Land Use Committee

Welcome everyone. I call this meeting of the City Council's Land Use Committee to order. It is Thursday, May 7th. Pursuant to Chapter 2 of the Acts of 2025, this meeting is being conducted via remote participation. We will post an audio-video recording and comprehensive record of these proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting. on the City of Somerville's website and local cable access government channels. Will the clerk please call the roll?

This is roll call. Councilor Davis? Councilor Clingan? Councilor Sait? Here. McLaughlin?

Yep.

Councilor Ewen-Campen?

Here.

With three Councilors present, we have quorum.

Excellent. And Councilor Davis has an unavoidable family Responsibility, and Councilor Clingan is at an important Ward 4 meeting, so it's just the quorum of us. We have two substantive items to discuss tonight. There's some amendments to the affordable housing overlay and then a proposal related to dormers. Before we get started, I'd like to move to recommend approval of items 1, 2, and 3, which are just the approval of minutes of previous meetings. Can we call the roll on those, please?

And on the approval of agenda items 1, 2, and 3, Councilor Davis is absent, Councilor Clingan is absent, Councilor Sait? Yes. Councilor McLaughlin?

Yes.

And Councilor Ewen-Campen?

Yes.

Three counselors in favor, those are accepted.

Excellent. So let's discuss the proposed amendments to the affordable housing overlay. So I'd like to take up item four and five. Item four is the planning board's recommendation for this item, which is recommending approval. and I encourage anybody interested to read that and then let's take up item five and I'll read the item it's 260204 requesting ordainment to an amendment of section 8.1 in the zoning ordinance to provide for larger buildings Additional dimensional flexibility and fewer use restrictions for affordable housing projects. So colleagues, the first thing I want to do just before we have our substantive discussion, Director Bartman... provided an updated draft to this at our April 2nd meeting. And I think that's the draft that we want to be working off. So I'm going to move to replace the text of the item that's before us currently with the text from April 2nd.

And the clerk has that ready and we can put that on the screen when possible. Thank you very much. So this is not a vote to approve the amendment. This is just a vote to put this updated language before us. Can we call the roll on that?

Yes, and just to clarify this is to update the attachment, not the actual text of the item itself.

The attachment is, yes, I want to replace the attachment, which is the substantive language that we are considering.

And on that motion, Councilor Davis is absent. Councilor Clingan is absent. Councilor Sait. Yes. Councilor McLaughlin. Yes. Councilor Ewen-Campen.

Yes.

That motion is approved.

Excellent. So colleagues, I'm going to turn it over to Director Bartman in just a sec, but I just wanted to briefly update you on my thinking on this. So at our last land use meeting, I had talked about two potential changes that I wanted to propose. One of them, we had discussed in a previous meeting the idea that there would be an additional and increased setback for parking. Davis and I had brought up that we don't want to do that. That's like added strictness. for affordable buildings that wouldn't apply to market rate buildings, which kind of is counter to the intent here. So I worked with our liaison, Samantha Carr, to draft an amendment to do that. But then in discussion with Director Bartman today, the language that we have before us actually doesn't include that additional setback.

So, Director, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like I don't need to actually propose anything. What we had been discussing was a theoretical proposal.

that's correct and it was represented that way in our well was represented in our presentation where we were trying to show the differences between the base districts and this overlay and that ended up causing us to discuss the parking setbacks because it appeared in the table as if they were going to be included but this PDF had never included parking setbacks and the table that everybody's looking at is the table of standards that would apply to any development using this overlay. They would no longer reference the base zoning district for these building dimensions.

Got it. So the table that is before us that is now attached to this item that's on the screen, these are the standards for affordable buildings. They don't link to some other table, right? That's correct. So the other thing that I had raised at our previous meeting, I had had discussions with some architects from Somerville who had basically said, you know, this was inspired by mass timber, this new building technique. and the idea was those projects can pencil out at eight stories whereas a typical construction project couldn't so that's why you're proposing going to eight stories all well and good but why not nine like we think projects could also pencil better at nine Made sense to me. I reached out to Director Bartman and he said, no, it's the building code. The building code has, and we can go into the details for anyone who's interested, but Put simply, there's a huge increase in the cost because of the building code requirements when you get to nine stories. So I no longer am proposing to increase this to nine stories.

I'm very satisfied with keeping it at eight. and you know the hope here is that this will allow mass timber projects to come to Somerville for affordable housing. Director is there anything else that you wanted to bring to our attention?

I want to call attention to discussions we had related to the green score discussion. The table here doesn't reflect what we had presented, which was a slight increase in the green score, but We allow these buildings to not only cover up to 100% of the lot, but their open space requirements a little bit smaller. So as like a counter adjustment, we thought to bring in the higher green score from some of the lower MR districts. So you would increase each one of those numbers if the committee chooses to 0.25 and 0.3. So the plants that you would include in your landscape need to earn more points, but you have a smaller area where you have to put them.

and your building's allowed to allowed to be bigger it doesn't mean that a building will cover 100% of the lot it means that effectively we allow you to choose up to 100% if you need if you need to cover that you can put your open space in another place In that case it'd be on the roof if it occupied 100% of the ground level. But we did discuss that in our meeting last time, so I at least wanted to highlight that discrepancy. One other point that came up, we were talking about how we did not include the upper story step back because it can cost units. The course of that conversation also pointed out that the side setback has the same material effect for buildings that happen to be abutting MR3. If the committee so wanted to, it could adjust that also. But that side setback is still in here. The upper story step back on the front of the building is not. So I wanted to call attention to that as well.

so here we're looking at side setback first to third story if you're a budding neighborhood resident or a lower height district is 10 feet right and then and then uh higher than that uh increases to

Sorry, can you? Right, 20, 30. Yes, yeah, yeah. And that would move the building slightly further away. It's about equivalent of one house lot. just for those upper stories but if if the goal is to maximize the interior space of the affordable housing buildings to get units That has the same impact as that upper story step back did, but on the side and only when it's abutting in MR3 or lower district.

Right. I'll say that my instinct on this has always been to kind of... I think the affordable housing overlay is basically working. I don't think we need to do a kind of massive overhaul here. I want it to go up to eight stories. I want to get rid of the upper story stepbacks. In general, you know, I think we could have we could talk all day about how exactly it should work if you're next to a neighborhood residence property, I think. there's probably a lot to talk about there but my general feeling is that it's working what we have is okay but I want to add a story for to allow for mass timber and these upper story step backs I think are basically like taking away units for no reason Are there questions? Basically, I personally am very supportive of this and ready to move, but obviously this is a little bit complicated and I want to make sure that everybody has time to process it. Councilor McLaughlin.

