 We'll call a meeting order. Bell is on time as well. We're on the road. First on the agenda is to approve the agenda. Does anybody have anything they want to add? Amen. Thank you. All in favor? Is there an inquiry? Is there anybody here that would like to speak that has an item that's not on the agenda tonight? Susie? Susie Fiat, I just want to talk about the Bethel Community Forward Festival. I think it's in your package. We've had the minutes. That was elected chair this year. You'd like to speak with her today? Well, now we've got a perform and nobody else wants to. But no, I think really good things are going to happen this year. There's two of our members, but we gained three. So I just wanted to report that. And we're really talking about some exciting things. A couple of people are going to talk to, you know, the businesses right downtown, see what we can do to bring the festival downtown more. They want to, we want to bring the street dance back that they always had the night before. And of course, as we, you know, go along, I'll be coming here and talking to you and, you know, just to make sure we're on the same page. But I think that's it. I was just told that I had to come here to let you know that I'm now chair of that. We have new members. So, I don't know if you have any questions there. Do you have a date set? Yeah, we do. Okay. I think I know that well. It's in September. Last weekend. And so we have a ton of repairs. Yeah, 21st. Right at the band show. That's 21st of the day. It's a Saturday. Is that the weekend after ton bridge fair? Yes. Is it the same weekend as ton bridge fair? No, it's the following weekend. It's the weekend after. That's what I said. I have a question. And I don't know if you got the email from Thatcher. Him in regarding the, the trail marker. Okay. I just was wondering. Thatcher had brought it to my attention that the prep is starting for the Gilead bridge. And there was a, there's a sign there. Kiosk. And Thatcher and I were talking about putting some sort of signage at the base of the trail between the rec trail and the school. And with hopes that someday we can have a map of all the trails that are up in there. And, you know, beware of ticks, kind of sign, whatever on there. But Thatcher said, what are they doing with that? Kiosk. And I said, I don't know. I'll go ask. So. It gets put right back where it goes. Oh, it's going right back there. They're going to take it down and put it back. Okay. So it marks something even though it never has anything on it? Yeah. It's part of the, probably, assuming part of the question. There actually is signage to go on it, but it didn't go up because we knew it was going to be taken down. Okay. So, but that would be kind of cool to have for the trail system. That's a contribution to the property. So what they're required to do, they'll be having contractors, anything that they damage in that area. That's not within their property. They have to put back the way it was. Including that. They have some temporary usements down in that area. And that allows them to get down in there, but they'll have to put it back. Now, if you choose to not use it there, they don't put it back. And they're putting it back somewhere else. That's up to you. Can it be moved even though it was part of the immigrant, the conservation? I'll have to look. I think you probably can. Because really what the FEMA stuff does is it just does de-restrictions and say, you know, you can't put a building on it. You can't do that. I don't think, I don't think anyway. Again, I'll have to look. They would say you have to have a interpretive kiosk, you know, on site. I don't think that's in there. I think it does. But I would check. If you're thinking about... It's going to be two years for the bridge to get it. Right. I don't know if anybody even accesses that land for any... At least. I'd check the conservation. Because they don't want to check all the kiosks. Right. And I'm sure that you can. Of course it's an informational kiosk that you can access and know what you're doing down there. But I don't know. Because that was part of the conservation commission anyway. No, he's on the wreck. He's on the conservation, is he? I don't think so. He's been working with us on some stuff. Did you talk about subcommittee? I think that's a good point. Maybe we go to them and... I think there you avoid things of those as sort of no responsibility. Right. I talked to her at one point about them a year or so ago. I feel like it's worth by checking in with Mary at least. I just didn't want it cut down. And like that you're saying, they're just going to cut down. We would take it. And we would take it. We love it. We would not take it down. Or we'll hand it to the conservation commission and the board of scientists. So right to move it over to that trailhead. Cool. Because they're not cheap at all. Well, we'd love it if the conservation committee... Well, maybe the rec committee needs to reach out to the conservation and work together on this one and see what they want to do. Okay. Ultimately, if the conservation wants to keep it, talk to me about we can have the school make it as a project since it's connecting their trails. So that would be an activity. So you're saying Billy can do one? Yeah, Billy can do another one. Yeah. That would be for that since it's partially part of the school. Sure. There we go. Yeah. Because they are not cheap at all. Yeah. Okay. I would absolutely love to talk to you about it. Yeah. So if this doesn't work out... So I think the rec board should just reach out to the conservation commission first and see what they're thinking about. Who's the chair of the conservation committee? Mary. Yeah. I can help you too. But just let that work go first and see how that works out. Okay. If they want to keep it, then we've got a second option. Okay. That's all I had. Anything else? I believe that the appointment for 6.15 is... Yeah, it's actually been moved to the next meeting. I can do a quicker explanation if you want. It's a little harder to follow and it's inconvenient. That's why I'm waiting until the next meeting anyway. So John Woodhall and... I do it for the other name. What's her name? Holly Hill. Thank you. They own property on River Street. A couple properties on River Street here in town. And they are in the process of refurbishing some of these buildings. They've got one building that's got five units and I believe another building that's got sort of two units. I think it's got a commercial on the bottom and a residential on the top. Two on top. And they're in the process of redoing some of these units. They're doing a kind of piece now. They're doing one unit at a time. So they came to us, I don't know, a few months ago and Paulie came to us and said, I think we've been overcharged for years. So they owned the building in 2010, I think they took control, maybe 2011. And the spreadsheet you have, all the water and sewer the spreadsheet that you have and I've written in numbers, say 5U's and all that. So she came to us and said, well, over this, since 2011, some of these units have been empty and some of them have not. And it's been hit in Medicare better. You know, one quarter or one month that I have two empty units and the next it's gone, type of thing. So I went back and I looked to see how we get charged. They haven't since the beginning. And if you look at these sheets, there's pin marks to say 5U, 5U. And so what that says is that we charge that five unit structure for five units in one way or another, whether that was for a vacancy or not. And then the marks on the left that say like unit five empty, that came from Paulie. So what Paulie told me she did and I haven't got the information yet for this is she took her utility bills and the way the utility bill works is if a unit becomes empty, it reverts back to her as the owner tent or whatever. So what she's saying is by tracking those utility bills and showing them that utility bill is reverted back to her, she's proving that those units were empty. So here's what she wants. Well, there's one more step to this. We have annual surveys that we do that we send out by and it says, you know, what's the status of your bill? So how many units you got empty? How many did they get empty? How many did they get empty? Not to fight it, whatever. They claim they've been doing this since 2007 and I cannot get them going. I can't find, I don't know if this happened with the change in administration behind me or something, but all those surveys from 2017 prior are gone. Gone. So they're saying that they did them every year and it's only once a year that we do them anyway. But what she's actually asking for and in a roundabout way is essentially every quarter she wants an adjustment being made based on how many of the vacancies and how many they didn't have vacant. I don't know if they came in. They claim that they came in numerous times. What that means, I don't know. But they claim that they came in numerous times to the town and said, I've got two vacant right now or I've got one with Gail. So I can't prove that. I have no proof at all. That's the first step of what they're trying to do is they're trying to basically say we can prove that some of these units were vacant during these months or these quarters and we didn't get credit for it. And they're going to prove that at least often I guess they're utility bills. So that's the first part. The second part is I'm waiting to hear back as to what they want you to move forward. That's what the board told them last time they were here is right now what you want. How long on what he asked before. So it's kind of a two-part deal. The first part is they want us to basically credit them for over-billing or miss-billing or whatever the term may be from years prior. And in the future, I think he wants to or she wants to possibly have us frigate or whatever the water on one of the units that's currently being rid of it and the water too. Can't do anything. So there's going to be a second part that they're going to actually come in and ask you for how they want to move forward with this. They have no problem thinking that the full unless the place is full and it's running but in the meantime, while some of the units are not even habitable they feel that they should be charged and that's what they're going to ask for is something. But the other issue, the bigger issue is the previous bill. So again, they have this concept that they were over-billed numerous times where they should have been on vacancy. Basically, they should have been on a vacancy rate at least once. And back then, the vacancy rate was $25 and $50. $25 full water, $50 for sewer. There are notes in here where that changed whenever Fritz might be in and we changed that policy and you'll see that note it looks like July of 2016 we adjusted the other unit. So if you look through the first spreadsheet, you'll see that there's vacancy rates. It says $50 and then there's a... So that was the vacancy rate at the time. That was 2018. So what we were doing, I think we were doing it at that time because we changed that. I've got notes on the next one. Right. That's right. So So on the five unit, it's pretty well set in my opinion it was being built properly. With the information we had if you look on the first couple sheets it says sheet pages 3 through 6 and it says for 259 River Street you'll see all these numbers that say fighting you out to the site. And that basically is telling you that whether it was a fixed water rate or if it was a vacancy rate it would be charged for the fighting you use. So what I did was I went back and saw what the rate was. The water rate was for when you came back at that time. So those in my opinion the quarterly buildings were