Land Use Committee · CivicPulse

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Meeting Title: Land Use Committee
City: Somerville, MA
Date Published: 2025-09-18

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AI Disclaimer: Summaries and transcripts above were created by various AI tools. By their nature, these tools will produce mistakes and inaccuraies. Links to the official meeting recordings are provided for verification. If you find an error, please report it to somervillecivicpulse at gmail dot com.

Time & Speaker	Transcript
Matt McLaughlin	I don't know, call this meeting of the land use committee to order. Please note that pursuant to chapter two of the acts of 2025, this meeting of the city council will be conducted via remote participation, post an audio recording, audio video recording, transcript, or other comprehensive record of these proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting on the city summer website. Please call the roll.
SPEAKER_08	This is roll call. Councillor Davis. Councillor Sait. Here. Councillor Wilson. Here. Councilor Ewen-Campen?
SPEAKER_03	Here.
SPEAKER_08	Councilor McLaughlin?
SPEAKER_03	Yeah.
SPEAKER_08	I do see Councilor Davis has since joined. Yep. Okay, there are four councillors present and one absent.
Matt McLaughlin	All right, very good. I'd like to move for approval of the first item. Could you read that, please, Madam Clerk?
SPEAKER_08	And on approval of Agenda Item 1, 25-1402, approval of the minutes of the Land Use Committee meeting of September 4th, 2025. Councilor Davis?
	Okay.
Matt McLaughlin	Just wanted to make sure there's no discussion. I know there's usually not, but seeing no discussion, please go ahead.
SPEAKER_08	Councillor Davis? Yes. Councillor Sait? Yes. Councillor Ewen-Campen?
Matt McLaughlin	Yes.
SPEAKER_08	Councillor McLaughlin?
Matt McLaughlin	Yes.
SPEAKER_08	Four councillors in favor, one absent, that is accepted.
Matt McLaughlin	All right, thank you. So we have a few items to discuss today. We have one short presentation from a community member that's item number four, which I would like to take out of order. And then I'm hoping we can address these other items as well. Does anyone object to take an item number four out of order? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, can you please read that item?
SPEAKER_08	And that brings us to agenda item 425.
Matt McLaughlin	I apologize. Sorry. It wasn't item four. I think it's three.
SPEAKER_08	Three.
Matt McLaughlin	Yeah.
SPEAKER_08	Agenda item 325.0246 that the director of inspectional services and the director of planning, preservation and zoning discussed with this council type four heavy timber construction, now permitted in a 10th edition of Massachusetts State Building Code 780 and potential impacts on inspections, development and the zoning ordinance.
Matt McLaughlin	Okay, so we have Gavin rob in the audience from some old yimby I believe he's one of the people who spoke to the authors of this item to give us a short presentation on what. The item is the unfortunately city staff are not here to discuss the item, but this is more of an information session for counselors so we can have an idea. about how this might benefit us, I would encourage questions and then we can discuss what to do with the item afterwards. Councilor, Director, IGA, Radassi. Sorry.
SPEAKER_07	Thank you, Mr. Chair. For the record, Yasmin Radassi, legislative liaison with IGA. Also, please feel free to just say Yasmin going forward. I know it's a mouthful to say legislative liaison with last name. Just for the record, wanted to also mention that ISD had drafted a memo in response to some questions that Councilor Wilson had asked at the last meeting. So just for the record, wanted to say that that was also attached to this item.
Matt McLaughlin	Okay. Thank you. Council Wilson is running late, but he should be here as well. Um, so let's see, Gavin, are you there?
SPEAKER_04	I am good to see you. Good evening.
Matt McLaughlin	Good evening. Okay. I would like to give you a few minutes to make a presentation and then I have some questions.
SPEAKER_04	Sure. Sounds great. Let me go ahead. Uh, If it's possible to share my screen, that might be easier. It's the same presentation.
SPEAKER_08	The slides are up. You can let me know when to move to next.
SPEAKER_04	Great. Perfect. That works.
