 Good evening. I would recording in progress call the meeting of the town of Essex select board to order for Monday June 5th. Clear that message that we're recording. First up any additions or changes to the agenda? Just one change from staff under item 5c Paulina Thompson is not available tonight so she's planning to come on June 26th interview for the Economic Development Commission. Okay. Thank you. Any from board members being none. Can I have a motion to approve the agenda as amended? I make the motion we approve the agenda as amended. Thank you Don. Thank you Ethan. Any discussion? None. All those in favor please signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed nay. Motion carries unanimously for zero this evening. Which brings us on to public to be heard is the next portion of our agenda public to be heard is a time for members of the public to address the select board on items not on the agenda. You would like to speak if you're in the room just raise your physical hand your online raise your virtual hand you can do so on zoom by going to the reactions button and then raise hand if you can't get there just unmute yourself and let us know and we'll call on you so we will I actually see a hand up on the screen so we will go ahead and start with Lorraine however I do just want to say please be brief please be civil please direct your comments to be well in this case the acting chair for the evening I will be your host and with that Lorraine go ahead Lorraine can we have you hold on a second that audio in the room is not great there's no sound from here though yeah I'm from that speaker I can try to I just can't hear a thing there we go Lorraine can you try again please can you hear me now a little better yes it's just really really scratchy I'm being told it's on your end I think it happened during the workshop when you guys were working on the year plan for prioritizing and googling during meetings I was just wondering if that's something I'm not sure if you guys can hear everything I said but I think you're questioning what the policy says around googling during meetings given that we are in the 21st century and we should be able to use the technology that's in front of us to support what's the discussion yes exactly an Essex policy and why is because it may have been a good reason that I'm missing and then secondly I just wanted to give a shout out to Tammy Gatchel for all the updates that we receive I'm not sure if the Essex community is still fully aware of the civic sign-up that we can do I just the town's newsletters are just amazing even just the poster that she does and graphics I just feel so much better informed in response to your question around the communications power the I believe it's the orderly contact of meetings policy that has that I do believe it mentions that you can use technology to like for the purposes of the meeting so I do think that that's addressed and it's allowed but we can definitely look into that farther that would be great I just think it would be a lot more efficient and helpful great thank you how about the audio and stuff real quick sure there's there's a button that says join audio up there but there's also no camera from town meeting TV correct that that audio is that audio button turns it on to the little job or speaker we do the town meeting TV speaker as for the town meeting TV camera I don't see if that's something that you could turn on in your end I'm gonna go ahead and ask if there's any public comment from anyone here physically in the audience right seeing none we're going to have anyone else online have have any items for public to be heard okay last call for anybody in the room being no hands we're gonna move into business items starting with a and I will preface this by saying I am so very happy to see so many names and faces that I do not recognize so thank you to each and every single person who applied so first up we're gonna start with a community advisory board chief did you want to speak at all or are you here to observe okay we will start with Gwendolyn Evans I'm on forward and have a seat up at the mic if you're here nope I'm online oh perfect yes so Gwendolyn if you want to go ahead and introduce yourself I give a little bit of background as far as why you're interested and then we'll start in with questions okay yes so my name is Gwendolyn Evans I have lived in the town of Essex for 28 years I am a homeowner you know I really applied because I need something to do I am I have not done a lot in terms of participating in Essex which is sad and over the COVID shutdown I really began to rethink that so I have done a little volunteer work with the Essex Community Justice Center serving on a circle of support and accountability which I really appreciate that my background is in human services I worked with people with disabilities for many many years I am a person with a disability myself and so I kind of retired from that about 20 years ago to pursue my goals of being an artist and doing them sort of spiritual coaching as well so I haven't been terribly involved except being a voter and keeping kind of aware of what's going on in town but I feel like I would like to be involved with this for because for one thing I have a huge passion for communication effective thorough positive communication between groups and organizations and individuals is very important to me 10 years ago I began studying and trying to practice nonviolent communication I try to bring that into all aspects of my life I also feel like people with disabilities voices need to be heard and we are not always we don't always step up to the plate so that's another reason I've been on very many boards and associations over the years including a condo association board I don't recommend that but I survived it and you know I have more skills and I really think I I would enjoy serving on this board and I hope that I would be of some help and in the role great thank you questions from the board how do you see the cab functioning and what role do you see yourself actually playing on this board well I'm hoping that it's a mutual sort of back and forth between the police and the community and us and how we can facilitate the most positive relationships all around I feel pretty positive about living in Essex and I feel pretty positive about all of the departments and I would just hope that I could help facilitate the highest and best in this and whatever way that could work in terms of my skills communication skills verbal skills ways of thinking about problems differently ways of looking at all the different sides of situations I think is a very important feature that could be helpful thank you my my question is kind of similar to Don's but I had thought of it ahead of time I'm gonna stick with it so I was gonna ask if if you find yourself between a conflict between the community and the department what are some skills or ways do you think you could work through those I think and this I'm trying on sort of my nonviolent communication skills looking at the needs behind each of the parties involved with the conflict understanding the needs and the positions and trying to help sort of facilitate common ground between the parties and perhaps come up with common requests or doable ways of rethinking the situation awesome thank you well I would be interested to hear if you have an opinion and particular area that you would work on first I don't particularly a particular opinion except that maybe just more visibility in the community and I know there has been some it would be nice to bring the citizens into a more connected understanding of what's going on in all the departments so yeah I think that's what I'm thinking thank you the other question I Gwendolyn I will ask do you have any questions for us um I probably do I so as I understand it this is three three positions from the town and three from the city that's is that correct yes on this point and and who else might be on I'm gonna assume there's other people from the town in terms of who's going to run the meetings and that sort of thing sure our community affairs liaison Anthony Jackson Miller is going to from the police department will be the staff representative to the committee and does anybody have any idea how often the group would meet hello ma'am how are you this is Ron hug I'm the chief so one of the things that we decided going into this because it's a new board is that we would we would let the members decide what's needed so once we once we get the board formed and we can have a couple of meetings we'll decide what they're what the schedule is going to be how often we'll meet and what's going to be needed for work and that type of thing but we wanted to let the group decide you know most of those things the parameters around that so it could be monthly it could be quarterly it could be whatever the whatever the members of it decide can I ask you a question mr. Ho yeah absolutely what what do you feel like this board could offer your department what do you need from us advice advice in partnership that's what we're looking for is input from the community input from the members to allow us to serve the community in the best way that we can and that and being that folks that live here are the most informed as to what's going on in their community by partnering with them that will help us help us make a more professional department and serve the community the way that the way that our constituents expect us to thank you that thank you for applying thank you Gwendolyn I should have said at the at the beginning that we do have if you've seen the agenda we have a lot of interviews to get this evening so if you would like to stick around you certainly can I don't know whether we will actually be making appointments this evening we do have an executive session scheduled for later where we will discuss not only applicants from this evening but up until this point we do have a special meeting scheduled for June 26th at which we already do have some more members interested in applying not only for the community advisory board but other positions so it's up to you whether you'd like to stick around but if we do make appointments this evening someone will be in touch with you likely tomorrow if we do I think we're planning to just wait until the 26th to make sure we have a full number of applicants and then just kind of take them all at once that that's my expectation if there is a surprise and you decide to appoint somebody tonight then yes someone will be in touch tomorrow from stuff okay so please don't hold your breath until June 26th but it likely will not be until June 26th all right well thank you I'm excited about this board it sounds it sounds like a really positive thing thank you for applying thanks and next up we have Kirk Smith yep we've I heard your name earlier good evening good evening if you would like to introduce yourself and give a brief description of why you're interested in serving on the community advisory board okay and then we'll go over to you board board questions all right my name is Kirk Smith been a resident of Essex for 32 years I don't do well with numbers I find myself now in the stage of semi-retirement I worked for IBM for 33 years I worked for darn tough in Northfield for nine years I have a master's degree in project management and I am a small business owner S&D landscapes here in the junction I think it's important as Gwendolyn mentioned I have to confess I have not been involved other than having civic responsibility to vote to be much involved in the town affairs and now having some additional time being in this stage of semi-retirement although a small business does take up some portion of it I wanted to be able to give something back to the community and how do you see the cab functioning and what role do you see yourself playing within its function well I think the particular role that I might have is one of perspective and bringing my experiences my life experiences to bear what does it mean to be a good neighbor what does it mean to work in partnership with the police department what does the community need to function effectively and efficiently as it's been mentioned this is a new committee so you know it's its total role and scope has not yet fully been defined so it'll be interesting to see what other parties that might be on them on the advisory board what they bring and what their ideas are I have a lot of management training and facilitation experience problem-solving and so to be able to you know work to bring consensus with a group is something that I'm very familiar with well that pretty much answers my question about the the conflict so I think I'm gonna pass to Kendall I'm curious if you have any experience working with those that have been systematically marginalized disenfranchised or oppressed I don't know I don't know how to answer that question because you know it's only recent that that definition has come to the fore you know I've had opportunity to work with a wide range of individuals that may fall into one or more of those categories today but didn't realize that that was an issue or you know something that was significant in nature so I can just tell you I've had experience working across the wide spectrum you know with my time at IBM and also even at darn tough so thank you I thought of one question for each of you have any questions for us no I think Wendell and asked the most important question you know what was the frequency what was