being done correctly. Now whether there was enough vacancy rates or not, who knows. We don't know. And they're going to try to prove what this is about. On 23 they were being charged wrong for a while because they were being charged for a 1 EU until we changed that. When I took over in August of 16 you'll see on page 11 of 14 it says adjusted to 2 EU for ordinance. We just basically read a ordinance and it says it's a 2 EU because it's one per the use. So that's where that adjustment was made right there. And you'll see that kind of from there on out. And then the ordinance change happened on page 13 at 14 July 24th of 18 and that's when they went to that's when they were charged for the 2 EUs because they had 2 units of that. So I know it's confusing and it's kind of confusing to me too a little bit. These units went all over the place they went from vacancy to non-vacancy 1 EU to 2 so it's a little hard to follow but when they come in and talk with you that is the idea behind what they're looking for. Is that first of all they're going to complain that we don't have the surveys to prove what they're right. The surveys are gone. But those surveys were a snapshot of time one hundred a year. And what they're continuing is that they came in multiple times during the year and they asked for these adjustments because of the units where they did or not and they were never made. What date did you come on board? August 16th. June 16th actually. Prior to this time to ask for adjustments. And the only reason why I say that is the first thing that comes to mind is why would you wait eight, nine years to come for it on this right? Where three administrations move forward and it's kind of like that lawyer that waits until the statute of limitations is up and then says I'm going back to get them all right? All documentations all gone yada yada yada. But so it's hard for us to say what went on. But what we do know is that you came on board in August 16th and this is the first that you've heard about her. But yet she's got the same notes in 16th, 17th, 18th that she does prior. You know. Well they'll tell you that they need them up because they're trying to finish up these units but it's also not the town of Bethel's responsibility to manage their facility on what quarter you know the policy isn't really there to say is it vacant one month to the next it's really to say when you pass in your your questionnaire once a year if you do have something going on in your two apartments as one then that's your opportunity to go on. Right on. Put you on for quarter one take you off for quarter two and put you back on for quarter three I mean that's not the town responsibility at this point. And if you look in there sorry I'm sick sometimes struggles with this but if you look through the five unit the 259 there were adjustments that were being made and it could have been or it could have been based off of their service I'm sorry. But it's just reading through the literature they're all over the board from when things were rented when they weren't oh yeah. And how are we supposed to keep going? In some cases it sounded like the apartment was rentable because they have occupants in it I mean like that we tend to have some bills on it. Well because back then though Chris back then the town was allowing partial vacancy rates and they were allowing a five unit complex that had three vacant units to have and that's why when we changed it the ordinance well we sort of just abide by the ordinance but that's why you see those partial vacancies but if you look down through the past years for 259 you can see there were some adjustments that were being made. So my guess is that those were based off of those service because they were probably done I didn't mark the actual dates they were probably done within a year or so of each other. So I was tending that some of these were actually being made. But it's pretty clear to see that the notes are consistent cheap there's just as many notes here for your time here as there is for others and this is the first took them two years to come forward for you you know I mean at this point you would have to be substantial proof brought before the board you know like I got all the surveys in hand I mean they would have to be substantial proof to be able to Again the surveys are just one snapshot again how she's trying to prove this that she's going to show you utility bills that show supposedly when the unit became vacant it transferred back to the board and that's how she's trying to prove when this but here's your point we have no responsibility to monitor every single multifamily business every month or every quarter and say okay what do you got this one that's ridiculous and the intent is more on a yearly basis it's not a quarterly or monthly basis they show that certain things get transferred into her name or however that system work but that doesn't mean that the town is notified or in that case it means that the town was obligated to put her on and the only thing that would notify the town the way we do it now the only thing would be that service but again they are also saying that they came into the office multiple times and asked for this change to be made but how many multiple times have they come into your office since since you've been here zero and it seems like you would think if somebody overpaid in the amount that they're looking for that they would have been to the select board a long time ago stamping the feet and demanding justice it just seems like now that they've been called out to pay for their bill now they're looking for directions or excuses to not pay I mean none of us were here the administration is not here so the only way to go on is they would have to be substantial proof for the board there's no proof of any of this anything before you came from the building it's just he said she said now there's things on the sheet still there's been nothing we just heard about this two months ago maybe I don't think it was that long was it two months ago two months ago and he was supposed to make a couple more I mean I would just so that's the backstory and that's what they're going to come to deal with so there's going to be probably two requests one is we want money and the second is most likely or it should be we want to have our whatever it is of that one building our water rates forgiven and abated until we get things fixed up well that's the bottom floor it's bottom it's 259 no no no he said there's one in here too in 259 the other building he's he's supposed to be giving me more information and another cover letter to outnit what they want done because this doesn't do that that's why it's not ready to sign anyway so we will get more information I just wanted to kind of give you a backstory because it's a lot of scribbling and it's a lot of numbers a lot of he said she said that thing and unfortunately even if they come in and say you guys lost all the survey see what you have to get if that's the only an adjustment that would have been made one time right here and if you look back adjustments were being made there was one made August of 15 there was one made August of 16 so who's to say those weren't based off of the surveys I don't know but they wouldn't have those surveys come to a lot of work from their own writing here you know in the 23 river street probably all five units are currently being rented oh I think well that's according to that's their their word has been fully occupied since and then it goes to the next one has been fully occupied since it looks like the only one that isn't fully occupied is 23 river street looks like only one of the two units is occupied in the basement they want to put a business in there but they do have a toilet and a sink he's got two 59 apartment one complete September 19 this means full occupancy for the first time since purchase of property so I think he still has one unit that's empty unit one unit in that building and the other building I think is completely empty I think she was running a business out of her something and I don't think that's they're on vacancy now right I don't know I can't remember one of the five is getting five fixed rates and then there's two unit right and I can't remember the two unit was I can't remember the vacancy we have to be careful with this this is a unit that has been in circulation for 8 years now and it's a little different we've given we've given other owners in town some retreat while they buy a purchase of property go to fix it up now in their case this is property that has been bought had tenants in it in some cases destroyed it or there was something that happened afterwards and now they're looking at remodeling and not wanting to reprieve from the town to remodel I mean it's a little different then like we've been using that incentive to really say hey come come by this beautiful building's beckle and while you're fixing it up we're going to help you out this one's been bought for 8 years in some cases has been used and now you know I don't know we just have to take that all into consideration when we look at it that's kind of the history so one thing sort of wrapping my brain around this one thing I didn't feel like I understood was that they kind of online and they did that whole the additional spreadsheet that we didn't have last time assuming they made up the breakdown number of units, quarter of empty yes yes yes when they did these calculations are they doing it, they want the credit for what they paid but is it being offset by what the vacancy would still be paying the $25 vacancy rate I haven't checked her math yet I don't know because that's a question that I can't go through and check her math either I just wasn't sure if we even looked at that is she just asking for the credit of a full amount of an EU but actually not adding back in that $25 vacancy well that's a good question I don't know I think we would need to ask them because I know she scribbled on so the writing to the left on the spreadsheet is hers and at one point she writes $150 on the back on page 506 for $259 so I think I think what she's asking for I think she's asking for I think she's wrong but she's asking for $25 per big unit which would have been the vacancy rate because this spreadsheet that they made of the department one 2014 data unoccupied $25 wouldn't that be the vacancy rate so she's asking us to credit her the vacancy rate yes exactly so if you look back let's look at February of 2016 she says unit one and two is empty and we only gave her credit for one vacancy rate that's what she's saying she's saying that there should have been two so there's one right there so if you see the stars you have it page 506 for $259 she has put stars out next to the water one, two, three, four, six of them and at the bottom she says credit of $150 so she's doing exactly what you're saying she's saying that she should have got $25 credit for each one of those missed units but she was charged for a full vacancy on that so even her numbers are wide I don't know if you know I don't know if you know them but there's sometimes it's hard to follow she actually had a stroke or something so she's having some health issues and he's trying to do that but I think you're exactly right they are being charged for the full but then she's only asking for the vacancy credit back which is wrong and it should be the difference of the two of course but that's what this spreadsheet is based on but that's what this spreadsheet is based on is she, like I said she said $150 because there were six of them on that one page so she's adding each one because she's saying we missed one unit so it should have been $25 but in fact it actually should have been whatever that one of you is but if they were reporting