 Your business will be to adjourn the meeting of May 25th. I was considering this part of the select board bill. So, can I have a motion to adjourn the meeting of May 25th? So moved. Second? Second. Okay, all in favor? Aye. So that meeting is adjourned. We have a decision, we have written the decision, and we will be posting that on the town website tomorrow for everybody to see. And I believe the people, the two people involved have already received courtesy copies. But we'll be sending them official copies tomorrow. Okay. Now, minutes of May 22nd. Any changes? Okay. Motion to move to accept. Motion to move to accept. Did you get that rose? Okay. All in favor? Aye. Aye. And finally, the minutes of May 25th, which was the right-of-way hearing. Oh, no, that's not funny. We've got three sets of minutes. Can we just do them all in one motion? Does anybody have any changes on either of those? Okay. Motion to accept the other two. Okay, second. So it's the 22nd, the 25th, and... And the 22nd, the 25th. Because we did two hearings on the 25th. We did the right-of-way hearing and then the dog hearing. Okay. Board orders are coming around. Oh, they're in front of me. Let me pass them this way. Fire truck. Let's see. Barbara, that's right in front of me. You guys have all seen this. This is... We authorized a bank loan for the East Montpelier fire truck. Now we actually have to authorize somebody to sign the contract. Would somebody please make a motion to authorize... I guess we all have to sign it. To authorize us to sign this loan document, which I will pass around. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Okay. Barbara, it looks like there's two pages to sign there. Yeah, there's... I think there's like three little sticky notes on there. Oh, three different languages. There's nice little sticky notes on it. Oh, okay. I think they're on there. They're on there. No, they have nice little flowers. Okay. I'm going to pass this around to Signature. Next one's the Cant Hill Scoping Project. The one that we signed last month. They found a couple of typos. She had written what those were. They were just pretty minor. They date changes and a couple of other things. So everybody okay with my signing the new one? That would just be me, apparently. Yes. Okay. And today, what's the date today? 12. Oh, yeah, I should know that. 12. No, this one doesn't need all of us. This is just for Barbara. The Merp Grant, which Scott so wonderfully prepared for us. We have it right here and this needs... How many signatures does this one need? Okay. Will somebody authorize me to sign this, please? Second. All in favor? Okay. Pass that over. Oops, sorry. You guys have to sign this one. Thank you. Oh, thank you, Scott. So Scott, I'm just going to have to tell my assistant to you. Okay, next one is the Lightning Ridge Road Paving Project, which was completed last year. They've now sent us the grant reimbursement form. And this one, we all have to sign in order to let them send us the money. Can I have a motion on that one? Go ahead. There was an amendment piece to that where they had paid the 40,000 of the initial grant and then it went over budget, so it was amended. That's right. Thank you for explaining that. Okay. Did somebody move to sign this? No, not yet. So moved. Thank you. Second. All in favor? All right. Okay. That one's done. The Weck Collar Hill application, you all had that in your packets. Whatever gets this. The road crew, has the road crew looked at that? Yes. And what do they say about it? Okay. That's why. It's good as presented. And Neil has also looked at it, and he said, I guess you all saw this, he said that they're going to be cutting some ash trees, which is fine with him because we're cutting ash trees anyway because they're all going to explode all over the roads. Actually, I think he said that there weren't likely any that needed to be cut down, but he encouraged them while they were trimming some of the other trees to also take care of that hash tree. Is that what he says? He said before the beetles kill them. Yeah. So if they're not to the ACF, it seems like it's going to be an extra curricular for Weck. I misunderstood it. I thought he was saying they would be cut. Okay. So then we should add to the application that we'd like them to cut the ash trees. Yeah. Okay. With that change, let me just see here. Does anybody familiar with that application? I was having an hard time understanding whether or not they were like relocating. I saw where they were identifying where the new pole was going to go. Were they going to move the distribution line to follow that? Yeah, I didn't understand either. Anybody? Okay. What would you like to do? There's more of a curiosity. It'd be great if they were putting in a new pole and relocating new distribution if they weren't going to also have another power distribution line that was several hundred feet away from it if they were needed. But that wasn't entirely clear on the application. It'd be nice, I guess, that we can give them some feedback to offer a little bit more clarity around the scope of work. Yeah, like is it for a new house? What's that? Is it for a new house? Yeah. I mentioned one adjacent property owner, but I didn't say whether or not it was being put into the service, service them and particulars. Do you know that, John? No. We basically understood that what the Washington County wants to do, they're going to do it there. Actually, courtesy, but that didn't even ask us, it's okay. To a certain extent. I don't know about that. There's one on the line. Yes, but if we ask them not to remove a certain tree and deal with certain things, they'll generally do that. So that's kind of why we're looking at it. Yeah. I mean, sometimes distribution upgrades trigger Act 250. I mean, there's a lot of things that happen with distribution upgrades. I don't think it's just a courtesy. Seems like a good thing to inform us about. Barbara, I don't see a place here to add those conditions or requests. That's more than they remind for us. Oh, wait. I'm sorry. I do see it at the bottom. So we're going to subject to the following special conditions, which is please remove ash trees. I think that's the only one. Yeah. Okay. What happens to, does somebody come get firewood when they chop down a big tree? They belong to the landowner. If the landowner doesn't want them, then they can take it. But generally, on our land, they just leave them lying. And if we get them, we can't. We do. And if we don't, they rot. Yeah. So just filling this in. That's the George Leonard Road one, right? No. This is Collar Hill. We're putting the George Leonard Road one aside for now. Because that has other conditions. And I've talked to Lewis Porter about that one. Because we're concerned that it has to do with the whole class board road. And he said that they could wait until our next meeting for us to deal with that one. Dean? Yes. On the top of that application from Washington Electric or whatever, is this town a work field? So it does. Yeah. Good catch for this. I'll sign this later. So Barbara, remind me to please to sign this later. OK, that comes to the end of that section. Next, we're going to consider appointing Cole Bliss, who is not here, but we've worked with him. So we told him he didn't have to come. Would somebody like to move to appoint Cole Bliss? As our constable and our animal control officer contingent upon his finishing his training for the two jobs. Sound moved. I didn't know about the constable part. Is an animal control officer always a constable? No. The constable is the person generally in the town. The only thing the constable does is serve orders on people. OK. They don't have the authority to do anything. Do the kinds of things that a normal police officer person would do. Although we could. We could require that they get the training, which would be months. And then we would have a police officer. Yeah. We just used the reason for that. But in the past, we usually the same person has served both. All right. We have a motion. Did we get a second? Second. OK. All right. Great. We also have an applicant for the conservation commission. Is Larry here? No. OK. Let's follow up. Oh. Yes. Oh, hi. Good evening. And you'd like to be on the conservation commission. I would. I am following the appeals for new members and finally just reached a point where I thought, OK. They're meeting last Wednesday night. Seems like a great group of folks. And I'm really interested in a number of the issues that the commission is taking up. Invasive species. And perhaps even looking at the potential for a community land trust. And I'll add that we got an email from the commission. Any questions for Paul? Yeah. Larry's email. You mentioned your previous work experience was relative to the commission. Was there? No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. In addition to a lifelong amateur naturalist hunter fishermen sugar maker lots of time out in the woods. We graduated with a B.S. and biology and went to work for the state of Vermont in Waste Water Treatment Biology spent 35 years assisting communities with treatment plant problems, issues in biological treatment, have done stream surveys, have done, well, picked bugs for TDC where you do a stream survey, a stream sample, and then sit down and identify them down in the genus and sometimes species, so familiar with aquatic biology. And would you say that there are, like, in particular, conservation needs that Cal's community needs in particular that you see are being underserved that they focus on? What I'd really like to get involved with is the push that the commission is now taking up on invasive species. Inventory and addressing, choosing a couple of species to really focus on the present time and trying to organize a community effort to address the invasive, attack them if we can. And the other issue that I'm interested in is a community land trust. I've learned that the land trust is no longer interested in smaller parcels. I had talked to them about a dozen years ago about conserving my property, but at that time they were not interested in parcels smaller than 50 acres, but were willing to talk to me if I could combine with a neighbor to bring up a parcel besides 50 acres. Now, we had looked at several neighbors putting together parcels and approaching 200 acres and they weren't interested because of the amount of work that it takes for the land trust to oversee and maintain the conservation needs. So thinking that the conservation of parcels 200 acres and larger is very important. It's going to be a way to guess toward that 30 by 30 and I don't know about 50 by 50, but in addition to large parcels, I think that it's important to preserve some smaller working forest parcels and that's where I think a community land trust might be able to come in and benefit the challenge. One more question. Before this board came into, I guess, was installed, you had emailed each one of us about another issue that you're really passionate about, which is affordable housing. And I guess I'm curious what your thoughts are around the sometimes competing interests of wanting to keep parcels and property affordable and developable and the goals of conservation as well. Yes, and I agree. I wrote that I see a real need for affordable housing and said something about my son, Andrew, is now renting over in his callus, but he and Rachel looked for months and when they finally found this place, that first day took temporary to receive 35 contacts about that particular apartment. We definitely need to have affordable housing and how to balance the need for conservation in our forested and wetland areas with being able to put in small developments that will increase the numbers of houses in that $150,000, $200,000 range that might be affordable by a young couple these days. That's going to be difficult to do. I think I mentioned in that email that I was wondering if there was some way to incentivize property owners that are in areas that would be appropriate for development of affordable housing and by the same token incentivize the conservation of wooded parcels that are contributing to a working landscape. Dare I say it, that's something the planning commission could look into. You'll be working on the town plan next, so maybe you can be thinking about that. I'm sure you will. Thank you. We're lucky to have you. So let's, is there a motion? No. Pardon me? I move that we appoint Paul all under two. Do I hear a second? Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Okay. It's a four year term that expires in 2026. Thank you. Generator for the Town Hall. Nick, you're on. Welcome to the town hall. Two proposals, contracts from Brookfield Service for the generator here at the town hall and a generator at a performing community center, which I thank you for having me here last time. I don't know if you have a copy. I'm here to see your formal approval and signature and check for $8,000. So that's this thing you put in front of me. It looks like somebody else needs to sign it. Just a check. If you have a document that you want to sign, is that right? Looks like the same document. But it looks like it's supposed to be filled out by. There's one for the Town Hall and one for the Maple Corner. Two separate contracts. It's highlighted on the front page, which is Town Hall, which is community center. Oh, okay. And that's the same thing that you have. Okay. Yes. So this one is for the Town Hall and that one's for the community center. I see it. Okay. That's a signature. So what you want is customers' name. And who's the customer? The town of Calis. Town of Calis. Okay. And you've all, we've had this in our packet, right? You've all. And just to what you already know is that the contractor is asking for a deposit of $4,000 for each of the two projects. So as soon as that is available and I have a signed contract, I will send that off to Brookfield Service. Okay. And then the Department of Public Safety will receive a financial report form for me to reimburse 50% of that deposit expense. Are they propane? Pardon? Are they propane? Yes, they are propane. Yeah. I'm just going to use the existing tank where that goes. And these are to come from ARPA funds. Is that right? Yes. Okay. That was what the previous board had agreed to. Okay. So what you need is one signature and somebody to fill out the rest of this. If you like, I can fill in the line that says who the owner is. Yeah. The customer's name. There are some other decisions about additional services. Do we want an extended service contract and so on? But I think that we'll talk about that later. Okay. Questions for Nick? And usually our maintenance contracts with the generators, these prior select boards, it had to decide do you want it twice a year or once a year to come and service the generators? And I think that when we get, they're going to do the work in late July or maybe early August. And so when we get closer to that date and that's when they want the rest of the money, we can, we have a little time to talk about those details. The contract does this. The one that we're agreeing to and does include, let's see, this is five year parts to your service warranty and so forth. So there are some baseline services included. Those are maintenance contracts. Right. So I'll be coming back to ask you questions about what we want to add onto the agenda. I just wanted the select board to know that it's ongoing maintenance. How often? You can't either once or twice a year. And you'll tell us what you recommend when the time comes. Okay. And you can look at the one at the town office or the school and see what their contracts are. Okay. All right. Scott had, Scott had questions. And that just made me think of what the relationship between the like ownership of the generator at the community center, community center responsibilities versus town responsibilities in maintenance. Well, the town go on the generator, community center. But that's a discussion. Who should be paying for the maintenance? It might be the community center. So we'll talk about that. Does it include all the wiring and switches to connect it up? It does. Yeah. And a snow stand to get it a few feet up off the ground. Those are complicated. Are we ready, folks? Can we sign this? Not the check. We signed this, right? Yes. And let's see. I guess I've been talking with Gabrielle and Sandra about having Sandra's been working on getting the deposit prepared and ready. So I don't know what the next step is there. Do I go back to Sandra and say, okay, I'm ready for the check? She has the same voice as that one. She received the invoice and she said it's all good to go. But I'm not sure what that means. I think we signed up on it at this point. Oh, you did? Yeah. So it's something for Rookie up in there. Okay. So Barbara should probably inform Sandra tomorrow that it's all signed. Okay. And a few words, Barbara. Okay. So I need a motion to authorize. Again, it looks like one, so me to sign. So move. Okay. So it is signing for the Maple corner generator and the Callis-Town Hall generator. Okay. Do we have a second? Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Thank you. Thanks for having me. Um, the favorite curb cut that's been in your package. Um, road crews happy with it? That's good. You gave them two options. Oh, right. Would you explain more? I'm not sure we decided on that. And we went by the road standard and found out that nobody has that kind of sight distance. He didn't shoot it. He didn't shoot it. That kind of what? Off-shed. Off-shed. What does that mean? It's a sight distance. The question is, what's a sight distance? Yeah. Did you get an answer? It's gotta be from three foot above the hot roadway. At the end of this driveway, looking both ways, keep the height of three foot, but they will see two hundred feet by feet with twenty-five miles per hour. And it didn't happen and it didn't count. It didn't happen. That is true. That is true. But he's a medical student. He marked out the options. The one option we compromised because he's putting his, he's already got a plan for a setting system and that one option. So he's going to clear the trees on the best visibility we can get. So what exactly are we putting on restrictions and conditions then? That he was going to clear those trees out. We haven't walked off a wooden. Okay. Clear trees as marked by... You don't have to improve the sight distance. Okay. Well, I'll just say as marked by road. Crew. You saw it. Yeah. But we just need to write it in here. So I just want to get it right. And Neil said it was, no, this was not a Neil issue. Okay. So, any other questions for John? Is it in the speciality element or is that a new... He's going to stop the project. He's going to stop the project. Okay. Everybody happy? Okay. I'll take a motion to approve this and sign it. So moved. Second. Second. Janie seconds. All in favor? Aye. All right. Okay. Did you vote in? I did. Okay. How are we doing? Oh, sorry. Barbara, yes. That's okay. I just wanted to... You skipped the swim committee appointments. Oh my goodness. Thank you. Yeah. That's okay. And I don't know if you want to talk about the participant doc. They're not here to talk about it. But if you want to talk about it, it's on the agenda. I'll explain that. Yeah. So we have no swim committee at the moment. And these three people that are listed, Daniel Peany, Pam Kentish and Adrian Wade, have volunteered to do it. So they would be appointed for one year terms. Okay. And they're not here. But they've done it in the past. So would you guys be okay with re-appointing them, essentially? As long as they know it's coming. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. They do. Okay. I'll take a motion to re-appoint them. So moved. Jamie moves. Second. Jordan seconds. All in favor? Aye. Okay. Now, one of the things that precipitated this is that the old raft that's out in Curtis Con has been sort of falling apart. They feel it's no longer safe. So Mark has been costing out... Mark is our harbormaster. Did you know we had a harbormaster? Yeah. I guess he got a hat with the job, is that right? So Mark's been costing them out and he's got some specs. The concern is what he wants is to use some of their budget to pay for it. And since they manage their budget, I don't think we need to weigh in on that. And they plan to fundraise for the rest. But the concern is that we will be the ones putting the raft out. So we are going to be liable. So we, Barbara, I believe, called Passif, our insurance company, and asked them to look it over and decide whether or not the specs that Mark sent or to tell us whether they would cover us for that. And have they responded? Yeah. So Mark did send the specs to Larry Smith. It was our passive representative here in Calis. And that one on Friday, and of course Larry had an out-of-office message that he'd be out of the office on Monday back on Tuesday. So we haven't heard back from Passif that what we thought was, since you guys are here together, if you would like to approve the purchase and installation of the dock, dependent on the Passif saying yes and it meets their insurance specifications. So was it previously insured? I can't speak to that. My guess is it was because when we talked to Sandra about the dock, she's the one who made it real clear that the town would hold liability and it would need to be insured by Passif. So my guess is it was, but I haven't been involved in the past. I'm not sure. Maybe John knows. Maybe Rose knows. Everything is insured. I don't think it came up. Everything's insured, right? It's a town facility, but it's good to check in. Things are shifting. I suspect the previous one was insured, but whether it was or wasn't, this one needs to be. Donna? Two things. One is when Passif figured out that we had a swimming area, I was the one that met with them. So they were over there and saw everything and we had to wrap them. The second year, there was a tourist fund reserve fund. They decided not to use that. They do not want to dip into the reserve fund for this. They have a sort of a GoFundMe style campaign built and ready to launch as soon as we give them thumbs up. Am I misremembering that they come short of that, that they mentioned that they were hoping to dip into that and that's kind of why it was coming to us? They have some money in the budget and they think they want to use some of the 2,500 is my memory. Does that sound right of that? Which they have. Other questions? Okay, so as Barbara said... Do we need to prove them if they need it to use some of the reserve fund if they decide to do that? Well, they're not asking for that. So, no, I don't think we do at this point. They'll have to come back to us if they want to do that. What we do need to do is just make sure the raft is safe. Rose, did you get the motion as... Yeah, the way it was on the agenda. So we just need the motion to approve the purchase and installation of the new dock for a corresponding area contingent on final asset insurance. Not a dock, right? Well, that says dock. Here you see the terms dock, float, raft, interchangeably. We should change it to raft. This is raft, yeah. Okay, would somebody like to move that? So move. Okay, second? Second. All in favor? Aye. All right. Barbara, would you let me or us know as soon as you're here I'm in close contact with some of the folks who are here today. I'm in close contact with some of the folks here today. Since we hear from Larry Smith from for tomorrow. Yes, he better. You serve our contact with the outside world, don't you? Hazard of the job. Good job. Before they came. Okay, Barbara did I miss anything else? Are we now a finance advisory committee? Okay, Charlotte sent us a couple of documents. Have you all had a chance to look them over? I saw one document or were there multiple documents? Two. What was the other one? One was a finance committee. And one was budget plastics. Oh, okay. And each was, you know, under two things. I really don't know all 25 documents. That was two of those. So, do you want to talk? Yeah, please. When we were talking about who was running for select board and very cheerfully said, I don't understand a thing about finance. You had to tell us again in public. Yes. What she's been doing, which I think is fabulous is delegating among select board members and even to outside the select board for expertise. And I think that's a terrific way of doing it. The more the select board can appropriately delegate, the more manageable the job is. So, hooray for you for having that point of view. And so, you may remember also that in an earlier select board meeting, I offered to be, to start a finance committee. And the question was, well, what would a finance committee do? And so the document that says finance committee tries to answer that question. And it didn't even be an actual committee. Donna, I think, reminded me that if we're fewer than three people we don't have to have all those rules about open meeting and, you know, all of those things. And it would be a very ad hoc kind of group, only if there's a need. So, here are some possible topics. And so I might just ask you what questions occurred to you as you were bringing through this. Anybody? I think, when I was looking at the budget process proposal and both, but I mean, for me a really key topic is what our future staffing looks like, you know, our professional ongoing staff to provide continuity to future select boards. And so I think I just, I don't know, I just wondered if that was kind of built in enough to that kind of budget process proposal. It is built into the finance committee proposal. And there are other groups of people working on those kind of staffing questions as well. Yeah. But one of the key things is once you decide what your staffing is, you do need a plan for how you are going to set compensation. So you need a metric and then you need to track it and make sure that you're keeping up because otherwise you will get behind and you'll lose people. And so the finance piece of that, Donna did a very thorough job description, but not at all about the compensation piece and that's one of your important pieces. I think Donna wants to check. So it seems, I'm looking at the finance committee piece here and it seems like each one could be a conversation. And as far as, as far as compensation, I have done some research on that. I have access now to the Vermont League of Cities and Towns website and gave them permission to talk to me. And then also East Montpelier has offered to loan us the compensation study that the league does. I don't, I don't think we've participated. We don't get a free copy, but I can go to the town administrator and she'll let me look at their copy. So I think that's a whole other sort of project is when we decide what our personnel is going to be in the office, you know, what's the compensation going to be? And I don't think it's something we're going to figure out tonight. But it is an important piece of it for sure. Maybe you may be able to make some recommendations for sure. I just think this is a lot to cover tonight. No, no, we were just trying to get some examples of how we would interact with this committee. I think that's what we're trying to do. Yeah, exactly. So other questions? So one of the things I was noticing when I put down these questions was did I know any of the answers to all these things? And in fact, I didn't know that the hybrid budget was bigger than the select board budget until I looked and found that out. And I thought, hmm, that's interesting. And I'm not sure that we've had a really thoughtful approach to purchasing all those really extensive pieces. Also, the debt that the town