the involvement going to be so I think it's going to be a let's see as we go so that was my only real question that I had actually I'll ask one question in follow-up to Kendall's question how comfortable are you sitting back and listening to others life experiences and letting that guide the conversation and inform your decisions I think I'm an open-minded person you know when one works with groups one seeks to you know make sure that everybody has an opportunity to be heard and make sure that we don't leave any good ideas or other thoughts other perspectives off the table thank you and same thing will be in touch after the 26th thank you moving right along to business item 5b interview volunteers to serve on the conservation and trails committee first up we have I'm apologize if I'm mispronouncing your name be no comment Cummings I did whoa and same thing introduce yourself tell us a little bit about why you're interested and then we'll move on along to board questions sure so yeah my name is be no Cummings unusual name I realize Robert but everybody calls me be no so let's just roll with me on that one I am not a long time Essex resident we moved here in 2020 just before the pandemic and live in a condo down by mazes farm and it's great we love it my daughter's going to be going to kindergarten on the fall and I work a full-time job and I also run my own mobile bicycle repair business so along with that I'm on two HOA boards and I feel like I need more to do in my life so I wanted I saw the post and I was like hey maybe I can help as far as the why this board in particular mobile bicycle repair I've been a biker my whole life trails paths riding is important to me and I'd like to help advocate for that and to continue improving the already pretty good system that we have here both for mountain and for just trail bike path riding the conservation part historical stuff is sort of ancillary interest to me but so it's really about the bicycling for me I like mint chocolate with ice cream and long walks on the beach go ahead darling well you sort of touched on what my concern was you realize that there's more to serving on the conservation and trails committee than the bike trails sure and what can you contribute other than working on the bike trails well I can contribute a open mind and an analytical mindset problem solving and listening and helping to improve the situation they come to the consensus thank you I'm gonna have to start again with Don before these meetings my question my question was gonna be um and for the same reason Tracy had mentioned earlier it's awesome that we've seen a lot of names of people that we don't know and yeah I haven't seen other meetings but I was going to ask have you attended conservation and trails committee meeting I have not I didn't even know what existed until I saw the posting about it and then to follow up on that I was gonna say you know more as Don was saying about the conservation side of things and and the role or if you understood the role of the board and how they play in with um you know other committees and commissions like the planning commission on you know decision-making or recommendations not decision-making recommendations for decision-making um and the whole process of how the board fully functions sure sure I'll admit to being a newbie so not particularly versed in how this particular board functions um I as I mentioned I've been on HOA boards in the past sort of on two currently so I'm used to meeting protocols and things of that nature um as to the specifics of that element I would listen and hear the opinions of my experience hopefully offer my opinions where I'm good and I'm hopefully a good understanding of how it works and offer advice. Thank you. Should a conflict arise between your personal ambitions and position and the public's interest how would you handle that conflict? I hopefully I would handle it in an ethical and responsible way if need be I would rather accuse myself from any decision-making process I suppose um but uh yeah I mean the purpose of being on the board is to help the community not to help business or anything of that nature uh so that's where I would frame my first starting point. Does that answer your question? Yeah thank you. Yep. Do you have any questions for us? Uh well I asked an email when the meetings happened and stuff like that so I think that's already been covered um no I would like to say it's cool just to see this uh local politics in action. I like it. That's very excited. Thank you. Thank you so much. And next up we have April Peterson. Go ahead and introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about why you're interested in conservation entrails. Um so I'm April Peterson. I've lived in Essex for about five years. I came to Vermont as an AmeriCorps. Did two years of AmeriCorps. Then went and joined the Vermont Guard and I've lived in Essex ever since for the past five years. I gotta be honest I saw that there was vacancies on the board for a while now so I figured I'd apply. I didn't realize you had so many great candidates for this position. I do not have a lot of experience trail building or anything like that. I do have an undergraduate's degree in international development so I know some of the theoretical uh concepts of like resource management and uh natural resources stuff like that uh but mostly I'm just a casual user. I have a dog. I really like Indy and Brooke. I you know whether as a volunteer on a board or just a volunteer period for cleanup days I like to get more involved in maintaining and stewarding these resources that I use a lot. Now I gotta pull on Ethan because she just answered my question. Um How would you handle if you wanted something done and the rest of the board didn't agree with that with you? How would you handle that? I would respect the opinions of the majority especially since I don't have a lot of experience with board management. I would probably assume there's a reason everyone is going one direction. Second question would be do you have any experience in grant writing? Yes. I did a $10,000 grant from this this was quite a few years ago. This was maybe six years ago but I got a $10,000 grant from Ben and Jerry's for Community Capital of Vermont. Thank you. I have one. So I'm going to ask um have you attended any of the conservation and trails meetings? I have not. I've attended a few of the Town of Essex meetings but I have not yet attended any of the conservation meetings. I kind of was reviewing the material they've published to their website about like the history and the zoning and the different parts that are maintained and properties. Um so I'm a little bit familiar with what they do but I would definitely have a steep learning curve. If you were appointed to the board do you have a particular area that you would focus on from your experience in Essex so far? Um not particularly probably recreation trails or what I'm most interested in. I would just follow that up it says on your applications you like trails are you as you like conservation as well? Yes um sadly drill interferes now but I used to do be involved in green up day watershed clean ups stuff like that once again just as like dumb labor not really in the planning part of things but I understand sort of how these things work. Thank you. There's no such thing as dumb labor. It's always appreciated. Exactly. Thank you. Any questions for us? Uh nope just really looking forward to being more involved in uh Town of Essex and local community resources. Thank you. We'll be in touch after the 26th. Next up we have Morgan Kirk. Same thing come on up get comfortable introduce yourself and let us know why you're interested. Hi my name is Morgan Kirk I have been a part of the Essex community for about three and a half years now just before the pandemic um me and my fiance had moved into a condo in Seybrook um been a Vermont resident here ever since I was born um lived down Colorado for a period of time did a lot there uh but I absolutely fell in love with Indian Brook Reservoir and the trails there as well as the trail system out behind my condo association um by Seybrook. I believe it is a new trail system but it is just absolutely perfect and um I am an emergency veterinary technician over at Bev's and so I have a passion for wildlife as well with the growing concern about climate change. I really want a sense of community and I want to do what I can to give back to my community and the environment that I live in um and I would just hate to see it um kind of diminish in front of my eyes if there was anything I could do to prevent that and to help contribute to it. Um so I have the big passion for wildlife conservation water conservation I don't have a lot of knowledge in the water conservation side of things but um I have a big ambition to grow my knowledge and passion for plant species and wildlife and water and my environment around me. Thank you. Tom? Yep. If you are appointed to the board and it was something you would like to see done and the rest of the board didn't agree with what you would like to do how do you handle that situation? I would love to gain as much information as to their opinions as I could um I feel like I'm a very understanding person and um if there was any way that we could meet in the middle or um and maybe they would their their reasonings would change my mind and change my opinion fully um my main purpose is to understand where they are coming from. Thank you. Have you attended any of the conservation and trails meetings? Sadly I have not. Um I uh have seen signs from the trail um the Essex trails out behind my condo about there being a um trail conservation committee um and then when I attended the kind of cleanup over at Indian Brook Reservoir was where I met some of the people that are part of the committee they had said that there were some seats open and that was like oh my gosh I'm in like done I will attend that and do what I can to be a part of my community. And to follow up on that but are you familiar a little bit of the processes and and the role that they serve as as the committee in the in the uh say backup information that they they gather to deliver to other committees and commissions? I can't say I'm fully versed in all of their expectations on what it would be to serve on the committee board um but I have browsed their website a little bit and um you know I'm willing to on what I've seen for those expectations. Awesome thank you. If you were appointed to the board do you have a particular plan or idea where you would focus first? Not necessarily I would hope that somebody with more experience in the Essex area would be able to help guide me and um with that little bit of guidance to then look into further what a specific area needs work and on work on. Thank you. And do you have any questions for us? None at this time I think the other interview is kind of helped me with that. Okay well thank you and we'll be in touch after the 26th. Thank you. Thank you. Next up business item five C interview volunteers to serve on the Economic Development Commission. First up we have Tim Mack. He's not in the audience. We will skip over Tim Mack if he goes up and move right along to Ray Garifano. Ray come on up. Go ahead and introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about why you're interested. Thanks to see you all. I'm Ray Garifano. I am a resident of Essex Town. I've been in Essex since 2009. I have a child in the Essex Westford School District. I'm also a house representative, a legislator and I also work for the state of Vermont for the Department for Children and Families. I have been serving on the Economic Development Commission for a little bit under a year. I believe I feel the vacancy which is why I'm kind of going through this process again because I feel it was just a couple months ago I was here doing this. I am very passionate and committed to the economic development of Essex Town. Post the separation from the city I feel like we have a lot of opportunities for growth and economic development and it's been really fun and interesting working on some of those plans. I feel like after I onboarded this last year because of the kind of separation and the change of the board, the makeup of the board, we were in a little bit of a kind of holding pattern as a commission for the last few months. So those of us who are hoping to continue, we have a lot of goals and kind of plans for the new board that's going to be starting in July. So I'm really excited about those opportunities. Questions from the board. Willer has serving as a legislator interfered with you attending any of the meetings. It has not. So I was able, I think I missed half of one meeting. I was able to participate via Zoom when the session was when we were in session and I'm hoping we've actually talked with Gene and some of the other members to maybe do a poll of what days folks are available. So if we move the meetings to Mondays then I can be here in person but I have been able to participate remotely when we're in session. And how would you go about encouraging businesses to move to the town of Essex? I think we have so many great things to offer businesses. I mean we have a great population base, we have we're a very desirable area in Chittenden County for folks to move to as evident by our by our real estate prices right now and our school district is amazing, one of the top in the state. So I think you know with working with the town staff, the economic development