Thank you, Chair. Through you to Mr. Bartman. Mr. Bartman, what would you say to someone at the State House who would want to change state building code to allow something like this to happen? What's the problem with the state building code and what would have to change in order to allow more height?

Oh, if we wanted to go up to nine stories? Yeah. What's the building code issue that would make it more expensive?

So mass timber is a new type of construction that was added to the building code recently. There are three categories of it. The first one is up to eight stories and 85 feet in height total for residential use, can be built out of mass timber. if you go above 89 feet or 85 feet or go to the ninth story it triggers you into the second category of mass timber so you're still building mass timber but only a certain amount of wood is then allowed to be exposed and so you have to cover it up with other building materials which is where the added cost comes in A second way that you could add another floor is by building what every mixed use building does on the ground level, which is like if it has a restaurant there, that's actually type one construction, the same thing you would see as like The new buildings in Union Square are all type 1 construction.

So if you add a ground level commercial, you frequently are adding it as type 1. That's another way to add that floor. that doesn't change anything with the number of stories that you can have out of mass timber so you can still only put eight stories on top of that podium floor so you'd get a nine-story building but not more residential and not more in mass timber So again, you increase your costs by going up to a ninth floor. Now, what that doesn't mean is that they're... that every site pencils out at eight stories, right? There could be other factors that make a site more expensive. You need to remediate the dirt, things like that. that might make a nine-story building pencil on specific known sites, but generically speaking, they would run into those limitations from the building code and have to react accordingly, which would increase construction costs. So if we're trying to aim at the thing that is the most efficient as a bonus, right? This whole overlay works as a bonus.

You can build taller than other people can. Then we would target the eight stories of mass timber

and not above that is that would be the argument okay follow-up question is is there a practical reason why why that is the case any safety reason why the building code would be made that way

Yeah, through the chair. The building code uses different maximum heights for different construction types. So there's four construction types. there's five construction types and they each have a number of stories and a total height that they can reach and many of the other types that aren't type one top off at 85 feet and different story counts. So that's a thing across the board in the international building code that regulates development across the United States. If you want to build taller than that, then you can go into the other construction type, right? So it's always about increasing the uh fire resistance of the materials in the building right like even a even a type uh

5 construction which is what houses are built out of that's still fire proof or safe right it's uh yes wood burns but there's like a certain amount of fire protection built into even stuff that's built uh Out of Wood, right? Our triple deckers, our houses. But as you go up in construction type and as you go up in each category, Within a specific type, it increases the fire resistance effectively. For instance, adding sprinklers. The difference between... Category A and B of Type 5 is that you add a sprinkler system, making it even more safe, and then you can get an additional story and go a little bit taller. I think it's another 10 feet. So the building code has all of this stuff related on making it even more and more and more safe as you get taller and taller and off the ground, you know, from the ground level. You've also maybe heard us reference that there is a high-rise building.

and so on. That's why that 70-foot limit is triggered. Once you have some building that high, firefighters can use things like a command center room at the ground level. A place to connect their hoses, things like that. Like the building code triggers additional standards because of needing to potentially fight a fire up in the air, right? The whole system works that way. And so it has these upper limit thresholds for number of stories and total building height that it doesn't matter what we write in the zoning. They have to follow that. or bump into the next construction type. So unless somebody is already willing to spend more money by going into the next construction type, We can calibrate our standards to understand the lowest price one.

That's what this eight stories, 85 feet is based off of. The simplest way to build a mass timber building and the most financially efficient. because it's not in one of the other categories.

All right. Well, a lot more questions about building code that I'll save for another time. But yes, thank you. I'm satisfied, Mr. Chair. Thank you.

Thank you. Councilor Steudt, anything you want to raise?

Yeah, no questions. I just want to thank the director for clarifying all the setbacks and the increased parking setbacks. I'm very supportive of this. Yeah, very grateful for all the work you've done.

As am I, thank you. Okay, so just two things I want to note. We have a constituent who has pointed out That the lot width and the lot depth are defined as below 100 feet and above 100 feet. But what about if it's exactly 100 feet? I think we could argue nothing is exactly 100 feet. It will always be a little bit above or a little bit below. Or we could amend all these to say greater than or equal to. So I kind of want to channel Councilor Davis, who does a lot of extremely detailed analyses of laws, and I would like... To move for lot depth under side setback and rear setback, I would like to change the lot depth greater than 100 feet to lot depth greater than or equal to 100 feet.

Does the clerk have those?

I am typing as we go. So you said I see the director has his hand up.

Maybe he's going to save us some time.

Well, I see it under the side setback one. That should be two lot widths and two depths for the rear setback. So there's that second one that you just added the equal to. Lot depth under fourth through eighth story. That should be lot width. So there's a typo right there. So while we're fixing typos, let's do that one too. Oh, under fourth, they should both say lot width. Lot width, yep.

Okay, one moment and let me make sure. Okay, so we have two and apologies. I'm just typing as we go and make sure this is correct for the minutes and the vote. So two-parter, so Councilor Ewen-Campen moved to amend the language in Table 816 for lot depth and lot width under rear and side setback to greater than or equal to 100 feet. and under rear setback to change the first one to lot width. Is that what you're trying to convey? Apologies.

It's just, I gotta write it down.

I believe, and correct me if I'm wrong, Director, under side setback, we want both of them to say lot width. Is that correct?

Yes, Mr. Chair. The last line under side setback should, instead of lot depth greater than 100 feet, should say lot width greater than or equal to 100 feet. Does that make sense, Clerk? and then we can do the rear setback ones separately.

So this is three separate amendments to this table?

Yes.

Okay. 816 for lot depth under rear and side setback to greater than or equal to 100 feet and under side setback That's it. That's it. Okay. All right, so on the motion to amend the language in table 816 for lot depth under rear and side setback to greater than or equal to 100 feet and under side setback, the last line. to say lot width to greater than or equal to 100 feet.

Councillor Davis is absent. Councillor Clingan is absent. Councillor Sait? Yes. Councillor McLaughlin?

Yes.

Councillor Ewen-Campen?

Yes.

That motion is approved.

Excellent. And on the main motion as amended.

And on the motion as amended, Councillor Davis is absent. Councillor Clingan is absent. Councillor Sait. Yes. Councilor McLaughlin.

Yes.

Councilor Ewen-Campen.

Yes, but also I see Director Bartman's hand up, which worries me. Director Bartman, go ahead.