has, our biggest debt over time is the East Mongolia Fire Station. And members know that that was a very fancy project. And what members would ask us for the same thing in terms of contribution? You simply don't have somebody currently on that building committee. We do know. But considering how much we're paying for East Mongolia, that that is one of our biggest, that is our biggest debt because a lot of the other debt is being paid off. We definitely need somebody on that committee to make sure that Woodbury is not planning the same level of generosity in what they want to build. East Mongolia has every bell and whistle they could think of and more. The one thing that is cheerful about the Woodbury new fire project is they're starting to clear the spot for it and it's not a very big spot. So that's good news. So that is a piece of advice I'm offering. I think John, do you know who was on the committee before? I just want to get that up for Woodbury. I just want to comment on the statements made about the East Mongolia fire station. Do we want to get into that tonight? I just want you to understand that there was a vote, at least two votes, Scott and I worked on this. I was on the select board. You were on the select board. I was the chair. We reduced the cost to like two million. I agree with Charlotte that we should be concerned or careful with agreeing to financing at another fire station in Woodbury. But I just want you to, it came up about affordable housing here. Things aren't what they used to be in terms of cost. The average cost to build a house in the state of Vermont is $555,000. So to build a fire station for two million, besides we had it there, that fire station would probably be $7 million now. This FYI, it could be a small one. It'll be expensive for distances. My point is that we need to be involved in that because that's one of, I mean, we're paying more than we are. I'm a deletion to attend those meetings. It wasn't an official thing. It was Denise Wheeler and Barry Bernstein. Oh, Barry was going. But those people were doing it on their own initiative. It wasn't a formal assignment, but these meetings were being had without, like, formal invites. Yeah, I see. Okay. Seven. Eight. What? You know. I'll drop this, but, you know, it's always, for the 18 years I was on the select board, it always kind of, I'll say, bothered me. And Rose has heard me say this, that we are the only town in the state of Vermont that funds two fire companies. And I would encourage you folks, finance committee, if you will, to explore why that is and what makes us so unique in this circumstance, unique, so unique. And why can't you figure out a way to be like everyone else? That's a good thought. Seven post districts. Postal districts. We're pretty unique. Ten out of a lot of ways. There are seven post offices in Caledonia. No, but seven post offices. Zip codes. Zip codes. Made it interesting when I was 9-1-1 coordinator trying to figure out. But there aren't four. Yeah. So, let's go back. The second document, which is the budget process, the reason I wrote that is simply because I've heard, I don't know where, that you might be starting your budget planning process late summer. And I'm sure you're going to have some education pieces as part of that. So, I just put this together for when you start that, this is something that you might want to think about as you do that. That's all. So, I also realize that there are a lot of people here who do have a fairly, have a lot of experience and knowledge in various finance parts. And so, I'm not implying that you all need very basic things, but I thought at the start they are anyway. I'm just not knowing what the range of experiences and I apologize if I gave anybody the sense that I was implying that you didn't have any knowledge because I know that's not true. That's a question. So, are you posing, and maybe this isn't even totally clear yet, that the committee would assist in supporting that budgeting or budget prep process? Sure. Sure. You know, this, if there's a group, it's not going to do anything unless you ask. So, it's sort of a service piece. A part of your, I don't, part of you, we don't really have time for this, but it might be really nice to have this information. Yeah, I think it's come up a couple of times with Sandra. I think getting some greater transparency within kind of core categories so that we can do a better job forecasting or trying to predict what future costs would be or identifying where we've had overages or attributed to a very specific circumstance and where we might not want to necessarily just carry over, okay, well, we saw this much. We're going to increase it by 2% next year to make sure that we're covered. I mean, that's not a very helpful exercise or a sustainable one for that matter, but everybody has the things that distract them from being able to do these deep dives. I'm one who really appreciates those things, but I certainly don't have the time to commit to doing them, and I think it would be really beneficial to kind of say that these are the core areas or even just to say we would like to see, you know, some red flags on where you think that the budget is way off or either underserved or way over-served to expenses that have been incurred in the short term over the last year. And my understanding is that Sandra, every once in a while would say something like, well, this is something the select board needs to think about, and she gives you good advice. And she makes herself very readily available, and I really appreciate that. I wish I had the time to take her up on her just as offers to provide clarity wherever I have questions, but that's where I think a committee to help kind of work on those things so that maybe the budgeting process isn't such an intense period right before the town meeting or in the first quarter of the year. If we can task a committee with some of that work considering it throughout the year, I think that could be that. That is a super idea, not to compress it into a small period too close to when it needs to be finalized. Yeah, absolutely. So how do you see yourself working with Sandra, or do you see yourself working with Sandra at all? Well, I don't know, but I think that's easy because she's so knowledgeable. For example, when she's starting to build a budget, could you be helping her gather information like what's the inflation rate or whatever it is she wants to... Yeah. And of course, the thing about budgeting is that you're looking at the future and nobody knows. I understand. What is your background working in budgeting and finance? So, I have a doctor from Stanford in education policy, but I worked for five years, maybe six years for the opposite budget management there, and we had lots of money, so it wasn't a real challenge. She was also on the school board. Oh yes, I was on the school board for many years. That's right. So that was dealing with the state systems with their categories and their rules for high budget, very like town. So how do you envision this? Do we appoint you and some other people? No, you don't need to appoint. You just need to keep in mind that help is available if you want to delegate out. That's it. I think a committee is very formal and not really needed. And are we talking about just you? Yeah, but there are several people who have volunteered to be helpful, and so depending on the topic, I would draw on others for sure. Yeah, but very eye-op. Go ahead. I don't know who thought it up, but when I came asking to kind of see this grant, this energy grant thing through, I came in thinking, you know, yeah, we've got to have a committee. There's always a committee. Somebody on the board said, you do it. Find people if you need help. No meetings, no nothing. You can go up to the board. Boy, that was genius. We really thought it up. But then you're the callous MIRP administrator. Really bad. Maybe you do it again. Right, okay. I think that Sandra and I, might together think about how to introduce a budget process to you all when you're ready and maybe guide some discussion for things that you might want to talk about. I think Sandra has been thinking about that. So that, I'm sure, two brains are always better than one. I do like the idea of having some kind of a written statement of our priorities, like our sort of, I don't know, not philosophical priorities, but just sort of an overarching budget statement. I talked to Sharon Fann and a little bit about their budgeting process and I don't know if you wrote it down or not, John, but there were definitely things that they, what sort of principles that they operated under. So I don't know if ours would be similar to that or not, but for example, this professional staffing thing, I want to, that's a priority for me anyway. For sure. And you probably all talked about this and you had your first select board meetings, what you were talking about was important to each of you, right? No, we didn't, because there were so many fires to put out. Honestly, that's how I feel anyway. I never had a conversation with them. It is about what are the things that you care about, what are your priorities, and making sure that you find a way to put dollar signs on them. Yeah, Donna's going to start helping us, well, a little bit in next, we're going to talk about Treasurer and I'm hoping at the next meeting to start talking about more and more depth about what kind of office staff we need. One more piece of information, because we haven't had this opportunity to have that conversation of what priorities would be. You know, I think when we were elected to make decisions and help govern a town, and sometimes I feel the information isn't as readily available to us to make quick decisions in the timetables that we're needing to. And thankfully, the budgetary process can be kind of a longer one that we can be more mindful and thoughtful of. Since Jan is in the room representing the Planning Commission. Of course. Yeah. One of the things that I think really is pretty critical is the quantitative information about the town and its community. And we have a great town plan. It sounds like that's the next project down the list. But the quantitative information in there is significantly dated. And we are largely making decisions as a community relative to what's represented in that town plan and its aspirations in a point of time. So, you know, in a budgetary process, if we're seeing increases in a particular line item or a need for increases in a particular line item, it would be helpful to also look at what kind of population or demographic changes have we seen. And that's a heavy lift, I think, for a single individual or even a committee to really dig into, but certainly bringing some quantitative information about new houses or permitting information that would help inform trends in the community relative to growth or not growth. That could be an interesting point of collaboration with this kind of appointment and one of the other subcommittees of the town as we're getting ready to go through that budgeting process. Okay. I think you got yourself a job. Thanks. And certainly, you know, the work that Donna is doing is also really absolutely key and we're really lucky she volunteered. Okay. Speaking of which, Donna's been working from two points of view. Well, you go ahead, you talk about it. You originally started talking about all positions but you carved out the treasurer as a discreet position and we'll talk about it. I think this is a priority. Yeah. So you have the job description. Yes. It was in the folders. Yeah. It says draft. You know, you really want to add something. This job description started with Wendy Wilton and so I've had some input. Sanders had some input. I met with Sanders before even have the job description. She's now seen it twice. I think Anu sat down with her for this. It would continue to use NEMRIC for payroll and for monthly reconciliations, mainly so that there's a separation of duties that comes to the reconciliations. But also for payroll, it's all the federal and state quarterly, monthly, annual reporting that has to go on. And I had a long conversation with Wendy Wilton, who's all over the state, you know, with NEMRIC. And she thinks it's going to be difficult to really find the person that we want. We're not going to replace Sandra. But she feels that if we get a really good bookkeeper with business background that Sandra can bring that person along, train that person in NEMRIC, then Wendy's willing to help as well. So the cost for NEMRIC doing payroll is $6,000 a year. That's in the budget. If you go to biweekly, it's $5,000 a year. And I think, aren't we paying them hourly for doing the reconciliation? That's $110 an hour. Why isn't it half if they do half the work? Where's the what? You said $6,000 a year. Every week in $5,000 if they do it? No, it's $6,000 a year for NEMRIC to do payroll. If it's decided to go payroll not every week, two weeks, we save $1,000. Why don't we save more? I don't understand. It's half the work, isn't it? Well, I don't know. The inputs are all. It's just cutting the chat. That's one piece. I guess you have to ask them right now. Because we pay half as much. I am surprised that it isn't biweekly because it allows places to pay it biweekly. We tried. And then when the unionization after the last one came to play, they asserted that that was a bargaining issue and that because they had established that they were seeking a union, that that would be unfair labor practice, ULP. And so that would be something they could bring to the labor relations board. So we had hoped to resolve that in union negotiations. But we reached a completion point. But the staff at the time didn't sign the contract. So Anne also suggested that we have a hiring committee. And so I have some names of some people. I don't know if you want to