staff, I think we have a lot of opportunities to really sell ourselves. We have a lot of business here already so there's a good base, a community of businesses that they can learn from. Thank you. You personally touched on my question, your opening speech. So I'm going to try and ask you a question without asking the same thing that you had said but in your time on the board I know you said that it's been kind of hard with the with the separation of things but how do you feel that you've made an impact and as far as business goes how do you feel that it's the board has been functioning and how do you feel that the board can function better in the future? Great question. So I think we've made an impact, personally I think I've made an impact with my knowledge of early childhood education and child cares. I've been working a lot with Jean and Rebecca. Jean is a staff member from the town that supports our committee around child care and kind of brainstorming what we can do to increase child care capacity in Essex because it's one of the biggest challenges for businesses that the that businesses are facing right now so that expertise has been handy I guess and beneficial. I think moving forward we've been the last two meetings we've talked a lot about doing a lot of visioning early on and having some strategic time as a board like a half a day session where we can actually come up with some priorities of what we'd like to see achieve and I think that with like my organizational skills my facilitation skills I think again I can bring a lot to the table to make sure the new board moves forward with a very clear vision and plan on how we want to work how we want to operate and also what areas we want to prioritize. We've also been reviewing the town plan the last town plan and actually providing edits to what we'd like to see in the new town plan so I think we we haven't we haven't been as active as I'd like I would have liked to see but we have contributed in the time that we've had even with the transitions. Thank you. As an acting board member and a legislature have you found any conflicts between the Essex economic future and the state of Vermont's plans and do you foresee any conflicts in those two roles? I honestly know I mean this last session we we passed a lot of bills that you know obviously we're still waiting but like for example the governor signed s100 today which is the housing bill and that's going to bring a lot of great opportunities for development in Essex and I think housing development goes hand in hand with economic development because businesses that come here need to have employees and employees need to find housing so I think you know increasing affordable housing and increasing housing in general I think that works really well so I would say that a lot of the legislation that we passed this year actually is really aligned with what as a town the opportunities we have before us to be able to take advantage of and to leverage. Thank you. Any questions for us? No but I would like to add one more thing I think another thing I really want to focus on as an acting member and hopefully as a future member is to increase the number of like BIPOC-owned businesses in Vermont as a board we have been working a lot and talking actively about creating a census of all the BIPOC and making sure that we we have a database where we can notify folks and business owners or potential business owners about funding opportunities that might be available to again attract businesses to the area but especially like women-owned and BIPOC-owned Vermonters because I think as a town and a community we have really worked hard to show that we are very inclusive and welcoming so again creating a business environment for those businesses to come and thrive would be a high priority. Thank you. Thank you. Next up we do have Melissa Stewart. Melissa I believe I saw you online. Go ahead and unmute yourself. You did indeed. I've got my old camera turned off. There we go. How are you? I'm well. Do I want to know how giant my head is in the room? Okay you're fine. Some teleconference here up on the screen. Melissa go ahead and introduce yourself and briefly tell us about why you're interested in the Economic Development Commission. Absolutely so hi everybody I'm Melissa Stewart. I am new to Essex. My family and I moved here in December 2021 so a little over I'm coming up on a year and a half now and I have two kids in the school system here in Essex. They are in second and fourth grade currently very excited for summer. I am an engineer. I came here for a job. I work for efficiency remote for the state energy efficiency utility and for their parent nonprofit the EIC and my job and my specialty and my career had built towards a specialty in working with commercial businesses and industrial customers and so I've spent the last year and a half here in my day job traveling around Vermont and also just Chittenden County and getting to meet and talk with and get to know all the different businesses that currently operate here and understand sort of what they value and how they make decisions and what their struggles are and how they fit into the communities that they're part of but to be totally honest with you as some other people have been I am interested in business and I always have been I have my own small business for a while. I was director of operations for a startup for a while and then I was just an engineer for a sort of typical larger engineering business before I came here to work for efficiency remote so I've worked in all these different contexts and seen how the world of business sort of influences and interacts with the community that it's part of either an individual business or sort of the ecosystem of businesses that rises in particular communities and because my family and I are so new to Essex and because of the timing of when we came we came as far as I can tell pretty much after the separation happened and so I don't have a lot of thoughts or history as to that all I know is we moved here and we love it here we love our home we live on Longwood Circle over near Hall Mott says we love our neighborhood we've been greeted so warmly by the community here we love the schools we love picking apples we love we plan to live here forever so I really see the future of the town as my future and my kid's future they're gonna grow up here and I'm just interested in finding a way that would be helpful to all for me to just help out and this seems like a good way to do that so that is why I'm here perfect uh questions from the board have you ever attended an EDC meeting I have not no I read the descriptions on the website to understand which committee was which and how would you handle a conflict on the committee if you wanted it to go one way and they wanted to go another um well Kirk Smith was here earlier he was at the street for me I don't have the tenure in my career that he has had but I have done a fair amount of management and operated in groups within my career and I don't know that there's a magic answer for resolving conflict and discussions but compassionate respectful listening looking for common ground trying to understand what's behind the conflict and come to some kind of compromise needs to be the most reliable for for most big decisions thank you um where where do you see the balance in Essex currently for the economic makeup of our town and where do you see it in the future and and in which I guess I don't know balances right word but how would you balance it out for future growth um I think I maybe don't completely understand the question yeah I didn't either I didn't make it right I will say all right so I I'm aware that I'm like newbie that moved here and showed up and was like I'll volunteer right right I would definitely be looking to um experienced board members and many groups to help me understand the label and and you know what the situations are and what's going on I'm not going to march in and pretend like I know what the history and current sort of spread and makeup of businesses in the town are and what's good about that and what maybe our opportunities for growth and what needs to be improved I would be walking in with fresh eyes is one way to say um can I ask a little bit simpler question um what are some things that you see in Essex that you appreciate that drove you here uh as far as like you know yeah sure sure um there's a lot of things I love um the schools you know we came in in the middle of dead middle of winter and just immediately there's a sense of community around the schools and then one of my kids is at Essex Elementary one of the founders and immediately one of my kids you know their parents work at this business or that business and so when we go in we're saying hi and um in the summer we really enjoyed Essex experience going up there and seeing how things are filling in and there and the the community concerts and sort of the just the vibe that I recognize people everywhere I go people are invested in these these businesses and there are places to run into neighbors not just places to go buy stuff yeah sorry for the first question yeah but don't apologize it's fine hard to um in your day job working for efficiency Vermont have you got any ideas from some of your customers of how you might enhance the economics of Essex currently hmm well when I talk to business customers there's it it depends a lot on whether you're talking about an independent independently on business or something that has a board somewhere else or shareholders right improving the economics in the town I guess my honest answer is no because I'm new to the town governance part I feel like there's the perspective that I bring it may be more as a really invested customer and resident of the town who's a little bit familiar with business as far as how to improve economics I think the businesses that have succeeded and have succeeded in really becoming sort of a core part of their community and enhancing the economic life of their community seem to me to really understand who their customers are and what their customers need from them and how that overlaps with the town that they live in um and that may not be super straight answer but that's good thank you and Melissa do you have any questions for us I don't um I think I even saw the the team meeting times and stuff we're already listed on the website so I already know that one awesome all right well thank you for coming and uh someone will be in touch after our June 26th meeting thank you so much thank you moving along business item 5d interview volunteers to serve on the Essex Free Library Board of Trustees uh first up we have Lynn Smith is Lynn Smith here hi come on up and introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about why you'd like to be a member of the library board of trustees I'm Lynn Smith I have lived in Essex the same amount of time that he has um and my children raised my kids in Essex and we use the library a lot and now you know as your kids grow and you're not maybe as involved in the library I haven't used it as much recently but I did see opening on the library board and I thought you know what maybe my expertise or my background would help probably couldn't do it with the economic development but maybe with the library um I have owned a small business not the same one that he owns and um Essex I am an independent piano teacher have been a piano teacher in Essex for 32 years and um and I also taught four years of English and literacy um on the middle school and high school levels so I just again semi-retirement board questions gone I have to figure this out because she answered one of them very good um so if a conflict should arise in the board on the board and you went to the library team to go in one direction and they wanted to go in another how would you handle that conflict I think I mean many of the other candidates have answered that question in a great way just you have to listen you have to understand the core of the conflict and then either be willing to back off or to come to a compromise or even to the point maybe you might even recuse yourself from the vote if you and my other question is would you like are you happy with the way the library is now or would you like to see it expand and if so what would you like to be part of the expansion I had not even thought through that I have always loved the Essex free library I love the whole vibe of Essex free library so I don't I don't know all right thank you nope um I'm still on my questions but do you um do you have any particular skills that you think are valuable in the setting of the library trustees I did read what somewhat that what the trustees do and they um I am a lifelong reader I've taught reading I got literacy all the way up through high school senior so I do have some skills in that area thank you as a long-term library user uh switching to become a trustee you would play a significant role in developing policies long-range plans you have a particular area from your experience at the library that you would enhance or that you would change improve I don't know um I am passionate about children's literature I am also um passionate about what we offer the public and um and also that it just I like to say I've always loved the Essex free library and um so I I really don't know okay well thank you do you have any questions for us I don't think so okay well thank you for coming in and we'll be in touch after the 20 cents thank you next