SPEAKER_06	Great. Well, good evening. I wanted to spend a few brief minutes sharing with you some thoughts about mass timber, which is related to type four construction, which is, you know, the sort of subject to this item. How I see this exciting construction technology, what it means for Somerville and how it has implications on some of the other items under discussion tonight, such as transit oriented development and density. If you go to the next slide, please. So a very brief overview. Next slide. Without getting too far in the details, type four construction just refers to a type of building construction in the Massachusetts building code. So this doesn't have anything to do with zoning. It has to do with the stuff that buildings are made of. So type one refers to like a steel and concrete skyscraper. Type five refers to like a wood frame house in the suburbs. And type four refers to this specific type of mass timber construction. And basically, the building code outlay is what fire resistance ratings certain assemblies have to meet and all these other kind of things, in addition to specifying the materials. If you go to the next slide, please. So that's a little dry, but the interesting part about it is this applies to a construction called mass timber, which is a new and old construction method. It uses large engineered wood panels, beams, and columns to create structures. And as of 2021, In the International Building Code, these structures can be very tall, 8 to 18 stories, which is why it's particularly relevant right now. If you go to the next, there's some examples of what mass timber is. These cross-laminated timber panels, basically giant mega sheets of plywood, if you think of it that way, and glulam beams and columns. And these replace typical building elements like wood studs or steel columns or concrete columns. And they, you know, perform the same functions, slabs, walls, floors, roofs, columns, et cetera. You go to the next slide, please. So these items of mass timber are sort of a kit of parts, which are then brought and assembled into a building, sort of like a giant kit of Legos. And the beautiful thing here is the structure is the finish. And as you can see, it's a natural material, it's a beautiful material. If you go to the next slide, here's some examples of projects that have been completed. On the right, a multifamily project and on the left, an institutional project that has, you know, this just inherently natural and rich quality of exposed wood, which is the structure. So there's no added cost to making this sort of beautiful interior. Next. This is relevant, particularly timely, because as of October of last year, Massachusetts adopted a new code base for the building code, which allows for taller mass timber and allows for significant density. And I'm going to talk about that through the lens of housing, because I find that particularly relevant to Somerville. But if you go to the next slide. So I sort of alluded to this, but mass timber is super relevant to think about how we build things in Somerville. It's inherently sustainable. It's fast to construct. It's beautiful without any additional cost. It's an ideal construction site for urban infill sites. It is a trade that is both new and old. So the fabrication techniques for mass timber are digitally fabricated. So they are sort of high-tech, low-tech jobs. and have a potential to generate new sort of entry-level positions into the trades, which is exciting to me when you think about workforce development. Low embodied carbon footprint and has the opportunity to be very dense in a city like ours. Next slide. So again, here are some images of how this stuff is fabricated. A lot of it is fabricated off-site and assembled either in modules or pieces and brought to site and assembled. Next slide. And here are some examples of these pieces going together. So as you can see, these buildings built this way are built very efficiently and very sort of quickly using these prefabricated pieces that slot in place. So all the efficiency is involved in that make it great for tight urban infill sites and the logistics that you need to make a building.
SPEAKER_05	Next.
SPEAKER_06	And this isn't just some science fiction. These are real projects, either built or about to be built. On the right is the tallest mass timber skyscraper in the world. I think it's in Cleveland. I'm not sure. So in the US, this technology has really taken off in a way that's very, very exciting. Let's go to the next. So what does that mean for sustainability and housing leadership in Somerville? I want to talk very briefly. We have a very progressive energy code in Massachusetts and solar specifically is focused on sustainability. But if you go to the next slide, but typically the code focuses on building operation. So I feel like we're generally pretty well covered of having to have passive house standards, and clean energy and all this other sort of climate forward initiatives and regulations on the operation of a building. But there's a whole other side to sustainability about embodied carbon. And that's how much carbon emissions are generated in the construction of a building. So manufacturing, transportation, and installation. And this is really a next frontier that some of us will take the lead on to advance sort of sustainability goals and code. And if you go down to the next slide, mass timber, as you might suspect, is Very, very good on embodied carbon and climate impact. Here's a relative case study of the same project done in steel on the left, all in timber on the right. And you can see about a 52% reduction in global warming impact. And that's just for this one case study. Go to the next. And as we know, we are in a housing crisis. The spiraling gentrification and unaffordable rents. We have a limited housing stock. Affordable housing projects have long, long pipelines. And with the current funding federal situation, we don't know. At the same time, Governor Healey has called for 225,000 new units of housing, which requires a density which we're not on track to achieve right now. Let's scroll down. Next page. So again, we all know the nuances of the housing crisis.
