literally infrigutivally we just don't drown in our own shit and I hope that your legacy will be that you will sort of helped to save the job. But the proposals that I saw up there tonight, I don't know. Thank you. Thank you. and I hope that your legacy will be that you will sort of help to save the town. But the proposals that I saw up there tonight, I don't know. Thank you. Thank you. I saw Mr. Hanley right after this settlement and then I'll go to you right after Mr. Hanley, J.O.H.N., H.A.N., L.E.Y., I live at 10-rural and is drive in the village of Point-Jews. So, man, I'll tell you, it's been a long night, and tonight, rather than having you have to listen to crazy old Mr. Hanley howling at the moon again, I thought I was just going rely on the planning boards we put on these proposed ordinances. Intensits. while Mr. Hanley howling at the moon again, I thought I was just gonna rely on the planning boards we put on these proposed ordinances. And since it's so late, I'm gonna cut things short. I don't wanna fill a bust tonight. But I had highlighted with the limits that you tried to set on tonight is two, four, six, it was eight or nine excerpts. I was going to read, but I'm not going to read them all because I'm tired. But I just want to take one thing out of their executive summary that says the planning board finds that if adopted as drafted, these proposed changes will pose significant and long lasting detrimental impacts for an arrogant future. And I'm not consistent with the town's comprehensive plan nor the purposes of the zoning ordinance. So with that said, gentlemen before I said, you actually stood here for a long time, said people don't understand zoning. Well, I would submit that maybe I don't understand it as well as some, but I am a fast learner, but I would submit that the planning board does. And the Narragansett zoning ordinance clearly states, and I'll quote, the zoning ordinance and all amendments there to shall be consistent with the town of Narragantus comprehensive plan and shall provide for the implementation of the town of Narragantus comprehensive plan. Clearly, this is not the case with any of this according to the planning board. Now, should these amendments go through? I hope I'm not keeping anybody awake because I had to stay up to. Should these amendments go through, I believe the door is wide open to litigation and I would certainly support that. I also believe that if these amendments go through, there are sufficient grounds in public support to initiate the recall provision of the town chowda. And I would support that, should you vote these things through. Now, Mr. Pueh quite though it had excellent things to say. But what are the things he said? And I think he said it at the meeting that he shared a couple of weeks ago at the community center was tonight you have the ability to put the brakes on this. And after seeing the outpouring, there's at least 100 people here. You can put your own percentage on how many are pro or kind. But you got the opportunity tonight to put the brakes on this. And I've accused you of this before, but this will just further my argument. I've accused you of talking to talk talk, but not walking the walk. Tonight, you have one more opportunity to walk the walk. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. Yes. I do. Yes. Margaret NAR, G-A-R-G-A-R-E-T, Rogers, R-O-G-E-R-S, 68 Earls Court, and I'll give it. You're welcome. So I am a 365-day-a-year full-time resident. And I wanted to concur with what Jesse said. We hear a pro- a year full-time resident. And I wanted to concur with what Jesse said. We're here approaching midnight. The pumpkin is broken, and this is no way to run good government. And I think you know that. The process here is broken. First, I do want to thank Mr. Brady, Dr. O'Neill in our planning board. I listened to all 15 hours of meticulous work that they put in and I was blown away by their decades of accumulated knowledge and expertise. And I say this as someone who has watched and attended many plating boards throughout my time in town. Regarding the amendment changes to the licensing of alcohol, I urge you as a mother not to remove the protections that you would remove if you remove our planning board from this process. Now I had a long discussion today with mothers against drunk driving. They don't weigh in on these sorts of issues, but they have eyes on them. Think about it. If you remove the protections of an extra set of eyes which is what our planning board is, on these licensing of alcohol and expansion throughout our community. You actually put more pressure on yourself as a so licensing authority, because in all the years I've lived in this town, if I couldn't, and I never spoke against a liquor license, ever, I never have felt a need to, because there was always that extra set of eyes, scrutiny, and oversight. And you actually take pressure off yourselves by having the hearing before the planning board, so people can think about it and give a little more time and attention to spreading alcohol throughout our community. So I would urge you to please slow down, seek the input of the police chief and our officers. I know when I first moved to Narragansett, Nancy DeNucho was the head of our prevention partnership and although I had a girl in high school when I moved here, freshman in high school, I was so gratified and happy that we had a prevention partnership that was active, caring about the young people in our community. I think it's gone dormant, but you might want to invite the South County Prevention Coalition to weigh in on this before you make a decision, please. Now, just as generally, I hope you know that one in five homes sold in the United States are purchased by investors, including developers. That is a startling statistic. And we saw this ramp up in Narragansett during COVID. I would go to Belmont or Shaw's and I would see New York plates. And know some of them of kids but not at the time I'm there and you know everybody said to me wake up people are gobbling up they're getting out of the cities and they're buying up up properties and that's what's happened. I have no neighbors. Did you hear me? I have no neighbors in the winter. None. If my home burned down, I have no one to toss me a blanket. That's way it is. So I would ask you to just think slow slow it down, and think about how this accelerated here, this rise in investor purchases, how that's contributed to concerns about affordability and accessibility which we all want for people who want to live in our beautiful town. So I know you guys are not doctors, but I would ask you please, please, first, do no harm to this place we love so much. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? It's got to be at least one other person, right? All right, sorry. Well, it's been a long night. And again, I really appreciate everyone's patience and allowing everyone to come forth and speak during their testimony. And before I go any further, Sarah, just a quick question. I know it's listed in the order here, Emotion Receive and Place on File, the recommendation from the planning board. That should be done before any decision, right? Okay. Well, let's just get that done out of the way, because is there a motion to receive and place on file the recommendation from the planning board? So move. Second. Any discussion? All those in favor? Any opposed? Motion passes, 5-0. All right, so back to that was within the public hearing as it was outlined here. There's obviously been a lot of testimony shared this evening. So I would like to go down the line and hear everyone's thoughts and feedback from the council. There's a lot to digest here. I think there are some more than some valid points brought up this evening. And I'll let us start on the end of Council to our other or Councillor Vignale, whoever wishes to start first. You know, initially this evening there was a proposal on a series of continued hearings with an outlined, you know, again coming into this didn't know how, you know, what the feedback was going to look like. You know, we didn't know how, as a council, we were going to discuss and review these items. So, for the sake of organization, wanted to make sure that was available, should that be the root that we decided to go down. But with that being said, I would like to hear from each council member and I don't know which I guess I'm starting. All right, councilor McNally. Thank you Ryan. There has been a lot said here this evening and there's an I listen to every single person that spoke tonight. I'm I'm still looking at this with at this to the lens of aligning things with state law and streamlining things for our residents. And I say that because it was brought up and it's something that I have in my notes to align this with state law means that we are now taking proactive measures to meet the home 2030 report that has come out, that specifies what Narragansett particularly has to do to meet the goals of that report. It helps because I believe someone mentioned that the state has been very vocal that unless towns try to align and do things, and make things easier for affordable housing, that they're going to start penalizing. And I know we talked a lot about our infrastructure. And I think we need to think about if we need to go for bonding. If we want something, need something from the state, we need to have those relationships. And that was one of the things that I said campaigning. We need to build relationships with the state. And I don't think we can continue to fight them. Because I it only harms the residents of near against it to do that. And I think that we also need to help our residents to better understand our ordinances. I, you know, I did campaign and I did talk to a lot of people and I probably the oldest one on this council I received a lot of emails. I mean a lot of voices here tonight We're not in favor of this and obviously there's you know, there's always two sides and and I've received I'm sure a lot of you have received a lot of emails that supported what we're doing from families from people who I've spoken to who are in situations situations. We have a lot of retirees and near-agents who are very lonely and they want their children close by and they want someone to come forward to help them and live in that type of environment. Their children can't. And they said, we need to do something so that we can get our children here. I believe what we're doing is going to help bring families in. I don't believe it's going to, we're so afraid of investors, investors that we stop doing everything to bring our families in. And I think we really need to be able to do those kinds of things for the families who, you know, I look at it my and I tell the story all the time, you know, we are the ones who own our homes. We're the ones who don't have mortgages on our houses. We're going to leave our property to our children because we want our children to come and live in near against it. If they have three children and they're not allowed to build another bedroom, they're just going to take that home and they're just going to rent it. The process has to be a little easier for people to want to come in, families to come in, to be able to do, if there's a two bedroom cottage or if I own a small cottage and I want my family, my family can't live in that, They need to be able to improve the property. And I think we're so afraid and we're constantly making restrictions because we're so afraid that, oh my God, maybe another investor is going to come in. And it's like, what if? What if? What if we build this house? And what if we have too many bedrooms? And what if because of what if we've we've stopped helping our Residents we stopped doing things to try to get People to come into our into our town and I truly feel that from my heart and I see people laughing But I truly feel that because I'm living it and I know I'm lucky. I have my children. I have my daughter or daughter she lives