 Okay, I'd like to call the Essex Town Select Board meeting for Monday, June 6th, 2022, to order. First item on the agenda, any agenda additions or changes from staff? One item from staff would like to add an item in executive session to update you on pending or probable litigation. Okay, thank you, Greg. Any changes from board members? None? Okay. Can I have a motion to amend and approve the agenda? I'll make the motion and we amend the agenda as requested. Can I approve? Second. Okay, thank you, Don. Thank you, Tracy. Any further discussion? Opposed? Okay. So you did say and approve. Okay, great. So we've got the agenda updated. The next item on the agenda is public to be heard. Public to be heard is a time when residents can speak to the board on topics that are not on the agenda. If you'd like to speak during public to be heard, you can either raise your hand in the room or use the raise your hand feature on Zoom. If you'd like to speak, please be brief. Please address your remarks to me. Please be civil. If you are attending remotely, please keep your camera off and yourself muted to avoid distraction unless you've been recognized as a speaker. And then we'll move forward. I saw Betsy Dunn's hand go up first. So Betsy come on up. Good evening. Betsy Dunn, Essex Town. And I don't know if that's our name or not. Well, I was at a Democratic meeting the other night and they were calling us TAS, Town After Separation, which seemed very punitive. But what that brings to me when I was sitting there listening to what we were doing is, I really believe that we need to look at our charter. And there are a lot of little things that we could amend within that charter. And I think that I'm not asking each of you to do that work. I think you could probably have an ad hoc committee that you could get people, someone from the board, and then have people from town get together and talk about what we need to do with our charter. So that's what my public comment is. That's what my public comment is. I'd love to see active community interest in our charter and get ourselves our name. Is it Town Center? Is it Essex Center? Is it just Essex or is it Town of Essex? I don't know. But not TAS, please. Thanks Betsy. Thank you. The other hand that I see right now is Margaret Smith. Margaret, go ahead. Hi, Andy. I just wanted to maybe get some information. The select board, when they have appointments or elections or nominations post the letters of interest and they have public interviews and it seems to me a very transparent process. The school board on the other hand was very reluctant to release the names of applicants and it did not. I'm not sure they ever did release the letters of interest and are planning to hold the interviews in, I guess you call it executive session. Plus the fact that of the people on the committee to select, they're not all Essex Town residents. They're Essex Junction. More of them are Essex Junction residents. So I don't know if there's any direction you can recommend to make some changes in that process so that it becomes more transparent. Thanks Margaret. We don't have any jurisdiction over the school board. We did however have an opportunity to review the candidate materials and we called a special meeting toward the letter half of last week and made a motion and approved it to stating that we didn't have any objections to any of the candidates. And that's essentially our involvement in that. So thanks. Thank you for your comments Margaret. Anybody else? That's you go ahead. Thank you. I've got the main thing I wanted to say was I found the YouTube channel or spot that we have for minutes from the board. I think it's YouTube. But nothing is really there yet. Are we going to post all the because we're streaming and I imagine we have a copy. Are we going to put that on there and is that going to be true for all the minutes that we do YouTube? Is it something, some channel maybe on Facebook? I don't know what our posting plan is. Tammy get shows our public information officer assistant to the manager. She's been building up our social media presence to start taking advantage of more of those things. I'm not sure off hand of the timeline of when to do that or how exactly how we'll roll it out. But we are trying to bolster the social media presence to try to get more information out there to our public. Okay. So best, are you asking about a specific meeting or just all meetings? No, I think all meetings so that people that couldn't go to the meetings, they have a link that they could just watch the meeting. You know, I think that's don't we do that. So town meeting TV is for that. Yeah. Yeah, that's why. Yeah. That's why they're here. Okay. My mistake. I don't I wasn't I'm not wasn't trying to make. Thank you. Thanks. All right. Let's move on. I don't see any other hands. Hands in the room. My glasses on. I can't see the back of the room. Hi, Allie. All right, let's move on to the first business item interview and possible appointment of a volunteer to serve on the conservation and trials committee. We have two candidates here tonight. Betsy, come on back up again. This opportunity to introduce yourself. Talk about whatever you want to tell us about either your background or your, your past experience on the committee and why you want to continue. Thank you very much. I have to say that I have enjoyed my, I think it's nine months that I've actually been on the on the committee. And last time when I came, it was mostly the love I have for the trails and I for hiking in our woods and enjoying them and wanting to preserve them and knowing that I'm a problem solver and I bring energy to what I do. And since then I was elected the clerk and I take our minutes and I'm very, very quick to get them out there. But I've also, in this last nine months, attended 21 different webinars presented by A&R from Vermont Urban Community Forests, from the Audubon, from the Watershed for Vermont, and from Ethan Tapper, who is our community, our county forester, and have made it my mission to know more and have a knowledge base that I can build on for what I'm doing on the water, on our trails committee. And since being on it, we've made a lot of really good changes. We've added the next two people to our committee, or we're not a commission yet, but I would love to see us be a commission. And I feel very positive about the things that I've brought to that committee, to our committee and would like to continue that because there's a lot more that needs to be done. Thanks Betsy. Any questions? Any questions from board members? Betsy, you've mentioned in the past multiple times that you're interested in interacting with the planning commission. Do you have any plans or ideas on how to have CTC interact with the planning commission? Actually, I'm on one of the task groups that, work groups that is assigned now to the planning commission. I'm working on ACCEP 171, which is the act that was passed in 19-19. In 2016, saying that in our town plan, we have to have a map of our town and we need to show where our forests are, the forest blocks, and show where the passage for our animals that we share this planet with to make their connectivity so they can move about. So I'm on that one. I'm also on the one for Saxon Hill. And so that we can look at how we're using it and how can we make that more. Thank you. You're welcome. Any other questions? Brad Tracy. Hi, Tracy. How do you handle situations where your voice is the minority? I tend to listen and I will always campaign to make them see my side. But when I'm not in the majority and my voice has been heard, but it's not in the direction they want to go, that's okay. Life doesn't mean you get everything you want. You have to work with where you are and compromises the way democracy works best. So that's what I try to do. And can I even, if it's not all of what I want or anything that I want, can I get a little insert of something I want or not? Thank you, Tracy. Question, Ethan? I just really got my computer to load so I'm waiting for my notes because I've walked out for a second. I'll throw one off the top of my head. I've been really interested in Saxon Hill and Indian Brook recently and finding out more about it. Do you have a vision for those two areas for the town? For Saxon Hill and Indian Brook? I do. In Indian Brook, we were just working the team of us from the Conservation and Trails Committee. Can I call it C&C? Okay. We went out and we were working on getting rid of all of the, we didn't get anywhere near all, but getting the buckthorn out because that's an invasive species and the honeysuckle, which we did, we got awful lot, but we only touched the bare minimum of doing that. That needs to be continued. It's something that needs to happen over a period of weekends, not just once a year. But the bigger thing for the Indian Brook is that it's not easily accessible for people who are handicapped. When you get to the lake, the pond or lake, I don't know how it was. So when you get to Indian Brook, it is, there's no actual place that's easy for a person who's in a wheelchair to get into the water. And I think a ramp, if we could have a ramp that goes into the water so that they could go in and have their wheelchair going in and then they could float off of that and then we can take the wheelchair out and then it could be brought back in when they're coming out of the water. I think that would be really quite lovely. And I think that we need to look at people who bring their dogs to Indian Brook and are not picking up their stool so that that contributes to the algae blooms that we have during the lake. And then it closes. It closes Indian Brook on us, you know. And last year we did have more blooms that I think we've seen. And based on the different webinars I've been to, climate change is going to make that even more. And people really enjoy being in Indian Brook and so I think we need to pay attention to that. In Saxon Hill, you know, there's so much happening in Saxon Hill right now because of the want for development and how that affects the trails and the fellowship of the wheel is engaged with that, looking at that. But we haven't started our work on the Saxon Hill forest and how to make it more attractive to people who aren't on bike. I think a lot of people think it's more of a biking trail, but it isn't. There's a lot of really wonderful trails just to walk as well. And I just think we need to look at that. And I think we need to look at how that can be connected to Forestdale because they're close and you could connect those two in Forestdale to Matthew Forest. So you have a nice network of trails that people can use. Today, I know you didn't ask about Matthew, but today there was a team of us that went out and looked at Matthew Forest because there's a lot of erosion. And what can we do about that? And some of the areas that you come down are pretty steep and you come into where there is a little stream that's a filler for Elderbrook. And there's erosion there and it makes the crossing a little bit more iffy. And so I'm excited about our work on that as well. Okay, you're welcome. I did find my written down that I had, but I had saw about the, and I'm not going to use the right term because I just bring up a note, but there was a note in there about the studies of the streams. Yes. Yeah, I don't know. I haven't looked into how long it's been since