Any desired change to the green score?

The current green score is status quo, right? That's right. Yeah, that's what I want to do. Okay, I just wanted to double check. Thank you. If counselors want to increase that, so that affordable houses would have a slightly higher green score, speak now, forever hold your peace. It's not literally forever. All right. That motion is approved. Recommended to be approved. Excellent. Thank you all. And that brings us to our conversation about dormers.

Chair, if I may, could I just clarify agenda item four you'd like to mark as work completed? The planning board's recommendations? Yes.

Or place on file, whatever you tell me.

Work completed is correct.

All right, so let's take up I said item six. This is item 260287. 26 registered voters requesting a zoning text amendment to amend the zoning ordinance section as listed. And this relates to dormers. Upper story additions. We held a public hearing on this item several weeks ago, and there was a presentation from the advocates who were calling for this. and in their presentation they characterized their discussions with planning staff big picture as Agreement, right? And they pointed out one area where the proponents of this and the planning staff differ, which is, should there be a couple foot setback from the front? When you're building these dormers on your top story, should it have to be set back from the front of the building?

I believe that planning has recommended two feet. Is that correct, director? and so I want to talk about that and then I also want to talk about one element that I think didn't really emerge in the public hearing which is the fact that the amendment also proposes to allow any building type in NR to be three stories. Thanks for watching! And I wanted to discuss those two things separately. And then lastly, before we finish our discussion, I want to talk about how this applies to backyard cottages, which is a whole other ball of wax that this committee is dealing with currently on a bunch of fronts. So let's start with this two foot setback thing. Director Bartman, do you want to introduce the kind of plannings thinking on this?

Sure, and I can share a little bit about what we did with the public since we last talked about this in the fall last year. We actually created a version of the amendment like what was submitted here, but it also included that front setback. So any side facing dormer facing your neighbors to the side, it would have to be two feet back from the front of the building. The reason we did that was to ask people questions about what that appears to look like from the front when you view the building from the front. We included a bunch of pictures and we broke down the regulated dimensions of a dormer into individual questions. Did this be allowed to? come all the way to the front of the building? Should a dormer be allowed to go all the way above the roof line? Five or six questions, all getting at the individual dimensions.

but we included that front setback and that's because it creates the visual illusion that a dormer is not a full height floor on the third floor. So the majority of buildings in the NR zoning district are permitted as two and a half story buildings. and there's been at least some feedback from the public about not wanting to lose the pitched roof visual character of the housing and the buildings in the NR zoning district. When we got feedback from the people that took the survey, I want to highlight some of the summary of the responses. And it's that 90% of the people that responded were supportive of relaxing the regulations, generically speaking, across the board. We did have one third of our respondents say that we weren't going far enough.

and the only dimension we were still including was that that two foot setback was from the front. We did have some people who think that what we're, Allowing dormers to be this size is like a crime against the existing buildings in the neighborhood and that our two foot A setback is they called it a token ghost roofline reference. And so I just want to highlight that somebody from the public at least has a care about what those look like. and the impact a dormer has on the visual aspect of their neighborhood. And so that's really where that two foot setback comes from is us

you know including something related to dormers that allows them to get bigger but has a reference to that person's concern um The thing that we can't tell you from our survey is that it reached a level of participation that is representative of the city's population. So I don't know whether or not There's a majority of people that actually have that concern about dormers overwhelming the roof, or if it's actually the 90% of respondents better represent the public interest. So in that circumstance, we try to understand and empathize with everybody's opinions and come up with something that we try to have work for everybody. and so we would still support that two-foot front sent back from the front because it makes dormers that are the full width of the building appear to not be a flat-roofed full third floor when you view that building from the front.

I can provide the committee if they have concerns with photos of what these buildings look like with dormers of that size, but that's where that dimension still comes from. Other than that, we are generally speaking in support of revising the dormer standards so that they are easier for people to build dormers. But we would still include that setback.

Sait, I see that you have a question. I wanted to share the presentation that the advocates gave on this, if that's all right, just briefly, because I think this is very pertinent to the conversation. Yes. Clerk, do you mind if I take the screen for a moment? Go ahead.

OK. Let's see if I can do this.

And is this a handout you can send to me so I can attach it to the meeting?

Absolutely, this is an attachment that is from the April 15th meeting, and it's called Land Use 2026-04-14 Dormer and Three-Story Presentation. So this has already been... So folks can see this, right? So this is the presentation that was given to the public and the committee at our public hearing. And... What I want to point out, so they have a lot of examples of dormers in Somerville that are currently nonconforming. The point being, what's wrong with these ones? And I'm just going to go through them. Nonconforming examples. So I believe, and the reason I'm bringing this up, is that 100% of the images shown have this front setback.

So this is, I don't know if you can see my mouse on the screen, this here, the dormer, the kind of like bumped out part of the roof, is set back a little bit from the front of the building. Even in all these examples that are non-conforming that we're saying, why shouldn't we be able to build these? And I think for me, Look, I'm going to be clear. I do not think that this is the end of the world. But I tend to agree with planning's perspective on this. I think this amendment, whether or not there's a two-foot front setback, Really, really is going to help people build dormers when they need to. And that's because of the width is not really strictly restricted to just 50%. The amount of windows, which that's the thing that I hear about regularly from constituents. They're just forced to put tons and tons of windows in a bathroom. It's kind of strange. But I do think... It makes sense that these should be dormers. I mean, that's kind of the premise of them.

Not just, you know, we're... Thank you for joining us. It's a very small setback on the front. I guess you could cynically say it's a cynical reference to a Ruffline. But it does something. I don't pretend to understand how architecture works on the human brain, but it does do something. So with that in mind, Councilor Sait, please.

Through you, Chair, to Director, thank you for these images. I was going to request, since Director Barman was referencing a survey that had pictures To just have a sense of what folks were looking at. So just to confirm, director, these pictures that we see on the screen, would you say that Two Foot Step Back would look the way... That this like first slide we see looks like just for me to have a visual just to confirm. Okay.

Through the chair, the image on the bottom right corner of it, it's a kind of a gray house on the slide that says, first slide that says full width examples. That one in the bottom right. Yep, that one. If you take a look at that downspout that's coming off of that dormer, look how far back, if you look below, you can see there's obviously one to two feet. Setback. So that one is likely a full width going all the way to the back of the house, but it's slightly set back from the front. You'll also notice that its roof is integrated right into the ridge line of the roof of the main building. When you look at that direct on from the front, that dormer will still appear to be slightly lower than the main roof because of the optical illusion it creates.

because of that slight setback so when you're looking at the front that will still appear like a pitched roof house more than not when you look at this this is standing at the side so I just like you just angle yourself a little bit and you see it more but You know, that's probably the most we could give and still try to retain some amount of aesthetic appearance for the front of the house if you were going to allow dormers to be that big. And so the... Amendment would only regulate an amount of window and then that front setback if it were included. As proposed right now, it would not include the front setback and allow that dormer to come closer.