we have Pamela Blake how are you good so I'm Pam Blake I have lived in Essex or Essex Junction for I guess 64 years so I came I'm I'm officially in New York or I guess because I was born in New York that's been explained to me many times that I can't claim a natural vermonter but I feel I've been here a long time so um and I've used the libraries I've always been a heavy user of libraries my children grew up in the libraries and now I bring my grandsons to the libraries and the Essex free library is a beautiful place and I think they do a great job and so I just thought that I was on the friends of the library in the past so helped run the craft fair when it was the cozy nook craft fair I helped organize that and participate in that and I volunteered at the Essex free library for a couple of years just helping shelve books I know my alphabet so I'm good at that and I worked at Essex High School I was the registrar there for 18 years and then I also um after I retired I came back and helped out at the school library so that's what I who I am and what I'm interested in great word question and I really have no questions for Pam I've known her for the interaction for a while so Ethan um I'm gonna say I'm running out of questions but I was just curious if you have any ideas of things that you could bring to the library or like events or you know book readings or if there's anything that you think you could specifically you know introduce an idea that you might have or anything of that nature that you might have for the library I think what I would do is take my lead from Caitlin and the folks that work there if they see a need you know I use the library myself and I think it works great and I appreciate all they do so I would assume that you know their boots on the ground they they may see something and if they if I can support that or help advocate for whatever they think needs to be done awesome thank you yep it's two folks that have answered my question by saying the library functions perfectly so I have no questions any questions for us okay we will be in touch after the 26th okay great thank you thank you already up to business item 5e interview of volunteer to serve on the housing commission I apologize if I mispronounced your last name Lauren Ressou yeah Ressou but that's great I put the embossus on the wrong syllable that everybody knows that so no problem go ahead and tell us a little bit about yourself and why you're interested um at the housing commission yeah so Lauren Ressou um I recently moved here about two years ago I'm in a resident of Essex town um my husband and I bought a house um and soon after moving here we um our daughter was born so we now have a 14 month old that's running around as well that's in daycare I'm sorry I can't hear Lauren can I have you pause just for a second we're having a little trouble hearing here the volumes a little too much I can turn I'm turning up the volume the speaker you are okay Lauren go ahead I apologize okay is this better now yes thank you yeah okay great so I'll start over um I my husband and I bought a house in Essex town about two years ago um also near Paul Mazas there's a number of us here in the same neighborhood it seems like um we have a 14 month old so we've been navigating Essex with a infant and now a toddler um she's at daycare at the edge um I grew up in Vermont I moved away for college and have been away for a while but I'm very happy to be back um I currently work at the Vermont Department of Health I'm a data analyst I work half time with our cancer control program and half time with our asthma control program and I'm well let me and so and then before that I was working in refugee resettlement found in DC area and then before that I I was in grad school and I've also had some experiencing experience working with an airport um in Franklin County here I did a year-long experience working with the agency on aging there so throughout all these different sort of career things that I've been doing I've really seen lots of different sort of perspectives of the housing housing crisis and just housing in general um from a social work perspective and now more recently with my job at the Department of Health I look at data on housing especially as it relates to asthma and especially in terms of quality of housing since quality of housing can really affect one's one's health and I recently done a report on just how many Vermalters report some sort of health problem related to that that they think was caused by their house in addition to looking at those that don't have a stable housing situation and have food insecurity which often just goes hand in hand so because of all these different sort of pasts that I've been on I'm really interested in getting involved in housing in Essex and I just know that in the US but also like especially I think in formal housing is just a really tough issue and I really want to sort of think it in um and see what I can do to help at least in in this little town great thank you board question have you ever attended one of the housing commission meetings no I um I've been very busy with with a move and in my daughter um and so I have not um but I am I've been on I work with many different community boards and I have for many years um and many different perspectives and I so I'm very used to working with different groups of people that are trying to come together um with with some common goals but no I've not been to one of the housing commission meetings and my second question would be what's your definition of affordable housing uh well many people think affordable housing is housing that is one third or less of one's income um and I think that's a good good starting point but I think it really depends and I think it one of the reasons it really depends is that the quality of housing is also really important and even if you're just paying a third of your your income and you live in a house that that has mold um and that is open to the air that that's still that should not be considered affordable housing thank you do you have any specific ideas on um direction or policies that the housing commission could could act on to help some of the problems you listed yeah so I don't know all of the details of uh of zoning and all the many things that are related to housing that makes decision in making change with housing uh easy um but I I am very interested in as I said um quality of housing we well before this they're the second largest community in Vermont um and so I'm not sure that our problem is is sort of quantity of housing but I certainly know that quality of housing can be a challenge um and I'm also with with my work at the department of health I a huge priority right now is health equity and so I really would want to bring up that lens into my um my volunteerism with the housing commission as well thank you what's that uh Lauren do you have any questions for us I don't think so um just thank you for the opportunity I look forward to learning more thank you for applying and we'll be in touch after the twenty six all right thank you thank you next up business item five f interview volunteer to serve on the planning commission we have mr brussel good evening you know the drill name is Dustin brussel and a resident of sx for 60 years serving on the planning commission serving the town of sx for 22 years a resident and of interest uh been involved in a lot of change I see a lot of future I see a lot of what's coming and there's a lot still to be done Ethan look at you you got a question they're sitting there somewhere it's right there go ahead you can go can I go first I'll go all right so I have a I have one question and then I have another question wait a minute you said you only had one for everybody I know I thought I'm by multiple throughout the night there's just many times where I had two questions and Don asked one or two of them and then I'm sitting here like thank you so um I was curious on your on your application for the personal aspirations I was curious as to why it was an interesting question there's anything that came to mind when you were asked that question based on your personal aspirations I thought was a pretty wide open question and but frankly it wasn't one that I felt there was a written response for right so I'd like to know a little more context around what what you're looking for in that framework of that question I think in my understanding I could be told here huh but my understanding is is there anything like to me to enhance personal aspirations as far as like financially or in a professional manner having a relationship with you know let's just say a developer or or somebody of that nature where your decisions would assume a potential conflict of interest yeah basically is what I was asking but the use of I have no conflict of interest with with development aspects I mean I'm a I don't work for the town I don't I don't work in real estate I don't work in area that profits from development a homeowner yeah I own a house that was built in 1960 so it's a little older than I am um I'm interested in and I'm interested in having keeping this community strong economically it isn't just about you know the I don't want to diminish diminish anybody's anybody's passion but it isn't just a flavor of the month is what is going to affect us in 10 years 20 years 50 years and that to me is as planning is not a is not a a knee jerk reaction planning is a long term process and you have to anticipate you have to look ahead and it is it is sometimes unpleasant to stage things to make the migration to make the changes it's it's honoring the decisions that were initial initially done maybe 20 years before me but looking ahead to 20 or 30 years beyond what's what's coming is that enough yeah and my second question you'd be impressed and I may not remember this word for word but I've carried this with me for three weeks is how do you feel about the change to the DRB and are you willing to offer any knowledge that you have and presumably transfer to to one of the boards in order to make a smooth transition that's a good that's a that's a fair question and one that's been asked at the planning commission you know actually what what does it mean and I don't think we really truly know yet and I would say that from the meetings that I attended and the discussions that I've been part of there is not a clear understanding of what those two boards will be even even members of the select the zoning board that attended one of our meetings recently expressed that they weren't sure about what this new process was going to become or new new new formation what it meant so I think that that one of the items that is is going to be key over the next year and a half is that we all we all you planning commission members community understands what that what that's going to be it's not just a question at this stage in my mind it's not a question of should we or shouldn't we because the decision has already made been made to do that it's waiting for eradication but the community has already stated that this is the direction we want to go so now what does that mean and what does that mean for a transition of a town plan transition of zoning and subdivision regulations is this an opportunity to consolidate regulations so we have one set of regulations is this an opera should we stay put should we keep things the same what is it that is going to be changing in the initials from the short term versus the long term we do a phased approach we have a big big approach is it a light switch is it a you know so these are all the questions in the and that are out there and in any discussions that I've been part of there hasn't been a single person who's been who has a clear roadmap which I think is not inappropriate because it's needs to be laid out it needs to be determined what it is there's a lot of models out there it's not it's not that this is a brand new thing it's just a brand new thing for Essex town of Essex so are you willing to work through it I've been here and I have not shied away from any I've not shied away from any planning initiative planning challenge that we've had in front of us the last couple of decades so yes thank you done question in your 22 years of experience what have the high points been and what have the low points been I don't know that I could come up with a list easily in the the high points I think that the individual high points have been when we we as a commission had taken a challenging application because that's another thing that maybe to shift the planning commission today does two rules they do planning which is the long-term aspect that I was talking about but they also do application review an application review can be as horny or as smooth as you know it runs the gamut and successful navigation of an application is a good feeling and that don't mean successful application in that there's no context there's no questions or anything it means that questions are brought up healthy discussion occurs regulations are understood and sometimes you have to make a decision based on the regulations not necessarily what you choose that's a low point when you have to choose something because the regulation says it's allowed you cannot say no just because you personally don't like it it is you should allow that so that's a low and a high point maybe to counter that is when you get into the planning phase and you go back and you find those items that were identified as a thorn and you find a way