that one unit was empty but didn't report that another is the town what mechanism do we have to do that on a quarterly basis except they are claiming that they came in I don't know what the frequency was but they came in and they made they asked the town to make these adjustments I don't know when, I don't know how often I don't know what was done with it we have zero records in our software and if they came in and asked somebody would we have it because it's made the change then or if it came in or maybe they used to be surveyed that we asked if the survey was done or if you can see the changes so we did that I did actually come in and asked what were the changes and I guess my just as we're having this discussion my concern that was coming up was if they had the utility bills that in their mind proves that they had the vacancy would they try to take us to court over this and what would that look like so just sort of looking down that road we eventually prepared for if we made a decision that we don't think that they're accurate on this or that we don't have any what I will send you is the vacancy rating policy at the time of all this going on I'll give you both, we have to know it's all enough but I'll send you the old policy if we even had one I don't even know if it was one honestly but I'll see what I can find what's happening in the rivers and the vacancy policy might they may not even get anything but what we were doing in house as far as I can tell was we were allowing partial vacancies if somebody came in and said I've got two vacancies that are empty she got two vacancies but she didn't so and we have notice showing all that everybody I mean, Therese can probably speak to them because she sees in the software more than me some people are coming in and asking for these in the past, there were notes that were being made sometimes, yeah and I think the adjustments were being made so I don't think that they would not have any but Bethel didn't have a clear vacancy policy we figured it out is that what it was? it was very if my members serves they mentioned a vacancy in their in the ordinance but it was vague it wasn't spelled out as to before it is in the water ordinance itself I think all the ordinance is that you can have me fix the cost of the system I think that was the vacancy because one of them the sewer in the water one of the two was more specific then the other one didn't say anything or one did but they were still there was no policy as to how it was unilaterally or you know in force I don't think that to your point I don't know but I don't think that the town is required to put anybody on a vacancy based off based off what the ordinance says it just says that the town the users are required to pay at least the fixed cost it doesn't say that I'll look into it and let you know if it's something there's no record of them coming before the flood more than the last eight years I don't know how to look into that I can look through minutes and minutes right well I know they have a kind of lens I can't really talk to Paulie much I talked to her once but she's because she has health issues it's kind of tough so she's kind of he's doing most of the work and I think he's he definitely doesn't know nearly as much about the history that she does but you know when we're here talking about such of those questions we can ask I will look into the ordinance and look and see if there was anything in place my guess is there wasn't but the way they were doing it was they were allowing partial vacancies because I had numerous times where we'd get a sponge or others yeah to say that they'll need some substantial proof to sure something from the town had said this but right now there's really no proof either way they don't have surveys and unfortunately we don't have surveys and I can't fight anything for years to 2007 well it's just like one of the units is still vacant right part number two or whatever we haven't heard anything in three years in regards to that so that's the history so now you know that's the rest of the story they're coming to the next meeting they will be yes they are already scheduled for employment at this meeting and I will have another cover letter to give to you that is hopefully explaining more of what they're asking for don't worry anything more on that matter sit here we started at the last meeting and started talking about some projections you know as just like the state and other towns we had a really rough winter some winter maintenance so we were trying to spend these last three, three and a half months on painting the belt and try to get our budget in order and at the last meeting we started talking about you know some projections on where we might be where we can tighten up a little bit a lot of it really hinged on the tax sale portion of that tax sale that people actually paying their taxes we did well it was just going to be easier for me to do this on a monthly basis the downloading of a spreadsheet so obviously the deficit has grown part of it is we did another AP run part of it is we did another payroll part of it is I might have missed some things the first time so this was easier for me easier format for me so what I did was I'm pretty much saying across the board because you have to make an assumption I'm going to assume that everyone's going to spend their full budget so if I know that people have already gone over or I'm projecting over just I'm adding that to the budget number so obviously I'm being conservative here so but really what you need to do because we all know that the wheels can still be one of us so you know I know for example Louise had said to me well I don't spend all the listing budget however she didn't pass we reduced that budget so over the past you know in the last round so when you look at this you can see I tried to put notes inside column for you so you can understand what we did obviously one of the things we did we made about 114,000 taxis we started with 12 properties 6 of them went for tax sales sold all by 2 so that's really cleaning up some stuff that also included a couple big takes on watering sewer but what I'm estimating is what I said before about 93% of collection rate of taxes keep in mind we have to calculate that because we have to pay to school so within a week or two after the due date is when I'm saying 93% collected so actually you know since May 15th and another month after that we could have collected more but I'm trying to use again a conservative number that depends on what we're going to collect the taxes because despite whether or not we collected all the school gets all of theirs so you can see where I talked to Alan a little bit and you can see where we're going to freeze some things for him obviously I think the best picture the best snapshot we're going to have is going to be in another month when winter actually ends we're all runners we all realize a good chance in April so by the time the end of April rolls around we will have a much better handle that should have put all the winter over time all that behind us this also included the last round did include an $8,800 which was the last salt bill so the last salt is now included in here for the year so I feel like this is going to add into a spreadsheet crunch the numbers and give you notes so you can see where there may be some savings and I know to look at the BLCT passive bill we're also going to have some savings possibly in health insurance so I want to look at that as well to see calculate any savings in the premium which I think was like 7% but then I need to pay out all the HRA so there may be a little bit in there as well that might be a savings um but here we'll use the REC budget this is a good example I have my page open to it I'm saying and this is how this system works for me to do these projects I'm saying the REC is going to spend their entire budget plus possibly go over by $4,500 because they're payroll now what could happen is it could very well be that that budget in one of the places is under spent but I can't say that right now it started there's means to be done etc so again as we get a little further we're going to hone in on these numbers a little bit but yeah so currently we're still projecting a deficit we can't cover it with you know by not transferring capital funds which is not what we want to do because obviously it puts those funds behind the APOC so I'm still optimistic that we can you know if we do better the tax collection if we don't spend every if everybody doesn't spend every dime you know we might maybe we're going to slide in here and have just a small and then you can make a decision if you have a smaller deficit obviously you legally have to offset it by adding it to the tax rate next time but we can maybe we'll maybe we'll leave this back my feeling is I'm going to give you a a projection that's financially I'm going to be more I'm going to be more conservative than some of the some of the big overspenders which kind of came with the winter and some of the unfortunate luck that we've had with some equipment you know equipment and things we've overspent on repairs and parts and stuff for equipment at 34,000 fuel because we're out there plowing more our fuel is up 10,000 and salt 46,000 overtime labor up 5,000 and the other one this is non the only thing that's non winter related was tax abatements from up to 5,700 so other than that everything's yeah well the sand will probably end up being you know we thought that we bought like once a year and a half for the sand but we took the deal we bought more sand up front thinking that was going to end with the winter didn't really get us ahead so so right now if we look at our whole budget which I would agree with Theresa that we're probably looking at the cost pretty conservatively right now we were looking at $73,000 deficit with winter spent pretty much I was going through them a little bit today thinking that maybe that 73 probably turned into just under 50 you know kind of what I'm thinking however right now on the remedy like the things Theresa's projections are built in at roughly 93% of what's owed to the town now as an accounting that's the formula that you would use you know you know that there's a lot of times you're not going to get all the payments in the quarter that you're looking for however all the taxpayers did pay all the bills in time which they should then we wouldn't have a deficit we would have a surplus so right now we're looking at you know if you take the $73,000 deficit that we're showing here I think that can probably be better unless we have a little bad luck here between now and the finish line if that instead of 93% if we collected 100% of our funds that we should right now it won't happen but if we did that would be another $130,000 revenue to the town so if we take 130 minus the 73 we're in the surplus so I think that's one thing I want to get out there to the taxpayers even with the winter spent and this deficit of promise if everybody paid the bills on time we would have a surplus so so when we talk about this again after we have a little bit of a deficit so because you know if that 7% of uncollection is about $300,000 and then in an higher portion of it's about 44% the rest of it goes to the school so and there is some bad things like we'll see some savings I think we'll see a little savings and possibly insurance like vehicle and insurance so I think we just I think Pam is paying she just did or she is in this round of VLCT so I'll have it better then I'll know because only a quarter left so I can hone in on those numbers and you're always usually ahead you know for like a health insurance and things and right now I know that the highway department health insurance is over it has a higher