Okay, through the chair, thank you, director. So if there was no two-foot, in the scenario where there's no two feet setback, it would look like, basically a cube with almost a flat roof that's correct yeah the slope uh we defined flat as like one not flat but right it's very very shallow very yeah um Okay. And, you know, a lot of, you know, the houses, they have that like, you know, the... you know like what we see here in the front is it just like for the aesthetic or um For other reasons, like, you know, that a lot of the houses here in our city are like that. I'm just curious.

Is it like for like the snow or...

uh through the chair many houses in Somerville were built between 1880 and 1920 into like pretty big swaths um as farms were were converted to house lots and uh the the gable fronted where the triangle faces the street that um gable fronted houses were very popular at the time as an architectural style. So we had thousands of those go up across the city alongside triple deckers. Those were probably the two most popular. If you go and look at rounds like just south of Powderhouse Circle to the southeast, there's a lot of buildings there with what's called a gambrel roof that looks more like a barn. That style roof replaced the roof you're looking at on this screen here over time, and it actually increased the ceiling height inside that pitched roof. So it was just a different style of architecture that came along later.

As you continue to move into West Somerville towards the Arlington border, there's a lot of houses there that have almost a flat roof. There's no attic space, right? And so they're just two-story houses that are kind of square. and so those are just reflecting styles of home building over the decades that have changed as Somerville continued to build out so I would say The further east you go, the more houses have that pitched roof orientation right towards the street, and they're that type. The Gambrill ones that are over in the Powder House area are even bigger houses. in their footprint um so they're like larger houses all through and through um but but generically that much of the city is this this house type with its pitch the gable fronting towards the street

Yeah, for the chair. Thank you, director. This has been fascinating. I know it's not exactly what we are doing here, but I just want to make sure this is just... you know it's not like the way the houses they were the way they were built that need like A roof like that. It's just it's just the aesthetic. It's not going to affect the houses or anything. Yeah, I will say that. These are dormers, so I think to me it makes sense to have the setback. It still provides a lot more space and it looks like a dormer. because if there's no setback I think it would just look like you know be slightly different than triple decker but like kind of the same style so um yeah I think that's that's where I'm at

And to your point, Councilor, the triple-decker is an allowable building type in this district, right? So if someone wants to build a triple-decker, they can. that's right yep these are building types that are different than a triple decker and to me it seems like that's kind of a foundational principle of our zoning is that we have these building types and It just seems sort of odd to me to say, no, we don't really, you know, any of them can be a cube. Anyway, Councilor McLaughlin.

Yes, thank you, Chair, on that issue. So we were discussing also that there's potential that these zoning changes would allow a third floor by right, is that correct?

Yeah, yeah, I think we'll talk about that kind of separately. We have a bunch to say about that, but feel free. Go ahead.

Well, it's a relation just to the dormer, because if we're allowing the third flow, why? What's the difference? Like, why? It sounds like we would allow an entire floor as opposed to an expansion of a rooftop.

I think that you have put your finger on why I am concerned about that part of this amendment. Because basically, you know, we're saying these are all the rules about a dormer. If we were to just say you can also have a third floor, Basically, we're mooting everything we just said, right? We're telling the public, you can have a dormer. But then, in fact, there's nothing... regulating any you know you can have a third story so it's it's like a kind of it to me feels a little bit like a bait and switch um if we were to uh tell people that well these are the specific rules but also you can completely ignore them and just put on a third story

I love when I ask a dumb question and it turns out to be a good one.

I guess, Councilor Clingan, let the record show has arrived and has a question. Before we get to that kind of in depth, if there are additional questions, comments on this two foot setback, so we can just take these issues up separately, because I want to propose a motion. Councilor Clingan.

Um, well, I'll just yield because it's, it was more, I was on the point that you all were discussing around putting a third story. I was just going to say, and I don't think it necessarily makes it mood in the sense of like, Some people can't afford to put a whole nother floor on and they want to be able to utilize an attic and make it into a bedroom or so. So I don't think it's a complete, you know, canceling out of, but as far as the setback goes, I think a setback makes sense. I'm kind of lost in the conversation on that.

I'm going to be really honest. I'm going to propose that staff draft a version of this amendment that has the two-foot setback. If the council doesn't agree with that, I'm still going to vote for this. Ultimately, you know, this is not like a hill I'm going to die on on this amendment. My preference, the way I'm going to vote is that I think the two foot setback retain something of the architectural character of these buildings without sacrificing any of the value of the amendment, which is to make it much much less onerous to build a dormer right which i think is clearly supported by you know everyone has been following this and i think it's really worthwhile to emphasize this is a proposal that came from a group of the public right um this was not like cooked up by the city staff right this is this is something came from people who have tried to build dormers on their own houses or have attended public meetings where they've seen I've had strange fights about dormers and just thought, this is crazy. Let's let people build dormers if they want.

So with that, I'd like to propose, I don't have the language, but I talked to the director that they can get this ready for next week, should the Committee decide we'd like to vote on this tonight that the staff draft a version of this amendment that includes a two-foot setback two-foot front setback is there discussion on that motion before we call the roll All right, let's call it then. Oh, Councilor Clingan.

I was going to say, yeah, no, I'm just catching up. I mean, that makes sense to me. I mean, like you said, then we can at least maintain the character. And although, you know, again, it It's a little weird yet to have such a huge dormer versus just doing a whole floor. But I think this covers... That's the max, but I think this would allow... More flexibility on just dormers in general. Like I said, situations where people don't have the funds to make a huge dormer and a whole other floor out of it. but want to be able to um I just I remember growing up and like you know that was where you put your bed like some of the houses with the little dormers the bed fits the Twin full-size bed fits in there perfectly on that third floor. But yeah, I think some setback makes sense.

Thank you, Councilor. Clerk, can we please call the roll on that motion?

Apologies, Chair. I may have missed the sentiment here, but what is the motion? You're just asking staff to come back with a different motion. revised and you would like that on record that you voted for it I can just simply put that in the minutes if staff is in agreeance to bring it back

I think we want to get the sense of the committee that they are in agreement with that.