to correct them in regulation updates so you take what didn't work and you correct you make course corrections as you can that's an example of a high and a low there's others that's the current head of the planning committee how do you handle conflict conflicts is a very broad term the commission in general you need a majority of the commission you don't need unanimity you shouldn't have unanimity you should have discussion you should have altering potentially conflicting ideas it's it's knowing the regulations acknowledging and being respectful to staff and having that discussion you have if you have a a member who sees things only one way and cannot see you know that's okay they can vote they can vote one way and you have you have potentially six other members who could vote a different way and that's absolutely okay you need a majority of the board to to pass a motion there should be conflict there should be discussion and there should be altering differing opinions in discussions about the regulations or an application well i've heard i've heard a number of folks about you know they might recuse themselves but conflict in being differing of opinions is healthy and expected should be there as chair looking forward what do you see as the most challenging issue the planning commission and do you have an idea of how you might address that well let's be clear i'm i'm chair at this point till for you it's it's it's a collection of the commission so in my position today i see the most challenging thing to be the transition from the current model as an ethanas i think i think the transition to the new model is going to be the hardest thing that we've done in quite some time we have the town plan update that's in process which this year we instituted a change in flow by going out and trying to engage with the community ahead of time and the current vice chair josh headed up a number of efforts to get folks in to get ideas ahead by now what they were looking for and try to use that to shape some of the changes instead of bearing changes and delivering to people and say what do you think of these changes but that's a shift hopefully we can continue that sort of approach even with the change in structure but i think the change the structure going to a drb pc drb just the mechanism of that is going to be the biggest challenge because it is a pretty short timeline in the planning sense of the word thank you you do have a question um given that you are a very senior member of the planning commission i have my AARP card um how will you personally what is your outlook of coaching and mentoring um newer members of the planning commission especially those well including those who have sometimes vastly different opinions than you understanding that the the goal right is that the planning commission can be very technical and that knowledge transfer is key in order to keep forward movement in the past because right now we we have we have mostly a senior senior group in the past i have with staff met with new incoming commissioners sometimes multiple times encouraged them to listen engage but listen um there is a learning curve there is a there's a long learning curve it it's not it's not steep i'm not going to say it's steep because one of the things that i've said consistently to people is to trust staff just because you're on the planning commission does not mean you have to be an expert in regulations staff are so you need to trust the staff to begin with to deliver you accurate information and from there you start looking at the things you start drilling into the things that you need to know more about so part of this is and this has been a consistent coaching strategy is look to staff for as the authority in planning is different planning is in more opinionated planning is when you bring your ideas to the table you ask for people from the public um i see ken in the background in the view ken has been primary person as that that has been present in many of the times in many of the discussions bringing up planning initiatives planning ideas the engagement of folks to come in at the right time in the right place is always a challenge most of the time the engagement is at the end which is why we started the initiative for the town plan process was try to get people engaged at the beginning um as far as members of the commission which is back to what you were asking it really is listen and trust the staff ask questions um don't you just really encourage folks to to to grow and for growth and not necessarily try to be uh planning and development expert the moment that you start because nobody is unless they are a professional they need to under folks need to to look for what an application is they need to learn what a planning cycle is and they are different thank you do you have any questions for us um really it's it's we've touched on it is the transition to the new model you know assuming that that there is state legislature approval for this you know that is something that it's it needs to have expectations need to be established more so than how do you're going to conduct meetings it really you need to understand what i feel you need to understand what the expectations the outcome is how are you going to make sure that the you know what what goes to the planning commission what goes to the drb everybody needs to understand that are we going to be able to start having you know crossover we're going to have people that can sit on both commissions of drb and planning commission so there's knowledge shared one of my concerns has been in this model as it's been brought up for many years is the experience that you get looking at an application going through an application process is invaluable learning what's broken and what what works and what doesn't work and it's very easy for example if you're talking about prds plan you plan residential development it's very easy from a planning perspective say hey that will do everything that'll solve all the problems we have with housing with challenging development sites and so forth but then when you actually start looking at the development application all of a sudden you start seeing the holes what do you need this doesn't this doesn't quite cut it what are we trying to cover what are we trying to get to so there's a there's a real significant potential for a disconnect in planning development review and having that cycle be able to that information be able to keep feeding it back through so i just i think those are things that the you as the select board are going to need to to be part of the process to help establish the expectations obviously even with the today's planning commission you there really is a separation right there this is this is one of the points at which you guys get to control the planning commission rest of it it's a separation but we have to work we should work collaboratively we should work to the same goals and if we're not then then something is broken but i do see that being a very key element over the next year in addition to everything else that's going on budget count plan updates all that stuff this still has to happen so how do we prepare for that next transition but i think it's it's something that we have to start with soon we'll see some joint meetings in our future so um short version i feel i still have more to give i think the the commission as it sits today even with members have turned over to some degree is functional is very functional highly functional um we hold accountable we listen to the public um and i feel that there's still more for me to offer simple good thank you all right thank you well thanks let you know after the 26th have a good night moving right along business item 5g interview volunteer serve is the mwnowski valley park district representative for oh sorry i should have asked i did not see him online i do not see him in the room um mr uh david rafiel are you here okay um if he shows up we can circle back if that's okay um or we can raise federal okay now we're on to find everyone i know it's the board the commissions are in alphabetical order and here we are at w for mwnowski go ahead and introduce yourself and yeah yeah um yes my name is jeff tice um i've actually been in on the uh the town's representative with the parks district for three years um time flies since the very beginning of the pandemic i guess is when i came on board um been a great experience been my pleasure to represent the uh had been the town of the village now representing the town new sx junction uh representative in in the uh on the board uh let's see uh career-wise i assume you might have a resume i uh i'm employed as a human resources manager i've been in hr and hr director type roles for a while and i've also worked in uh insurance risk management professional safety those kind of fields which included prior to my current role working for the uh from our league of cities and towns which i'm acquainted with a couple of the gentlemen here it's to a certain extent from that period as well as the uh the chief when he was um it was during that time that i really four years i guess with the with the uh league of cities and towns that came to really appreciate how much happens at the municipal level and i thought when i move on from that role i will absolutely uh try and give a little of my time and expertise and effort so i um saw the parks district role open as i say three years ago and uh here we are i like i appreciate the idea of needing to reapply and give other people a an opportunity in fact when some folks were interested in the trails and conservation i was thinking oh well the parks district conserves 19 different properties and counting so um maybe future interests there for some people great organization it's i think it's a little different from what i can tell for most of these um other missions etc that are really just town-based you know i'm one representative of eight different towns for for this uh this uh district which is as you know based in uh euthanality instead you can see him there plus it's nice having a staff to work with an executive director and uh bless you the executive director and that small staff so anyway word question i want to thank you for clearing something up if i couldn't tell if you were still a member or if you were if i didn't realize this was a renewal of your it's a renewal thank you and my question i need to ask is how soon will the wanooski valley park district get a boat launch canoe launch for andy hat for andy the end of the whatever that road is by woodside well that's a very specific question one that i will pick up the executive director who is more i don't know if andy was here he would like to know because each year that comes up and each year they don't get the canoe launch down there well i should speak to the perhaps just bring the weight of the select board to bear on yeah you know director we can move forward thanks you across from the pump station at the bottom of the pd9 that's where i'd like to see it i should be taking notes here i'm just picking um i am gonna ask this question kind of naively because i should probably know what's going on more than i do with the wanooski valley park district there are many things to keep track of and and i'm very interested and thank you for your your volunteerism and i'm nowhere to the select board so i haven't met you before um i was curious on when you mentioned in your interest to see about your contribution and how you've been able to make change and and progress with things and if you've done it with him that morning i'm just curious if you could just share a couple things with me that you're proud of yeah um it's it's been interesting as far as like what what i think i've specifically been part of i'm able to bring that general you know so there's a small staff so so some of the hr experience applies and the uh some of the insurance and you know at least i can say well call the league cities and towns don't ask me i'm just kidding but you know at least i have that those kind of connections but as far as the actual experience the probably the most interesting and rewarding thing for me has been the um there's been a real effort to evolve the the headquarters there at the uh ethan alan homestead beyond the ethan alan colonial the blunt white person history into the bigger picture long-term uh history and heritage and culture of that land so we've really been through the executive director he's went on all these things of course it's my job but uh he's been able to really forward the partnership with some of the uh abanaki bands the on the bioway they're called the 404 abanaki bands which has been really interesting to be part of and he asked me he wanted to have a uh board member one of our eight of us i think he wanted one of the board members to be a little more on point with him um because there were some sensitive issues etc so i've put in a little extra time as i can you know among my own other obligations to do a little bit more with him in coordinating with the uh the alan the bioway and progress and make some physical changes there at that you know at that uh at that headquarters in ethan alan museum through the staff we secured a pretty pretty good grant through senator lehi's office and uh and other funding sources to to really like expand that to be is a nice there's a nice homestead not there's the the ethan alan homestead but there's a basically an abanaki village that's in development as well as artifacts in the museum