 Let's move on to the first business item, which is a presentation from the Chittin Solid Waste District about the bond vote for the materials recover facility. Sarah, come on up. Introduce yourself and have your say. Great. Thank you very much. My name is Sarah Reeves. I'm the executive director for CSWD. And I believe Michelle sent over a PowerPoint. So if that could be brought up, that would be great. I appreciate that. So I am here today to talk with the select board, as I promised that I would come back and talk to you specifically about the ballot initiative that Chittin Solid Waste District has, is putting before the voters on November 8th. It is considered a special election. We are seeking authorization from the voters of Chittin County to borrow up to $22 million. Recording stopped. Oops. I can hang on until it starts again. Please. Yes, you should have it put right back. No worries. Disabled. Sorry, something. Do you want to make me those again? Do we need to restart recording? Yes. Okay. Thank you. Recording in progress. Okay, we're back. There we go. No, it's okay. So as I was saying, we're requesting authorization from Chittin County voters to borrow $22 million to construct a new materials recovery facility. And go to the next slide, please. And I don't know that anyone here needs to be reminded of who CSWD is, but just in case there is someone new attending and from the public, this is who we are. We are a municipality created in 1987 by our member towns, and we do encompass all of Chittin County to manage solid waste created in the district on their behalf. And our numbers keep going up. The population is increasing in Chittin County as are the businesses. So we serve not just residents, but also businesses, institutions, schools, et cetera. Next, please. And again, I think probably everyone here is familiar with the facilities and the services that we either own, operate in the services that we provide to the residents and businesses of Chittin County. And one of the key reason I'm here today again is that last bullet on the bottom there materials recovery facility. We own the MRF in, and we call it MRF, my name's MRF. We own the MRF here in Chittin County. It is, again, a municipally owned facility. The other facility in Vermont is privately owned and operated by Cassella. Next slide, please. And what it does is it basically is a big plant, a manufacturing plant that sorts the blue bin recyclable. So anything that you put in your blue bin or your blue cart or that you drop off to one of our drop off centers and put in the recycling container gets brought to this building and then is sorted into different commodities. So we sort them into bottles, cans, jugs, cardboard, paper, tin. We own the building. We own the property. We own the equipment. We do contract with Cassella for the daily operation. And as I mentioned, it is the publicly owned facility in the state. So why do we need a new one? The last one that we have now is built in 1993. It was built to manage 25,000 tons of recycling. We are currently processing about 47,000 tons. It is at over maximum capacity. We are still operating at one shift, but it is very, very inefficient. We cannot expand. The location where we're at in Williston, we can't go up. We can't go out. We can't go back. We are at the end of the road. So we literally cannot move anywhere and do an expansion, which we would need to do in order to accommodate better what we're doing now and to be able to expand and have flexibility for the future. There is no way that in this particular facility we could ever hope to take any more material or any different types of material. And that is critical for the future. Thanks, please. So again, I just kind of jumped ahead on the slide. But what we're doing is I'll skip to the inefficient hand sorting. And that is a photo of some of the Cassell employees who are doing the best job that they can given the circumstances of sorting bottles and cans. They are sorting each bottle, each jug, each can by hand. And the material is, there's so much of it that it goes by so quickly. They literally cannot get everything that's going by them at one pass. So it has to be scooped up and brought back in for a second pass. Every container is sorted twice. It's incredibly ineffective and inefficient. Next. Also, we have very limited storage. This is a photo of on the left side milk jugs and on the middle and the right are laundry detergent jugs that are being stored outside because we don't have room inside to store them. This is not at all ideal. It is not industry best practice. You always want to keep all your materials indoors whenever you can, really at all times, and particularly in Vermont with our variations in whether this is not ideal and the new facility, everything will be kept inside. Next, please. So this is, it might be a little bit difficult to see, but this is the conceptual design. Again, this is being intended to be built on property that CSWD owns in Williston on Redmond Road, just down the road from our admin building and our drop off center. And the blue square is the representation of the current Murph's size. So you can see that we're looking to add on either side on either end. One is the receiving area or the tip floor, which will triple in size. And on the other side is the storage area for the bales, which will also triple in size. So the entire Murph currently would fit in just the processing area of the new Murph. So we're looking to go from about 32,000 square feet to about 60,000 square feet. That's desperately needed. Next, please. So we're looking at adding technology. The only technology we have in the current Murph is an old magnet that does wear out over time. We do have some glass cleanup system that we will be actually bringing