Okay. So on the motion- Mr. Chair, well-

If we're having a discussion on the motion, I will say that I agree with you.

Thank you.

So on the motion that staff draft new language to include a two-foot setback for dormers. Councilor Davis is absent. Councilor Clingan? Sait, Councilor McLaughlin, Councilor Ewen-Campen. That motion is approved.

Excellent. Now, OK, on to the issue of the three stories is allowed. Director, we had a conversation about this earlier today. Do you want to summarize planning's response to this part of it?

Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. The real issue is that the amendment also proposes to make the detached house, the semi-detached house and the duplex three stories, which many of you just brought up. Really makes the standards in the zoning ordinance for dormers moot, not that somebody can't still build a dormer. The real thing about being allowed to build 3 total stories is that you can build less than that by right and it's your choice and so actually building a pitched roof house when you're allowed to have three full stories is just a decision you make and if you like look at these same dormer photos anything that's not a full-height story was them deciding not to build it right if they were allowed to build Three full stories. So just think of it as less volume that they didn't decide to build.

That's how full stories are applied to buildings today. We don't actually force them to follow the dormer standards if they're a three-story building or a four-story building. so our table when we drafted the zoning ordinance back in 2019 we permitted gable dormers and shed dormers for cottages even though they're only two stories and multiplexes even though they're only three stories but in the implementation of the zoning ordinance there's case law that says if you permit full height stories you can't prohibit somebody from exercising that right it's called entitlement that's what a zoning ordinance does it entitles somebody to a certain amount of development in a certain form and manner and if we tell somebody that you get three full stories we can't then inhibit them from expressing those three full stories according to the code as long as those stories meet the zoning ordinance. So that would be the effect of switching those buildings to three.

We don't need dormer standards because dormers are things that are projecting from half stories. And if we get rid of the half stories, then somebody can choose to still build this in in what ends up being a more permissive regulation for a full height third floor now if this were to be passed the remaining Two building types in the NR zoning district that, sorry, the remaining building in the zoning district that would still have a half story is just the backyard cottage, which would make these larger dormer standards apply only to the backyard cottage. and we have all experienced some of the backyard cottage conversations that are also going on so we don't think that that is an intended Outcome for the Backyard Cottage, at least not what we're hearing from the public. So that's another argument on why we...

We should either permit all of the buildings to have full stories and get rid of dormers or we keep them at 2.5 or 1.5 and have dormers in the code. I hope that makes sense but the real thing is like a dormer is projecting from the pitched roof of a half story and if you allow somebody to have a flat roof full stories then you don't need the dormer standards anymore.

So director if say we were to allow three stories by right on these building types and someone went to ISD and said here's my dormer proposal what would they say?

It'd be compliant because you're allowed to build three stories and if you chose to build a pitched roof instead of a flat roof, that's your choice. You could decide to build a half-width dormer, a three-quarter length dormer, a full-width dormer. It's all...

Part of your larger entitlement for our full floor So I guess that's what I meant when I said that this would moot the dormer standards, right? It's literally anything you proposed That's up to and including a flat roof would be fine. So there are no standards for a dormer under that. That's kind of what that would mean. Correct. Councilor Clingan?

Yeah, no, thank you for that. That's good clarification. I just didn't know that whether or not if somebody wanted to build just like an old school whatever six foot wide dormer if they would have to have certain specifications on that piece of dormer like of any kind like they could just do whatever they want and I don't mean size wise I mean Is there any other specifications related to how much window you have to have or anything like that? That's kind of what I was getting at.

Through the chair, there would be a 15% window requirement for a dormer still. And then the two-foot setback that you all just voted for. That would be the only, the dormer standards, if they're kept, would just be reduced to how they attach to the building and then a 15% window requirement.

Okay, thank you.

So colleagues, the way that I'm thinking about this is the triple-decker is an allowable building type. That's a three-story building type allowed in this district. I personally am in favor of maintaining the other building types as well as pitch roof building types. Um... and to me it just seems a little bit of cross purposes for us to be talking about dormers and then basically saying also do whatever you want like it seems it seems I don't support it is how I feel about it um And I'm curious what the will of the committee is on this. I'm happy to make a motion to kind of prepare a version of this that doesn't include the three stories for all building types except backyard cottage. But I want to hear from colleagues as well. Or, you know, I'm also not trying to force the issue. You know, these are important decisions. We don't need to make them tonight by any means. Councilor McLaughlin.

Give you a chance. So, just want to share thoughts out loud and then get Mr. Bartman's response to it. There's one, I don't know what the scenario would be to have a two-floor building. That would add a third floor to the top. I wonder if that's a scenario that would actually happen. Also, though, one of the things with our triple-decker ordinance... which is just a third unit it's not necessarily a triple decker people would be able to add a third unit as of right currently so how does that work with a two floor limit And can't they already do this? If they wanted to add a third unit, can't they already do this?

Through the chair, you can add a third unit. It'd be in the basement or even in the attic still. Some two-floor buildings don't yet have a half-story but still have that pitched roof. it's just attic space so like you could convert your attic you could convert your basement you can add a side wing or a rear addition put a unit in there or a backyard cottage right so that's where those extra units come from even within a building like that. Related to your first question, I do believe interestingly enough that former Mayor Ballantyne actually added a story to her building, her home in West Somerville that I could be wrong misremembering about that if it was just a roof conversion, but I think it added another story to the existing building. So we have seen that sometimes. It's hard to actually do that to a home that's being lived in. So most of the time this happens when they're being rehabbed.

You wouldn't say that if she was here, I'll tell you that much. So yeah, so I guess it is a plausible situation for a two-family house to add a third-family house, knowing that the former mayor did it. Why is that a big deal?

It's not a big deal to add a unit. It's a very different situation to change all of the buildings in the NRZ to three full stories. That doesn't equal units. You could have three stories and have one unit in the building. So those two things aren't one for one in how they translate to one another. and but the real thing I'm pointing out is that if we switched all the buildings to be allowed to to be full stories like two three four whatever the number is we don't need dormers any longer and we should remove them from the code. They only exist for half story buildings. So anywhere you see a 0.5, Thank you for watching! have some buildings to be two and a half stories, one and a half stories, whatever it might be.

I'm trying to wrap my head around this. It sounds like the dormer will solve the third floor problem. I don't understand then, I guess I'd be curious what the activists, their rationale was to allow a third floor to then. Is there a situation where having a third floor would be more preferable to the dormer? And again, I understand you. So we use that one example of somebody who added a third unit, but that doesn't sound like that was a third floor. So I'm wondering what's the real world situation where someone has a two floor building and they want to add a full third floor as opposed to a dormer.