it's happened. But you had mentioned that it was important to the water quality and everything else. I was just wondering if we had a direction or a plan on how we were going to... That came up today when we were walking in Matthew Forest and Allie said that the state is working on that in conjunction with UVM. They're doing water testing. We would have to hire someone if we wanted to have specifics done of our own. But that is happening. One of my friends who had been on the conservation committee when it was a commission, when it was still a commission in 2005, she has the report that they put out about our waters. And I just sent that off today. She sent it to me and I sent it to Darren to give to the whole group because that's one of the things that we're going to be working on this year. Thank you. You're welcome. Kendall, any questions? It was actually just a little curious about your vision for connecting the trails. I know that you had mentioned that. And I was also curious if you folks have done anything with the Law and Youth Conservation Corps for trail building and projects like that? Yes, Allie had said today that we have had coordination with them as well as I was talking to a person who is from Community Justice and they have young people from our town that have to do volunteer hours and they would be another source of working with them and give them a sense of community in working in the area might help turn them around. I don't know how much turning they need, but I think that it's a really good source. So I'm going to follow up on that. Did I answer your question? Okay. Okay, good. Thank you. Yes, you did. Thank you. Okay. Thanks. I'm going to ask a question since water was brought up and it's one of my favorite things to bring up when Allie is in the room too is our entire southern border, at least until July 1st, is a river and we have really no access to it. Is that part of what? We have no access to it? No, there's no canoe launch. Oh, well. There's a couple that aren't very useful. There's the one at the top of the dam that the power company is supposed to maintain. It's almost impossible to actually get to it. And then the other one is if you go down the road where Woodside used to be. Yes. There's three parking spaces there and then it's a quarter mile hike with your kayak to get to the water. It's a distance. And so it's very difficult to use. And so there's no... I'm not a kayaker, so I wasn't aware of this, but I will find out about it because I think that's really important. I think that getting people outside and enjoying the fresh air as well as what our community offers is really wonderful. So yes, I'll look into that. Thanks. Sorry, it's a plug from my side. No, I think there's many people who like to kayak. And I'm all about it. And then my question is then, do you have any questions for us? Or is there anything that you'd like, anything you want to ask of us? I guess that one of the things that is one of my charges is around the mapping of our trails. And I think that the community wants this. They want to know where the trails are, how to get to them and have a sense of when they get there. Where it goes and how far is it that we have to go. Chuck and I, Chuck Vile, and I are going to walk after the 23rd when I get back from Boston to look at the trails and start marking them for their depth of slopes that we have and get them all marked so people can do those and have them on the kiosk. There aren't kiosks at every entrance to these woods as well. And at crucial moments when you're like, what did that map say way back in the beginning? Have another map there so they can see where they are and what direction this fork is going to take them. I do think that having our trails mapped and on the website for the town is really important. And I know that Allie wants the GIS, it's GIS, not GIF. GIS survey done so that it makes it really, there's a lot of clarity to it. We have a simple map that the town has kind of gotten put together, but it's not, it's legitimate, but it's just, you know, that. So there's two issues that in one section of our forest in Matthew when you come down from Tanglewood and going towards the school and it veers and goes to the school and the next part goes down to, further around to the school as well as all the way down to 289 and then back up Prairie Fields back into the school, a portion of that is owned by one of our developers in town and we'd like to get an easement for that and so that we can map it, you know, legitimately. As well as in Matthew, there's like a 50-foot section, I think it is, that we didn't get into their deed when it first happened this last, I think it's maybe four years ago now, that we didn't get the easement put into that. You can't see their house from him, but it's his land and so get an easement for that as well. I think those are important things and I'm wondering if you would support that. You can consider it. Okay. That's what I would add. Yeah, I hear a lot of requests for wayfinding and mapping. It is. I have a plan for when we have the kiosk. I found a forest scavenger hunt that's for kids fourth grade and lower that they can take it and they can go find these different things and you could have them on a laminated thing so they could get into the woods and more than just walking but looking about and seeing what they can find. Make it a really educational experience as well as fun. All right. Okay. Any other questions? Okay. Thank you, Betsy. We are just to be clear on our process. We're interviewing everybody and then I think we're going to we're at our final meeting of the fiscal year, which is our next one. I think we'll be making a lot of appointments. Fabulous. I hope I get your vote. Thank you. Thank you so much, Betsy. Ken. Good evening, Slickport. You want me to start? So, Ken, yes. Thank you for stepping forward and being interested in continuing your role in the conservation and trails committee. Feel free to introduce yourself, share any information with us that you like about your background, your interest in conservation and trails and your experience. Thank you. You should record that. Push a button. I've been on the committee now for five months. And if you remember from my initial interview in September and again in January, I said I was going to focus on invasive species, particularly the spongy moth on infestation, which probably you've heard a little bit about. I imagine you would have by now. So what I did is first thing I did is in your packet, you will see a fact sheet on the spongy moth, which we didn't have oddly enough. I put one together for us and we have that now. We've been on distributing that. I did a lot of public outreach. I visited with about a half a dozen homeowners associations and maybe three or four more individuals. Around town to try to get them up to speed on what they can do and the current situation. Did that. Let's see. What else did we do? So on the committee in those five months, I spent a fair amount of time helping with editing the tree policy, which you approved. If you remember, you have in your packet tonight, I believe a new recommended change to our mission, which we worked on quite a bit into all of the, all the meetings in between since I was appointed, went to the Indian bro cleanup where we did the buck on removal. I went to the Arbor day celebration over at the founder school. Did that. I've been helping other committee members as well on working with Steve on trail mapping. We tried to come up with a sort of a halfway step. We were developing that problem, maybe using some third party mapping and incorporating that into a system which could at least give people an idea as to what we have as an inventory. Keep in mind that our committee has some seven different things we're supposed to be studying and inventorying. Historic, archeological, architectural, educational, quite a few different things. So I've tried to stay away from the things that we're covering pretty well, which is the recreation and trail mapping process. I'm trying to get the website up to speed to reflect our mission a little bit, have that inventory available for all seven of those disciplines. That's pretty much where I've been focusing. Thanks. Any questions? You didn't got it. Sure. I was going to start because I was very intrigued with the new trail's policy. The new mission. The mission. Sorry. So my question that you kind of just answered some of, I want to hear more of was in that mission, there are a lot of things that are trails. There are a lot. Yeah. What is the most important to you? I know we can't bring them all up to speed, but what are the aspects that we are lacking currently? That you think will be easiest brought forward in your direction? We have nine members now, which helps a lot in separating areas of work, certainly. So I'm going to try not to step on anybody else's toes. I'm going to try to focus on the things that even though they may or may not seem that important. I mean, the invasive species thing didn't seem all that important on two years ago, but now, you know, some people in parts of town are, you know, quite concerned about the spongy moth infestation. It's actually getting to be a health problem. As you can see, I have a bit of a reaction to the little buggers. And so that's the kind of thing that I don't want to let get out of hand. I want to make sure that we're on top of these things. There are many other invasive species that we have, plants and animals. And so I want to try to continue to focus on that. I think that a simple list of our historic resources, like the museum that we have, even our own tower, just having a nice list is an inventory and study. So I think an inventory of our things is a fairly simple thing we can do and have that available on our website. That would include the trails, of course. Any other questions? Go ahead. Talk about a time you changed your mind on the issue. What was the issue and how did the change come about? Good question. You know, I didn't think that using herbicide or insecticides or more severe controls for the spongy mouth was something that should be recommended. But I'm thinking maybe that may be necessary. Did that come about due to your reaction? I've never seen anything quite like what I've seen. It's like World War Z. In some places they're going into people's houses. It's amazing. I mean, it really, for some people, they really feel as though, and I believe them that it's becoming a health hazard. The evergreen is what got me. They will kill a larch? No problem. Uh-oh. Any questions? What do you do, Ken, when your voice is in the minority? I try very hard to make sure it's not in the minority. I will try hard to debate my case. And if I continue to be in the minority, I suck it up and we move on. I have two questions. And what are archeological resources and ethics? Archeological? You know, I don't know. We need to find out. I assume there might be some Native American things, I'm guessing, at the very least. Thank you. Andal, any questions? I was curious what your vision is to go about connecting all the various trails that are in town? Well, it's not something that I've been focusing on, but I think that's a really good idea. My wife was just telling me how she would love to be able to have a trail-wide ride to work. She's on Brigham Hill Road. She drives to 117 over by Emtec, which