etc so that's been really good from my personal standpoint you know it's been very interesting and rewarding and the continued acquisition of property has been impressive interesting the fact that the director has some ties in burlington and chitenden county sometimes when people are uh uh trying to determine what to do with their property and don't want to see it developed etc they they can turn to the parks district um i know i naively when i first saw this thought that maybe the parks district was like you know the parks playgrounds etc that at all it's really conserved properties more than anything relatively minimal developments in some of these locations is your problem thank you yeah and to follow up along those lines uh should you be reappointed do you have any other projects other than the canoe accesses that you would push for in essics uh it's i think i'd never thought of it from that viewpoint before because it's more of a uh you know a broad oversight board looking at the properties every you know within all the towns that the uh with the winuski river touches um but that's a new perspective that i kind of welcome as to what we can do development-wise for our town here um it wouldn't be i don't i don't i i've not experienced it being the path that someone on the board is necessarily advocating for something within their own town um but that's an interesting thought i have to think about that more and uh and i know we're kind of half joking about some of the some of the accesses but along those lines that i think that is kind of a legitimate point theoretically that we could we can continue that element to the benefit of the town so i've definitely opened to that and and as i say other than those specific points i'd like to know a little bit more about what we could do thank you i don't question i just wanted to thank you though because when what you just said about when you joined and you thought it was just you know parks that's what i thought it was too until you just explained the conservation land part of it so thank you well good you're welcome i i think it's too easy to make those kind of assumptions that you know yeah no it's not not a lot of swings and uh Peter Todders it's a lot of conservative property thank you and the museum and uh then those those i knew the museum part i just didn't know the land part yeah yeah some new developments up like well Gerway Cove where the Winooski empties into the uh newly acquired property there for example for example Winooski okay yeah oh i know you mean can i ask a question not to you but as a curiosity is the museum like if you're on the belt line yeah take that okay yeah i've been there i brought my kids there but i'm like i think that's the museum but maybe there's a different museum then there's like a there's historical buildings down on riverside but i'm not sure what that's part of you should go you should visit or intervene yeah i'm talking yeah you should visit the homestead again yeah free admission yeah we went there for family pictures and we went there we went back there because my son was just fascinated but i just want to make sure i was at the right spot that's the place i love it it's good well i would follow up that personal question and i hope the district will bring back their trout sales that you stopped be nice to resume again oh see i i wasn't even aware because in my three years i haven't been yeah thank you was that your stocking yeah oh nice good i learned something here too you better make a list now i've got i'll write it down when i go do you have any questions for us i i don't tell you like i say i am it's it's been my pleasure to do this and happy to continue if that's you'd like well thank you for your service and we will be in touch after the 26th great thank you thank you and you know for as far as thanks thanks for doing this i know you've got a full evening yet so thanks for your work here well and that actually brings to a close a through g our interviews for boards and commissions so what happens to the people that were on the schedule and don't show up we reach out to them um make sure yeah we have the uh the meetings on the 26th so we'll ask them if they're available on the 26th thank you so moving right along we are now on business item five each consider approval of human services funding recommendations for fiscal year 2023 hammy i see you are online how are you good evening i'm great thank you how are you all good uh do you want to give us a little bit of background on your your process and introduce this agenda item oh well um i'm back for another year um this this is um the policy that the townspeople approved i think in the 80s where one percent of the budget would go toward human services funding um the manager is typically the person that has been in place to try to determine where all of those funds are going to go and when i started here several years timmy you're breaking up and we might have lost you we started a pro of kind of a oh sorry we can see and hear you now back now okay sorry um so we determined a process um and we have a committee that meets each year and tries to make up a recommendation to all of you um so this year we received 28 applications um and they totaled just over 275 thousand dollars um it's about 25 thousand dollars more than last year in requests um we did have applicants that uh they covered all five of our focus areas i think five of the series i think maybe we have six now i'm lost track but we have a new focus area which is workforce development um this year um some of the applicants touched on more than one of the focus areas which is always a good thing to see uh due to the number of increased requests and the amounts we did find that we needed to cut more than 109 thousand dollars from the total requested compared to what we have budgeted uh so what you have for you um are the is that list that recommendation list um it's attachment a and i'm not sure if we are sharing that or timmy it's in the packet do you want me to bring it up um no that's okay i have it on my screen here so if you don't mind me looking away i can kind of look at it here um yes it is in the packet so attachment a does have a breakdown of the process that the committee has used to determine um kind of the top tier of um applicants that could receive some funding um and it's this is the same process that was used last year it funds it bases what is going to be awarded based on how they scored the the better they score um the higher they are ranked and then also the more that they can receive from the request um and in that process uh we do have some that get eliminated at the bottom because we simply do run out of the funds um so out of the on attachment a you can see that we are using the full amount of the budget which is 166,753 dollars and i guess the part two of all of this would be the recommendations for the focus areas for next year which we recommend to remain the same we had awaited for the university's community needs health assessment last year and we made the recommendation late last fall for what the focus areas would be so those are pretty new and i think they are still very current and so the recommendation is to keep those in place for the FY 24 funds and i think that's it unless i have it unless there's other committee members online that wanted to make any comments or if anybody has any questions i would just like to thank you for your wonderful work tami as being part of the process it was a it was rough this year less money more applicants and less money but tami dealt with it outstandingly so well thank you don don is right i will i have to commend the the members that we have on this team they shifted through 300 pages um of applications and you know reported back to me that it can take anywhere is between i mean between that and the meetings we're talking there are solid eight to 12 hours that were spent on review and um coming up with this list the time is very much appreciated um board questions comments just have one comment um to be fully transparent i have um done business with ant dots through the vermont human services funding and um they did not use any of the town's money to to purchase from me but if anybody has any issue with me um voting on this approval i will gladly recuse myself from the vote i think we've all donated to ant dots ethan i don't think that's a problem i've received um grant money from the state of vermont from human services funding and it is public record so it's i don't have a problem to tell people up front and if there's any issue i'm more than happy to step back but it was town's first fund no i wish you i would just add to that to say i'm very glad to see ant dots on top because you hear about them all across the town you agree job at this time i make the motion sorry i want to make sure that we go to public comment if there is a public comment all the time i apologize that's okay um it's been a meaningful of interviews where we didn't have public comment so it's easy to forget i just have two minor little questions about the um the sheet so tammy mentioned that there were 28 businesses considered but i only see 27 listed on the sheet jump jump closed down yes thank you don't oh one's gone okay great thank you second question is the orange or yellowish the orange column i guess it is labeled percent of max score but the values that are in it don't seem to be percentages they seem to be dollars i wondered if the label on the top was wrong or the column values were not the right ones um i'm going to say that that title probably is i don't want to say it's inaccurate but yes i guess it's not a percent is it so so um i i think that that that's the column that takes the maximum score that they could possibly receive from all six reviewers if they score a whole 10 on everything that would be 360 yeah and how right and how they scored within that so yeah it probably should have been the dollar amount from the percentage of the maximum score or something along those lines so the title is what is wrong there okay and the title should be um i would say the calculation of the i'm not sure how to word that it's obviously related to their request i can see that much i think it's actually a percentage of if the total amount that was requested was broken down based on the the scoring how well because those columns add up to 183 578 which is more money than we have to right right i see the requested 20 000 but it comes out to 21's okay don't quite follow exactly but yeah it's gonna just can do is this something you need tonight or can we get back in touch and try to i don't think you should stop me from voting by any stretch of the imagination i just didn't understand yeah i just did sometimes being on the spot and we're trying to remember exactly what the thought process was maybe it's something that tamby can reach out to you afterwards okay just a thought it's a formula that travis helped us come up with to make the numbers work it looks like it's the request amount times something probably the funding ratio at the bottom 1.1 zero zero nine oh maybe i think you're right crazy i would have i i think that would have to pull up myself look at that but i think you're correct i think that's great thank you for figuring that out i think i figured it out it was a guess um any other comments from the public on human services funding do not see any hands online back to the board now i make the motions a select board approve contributions to the human services agencies as presented on the attached list attachment a i recommend that the select board approve the proposed focus areas for fy 24 funding cycle thank you don is there a second okay thank you even any discussion on the motion but i just asked since one of the focus areas was workforce development if there was another one of these that got an award that is focused on that or involved in that um there were i think let me look at the list there were yeah so like um remote professionals of color network uh which is right number 15 um that was one of the major and see it so this year and last year we did not ask them to select a focus area we scored based on how well we thought they fit into the focus areas because we found one of the things to be that sometimes there isn't just one sometimes they are getting to three different focus areas which are really important so um there are many of these which are offering um either training or opportunities um so they could they certainly would touch on their workforce development then answers my question thank you you're welcome yeah i just question on the motion i was just going to mention to kendall really quick that turning point uh turning point center of triton county and cboa or both really and i wasn't a high dollar amount but they're both really good organizations that focus on those as well thank you thank you any other discussion i'm sorry i'm gonna have your hand up on one actually there's a couple folks um is the board okay with going back to public comment even though we have a motion on the floor i don't think you're supposed to go ahead uh christina go ahead and unmute yourself hi i'm happy to wait too if you prefer but um i'm the director of s6 chips and i just want to say we really appreciate the ongoing support and it means so much to the youth of our community so thank you so much for your consideration again thank you so much uh seeing no other hands um motion on the floor is to approve the proposed human services funding