 Today is Wednesday, May 24th, 2023. Time is currently 6.06 PM. We have a quorum present and I would like to call to order this regularly scheduled meeting of the Chittenden County Solid Waste District Board of Commissioners. First item on the agenda, is the agenda? Are there any requests for additions or changes to the agenda? I'm hearing none. I'm seeing none. Therefore, the agenda will be accepted as presented in the meeting packet. Next item on the agenda is the public comment period. Are there any members of the public present in person via Zoom or via the telephone who would like to address the Board of Commissioners? Thank you, I'll give it another moment. We'll now close the public comment period. Next item on the agenda, item three, is the consent agenda, consisting of minutes of the April 26th, 2023 Board meeting, program updates, executive director updates, financial report warrants and cash and reserve balances, and the 2024 Vermont Materials Management Plan comments submitted by CSWD. Rick, your hand is up. I have two questions about the program updates. I'll let you decide, they're just questions. I'll let you decide whether to pull that from the consent agenda or just ask them at some point. Do they're not substantive? They certainly don't require any action. Okay, we'll take them out and we'll address those quickly right after we deal with the other items on the consent agenda. Marty, do you have a request? Yes, sorry. I just have a question also. I didn't, I don't think I got an email on the community cleanup fund and I didn't know whether I just missed it. There was something in the minutes about it and I'm just, I would love to see one but I don't think I got one. Okay, I'm gonna ask Amy to make a note and send that to you. There was a memo in the recent past and we do get the regular update of the balances but I think we can get that memo to you and handle that one offline. Thank you, Paul. Yes, Paul Stadler. Yeah, I'd like to request that the last item on the consent agenda, the response to the materials management plan be pulled off for discussion and open session. Thanks very much. My intent on that since that deals with kind of government issues and our relationship with Montalier, I'd like to move that item out when we take it out of the consent agenda, combine that with item number five, the legislative update. I think they might all be part and parcel really similar theme and I think it would be an efficient way to address that and have any questions answered. I agree, thank you. So right now we have requests to remove the program updates for a couple of questions and we will move the Vermont materials management plan to item number five, legislative update. Any other comments or requests concerning the consent agenda? Hearing none, the consent agenda with the exception of the program updates and the Vermont materials management plan consent agenda is approved as presented. I neglected to inform the board that Sarah is on the road, I believe right now. She alerted me ahead of time that she had, she was down in Massachusetts, is on the road and that she might very well be late for the meeting. So we're gonna do our best without her until she arrives but didn't want to explain to everybody why she is not here right now. With that we'll move on then to item number four, the June annual organizational meeting preparation. Sarah did include a memo in the board packet. I can kind of talk this out a little bit. I don't know if Amy would want to jump in with any clarifications if I missed something. But really for the benefit of the newer board members, we are required to have elections once a year, all the elected positions of the officers of the district are for one year only. The current officers are me, I am the chair of the board, Alan Nye is the vice chair of the board, Leslie Nolte is the treasurer and Amy Jule currently serves as our secretary which is allowed by our charter to have a non-commissioner serve in that capacity if the board so allows it and that has been the practice for the last several years. So those are the positions that will have to be elected or voted on at the organizational meeting which will happen on Wednesday, June 28th. We actually have two meetings that night. The first is the organizational meeting where we take care of our elections and a couple of the housekeeping items and then right after that, we move into our regular board meeting. My understanding is right now there is at least one incumbent, there is one position where there will not be an incumbent position to be elected. That would be the position of treasurer. So if there is an interest by other commissioners to put your name forward, that would be welcome. I'm not gonna put anybody else who's currently an officer on the spot to ask if they're going to be submitting their names. But as Sarah outlined in her memo, commissioners can self-nominate up till, I believe it's about June 16th. And I believe Sarah will be sending out an email soliciting those self-nominations. But you are welcome to nominate yourself. As also stated in there, it is possible for a commissioner to nominate another commissioner for a position but that nominated commissioner, presuming who has not self-nominated, that commissioner would not be added to the ballot until that commissioner assents to the nomination. We don't wanna draft somebody against their will to serve in one of these positions. Let's see that, she's outlined the election process. It's a secret ballot. For those attending via Zoom, there'll be a separate breakout room. Ballots will be counted. In the case that happened last year, there was one of the positions, actually that was for the executive board, which I'll get to in a minute. But in case there is a tie vote, we would go to a second vote, try to break the tie for any position to be elected. Let's see, the board of commissioners also has the executive board functions kind of as an