approve it or... I think that's what we would have to do. What I had suggested is that they continue to refine this if they wanted to. The committee? Yeah. The job description that they turned it into something we would advertise. Yes. So I'm thinking this committee would write the advertisements. Which would include a lot of this. Yeah. But there's two things. One is we should figure out the salary. Figure out the what? What? The salary. The salary. The salary. We can ask our finance advisory committee to work on that. And I think it would be really helpful. I'm going to get this from Santa, is to have a list of benefits and the value of the benefits. Because that is a chunk of money right there. Yeah. For a total compensation. Yeah. Also personal policy really needs that paid. But that's a matter of time. Indeed. And I'm assuming this will be a salary position, not an hourly position? We haven't discussed it. Yeah. I guess we'd take advice on that from both our committees. But so you would do the advertising. And then read through whatever resumes we get. And then select some for an interview. And conduct a preliminary interview. Yeah. Bring us some candidates. I think from the preliminary of this committee or some members of the committee would meet with applicants. Yeah. So you wouldn't have to see anybody that wasn't qualified. Yeah. And I guess we would have to appoint you as a real committee in order to do that. And you'd, I don't, I suppose for interviews you don't have to warn as an open meeting. Well, my office had like once organizational meeting with this group. And then we would go off and do our thing. Right. We had limited number of meetings. Yeah. And Sandra's agreed to be on the committee. Great. So who would you propose for this committee? Well, how about Sandra? Marianne Miller. Are you all familiar with Marianne Miller? She was former director of Head Start with Capstone Community Action. Then I asked Louis Franco. He's a human resource. He kind of sent me retired. Former human resources administrator with concept two for 15 years. Northern power for 10 years. Can you speak up? I can hear you. Oh, I can hear you. You want to email us here? Okay. Great. Thank you. Thank you. We take a note here. Okay. Community. Thanks. And then also Judy Robert. I'm hoping she'll write the ads. And she's, you know, that she was former teleporter. Was she treasurer also? No, that was both. Yeah. And if you established this as a committee of the select board the meetings are going to have to be warned. No, that's a problem. So if you don't establish it, there's a group of citizens getting together to assist you in an informal way. Yeah, but then they would have to bring us all the advertisements and ask us to actually deal with it. I have another group that's meeting informally. Yeah. That's not, that they haven't authorized yet, really. Yeah. Okay. So would you prefer we not appoint a committee tonight? I think we need to move forward. I mean, we really need to have a, it would be great if we can have a treasurer during tax season. So we would appoint you as a committee and you'll be subject to the open meeting. Yeah. Okay. What's the name of the committee? Treasurer hiring committee, I suppose. Oh. It just was one, one job. Well, but if you don't say treasurer hiring committee, if you just say hiring committee, then you could carry over to other jobs possibly. I think we might as a whole lot, it's sort of a larger concept when we get to how we might want to reorganize the office. Yeah. But it could be used in the, they could be used in the future as a stand-up. Sure. We can be with the same number. Yeah. I think for now, in order to make sure we get who we want, we'll just give it this one discreet task. I think it's an open meeting. Yeah. It's so much easier to not have a community just have a random group. So that's, you would like us to appoint you tonight then. Yeah. I think we need to move forward. Yeah. Okay. Are we ready for that? So you have the list of names. Yes. Sure. Can you say them out loud so we can hear them? No. Okay. I can say them. Donna, Sandra, Mary Ann Miller, Lewis Franco, and Judy Robert. So I would entertain a motion to appoint those five people to a hiring committee for the purpose of recruiting and screening potential candidates for the position of treasurer for the town of Callis. So... Second. Any further discussion on that? All right. All in favor. Jordan? Are they also defining the role of treasurer? They may refine the role, let's say. This is the job description right now. Everybody has input, you know, like Sandra's seen it. I don't think the other members of Mary... Yeah, Mary Ann's seen it. And she's commented on it. Yes, she's commented on it. Yeah. Judy's seen it. But I think... The select board should be defining the role. Yeah. I don't think they're going to... That's not only the role of the committee. The role of the committee is to do the advertising for the placement of the ads. So you would like this to be the final description or would you like the committee to look at it a little bit and discuss it before we... The committee? This five-person committee. My thought was that they could help us. There's three members of all we're seeing now. Okay. So I don't think... So you think this is final then? No, I think the select board has some input. I'd like to see it get tightened up like editing and things like that. It's a little long. It's got a lot of weird spacing and stuff like that. So at least on the version on the Google Drive. So just a little stuff like that. I mean if I think it could be shortened, that would be useful. You know, there's some overlap between like the experience and, you know, required ability and something like that. So I don't feel super strongly about it because you know if you're doing that, the screening and stuff. Is that something that you like to talk about? No, I thought that's what the committee did. I don't think they're going to worry about formatting. Would you just like to write out what you'd like to see changed and send it to them? Sure. Okay. Okay. Good. So then lastly, I don't know that we have to move to accept this job description. Well, for example, it doesn't say how many hours a week it is. Are we assuming it's a full-time job? Okay. So this is what Sandra said. She said, what Nemerick doing when I described, and the four hours a week of a treasurer assistant, especially through tax season, that would be 32 hours a week. But if it's a salary position, we don't have to define the number of hours. And also I talked to the league about that, and it's a select board, because right now our personnel policy says everybody works 40 hours a week, and the league says it's up to the select board to determine what the expectation is for the number of hours, like the rogue who works 40 hours. The town clerk can do whatever she wants. And I have some notes for meeting with Barbara and Sandra and Judy about hours in the past. So this number of hours really comes up when we look at the office in the town as a whole. Are you suggesting that it might not be full-time? No, I'm not. I think it's going to be 32. It's going to be at least 32 hours. Okay. Especially if this person, if we hire somebody who, you know, doesn't have municipal experience, doesn't know number, there's going to be, you know, some training time. It's going to be 60 hours during tax season. Right. Yeah, I mean it really fluctuates throughout the year. Right, Barbara? It does, but it depends on who's going to be entering and entering all the tax checks and processing them, because that's the time-taker. So are you going to pay the treasurer at a higher rate to do that, or are you going to pay the assistant treasurer at a lower rate to do that? So that depends. The treasurer position reports to the select board. That would be the select board's call. So does all that need to be put in here? I mean, I think that's your point. Well, actually we did, there was a mention of the assistant, and then Mary-Anne took it out. No, I meant whether the position is full-time. I mean there's- I didn't remember seeing that. Yeah, I couldn't have that in here. I mean, I think we have to say if it's going to be a settlement position. Okay. I can bring you guys the grants. That would be helpful. Well, then you'd have to wait two weeks, although I suppose you could get going on figuring out where and how you're going to advertise it. In fact, you could even advertise it and we could tighten this up. And then some of those could become points of negotiation when we hopefully get some candidates. Okay. So would you please read the motion again, Rose, that's on the table? Nobody- did anybody make that motion or you said you would entertain it? But anyway, the motion is going to be those above-named five people to a higher committee for the purpose of recruiting and screening applicants for the position of talent charger. Okay. And advertising, right? That would be recruiting. So that's how they would recruit. I'm still having a hard time seeing how they can move forward with advertising and recruiting for something that is not finalized and we don't have costs associated with the salaries. Yeah, I agree. So we can formally committee to those individuals, but I think the explicit first task has to be to refine and propose two finalized positions or potential positions that then get approved by the select board. And once those are approved, they could move forward with soliciting candidates. I think the challenge is that even if we feel like we've done, or the committee has done some pretty great homework on this, it's a very competitive market right now and how do we adapt or change the role relative to candidates who might be applying for it. So I think there's going to have to be some dialogue with the select board. I can tell you it wasn't a budget. I mean, so in fiscal year 23, the treasurer was paid $55,000 as treasurer and $11,000 as development tax collector. The year before that it was $50,694 for the treasurer, just the treasurer. But in fiscal year 24, you've got these lumps. So for treasurer in the budget, it says treasurer, business manager, town administrator, $66,500. You get a director of public works for $80,000. So as I'm looking at all the other jobs in the office, I'm looking at these numbers here too because that's what we have to work with for salaries. And I'm going to get that compensation book from Gina over in Eastmoor. Okay, so I think what we could do is appoint you tonight if we could get started and we could ask both you and Charlotte to come back next week and talk to us about what you've decided about these other questions that still need to be answered. Right, so the other questions would be pay... Yeah. Hours. You say hours? Pay hours for those who can't salary. And I don't know how you'd want to work together on that, but Charlotte, that sounds like something you could really help with in terms of figuring out what the salary should be. Okay, although to be honest, you just got some good sources. Oh, okay, all right. It has to be balanced with these other... with potential other positions, position or whatever. Which is... I'll be talking to you in two weeks about that. Yeah, okay. About a new position? Well, I don't know if it's going to be a new position. I mean... Yeah, we don't know yet what it will be. But we'll talk about that next week. We've really got to move on. I think I've got enough information here to talk to Charlotte and figure out the salary. Okay, and you can start working on things like where to advertise, but you'll come back to us before you do anything, and we'll just talk about it next week. All right, so there's a motion on the floor. I think nobody made it. Nobody made it. Oh, would somebody like to move the motion? Is that okay, Jordan? Yeah, I guess I would say we should probably just charge them a little bit more broadly to consult and facilitate on seeking a treasurer of the town. So would you like to change the words? What are the words, Rose? Jordan will probably make a motion to apply those above name five people to a hiring committee for the purpose of recruiting and screening applicants for the position of town treasurer. Appoint those five people to a hiring committee for the purpose of recruiting and screening applicants for the position of town treasurer. So before they actually do recruiting, they need to figure out these details. I guess I would have had, for the purpose of advising. Of what? For the purpose of advising. Advising. The select board, yeah. On the roles and responsibilities associated with the position of treasurer. Okay. And facilitating a hiring process. Okay. So how does that whole thing redo? For the purpose of advising the select board, the roles and responsibilities associated with the treasurer. And for recruiting and hiring? And for facilitating a hiring process. I see, so you're removing that language, okay. That's a good one. Okay, I'll accept that as friendly a minute. Yeah, I don't think I have that. I have a question about, but this is an appropriate time to ask a question. Sure. You were talking about that kind of, the chunks in the budget that are there for staffing. And I'm just curious how that differs from, say like the chunk in the budget that there was for an attorney that is like, we had to spend 10 times more than that for attorneys in this fiscal year than was budgeted. So, and I'm not suggesting we need to spend 10 times as much, but I'm saying like, are you suggesting it's more finite than, you know, what the needs of the town for attorneys, for example, was? Is that what I'm saying? I'm saying, yeah, there are things in the budget, but that's not, that's actually not. If you want to change it, you certainly need to change it. Because if the market won't bear a $55,000 a year treasurer, then we might