is where the Planet Fitness used to be. She takes a circuitous route right now, and she's indicated that she would like to see that as well. So I think it should be done. Thanks. I'm going to put in another shameless plug here that handout that you... The spongy moth? ...that you have there. In your packet? Is it on our website? It is on the Conservation and Trails website. Okay, so there have been a number of folks who have been commenting about spongy moth on the Front Porch Forum, so I see a lot of questions about it. And so what I may start doing is offering folks a link to that. Let me say this about the spongy moth situation. So last year, we had an infestation which was bad. Yeah. Every egg mass that was left had up to 1,000 eggs in it. So if just a few of those, say four or five, successfully reach caterpillar stage, that's going to make what we had was bad to worse. Twice as bad at the very least. So the caterpillars at this point haven't even gotten full grown, but we haven't even begun to see the worst of the defoliation that we're going to see. Last year, we had a pretty significant defoliation event, and you saw it in places like Indian Brook. Pinewood was pretty heavily infested. Apparently on Pinecrest, Royal Park. Is that right, Pinecrest? Royal Park. Just got a freaky call, email today about how bad it is there. They were bad last year. It's worse this year. And they're very, very concerned. So that was last year. This year, every successful mating will produce another egg mass, and there'll be more egg masses than there were last year. So I suggested this in September. We need to mobilize and do a survey of the town so we can understand where the heavy infestation is before the outbreak, next spring. So we can, at least if the state decides to do some spring or we could actually consider doing something, it's very important to know where to focus. You don't want to have to spray the whole town. That just doesn't make sense. There are fairly benign biological treatments and more severe ones, but if you time it right with enough lead time, you could go with the bacteria that's called BTK, which seems to be somewhat effective. That's for forest areas and somewhat wooded semi-urban areas. The next alternative for shade trees that we have that are valuable, like in front of the library, for example, there's some beautiful oaks there. There is systemic alternatives. So there are a lot of things that we can do, but we need to be ready and know where the problem really is. So I think I suggested this to our committee also. I think it was even before I was appointed in January. And it's hard to deal with these things because it's not right in front of you at that time. Like right now, yes, let's go do a survey just to roll over the place. When there's this little benign egg masses on trees that you can hardly even notice, it doesn't seem like such a problem. But don't underestimate this problem. Counting on the standard natural biological controls, I don't think we can. We were all hoping that that would happen. Climate change is making that less probable. We needed a wet spring, really wet spring. It didn't happen, two years in a row. So there's a fungus that infects the young caterpillars. It did not happen this year. Thanks. Do you have any questions for us? Let's see. Do I have any questions? No, I don't think so. I would say you have our revised mission in your packet and I worked on that with the committee and I think it's good. And it takes into account the tree policy that you passed, which needed to be incorporated. And I think that that's really important. Oh, I should say, so, you know, Betsy mentioned the business about the recordings. It wasn't the recordings that Channel 17 does that she was referring to. It's all the other committee recordings, like the Conservation and Trails Committee. She was asking that those recordings, which do exist, be put onto the YouTube website. That's what it was. There's a lot of them, actually. Think about it, EDC, Conservation and Trails. Quite a few. That's what she meant. Sorry, Betsy. That's okay. I haven't been known for... I wanted to just... I'm done. Thank you very much. Thanks. One of the ANR webinars I went to, it says the Agency of Natural Resources. It was being led, it was around forests and our pests in the forest. And what can put together there was something that they were looking at to make for all of them to use. And when I told them that he was going to the local HOAs, they thought, what is a great idea? And that is now happening throughout the state. People go into the HOAs and doing it all because Ken started that. So I really wanted to do this one. I'll be back. All right. So Ken, will... I think if you've heard before that we're going to point everybody... Like we had a future meeting here. Yeah, so... All right. So let's move on to the next business item, which is Considered Changes to Conservation and Trails Committee Charter. Who do we have? Looks like me. And then we have a couple of members here, they can chime in if I misspeak, but the Conservation and Trails Committee has taken a look at its charter. You heard a little bit about already. Part of the changes that are proposed, being proposed are just to reflect the change of membership from seven members to nine members. Most of some changes to capture the town's tree care policy. Part of that is having a tree care board. This would identify the Conservation and Trails Committee as that board. Those are the main changes, because I would look to the members who are here to elaborate if it needs to be. Anything else you want to add? I think this is still part of the introduction. Is there anything you want to add to what Greg said? So I wasn't prepared for this, so I'm going by recollection. Some of the things that I had requested be changed was the way it was written, it was that the Conservation and Trails Committee maintained the trails. It was very direct what the committee had to do, and I suggested that that be more like a guide and develop, but not actually get out there and build the trails. That's the way it was written. So that was the major change I think I suggested. And in terms of the membership, I wanted to make sure that every single person in the town, whether they were property owners, renters, homeless people, whatever it was, if there are residents in the town that they could be considered to be on the... That was the other change that I wanted. Right, and just having the nine, because we did that, but it hadn't been reflected in our charter. That would mean that change in January that we could get on all three of the people, Aaron and Ken and Steve, so that we would have a full slate. The nine has worked out well, too. It hasn't been a problem at all. I think Alan handles the meetings quite nicely. I've tried to get a little bit more parliamentary procedure in place. That helps a little bit control the chaos. And I think it's worked out well. We delegate, which I think is very important with such a wide mission that we have. I think that having nine members, it helps seven different disciplines. Nine members, it kind of fits. That's right. Thanks. Questions? Alan, go ahead. So you're going to actually carry out the town that we were written into here? Yes. You didn't say that you were actually going to do it? With the help of staff. Right, with the help of staff, and that we were going to get the designation of... Tree City. Tree City, USA. Because nowhere in here does it say with the help of staff. With the help of staff? Really? I thought we had that in there. In the next part down, and membership powers and duties that does mention it, but in to carry out the town's tree care policy, it does. It does. Please have that. Yeah, please have it. Because today, while we were out walking in the Matthew Forest, that was one of the things that we had, Anne from Public Works there with us because of the erosion. And a lot of the area that you walk on along these little side streams that contribute to Alderbrook, there's a lot of erosion. And so some of the bridges that we have there, as well as some of the trails that we're walking on, are very close to the edge, and they could fall. So the trails community... Is it Anne's group that would fix the trails where that erosion is happening? That we were talking about making the trail up higher and coming down? Public Works. Public Works doing that or us? What are you asking? Okay. So yeah, Parks and Rec would do that. Any other questions? Ethan, go ahead. I have one just above that. It says do support development and maintenance of multi-use trails, sidewalks, and a greenway system. I'm having a hard time reading through that and a, and the fact of a greenway system. Because the greenway system to me is one system fully connected. If it's going to be multiple, just reading it, the wording would make more sense as including greenway, including a greenway system or including greenway system. This is your... Yeah. Speaking of the multi-discipline and delegating to your area. This is my area. I couldn't read it as Anne a greenway system. Anne a greenway system. I would be right then. Well... This isn't my expertise. I just had a stumble. That was the goal to have a greenway system. Yeah. I think it was when Darren and Alan were talking about they were, and a greenway system. So... I guess... what we want is connectivity for people who are trying to go into Burlington. So you have the path that's coming in from Burlington now that's past the Ethan Allen homestead and everything and it's coming down to Susie Wilson through Colchester there and they'll go into the the city of Essex Junction. So carrying that on out to us so that just like Ken was saying about his wife that be able to get to places using your bike and not needing to use your car. Or the road. Or the road because those roads are really... I won't ride on them. You know because they're just the side when you're on them and there's so many gravel I'm just afraid the bike's gonna be like that and I'm gonna be on my... there comes a car. Pancake City. So I really think that having that trail come all the way out is really should be a goal, should be a goal. I really would like to actually see a connector with the trains but I don't know that's not gonna happen. It's not this year. Yeah, I just bring that up. I also don't want to see that bike path end at Starbucks and do that about. It's only a couple hundred feet in Essex. I know. Well the other thing that I think the green way for me is around the green belt. So you go into a lot of our neighborhoods and you've got the green belt from to the curb to your sidewalk is like three feet. There's not a tree that can really handle that and have their roots grow well. It shouldn't be no less than five feet really. Any of those green belts that you have. It's a planning commission thing. That's a planning commission thing and that's one of the things that I'm gonna work on from the being on those teams in the planning commission. You really think about that so that the trees can form properly. So I'm just trying to get to Ethan's question. Is there a grammar question? Yeah. I think if you put in sidewalks and pick out the A and put in greenway systems it's gonna involve more than one trailer. That's good. That's good. Yeah, thank you. That works. And greenways. And greenway systems. Okay. But that is a biggie because when I think of, I've been through a lot of little towns lately and the arching that they have over the streets that are as big as 15. Different topic. I'm sorry. Anybody else? I do. The second paragraph from the end of the session, if a member has excessive, unexcused absences, excessive is subjective. Yeah. What would you feel is excessive missing more than 50% of meetings? If they didn't have three I would say even just three because we all have remote that you can do. You know. And I'm happy we're doing that because otherwise while I'm in Boston I wouldn't be able to attend a lot of this stuff. So do you think three is too harsh? I think 50% makes more sense because the number could vary if you start meeting twice a month or something so that's not a number, not a good idea but a percentage makes sense. So I would suggest if we have 12 50% is a nice How many meetings do you have a year? We meet monthly so it's 12. 