to the new facility. So we will be reusing some of the equipment that we have. So that system and the baler, the machine that makes the cubes of recycling. But everything else will be new. Everything else will be up to not just today's standards, but really the standards that were in place 15 years ago. We are that far behind. So we need and deserve to have a modern facility here in Vermont so that we can continue to recycle as much as we can and to have some flexibility for the future as packaging does change. Next, please. Again, more square footage means a higher quality output. This also means much more efficiency. Everything will get run through once. And the folks who are working there today, they're Cassell employees today. If Cassella continues to operate the facility, they will all come over to the new facility. There will be no loss of jobs. That has been a question and concern. Well, how will automation affect employment? And actually, it's going to make the work much better. Right now, as you saw in that previous slide, that sorting room is extremely cramped. It is not a great environment. In the new facility, those sorters will become quality control people. And the machines will sort to the initial pass. And then they will just have to sort anything that is missed by the equipment. So it becomes a much less taxing job. The building will be taller, airier, brighter, and will just be a better environment for our workers. Next, please. We are looking to future proof. We don't want to be behind again. So with the addition of technology, which can be programmed to read different types of material, whether it's different types of fiber, different types of paper, different types of plastics, we can adjust as packaging changes over the years. If you think, you know, even 10 years ago, we have different kinds of packaging now that we did then, certainly then we did 20 years ago and certainly then we did 30 years ago. So as packaging evolves, we want to be able to also evolve with that. And this new facility will give us the space and the technology to be able to adapt for the future. Next, please. And these are some of the environmental benefits. I won't run through all of them. But, you know, we are building the facility so that we'll be able to accommodate at least up to 70,000 tons of recycling a year. So it gives us a lot of room to expand and to take more material and keep more material out of the landfill, again, as packaging changes, and as our population is growing. Next, please. And I mentioned the better conditions for employees. We can move on to the next one. And this is an important piece that I want to make sure that all voters are aware of and understand. We will not be sending a bill to any of our member towns. We will not be asking to put any fees or any taxes on property taxes. We are going to be paying for the bond out of our operational fees, operational revenue, and out of the revenue that we receive from the sale of recycling. So we are not going to, like I said, sending anyone a bill will not impact property taxes. We're not going to be imposing any additional fees, no assessments to pay for this facility. And we have modeled multiple scenarios to say, okay, what is the absolute worst case that can happen before we are in trouble? And it has to be extremely dire, meaning, you know, we saw a pretty dire circumstance several years ago. It's got to be worse than it was back in 2008, but worse than it was in 2016-17. It has to be a real catastrophic situation to where we wouldn't be able to pay the bond. So we are anticipating, you know, again, we've modeled at least a dozen to 15 scenarios and are confident that we will not have to come to you for any assessments or any taxes. Next, please. How are we going to pay for this is also the next question. So we are, again, we're looking for bonds from the Vermont bond bank in the amount of about $16 million. We are applying to and have the closed-loop fund, closed-loop partners, for an interest-free municipal loan in the amount of $6 million. And that is to basically be able to reduce the amount over the course of the 25-year payback over the bond. So it has an initial higher price tag in the first five years of paying back that closed-loop fund debt, but then in the out years, it's much, much lower. And again, we're kind of relieving some of that pressure in case there are some variations in the markets. We have about $3.5 million on hand in cash that we can put towards this if needed. I'm also looking to receive a grant from the recycling partnership of about $500,000. And this is before applying for any money from the EPA. The EPA is managing a very large recycling infrastructure grant program. It's a five-year grant program, and it is for municipalities. So we will certainly be applying for as much as we can to that program. The EPA has not seen this amount of money available to them ever. So there's a good possibility that we will be able to receive some amount of money. The first round is a competitive grant. We are essentially basically shovel-ready. If this is approved by the voters, we are ready to go. So I think we have a very, very good potential application to the EPA. So I am hopeful that we will be receiving some money from the EPA. But we don't know, and it's never guaranteed. So that's why there's a little asterisk there. But I'm very, very hopeful. Next, please. So what we're asking is for a yes vote. And it's a little bit different this year that it may have been in past years. Due to the new law that is having the Secretary of State mail out everyone's general election ballot, it's a little bit different. So there may be the assumption that when people receive their general election ballots in the mail that they have everything they