with me and we do have that intergenerational but there's so many people can't do that and there's so many people who would really like it so I say we're on the right path now we're on a path forward that we continue where we are and we continue forward we have workshops if that's an option we. We meet with the planning board. We talk with them and we continue on with our process and we move forward as planned. Councillor Dirk, do you wish to come in on any of this? I'd like to just continue it as planned. Okay. Councillor Colleignees. So there was a lot going on tonight and I certainly was listening. I agree with Donna on a lot of her points. I agree that we should keep moving on but I also think that we can, we can probably slow the process down a little bit, maybe do some workshops before the next meeting, and just keep moving forward with it as planned. I certainly don't, I mean, I am not for height, we've known that, I've talked about it with James a lot. And there's a few other things that I can address at a workshop. Plus I have been doing a little bit of research, and I would like to bring that to a workshop as well. So I think we can push out the public hearing a little further and maybe put a workshop or two in between. Okay. So just as a point of clarification, Councillor Collinies, would the proposal be, for example, that originally proposed would it's the date of May 14th, as I did consult with Sarah ahead of time as to what dates would be available and we do have an awful lot of public hearings and at some point we'd like to cut down on the number of hearings that we have. Would it then therefore be instead of May 14th being a continued public hearing that we would instead continue this hearing to a date uncertain and then just schedule a workshop on the word taint is just as again just an idea. James, you have to continue it to a date certain, am I correct in saying that? I think you can have a workshop, but I think it have a part of the public hearing. I don't think I'd want to have you schedule something in the interim while this is pending that addresses these issues. I think maybe May 14th should be a public hearing and have the workshop. In the public hearing? Correct. That makes sense. Is that legal? I think the public hearing is basically a workshop. That's the process. Yeah, I do too, but I think if it can be a little bit more of a, you know, maybe a little bit more of a back and forth from a little open communication with the planning board and having them speak directly to us. I guess in my, actually, I'll let them speak first and then I'll ask my questions. Sorry, it didn't mean interrupt your councilor colonies. Oh yeah, fine. So that's doable that way. I think so. Everyone who testifies out to be sworn in, it could be a more flowing conversation, but the Stenigovica has to take track of everybody what they say and who they are and for the purpose of the record. Okay. Then I'm good with that too. Victoria LA. Question four. Okay. Then I'm good with that too. Councilor Toriale. Question for Councilistor. If we were to advance, would we be able to put out comms endorsed by the council like Barbara Mariconda S4, as well as David Fonds, or would this be problematic? Can you elaborate on comms, please? I don't know. Some posting on the website or something in the newspaper just stating the purpose behind proposed change X is this benefit is Y. Yeah. Is that something that would be feasible? Do we run into issues with endorsing as a council outside of the chamber? I think it would be almost like a backup as part of the agenda if that makes sense. Yeah, I guess to answer Council Chair Ely's question is it's not so easily communicated the rationale because it's not necessarily a reflection of this town council because we haven't had the opportunity to discuss. So, ideally once all amendments have been reviewed, we would be able to better articulate and put together that summative list of all proposed amendments or revisions and then based on the consensus of the general council provide that rationale as to how it could be of the best benefit of all residents or maybe it could be found that it is the determination of this council that there are second thoughts and we don't decide to move forward on any of those amendments. Does that answer your question, Councillor Tarelli? Sorry. Again, I spearheaded your question. So what you're saying is we would need to have all hearings before we could put out a unified statement. Okay, so from where I'm sitting, my preference is and it's a unique seat to be in the center of the group because I can't make any proposals for, or I can't make any motions, but I can recommend. And I do agree with Councillor Collinies. I do believe that based on everything that we heard tonight, and we only had granted we had the budget hearing as well. Intentionally, try to keep the agenda as, and again, I'm, I don't mean interrupt, I apologize, Councillor Tarildi. We intentionally had a short agenda here. It would be my wish because I don't know if if it sounds like we're going to get a motion to close this hearing. In the spirit of slowing things down, I would prefer that we have workshops and push out the public hearing to, you know, at least. But if- I'm a large day. I'm not, I'm just- Yeah, I know. But if we do a workshop at the next public hearing, that's gonna push us out anyway. Do you know what I mean? Like we're not gonna, we're not gonna, if we do a workshop, we're not gonna move forward with what the proposed agenda is on that meeting. We're going to move forward with a workshop on that meeting. Is that the same thing now? Just a minute. We're not going to move forward with what the proposed agenda is on that meeting. We're going to move forward with a workshop on that meeting It isn't at the same thing now I'm just trying to understand what you're saying The solicitor said that we could have a flow a much more flowing conversation and that we could Communicate a little better