Open Space, Natural Resources, and Trails Committee

By City Clerk at 6:01 pm, Dec 07, 2023 AMESBURY CITY HALL 62 Friend Street Amesbury, MA 01913 Amesbury Open Space, Natural Resources, and Trails Committee MEETING MINUTES June 28, 2023, 7:00 p.m. This meeting was conducted under the "Executive Order Suspending Certain Provisions of the Open Meeting Law' G.L. c. 30A, Section 20, signed on March 12, 2020. Attending: Jonathan Sherwood, Michael Hogg, Peter Frey, Pascal Rettig, Rich Hucksam, Kassandra Pearl (City of Amesbury) 1. Call to Order: 7:01 p.m. 2. Minutes from May 23, 2023 meeting: Pascal moved, Sherwood seconded. 2 yes, 2 abstentions (absent). Not approved, will need to vote again when quorum of attendees at that meeting present. 3. Public Comment: No public comment 4. Communications: 5. Chair's Report: • City’s ARPA Grant: Kassy Pearl confirmed that trail planning is covered under the scope of the EOEEA grant. • Land Management Planning – MA Audubon: Bill Giezentanner/MA Audubon Extension presented the Amesbury Conservation Land Management Principles and Policies document to the Conservation Commission on June 19, 2023. Sherwood also attended this meeting and was available to help with any questions the Commission had. Discussion centered on this document as something of a ‘best practices’ guide for conservation land management, for Amesbury to use moving forward in decision-making. The Commission noted that the document bound neither the Conservation Commission nor the City to particular action steps, though the document did contain a variety of recommendations, including the articulation of allowed and prohibited uses on land designated for conservation purposes. The Con Comm unanimously endorsed the document, which is the final deliverable from the City’s contract for this project. The City will next take up management planning for Woodsom Farm – Town Forest, under a separate contract agreement, using the re-purposed ARPA funds. Once a new contract is in place, OSNRTC will support the contractor and City with developing this plan. Rettig asked if Amesbury puts plans and policies, will they be followed, referencing the re- scheduling of Fourth of July fireworks because the annual mowing plan for Woodsom Farm had not been followed. Sherwood noted that that issue was not the lack of plan but lack of adherence to existing plans. But next phase of MA Audubon work will include Woodsom Farm, so plans may be updated. Next step: City finalizes new agreement with MA Audubon Extension Services. • Land Management Planning – Merrimack Valley Planning Commission: The City has previ- ously engaged with MVPC on some work to support municipal land management. This in- cludes the enhancement of the already available MIMAP utility for use as a mobile app, for City personnel and other authorized users to capture parcel level management-related da- ta. It also includes working with the City Assessor’s office re-code multiple city-owned par-  cels (using the Commonwealth’s land classification codes), to accurately reflect re- strictions and uses. With Amesbury staff turnover in OCED and MVPC having competing priorities, this work is still pending. • Woodsom Farm Mowing: During recent evaluation of the mowing at Woodsom Farm, Sher- wood supported the Conservation Agent by providing documentation regarding OSNRTC’s 2017 mowing recommendations, as well as a copy of the final as-signed 2018- 086, that added Article 97 protection to Woodsom Farm parcels. Sherwood noted that in his view this issue highlighted the unclear ‘ownership’ or management responsibilities for various properties – who ‘owns’ keeping track of the mowing plans at Woodsom and Bat- tis, for example? • New OCED Director: Amesbury resident and current City Planner for Portsmouth NH starts as Amesbury’s new OCED Director on July 17. With the land management planning/ARPA work ongoing, Sherwood will request a meeting, if helpful, to review accomplished and planned work. • Powow Hill Trail: This item, which we referred back to Con Comm with recommendations, was on their 6/5/23 agenda. Project applicants didn’t show, so continued to Con Comm’s 7/3/23 meeting, contingent on applicants attending. Out of OSNRTC’s hands at this point. • Revised Open Space and Recreation Plan: OSNRTC worked on updates late 2022 to this document, following feedback from EOEEA. Some of the comments required overhauling the Section 5 Inventory information, which meant a good bit of parcel level work and re- writing. Parcel level work included making sure all Article 97 protections were logged in parcel data, that all conservation and agricultural protections were logged, that all Chapter designations were logged, that Conservation Commission ownership was logged, and that a fair number of Assessor’s classifications were re-categorized, in order to be able to cap- ture these updates on a GIS-based map. This also meant having MVPC re-run a new Open Space map for Amesbury, based on the revisions. Work was completed in April with the document needing a good bit of reformatting work to bring it out of Google doc draft back into Word, then PDF. Revised doc is just waiting for OK from City to re-submit to EOEEA. • Update to City Council? Sherwood suggesting an update to the City Council may be in order. Hogg noted that Council is out in August. Frey suggested October, as best time for a presentation. Sherwood will contact Council President Wheeler to schedule. 6. Referrals • None at this time 7. Ongoing Projects i. See Chair’s report 8. Other Business • Munter Project: Rettig noted that new Munter’s project on South Hunt road will not be developing access along the western end of the property, unlike previous Maples Crossing project. Rettig suggested that there may be opportunity to include trail access to conservation area, since access road will now go through the ‘sports park’ section. Rettig also noted that the massive retaining wall originally proposed on the south side of the project will be reduced and likely ‘not visible’. No next steps identified. 9. Adjourn: 7:46 p.m. Rettig motion to adjourn, Hogg seconded. Unanimous. Minutes were approved at OSNRTC’s 10/25/23 meeting, with a unanimous vote. // Respectfully submitted, Jonathan Sherwood, OSNRTC Chair