number than it should because every quarter I have to make an adjustment to move or not as retirement I mean not health insurance but I have to move it to like Morgan so so specific percent goes to highway parks and water so I make adjustments quarterly for retirement for him so you know to make him accurate so but I the question was and Chris had said that the last meeting was for if you all had ideas or questions about where things money could be saved and to bring them here so does anybody have any thoughts about that that's right right yeah why does it always have to happen more break on Monday yeah better time to get a break you can get that happen right I mean can the trucks break what we don't need one thing I would like to bring up is let's say that for some crazy reason we get a lot of having a lot of ice or whether that requires a lot of salt in the next month or whatever and we start to run low on our salt I'm not going to buy any more salt we're going to switch to sand probably sooner than later we're done buying salt for the year if you all are okay with that I don't care if it's freezing for two weeks straight it's icy everywhere sand will do the job what will we use sand if you're okay with that it's a huge expense I think we've used a lot I'm hoping that we're kind of trending towards going to more salt uses than sand anyway sorry we're kind of going towards more more sand anyway this might start that but I just want to see if the board supports that notion that if we do need it and we need to buy more we're not going to buy more we're going to use it sparingly use more sand even now than we would anyway so if you're all okay with that that's kind of the direction I'd like to go with sometimes nothing else just a little bit of sand just in the case something were to go crazy and it gets really cold and it would normally use a lot of salt but we're not going to we'll use salt we need to but we're done buying that stuff this year I just want to have the support of the board so that when those calls come in I can throw you guys a bus can you mix it in the truck could you put sand and a little bit of salt not all the trucks the big dump trucks don't do salt very good I don't know why there's some idea I don't know why but like Doug's truck will it'll run both so you could mix it Alan's truck you could probably mix it I don't know about that sander if you could or not you don't have to mix it on the ground you almost the best way to mix it is to kind of pour them in make sense but if we ever were to go to doing this the right way you could use a liquid sodium chloride or a mag chloride that you pour on top of your pile of dirt and it just filters down through it and then you go but anyway for now I just want to let you know that we will not be buying any more salt unless Hal Reed is doing it I don't know the problem with that okay what days do you look like you had some say do you have questions about the projections or things that you thought I may have in all kinds of looks I'm not a whole lot better than him oh okay well you got seven e-mail or whatever questions most happy to answer yeah so that's just kind of the way the projections are working basically it's just taking them and making assumptions that budget is fully spent and adding that on top of that number to see so I mean I agree with Chris I think that they're probably a little high but I don't want to be there you don't pay me to be optimistic yeah pay me to tax so that's working too you did a great job with the tax sale oh nice yeah a lot of good things have hurt yeah but I'm not going to lie people go like see tax sales but you worked out really well I have two that just go because that means that I spent money on the journey for the tax sale I don't feel like we had another option however you know it's one of those things it'll go again in the fall that's the way it'll do I would like to try to hold the tax sales late in the fall those costs roll over to the fall tax sale the attorney's fees that's a good question I've never had a property not a sale of tax sale so we'll see if we can get that I don't want to be able to stay with the property yes because the statute says they can up to 15% so I don't assume that they would stay because that's the lien that we put on it the tax sale lien is that amount so yeah actually I would assume that they would but so hopefully those two properties clean up before fall and come around the pay and find another way to pay or I'm going to go again in the fall for sure oh could be this is one thing that came to mind for us I guess the other comment that I would have I was going to mention the sale as well but also probably just coming up with you know straight time no overtime how are we going to work with this and we've got to hope that whatever storms we do have left won't be major in nature won't be so that we have to go out clean snow off the road so hopefully they're more like the one we got on Friday Saturday that kind of disappeared after two days but definitely looking through this coming to the table and working on this winter maintenance policy or whatever we want to call it I think will be very helpful for next year with a combination of what are the materials that we're going to be using in certain roads I think there's could be significant savings I mean you've got to think you're at the $80 a ton for a ton of salt where a ton of sand drew 70 bucks so there's a huge difference there now you might have to use twice the sand to do salt but you're still significant in cost savings so that's definitely got to be something to look into and I definitely would like to charge the board with moving forward quickly on putting something together you know while it's still fresh obviously we want to get through the rest of the winter so we know exactly what it cost this is one of the toughest winter that we've had in the last dozen years so at least we can engage that as one of the tougher ones hopefully and really kind of get it get the process corrected for next year we can get it out to the taxpayers this is what we will be looking to do these are the changes you will see this gives them happy year or so to prepare themselves for winter you know so I think there's an order next year to plan a good policy I would say it would be more of an internal I don't want to use the word policy but maybe more of a yeah maybe more of a you want to make a policy saying you can't use salt on that road but you want to have a guideline that you can follow as internally that for the most part let's say if you said we're going to sand the downtown road but salt the sidewalks something like that that's our guideline but that doesn't mean that if something happens we can't salt the roads in the downtown ground which is why it's not an ordinance because it's not law we would say if you take the mountain road we would say we're going to sand them but if something happens we need salt up there we need salt I think it would be more of an internal guideline for our employees the reason why this is happening when somebody comes knocking on Alan's door saying salty look this is the policy we're following the procedure that we're following and that's really the nature of what it is Paul had an idea about yeah I was going to talk to Greg last week about having an end of winter meeting to kind of review everything that happened this winter and some of the challenges and some of the look down the road with the policies talking about sanding and assaulting or whatever and having a year in end of winter review here it would be select board and you suggest that Alan help when he's involved in like a debriefing like a debriefing kind of a thing closer logic lessons learned and to go over all those types of all those areas so if we were going to do that so our next meeting is first of the Monday right so it's April 8th so the 8th might be too soon we could do it on the 22nd could we so the 22nd of April could we do that debriefing maybe appointment or something is that what you wanted well it would be a likely discussion it would be a likely discussion I don't necessarily know it would have to be a public meeting we don't need every person we're going to be involved it's going to have to be a public meeting unless you want a point we can't one or two individuals to go with select board meeting because I don't know that we wanted out of every citizen here voicing their opinion on this this is more about you all and how we move forward with operations and policies and things like that just have the meeting or have this debriefing at your office and maybe just have two select board members attend and then you don't have to warn a meeting do you know if there are laws in Vermont about having workshops board workshops if there's three of them together you can warn but you could we could have two of the board members represent the board and go there and scan it we can do that it's just a debriefing we're not making any major decisions all are really just giving me information so that we can move forward with the policies do we have any plan on the board that would like to be a part of that discussion we'll raise a hand very quickly he thought jump out of the board very quickly actually I see all the town boys all the road crew there all of them because they might have something but maybe I don't know so no one would like to go to anybody else on the board that would like to I'll go I like to get people that if you've heard stuff on the street that's kind of the idea of it too because you guys are hearing a lot more than what I'm hearing good bad and ugly so that's what we're kind of open for so I would think that at this meeting that we talk about obviously the material we're using what roads kicking that can around but also with the repairs that we've had to trucks and trucks down I'm sure some of that is the winter that we just had and I'm sure some of that is are we using the right tools in the right places type thing are we using the right truck on the right roads and that probably ought to be looked at very carefully too because we can't be burning through this equipment I would like to think it's fairly newer for this town actually you're getting on the the other edge of becoming up for a lot of repairs I think because they're at that age we used that as an issue with the death system and they said basically it's just age it was just a parent what year of them? 11's or 12's? they're on 8 year rotation the first one was doing 20's or 11's yeah maybe 12's so these trucks were the first trucks that came through with the beef economy so it means everything is that death system is what's going on but but yeah that would be part of the conversation I want to actually have this conversation numerous times about the right equipment in the right place the equipment that we do have in place we want to make sure it's operational as long as we can go moving it to the continued plow of the mountain road one time doesn't make any sense that should be our large truck the only reason why we did it one time is because we want to solve it so if we get the large truck up there with Satan it gets accomplished but if we keep pieces of equipment on the wrong roads right now we're going to pile up more and more equipment which is going to result in needing equipment sooner than budgeted you know that whole thing and when we do buy new trucks what is the proper size truck that we need to do our work wouldn't you want to meet bring the date with you best for us and you guys can do it today would you want to meet me so say morning you could hear you morning morning well the bell wasn't on sorry what do you want to how about you want to do it kind of towards the end of the season so you want to do