on that so we wouldn't be putting the four the next four up. We would be doing a workshop So So revise, see this is where again communication I think becomes an issue with the town. Again, we'll, it will be advertised as a public hearing, but if the intent is to workshop and run through again, I'm just, my concern is, you know, again when it comes these amendments, you know, what is the structure of that workshop look like? You know, if it's advertised as a public hearing, we still have to allow public comment to come up and work through and, you know, as if it's a workshop, for example, we could, we don't have to, I mean, we of course welcome all public feedback. But during a workshop, we could have it as an intentional sit down with whomever and then go back and forth and workshop the proposals. So that way, when the next public hearing comes up, it'll be, you know, we will have saved, I don't think anyone likes to be here until midnight, one o'clock in the morning. It's just an idea, just an idea, on a way in which we can save time, slow the process down and carefully consider a lot of these changes. But it also allows us to, you know, go and like to, you know you know, like hear from the residents here from the planning board directly and workshop these before the continued hearing. Can I ask a question? Sure. So, if we have a public hearing is, and this is process because I'm not sure a process, if someone is up there speaking, can we have a dialogue with that person versus that just sitting here and listening to them? Yes. Yes, so I mean, we can have a dialogue with the people who are coming up. So that gives us the opportunity to ask questions and to actually be able to say, for instance, we wanted the building inspector to come up. He can come up and we can have a dialogue with him. Other than that, even just to have a workshop, like you said, sit down with particular people. Who would those people be if we have 100 people sitting here in the, for the workshop? Well, I mean the workshop. Well the workshop again would allow us to invite to the table if we so chose the planning board members we could choose town engineer, Jill Sabo, you know, again an opportunity for us to sit down and have that dialogue with them directly without having to be in the middle of a public hearing. So then I understand the public would not be have the opportunity to speak that. So again, it's just based on design but again traditionally it's usually just a workshop with, I mean again we can structure whatever way But, you know, with the budget workshops, for example, we spoke directly with those department heads who were presenting those budgets to us in a similar fashion. These workshops could be set up in a way that the public comes or listens online. And I hear us engage with these different department heads or planning board or zoning or whoever and it allows us really to get through all of the questions that we would like and then kind of workshop the changes ourselves and then continue on with the hearing. If I may. It's just my thought. If we are limiting the number of ordinances that we're doing and we try to keep it to that particular ordinance, that set of ordinances, just as the planning board did, and they only spoke to those items at that time and we can then you know if we had a question Ask the building and I'm just using you as an example So ask the building inspector or ask the solicitor instead of waiting to the end we can engage in Conversation so it's a more of a conversation type of thing During the public hearing I Is that possible so So, yep, go ahead. Sure, you can ask whether you'd like to weigh in planning board members, building spectra-engineer, solicitor. It just has to be, I think at this stage, we can't have meetings that aren't public hearings on these topics. Has to be, the public hearings open, continue to under date, this is, ask the questions, have the dialogue and decide what you want to do at the conclusion of that meeting. And you have to let the public talk, too. If public shows up or public hearings, they separate class. You have to give that opportunity. What if we did the three hearings and then we did the workshop? So we take all of the tests. So we close the public hearing after the review because as far as I'm understanding based on this interpretation, that we couldn't, this is so backwards, but we wouldn't be able to have the workshop by traditional definition until after the public hearing has closed. I don't think that would make sense because the public may close more comments. You never know what your decision is based on at that point. That would be difficult to navigate. Can this just be like a recommendation? And I say that, again, my preference is still to, again, workshop. Again, and I don't mean any disrespect, but I just, I think it's just going to be really challenging for us to workshop these. And again, I'm all in favor of reviewing and revising and doing a lot of the things that we were looking at in here. But again, I think in regards to the process, it is just, again, I can't make any motions. But it is my recommendation in order to proactively review everything in here and we're doing that. I just think, again, from my own perspective, that in a workshop format that is separate from a public hearing is, it's more beneficial. So again, I question how effective we can workshop these when at the end of our dialogue and our conversation, we would have to still allow everyone who showed up to provide their feedback. Sorry, my interrupting. No, no, no. Just go ahead and say, Brian, did you want to speak before I speak again? OK, I just think that I know individually I have done enormous amount of research on all of this. I think I pretty much understand it. And I do have a few questions. I've read the report. I do have a few questions with the planning board, but I don't think I have anything that's going to have to sit down with the people. I mean, I've talked to people. I've met with