50% is reasonable. That's too much. Too much? That's too much. 25% you're out? 4? What would be a quarter? No, a third. That would be a third. A third? That seems a lot. Awesome. And taking notes. Well, I guess I guess what I would say is I think four is a third of the meetings. I think missing a third of the meetings is hard because we do a lot in those meetings and maybe can I bring that to back to the meeting for next week and ask to get because since we didn't have a number can we bring that back into I think they can take care of it. So one thing I wanted to point out is that language is the same language that was in the chart or the mission before just get them to move down a couple paragraphs. The exact same sentence was already in there, just got changed location. So it's not a new sentence just to make that clear. But it should probably be still a concern. Still be nice to tighten it up definitely. It could be used unitively. Does the select board have a number? Why don't we go with the select board now? 50% Insistency That's essentially 50% but I don't think it's ever been a problem. I think that's what's in the talents charter for the select board. If you miss 50% of the meetings then you... Well, the one I'm just saying the one on our charter. Isn't our charter saying that? About select board members? I don't have to memorize. I will before I sign myself up. So I think we probably used the same... 50% seems like a pretty low bar, pretty reasonable. Mr. Scherer So does this mean they have to take it all back and rewrite it? No, I think we can say we approve it as amended if we want to or we can or we could put it on what we want to do. We could also we just haven't put it in a sent agenda next week or next meeting or or something. If you want to see exactly what the language is before we approve it. But do we have to put it in a consent agenda? Remember we approve something for the free policy then have to be brought back to the consent. This is voted off. So this is not a new policy. No. Those policies that policies that we need to I think it's adopted one meeting I approve in the next or however. That's also if there are new policies. This is not a totally new mission either. It's it's um subjectivity you know what's as far as policy goes what's the significant change that rewards to reviews I'd say the same thing for this if you want to apply that same sort of standard. If these are significant enough to bring it back but I would be comfortable with the I think you're totally within line to make the changes this meeting if you want to. I would like to make a motion. I'm going to quickly ask Kendall if he has any questions. Kendall you got any questions? No. Thank you. All right. Thanks. Do we want to do what comment before the motion or that's typically what we would do. Yes. Any public comment? I'm seeing your hands in the room any hands online. Patty Davis. Yeah sounds wonderful. We need this badly in our town. Thank you. All right. Thank you Patty. Anyone else? See any other hands? I would like to move that the select board approve the updated Conservation and Trails Committee Charter with the following changes the second bullet of the mission update to read and Greenway systems. The third bullet begin with in coordination with staff carry out the town's tree care policy and updating the second to last paragraph if a member misses more than 50% of the meeting's the Conservation and Trails Committee continue with what's presented. Second. Thank you Tracy. Thank you Don. Any further discussion? The only question I have was about the first paragraph under membership, hours and duties of the group. It's written about receiving the staff support and then it goes on to say of the community as well as parks and back. That's still there. That's still there? That was the only other one that mentioned staff support and then with the point I would also include in my motion that the membership powers and duties read the committee shall receive staff support as needed on an as needed and as available basis. I will second my hearing. So doesn't it already say that? It does, but it specifically lists only three committees. Departments. Yeah, departments. Oh, OK. So you want to get in general to all and any staff as appropriate, as appropriate? Yeah. OK. OK. Work. Work. That's perfect. Right. Thanks, Ethan. Don, are you OK with that amendment to the? I thought I would second the. OK. All right. All right. Any other discussion? Candle, any comments? Oh, I'm good. All right. OK. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? OK. Motion passes 5-0. Thank you very much. Yep. Thank you. Thank you both for your hard work. Thanks. OK. Moving on to agenda item 5C, consider approval of human services funding recommendations for FY 22. Who's got this one? Eva saw Tammy. Yep, there she is. Here, somewhere. You hear me? Yes. OK. Good. So hello. Good evening, everybody. I am here to present the fiscal year 22 recommendations from our review committee. Most of the facts are there in front of you in the memo that's in your packet, but I'll just go over a few of the highlights. As you know, we approved the budget last year with a group by the town voters on March 2 to approve a budget of $159,261. And we received applications up until February 15. And we received 34 applications totaling $300,857 in requests, which is $58,992 more than last year. And we have had a significant growth both in requests and the dollar amounts that are being requested. I think part of that could be maybe because of COVID. It's also an increased effort for outreach that we've been doing. Since we are above and beyond what we have for the budget, we did have the tough job of having to pare down the requests. And the committee is recommending partially funding $228 of the highest scoring requests. Some of the highlights and how they got to that point, one of the things they did this year was they increased the scoring range from 1 to 5 to go to 1 to 10, which gave us a little bit of wiggle room as far as being able to differentiate our scores a little bit better. And I think everybody was a fan of that this year after we processed everything. The scores, the second thing we did, we weighted the scores based on a formula and how well the applicants scored. So basically, the higher they scored, the higher percentage of the request that we are recommending. If you look at Attachment A in your packet, the formula breakdown by step is in there and as well as the recommended funding levels, which are in the green column. Let me see. I guess that's basically the recommendations from the committee. Some of the other things I would point to is that the current guidelines allow organizations to submit applications by the program. That was something that our review team in the past had decided that we would allow simply because sometimes there are large organizations that do have multiple programs and each of those programs could benefit as ex-residents. However, due to the volume of requests and the amount that's being asked, the review team, we had one applicant that organization that submitted three applications. And so the review team started with that one and decided that they would review it as one application and scored it as one application recommendation. This way it doesn't eliminate the organization from receiving anything, but it certainly will allow the team to be able to provide recommendations that would spread that, those dollars, those funding dollars through to other organizations as well. And also, I think the recommendation from our team that we would eliminate that our future guidelines so that organizations would only be able to submit one application. The review team also is recommending to request a one-page report from the organizations receiving their funding awards. And then the review team would look at these one-page reports, they could also be submitted into the packets so that the select board can see how some of these funding requests have been spent. Sometimes the organizations just send those to us. The review team is looking to see if possibly we could or should request that they do that, that they actually, once we award that, they would be required to submit something before December 31st of each year. That, again, is a recommendation. And finally, regarding the focus areas, typically we make recommendations for funding at this meeting and we also make recommendations for the focus areas for the next year. However, I've done a little bit of research on that and one of the tools, the resources that we use for that is the community health needs assessment that UVM puts out every two years. And I've contacted them, they are supposed to be releasing that this summer. So the suggestion would be from our team that we hold off on making a recommendation of focus areas until we have had a chance to review that needs assessment when it comes out and then possibly come back to the board this fall with some recommendations for the focus areas. One other note I would make on the focus areas is that we did not score by focus area this year, which was different. And that was primarily because some of the organizations kind of fell into more than one of the focus area groups and didn't really know how to submit their application. They may have fit very well into a couple of them. So for the scoring, we leave the focus areas in place but then we score based on how well the application fit within any of the focus areas and that way they don't have to narrow that down into one particular place. And they can apply and describe their program to the fullest extent that way. The last bit of my presentation would be attachment B, which is a copy of the human services distribution policy which was adopted in November 18th, 2019. It formalized the former one sentence policy and made this into something a little bit better for us. The items in red basically are a lot of things from changing wording from unified manager to town manager. And there's a couple of other minor edits in there that we are making as a recommendation. So I know the select board typically does a review at one meeting and then we'll put it onto the next meeting for consideration. So I'm including it as part of this item for your review. And we can put that onto the next meeting for approval and any edits and suggestions you may have. So I'm open to any conversation, discussion and questions you might have about all