need to. Right, you've got $80,000 in here and that's another position that we're not going to have. And I think this is just something we have to look at as a whole, two weeks from now. Yeah, I guess I'm just saying those two chunks added up are actually not the limit. They may be the goal that we want to work with them, but they're not actually a limit that we can't exceed. Right, right. You can move money around. Or exceed the budget. Or exceed the budget. Sure. Or hire an assistant at a lower rate. We've been there. I don't want to do that. Hey, a treasurer by the hour. No, I don't mean, I mean, I'm not referring to Barbara, I'm referring to past. Okay. All right, so we have a motion on the floor. Deserve it? We have one more time, Rose. Ouch. Because I just need writing stuff. Jordan Keyes made a motion to appoint the buck, named five people to a higher committee for the purpose of advising the celeb board on the roles and responsibilities associated with the treasurer. And then I have that other part about recruiting and screening applicants. As well as before the recruiting thing and facilitating the process. As well as, okay, so let's start that again. Jordan Keyes, the motion to appoint those of the five people to the hiring committee for the purpose of advising the celeb board about the roles and responsibilities associated with the treasurer as well as recruiting and screening applicant facilitating the process. No, strike recruiting. Yes, and screening. And screening, strike that. And replace it with, let's get here and there. Jordan, okay, appoint the hiring committee for the purpose of advising the celeb board about the roles and responsibilities associated with the treasurer position. Yes. Sure. As well as facilitating the process. As well as. The hiring process. Yeah, that's fine. That gets it all. Okay, everybody understand the motion? She is second given God. Yeah, I know, but I want to make sure everybody's got the motion first. Okay, Jordan Keyes made the motion to appoint the above being five people and I'll move them into that thing. To the hiring committee. Okay, Jordan Keyes made the motion to appoint the above being five people to that thing. To the hiring committee for the purpose of advising the celeb board about the roles and responsibilities associated with the treasurer's position. As well as facilitating the hiring process. And I could get rid of that for the position. Facilitating the hiring process for. That's period. Period. Period. Period. Period. I'll get rid of that. Okay. Excellent. Good. Thank you, Rose. Thank you. Can I second my motion? Second. No, you can't. Okay. All in favor. Aye. Aye. All right. Thank you. Thank you. And we are so behind our schedule. Thank you. Yeah, thanks a lot. We'll see you all next week. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Thank you. It's okay, it's okay, it's okay, and it's a quiet thing. So we're getting to the reports. We need to hear some of these things. I'm hoping we can skip over them. Like maybe we don't need reports from emergency management, Curtis Pond shared documents, collective bargaining. I think just with the emergency services. There it is. It's really hoping to put in a plan for us to attend the June 29th meeting. Right. Nick, would you like to put in a plan for us to attend? I would. Our regional representative from Vermont emergency management offered and encouraged us to have him come and do a presentation and also somebody from who's on emergency management from regional planning commission is going to attend as well. He said it would be very useful to have some select board representation there, road crew. John just said he's going to come. And the purpose is just to describe the role of Vermont emergency management during an incident. What are the responsibilities of the select board? What kind of communication channels are available? And so it's a basic orientation to the state's role when we have an incident. If we need to do that. So strongly encourage, I'm sorry, it's 30 June 29. It's at six o'clock. I have it on my calendar. So I think you've done this already. And that's the end. What time? Six. Six. And 90 minutes. Okay. We'll keep it. We'll keep this 90 minutes. Okay. Great. It'd be really very helpful to have you here. Okay. All right. Everybody. Okay. Thank you. It'll be here. Where is it? Yes. Right here. And we'll be using the screen a lot. Okay. So it'll be like multiple tables there. Yes. Did you read all this time just to say that? Yes. Sorry. If I'd known it would have let you do that anyway. I'm interested in what you're doing. All right. Shall we move back to Rhodes then? We'll boom more. Okay. I'd like to quickly try to keep it super tight. I spoke to Toby earlier today because we had the two, we had the one for Kubota that had come out earlier. And then they had also a spec'd out one. The second one, which is like a John Deere. Toby said either one is fine. The issue is whether or not we have a mower on the ground running. And they have, the current one is currently out running. It's not a pretty cut, but it's doing the mowing job. John did and me that I know that they had written because they've been thinking about longevity, ability to get it fixed, availability of parts. They did find that the second one and the John Deere is very thoughtfully built out to his very balance. She's Montpelier has one and it's able to get higher than the Kubota and just overall more nuanced machine for about the same price. So John handed me Deere's slide board. We wish to order the John Deere boat side mower. We understand- Wait, the John Deere, not the Kubota? Not the Kubota. So the Kubota, they have been hearing repeated instances of the frame breaking. It's a kind of chronic issue with it. And so that makes them nervous that it's- Okay. So the Kubota is like about 8,000 more. I'm sorry, the John Deere. I think a pretty close. I have to go pull up. Because I don't know if the Kubota had the source well. I think it had the source well down as part of it. Okay. Are you buying a tractor animal or a mower? Go on the tractor. It's a mower tractor. So it's going to be completely- It's going to be- It's going to be- It is a pre-equipped boomer. Okay. So we know that we can get the Kubota now. Can we get the John Deere now? No. So the John Deere would take a few months. So we wouldn't have it for the end of the season. But they have the one that they have is currently running. They said it wouldn't make another- They weren't sure it would make it through this mower. They think it'll make it through another mower. We've got two machinists, so they've got to go in. I mean, that's- And they can also match a mower too, right? Yeah. Running a mower at these days is prohibited because everyone's doing it and getting it when you need it. Yeah, you have to get on the schedule way ahead of time. But I was- They were the best- Toby was clear that they needed that- that if they went that route, the one that they have, they have to keep going until such time. Does Toby agree with this? Toby should- I'm sorry, I'm asking all these questions. Toby is finding ways that whichever one they think is best, it can be done. The big thing is that we have a mower on the route. Can we get a lease to buy option for the John Deere? Yes. We can. It's the same deal. Okay. Questions? Yeah. I understand. I guess the scarcity and the challenge of trying to get a- trying to get a rental, but the math still doesn't work relative to renting a mower versus owning a mower and having it- or an anti-mower tractor and having it pay off in that period of time. And there have been a lot of kind of conversations, kind of loose conversations about pretty significant equipment purchases for the- for the road department or highways department. And I think, you know, I'm glad to be having a conversation about a tractor. I've got questions on whether or not this tractor is going to be appropriately sized to do some other extracurriculars. They're very versatile pieces of equipment. Frankly, I've been looking at pieces of attachments and implements that would replace the function of a grater and maybe make the maintenance of the roads a little bit more tenable and sustainable for the town at a better price point. So I think a broader conversation about equipment acquisitions needs to be had before we plunk $180,000 or $190,000 on a tractor with a boom arm. It's a 110-horse tractor, which is a lot of horsepower, but for an extra 20 to 30 horsepower, you can add a class of implements on it that can do a lot more for the town. And there's just a lot of things that are going to be affecting the highway department budget in the next coming months that are going to then impact the budget, moving into the 2025 budgeting process as well. So it seems like just kind of a tenuous time to be purchasing a mower of that cost. Well, I would ask, and you're sure you can get through the next mowing session because at the last meeting, they said, we can't do it. We can't make it this fall. We have to do something else. I don't know how they made it happen. I don't know how they did. And then they said, if we were to order most of these pieces of equipment, it would take probably a couple of years because they have to build it. And so... Oh, no, not with this. They've spoken to the person. Yeah, that was why they wanted to go for this one. So I guess I want to know when we could have such a machine, if we could have a different machine. As far as when we'd be able to get the Kubota... If we have to, if we go to what Jordan suggested, we might not get it for two years according to what they said last time. Okay. And I don't know, are you suggesting something that has removable pieces? Because I think one of the concerns is that the boom arm, it's something that should be permanently affixed and done. There is a concern because we had talked with Toby about having a tractor that you could attach this thing to or that thing to. And there's concerns about the integrity of the tractor, if things are coming on and off and it's not designed like the one that's backed down. And I realize it's specific, but moving is very specific and it's very timely when it has to happen. And it's very difficult to lease because everyone else wants to lease at that exact same time. And perhaps if we got on it in November and got the person, I don't know. Has the road crew done any work looking into other people who might be contracted to do the moving? As far as hiring people, we used to hire people, but this year, I mean, they're very swampy. I think you're actually saying like a service. A service. With its own equipment rather than a service. Yeah, I'm going to make a couple of things. One is that we need the service to be done in a timely manner, but also that we're having to procure a piece of equipment that's very specific to a particular task. And it's a fairly expensive piece of equipment. So if we can't take a comprehensive look at what that tractor can do more holistically, then it seems to point me towards wanting to have somebody else with a specialized piece of equipment for that. And then town is buying a tractor relative to what it wants. And not just that one particular purpose. I mean, we're a town of limited resources and roads and... What would you suggest is a process to do this? Well, actually, can I ask what is the process we're doing now? Are we potentially boating on a $198,000 piece of equipment? Potentially, yes. And the mower that we're using now is an old tractor with a mower on it? They weren't even sure it would make it. Yes, I understood. No one will work on it. It's too old-time for anyone to work on. We've got several guys that are extremely good mechanics and have basically that machinist version of duct tape to back together. It's not a pretty cut. It does the job, but it's not viable for permanent repairing and making it run for a long time. It's on its last legs. And as I understood it, they want to do it twice a year. So they do it... And the first time is very specific because they need to hit it right when the invasives are at a certain stage. Before they go to the stage. And everybody in the state wants to do it then. So you have to work at it a year ahead to get either lease or a service to do it. I believe there's a lot more flexibility in the fall. They like to do it a second time, but... Okay, that's correct. So the upcoming mowing is like what? Next week? The week after? No, they're doing it now. And so they'll get through this one? Yes, I think they will. So the question is, what happens if you don't do it in the fall? Is that a terrible thing? Does anybody know? It impedes snow. So we need to get it done in the fall, but we may be able to get somebody else to do it if we don't have a machine because there's quite a lot more flexibility then. Okay. Yeah, John. So I agree with Jordan. This history is important. When East Montpelier bought that very expensive tractor, it was $125,000. And boom, as soon as they got it, the road crew at the time and Toby came in here, let's buy one too. And we said no. And yes, we bought a used tractor and the mower was old, but that cost $19,000 and you've gotten four years out of it. So you figure that out with that cost of time. And you could replace the belly mower on that. Put a new mower that tractor runs perfectly. I know it does. The mower saw a lot of use and came out of Connecticut. I think Wilton, Connecticut. But we knew it was just meant to get us through like five years so we could have this conversation. But of course, $175,000 just to mow the roadside. So we had the same concerns. That was a huge investment for a machine we'd use for a very limited period of time. If you were to set up a lease situation well in advance, you probably could rent a machine for next year this year or five-year lease or something. But that's a big