need. And this is considered a special election. So the Secretary of State has informed us that they are not able to mail our ballot because it is a special election. Even though we consider this to be a local issue, the Secretary of State's office does not. So unfortunately, that means that voters do need to request our ballot, our CSWD ballot. They can do that either through the My Voter page or they can contact the clerk. You can certainly vote in person. And the ballot will be provided to the voters when they vote in person. But it's another step. So we're doing a pretty significant get out the vote and just a voter awareness campaign to let people know that when you get your packet from the Secretary of State, there's still one more, one more you need to request, unfortunately. So we're doing postcards. We're doing front porch forum posts. We are talking to people. We're trying to get the word out that if you want to vote for our ballot initiative, we do need you to take that extra step. And next please. I don't know if there's any more on that. Just questions at that point. So yes, questions. All right. Thanks, Sarah. Any questions? Don? Do you think you can come to the town clerk and request a ballot? You're at or a call and you're asking the clerk to mail it to them? We are going to be, unfortunately, yes. And our charter does require that the local election officials in each city and town manage our ballot, our election. So we will be reimbursing the towns for any expenses associated with with the ballots. And are you concerned that people aren't going to get the message? Yes, absolutely. Absolutely concerned. We need 50% plus one of the ballots cast in favor to pass. So it doesn't have to be, you know, of all of the ballots cast in general in the district just of the ones just of the ballots cast on our our initiative. But yeah, we want more people for each town or for the entire entire county. Yep, they can exactly exactly. But yeah, we are very concerned. We were hoping we would be able to have them mailed with everybody else's. But that is not the case. So it's not approval. And just to be clear, it's not approval in a majority of towns. It's it's all of the ballots are pooled counted. Correct. That's right. That's right. Any other questions? Tracy? Just a comment. I went on my voter page just to see what the process is. As soon as you log in, you're presented with your options. 2022 general election and same date 11, 8, 22, and in solid waste district bond vote. So it does seem to be fairly straightforward if you're requesting a ballot on the secretary of state site. And I want to thank the clerk here in Essex for for making sure that that they did that because that was also another step for the clerks to have to add our special election to your my voter page for the town. So thank you. And thank you for checking. I'm glad that it's it's up there. Any other questions? Just a clarification on the 50%. You said of votes casted or ballots? Ballots for our and for so of the votes slash ballots of just our election. So let's say there's 100 votes cast ballots cast for governor, but only 62 of those people got our ballot. We just need 51, you know, like of the total of 100 to be able to to pass our ballot. So if like the entire district was 100, only 62 people got them, we just need 51 of those people to say yes. I'm not being super clear that probably even worse. I just didn't understand the 50% or 50 plus one, like, so there's no minimum number you need or you need 100 people to vote. There's no minimum number. So if only three people cast their ballot and we get two, it goes. But ideally, we would, you know, we would love to have had this in everybody's hands so that they if they feel strongly for or against, they have the opportunity to let their voice be known. But thank you. It's not how it happened. Kendall, any questions? You have a plan for repurposing the existing murder? Well, that's a great question. I love talking about this question. Thank you for asking. That is still in the blue sky realm. The board has not decided yet what to do, specifically because the voters haven't yet cast their votes and made their decision. If we are successful in being authorized to borrow this money for a new mirf, then we could start having the conversation about what to do with the current building. And there are a bunch of different options. So it's a good asset. It's, you know, a 32,000 square foot building in the industrial industrial park right off Industrial Avenue. So I think it would have some good marketability as a an asset to be sold if the district wanted to sell it. I think we could have other uses for it as a district. We could lease some spaces to maybe other kind of like-minded businesses. We could take on additional businesses ourselves or additional lines of operations. We could use it for special ways, special recycling. We could use it for mattresses. We could use it for collecting special items that we don't want in the blue bin, but have recyclability such as plastic film. It could be a great consolidation area for something like that for bulky, rigid plastics like, you know, little tight houses and turtle sandboxes that won't fit in, you know, in your cart, but are good plastic and could be recycled if they're not able to be reused. So there are several different possibilities as to what that building could be used for. And we'll have probably two and a half years, I think, to figure that out or at least two years to figure that out. And I would welcome input on, you know, what the district and what the members would like to see that used for. You know, if you think that there's something out there that a service that is not being performed or that we need to take a look at, it's a great opportunity. It's a