I think that through the chair, I'd have to go look at permitting data to understand the degree to which this happens to existing buildings. I think really where we'd see that is new build stuff would never have a pitched roof and a dormer because it's more complex construction and design. Compared to a flat roof building. I can think of one building on Russell Street that went from a one and a half story cottage to a three story three unit house. House under the old zoning ordinance prior to the new one that was adopted in 2019. It is effectively a cube with no design detail to it, right? And then we would have...

Thank you for watching! Half stories and dormers add a ton of architectural character to the city because every one of them is different and they tend to express need of the resident at the time. But if your full allotment is to build a full... like although the triple decker exists some people choose to build a house but if every house is already also allowed to just be three stories They will most likely maximize that new build because that's the largest return on their investment.

I do believe it would be rarer to have one changed like you're talking about that scenario is just way more rare because it's really hard to stay in the home and have the ceiling ripped off and another floor and half story added to the building and so many times if that happens it's when a rehab a full gut rehab is happening anyway it's basically new construction at that point um so they're making a decision to uh maintain the roof but turn it into a half-story and add dormers to put a bathroom in what used to be an attic. I think the situation where somebody would just cut off their roof and add a third floor at A single story height is even rarer in the scenarios that could play out More likely to be done by a developer than a resident developer

So it sounds like the scenario would be if we added a third floor, the building would probably get torn down and rebuilt into a three-story building. That sounds like the most likely situation then. Okay. Um... Yeah, it just makes sense, Jack. I fully support making these dormers done as of right under the guidelines that we've voted on. I don't like attending community meetings for something like this. I don't like the process for people making new construction to their own property. and it seems like the third floor issue would would be moot if we allowed the dormers to happen so my questions are answered thank you thank you counselor counselor Clingan

Thank you, Mr. Chair, through you to Director Bartman. And so, and just, again, I'm not a builder, I'm not, so, you know, a lot of these terms are new to some degree, but where does the man-side roof come in in terms of, like, That's not an entire extra floor. I have heard of like, you know, the roofs of places are getting taken off. I don't know if anybody's I don't think everybody's living in them. But and they get in the Mansour roof. And those are by right as well.

Yes, through the chair. The mansard style of roof was actually invented in France to add half stories to buildings that weren't allowed to have an additional full floor above that height. So it's always throughout history looked at as a pitched roof, even though it has a very steep slope because of its design aesthetic to look more like a roof with dormers punching out from it. but throughout history that's always been that it was invented and it's always been maintained as a way to add a half story those stories although their ceiling height might be what you would expect out of a full story they tend to be smaller in actual floor and many more.

you know anything resembling a full-height story inside underneath that pitch but intended to be designed that way and functioning as intended

Okay, Three Mysteries. So it's just a half story. It's not an actual full story. But it's probably the way most developers are going to get three units into one property. I know there's a bunch going up near me. Okay. Yeah, you know, I just go back to 2019 and kind of why we at first were reluctant to even have a third unit, you know, to hopefully... Be able to give a family the opportunity to buy a property that they can rent out one floor and maybe have a half a shot of outbidding or not getting outbid by a developer.

I just think that if, as is noted, I mean, you can still put a third unit into these homes and with dormers, I think, you know, you can certainly make space for family or even, you know, even three families. Three separate units. Yeah, I'm not sure that we need to go all the way here. You know, again, especially since we do allow... Thank you. Thank you.

Yeah, I just wanted to say that I think I'm supportive of the dormers to be built by right. I think it creates a lot more space for growing family for you know maybe grandparents to be living in the same you know house and um with you know the two foot setback um and yeah in terms of like the three story yeah I just think it's Just having the dormers would allow us to have a variety of building types. And the fact that we have the triple-decker, that folks can build... as an option I think yeah like to me there is I don't see the necessity of going you know three stories

Thank you, Councillor. Councillor McLaughlin?

So I didn't unraise my hand, but Councillor Sait brought up a point that I'm still, I guess, kind of confused that it's like, yeah, you can build a triple-decker right now, so you can build a three-family house. So I just kind of don't understand what this is, and maybe it's because I do understand.

I'll just share my thoughts. I think that I feel uncontroversially in support of the dormer part of this. And I feel very strong public support for there should be easier to build dormers. That's been a huge... I think... I'm not saying there's no universe in which I could be convinced that a third story should be by right. I mean, maybe, but I just think that's a much bigger conversation. And I don't feel comfortable including it in this. I don't think there's been kind of meaningful public engagement on that. I do feel, you know, I've been doing this long enough that I know that what we pass in zoning, people are going to start building. you know maybe not right away but it'll start happening and Thank you for joining us.

That to me seems like a much bigger conversation than the Dormer thing, which I'm totally comfortable moving on, you know, tonight, basically. So that's why I... would encourage us to kind of separate out that issue and consider that separately so that we can make progress on the dormer thing, which I think is it does have a lot of public value.

So my confusion is I've had two triple-deckers built in my neighborhood since we passed the ordinance. So those were done as of right. So what is this about allowing or not allowing a three-floor building when we do allow it?

Director Bartman, do you want to kind of answer this in a technical way?

It's the question is through chair. The question isn't, you know, do we not permit any three story buildings to be built? It was that. Everything but a cottage was proposed to also have a third floor instead of our houses and duplexes have two and a half stories and pitched roofs. so the question wasn't can somebody build a triple decker by right on that same lot is do we allow every house to have a flat roof or does it still have a pitched roof with dormers that also includes every existing house in the city whether or not they're compliant with our form-based code or not. So you'd be allowing houses that exist now that might be bigger, wider, longer than a triple-decker To have a flat roof third floor change happen to them. So that's like one of the things we think about is how also the existing buildings can be built or changed versus the new construction happening.

But you could end up with a house, existing house, that's much larger than a triple-decker in its floor plate, right? that then ends up having its pitched roof removed and a full third floor. That's a very different building in appearance than a triple-decker. And we have some of those existing. I brought up the Powderhouse neighborhood has larger houses than the ones we're looking at on the screen here. or the Powderhouse area right those those streets there have much larger houses if we had all of those convert to a full height third floor it doesn't look like a triple-decker it doesn't look like much of Somerville So our code's trying to replicate Somerville, but make it easy to build. And the dormer standard is really getting at keeping...

some of the reference to what was built previously and those are pitched roof houses right so that's that's what we're trying to do here is like be as permissive as we can without necessarily every building being having just three stories be permitted across the board the second aspect of that as a code writer is that we if we change all of the buildings to be three stories we don't need dormers anymore and it's misleading to people to have that in the ordinance at that point So that's the other side of that argument is we would propose removing them. And once you get rid of half stories from the code, there's not a whole lot differentiating our building types from one another any longer. So that carries with it other implications. I tend to agree with Councilor Ewen-Campen that that's a little bit of a bigger conversation.