uh to the organizations to the agencies as presented and also to approve the proposed proposed focus areas for the fy 24 funding cycle all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye i oppose nay motion carries for zero thank you um you're welcome thanks tammy thank you tammy you guys do an amazing job uh next on the agenda is discussion about improving communications with municipal boards commissions and committees um this item if i can actually get my agenda to display correctly uh this item we've we've talked about multiple times uh just about how we can just as it says improve communication between boards and committees we have had the discussion around um whether it would be more meaningful or impactful to have written updates in person updates this is just an agenda item to allow us to have some open discussion on ideas of how to meet our goal to increase that communication both ways back and forth um in order to meet our goals more efficiently uh so greg did you have anything to add this what's in the memo um it's something that was on your your um work list for the coming year and just figured we could start the conversation tonight about what exactly you're trying to accomplish what exactly you want to see um as far as give and take with your boards and committees and based on some of the feedback tonight staff can work to try to put some of that stuff into motion i'd like to hear in person reports and have them staggered so when we don't get hit all at once but we are at least aware of what's happening on each board i mean like tonight with the minouski valley when i learned that that's not just you know what i thought it was parks it's other stuff but when somebody comes to me and says you know how are you using my tax dollars or what's going on or what's this committee doing that you know benefit i don't i can't go to every single meeting i mean i try to get to as many online as i can but as a i just don't have enough hours in my day so i would like to know so that i could be responsible responsible representative to the voters so i could tell them so i think it's important that we hear from these committees as to what's going on and especially i know that i know you had the board of civil authority on there well we we don't meet that often although i suspect that once assessments start up we will be having more meetings for maintenance so from a communication perspective all of us sit on the board of civil authority so um we should already know that's what that board is doing um but i mean like on this week's warrants it was something to happen you know some repair or something that happened in the cemetery i have no idea i don't even know you know what's going on with the cemetery commission or they still need help or stuff like that that it's important for not only as a select board member but as a you know a voter to know you know what's happening i just think it's important that we hear from these these groups is very um time i mean is it something like the the boards all sent sent in work plans for their coming years it's something that you'd want around this time of year you can kind of go over work plans and hear what they're doing would you rather just stagger it throughout the year they come with what they come with um and fill in the gaps with minutes annual reports stuff that's getting produced um trying to think of how to how to fit that in if you deal with minutes and reports great there's no opportunity to ask questions of the person or something comes up when we're talking i'd rather have something you know in person and if they can't do it then yes you know a written report or or a plan is it's awesome but i'd rather see that way because we're also televising it everyone can see the plan or hear just me yeah and i'm gonna just bounce off your last sentence there because if it is something that's written in and produced to us you know it should be in advance so whenever we post it to the meeting that way we can ask questions whether it's you know it's not uh we wouldn't do it directly but we can ask you the questions and you can forward the questions that are not or the chair so there's not all all of us doing it then we'd have responses to those questions and then we could post the report the questions the answers in the packet if it if it's not available for in person and there's a better understanding of you know actually what's happening but i was going to say too was you know um not made a good point about the Winnowsky Bay Park District because i learned some things too but i think that there's a lot of and and like the board of civil authority like like tracy mentioned there's a lot of committees and commissions that we may not need an update from only you know six months or once a year for a few of them but if we know that something's happening you know like like let's just say this year i'm just gonna throw a couple out there let's just say you know planning commission economic development and and trails and and conservation we know that there's there's hot tickets on the on the on the menu for them so maybe we want to hear from them every three months for you know on progress of what's happening and what direction we're on and are you having problems is through you know direction that is you know needed from the town or input or you know whatever it may be that way there's an actual um i want to i don't want to call in a relationship because we have a relationship with them but they're just um i know communication is a good word but kind of like what go working group like we're all interacting you know in a more feasible yeah teamwork you know quicker quicker way but then when things aren't going crazy and you know things are calm we could go back to the six months or once a year or whatever it may be but i um one of the things you mentioned tonight about the work plans you know being produced already to me that's so foolish because all these appointments are happening and the work plan should be you know we don't make a select board work plan until after the appointment so when these appointments are all happening you know i would i would consider like all of our committees and commissions their start date you know ours is what march may 30th June 30th June 1st April 1st April 1st yeah that month i would consider them to be July you know and i to be fair to them i asked for their work plans i think somebody might have asked for time to help inform what you were doing so it wasn't a comprehensive it was kind of a just a high overview of here's what they see on their horizon that to help you inform what you see on your horizon yeah and i get that i just think you know if we have us if we have more of a i don't know if i could be totally wrong and we could agree with me that's perfectly fine but i think we need to have more of like a formal okay you know this is kind of what's going on we want to hear from you guys every three to six months you know we kind of expect you to um you know create a work plan in the first month or two and have your reorganizational meeting and you know get your pieces together and come to us in September or you know September and December or whatever and then things aren't crazy then the next year i don't know i don't know what that looks like but i think that it's very important that they have for one they all have a work plan and it's at least emailed to us for the year and i think it's very important that you know we successfully did our reorganizational meeting we you know conducted business meetings with forums you know it's stuff like that that's following through the grapevines because we just don't have you know i don't have the time to attend everyone these meetings and i don't know anybody else either so i just don't know what the missing link is and it'd be rambling at this point but i just think that that's a few things that are important to me and things are going to happen the town plans being worked on it's going to be adopted but looking at just like tri-town sewer committee i mean who would think we'd need to hear it but with the new laws that are being passed and they're going to bypass act 250 and let people build where there's a sewer connection i think that's going to play a huge role in decision-making stuff like that that we wouldn't initially think about this little thoughts well i would just say that i think that our boards and committee commissions and committees all do fantastic work that we don't hear about that we don't know unless it's something so significant that it comes out and i just we need more information from them my original thing was written updates and meet only if needed because i mean if it's just work stuff that's happening there's no need for somebody to come in but anything of import that affects the community or affects the board that would be nice to hear and and my point is the town manager you read you've got the pulse of the town you're on top of most of this stuff anyway that maybe it doesn't need to come up to the board level all the time as a meeting unless it's something that is of that importance but there's definitely i feel like i'm in the dark a lot i've also felt like i wasn't truly aware of what was going on i think the work plans were great it gave a really good narrative as far as what's what's on the radar um coming down but understanding that there are there are differences in how people and not just us but people intake information digest it learn um what do folks feel about having in-person time and what i mean by that is not necessarily you know marching everybody in during a meeting and you know just giving an update you know it's field saying you meeting could have been an email right it could have been but how can we make the most of that time and make it meaningful for the committees as well as us uh does it make sense to in a former life uh we would have twice a year uh chair and vice chair of the council committees meet to really form those relationships and those understand where that intersectionality is where the gaps are where the overlaps are so that we really were working as one cohesive municipal team rather than pockets of committees and boards and you know the select board planning commission what have you so just wanted to give that is some food for thought and get feedback on that well i think it's important that we all function as a team i mean all the committees and the select board and the town manager all function as a team however we decide to do that so that we're all on the same page just what's happening what's needed and where we're going basically it's all i mean we're a new town we you know it's a whole new road to travel so i just i want to keep the communications open and and i don't want to be blindsided with somebody said i heard this at a meeting and you know it's news to me i just you know i don't want to know that to happen that's all only the fifth lord is kind of intriguing i think we've got point of information um just a couple thoughts uh reacting to what you've all said um teamwork sounds good tracy i like your your point about um what can the committees get from the select board too so it becomes this a big collaborative back and forth it's not just you expecting information of them recognizing that they are volunteers um and you know keeping keeping workloads in check uh certainly we can look at camera was that here that used to have the chairs and the vice chairs that sounds awfully familiar doing municipality okay i've talked about it maybe that's why maybe that's what and and so trying to balance all that stuff together being respectful of time uh staff can go back and can put together some some options but one thought right now is you know maybe a once you're checking with the board and the select board for some of the boards and committees but then maybe a lunch or a breakfast or something like that with the chairs and the vice chairs to kind of reward them for their time and and also have more of that back and forth collaborative type of thing but um yeah just some some thoughts and hearing you speak well i just i want them to know that we care i mean if we don't talk to them how do they even know the select board cares about the work they're doing that's the other thing like they need to be appreciated for what they're doing so i just have a question as far as like for once a year what would make the most sense would it be like september before we dive into the budget would it be would it be february before we dive into the election like i i that's a busy you know i mean kind of right in the thick of it right it's june just june july makes sense when you're doing appointments i mean it just i don't know what time of the year it makes sense and this is going to be the case for any direction we decide but august or september august or september strikes me as three months settled in and you know and one thing that we had done previously was there would be a like a prompt or a few prompts a town plan for one um and and just seeing like it's sort of like a issuing a problem statement or you know a theme and then each committee weighs in as far as how they see it how they're working toward it initiatives that they're undertaking in order to work toward this goal or this thing that is the prompt and that may not make sense you know in theory but but it was very much a you know a team building but also a working group aspect of it with food oh okay to tie in the don't have some bagels i'm upset no i i