SPEAKER_05	Keep going.
SPEAKER_06	One of the keys to addressing this is dense transit oriented housing. As we know, you know, density without parking near transit stops makes good cities. And it's important, I think, as we think about how we build the future of Somerville to build as densely as possible, right, while retaining the city's character to build sustainably and to build high quality buildings for the future. We've always been a leader in this and we can continue to be. So what does this look like in terms of potential policy initiatives and incentives? If we go out of the next page, design and policy can unlock this kind of carbon smart construction. We go to the next technology is the stuff, right? It's a passive house standards, building performance, prefabrication, mass customization, technology of making policy is what we want to achieve decarbonization, housing production, community empowerment, climate goals, et cetera. And the way I see it is that design is the field that can unite both of them and understand what the technologies that are emerging and available can really help us to meet and develop and shape our climate goals. And mass timber is, in my view, one of these technologies that is incredibly well suited for some of those goals. Next, please. Somerville has a bunch of constraints and variables I'm sure you're all very familiar with. The building heights range generally from four to 25 stories at the tallest with an average around six. transit-oriented urban infill lots. Things that are needed to make buildings successful is construction speed, logistics, modularity, labor, and regional supply chains. And this construction type of mass timber and type four construction meets all or almost nearly all of these boxes. So it's particularly well-suited to the kind of density we need to achieve in Somerville. If you go to the next. And here's just a little diagrammatic example of that. Right now, we basically only have two types of construction available generally to do kind of infill development. So that's type one on the left, which is, you know, concrete, steel, skyscrapers could in theory go infinitely tall, but typically is around 25 stories. That's the height of the new tower in Union Square. Obviously expensive, very large, you know, high carbon emissions, etc., And the flip side, we have type 3A, which is a sort of 501 stick built construction we see, which is typically captive six stories around 50 units on a typical infill lot. So if you go to the next slide, So there's a whole middle density here that's missing, that is not financially achievable in the current development scheme environment. And also, you know, that there's just a necessity for more density than these sort of 50 or 60 unit per infill lots that is missing right now in the way that we build things. If we go to the next slide. And one of the amazing things about mass timber is that by the way that it's regulated in the code, it actually fills in this missing middle. I'm not going to get into so many of the details here. I'm happy to talk with anybody ad nauseum about the intricacies of the building code. But suffice to say, there are different sort of subtypes, depending on how you do the fireproofing, that can be 8, 12, or 18 stories tall. You know, we're not talking about sort of a three or four story like barn, heavy timber frame building. We're talking about like a substantial, you know, dense building that fits right in between the sort of mid low rise buildings we see going up and the sort of high rise tower, which is, you know, appropriate to some parts of Somerville, but also out of scale to a lot of them. If you go down to the next. So as you all know, Somerville zoning code is form based. Overlay districts are a great way to incentivize certain policy goals. We're going on to the next. So here's an example of what a mass timber housing overlay might look like using the framework of our zoning code. It could incentivize additional stories if we use this construction type. It incentivizes accelerated permitting tie lines. It could promote carbon neutral, carbon positive buildings. require additional community benefits and open space. So there's an opportunity to incentivize this sustainable climate forward progressive dense construction typology using the tools that we already have. If you go to the next slide, this is an example of a draft that I've been working on with Somerville YIMBY. I'm not actually part of the group. I like them, but working with them on what it would look like to actually incentivize a mass timber typology in Somerville, potentially around transit points, looking at height limits and looking at number of stories. And because of the framework of our zoning code, it's actually fairly easy to do. I'm happy to share this in more detail with anyone who's interested. But just to round out the presentation here, I'm sure I'm over time to go to the next page. To me, when we think about the future of how we build in Somerville really is about what future we deserve. Go to the next. Somerville, you know, was built 150 years ago as a dense, you know, walkable transit oriented city that was built to last. And the current way that we build buildings is sort of here on the right. Generic. very piecemeal, you know, 501 housing. And if you go to the next slide, and I'm just, you know, I wanted to express to you all that we can potentially imagine a different future, a way of building that with this new and old technology that is built to last, that is, you know, carbon neutral, carbon positive, that thinks towards the future and creates the kind of dense high quality housing that's in line with the character of our city. And if you go to the final slide here, I would like to just imagine what a decarbonized future of sustainable buildings would look like. And I think it looks not too far from what Somerville used to be and what it can be in the future.