oversight and a sounding board and deals with some issues that don't need to go before the regular board. The exec board meets monthly, usually meets monthly, one week before the regular board meeting. And as I always like to say, all these meetings, the exec board meeting is certainly open to all commissioners. You don't need to be a member of the exec board to attend the meeting and to participate in the discussion you just wouldn't be a voting member. The current members of the executive board are, I am the chair of the exec board, by virtue of my being chair of the full board, Alan Nye, Paul Stabler, Kelton Dugaske, and Lee Perry are current members of the executive board. I'm not gonna put anybody on the spot to see if they'd put their names in the hat. We're in the ring at this point. But those are additional opportunities for commissioners to serve. And again, the voting process will be the same as what I outlined and what's in the memo for electing the officers. Again, in case of a tie, we'll go to subsequent votes in order to break the tie and arrive at a fully, hopefully a fully rostered executive board. And then the last item in her memo is the other standing committee that we have is the finance committee. And the members of that committee are appointed by the chair. It has been our practice that the treasurer serve as the chair of the finance committee. To be honest, I don't know if we do not have a commissioner serving as treasurer. And if we were to appoint somebody who is a non-commissioner, I'm not sure if that person would chair the finance committee. In that case, we might be looking for a commission to do it, but I need further clarification should that transpire. Amy, did I miss anything important? Just wanted to thank the town of Williston for allowing us to use their space since 2006. And we are excited to have our June meeting in our new office space. Our AB is being set up tomorrow and Friday. We'll have to do a little trial run, but then the plan is to invite everybody in to come to see our new office. And to hold that meeting in June at the office. So we hope you can all make it. And we will certainly include the minutes of the last organizational meeting as a guideline to follow along in the packet as well as Sarah's memo. But if everybody that's interested in positions could get her that information by as noted June 16th, that would be great. And if we don't have any contested positions, we may, I believe last year we decided to just do a vote and it was a little bit simpler process. But if we have contested positions, certainly we'll do the Australian ballot process. Paul? Yes, Allen and Bryn. I would like to see if we could put together a letter and have Sarah and you sign it to the town of Williston, thanking them for the many years of use of this facility. Thanks for the suggestion. I'm sure we will, we can handle that. Perhaps this, sorry, this is called, perhaps we could just adopt a resolution at our next meeting thanking the town of Williston. It's just a suggestion, Paul, your choice. Thank you. We'll take it under advisement. Bryn? Yeah, I was wondering, Paul, did you cover alternates and how they're dealt with for the organizational meeting? Well, I didn't. And I'm not sure what more I could say other than that alternates really are willing or welcome to attend and participate in meetings fully, but do not have voting authority or voting power if the regular or the main commissioner from that municipality is in attendance at the meeting, unless I believe it's officially the voting power to be transferred over. I do not believe that alternates are eligible to serve in the capacity as either an officer or on the exec board. I don't know, Amy, if you have any clarification on that or Bryn as a past chair, if you know. Yeah, I mean, I'll divert you. Okay. I was going to check with Thomas because in the charter, I don't believe that it outlines that and I'm not sure we've run into that situation before, honestly. We have on the issue of whether an alternate could be a member of the executive board. And at that time, I came to the view and the conclusion that no, it needed to be a full board member. That was on the executive committee. And just as a follow up, the secretary and the treasurer may both be non-board members. But as the chair pointed out, whether the board wants to appoint a non-board member to the finance committee, that's an issue for the board to consider. And that matter would be taken up at the organizational meeting. We don't need to kind of work through a hypothetical at this meeting. Just to kind of give you a heads up of how that meeting will transpire. Yeah, thanks. I wanted to make sure, especially since we have alternates on the call tonight, that that was a reminder for everyone heading into June. Thank you very much. And as a reminder also, when both the regular full commissioner and an alternate are present, if we're voting and it's a verbal voice vote, the alternate in that case should not be expressing their vote. And certainly not if it's a matter of raised hands or a secret ballot. The alternate should not be participating in that election or that action. But again, other than that, I fully welcome the points of view from alternates and encourage them to participate as fully as possible in all our meetings. Any other questions or discussion on the organizational meeting preparation? I'll take this opportunity also to say it very soon that we need now coming out to commissioners and we conduct an annual evaluation of the executive director's performance. I think I've given you a heads up on that. There'll be an email with a link to a survey monkey survey in the near future. And I'll give you a week or so to consider that to respond to it. And then I will collect, consolidate those responses and formulate a response and presentation with Sarah. That will be coming up again in the next several weeks. Any other discussion on