expenditure. And as Jordan has said, there are also belly mount mowers that you can mount to a tractor and remove from a tractor. And there are all different grades of tractor in terms of weight. You can't just go by horsepower. The big groovy thing is people sell a 110 horsepower tractor. But the carriage, the structure, it's a medium-duty tractor or a light-duty tractor to get something that's substantial. I mean, maybe that's what this is. I don't know. And lastly, those tractors, and I just want to inform the select board of the importance to force fire departments and road crews to look at use as well. Maybe not a $19,000 tractor. That was kind of a triage thing. We found it. The first instinct, it's not their money. And they want to buy new. The fire department came to us wanting to spend upwards of $750,000 saying, this is back when, three, four years, five years ago, saying it's impossible. You'll never find a machine like this. That's when we need it right now. We're not in compliance. And Cal said, no. You need to go look for a used one and then come back if there's nothing available. Well, they found one with, like, 8,000 miles on it, like out of Chicago. And it saved us $200,000, $300,000. So this is the kind of thing that these machines offer sale. We've been talking about because, as someone who's read Cycord Minutes for years, going and buying used equipment, having it come and then immediately die and then nothing to do with it. So the brokerage was not about what I knew. It was about talking about what kind of equipment needs are we going to have over the years. What are things that would be most important to have that work because of what they specifically do, the time that they do it, that it's something that's ongoing, yadda yadda. So they've been thinking about that and thinking about how to make it. We've talked about how to get used freighters that aren't like from 1997, but maybe a wealthier town has used one for 10 years and then you can go in and get a better price and you can still get 10, 15, 20 years out of it because they aren't capable of fixing things. I think just with this summer because of just last year's kind of crazy and no one set up hiring a person to come and do it, there are issues with the tractor too. It's not just the mowing piece, just the whole package. It's problematic. But they have it going. They were thinking that, and that's just through discussion, that this might be a piece that is worthy of purchasing. It would last for 15 to 20 years. It sounds to me like we want to have a longer discussion about this and it's already 9 o'clock. I know, I wish you had the same number earlier. Sorry. I didn't mean to pack the agenda this much. It just sort of happened. So I would like a process here. Usually what we try to do is for big items, we wouldn't purchase it unless something broke down and was an emergency. Like we lose a plow truck and move across easily. We put it on the warning for town meeting and let the voters consider that. Yeah, and that's what we were trying to avoid. But if we weren't going to buy one this fall, then we may as well if we're going to go that way. But it sounds like we need to have some people. Jenny, you got an idea for a process? Well, I was just thinking, we have a sort of a living document that's a capital plan, a equipment plan for the road crew. And it seems to me like a lot of ideas have come up here of dual use and equipment, how much use each piece of equipment gets. And so it wouldn't make sense to me to spend that kind of money on a piece of equipment without looking at it, looking at it in the context of our capital equipment. So, would anybody like to volunteer to look into this? It sounds like we need to talk to Toby. We need to talk to the road crew. Could I propose that we at the very least, I guess, take these quotes and that and look at it in one of our August agendas? August. So that we can have a more dedicated conversation about where it falls in the context of the equipment purchasing scheme? And what would we do between now and August? Well, I'm not thinking about it anymore. I'm sorry? Well, I guess what we're currently doing which is using a mower that is... No, no, in terms of gathering information that would help us with this decision. It sounds like we need people to think about what are the options out there? Do we want to buy used? Can we find something new? I guess I would like the folks who are involved in making this decision on identifying what the pieces of equipment are that they participate in the conversation. So we can have that conversation outside of a meeting. You know, if there are two of us who want to meet with Toby to talk, to go over that, and members of the road crew, but to Jamie's point, to my point, that's a pretty significant investment to make without grander kind of context. And so I propose that that meeting happen or that conversation happen. I'd be happy to participate in it. I'm going to be gone for the next week, basically. So sometime between the last week of June or sometime in July, it would be nice to have that conversation, take a good look at what the plan is for pieces of equipment, what they do, and what the road crew wants to do. And look at that compared to these quotes and see if this is the tractor that is going to most appropriately service our needs. Excellent. And they have a more comprehensive proposal or request in August if we still need to have a conversation about a tractor. But if we don't, then maybe have a different conversation. Okay. I think if we were in, if we determine that we're in the market for quality used equipment after the mowing season or after the tractor season is the right time to enter that market for the tractor season. Okay. So should we be one or two? Jordan, is this something you could do? I mean, I love equipment. That's what I was thinking. Maybe you could just... As long as I'm not buying it. Yeah. Talk with Toby. You can talk about capital planning. I'll just walk across the field and Toby and I can have a chat, I guess. But I think, I mean, I think it's important to include the road crew. I don't think this is a conversation that we have absent of their input, though, you know, I think we need, we need to be both trying to meet the needs of the road crew or trying to get the work done, but we need to think about, you know, the long-term commitment to the town's banking. All right. I will put it on an August agenda and we'll look for a report at that time and a recommendation. Is that all right with everybody? And if somebody wants to join... And has there been anybody other than Toby from the road crew that's been... kind of spearheading... Equipment things? Equipment related things? We gather every morning at six. So, yeah, it's an ongoing discussion. Is everybody at the whole crew? Yep. I mean, Tyler and John probably are the ones going out and talking to different vendors and whatnot, but... Okay. Okay. Thanks, Jordan. No parking signs. Is this quick? If not, I'd like... Could we have... I'm fine deferring it to the next meeting. Thank you. Now other people in other communities want signs, too. Yeah. And stop signs? Yeah, stop signs. I'll just quickly report that having talked to Toby and reread the traffic ordinance, stop signs and yield signs are very clearly part of the traffic ordinance. And so I think we need to do that in the more proper detail ordinance and the adjustment process. Okay. So that needs to wait then until we're ready for that. It needs to be in ordinance. Class 4 Road, Leonard Road. Larry. Well, why don't you report first? Okay. So we... Why don't you come forward? Oh. You're going to term it. Okay. So... Let's go right here. People just lead you all. I remember... Larry had started work without a permit. And the... who had gone out to look at it to talk about the curb cut and there was work that had already been done. So we had written up what would cause it and we were to put back what had already been done the way it was. Since that time, kind of made some liberal changes. There's essentially like a new curb cut which technically is better and straight as opposed to before I was going up the road and down which was the... the old way. But then you cut into the bank and what is that road is like a cliff and dumping dirt from your excavation for the cellar on the roadway which is not the surface material. They need their stitching. So basically there's another... 275 to 300 feet of impact at road both with ditching, the road surface, using things that are all like... we talked about the ditching stones and ditches and you've got like wire and other kind of stuff in there. So it's a mess from our perspective, you know, from the way we want our roads to look and that really went all the way out. I mean this hanging and seating at the very end of the road where it meets George Road. The guys are unable to put a concrete... I mean we can write up the list. But as far as cost per day, it's hard to know until they know really what's under the road now because there has been a lot of disturbance on the top. So there's not... if you don't really know what's going on, you know, you get down a few inches. Larry, are you here to listen or did you want to speak? I really thought that the bank would go over the weekend and I was going to do some more seating and stuff. I thought I was 75-80% done putting the stone in a ditch. But you put in a different culvert than the one that was in your permit and you worked on more of the road than was authorized in your permit. Do I understand that correctly? I guess you could say that, yes. There was the 270 feet that we talked with John about on here. Over the weekend, I decided that I don't really need that spot there. So I had taken some of the material that was in the road and sloped it up and covered out that. That was that entryway that I had been using. And lower than that, about 100 feet lower, there was another entryway and that's what I had been using to access my property. I've been able to have a 10-wheel dump truck get on the road into the property and we dug the solar hole and I used that material there and I put it into the class for a road as a base. What kind of gravel is specified in the permit? For the top base, yes. This is basically lead stone. It's the same thing you would get from the carers. It just wasn't washed, but it's getting washed now. You can drive a fire truck, a 10-wheel dump truck on it and I was prepared to get the stone put over the top and get the ditching stone. Basically, I called a swell. The bank was pretty well stabilized. I had hay bales up on the sides preventing more of the roads from coming down into the road. That's basically what had happened with the class for a road. Everything from the bank had come down and everything was slanted my way and that's when I had the culvert put in there. I did that illegally, I guess, years ago and I just thought, let me make just more sense to have the road slant away from all that. That's what I did. I've also had a large cement block that had been dragging behind my tractor to compact the road and what I did at the end where George Road and Leonard Road is, when it was going up and down the road I made some passes around and so I basically leveled that triangular piece where the roadway was. It was called Joanie O'Tern so I rooted all that up and kind of leveled it out and I seeded it over and I put hay over it and that's, I guess, a lot of flags or whatever. Seeding a roadway and I don't understand if you're throwing grass on a road. I mean, it's literally the road that you've paid. The culvert has now touched that where it cuts off it's going to cause erosion right there as opposed to when it was 40 feet it goes off and then down and it's less likely to cause erosion around. Yes, I installed a 20 foot culvert and you saw it today. And they were concerned because it wasn't properly compacted and I understand you're dragging a cement block or something over it but the culvert not only is way too short but it's already compressing because it's not. The road is not complete yet. The easier question is that you're not building it to any kind of relative road standard and I understand it's a class 4 road but material that's dug up from a cellar hole even though it has lead in it or shale or whatever is not the same as a plant mix even if it's a 3 inch minus plant mix from legumes. Legumes that plant mixes got fines from rock and blasting it's not earth and pieces of shale so that those are analogous pieces of material. So my concern is that we kind of gave a little bit of leeway while trying to be pretty specific about what the building standards should be to come close to meeting an acceptable construction practice relative to the input from the road crew and their maintenance of the rest of the callous roads but you're falling pretty far short of that plus expanding the scope. At this point I've got questions about whether or not there's enough erosion control for all the disturbed earth that's happening and that's going to be a state issue because you're not putting in any kind of storm water check dam sill fences, any of the things. I'm not there yet. You need to be there before you even start breaking earth that those sill fences need to be in there before water can hit exposed earth and run down the hill. You need to have those sill fences in place because they're supposed to stop the sill from getting to the road surfaces to the culverts to anything else where they're going to continue to contaminate or impact other infrastructure or adjoining property owners being some of whom would be the town presumably out of the town's right of way. That road crew was concerned about there is erosion and just because we're letting road goes up where it's pretty dug up and currently I believe you attempted to ditch on the far side