would just add that just going through the appointment today with the chair of the planning commission and the musiki valley guy we learned a lot just just to knows that little bit of time so it's not something that takes a lot of time necessarily yeah i feel the same way as kendo on that because like i mentioned i've only been here for you know one full year and in a couple months so there's a lot of people that i've never even met you know just on me for not attending everyone these things by now but it's uh there's a lot out there and i think that's part of the problem with the community is not a problem but probably part of the missed portion for the community is there's so much happening and so much that's going on and like don said the or kendo maybe i'm forgetting now but you know all the work that they're doing that we're missing out on and and you know just appreciation of knowing yeah you know are we okay for public comment and then we'll bring it back to make sure greg has what he needs uh ken simple a simple suggestion i might get a chance to monitor other municipalities and i noticed that others have the minutes from various committees and commissions included in the reading file for this luckboard and that's pretty easy i'm going tomorrow's the conservation and trails committee meeting i'm going to make that very suggestion that our minutes once approved of course are included in the reading file for you guys to have and then if there's specific questions something in there you might have face time specifically from that not to exclude the idea of face time that's a good idea too right uh happy to consider that there is that we've talked about that in the past the reason we don't do that is because it is um just one more thing for staff to track down the you know seven or eight boards there make sure the minutes are in the packet and makes a packet an extra 15 20 30 pages long for you to read all the stuff is online so it's always accessible if you want to see it um the public wants to see it but if that's going to help then we can certainly look at doing that but just want to let you know that there is reason for why it's done is is there one easy place online where you can go and get to that minutes and minutes and agenda i go there sometimes but and i totally agree with greg because i'm not going to mention municipalities but recently i was reading a couple packets that were 500 pages long and i like thank you for not doing that i'm glad i missed out on some of the separation thing because 180 pages is a lot of pages to read through i've read like 250 before and it's it burns your eyes like i don't and i'm i get the whole minute thing because we have it and it's sometimes it's slower to pop up and there's some things that can always be worked on but i don't think that to me it's not helpful because i'm a poor reader to begin with and i think it's better to have an alternative measure and for um just to sort of go down that path a little bit um for those folks including myself who sometimes can't find that prompt to go out to the website um it may be helpful to have that in the packet twice a month um perhaps uh we could get an estimate on staff time as far as what that would take um just as a point of information that we can take into consideration uh lorraine i see your hand up i was actually going to ask request the same thing that ken just did because again all of us work a lot and i just to me to be able to have one place to be able to go before slackboard meeting and kind of catch up because it's a lot of meetings that i try to attend and it's very difficult and it would be great to have it all in one place even if it's not necessarily in the slackboard but maybe a monthly kind of everything or something somewhere um and then the other thing i noted um was that i think for emails the only uh committees that i said that had uh direct emails was the housing commission and uh the slackboard and the rest looked like it had a staff position and i was wondering if emails also tie up the staff here and there and if maybe there was a way like the housing commission and like you guys add like a green email for each department so that some of the volunteers could help go through some of the emails so the staff time could be lessened as well um but just a thought thank you for the idea um do you need anything else another hand just pop it up uh iran go ahead thank you back in the dark ages when i served on the slackboard we had paper packets printed out and eventually minutes from all the meetings were not included to safe trees but i missed it when we had that transition because it was extremely helpful for me to just skim over the library trustee minutes the cemetery commission minutes and get a flavor as to what you were leading looting to earlier about just the scope of the work that gets done under the umbrella of 81 main street um both by volunteers and by paid staff so um i'm a big fan of more information rather than less in one place if you don't have time to read that's one thing but for people who do have time to read it it's extremely helpful to just have in one place thank you thank you any other board comments you have enough to i think so yeah we'll click together some some options and proposals and bring it back and continue the conversation okay sounds good uh next to agenda items discussion about appointment evaluation and real estate i believe and the tax stabilization i believe those are for executive session there's nothing correct okay uh so with that we will move along to the consent agenda and make the motion we accept the consent agenda as presented thank you don okay thank you ethan any discussion on the consent agenda i just had one question about the keloch road paving that's coming up they're not going to pave where they're going to tear up for that new retrans intersection are they it looks that way i'm going to lay new pavement and then turn around and i hate doing that i'm going to record for that um you're talking to susie wilson keloch yeah i think they're doing just the intersection but if they're doing just the intersection you guys should pave just the way they're gonna stop not pave into the intersection oh as far as the work the town does yeah yes yes okay i i believe that you're probably going to do that or i'm just throwing it out there because the way it looks from where the where we're going to go is from where it ended when it came off the circuit and ended right there but they're going to go that way to all the way to the lights was my understanding for the new pavement because that's what the road broke up but yeah and yeah then it looks like v trans is coming in to see if v trans is going to do that in a year or two the pavement you're better off just getting your pavement through not paying all that money and then having them tear it up even though they'll repave it and pay for it still awesome just uh i will just mention that i will say i drive that road twice a day every day and there's definitely a potential there for public works equipment to be destroyed yeah there's probably a 16 to 18 inch pivot in that road multiple i get your point totally but you know how v trans is this this could go on this could be five years down the road i mean they're gonna be they're gonna be musky for a few more years are they are they doing a re a regrind reclaim of the whole pavement or are they gonna just top coat it i'll have to be i have to get back to i would just ask and i mean because if if the choice between a complete reclaim now to be dug back up when they do that versus the top coat to get it through a few more years again i'm probably just repeating errands probably already got it but i wanted to mention that it's a substantial amount of money thank you any other discussion and i sent my questions on the warrants to you and so if we ever get around to it that's fine i wrote you back okay let's come in after i learn thank you yeah i did i i did want to just ask one question and i was going to shoot an email over today but i never i never did i'm just curious if erin had any specific thoughts on the whole v trans thing you're talking the letter to send to the state about um the susie bolson yeah yeah erin and katherine and kent really worked on that together i just want to make sure that if he had any points he wanted to share that they were captured and to be consistent with my being a pain make sure that they have enough of a radius for 18 wheelers to come around that corner thank you that's nice that's it being no other discussion all those in favor of approving the consent agenda please say aye i oppose nay motion carries unanimously uh moving along to the reading file me first i have a whole bunch but first of all happy birthday tracy thank you for being here on your birthday happy birthday thanks to laura schwerhorn for serving on the library committee as she's retiring to emily taylor for her time spent on the housing commission and especially would like to thank alan batula who i believe they're honoring tomorrow for his four and a half years of service as um on the conservation and trails committee two of which he has served as chairman and over his years of service he saw he oversaw the tree city application and award he shepherded the adopted tree program through he officiated at two arbor day celebrations and he has led the indian trail and maintenance of trail maintenance and invasive species removal so he will be missed and thank you for your service can i can i follow up on that in that does the town send out a letterhead a thank you letter to anybody that gets off of a can you serve we we had for a while i think it's something that had fallen off the radar um we could certainly look to revisit that this nice record have a comment remember comment um as you know it's going to send a couple things i will have to follow up these points but i wasn't very i guess understanding of the boat on the sx town logo because it doesn't include anything that we had talked about just says pick one of these six options or i don't like it i'd prefer more options and i thought we had talked about like what do you see when you see sx and that's in there yep a couple questions having a brand there's no unless i'm clicking on the long wrong thing there's no this is no questions there's six i think it went down the survey though that's not the actual survey yeah if you click on the link and it'll take you to um the ones that are there what was this i'm going to check with tammy that this is the right link because there was one that had the additional questions in there okay this is the only way i didn't go on the one on facebook or anything i just last night clicked on the packet and i was just confused if we were leaving that no this is what wasn't put in the packet was just six options or i don't like it yeah no the but the once you did for front parts forum there was a a lot of questions and you could input on what you wanted to see if you liked it or you didn't like it or yeah once you click on those one of those six options that creates additional drop downs um and i think regardless of what you click on there's a question about what first comes to mind when you think about sx regardless of how you feel about the options presented is there any feature of sx that you would like to see represented in the logo okay i didn't vote i didn't think it was right but but they're there that's why i didn't know thank you for clarifying because i was very curious and i had one more question oh email it because i can't remember okay thank you after the reading file we have uh we will or will not be coming back i don't think you need to come back no okay so we will not be returning uh after executive session um and speaking of executive session does anybody i'm getting there just a minute okay just i can pull up a couple civic clerk is not liking tonight so hold on let me start go ahead to move that the select board enter into executive session to discuss the appointment or employment or evaluation of a public officer or employee in accordance with one vsa section 313 a3 to include the town manager and deputy manager thank you ethan is that the second thank you kendall uh all those in favor please signify by saying aye hi hi pose nay motion carries for zero i move that the select board enter executive session to discuss the negotiating or securing a real state purchase or release options in accordance with one vsa section 313 a2 and to include the town manager and deputy manager thank you ethan is there a second second thank you kendall all those in favor please signify by saying aye motion carries for zero i move the slipboard make the specific findings that general public knowledge of contracts would place the town at a substantial disadvantage thank you don so good thank you ethan all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye pose nay motion carries for zero and i move that the select board enter into executive session to discuss contracts pursuant of one vsa 313 a1 a to include town manager and deputy manager thank you ethan thank you ethan all those in favor please signify by saying aye hi pose nay motion carries for zero uh just for clarification the only thing we will be coming back for will be to adjourn that is it um we will not be coming back on zoom due to only adjourning correct i'm going to log out of zoom and okay in the beating on there we'll open the door upstairs and adjourn from up there okay thanks all have a good night