We might even be inclined, as people think about the format and nature of the code, that might push us to simplify things. Thank you. We're trying to, I think, accommodate the desire for a larger dormer, but still fall within the program that we invented for the code. which was to allow if you remember the Summer Vision objective for this was to write standards that allow people to build more of the existing Somerville So that's where a lot of our dimensions and building types came from, from surveying existing Somerville.

And director, if I can just add to the answer, correct me if I'm wrong. Basically, say you buy a single family house, right? It's a detached, that's the building type on the lot that you buy. One thing you could do is you could demolish it and build a triple decker if the lot's big enough. but if you want to just make additions onto the actual house we're saying you can put on these dormers that's one thing you can do you can put on a porch you can do xyz but you can't just Turn it into a cube, right? In order to do that, you'd have to demolish it and build a new building type. We're trying to have some amount of conservation of these existing building types. and not kind of supercharge the financial incentives to tear every single one down or rip the roof off every single one. Make it so that people who own these houses can make the changes they need to do and not just get rid of any architectural standards for the city. If we do want to do that, I personally think that's a bigger conversation.

My final thought is it just sounds like allowing the dormer is what makes sense. And if it doesn't make sense to me for the third floor, there's probably a reason for that. and I think that allowing the dormer gets us what we want.

Well put. I agree, Councillor. Councillor Sait?

Yeah, through the chair. I'm only asking this because this was mentioned a few times by director Bartman tonight. talking about this survey can you tell us a little bit like who's taking this survey how is it being you know is it like in the city newsletter where people can find it um yeah

So through the chair, we put a survey up on Summer Voice, which is the one place where all of our projects go. We ran it for a couple months. We put it into our newsletter. We advertised it in a couple other divisions' newsletters. I believe we reached out to neighborhood councils and asked them to take the survey. So we tried to reach people. Whether or not somebody is willing to take a survey about dormers is a whole other question. And like I said, we did not reach an amount of the city that makes us feel that the results are representative at any confidence level. But they do reflect actual feedback from real residents and real community members, right? So we shouldn't discredit them. We just don't know that they're representative of the broader opinion.

So we need to understand that of the opinions we collected in general, for instance, 90% said that they want to see the regulations relaxed, generically speaking. And then we asked them about specific ones that the feedback was very high in support of relaxing the standards. But like I said, we had people who thought that we shouldn't regulate dormers at all. And we had people who were very insulted by the idea that we were going to change the standards to allow bigger dormers, wider dormers. So we wanted to use it as just kind of a reference. Also, that was like the very first newsletter that our department had ever sent out. So we were building our readership base. but we you know it was informative if not far off from other feedback that we hear about dormers from people who care about dormers and like I said you know

The people that don't respond to a dormer survey are also potentially people who aren't worried about dormers and thus don't participate in the survey. but that's us extrapolating non-involvement right so it's it's um we kind of wanted to bring this feedback but like put a star above it because it's uh We didn't get to enough people or convince enough people to respond to it to where we could say, oh, this is representative feedback. But again, I wanted to share it because it is feedback from some of your constituents.

Yeah, thank you, director. I just wanted to ask, because it's the first time in land use that... that is mentioned they want to make sure you know understand this is like part of the process which is just like an additional information that you provide in this committee which it sounds like That's what it is. After all, you know, this item and all the items that come to this committee, not all, but the important ones do have a public hearing. And that's, you know, the process we have in the city. And that's how people can provide feedback. but yeah also thinking about the three-story or any other you know zoning changes we're gonna make in the future how can people engage with it so this is an option This is another option we have and it's great that like

Thank you for the clarification, Director.

Thank you, Councilor. Well, based on what I've heard, I'm going to make a motion similar to my last that the staff prepare a revised amendment that removes the Ability to build three stories by right on all of the NR building types. And I'm happy to wordsmith that with the clerk. Director?

If you want to reference them specifically, it's the detached house, semi-detached house, and duplex. And we would want to retain the triple-decker being three stories though. Yep.

Chair 3, can I just clarify again that if staff is here in an agreeance, I can include that sentiment, but... It's not necessarily a motion if he's going to create an entire new document. Otherwise, I will need all of that again and slower to type it and capture accurately.

Certainly. I mean, here we all are, I think, agreeing with each other. But as a matter of principle, committees don't have to agree with one another and people can vote however they want on this stuff. So I'd prefer to do it as a motion and I'm happy to state it more clearly.

Okay, then if you could state it again for me and Dan list that more slowly, I'll type it out and read it back to you all.

Excellent, thank you. So I move that staff prepare... A revised amendment that removes a third story by right from the detached house, semi-detached house, and duplex building types.

You said remove a third story by right from detached house, semi-detached house, and duplex houses?

Yes.

All right, so on the motion that staff prepare a revised amendment that removes a third story by right from detached house, semi-detached house, and duplex houses. Councillor Davis is absent. Councillor Clingan? Sait? Yes. Councilor McLaughlin?

Yes.

Councilor Ewen-Campen?

Yes.

That motion is approved.

Excellent. Director Bartman?

Our last concern would be the backyard cottage and a full-width dormer using all of these standards. If I may be... There's probably two scenarios. You could remove dormers from being permitted for backyard cottages, or... We expect a backyard cottage solution to be developed over the course of May and maybe be adopted in June. There's a bunch of other amendments related to backyard cottages. It could be rolled into those amendments. That would be up to the committee. but the tables are in this ordinance, so it's in this section.

Right, so colleagues, again, the issue here is if the city council were to approve these full-width dormers, and they applied to backyard cottages. I think we've heard quite a bit of feedback that already the backyard cottages we're seeing are much larger than many members of the public and I presume many members of the city council and Others anticipated them to be. We would be exacerbating that considerably. Right now by approving these dormers as applied to backyard cottages. As the director said, I think we're going to be having a lot of conversations about these in the coming months. My understanding, there's a bunch of... Amendments proposed by Bill White that are before the committee and I know the administration is drafting their own amendments and counselors of course are free to do so too. My inclination here would be to remove the changes that we're making today from the backyard cottage. Just not...