it Monday or Tuesday April do we still want to be able to have discussions the 22nd of April here at the board to start the winter program schedule we want to start talking on that then or we want to push that back maybe we should have this meeting before that meeting usually all your winter storms are done by the end of the 2nd of April hopefully how about I don't know if I'm going to get jury duty starting on the 3rd I'm going to be available I don't know I don't know if I'm going to get how about just go with the case law I never got called okay we want to do it this week how about the 20th no I can't do it don't you want to wait until right or the degree wait until the end I don't think we're pretty much through how about Friday Friday I've got to be on my river in the morning until well no we can do it let's see I'm going to be there 8.30 I won't be back watching for all of them so we can do it noon you bring the pizza you go with that I'll bring the syrup I'm making all that so we're going to do a large 29 which is Friday at noon and then we'll have our first discussion in regards to the next probably on the 2nd of April yes right and then we'll just do it in my office and I'll get in on it more maybe the rest of the boys I got one little comment is pretty high this year and I think part of that goes to the great accolades that the boys got for keeping the streets down down in Bethel, perfect I think what you're going to have to look for to save money is to say ok everybody can't be perfect yep this was a great year, you had a horrible winter you had the best roads you've ever had you had those too it cost a lot of money when you're talking about this the folks have got to realize maybe there'll be an inch and a half of snow on a road and that's a good one I was down down in the road the road goes perfect, they didn't let three snowflakes hit the road and they were plowing which that exactly leads into why we're doing this whole discussion with with all of us it comes down to a couple things we've got a level of service at the big market 100% you're paying for 100% we need to determine as a board and as a community what level of service we want so that's a good point that's exactly what we're talking about and expectations so with that level of service we need to find out what that level of service is actually what does it look like because you're right, it's going to have to be fun if it's low as well what's sort of worthy for this is the proper material as the job then helps the environment you're really insane, we got no use much right we want to get the job done to a point this expectation that the asphalt has to be black all winter is not realist it costs too much money it can be done, but you've got to pay for it we've saved up to people all the time, yeah we can do it but it's going to cost you we want exactly that have increased the budget I mean, it's bottomless that's the whole reason for this whole discussion that is to really come to an agreement in our policy and say ok, we're going to go to SANT up on the mound, whatever we can drop that budget to accommodate what that new level of service looks like both the service is allocated for soft and we will have to increase the budget and that's why this is the public forum at the end of the day at one point those discussions It's so early, so is the service a little bit. It has to go in any way. Okay, yeah. So 29 to 100 bucks, you're bringing pizza, you said? No, you're bringing pizza. I don't know. I'll bring some sugar, you know what I'm saying. Okay. Maybe I'll bring some pizza. You can't buy pizza until July 1st. Yeah. I'll bring some sugar, you know what I'm saying. I'll bring some sugar. It's starting to make you pizza. Yeah. It's always doughnuts down there. Yeah, there's always some. You guys put skimmins every day at the table, you can serve. Anything else in regards to the projection on the board? Yeah. Dave, when you're feeling better, if you have any questions, don't hesitate to give me calls or some email. Whatever works for you, Dave. Happy day. I mean, really, at this point, the only thing we can control is some overtime or nothing. And sometimes you can't control that. There's not a lot of activities that happen between now and, you know, maybe a little bit on the gravel end or something like that. There's not a lot of activities that we do between now and July 1st that are really costly to get. We are going to have a lot of painting and things like that. We typically paint in May, the crosswalking and all that, and we'll probably have to hold off on that a little bit because we've got a lot of painting and all that stuff. We'll see how it goes, but ideally, it's good to get it all done. You know, I could get it done before May 1st. It looks good to have it done early in last year. Yeah, and that's huge to be able to do that about. I think it was the first time since I lived here that it was all painted. First thing, it looked nice the whole year. Using the paint at the end of summer, and at that point, it's like, why do you love painting? Yeah, we'll have to see. That's one of the things I was thinking about with being delayed. But I mean, I don't know how much the paint cost, but it's expensive. It's a lot of different things. It's not a lot of paint, it's a lot of paint. So it's kind of a little more likely than just like a whole lot of things. But we'll have to find out the, you know, you might have money because you have a lot. There's money in that budget. I think I might have taken it out to kind of put it towards those circles. But we'll see. It all depends on everybody's, you know, over time, you know, the next month if we don't get a big storm and, you know. Water breaks are, this is the time, the water breaks in the spring, I think it's certain fall. Yeah, so we'll see how. At least the water part, we gave the last, like the last week, actually charging the time for the people that were working to the water part. Because there's water breaks. We're sure. Yeah, yeah. That way we're not eating out of our own, out of the general part. I mean, what we need is we need all the taxpayers to paint their bills on time. I understand. May 15th is your next chance. May 15th. You know, we're not 100%. Let's go for 100%. You need to pay it earlier, you hear me? Pay it or take your money anytime. Yeah, I'll give you a swap of 1,2005. Yeah. Back in the day, they used to get, used to get a discount to pay your taxes in for almost a year. Yeah. Really? And they just fixed the discount into the tax rate. So some people took that, some people didn't like that. Yeah. So that's probably the way 15th. Well, thank you, Teresa. Thank you. See you later. You too. Thank you. Is it cold in here? It's freezing. Mm-hmm. It's cold in here. Good? Back on the budget. That's right. Sorry. No, we're not budget models. You turn it off. So we had to do it to turn it off earlier as well? You have to turn it off earlier? Yeah. Late, late. It's not so Halloween anymore. Late, early, early on. Mm-hmm. All right. So last time we got the Fade Calvary Trust. Yep. Really was the thing that was working. We signed it and just we wanted a little more information which we received in our packets. Let's say it sounds a little different than what I've ever bought. You know, it does what it does. I'm still just a certain amount of income. You don't get any money out of it. Right. It's tough because the way it's set up right now, the interest rate's being where that, you know? Because, you know, it makes reference after $600 of reinvested annual income, then anything over $600 starts to be spent towards the cemeteries. And then any other leftover money would go to the library. However, you know, for the last, I don't know, many years, for the last, what, six years or whatever that hasn't built enough interest to even do the cemeteries. So, yeah. However, the accounts, the account has, you know, more than double. But nothing you can spend out of it. So it's kind of a weird thing. So I guess we'll, I would entertain a motion to allow myself to sign off on your credit sign. There's like three copies there. Oh, yeah. So move. Second. Hang on, we'll do it right. The motion is to allow you to sign off. Yeah. OK. Yeah, it says in the chair. My memory was a little bit there, wasn't it, from 30 years ago? Yeah, you were on it, Rose. I don't know about this board, but it was back in the cemeteries. It was in the 80s. Oh, 80s. You don't know that? I don't think it was this year. Once it was, I don't really know if he's around here anymore. Not any models in New Mexico. I'm going to hand this off to you, because I don't feel good. Is that what happens to select board members? Yeah. I know you know this inside and out. Hold it this strong, sir. I'm not sure if he's around here. I don't know where he is. First board, so I'm going to hand that with water in there. Why? Or it's just those two spots? Should be three. I think there's three signs here. There's a letter, we have to sign here, and then there's two of them. OK. And some here. And then some here. Y'all get in here. See? Today? Morning. See? Morning. Don't pass this off to me, because she's written this and knows it inside and out. So we last summer had from the VLCT came to the pool and did an inspection of everything. And we received from him one of the things that the VLCT is saying is that we did not have a blood-borne pathogen policy or other hazardous body waste policy. How to deal with this. And so I spent a good week looking at what OSHA recommends for blood-borne pathogens and other hazardous waste. And then what the VLCT recommends. I went to Dave Al-Jergeti and said, does the fire department have anything in writing? Because I didn't want to have to reinvent the wheel. And he said, no, we don't have anything. Nor has the VLCT said that the fire department should have one yet. And then I asked the highway, does the town have? Well, the town does not have a blood-borne pathogen policy of any kind. And so as I was reading through OSHA's policies, they recommend very strongly that highway departments have them, fire department has policy, that a rec department has policy. So I kind of took it upon myself, whether it was right or wrong. I just wrote a policy based on what the VLCT had kind of as a standard as an example. And so this is what I would like to adopt for the rec department. And I think it's really, really important that we have one. We did have a case last summer where a little girl fell, scraped her knee up pretty bad. And mom was really upset that we did not have a formal way of getting rid of all of the materials that we used to clean up the blood. So I really do think it's a very good thing to have this policy. With the policy, though, there has to be a training. And so I reached out to Matt Parrish at the White Reveille Ambulance because VLCT says that the American Red Cross trained. I'm trained by the American Red Cross. All the lifeguards are trained by the American Red Cross that that is not sufficient training. So I reached out to Matt Parrish and he said he would be happy to come and do a blood-borne pathogen training with our staff. And then we got talking. And he said, you know, if you ever, if you get all the materials, the containers, the needle containers, the waste containers, the waste bags, everything that OSHA says you need to have. He said, if you ever have a situation where you have to get rid of that, just bring it up to the White Reveille Ambulance. He said, we take all of our waste to Gifford and they take care of it. So we already have that agreement. I talked to Dave, Audra Getty. He said, you know, it's probably not a bad idea if the slick board adopts this for the rec facility that we just tweak the language so that the fire