good space. It's just too small for the blue bin, but it can certainly be used for the things. Excellent. Thank you. Yeah, I was going to suggest or some of the things that everybody recycles now, but that don't actually get recycled to be reused. Thank you. Welcome. Thank you. All right. Thanks, Kendall. You asked my question. Oh, good. Yeah, it's a good, it's a big asset. And you know, there's just so much more that we would like to do if we have the space. And maybe that's what we do. Any other board member questions? I'll open up to the public. Margaret, you want to come up? Sarah, if you could make a little space for her. On the other side of her, Margaret. Yeah, actually, actually, Sarah, it's easier for you to move than the mic to move. The Scott's not here. So I just found out yesterday this was even an issue. And when I looked at the information and I may have misread it, it said that you had to request a ballot by August 31st. And, and it looked like if you went to your town clerk, it had to be by another date. And, and somewhere I got the idea that you had to go to South Burlington to vote for this. That's the water district. That's champagne water. Yeah, water district. Yes. Which is also a BWD. Yes. Yeah, that one's kind of stealthy. I think this is great. So I guess my comment for you is to make sure that you get the voter information out. I don't know how you do it at this date because time's getting short. And have you really figured out that this is going to be enough capacity going forward? Are we going to run into this same overload? Thank you. Great questions. I will definitely address both. Actually, it's by three, but I'll do two. So yes, CWD also does have a ballot initiative there. There's is earlier than ours. So ours is on November 8th. So there's plenty of time to certainly request the CSWD ballot, the Chinasola Waste District Ballot. As of August 31st, they were available to the clerk. So that was, or that's what they were designed to be available to the clerks. I think we missed it by a week. But they are now at everyone's city and town hall and they can be requested again either through my voter page or in person. However, your town manages that. And yes, there is confusion. So that's why we want to make sure that we are distinguishing ourselves from Champlain Water District. We are doing a series of three direct mailers to voters. So one is going out either this week or next week and then another one in the next two weeks and another one just the week before the election. So if people do think that the deadline for ours has gone because of CWD, CSWD, they'll get another reminder to say, no, this is something different. And then a second reminder, another just something different. We again, will also be posting regularly in front porch form to remind people that this is something that does need attention, that we are, and I am definitely going to take this back to my team to make sure that we are being very distinct and making sure that we're letting people know, no, this is different from Champlain Water District. We're also, we tend to be mixed up with Casella as well because sometimes it's Casella Waste Management, CWM. And so we will make sure Saleh Waste in recycling is front and center and people know to look for recycling. And then yeah, so just the awareness, it's there's a whole plan in place, but we could always do more. And again, is being able to speak with you and to talk about it on your meeting is also really important. And anything that if you feel so inclined to even just let people know that this is something that they want to look for, we would certainly appreciate that help. But that was a good comment and I appreciate that. And I will definitely bring that to my team and just say, let's make sure there's not extra confusion. Well, the water votes tomorrow anyway. Well, that should help. Yes, that should help. And what we want to make sure is that people don't think that it's that ours is also done and they missed it. So hopefully they'll, they will see an our postcard recycling and they'll be like, Oh, wait a minute, that that is something different. Okay, maybe I need to take a look at this one too. But it is quite very well taken. I think the other part of Oh, capacity, Margaret's question is capacity. Yes, thank you. So we are the facility is being designed to accommodate up to 70,000 tons of recycling on again on one shift. So we always have the well, I say always, I can't say always because it is relying upon staffing, but we could potentially have the ability to operate a second production shift. If we needed to if we ever got to the point of needing to process 90,000 tons, which would be amazing, we could do it on one and a half or two shifts. I don't see us getting there. But if our population really explodes in the next 15 years, it's possible packaging changes of the next 15 years, it's possible. We are building in extra storage space. We are building in again, the ability on the lines to add additional technology, whether it's robotics or whether it's additional sorting capacity, so that we have more room to sort even more products. And again, we're designing for 70,000 tons. We're at 47. So we definitely have room to grow over the next 10 to 15 years. And because we have space on the property, if we need to continue to bump out, we have a little more room to also bump out on either end, or actually in the front. So the location, the lot will allow us to, if we need to expand the building, we can expand the building up out in the other side. So yes, we're doing it right. We're doing it right. All right. Thanks, Sarah. Any other questions from the public? Don't see any hands online or in the room. So thank you, Sarah. Great. Thank you very much. I appreciate your time.