of it where before it used to go that way but it's kind of dug up it's not really a ditch but we get a heavy rain or something there's going to be a whole lot of just getting rain tonight. I knew there was a lot of material that was in the road right there I mean it's basically silt as it was I've got everything channeled so it's going to go to the ditch you know when I started there was this much silt in the road and I wasn't even able to get my pickup truck through there I got the culvert in nature's you know water's finding its course there I have a lot of stone in front of my culvert to catch any sediment so to speak before I actually get the ditch stones in with the recomb cop or dams Jack dams Jack dams I'm just saying that you're thinking about it that it's going to work but when we gave the approval for the permit it was very specific both to the location of that you would be working in and exactly what we needed you to do and you've kind of gone and done it your way okay did anybody want to ask any other questions? alright I spoke with the town attorney today about our options what I would like to suggest is that we give Larry say ten days to comply with the permit as written unless anybody wants to make any changes and if it is not complied with by then and signed off by the road crew we could think about what we want to do about that we can impose penalties under our ordinance the penalty can be anything between $110,000 we can have the road crew go in and fix the put it back the way it was at Larry's expense there was one other thing maybe that was it oh we revoke the permit of course so with that would that include would we need the crew to go and specify as an example what used to be a road is now just like a dirt cliff because you created kind of a new per cut how they're going to because there's things that are damaged and need to be rectified that are not part of our current under our ordinance they have to be repaired and put back to their original was there one thing you said was better though so it used to be a logging landing crack Larry yes okay and what you did was not okay but when it basically but basically it goes straight so now you have a straight relatively flat road into where his house site is where before it was going up Leonard and then down onto the thing and this had just been like a logging landing thing so there really wasn't anything obstructing it you just move stuff out of the way but in doing that basically cut the road cut the road in half so that the downward part of the original curb cut that he was supposed to be working on is now no longer there so that being is going to be stabilized because it's just like a sheer chunk of dirt at the moment when I originally approached you guys I wanted to just put in a culvert there and put in some ditching and do a minimal improvement to get to my curb cut I mean it just seems to me that why do we want to encourage more people to say hey look at that nice road right there because then they're going to continue on further up there but that was just everything that we talked about if it's like the road you wish to discontinue it or have an arrangement like yeah where she had the gate that's something that has to come through this lifeboard you can't make it impossible so people don't go there I just need to use 170 feet of that class 4 road and I can go I have 3,000 feet along that road I can get wherever I want to from where my build site is there I don't need to use the road but I know that when the mutters I'm not sure there they did it in the past I know but above the disturbed area it doesn't look like it's got any kind of use there's no sign that there's vehicle tracks up there it's just 100 feet beyond where you were originally approved on the Leonard Road portion not down below where you but up above there it does not look like there's been any kind of activity the mutters have been blocked off on Gale's side if you want to look at having the road discontinued those are steps that you would have to go through a process you can't just be like I really don't want people up in here because it is a road that is still a town this morning I was going to see the road from where I had to start from where I had made the new curb cutters so to speak and put A on there and within months time or whatever it's going to be all natural the ferns are all going to be growing in there as long as it's going to be a natural yes but if it's still a road it's still a road you should be seeing a road the problem is there's processes for each one of these steps and we're doing all of them out of order and continuing to operate like this is the reason that we have increasing regulations against this type of thing because we're trying to protect against irregular irresponsible development practices and so if you just decided to change where your curb cut is for a dwelling that you're trying to build then that's a change that has to come before the select board and take into all of the considerations that go into that relative to the public safety and public infrastructure even though there's a cult class floor road there and even though it's getting used and damaged by mutters in an unsustainable and in a way that maybe negatively impacts the environment or the space up there and the development activity is a continuous improvement exercise so you originally said that you were going to put a curb cut in one area and your initial attempt to do that was fell short of expectations of the town we tried to give you very specific input on how to improve it relative to those expectations and then it just sounds like you just changed where you wanted to enter the curb cut and then see the road that's not that's not how this process works yes I guess when I first did this whole map and all that that's where I had been cutting into them I spoke with John and there was a culvert here and it just seems like I could eliminate having to have a culvert or use that and then from below take out the hill take out the big maple tree that does not factor anymore I used a hundred feet less of a road so you know I I'm a little confused as to what to do about that I think pragmatic basically when you come onto the road here it goes up a little bit of a hill and then it came down and then the house sides back here and so he basically took this logging landing out and just basically is going up this way and this has been kind of like chopped off thank you seems like when I got the original working working doing anything on class 4 he did this like board approval and all that and then he would do a site visit is that a possibility that the board can come and I don't know what to do now I mean really well like we talked about this morning like please stop dumping from this cellar out there don't change anything more put seed down at the entrance to the road I mean are you saying you have access to your home that's not from George Road like you don't have to use George Road to Leonard Road like you don't have to get onto your property from that get on to Leonard Road off in George Road do you have to use that because you like both sides I mean I can I'm going to see the guys in the morning I'm going to be with you later you can go by and I can show you it's really important not to I mean can you work towards the back and just not because I think you get like a mind like oh I'm going to do this because this is going to go well but it just like further exacerbates the problem I thought I was basically done with the road other than putting the topping on it and putting the stone in the ditch and then I'm not sure if George if you ever email me the state specs or not because I kind of look around he's 71 it's the because I'm going to ask about the stone and whatever the damn things were yeah sure what's happening I'm really I was just and then we're going to have to put in yeah I said now there's now there's other material on top of the road and so there's there's no point of putting top dressing or top dressing material on a road that has inadequate base material underneath and that's it's it's part of a larger system and I know that's more than what was there but that was the scope of work that we were initially talking about relative to the thermodynamics relative to your aspirations to develop this partially yeah I had a couple of materials and I added to what was there and it's got a pitch so it does go to the drainage ditch and I can say I had a little dump truck that was able to go up through there the road seems to be the road is just station I just want to say that I feel really bad that you did this it sounds to me like you are so far in over your head that you're drowning my husband and I on a rock quarry road it took three and a half years to go through the the engineering process the wind blowing study the determination to find out if there's exotic grass in Calis and to know somebody who had to follow every length of the law every T was crossed and every I was dotted and to hear what you've done to Leonard Road part of my French but not knowing your butt from your elbow what gives you the right to do the post you know I'm just sorry I mean I think that the select board should give you a cease and desist or whatever and I think that you need an engineer to come in there and figure out if you get it back to the baseline never mind the violation of the permits we have rules that we all need to go through and it just it makes me feel really sad that if you were in over your head you should have asked for help but I'm sorry I mean I strongly urge the select board to issue through your attorney a cut off any more work and I appreciate the knowledge and skill of our road crew but this might be even more than they can handle as far as the proper material that needs to go back on the road or something I mean I think this is one big huge mess and I I urge this select board to issue a firm decision tonight and I think you were mentioning that like don't do anything else pull the permit you know he did a curb cut without a permit and then all those other things I mean you really have to stand up for what we have these rules for I mean with the planning commission hearing and the modeling and protecting this shoreland and everything else you know yeah it's a little used class 4 road but it's just the idea of the process you know we all have to follow the rules and I think this was just a huge violation in so many areas and I strongly urge you to issue a violation they can stop and get an engineer in there and who would be able to determine what the next steps would be okay thank you since you're taking public comment I just want to comment not having seen what Larry did and I like Larry a lot there's this an aesthetic that goes along with these class 4 roads and there's been battles for decades in this town about whether to upgrade a class 4 or 3 that happened on up Lightning Ridge road that involved a lot of public conversation and debate and a court was reached and a compromise and it involved this very issue and that road was actually upgraded but they had to put together engineering plans and they had to ensure it was brought up to standards and actually the road crew stepped up in that case and actually built it and then built the property owner for that work you might have been on the board and then it was falling in and it was on the board but Chaitan Road but you know there was no input on that and I don't know it sounded like it's been improved there was a triangle there was that gone Larry? that's never been determined that whole who owns that triangle it's a middle road Larry it was a triangle the roads came like this it was never determined it was changed at some point and never was right so there's a process behind it I don't want to debate with you I think we need to decide what we're going to do I'm a little confused by this moving the curb cut without a permit it makes me pause as to where I thought we might go they challenge is I'm not sure if I ever had an official curb cut where the length was ok? 1998 or 2000 whatever I got two curb cuts there's one further up the road where I have a gate and I had to put a culvert in that time ok and there was all the water coming over into my land from that one and then I had the other curb cut where I was using where I guess I'd been entering like but I don't know if there was ever official distances and all that as far as curb cuts ok so our options would be we could fix it within a time certain never mind we'll fix it what do you guys think? I mean I don't feel comfortable asking Larry to put it back the way it was because you're always driven by what you think is going to work best I think you're really going to struggle with like doing it putting it back the way that it was I mean where was this correct with that with that with that we're trying to craft out exactly the distance and what side was dug out versus the other side and that it's a lot it seems like every time we drive by you're doing more so ok so you would suggest that we either the guys go in and fix it or and if they believe that they need an engineer as Rose suggests I don't know I can't evaluate that we can talk about that we can talk about that if they need a higher level alright anybody else want to chime in where you are with this right now I think work needs to stop before before a site visit can be conducted with the road crew if you want to do it tomorrow during all of our other pictures I like to take Jordan by so that he can see because pragmatically the totally illegal corp pet pragmatically it would lead to his home and you know get Leonard road back to the way that it's supposed to be it was but if it bisects the road we have a whole nother right of way issue and it's like three curb cuts just to get across the class for roads right now it's just but what's the