staff. I've met with people. I've met with the public. So I don't see that there's any purpose to have to sit down in a workshop type situation. And I feel I can get my questions. Personally, I feel like I can get my questions answered that I have on each particular one just by asking the question during a public hearing. That's just my opinion. So. The problem is here is that I think the public thinks that we're just going to change everything the way it was publicized. And I believe that that's not going to be the case. And so if they knew that was the case, they probably would have all been here tonight. But we don't know what the case is until we vote on it, you know, and we finished these public hearings. The process kind of was against us from the beginning. And like you said, we probably could have done it a different way. I don't know which way we could have done it, but we chose to do it this way. And we have to finish these public hearings. And then I would think there's some kind of process we could do at the end of the public hearing, maybe close it, workshop, vote, something like that. Yeah, well that's actually off of what Councillor Durkin is saying here. How exactly would we go about amending or having that very important dialogue as a council if we, you know, if we want to make changes, amendments, or don't move forward with anything, I'm just questioning how do we do that in a structure of a public hearing and not a workshop, and knowing that if we have to close the public hearing, we are then restricted to the number of days in which we have to make a determination. Right. I thought that you would, after you hear everyone speak on certain issues like tonight you'd have an internal discussion among yourselves as a council and see which which ideas you want to either approve not the vote but just consents wise say what you think is you want to keep what you want to change or what you want to Sort of get rid of it's I think that's the way you should approach it Okay, not with a vote tonight, but kind of each each of your ideas that way if there are changes we can come back to you with that text Those drafts Okay, at what point point would that change come back to us during the public hearing? Yeah, exactly. And the next, during the public hearing, the next meeting or the following meeting, whatever, whatever it is. So you'd have that, that tax, we part of the agenda, that new text. And this is language that would be changed by you, by collaboration with, Correct. Community development, planning board. However you direct us to do it? OK. OK, so again, just a point of clarity. And I don't want to seem like I'm steering off course here. But in regards to the new amended versions, You know, you're saying that it would be like at the next continued public hearing, wouldn't it then be, you know, I just, I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the ability to move forward. And if we're amending during a public hearing, and then coming back to the next public hearing to revisit the new versions of these amendments, I just, it'll be like the first time that the general public sees it, first time that we're taking a look at it. I just don't think it's a really good structure of the process. Again, and this is just my personal opinion. I don't necessarily expect the rest of the council to agree with that. But again, when it comes to work shopping and revising, if you come back to us with a new version of these amendments, I'm just trying to figure out. it seems like the process starts all over again. It's like shouldn't we be looking at and having a hearing on exactly what we just talked about tonight? Well, the advertisement included language is said that this text can be amended during the public hearing. That's part of the process. Right. I mean, if it's a drastic change, it probably should go back to planning and start over that process. But if it's a slight, if it's not significantly substantive, then it's different. And again, I guess my question, and I think if I have this question with you before, is how do we define substantive? Yeah, I know. I think if you start changing other parts of ordinances that aren't part of the draft or if you, it has to be something wholly unexpected, I would think, to go back to the planning board. So what if we did like we continue the public hearing tonight to a night in or day, whatever it is, between now and the next scheduled public hearing to discuss what we talked about tonight and come up with some kind of language to give to the solicitor. And then we move on to the next public hearing on the 15. Is that possible? Well, I'm sorry to be a stickler here, but I think once this public hearing is open, you're going to discuss any aspect of these ordinance changes or amendments or drafts. We're going to call them, it has to be part of the public hearing. No, that's what I'm saying. Continue this public hearing to say three days from now or four days from now, we discuss what happened with ourselves, the public will be able to be there, and then you get your language to move along, and then we do the next public hearing on the 15th I think, right? And if we determine that, if we keep that schedule. And then do the same thing after that. Right. That makes sense if that's the public hearing process. If it belongs to public hearing and you're doing under that guys, that's fine. Yeah. That would kind of separate it and, I don't know. And again, I don't mean to keep being a pain up here, but I remember one of the first, and then we'll, because again, we're way over time. One of the first public hearings that we actually had as a council that we voted to continue was on a zoning amendment and I believe it was the definition of basements and sellers that we've now had twice I believe could be wrong but it was my understanding at that time for that public hearing, We then had a sit down with the planning board and workshoped. So I, and again, I could be wrong about the process, but