Counselor Sait

Yeah, I agree with that. I think we just had one presentation. on backyard cottages and it was just like part of like the ADU presentation and there was that I have like a lot of questions there and uh and it totally makes sense to me If we're going to have this conversation in a month or two, then let's take care of backyard cottages all at the same time. Yeah, and for now, remove that. Yeah, not include backyard cottages in the dormer amendment.

Other colleagues want to weigh in on this? Trying to find a... The presentation doesn't include the specific table. Councilor McLaughlin?

Councilor Sait said it makes sense to me. First of all, a backyard cottage, if it doesn't exist, won't need a dormer at all. because it's being newly built and we're already having discussion about how many floors that should be so I think that's going to get resolved with the other amendments that we're not discussing tonight. Clingan.

Yeah, I concur with all that. I think it makes sense to wait and deal with backyard cottages all at the same time.

I agree. Director Bartman?

So, for the clerk's sake, that would be an amendment to Table 3.1.13 Building Components To change Gable Dormer and Shed Dormer for the Backyard Cottage to N for No

Sorry, I don't have the table now in front of me, so amend to table 3-113 building components to change gable dormer and shed dormer to N for backyard cottages. Backyard. And is someone making that motion now? You just want me to say that?

Yes, I'd like to make that motion.

Okay. So on the motion to amend Table 3113, Building Components to Change Gable Dormer and Shed Dormer to N for Backyard Cottages, Councilor Davis is absent. Councilor Clingan?

Yes.

Sait?

Yes.

Councilor McLaughlin?

Yes.

Councilor Ewen-Campen?

Yes.

The motion is approved.

Excellent. So procedurally here, we have an amendment before us and we've passed three motions to change it and we don't have the actual final change language before us. So what's the best way to get this out of committee with the expectation that a revised draft will be on the agenda? Is it to recommend... Approval with the understanding that we're going to take up the amended one or should we move it without a recommendation?

If we move for approval, it will be on the language that is currently attached. You can...

Yes, the cleanest thing is to discharge without a recommendation.

Um yes if you intend on submitting a new item with this or you could always keep it in committee and have them create a new attachment and then when it comes back we can just vote. to change the attachment similar to what we did earlier today I'm not sure if there's a general preference as this is a public communication but if the administration would like to put in a new item with these amendments you could also do that

Well, I think procedurally we are ready to vote on this as a council once we have these amendments. So what I intend to do at our next city council meeting next Thursday is to Replace the item before us with a new item that will be later on the agenda that has these changes and take a vote. So I'd like to have them both before us next Thursday. So I definitely want to discharge it. I see our liaison Radice.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Sorry, I just want to clarify, is the expectation that the administration would put forward the new language for The item or are you planning to do it? Just mentioning this because the administration does have a deadline for when to submit language for a council meeting. And we are now past that. So I just wanted to clarify that.

Well, that contradicts what Director Bartman told me today. So how do you explain yourself?

Because the intent's not to trigger a new public hearing. The intent's to revise the item during the legislative process that's in front of you now. I don't know the procedures that you all have to do to do that, but yeah, whether or not it's your staff or effectively my staff making the edits on your behalf, you know, like you just amended the item. by vote um so but I don't know I don't understand the logistics that you need to do as a council or anything internally uh but um

Yeah, our intention is not to trigger a new public hearing. Of course not. No, director, my question is, can you or your staff Get language into my hands that I can have before us on next Thursday's city council meeting to vote on. Yes, that could happen. And to the IGA... I'm kind of agnostic whether that comes in as an item on the agenda. If we're past some deadline, that's fine. It could also just be emailed to me and I can present it on the floor, you know.

Through you, Mr. Chair, to maybe the clerk, Maddie, does it make sense that we would just provide you with that language so that Councilor Ewen-Campen has it ready to substitute? and do a floor amendment for next week's meeting?

Yeah we could recommend to approve with amendments out tonight similar to the other item and then you can present that at the council meeting.

That sounds good to me. I think we're in agreement on what the amendments are going to be. We just don't have the actual text before us at the moment, right? But by next Thursday, I will have that in my hand and I can do the floor amendment. Speak now or forever hold your peace. Everyone on the administration side is good with that plan? Okay. So then I move to recommend approval as amended.

Okay. Okay. And on the item approved as amended, Councilor Davis is absent. Councilor Clingan?

Yes.

Councilor Sait? Yes. Councilor McLaughlin?

Yes.

Councilor Ewen-Campen?

Yes.

that is recommended to be approved with amendments.

Excellent. Thank you all very much. This is the first thing that we're actually moving out of committee this year. I appreciate all the work that's gone into it and all your time. There is one other item on the agenda which is seeking an update on the planning work that This committee has been discussing for a couple of years now in Gilman Square. I understand the director has a brief update on the public process there. So this is item seven on our agenda. We'll take up this.

Through the chair to the committee, the question was what's the update on the Gilman Square larger upzoning project? We are continuing to advance that project. The research and upzoning project that we were doing last year still behind the scenes. And so... Tomorrow we'll actually be meeting with the Gilman Square Neighborhood Council to introduce some of the new staff that just joined recently as early as this Monday. will be presenting at the Ward 4 Slice of the City, doing a pop-up open house of the four zoning maps that Samantha had developed for the committee last fall. so that people could come and find their house on the map and see what those maps mean for their own property and we'll be following that up with a

Hopefully a collaborative effort with the Gilman Square Neighborhood Council to hold another open house that reaches a broader audience than anybody that might come to Slice. But yeah, so we hope to have an engagement in the near future related to those maps.

Excellent, and it's my understanding that your department, as of like this week, is fully staffed, is that right?

For the first time in a very long time, we have all of our senior planners have now joined the team. We hired another planner from within. And of course our deputy director joined us a little bit over a month ago. So yeah, we have a full staff for the first time in a long time that I can remember. Congratulations. I'm excited for what that'll mean for the city. We are very excited to get to work and hopefully do good things for all of you. Yes, indeed.

All right. Well, with no more items before the committee. Clerk, am I missing anything before I move to adjourn?

Apologies, I'm behind the eight ball, but are you looking to mark this as work completed?

Sorry, we will keep this in committee.

Oh, sorry. Okay, kept it in committee.

My mistake.

Then, no, I'm all set for adjournment if you are.

Excellent. Councilor Sait moves to adjourn.

And on adjournment, Councilor Davis is absent. Councilor Clingan?

Yes.

Councilor Sait? McLaughlin, and Councilor Ewen-Campen. We are adjourned.

Excellent. Thank you all very much for your work. See you soon.