SPEAKER_05	So thank you all for taking the time and hearing from me.
Matt McLaughlin	Thank you very much. Are there any questions or comments from the council? Councilor Ewen-Campen.
Ben Ewen-Campen	Thank you, Mr. Scherer. Through you, thank you very much, Gavin. This is really interesting. I went into this thinking that it was mass like Massachusetts. So I have learned tonight. Could be both. You know, off the top of my head, it's not totally obvious what we could really do in the zoning context. I know I appreciate the suggestions that you made, but it's definitely something to think about. And it's a really exciting technology. I've been watching the building go up, I guess, in Alston. I don't know if it meets this requirement. definition exactly, but we drive by it often and it sure looks like these pictures you've been showing. It looks very cool. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
SPEAKER_03	Thank you, Councilor Davis.
Lance Davis	Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yeah, I just want to echo the thanks for that presentation. You know, definitely an exciting development. You know, we have, as the presentation said, you know, that it aligns with what I recall sort of being told as we've thought about zoning and just sort of development in general is sort of like, you've got kind of this and then this. And the problem is the in-between, the numbers just don't work because of building materials. So this seems like a really exciting way to give us more flexibility, where for whatever reason, maybe, maybe something smaller doesn't, isn't appropriate. Maybe something taller isn't appropriate, but you know, you got the Goldilocks site somewhere at least gives us another tool, another option to, and then we can have those conversations about, you know, what is appropriate in various neighborhoods. And, you know, maybe it's 25 in lots of places and that's also still good. You know, quick side note, I, looking at the pictures of this, it, it, And I'm sure there are some differences, but it strikes me that, you know, to some extent, and I think just generally from an engineering standpoint, like the concept here is not a new concept, right? I mean, this is, I spent a lot of time in hockey rinks coaching kids. And I think about the Charlestown rink, the Framingham rink, some of those older, the first wave of MDC rinks post Bobby Orr from the 70s that had these big, including Orr rink in Amherst College, where I played when I was a kid. that had these big arched timbers, all clearly plies, you know, looks very, very similar technology and, you know, they're still standing and doing great. So, you know, not a whole lot of point to that, but just that like, you know, that's the, that's kind of the anchor point that in my sort of understanding of it, that strikes a chord with me. I do want to, I think, put a question to, and I unfortunately wasn't able to attend the last meeting of this. And I did look through the memo that was presented in response. I don't see anything there to this point. From a zoning standpoint, my understanding is, and my recollection is what we've often been told is that zoning we are not enabled by the state laws to regulate building materials with zoning. Probably why you're talking about the building code, right? That makes perfect sense. So I'd love to have our direct department, our local zoning expert, and resident zoning expert, and or the law department Yeah, take a look at the presentation here to see. I hope the answer isn't that I'm right, that we really can't zone for a building type, because I'd love to explore exactly what you're talking about. I mean, totally on board with it. But let's, I want to make, to the extent that that wasn't done last week, and apologies, Mr. Chair, if it was, but to have our in-house experts take a peek and see, you know, What can we do if not sort of exactly the selection here? What else? Are there ways that we should think about zoning in terms of building height? Knowing that the building code now and these building materials exist, that maybe even if our zoning isn't specifically about the building materials, it opens up more options and opportunities, knowing that those might be more financially viable. Just, you know... I want to know what our options are so that we can we can move forward with something, because this to me sounds like a really exciting opportunity, as it has since I first became aware of this a year or so or more ago. And, you know, I'd love to start moving forward with as we look at the transit oriented options. um density uh you know concept and and and other other options for density throughout the city um ways that we can help facilitate that essentially get out of the way to whatever extent it makes sense for us to do so so thank you uh gavin i appreciate the the um the the presentation and yeah if i could share through you to um the liaison and make that request for our in-house experts to take a peek and um at whatever time frame is appropriate give us some recommendations of ways we might might tweak our zoning to take advantage of these technologies. Thank you. Appreciate that.