department can adopt it. So if the VLCT says to them, you need to have this. It's already in place. And then I talked to Greg about, you know, maybe the highway department also developed, you know, adopting the policy. So basically what OSHA says is if anybody in the public forum is dealing with the public, they should have some basic training of how to deal with blood or other body waste. And so I'm sure Matt would be happy to train the fire department and the town crew, the highway department, if that was something that you felt was necessary. I would just need to give him a heads up. But this is why we have it now. I would really like to adopt it so that trees can, I can get it sent to Wade and trees can use that as part of what she's trying to do to get some grant money for the town. So if you have any questions, I don't know if I included in there the training. I don't think so. I think that's just the policy. It also, there should be part of that packet, a signature page where if a staff member, so bless you, so like at the rec department, once we have the training, if this, I'm sorry, I don't have it in front of me. So I don't, I need that station way before. Yes, yes. So this is, this was included because VLCT says it needs to be included. And it basically says that due to the nature of our occupation, you know, we're going to be most likely at risk of exposure. But with that understanding, I purchased everything that we would need at the pool to reduce the amount of exposure. But we have to, our staff has to be given the opportunity to be vaccinated against the hepatitis B vaccine, or receive the hepatitis B vaccine at the expense of the town. However, a staff member can decline that. But they also can at any time during their employment, change their mind. And so that's what this form here says. And this came right from the VLCT. This was not something that I came up with on my own. I got a couple of questions. Did you, anyone direct you to look at local businesses that have these policies to see what they did? So you could look at one that's been in effect for a while? No. Are there any right here in town that have them? If I cut my finger over there, there's six guys in casual suits all over the place walking in and it's crazy. At mills? No, at GW class. Oh, at GW class. Oh, I'm sure they must have one, yes. It's crazy. But anyway, I was just thinking for, but you've already written it. And then the other one, the other question I have, which to me is more concerning, is the risks to the town if an employee says, I don't want the hepatitis B vaccination. If something happens to them, I would like something written here that says, okay, I denied my decline to have the vaccination. So if anything happens to me because I did not have that, the town is not responsible for, I have to, I have to come right here, I'm saying about if I take, don't take this. It's a way to perform, saying that I know like, I could be exposed, but I have chosen not to take that, to not have hepatitis B. Right. The second paragraph says, I have been given the opportunity to be vaccinated with the hepatitis B vaccine at the expense of the employer. Yeah. But I'm too much of a nation, but I've not yet specifically said that I do not see the town hold the town harvest. So I'm gonna hold the town harvest, something happens to begin there, do not do it. I don't. Well, I think, I think great. I think we kind of hashed out that language because again, this is not all my writing. I mean, I pulled from the, from the OSHA site, I pulled mostly from the VLCT, what they sent me as an example, because I said to Wade, I don't know the beginnings of how to write this. So do you have a sample? And he sent this to me. And I, and Greg and I spent quite a bit of time. I wrote it, Greg read it. We talked about questions. I went back to the drawing board, tried to clarify anything so that there was, there was really as little risk to the town as possible. But the language in the VLCT example was, they can, they can decline it. So if Allen says, I don't think I'm at risk. So he declines the vaccination if he doesn't already have it. But then he, you know, gets called to a scene or he's at a scene where someone gets hurt. He could change his mind. Legally, I think he has the right to change his mind as per what we talked about and what the language was at the VLCT. So what you would like to say is like a no-go or almost lost it. Yeah, like, I mean, I don't know, I read it again. I can, I can see where that's kind of in there. But I put it in there and I said, whoa, wait a minute, I don't want this shot. The thing happens to me, we're still on the hook, buddy. Well, also too, you know, last summer when we went to that scene where you don't have time to say, I'm going to be in my mind. You come to the car accident and shoot a die. Right. You don't have time to make a change of mind. Right. You either need to walk away or you need to do something. Well, even if you're doing it that boldly, it's not going to have an impact. Right. If something happens where you mean I was like that, I mean, it takes a lot of the vaccine to take a fact. Right, and there is language in here. Well, under vaccinations and post-exposure follow-up, it talks about what that's to the employer who has not had the vaccination will be encouraged to receive the series. But if declined, the employee will sign the OSHA declamation. For if the employee does not have the vaccination wish to receive the vaccine series, they may do so. It'll cost them. That's really, that's all it says. Now, when Wade came last summer and asked, do you have a blood-borne pathogen policy, we said, we do not. I believe we did not. But what I did immediately was I collected the immunization records. I had each of my lifeguards provide their immunization record that went in their personnel file. So I had, we had proof that all the lifeguards had the hepatitis B vaccination. So for young people, it may not necessarily be a problem because if kids go to college and whatnot, they have to have the vaccinations. It might be older staff that may not have that vaccination. But as my first line of defense, I said, OK, just everyone needs to provide a record of their immunizations. And we put it, we had them in their personnel files. So as a town, I don't know if, in here language from the VLCT was that we would encourage employees to receive the series. I mean, I think that's all we can do. We can't force people to get vaccinations. So what does everybody else think? I think the idea is that if you just add a clause that says that if you choose not to take this, the town will not be held, will not be held permanent. I guess what I was just saying, basically saying you're a forfeit of all of your rights to sue the town. If you receive hepatitis. If you do not receive it and you end up with, I think that's pretty simple clause. I think we can add to it if that's what everybody likes it. I think we could probably, because you need to get this approved pretty quickly, don't you? Would it more be comfortable approving the actual document and coming back with a waiver form, approving it as a separate item to this? I think that did an awesome job of this. The only concern I have is when we adopt any policies, like I would, we should be adopting townwide policies rather than specific policies for a certain group. Because they are town employees that are at the pool, right? So if we're gonna adopt the policy, it probably should be a townwide policy that would accomplish the fire department and the highway department. Yes, because honestly, my opinion, it's coming. I mean, if they singled out the rec department last summer, that's why I went to Dave and said, well, do you have one? And he said, no, but I probably should get one because it'll be coming. I wonder if they would also get some pressure from the National Fire Association or whether they have a different type of policy that they want to the fire department have. Could be a specific, you didn't change this around and make it specific to a pool environment. Yes. If they're not firemen or police officers are different. I think that's what our initial thought was, was not to make it a one-size-fits-all, but because of your market catering for each department. Like you said, we would follow it up by possibly the fire department and make it at least possible. You know, I think it'd be possible to make it a town policy. Absolutely, because there's only a few places in there where I specifically mentioned vessel recreation. We just have to see what that does to these other entities, what it does to their, how they're, like you said, how they're talking to whatever, whatever jurisdictional entity or whatever it has, what's the policy, what kind of policy they want. Fire Department, they play under a whole different set of rules. You know, there are national rules that they have to abide by that may not like this policy, I don't know. It's just something that we have to, I guess, discover if you want to go with an overall policy for the entire town, as opposed to just a facility, so it's okay. It's okay. I meant it for another one, right? You could. Yeah. If it all works together, I'm sure Mark must have some kind of policy. And that's just it. We don't know, and we have to find out. If he does, then this is probably not going to supersede that. And so, we don't know if it's really worth doing this exercise and doing it for everybody, if they're all required, federally, or whatever, to have their own particular type. I think Dave said, and don't quote me, but I think when I asked him, he said that they didn't have any for the Fire Department. That's true, Mark. Oh, I'm sure he does, I'm sure he does. I'm surprised that David might have something he just got to wear, because, you know, the regulators and his first responders are. But instead of having the Hepatitis B vaccination waiver for, could we just, adapt the policy? Could we just add something in the policy saying, you know, that it's highly recommended that, you know, the employees to have Hepatitis B vaccination when dealing with potential blood-borne pathogens, you know, and will hold the town of Bethel harmless for, you know, because, I mean, most, I mean, I just kind of look at this as the same as, I don't know, if I'm gonna go work in a restaurant, right? Where, again, you have the whole Hepatitis that comes into things and, you know, usually, you know, you kind of know that you probably ought to have the Hepatitis if you're gonna go work in the food business, but usually the employer's not gonna stay, you know, have this or you get to sign this form or that they're gonna pay for the vaccinations themselves. Now, if you work in a hospital setting, most of the time, they'll do the vaccinations while they have them anyways. So I just wonder if, should we be, you know, do we even need this form? Well, I think for the waiver form is that it's supposed to be visited every year. So you're supposed to go back to your employees, whether they're different or new or whatever, and it says it in the body of this document and review whether or not they have up-to-date vaccinations. And so if they're taking the policy, so the way we typically do policies for employees is they look at them really at one time, I hate to say it, but they look at them and are first adopted and they sign off saying I agree with what's in there. It's the same here, right? Well, first, in the real world, and these forms allow us to kind of revisit that and do it, and typically they're signed here, but that's because the board is reviewing them also, and we're looking at them and making a small change to them and then we're giving them back to the employees and I don't know if that's always