of that. All right, thanks, Tammy. Any board member questions? Very simple. Thank you, Tammy. Last year we approved one contingent upon the organization obtaining 501C3 status. Have all of the applicants met that criteria that's in policy or the IRS 990 criteria? I say yes, but I also double check that before I actually cut a check. So it will be double checked to make sure that our finance department also has the most reasons. Perfect, thank you. So Tammy, I didn't think Heavenly Pantry had a 501C3. Oh, okay. Well, I'm sorry. Their application, I said you did. So they do have one now? They have not in the past. Same, that was in their application. Okay. I don't have that at my fingertips. I can try, if the problem is, is if I look that up, my internet is going to freeze. You're going to lose me because I'll be looking. Well, I can take a note. Let me. Yeah, so as long as we have that requirement that before we cut a check, we verify that there's 501C3, because I know in the past, it's been a touchy question with Heavenly Pantry and how we got around that, the last time they asked for money is we sent the money to the Vermont Food Bank and they put it in an account that Heavenly Pantry could draw on so that it was, yeah, minus 501C3, good girl. Patty, can you go on mute, please? Patty Davis, please mute yourself. That we, right, we sent the check to the Food Bank so that it wasn't going to a organization that didn't have a 51C3, but if they've gotten a 51C3 since the last time they applied, then that's a different. Well, I can say as well, I read in the application. Right, right, right, right. I understand that they are a tax exempt organization because of their religious organization. We do need to verify that they have a 501C3, you know, in certain of the past. I don't have a question, but I would truly, as this is my first year sitting on this committee, like to thank Tammy for the awesome job and the many hours she spent on him and to also thank Travis for the amazing formula he came up that once he did the formula, then things started to really click and we could do more with the information. I truly appreciate both of them and their hard work. I will be sure to let them know and they are invaluable. Yes, thank you. Thank you, Dawn. Evan, Evan. Ethan, sorry. Okay, I'm used to it. My question is, I don't know all of these organizations. Is this all of the organizations that work with Essex, not necessarily within Essex? How does that work? Are all these organizations in Essex? They're based out of multiple different, can you hear me? Yes. Okay, good. As far as like where they're based from, not all of them are necessarily located in Essex, but one of the storing components that we have, because they could be regional, some of them are some agencies that serve a region, but one of the storing components, and one of the questions asked on the application is how many Essex residents have you served in the past year? How many Essex residents do you anticipate serving in the next 12 months? And we score that. So if they come back and they say, we've served three residents and that happens and sometimes they say, we didn't serve any, but we think we might serve five. They could get a lower score or then say an organization that can show that they have serviced and assisted 500 Essex residents. But it's part of a scoring component because there are agencies where a reasonable number of like three could be a reasonable number given the type of service that they may be, like the habitat or the, which was the one I wanna think of here, the housing one, the one that builds houses. You got it. Habitat for Humanity, here we go. That one, I mean, they're obviously not going to build 500 houses and serve 500 Essex residents. So sometimes, it's all in context of the entire application. I have more questions. Yeah. So that leads me to my next question because I, again, I don't have a big background on this, but is sleep and heavenly peace within our area or serving any of our community members asking for $25,000? I don't think we recommended any award for them. Yeah, no, I see that. I just had a hard time with them. They travel all over the country. Okay, awesome. I would have to look at their individual application to know like the specific answers for what you're saying, like how many did they actually serve? I'm not. I was just curious if they were, if they were, I would not answer my question about them being a national company. So that's awesome that we have you guys to do this because all of us know what we have here in the community for these services. So that's very good. They have in the pack, in the past, yeah, in the past we've gotten the entire packet. It's a two inches thick, yeah. If you print the whole thing out. I just had a couple of questions. I was like, man, I just wanted to know why amdots wasn't asking for more money too because they do so much for this community and they have the highest score because they do the most. Yeah, it is a tedious job. There are approximately seven pages per application. That's actually really much better than we have had in the past. But multiply that by 30 some odd applications. It's a very, it's a huge review practice. So as Dawn mentioned, there's some thinking to go around. There's a lot of thinking to go to the entire committee which has to spend a lot of time going over these applications. And yeah, the goal is to save a little bit of time for all of you folks. Any other questions? Kendall, any questions? Well, at the risk of going home to a locked door because my wife told me to leave us alone. She's actually very, very proud of the way Essex is set up out of this 1%. And I got to agree, you guys do an excellent job. We've got a great criteria and everything. So, kudos to all. But I will ask, because I've participated in this a little bit in another town is that I assume that the criteria takes into account the fact that some of the smaller requests that you get, it's really a larger portion of their budget to help folks and some of the big ones that are in there where the 1% that they get from Essex is a small part of their budget. But the request from Essex might be a huge part of another organization. I assume you've got some criteria that takes care of that. And that's my only comment. Thank you. I will respond to that and tell you, I think that's a great comment. It's actually, so I'm glad you took the time to go ahead and say something. It is a piece to this that our review team struggles with in trying to determine if what an organization is asking for is makes sense. If it makes sense for them to be asking for $25,000 or compared to the one that is scoring higher and they're asking for $4,000. And so the weighted formula that we have really doesn't take that into consideration but we've had a lot of conversations about that. And I would like to think that this is still a goal for this committee to be able to come up with something that is, everybody really did like the idea of the formula. And as Dawn said, Travis came in just being an Excel whiz and put this formula out there. And we all were just like, he just created a magic trick. It was the best thing ever. And I think part of one of the things, the appealing part of that is that with the changes that we are looking at with the committees that in the future, maybe we would look at having other, like maybe a member of the school board or maybe a community member or some other people sit on this committee to do reviewing and maybe do a better job at rotating. And if we had a formula in place, that's gonna allow us to do that a little bit easier than what we're doing right now. So I would say this is still a work in progress and we still are trying to come up with better ways to score in the fairest way. It is far better than what it was. And I think it does outshine what some other municipalities are doing as far as just arbitrarily, just the here's what we're going to give you. You know, because it is a donation from the town. It's not actually a grant. It is a donation. It's something that the taxpayers are paying for that go to help fund these nonprofits. But it's not necessarily a grant. We've just really formalized it. We're just, I would like to say we're ahead of the game. It isn't perfect. So I appreciate your comment Kendall for sure. And we are working on that to maybe make that a little bit better. And Tammy, we do make it clear to the recipients that to not count on getting a grant every year, right? So they, you know, if getting money from the town of Essex is vital to their survival, they need to consider their overall funding plan and not rely totally just specifically on town of Essex. Yes, I think it's an actual question. But if they were not to receive this funding, how would that affect their programming? I think that's an actual question on the application. And it is also mentioned in the guidelines as well, but you know, this is not, there is no guarantee for this. And it is not supposed to be that backbone of their organization. So yes. But Tammy, one thing I wanted to bring up, you mentioned a report asking for the organization is to provide a report. In the past, we have made efforts to ensure that any funds that we give are unconditional in that we don't put any restrictions on how they get used by the organizations, largely because should an auditor ask us how the money was spent, we can simply say it was given to this organization and that's the end of our discussion. But if we give it to an organization with an expectation that they're gonna spend it a specific way, we may need to prove that they spent it that way. And it's very difficult to get outside organizations to provide documentation that's legally acceptable to an auditor, it may be difficult to do that. So that's why I'm a little concerned about requiring or asking for a report like that and whether it exposes us to an audit risk. I think it's really valid. I personally, I grumble about it on my own level just because it is an extra step that we're doing and it does make it feel a little more like a grant. And we're not, we are not a grant agency. This is not what we're doing. We're not even a human services agency. We are just, we just simply have funding available just like the many municipalities, we just have tried to come up with a way that makes it fair for distribution. And I would totally, if the board wanted to make a recommendation not to do that, but this is the board's decision to do that, we would certainly, that can be changed. So, so Tammy, that's just a practice. That's not documented anywhere that they, or is it part of the application that they have to do that they have to expect to provide feedback? Where were we? I'm gonna, I think it might be mentioned in the guidelines, but the guidelines are guidelines. Just guidelines. They're just guidelines. Yeah, so let me see. I'm looking that up quickly here if I, hopefully I'm not freezing on you. It was, this is my suggestion that we can do this. My reasoning was we are giving out a tremendous amount of money to a lot of these organizations and never hearing from them. They are asking us for money to help the residents of Essex, but we never hear of the money that we've granted or given to them was actually used to benefit the president. So the problem, like I said with that is then you, you put workload on staff to go collect that