SPEAKER_06	I have some thoughts on that.
Matt McLaughlin	If you don't mind, go ahead, Gavin.
SPEAKER_06	Just very briefly, Councillor Davis, you're absolutely right. It's an old and new technology that the The crux of the matter is that the new thing here is the density that's allowed. Because up until last year in Massachusetts, you were not actually allowed to go more than, I believe, eight stories with heavy timber. And so now we can look at 12 and 18. And then to your second point, not being a lawyer, it's definitely something to look into. But also, this is why I was highlighting the presentation like. the policy goals of a low in body carbon, right? Or sort of a, you know, sort of, you can probably structure policy in such a way that mass timber is a natural fit, right? Without regulating that buildings have to be made of wood. And if somebody can achieve that with another building technology, great, right? So there may be other ways to think about this and incentivize the outcomes rather than regulate the construction type.
SPEAKER_03	Councilor Sait?
Naima Sait	Through the chair, yeah, I want to echo thanks to Gavin for the presentation. Yeah, definitely learned a lot. And, yeah, as, you know, it was Googling this, I have this, like, dumb question. We don't have staff today. here to answer that, but I would love for us to look into this. Just, you know, timber, like looking at the pictures in the presentation when the whole construction is all timber. How are we thinking about like fire code? Like if we, you know, because we're talking density, everything is going to be timber. Do we know, do these houses or constructions have specific fire codes or specific engineering that's different from steel and concrete ones?
SPEAKER_06	gavin do you know but again the short answer is yes the short answer is absolutely yes and i'm happy to expound on the intricacies of the building code with you council say it if you'd like to uh but yes the uh heavily heavily regulated up to the stringent standards of u.s fire code um i could go on but there's yes okay great all right any other questions or comments
Jake Wilson	um i'll recognize council wilson and then jasmine yeah thanks chair um and thank you gavin for the presentation this is something i've been interested in for a very long time a lot of food for thought here this is what i was sort of hoping we would uh get to lead to this kind of discussion uh i'll echo a lot of what my colleagues said i'm not going to rehash it there's no point in uh Yasmeen Chanes, In in saying ditto. Yasmeen Chanes, But yeah, now that i'd love to see us, you know where we can go in and reshape our zoning around this to just recognize some of the new exciting possibilities of this unlocks in terms of the you know different districts, we have so thank you.
Matt McLaughlin	Thank you, Yasmeen.
SPEAKER_07	Thank you, Mr chair i'm just wanted to share, I think I shared this before on discussions on this item, including last meeting. Is these position on this is that they would not recommend doing construction zoning based on construction materials again because of those. state building code preemption issues. And did want to just say the reason that that's not in this memo is because they were responding specifically to Councilor Wilson's questions at the last committee meeting regarding preparation for this change in the building material.
Matt McLaughlin	Councilor Wilson?
Jake Wilson	Yeah, thanks, Michelle. Just to clarify, not saying I'm looking to specify materials in the zoning, just the what we discussed at the previous meeting with Director Bartman, where maybe it makes sense to look at some additional districts just in light of what's unlocked here by this material, just to clarify.
Matt McLaughlin	Thank you. I do also want to point out to Councilor Sait's point, we actually do have a staff person. Samantha's with us today. So maybe, Samantha, do you think this is something you could help us investigate?
SPEAKER_00	Thank you, Chair. I'm happy to take the conversation offline with the planning team to look into this further. Initial thoughts echoing from other folks about being reticent of state preemption of materials within the code, but certainly resonate with folks' points about if there's an opportunity to look at other zoning districts as a way around that and to maybe get closer to the typology that's between the MR6 district and the high-rise that we have currently. My understanding is that, you know, applications that would be interested in pursuing this building typology would fall under the high-rise category currently, but if there was a particular incentive to kind of break that out into categories or more nuance there, maybe that's something that could be explored. So I have a have some touch points with the planning team with our transit-oriented development item and happy to discuss this further and, you know, bring some responses during our next meeting.