happening. So I think the form was a recommendation from OSHA and I think it was, I would say for us, it's just a way for us to have them on file and be able to go back over here and make sure that we've got a signature from everybody. For the pool, that's probably because every year I have a change in staff and every year I retrain, so every year we will do this training, every year I will collect their immunization records. So for the pool, it makes sense. I think it would be really easy to make it so that it would make sense for everybody. Hey, but do we need to pay for somebody to have this? I guess that's my question. Like, there's a difference between being required and it's recommended. Is the hepatitis B vaccination a requirement? I think this actually, you know. It is not a requirement for employees. This came from VLCT. Yeah. This, the decline was from the VLCT. But it's not, the American Red Cross does not require hepatitis B to be employed at one of their employees. No, American Red Cross doesn't, I mean, the lifeguards as for the American Red Cross does not say that in order to be a lifeguard you have to have hepatitis B. No. See, Chris's point, you really don't need to have it that we will pay for it if they want it. Well, I mean, it's a little change for sure. Well, I was just thinking more along the policy lines that there should be something in the policy that says being that you, you know, have the potential to be exposed to this to your hero recommendations. But I don't know if we need to go as far as to say that we are going to vaccinate everybody at the pool unless you sign a waiver. One, you know, I don't know if you really can do that. And two, you know, there's a substantial cost to, I don't know, I mean, say a lifeguard turnover is six people a year. You know, you got six new people a year at whatever, $50 a piece, you know, there's $300 a year vaccinations that I'm still going to have to do, you know, there's a cost there too. I would have to, I mean, I'd have to ask Wade because that, that pay. It's some of the costs we're eating because it's a mental weight case that are not, you know, they're not going to find. Well, I'm just looking back, like for instance, when I went in the health professional in college, when I went to college, there were certain vaccinations that you need to get into college, right? But then there were certain vaccinations that I had to go get on my own just because I was in the health field and have to tell you this is true. And I had to pay for that myself. So I just, you know, I understand that they're kids and you know, most of those kids are probably on their parents' churn still. I don't know if that needs to be a requirement of, of. Right, I don't know either. I mean, I just, this is language that I took right from. And I'm just thinking of this like if we end up adopting this policy to move forward and say include the highway department and the administrators and the fire department, now all of a sudden that group of six or eight people has now turned into, you know, 30 people and now the families that they pay for to have vaccinated or up to, you know, so that, you know, it could turn into more. Just kind of. Honestly, I don't know. I mean, once you're vaccinated for HIV, do you have to? I mean, it's not something that you get a booster for. I think we need to, you and I need to sit down and we'll do a little work to this. I think we maybe look at it towards more of a town policy and then address some of the other concerns. And when you're looking, you know, look at the cost factor, number one, or one of the things to look at. The possible, the boosters, yes or no, and once you get this in vaccination, are you good for 10 years, five years? I thought the hepatitis would go as a booster on it. Or you have to get two within a certain amount of time. And then. Yeah, I mean, I know my kids got them, but I don't know that they got them as adults. Because when my kids did it, they had one and then, like, within three months they had to have the second one. Seriously, but there's no boosters. Yeah, no, they don't get them as adults. You're done. But then also, once you get past your part-time employees, your full-time employees, what is our insurance code? Well, I think the discussion for them will take out the, well, first thing you check is it required? Right. Is it required? It's not required. I know it's required. So make sure that. There's no position in town, other than possibly the constable, and probably not even him, where you are required to have this shot. There isn't. I'm not sure if you think of action 10, actually, out there to sort of plan it, but I don't even think that he's required. So we'll look into that, and if it's not a requirement, I think we'll change this language. I think what I'm hearing from the board is that if it's not a requirement, there's no reason that the town would pay for it. If you choose to get it, because we recommend that you get it, because we recommend you do it, great. We provide you insurance and all that, so you can do it, but we're not going to. And anyone have to worry about a weird reform? Sure. Yeah, sure. So I think we can make those changes to that language. We also need to research and find out the requirements. If there's any departments within the city of the city, the town that requires a shot, and I know the answer to no. American Red Cross is the only one I want to think of, maybe. And they don't. And they don't, okay. So we can, we'll make some changes and we'll worry about it. How about that? No, I think that'd be good. Again, I think just one word of good policy is we should be looking town-wide, covering the entire umbrella, which it's good if we didn't have one. I think this is great. We should definitely adopt one, especially nowadays. Okay, we will bring it back and probably the next meeting. And it'll be a really good job putting it together. Well, thank you. Anything that involves OSHA is a challenge. Any further discussion? Okay. Is the insurance that we have, the town insurance? Do they get involved in any of these? That's what I'm thinking of getting to check. Yeah, we'll need to get to check what it is. You know, in most of these, again, this is gonna be, well, for the pool experts, they're not sure, they're not sure if it's for us, but that's something we'll check into. Well, but still there's a liability insurance of some kind at the pool. Yeah, but that wouldn't cover this, because it's not a required shop. It's not something you're ever gonna have for your position. And that'll be part of what we check. We'll also check and see if our insurance was sort of coping that with some of the issues. And really we have, I mean, again, preface, you know, these guards are well trained. They're well trained to respond quickly with all the gear that, you know, they have in their own personal packs, which I just learned yesterday, because we've got a bunch of kids that are getting certified actually right now as we speak. The American Red Cross is now requiring that every lifeguard as they are out at the pool have a pack already on their person with all the supplies that they need right there so that they don't have to run to the office or we don't have to waste time getting. But with that said, we will do everything we can to reduce the risk of exposure in the first place. And I think, and that's, and you know, and part of that is even more training, you know. Again, teaching the staff before you go and touch that, you need to be fully geared up. You need to take a moment and do what you need to do to protect yourself first. And so, you know, we're gonna stress that and stress that time and time again so that the risk is going to be minimal. If... I might have missed this, like the, to get the proper PPE and the, you know, disposal of containers and things. You were getting some sort of grant for that No, I just used my supply budget to get these. They weren't real expensive actually. One thing, I mean, it may wanna, you know, I'm sure if you reached out to Gifford or something, they may, you know, donate, you know, some of that. Well, I already have it now for the pool, but again, if the fire department needs it or if the town office needs it. We can get a part of our passive grant to our show. I'm just thinking there might be opportunities to get it donated or through grants I'm sure there's an opportunity to stop that. Yeah. But, I mean, we should have that, you know, I mean, at the garage or at the office or, you know, we should have a disposal container and gloves and things like that. You know, I'm sure we don't, but we should, you know. You need those kind of gloves just to walk around the town garage. So, what are you talking about? So, I mean, I think you, you know, they have those, we ought to have all that. I know, I do have those, so. Yeah, yeah, yeah, like I said, I need to pass a grant with probably the first window to utilize to get that kind of stuff. So, we'll do some, make some changes and we'll make it back. Okay. Okay, thank you. Thanks. You're welcome. Yeah, thank you. And we have the Lister Education Grant. Yeah. I don't think there's actually any word even sign, I just saw this today, but what of our listeners is going to some classes and they're getting a grant for scholarship, I think, for the classes. So, I don't know if they're asking for an approval just for the minutes, just so we have it. They don't seem really, but he has to sign it today. Thanks, Steve. Well, I know we had mentioned here months ago about being aware of all the grants and, you know. Sure, sure. I just didn't know if maybe there was more to this than I was missing, but if I don't mind, you know, if I don't mind, we have a deal motion just so we have it, just to approve the application. So, I would make a motion to approve the application for the Lister Training. Okay, all in favor? Use of these to call them a grant, but using these are, you give your cost for going to the training and you pass it in the state. Yeah, you go on the whole channel. And we talked last time about, and again, that's just something that have a little more information around here. And every year the, you know, the pencil looking exercise of all the nominations and then place of business for animals. Usually we just kind of go with the country animal hospital and send it on its way. And a couple of us had asked this year if maybe we could just get a little information on regards to the others that are in the community, being that we don't have an animal hospital in Bethel. It's gonna be at all sorts anyways. So, great. Just to real quick, I just put it together real quickly here right now. You know, I didn't give you the cost for the emergency services because they all are in the variable place depending on what services they need. They all, both of the country animal hospital and the Randolph animal hospital provide the same services at a comparable rate. The only thing that's different is their night and boarding rate. So the Randolph hospital is a little bit cheaper for night than the country animal hospital. The big one here for when I was talking to Mark is the 24-hour rate of ability. He actually has a key to this so he can get in and take the animals at 24-7. Randolph, they don't offer that and they like it when they go to negotiate with them and ask them, but as of right now, they do not. That, and in Randolph regional bed, they don't want one of them just a vet clinic out of the thing so they don't have any of these things. So I just took a couple that was apparently close to us. I didn't want to go too broad on this because it kind of beats the purpose of driving a whole long way for a couple of hours. Yeah, one in Brooklyn is more closer for Mark and more stronger