feedback. And also we could be, as I said, we could be required by an audit since we're putting stipulations on the funds to pursue it in a way that probably pretty resource intensive. I'm trying to think if there's a way to ask for, they're not how the money will be spent, but how, how will work be done in Essex and how will the people of Essex be served? Which may be captured already in some of their materials, but is it a one page? Some of it was, and that was my concern is that because there's three or four groups here that have gotten large amounts of money that we never heard from. What they, you know, and my concern is that, I mean, these are our taxpayers dollars who are trying to help the people of Essex. I need to find a way to make sure to helping the people of Essex. And what if, so when she mails the check, what if there was a note that we would love to hear how these dollars were used or something? I mean, you're leaving it optional, but you're not actually requiring them to, I just. No, I don't think it's a question that has to be answered tonight. I think it's good feedback. Tammy's here, which is great. So she can hear that. And I think it could be a work in progress of what the best way to hear back or hear from some of these agencies is, are without necessarily putting the talent at risk for staff time, for audit concerns, anything like that. I can make a quick, again, our guidelines. I can read to you what we asked them to do. So I found it. Award recipients are asked to provide a summary of the project work completed and the services provided to Essex residents as a result of receiving human services funding. Summary reports should be received no later than December 31st or six months after receipt of funds, whichever is later. Award recipients who have not provided a summary report will not be eligible to apply for funding in the next cycle or until a final report is received by the town. It limits them, the reports to one page and they can submit it by email or in person. So I think the wording to that, if we do it this way is not, basically the only way that they wouldn't be eligible is if they don't submit anything. They're not being judged by what they put in the report, but we are asking them to provide us with something that says, hey, this is what we've done. That's what's in the guide. I might suggest that that guidance be, that that one page that you get way pretty heavily on the next year of selection only because as Don says, the reason I asked my question was that you can look at some of these like ant dots and I don't think there's an Essex resident that doesn't know how much they do. But some of the other ones you might look at and say, well, what do they do for the money that we give them? That's all. I just think Steph, you need to look at whether this is putting you in a position to just problematic resource-wise or audit-wise. You know, I completely agree. I mean, we used to have the VNA come in every year and explain to us why, because they used to get a huge, huge portion of the large percentage, much more than they're getting now. They would come and explain to us why. We can invite anybody to do. But anyway, yeah, thanks. All right, that's not the accident. The request here is for us to approve the funding, not to talk about the policy, but to approve the UMPHRZ's funding recommendations. So this is on the agenda. A bunch of changes in the... There are two recommendations in the memo about... Ah, it's in the memo. It's not on the agenda. I read it. Yep, yep, yep, I did too, but I run the meeting by the agenda. Okay, so any other questions about the funding? And then we can talk about the policy. Or do we want to go to public comment about funding and then first? You know? Yep, okay. So, that's yeah, I saw your hand first. So come on up. Tammy, it all sounds so good. My name is Betsy, I'm sorry. My question is about like, when you brought up Habitat for Humanity, do you get a higher weight on them if they, when they're working with our CTE, that they have the students who are working in the houses and do we find that the students are actively involved in the building and learning how to read the architectural drawings and the working drawings so that they can work with those people and come out as a ready for an apprenticeship when they leave the high school? That was a really complicated question because it's a good question. No, it's a wonderful question. But what it is as far as like in the scoring, I guess what I'm getting at is that all of those details would have to be in their application and then all of the reviewers, five or six of them have, can score between one and 10 on, we have one, two, three, four, five, six different components that we score them on. So say for instance, they have all of those details, but you're just explaining, they can score between one and 10 on program fit with one or all of the focus areas, benefit to Essex residents, the need, outcomes, number of people serve, the ease of eligibility and access for Essex residents. Essex residents will be well informed about the program available. I culturally responsive services to BIPOC, LGBTQ and underserved and demonstrated need for funding. So those are the six components that we score on. I see. Okay. So yeah. So like everything you're asking, I would fairly have a support for it would be coming from the team. Okay. Thank you very much. In the room. Hey, Patty Davis. Andy, I'm sorry, this is for you. I was muted and I had my husband come in because I get upset when something goes, okay, why are on my laptop here and my PC and I was muted. So I just wanna make sure I'm gonna mute myself again. Can you please tell me when I mute myself that I'm muted? Okay. You're muted now. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. Thanks, Patty. Travis Poulin. Hi. This is Travis Poulin. I work at Chittenden Community Action, a program of CVOEO, the Champlain Valley Office of Economic Opportunity. And I just wanted to thank the select board. You are so thoughtful about all of the work that goes into it. And I well know that it is a lot of work that goes into it as an agency that has been the recipient of your support. I just wanted to thank the select board. And as a recipient, I will give you any kind of data that you want. So thank you. Thanks, Travis. Thanks so much for attending. Okay. Any other comments? I don't see any other hands. I'm in the room. Okay. So how do we wanna proceed? Do we wanna approve the funding and then go on to talking about the policy? Tracy. I will move that the select board approve contributions to the human services agencies as presented, contingent upon receipt of proof of 501C3 or IRS 990 status. Okay. Thank you, Tracy. You second? Second. Ethan, thank you for the second. Any further discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Okay. Motion passes 5-0. Now let's talk about the policy. I make the motion as a select board review. Do you recommend amendments to the town of Essex? So we should have a discussion first. I definitely wanna have a discussion. I might wanna make some comments on it and the public might want to as well. Okay. Before we make a motion. I'll take the motion before we have a question. Go ahead. Okay, so we, yeah, we, the select board is typically, yeah, the select board is typically talk about, yeah, move to an agenda. We have a motion that we don't have public to speak. During the motion. Yeah. I guess we do it in a different way. Do we need a motion to discuss this? Since it's not on the agenda. It's on the agenda under part of the recommendations. Oh, I would read it. So you're fine to discuss it. Oh, okay. The human service funding recommendations. So it's one of the recommendations that we change the policy. Gotcha. Okay. So anything, let's see. The policy, as you said, there's a couple of just, there's a few changes in there and there's that one new sentence added. Anybody have any comments or concerns about what's in here? Board members want to make any comments? Ethan. Is it again? All I've done at once. The only question that I had in, and I could be not reading this correctly, but under item four applications and guidelines, I believe Timmy was reading from the guidelines. Um, says town of Essex, my human service distribution policy. Is that what you were reading? No, actually what I was reading was the, where the guidelines and the policy itself and used to be just one sentence that was made, I think at a town meeting. And so we kind of brushed it up a little bit to have to include a timeline and basically a process. But the guidelines change each year. So as opposed to taking this policy and having it amended every single year, the guidelines change based on a different approval for different focus areas possibly, or it could be a pandemic could urge us to change the guidelines and how people apply. So, or even a way that we process if we've changed our application, we didn't wanna have to change the policy each time. So there is a policy and there are guidelines. Also, even they're all found on the website, which is sxbt.org slash human services. And the, just I wanna give you a little history here about this is that this has, this process has always been viewed as the manager's process. So the manager owns the guidelines, the select board doesn't. So we've never approved the guidelines. We don't review them or then we set this policy which allows the manager to handle the guidelines just to clarify that. And so, and it's also the manager's committee, the manager points to people that are participating in the committee. They're not appointed by the select board. Just some background, but go ahead and read your question. Sorry. The reason why I had to ask this because I didn't see any guidelines. And then in the next, there's a sentence and then there's a paragraph that starts. Used to read the unified. It says, now the town manager will revise and update the application and supporting guidelines in the coordinates to this policy. And then it says, and with focus areas approved by the select board when necessary. I guess the clarification that I was asking for was those focus areas being approved by the select board and then the when necessary. Where is that? So, maybe I shouldn't jump in. Defer to you, Tammy. You want me to answer this? You have a, I know Andy, you all great handle on this because you were part of the committee that worked on a lot of this bill. So, so Tammy had mentioned earlier that there's the UVM, a medical center or whatever it's called now, the hospital is required to do a community needs assessment periodically. And there's a new assessment coming out this summer. And so there's five categories. And yeah, they're not listed here that we approved last year. And Tammy and the committee is recommending that the select that they, that we allow them to review the contents of that community needs assessment and then consider whether or not changes need to be made to those focus areas and then bring that recommendation to the select board and after the documents available. And then we would approve it if any changes are recommended. Just one more comment to that. This piece is a little bit new in the past two or three years. I wanna say that the select board approves the focus areas and practice for the, since it's been in place has been that the select board approves them each