I know we had a sit down with the planning board. Was that separate? OK. Sorry. I should be in the mic. That wasn't that. That was separate. That was separate. All right. Thank you. I'm just mistaken. So all all right. So, my preference, again, is to a slow it down. Again, I can't make any motion. But my recommendation would be to slow the process down to schedule workshops and then continue this public hearing a little bit further down the road. But if the council's decision is to continue it and have the workshops be the public hearings, you know, it's up to you guys. So what is the consensus on that? Just real quick James one more time. Can we have workshops outside of the public hearing? I would recommend that. No Okay, so again, they would need to be part of the public hearing if we were to do it I just think that's gonna be messy Sorry, what's going to be messy? Holding the workshops during the Public hearing unless it was constructed in a way in which we are working with Planning Community Development to workshop the language of said proposed proposed ordinances or amendments followed by public hearing or public speaking or public speaking followed by the back and forth with planning and community development. Okay. I agree. But again, Councillor Collezz. But I think that's what we're saying we want to do during public hearing. Correct. So we can do the beginning and then the public can come up and comment after that process. So I think it might be a little better if the public were to speak first. You know, they see the list of proposed ordinance changes of that day. They can comment it. We can digest that feedback. And then we can, you know, tailor that discussion with planning community development following the feedback from the community. The only thing that's my comment on that is that a lot of the times the public wants to hear about our different perspectives, different points of view, learn about what it is that's being proposed, the rationale behind it. And that's why the public will then comment afterwards. But I appreciate you're being mindful of the general public as well. But you, so where, what is your position on this point? At this point, I would move forward. At this point, I would say proceed forward holding the workshop public hearings, such that we digest feedback from the public work with community development and planning during those meetings to draft to redraft proposed ordinance changes. Okay, Councillor Collinies, I'm sorry. I just need to hear you one more time. I think that's the direction we should definitely go. Okay. Thank you. Councillor Dirk in any comment? I don't quite understand. What do you guys want to do? To proceed forward with these hybrid workshop public hearings. The public hearings will remain open and we have the workshops going on during the public hearing. Bring up community development, bring up planning board, have the five of us work in workshop language with them on the proposed ordinance changes followed by public comment. Yeah, it's fine with me if it's all right with. That makes sense. I agree. We have a public hearing in my own children's case. Now you have to vote. Excuse me. We're still in a public hearing. Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss, Miss Celebrita, if you want to talk, you have to come to the mic. You have to come to the mic if you want to talk. You have to come to the mic. We had a public hearing tonight. It was do we noticed everybody who wanted to speak showed up. You have to vote on what's before you. You vote it up or down. If you vote it down, then somebody will come back with another, you know, ordinance, or change or whatever. You can't be che... You workshops in the middle of a public hearing. This is absurd. This is before you. The public hearing was tonight, vote each of them up or down. If you vote, like I said, either one of them down, then you come back with a new ordinance and have another public hearing. This is wage-cougar-fusing when you're talking about, I've never heard of anything like this. I don't think this has ever been done. You know, where you have workshops in the middle of a public hearing, this is crazy. Honestly, I want you to listen to your go home after it, and listen to yourself, okay? Because... that we have workshops in the middle of a public hearing? This is crazy. Honestly, I want you to listen to your go home after and listen to yourself, okay? Because this is not process. This is not the way it's usually done. And you should know this, Mr. Dr. Dr. and you are on the town council. You have a public hearing, you vote. And a story. Where again, no, I don't want anyone else coming up. I apologize. We just need to make a determination here and a point of clarity. We did not advertise to have a vote on this. It is advertised as to continue or to close. And there are more than a number of occasions on record where you host a public hearing and then you vote on it at the next meeting. So this isn't new. So again, with that being said, I'm trying to develop a consensus as to what it is we want to do here and then move forward. I agree with the rest of the rest of it. Yeah. We want to continue it. I I to continue. I would prefer, again, it sounds like I'm in the minority, but I would prefer to continue it to a later day and workshop this as a workshop and not during the public hearing. But. We can't do that. But our solicitor is advising against that. I know. Yeah. All right. So with that being said, what is the date being proposed? Well, it's up to you. So then, if everyone is good with May 14th then, is there a motion to continue this public hearing to May 14th? Make a motion to continue public hearing to May 14th. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. Secretary. I will... Any discussion? All is in favor? Aye. Aye. I will oppose. Motion passes for one. Is there a motion to adjourn at 12.25 a.m.? So moved. Second. All is in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passed.