than the other. And we've been with them for a while so there's a little bit of a comfort there. They are pretty good about calling us whenever they're proposing to do something to an animal. That's more of the outside of the emergency and find out it's something that we do willing to pay for but it's something that we want to do. Remember any way of recouping any of these costs? The only time we recoup costs is if somebody adopts the, they'll pay for part of it. Or if the owner themselves goes against them. Yes, if they get taken in by Mark for an issue with the owner for the owner or something, then the owner has to pay all of these things like that. Most of them. There's just a couple of things that don't. Yeah, but majority of them either. But for the most part. So if you bring this great cat in, well not now. A dog. And by the way, I got a call from him that he was mad because we don't take cats anymore. But, you know, there's what it is. So if they dogging out that and it doesn't get adopted, then that's not going to look good all the time. And it stays there for the time it is. So whatever the emergency fees are plus the, until it goes to, it goes to Woodstock. I believe it's one of the actual, kind of majority of the dogs will be adopted. But they do a pretty good job here of trying to adopt them out from that facility to walk there. They know the streets and don't walk anywhere. So anyway, that's just kind of a really quick, very nice. If you're comfortable with one of these three I would entertain a motion to designate it as already. Sound initial from the work was to stick with the animal. Yeah. Country animal. That's the one that we stayed with Country Animal was. Second? Okay, all favor? All right. Thank you. So I would assume at the next meeting Greg will finish up with the rest of the appointments. We still have, I remember right, we still have a few appointments that we haven't finished yet. So we'll, we'll have that the next. Yeah. There's a couple of ideas. Yes. We'll get a constable report. It didn't look like there was too much activity. Look into there. Only two shifts. That's not right. Yeah. He didn't work in some long shifts. I believe it wasn't one day. That one was 11, one was nine. Yeah. That's not it. One was a trip to Maryland. Well, the eight to nine team was town. Yeah. The, the opiate training. Yeah. So was that something that shared by the towns? I think he was talking about that, that was paying for the training. Right. I guess the only thing that. Oh, that's good. Because at the end of town, I think based on the training and he might have taken it from the car and he paid for the hours. That's something we're still working on. How the balance had to happen, remember? Yeah. Because honestly, it's, there are issues with it all the way around. How we balance things out because it's not, it's not a one-third split anyway. It's tight and not a split or anything. So that's something we need to really work on as he does more trainings related to this. And maybe it's just a time of year, but this seems my observations of late and looking at the blogs that he's not doing as much. I mean, I still see him around the community, but he's not patrolling as many hours, but what I'm gonna say, you know, in the community as normal. Seems like more of his, half of his hours are spent on training with others here in the last month or so. Maybe it's just this time of year. Yeah, I don't know. Training time in the rest of the year is done, but it just, like, you know, in the summer and fall, you know, we were getting like four shifts with the work. And you know, there was a lot of activity going on and it was all like in the community. And now it seems like we're getting like two or three shifts and one or two of those shifts is spent doing training or something else. It's not really, yeah, I don't know. I'm not gonna ask him that maybe just a time of year for his training to happen. You know, he has tried to explain where he's policing, he's kind of can't go over. Yeah, and I see him out of the bell, you know? I don't know. I'll ask him why there was a, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if the training's all happened or anything, I'll see you because it's not. And it couldn't be. But I have seen lately that this state troopers have been doing more patrolling in our community than normal. Yeah. Maybe he talks to them. And I saw him make stops the day after day. But I've seen them out and about. They've been hanging out at the fire station and other places quite a bit lately. So, at least one or the other is in the community. It's good. So, but I'm sure as spring comes that summer and the speeds will go up better. Well, right now, I mean, I'm gonna tell you. This is obviously a beautiful run. I don't know if the scoops are talking or not. This past weekend it seemed in the community here that there was a lot of how to state vehicles. But I noticed that stop eating, that, you know, getting gas. It was the influx on this weekend. So, it was an insightful thing, beautiful. Well, most of the roads, you can't even do the speed limit right now, so. Well, you're not doing that. I guess you won't get any tickets. And we had planning commission. Yes, you're telling us planning commission back then. And it looks like they are in desperate need of help. We've ever. They're averaging to three people. I mean. We have advertised for that multiple times. And it looks like right now we're struggling for a hell of a lot of committees. You know what's funny about that? Planning commission, rec committee. Remember that flyer group we had for a town meeting? We called everybody and said, hey, can you meet people? And the ones that responded were the ones that responded. Nobody else seems to have an issue. So, I don't know if there's, here's I think the problem. I don't know that we've got a real defined set of what board, what those boards are supposed to work on. You know, typically you've got, you've got it defined. It says it's made up, it's comprised of five members with a chair, and this is what they did. You know, they made recommendations on this kind of area. So it kind of defined what their purpose and what the structure was like. I don't know that I've seen anything, in my office, that really does that for all the boards. Isn't that kind of what the operator's manual doesn't mean currently? He could, yeah. It's sort of intended for it. I don't know, I haven't read it. I haven't gone through it very far. It would be worth if it's not in there currently making sure that it's in there. But I think that's exactly what their intent is to give people that informational aspect of how things function, not just from the town, but from more than just that. But it's a perfect venue for that. It just seems like, I mean, all committees are important, but when you get into the planning commission, conservation committee, those are two of your larger, more important, you know? And it seems like they're very down on membership right now, and actually probably, I think the energy committee has the most attendees right now, which is great to see, but we need to fill these other ones. And you ask some of them, are you okay, well enough, you meet people and they say, oh, we're great, and it made me tour three. And then others say, we need people, I'm gonna make me tour three. But looking at the planning commission, it's that with only three people coming, you'll see this meeting got postponed to this date because we have three people, it takes one person that doesn't come in, and the wreck is the same way. Absolutely, and wreck's struggling too. I mean, not that we don't wanna spend any money, but somehow we just, you know, I don't know if we can maybe do something with the Facebook page or something that doesn't cost anything that. We try it again, we get that flyer out there. Like Gary Armore and we know you or something. Yeah, we can repost that flyer. And I slow the player with the paper, if you're really nice. And I sent free board with the paper. Maybe like in bold letters. I don't know. I wasn't thinking the same. All the slack board talked about was because we need committee members. Feel free to follow our channel. Picture with Greg. We need you. I had that. Did you see our flyer sitting on top? We need you. But we, on our flyer company, we didn't have it on the same. Yeah, I'm not sure. I know. I'm not sure. Well, you don't want to do that. The planning commission right now they've just got a lot of work ahead of them. The talent they have, like that's up. Yeah, they're working on this flyer committee. Yep, I mean that's part of they need more members. Yeah, I mean they need probably at least two more committee members. We have advertising coming here to three. Advertise since I started here. For everything. Just nobody, you know, we had, I don't know, we put in 150 flyers for talent committee and nobody, not a thing, not a thing. Well, we got somebody that on the sewer board. Well, there was another person for energy. Make it happen. Sure. Well, I don't know. You have an in? But yeah, so it's a tough deal. It really is, you know. It's not real good. It pays. Oh, all the company. So Greg, this one for the meeting of 220, 19 for the planning commission. Says the next meeting is going to be in September. That must be a misprint. That's a lot with the two burgers. Next meeting. Next meeting will be Kimber 20th, 7 p.m. at the level tower. Yeah, I mean they were meeting monthly. Enrollments down so now. Yeah, I don't know. Maybe they're going to be a misprint. Well, the new plan is going to be important. They usually meet monthly once a month. Yeah, I guess that's a misprint. Once a month. And it's only draft, but hopefully we'll pick it up. This is a draft. Hope we don't pick that up in the final. Yeah, they could have printed it out a little bit here. Well, they're pretty good right out there. It takes a lot of electricity to print assets. Yeah. Costs more than costs or something. Yeah. Hope we don't have it on the agenda. I guess we can't approve the meeting minutes. You know what? I got the minutes into the town office late because we had a challenge in the week at our bus stop. They were there Friday morning, but I needed some clarification on a couple of things. And I think it just is a little bit much to get an impact. Yeah. We'll just bring it back up. Yeah. Yeah. My problems with that. Well, we have it. Does anybody have any questions in regards to the answer that they could be amended prior? And that's me and Eric. Are we good with them? No, since I haven't seen them. Tarzan, did you not get it back? Did you not get it here? They are in the packet. Trees told me they were not in the packet. I have not. You have the minutes from last week? I have. No, these are the amended ones over the 25th. Yeah. We don't have them. Yeah, we don't have them. You don't have the last weeks. That's the last weeks. I haven't even reviewed those, anyway. Oh, okay. They're still on my computer, and we need to do a sign-event anymore. Yeah, I think it was good. Yeah. I know, this is the one with the edits that we did. Right, and we did the edits. Yeah. I'll make the motion now to be accepted. Okay, all right. Do you have a two-point phone number? Yes. Okay, I'll start with that. They shouldn't be accepted, Eric, because we already make it amended. Yeah. Yeah. We just got a sign-event. I think they were accepted pending then. They weren't. They were pending then. That's kind of a sign-event. Oh, we didn't get a yellow one, just, real honestly, the yellow ones didn't need areas, because I do have a thousand long, and you saw the conservation convention also as well? Yep. You're in there? Okay. Does anybody else have anything else? Anyone agree? In the session.