year at the same time you do the focus as the funding distribution. So just it's not happening this year because of what Tammy and Andy explained. So it'll happen in the future but as long as always the regional planning commission puts out information that we've used in the past. So depending on the resources that are available it does come to the select board each year. It's just a matter of time. That answers my question. I could also mention, I'm sorry if I'm talking on the top of you. I can't tell, I'm sorry. We also outreach to the school and I've already done that. I have contacted Brian and Donahue and Aaron McGuire to ask about needs that they may recognize. There is no like rule that we use it's just to kind of, it's to give us resources to see if there is, there are certain specific needs that could be trending in a different direction that we don't quite understand. And these reports and that outreach helps us to understand that a little bit better. And we may want to make a recommendation to adjust the focus area, say based on a pandemic year or based on something else that could be coming in. So. All right. Any other? Let me just get one. Yep, again, sorry. Go ahead. This budget this year, was there any focus areas that were changed or approved for this budget that were kind of proven? So last year, I believe the equity category was added. Sounds right. So that was the only, I think the only. That was two years. Two years ago. Two years, yeah, we didn't add. So I can read them off to you. We have the areas that we had before start this was access to health and behavioral health, affordable housing or housing assistance, child or family support for healthy relationships and emergency food and disaster relief. And then not this year, but the year before in the round, I'm talking about fiscal year, we added diversity, equity and inclusion, which provided support for initiatives to build diversity, equity and inclusion into a program or to actually support a program that provides those services. So we actually have one, two, three, four, five different focus areas right now. And based on whatever feedback we've received from the school, from the police, from, I mean, we have several different areas, but primarily UVM needs assessment is a big part of that. We may wanna make adjustments to some of those focus areas. Eliminate, add, change the wording, that sort of thing. Who else? I've got one. Um, my concern is the added sentence and under eligibility about religious organizations. We've had a lot of discussion about this in the past. I know it's a new select board. So I have a lot of concern with opening this up to non 501 C3s, giving my- That's still in the sentence above. So this doesn't- Eliminate that. No, it's still like in numbers, like just above that sentence, only those that are nonprofit organizations who are considered a 501 C3 or that file before 990 are eligible. Okay. I mean, we could maybe add it, emphasize it in that sentence or reword this in a way to make sure that that is still tied together. Yeah, because it's in its own paragraph, I thought it might imply that it is a, an alternate way to be eligible. And so I guess if we can, and so I, and I understand that we're not approved. Where are we? Yeah, we are. Are we approving this tonight? You could. You're ready to do it. I can't, it's up to you. Yes. Okay. Right, because it's, yeah. Okay, so as I think as long as it's clear that you still have to have a 501 C3, then I'm fine with it. And I agree that, yeah, the programmer service needs to be not a religious based or not, not to need to be secular or whatever the right word is there. So Andy, if we were to just make that as a last sentence in the paragraph, rather than its own. I'd be more comfortable with that because I don't want it to, I don't want it to appear, you know, like as I said, when I read it, I thought it was a second, an alternate way to be eligible. I might suggest you place it in the middle of that paragraph right after the reply. Make it the second sentence. What you're saying too? No. Doesn't this include it in the next population? Yep, okay. Make it. It works for me. Make it the second sentence. And to make it clear, instead of the third sentence, only those that are nonprofit, I would say only nonprofit organizations who are considered a 501C3, yada, yada, yada, just to make it very clear that the those isn't up for debate, it's everybody. So you're saying, remove the three words, those that are? Yes. And say only nonprofit organizations who are considered a 51C3. Yeah. I agree. A couple of nods. Thank you for that clarification, Tammy. That helps a lot. Yelts. Let me go back to the meeting. Any public comment on the policy? Seen any hands on the round? Don't see any hands up online. So, Ethan. Make a motion that the select board approve the policy for the human services distribution as amended. Karen, this one. I'm good, Tammy. Are you okay with that? That cleared up for you, Tammy? Yeah, absolutely. I made the changes while you were speaking. Okay, second. Okay, thank you, Ethan. Thank you, Tracy. Any further discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? A motion passes 5-0. Thank you. Thank you, thank you. Cool. All right, so. Hi, Ali. Finally getting to you. Okay, business item 5B, presentation of Essex Parks and Rec program fund budget. On our family. Hi. So, every year the program budget, the enterprise fund is presented to the select board. Just as a reminder, this fund is not taxpayer based. So it's not affecting anything that's already approved. But just going through and, you know, things have shifted and changed a little bit and we're kind of diving deeper into our larger programs for budgeting purposes. But this is what we propose for the upcoming 2023 budget in regards to our programming. When it's not aquatic or park-based, those seasonal staff members we have are out of this combined budget, which is with the extended school program. And then this budget did in the past support a 60% employee. I can't really say FTE because 60% employee. And that's shifting a little bit as we have shifted from merger and co-location aspects into back on our own and staffing shortages. So I don't know if anyone has specific questions on the revenues or expenses side of it. We're basically in a rebuilding year in hopes to get our extended school programming back into the lineup. We did put that on pause as of January of this year due to staffing and also with some summer camp offerings, which will end up kind of being loading on both fiscal years, just increasing that as we rebuild over the next year. All right. Thanks, Ali. Any questions? Casey, go ahead. So I looked at the budget multi-year forecast graph and it looks like the revenues for 2023, the expectation is roughly $200,000 in revenue. For the expenditure, I'm estimating that at 375, just based on where that graph falls. So if revenue is making up roughly 53% of expenditures, where do the rest of those expenditures get paid from? Well, we, I haven't seen that fun, fancy graph. And I'm a total visual learner when it comes to that. So, okay. So cost center, cost center summary for the EPR programs. I don't have that. Oh, that's, okay. Oh, this fun one. Okay, can I refocus again? Can you ask me again, Tracy? Sorry. Based on this, it looks like revenues are expected to be roughly $200,000, but the expenditures, it looks like roughly 375,000, which means that the revenues are only covering about 53% of your expenditures. So wondering where that other 47% of expenditures gets paid from? Well, a lot of this is based on, you know, minimums we set and what gets paid out for instructors on that. Ideally, as we go, this pot of money, you know, carries over every year and can support that. Courtney has her hand up. Oh, Courtney has her hand up. Great, let's go to the finance director. He's, he's, I don't think that multi-budget year forecast graph is grabbing more expenditures instead of just the single year of fiscal year 2023. So some of the projections go out expenditures. We're not presenting tonight more than just the FY 23 numbers. So I wouldn't look at, refer to that graph in this budget presentation. I would just go to the actual numbers from the detail and the account lines. So for her, sorry, the AP program, Costing Center 159-30-14, it does have the 200,000 for revenues coming in, but total expenditures are actually 162,179. Okay. So she... Sorry, I mean, that's why it caught me off guard because I was like, well, when we went over this, it was all good. And I was not seeing this fun fancy graph in pictures. So I didn't know how to answer that completely. Well, that was important. So this expenditures are projected out further, but they're not captured in revenues. Revenues were included. Thanks, Courtney. Sorry for the many, I was like, oh, shoot. All right, Kendall, I see your hand up too. Just had a couple of quick questions. I noticed Salary's up, and you mentioned that you can only get part-timers now versus full-time, that's why those were up. The other question I had was the full-time fee and software, it's the first year you guys have done that. And the third question I had was, I noticed that your credit card processing fees, I'm always looking at those, so is there any way that you can increase or get that back or charge the full-time? You don't have to have a low, it's a question. Thank you. Salary one was the first question, and then I got distracted with the Bolton one. This is your first year? What's that? It's your first year doing Bolton. Oh, I know, the Bolton one. It was the salary with the increase. So we actually dropped the salary for the regular Salaries because it bumped down to part-time because that position, if we were to re-advertise right now, would only be a part-time salary based on the program needs that we have. So those are wrapped in, if we had someone year-round who's part-time along with the seasonals like extended school program and summer camp, those are down because we're not having a day camp this summer, which we have done. The last time we did it was COVID summer 2020, but the real feel of what that looks like is from 2019. Bolton, so what we did is, we broke out the Bolton ski and ride program soccer and then we've had boys and girls lacrosse listed on there, but we've done Bolton for probably 30 years at this point. It's just always those Bolton and soccer have always been wrapped up into other miscellaneous revenue. And so it just kind of gets lost in the shuffle to when it's such a large program to our preschool music classes and seeded yoga classes when we're taking 100 kids up to the mountain. It's just a really different one that we want to make sure that we're pricing correctly based on the expenses for the program. And then the credit card fees, that's something we're definitely looking into there are a couple options, but basically that a couple of years ago that was a new line item added in that was never really separated out to see how the convenience of the credit card purchases for transactions is really affecting our overall budget. It was wrapped into expenses and we couldn't really pinpoint it. So when we were co-located with EJRP, we did a cost recovery program since that ended a year ago. There are some things that have gotten in the way for us to really dive back into pricing and programming, pricing our programs. So basically we're looking into that. There's the question of well, if someone were to pay here in the office with a check or cash, should they be charged that fee? The majority of our transactions are online over the phone and a lot of in-person credit card. So on the list, Kendall. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's just, yeah. I just thought I'd mention that credit card. Yep, I appreciate it. And just so you know, the credit card processing is split out between programs versus other purchases that do come in but affect operating costs. So it's an overall project that we need to dive into. All right, any other questions? Okay, any questions from the public? Any hands in the room? Or do we have a hand in the room? Okay. Leave it, don't touch it. Okay, sorry, my gosh. My first in-person meeting in years. If I get too close, Scott, let me know. I looked at this component of the packet and I was just wondering if the senior center expenses and revenue are just totally separate or should that have been in there? I'm just looking for it, I didn't see it. So that program fund, the enterprise fund is actually in the village budget approval portion of the calendar year of the budget year. So that's already been presented and approved. And it's done on the village side and is not incorporated. The senior center budget is not incorporated in this fund. Got it, senior bus and the staff and all that. Senior bus is operating. And the staff is operating. What happens at the senior center at two Lincoln is its own budget. If there are other 55 plus programming that are done, it's with this budget. Okay, so the 55 plus should be in there. Separate from senior center. It's offered by a six parks and recreation and not the senior center. Right, right, right. So the 55 plus programs, I would see that in this then. They're included in the open. They're included in the overall miscellaneous revenue and related expenses of whether it's seeded yoga or the couch to 5K program. The reason I asked it is because I saw a specific line item, like the egg roll or the egg hunt, whatever it was, very specific things. And so that's why I was looking for those items. Yeah, historically, some line items are in there because they have been collaborative events with S extension recreation and parks similar to the Halloween. That one of them as well, yes. Yeah, so historically that's going to show and as we transition into how we're going to provide events in general, if they're gonna be on our own, we're gonna look more at special event budgeting. So any sponsorship or any fee to do it or if they're free and how we're providing that. Thank you. All right, thanks, Ken. All right, so this is, you got a question again? I just have a quick question. I just, I was in the Halloween section. Seriously though. They blow it, this is just totally clarification. The transfer between town village, it shows 100% refund. That's because that's a ended group here on out. All right. Are you on one of the costing center pages or the general costing center? Just below the Halloween, the winter fall or carnival, all the piece of paper I got in the. Nine hundred, my nine. Transfer between town and village. Right, okay. I didn't know if it was a page lower than page two. But my question was just a clarification that the transfer has when they've been just planned. Correct, yes. That's not happening anymore. All right, so the intent here is to provide information. We'll come back again and we'll approve it. Correct, next meeting. All right, great. Sorry about my confused moment there. Like, I don't know where you're looking and where you've seen it though. Yeah, let me know if you have any questions in between and happy to get you answers. Thank you for your hard work, Raleigh. Thanks. Okay, moving on to business item five E, consider the appointment of a representative and alternative to the Chittin solid waste district. We already interviewed Anna and I and the waste district is asking that we appoint somebody before the end of the month. The expired, yeah, the expired on May 31st. Already expired, okay. And there's also the question of the alternate. I have worked. Mr. Chair, we received, or town manager, have we received any additional applications for that position? We have not. Then at this time, can I make a motion or not? So I was going to ask a question to any select board members want to be the alternate. Marguerite stepped up. I think that's pretty awkward. Well, I want to cheat. I did say unless a select board member. That's why I was trying to get this motion and he really tries. So I don't see Kendall jumping up and down. No, he's gonna say no, no, no. No, I had to go around to that. No, thanks. Si makes the motion that the select board appoint Allen Nye to the two-year term to expire June 30th, 2024 as the Essex representative and the alternate to be Marguerite Ladge to the Chittin and Solid Waste District. Second. I think Tracy beat you there, Kendall. All right, so thank you, Don. Thank you, Tracy. Any further discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Okay. Professor's five zero. Thank you for that. And then town meeting TV. This is another position we have not gotten. It's been advertised for quite a long time. It has not been, we've gotten no response for that. Is there any select board member who'd like to do this? Did you do it? I would like to. Okay. You've got it. Tracy. I move that the select board appoint Don Hill-Flurry to the position of town meeting TV, trustee. Second. Thank you, Tracy. Thank you, Ethan. Any further discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. I need to abstain from the vote. Kendall, I didn't hear you. Aye. Thanks. All right. Opposed? Okay. Motion passes five zero. Congratulations, Don. Mr. Chair, I didn't vote. I have to abstain one. Are you abstaining? I can't vote for myself. I can't vote for myself. Okay. You could, you could. I can? All right, leave it then. Okay. Okay, sorry. No, I just didn't know you could do that. Yeah, yeah. All right. Okay. So we do have a executive session item that was added to the agenda, but we'll circle back to those motions at the end. Consent agenda. Tracy. Vote to approve the consent agenda as presented. Second. Thank you, Tracy. Thank you, Don. Any further discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Okay, consent agenda approved five zero. Moving on to reading file. Any further member comments? I would like to thank Dennis Lutz for the awesome report that he left us. That has got to be the most complete report that I've ever read. It was awesome. It was easy to read. It was easy to understand. And I loved the ending when he listed everybody's names that he had worked with. They were like, wow. So thank you, Dennis. Thank you for that, Don. I personally haven't made it all the way through it. You spoiled the ending. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sure Dennis's fashion is very thorough. Ethan. I just want to make the comment that we still have staffing levels on the table. And as long as we have Kendall at the next meeting, I'd like to bring that back on to the agenda. I don't know, Kendall, what do you think about that? You need to talk about staffing or that he talked about when we get to budgeting for FY24. I think we could probably go over the budget. I've had some conversations with Greg and everybody's very aware that we don't want to hire folks if we ever have to let them go. So I guess at this point we'll wait for the budget. That's okay. You're okay with that, Ethan? I'm okay with it. It was tabled and I wanted to make sure that we brought it up. Thank you. And maybe I didn't read the letter from the Agency of Transportation. So they still have to meet to decide about that section. It's not really a done deal. Is that what I read or not? It is a done deal, but they're just going to... Everything that I understand from the way it's happened in the past and what I'm told is that it's basically a done deal based on the recommendation from the V-Trans engineers, but the traffic board has to prove it. So that's Wednesday afternoon. Dennis and I are going to go and represent the town just to make our presence known, let them know that we did our study. Unfortunately, we don't expect a change, but people will be there and do what we can. I was just curious the way they worded that letter. It was like, well, are you going to accept the results or not? Are you... Thank you. The individual that initiated the question also has been notified that the hearing is coming up, so they may attend too. And it's up to them to represent themselves if they choose to. Ethan. Can I make another comment? Yes, you may. Speaking of V-Trans, anybody noticed today I'm shooting the cows and on my way home, there's a green arrow of towers to 128. And my question is, and I haven't seen it yet because I've got my double green. Is there a green arrow coming from towers and 15? Because if so, that's petrifying. Not at the same time. Okay. Just wanted to... I didn't know. There's no way that's happening. Yeah, I went for a walk this morning. I saw them out there. Putting it up. Putting it up. And I'm like, oh, there's four lights on there. I wonder what the heck it is. And then on my way driving here today, I saw the green arrow. And I haven't seen it yet from the route 15 side, but I assume it's a green arrow going the other way. One it's green because the problem is there are plenty of people who are unfamiliar with that intersection that come to that. And you're sitting there in a red light on towers road. They think you're going to come across and they just sit there expecting you to go because they want to turn left. Because it's not, there's nothing that says you can just go... No, left on green. Okay. So yeah, I think that's finally... I saw it today and I was like, that's so dangerous but that's what I think it is. It's not simultaneous. Let's see if there's anything I wanted to bring up here. I would just add the comment at a welcome aboard to our new public works director and our new community director. Yep. Yep. Both excellent people. Yep. All right. Thank you very much. Should we accept the reading file? Do I do that? Nope, we're good. Never mind. I can't remember where I have to do this. All right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So next thing is we need to circle back to executive session and motion. I moved it to select where I'd make the specific findings of the general, that general public knowledge of pending or probable civil life litigation to which the public body is or maybe party would place the town at a substantial disadvantage. Second. Thank you, Don. Thank you, Tracy. Any further discussion? Those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Okay, motion passes 5-0. I move that the select board enter into executive session to discuss pending or probable civil litigation to which the public body is or maybe a party to pursuant of one DSA 313A1E to include the town manager and deputy mayor. Second. Thank you, Don. Thank you, Tracy. Any further discussion? The question is there's no reason to come back to this meeting. So we will adjourn directly from the executive session. So we won't be coming back to those that are in the room or online. And those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Okay, motion passes 5-0. We'll be going upstairs for this.