purpose of doing a site visit tomorrow I was just going to show you what it looks like I think determining whether or not anything needs to be stabilized in the very near term if there is exposed earth if the seating isn't or there hang isn't done properly if there are concerns with the road crew there's going to be erosion and runoff into other town right of way or if there are any properties that would need to happen I wanted to do this morning because I was washing the weather and now it is raining I know that Larry my point is that that work should have been done with foresight and before you even started moving any earth that's the problem and so there's already a failure of confidence and your ability to perform the work that may be necessary and right now I'm not even sure any of us really have a full grasp of what the scope of work needs to be and I sympathize with not wanting to have to over complicate and engineer over engineer a class 4 road but we're kind of we're kind of at a loss here and needing to at the very least pull in more competent resources to stabilize the situation before we can even have a conversation about where the curb cut should or what it needs to be the curb cut has to come off of the town right of way for you to access your land you can't go off of one road bisect a class 4 road even if it's not fully developed with a driveway without having going through a potential variance process so you would determine what needs to be stabilized ask our guys to do it and then what just play out the process and then evaluate the status of an existing curb cut and do that on the 26 work on that on the 26 just put it all back to the 26 is that what you're suggesting okay yeah I think so everybody Larry or anybody who wants to tell us where they are I think that makes sense to me I also sort of wonder if at some point it would be appropriate to have a special meeting that we all do a site visit with the road crew to gain a broader understanding of the whole situation and discuss it while we're visualizing it I want to see it when you first came in just the thought that you had started working without getting a permit was foreign to me that's not the way I think so I'm disappointed but I'm not surprised that it's I don't know I kind of want to see it okay what do you think about you know never mind we don't need to go there so it sounds like what we're coalescing around is Larry you got to stop work now yeah I stopped this morning okay and then we're going to schedule a site visit with the road crew and we will re-evaluate and we'll figure out where we're going do you want to have a separate site visit a site visit that I can do with and and maybe a member of the road crew to kind of evaluate short term triage type work and the same thing that the whole site board would have to be boarded it may even be put some rocks down to keep that you should continue with your emergency plan you could do an emergency site visit if you wouldn't have to be warned in advance if you consider it an emergency you wouldn't actually get out there the next day or two and emergency requires no warning is there it requires reasonable warning relative to the circumstance so I've got the word to say we're going to offer tomorrow morning at 8 o'clock you could do that we could still board it it could go on the website tonight and on front board tomorrow okay so that's an option but we'd also have to ask the road crew if they could join us and I don't know what their schedule is I'm just going to do what the road crew is going to say alright is that what you guys would like to do get out there as soon as possible or do we want to I'm available on the afternoon or before before before 9 it's light at 4.38 so the this is a mixing subject but the bargaining committee means is going to meet tomorrow at 11.30 which means also be an emergency meeting relative to scheduling so that should be warned we're just trying to move through the process as quickly as possible and there's summer scheduling issues with vacations are going to be gone so we have our next negotiating meeting already scheduled and so we want to make sure that we have everything prepared so that's happening at 11.30 here well how do you feel about tomorrow afternoon so there's another engagement tonight at 1 but we can do it immediately following then it's the whole day it is before before I mean if the union meeting is at 11.30 we could do the site visit at 10 I couldn't but that's okay if other people want to continue with this I yeah I don't need to be there take a video for me I've got pictures I mean after spine 2 your next meeting is at 1 yeah and how long do you think that will be an hour at most Gabrielle when did you say you'd be free I mean I could do it at 2 1 or 2 or even 1 I think I may need to use the morning for getting things to work okay my day job site visit 2 o'clock let's call it 2.30 so there's going to be a return to town hall following the that's how we could do it here at 2.30 wait so site visit at 2 no site visit first right no so we have other people involved in the 1 o'clock thing that we're going together to go and do the thing and then oh I'm sorry you're just doing logistics I'm just doing logistics so for multiple site visits so we we would all meet here at 2.30 and caravan over I think so okay would you like to meet afterwards to discuss it which I think we could do under the emergency that would be appropriate it's one meeting we're already convening so we could continue this discussion then okay so then we'll come back to the town hall follow at the town hall here okay pew you got all that Jamie because you're going to be on the website tonight yes Larry I'm sorry I know this is not fun sorry I've been accessing the land for 30 years I just need to be able to get a dump truck and cement truck I know but that's the point Larry the nature of the access changes as soon as you start developing the land and that's why there's regulations governing the development process okay we have a plan can we move on because we still have one or two other quick things do we have a unsigned crew pet to sign Barbara yeah it's for that okay okay you all got that for some reason it never got signed it's done and it's this is a curb cut that was the previous leg board from back in 2020 sorry Barbara this is a curb cut from the previous leg board from back in 2020 and they've done the work they met the specifications and so it's just that the permit was never signed and we need the select board to sign it so we'll take a motion to sign but for Memorial Hall on November 1st 2020 as written I guess thanks for coming and sitting with us okay all in favor thank you road sign inventory shall we defer that one okay road sign inventory management team meeting we did do we need to talk about Kurdistan yeah we do it'll be quick I told my family I was going to midnight so so we're early I spoke today Thomas Maloney he agrees that the bottom vote was okay as was and would not there's no question there however there's a process in which we make a motion as a select board to certify the election results and so he emailed me about an hour before this meeting a document that was a draft motion that's two pages long that is all the legalese of us as a select board finding that the vote was appropriate and the bond can move forward he said it's not super time sensitive so it's okay I think to move the vote to the next meeting but I wanted you to be aware that that was an action from the one that you and Tegan filled out to certify yes yes and part part of the reason this needs to happen is there's question in the warning of the bond vote front porch forum was used as one of the publication sources and there's questions about that go way beyond our town where different attorneys have different opinions on the validity and so there hasn't been a ruling but it was also properly in it was yes and so this two page yeah so this two page motion that Thomas suggested which I put in today's meeting Google an hour ago if anyone wants to look at it goes through exactly all the steps that were taken and explains why that it was an adequate process so if we sign it I'm just thinking what to put on the next agenda for possible action would it be vote to certify the bond vote I don't understand if we did more than the requirement why do we have to certify the bond vote certify one way or the other procedural thing right so there's been there is some question whether or not it is certifiable arguably we all are but it seems like council's recommendation is that we make a motion that provides our rationale while we certify the vote and that kind of clears the air so to speak right so he's I think it's important that you guys know that I don't know what you guys do for procedure we just select more did not rely on from court form formal public notice venue it wasn't a courtesy if you will because town folks reviewed that regularly but in terms of official notice that was never relied upon so you should know that and certifying this yeah so what he said in the email which I think went to you as well and that he said I reviewed the clerk certificate for the new old town meeting there is a question with respect to the posting of the warning and in particular whether front-port form is a proper location for posting notice there is a Vermont statute that allows the select board to validate the vote at the annual meeting validate I recommend the select board take such action to address any questions that may remain how can they have done that at the annual meeting when the annual meeting was held before the polls closed yeah so we were the ones that should have done it because then they weren't the select board after that and the polls had closed yes but it goes to intent also the previous select board used that as the the mechanism for providing a legal warning it did not and the resolution includes and he told us how to do what we followed is yeah okay so we didn't know we were supposed to do that so I'll put it on the next agenda okay okay anything on shared documents and emails no good collective other than we have a new email for Cole so he is going to be constable at Calis that's active new password to give to Cole which I'll try to get to him in the next day or so there is also an animal control at Calis which is not a separate account but a alias so people can email it and it will go to the same inbox and I'll work with Cole on organizing that in a way that is intuitive for Cole but at the moment those are two accounts that are tied to each other I'm going to post it to the phone members no way I'm serious there is a Slack board email phone members Slack board members are supposed to be available what actually if you look at a lot of Slack board sites they do not post that okay so you're not as much if they want to get a Slack phone and she'll ask I believe that Ann's and mine are posted as road commissioners on the road commissioner page collective bargaining team anything to report collective bargaining just what we are the only thing we need to make an emergency rescheduling for the committee meeting that's going to convene tomorrow at 11.30 mentioning that now as kind of an advanced morning that's going to be coming through we're not trying to sneak anything through it's been tough trying to keep everything on schedule and trying to move through the process as quick as possible and we have to reschedule can I ask a question addressing the collective bargaining team Wendy Wilton who was running mayoral has been trying to figure out if the previous select board approved a COLA increase for staff for start effective than July 1 which is the beginning of the new fiscal year that's what it typically takes effect and we can't find any information about COLA increase and the question is was it maybe not done because of contract negotiations so if you guys could add to collective bargaining agenda to talk about what if the town can do a COLA increase across the board for employees for fiscal year 2024 or not or you have to wait until the end of your negotiations and then make it retroactive until July 1 that's a tough one to answer because it's part of the negotiating process and I'm not expecting you to answer to that I'm asking you to add it to your Jeff and Dallas what you're discussing in collective bargaining it's already been kind of recruited in the conversation and the intention would be to keep everything as equitable as possible we just need to make sure she can already get a conversation so we'll add it we'll keep it top of mind should be town of Calis what do we got nothing we're just kind of in a holding pattern at the moment so I just wanted to make a comment we just want to be careful about how we kind of represent things on the agenda right now the town isn't planning on taking any specific action at the moment we're we're going to be conducting a a site visit relative to the remedial actions but the legal matters have kind of shifted a little bit and we're just in a holding pattern right now while we kind of wait for that to result or find some resolution or work towards resolution or do something to that extent so Joe brought it up today let me think about whether I can say this in public yeah he wanted us to think about if there was a deal we might accept that's an executive session conversation that's definitely executive session yeah we don't want to go to executive session now do we there's nothing to do at the moment other than conduct the site visit and to continue to work with the lawyers to work through a dialogue as we're doing that in the coming weeks we need to have a group discussion about a path forward but all of that is somewhat informed by the current legal status okay I think we're done I'll take a motion to adjourn so moved all in favor okay thank you everybody that was