Matt McLaughlin	Thank you. And any further questions or comments? I see Councilor Sait, your hands up. Is that from earlier? Just one question or thought to share if Gavin or Samantha or anyone from the city has this. It seems to me the answer isn't to zone specifically for the materials, but rather the materials allow to build cheaper. So we might want to consider allowing taller buildings because of this new technology. Is that how I understand this? The new building materials, I should say, not technology.
SPEAKER_06	That is also my understanding. And also, as I was saying, the fact that this building technology meets or exceeds, you know, current climate goals, and you could frame an incentive, you know, for embodied carbon, for example, Burlington, Vermont has like, there's a bunch of municipalities countrywide that have actually done this already. I don't know of any Massachusetts, but I'm happy to look into it. I'm happy to be part of any
Matt McLaughlin	uh conversations you know with with planning or with this uh committee you know going forward just as a citizen and an interested enthusiastic professional okay thank you any further questions or comments uh seeing none so council wilson how do you feel about this can we mark this work complete or do we want to come back for more discussion
Jake Wilson	I mean, I'm inclined to just, I appreciate the question, Mr. Chair, I'm inclined to just mark this one as work completed, and I'm happy to follow up with planning staff to see, you know, and our land use analyst to see, you know, if there is anything that we think can be done on this, but that doesn't have to be done here. In front of y'all, happy to mark it work completed.
Matt McLaughlin	Okay, thank you. Seeing no further discussion, this item is marked work complete. And can we take up Madam Clerk, the Gilman Square or the yes, item number two, I believe it is now that. Yeah, let's just do the regular order of business. We can do item number two.
SPEAKER_08	All right. So that brings us to agenda item 225-0338 that the Director of Planning, Preservation and Zoning provide the Committee on Land Use with opinion as to whether the City Council may dictate standards and materials used for outdoor bike facilities.
Matt McLaughlin	Council Wilson, this is yours.
Jake Wilson	Chair, do you want to speak on this? I think we have the administration here to speak on this, possibly with an update. But happy to hear of that.
Matt McLaughlin	And then, yeah. Yasmeen, I believe you sent a memo over this as well. And just an interesting note that this item says it's from me. I don't want to take credit for Consul Wilson's actions, but this was introduced by him. Yasmeen?
SPEAKER_07	Thank you, Mr. Chair. No memo on this. I was just going to give a verbal response on behalf of ISD. They looked at the context for this conversation was about outdoor bike racks specifically. So ISD looked into whether the state building code would preempt us from saying that we should use a particular material for grounding, I don't know the terminology, grounding the bike racks outdoors. There is no... preemption based on state building code. So that is the update and response for this item.
SPEAKER_03	Any discussion?
Matt McLaughlin	Seeing none, Council Wilson.
Jake Wilson	Thanks, Mr. Chair. Sorry I didn't get the raised hand icon in time. Yeah, I'm happy to have this one, Mark, work completed. And I want to speak with Director Rosson about, you know, whether what we're doing on this already is sufficient, whether we need anything. But again, happy to do that offline.
Matt McLaughlin	Okay, so this item we've moved on, we're complete as well. Next item.
SPEAKER_08	That brings us to agenda item 4, 25-0200, 15 registered voters requesting a zoning text amendment to amend the zoning ordinances, sections 3.1.8C, 3.1.9C, 3.1.10C, 3.1.13 K, 3.1.13 L, 3.2.12 L, and 3.2.12 M. Yasmin, did the city have an update on this item?
Matt McLaughlin	Or is this one we're going to leave in committee?
SPEAKER_07	Through the chair, I might defer to Maddie on the exact procedure for this, but my understanding is that this item is timed out. I think it might, Maddie, correct me if I'm wrong, but it might need to be discharged to be placed on file at a full council meeting. Does that sound right?
SPEAKER_08	Yes, I'm not going to speak to the timeline of the item as I'm not an expertise in that, but I believe what we did on a previous item was incorrect and we're ending it here so we can discharge it back to the full committee and you all can end it however you'd like.
Matt McLaughlin	there in front of the full committee or full council so we want to discharge without a recommendation yes do we need a roll call vote for that i don't think yeah sorry one moment um excuse me i'm just still in office can you repeat that for me chair i was just asking if we should do do a roll call to discharge without a recommendation
SPEAKER_08	Yes, we will roll call for that. Would you like to do that now?
Matt McLaughlin	Yes, please.
SPEAKER_08	Okay.
Matt McLaughlin	Any discussion before that? Seeing none, let's go.
SPEAKER_08	And on the roll call to discharge without recommendation, Councillor Davis?
SPEAKER_03	Yes.
SPEAKER_08	Councillor Sait? Yes. Councillor Wilson?
SPEAKER_03	Yes.
SPEAKER_08	Councillor Young-Kampen?
SPEAKER_03	Yes.
SPEAKER_08	Councillor McLaughlin?
SPEAKER_03	Yes.
SPEAKER_08	It is recommended to be discharged without a recommendation.
Matt McLaughlin	All right, last item.
SPEAKER_08	And that brings us to agenda item 525 dash 0085. Councillor Davis and Councillor Wilson as the director of planning, preservation and zoning draft amendment to the zoning audiences for transit oriented height and density bonuses for additional affordable housing and other enumerated community benefit.
Matt McLaughlin	All right, I think Samantha has an update for us. I'd like to turn it over to her.
SPEAKER_00	Thank you, Chair. I just have kind of one quick update slide to check in with folks and provide a progress update since our last conversation two weeks ago on this item. So since then, I've had the chance to speak with the planning team and outline a path forward towards progressing towards some draft maps for folks to respond to for Gilman Square. So just wanted to provide some visibility and a status update of where that is. And so we're currently in the phase one of completing some more in-depth feasibility analysis on this item, which will include reviewing building permit data since 2019 to determine the average lot dimensions that are feasible to permit both the UR and MR construction types. And this came out of our thoughtful conversation two weeks ago around balancing density of growth and also being mindful of property tax increase impacts that would result from upzoning. So really the impetus of this piece is to try to be thoughtful about where we are proposing to upzone particular parcels on sites that are primed to be ripe for development in that scenario. We also have two other items on the go here. One response from the assessor's office on the tax implications of upzoning. So I think Legislative liaison has been working with the assessor's office on that piece and we're hoping to have an update during the next meeting that will be in response to folks' questions from the last session. And then finally, looking to discern if there's a need for a more in-depth fiscal impact analysis that the planning staff has in-house a model that we can project that fiscal impact analysis as part of the proposal. So the goal being here, we're hoping to bring back the permitting data results as a summary table so we can discuss that with the committee in two weeks, as well as that assessor's office memo to address the tax implication question. Once we move out of this phase one feasibility analysis, we're proposing moving to phase two, where we can get some draft maps in front of the committee to respond to and comment on. We're recommending two to three draft maps so that there can be a few iterations for folks to reflect upon and have discussion towards. And the scenarios will be responsive to the feedback we've received from the last committee session discussing the Gilman Square Neighborhood Council's proposal, as well as folks' thoughts around exploring that incremental upzoning further within the quarter-mile walkshed of Gilman Square's T-stop. And so, this includes the comments from Councilor Ewen-Campen around some properties on School Street, as well as our discussion around zoning for the home and site and keeping that as a civic use property. Two other pieces I just wanted to point folks attention to in this phase two. At this time, it would be recommended as appropriately that we can have an alignment check with engineering to determine the proposals or the two to three proposals impacts on our combined infrastructure sewer wastewater system. And then we can bring this back to folks with an update from engineering and some draft maps that we can respond to to move towards the public hearing and discussion piece.
Matt McLaughlin	Thank you. Any questions or comments? Seeing none, this item will be left in committee. That brings us to the end of the agenda. I do think I would like to take up the previous item for reconsideration and rather than discharge it without a recommendation, just place it on file. Any discussion, any questions on that? Seeing none, the item will be placed on file. And with no further business before us, Councilor Sait moves to adjourn.
SPEAKER_08	And on adjournment, Councilor Davis?
Matt McLaughlin	Yes.
SPEAKER_08	Councilor Sait? Yes. Councilor Wilson?
Jake Wilson	Yes, please.
SPEAKER_08	Councilor Ewen-Campen?
Matt McLaughlin	Yes.
SPEAKER_08	Councilor McLaughlin?
Matt McLaughlin	Yes.
SPEAKER_08	We are adjourned.
Matt McLaughlin	Thank you, everyone. Good night.