organizational meeting? I think then we will move on to item number four. I'm sorry, item number five, the legislative update. First, if we could address the materials management plan and CSWD comments. I don't see that Jen is here unless she's in the... Yeah, she is. Okay, good. I am here. Can you hear me? Yes, loud and clear. I don't know, Paul Stabler, if you had some additional initial questions or Jen, if you could give us a little overview. Yeah, I just like, first of all, I'd like for the new board members, I'd like for Jen to just describe the process with the state and how the material management plan affects solid waste in the state. And then more specifically in this memo, which I thought was very well written, but it alarmed me in a few places, which I think it should, especially regarding for instance, landfill space. If truly Coventry only has potentially as little as 10 years, then that really concerns me because it's gonna take a long time to find an alternative. I'd like to hear what the state is or isn't doing to address that. And then as well, biosolids with PFAS, that's a real concern. And I realize you may not have a lot more to say other than what's in the memo, but still I would just appreciate if you could go through some of those things with us. Sure, so. And Jen, before you begin, just again for the benefit of newer members, I don't know how long you've been on CSWD, but it seems like it's been forever in your resident expert and primary contact with all matters in Montpeliers. Is that a correct characterization? Yes, that is. I've been with CSWD for about 30 years. So we are having, we don't have the camera working clearly for this room. Is that correct? Is it still not showing up? No. So I... Do you want me to sit there? Yeah, I'm happy to just... Okay. You probably want me to sit on this. And then they can at least see you talking. Well, we're getting that set. Rick, I see your hand is up. Is this gonna be a question that could follow up? You could express after Jen has done her initial presentation. It might be helpful before. Okay, then go ahead. I don't recall ever hearing of the Vermont Materials Management Plan prior to this, and I can draw some conclusions just based on the nature of the comments. But I'm wondering if we could get, for those of us who are relatively new to this, a little description of what the Materials Management Plan is, how often it's reviewed, I could use some background. Yes, of course. So the Materials Management Plan is required by statute for the state to write a plan every five years. That essentially is, it has a lot of requirements in statute of what they need to consider, but the aim is to reduce the toxicity in the volume of the waste stream. So it essentially parallels to what our mission is. And there's some specifics in there. So once the plan is written and adopted, then the solid waste management entities, which is a solid waste district or alliance or an individual town who's representing themselves as oversight for solid waste in their jurisdiction, has to meet certain requirements that the state has included in the Materials Management Plan. And this is where we get our requirements, such as outreach to the business community and reaching out to a certain number of schools in our jurisdiction, those types of things. As well as providing services or ensuring that there's facilities that collect certain materials in our jurisdictions, as you see in the memo, asphalt shingles was called out because there's not much out there for markets. So that's the Materials Management Plan. And as I said, every five years that has to be rewritten by the state and adopted and the last one, the one that we're under now was written in 2019 and they will have to have a new Materials Management Plan next year and we will be writing a new Solid Waste Implementation Plan next year as well that will correspond with that. So are there any questions on that? I have a couple of quick follow up questions that those could logically wait till the end. Okay, so there was an email that went out about a month ago from the state that said the Agency of Natural Resources, which is the department that oversees this and writes the Solid Waste Management Plan. They overseed the Solid Waste Division. They wanted some input. They said we're getting ready to start writing the 2024 MMP. We're just checking in with Solid Waste Management Entities to see if you have any input. And that was great because they're really, this is the very beginning of their process and staff at CSWD felt that this was a good opportunity to really voice our request for the state to really look at some of these hard issues that are before us and not just what the statutory requirement is, which makes work towards reducing the volume of the, and the toxicity of the waste, but looking at issues like the landfill capacity and the PFAS issue as well, because these are big statewide problems that we really need some leadership to focus on and work together to figure out what we're gonna do. So these comments are not as a result of a public comment period, but once they get into the process of writing the MMP, they will be going through that formal process and there will be more opportunities to hone in on some of these issues that we see that need to be addressed. So that was the premise of that memo. We've got a lot of time between now and when they have to come up with the next MMP and a lot more opportunity, but it's just to get that conversation started and to get on record that we're really concerned about this and we're like the state to look at it. And then there was all the other issues with that we just commented on that, just like the asphalt shingles, the smaller things of the nitty gritty of what we're required to do now and how we might like to see that done differently. I will point out that one of the comments that I made was about the biosolids and the requirement in the MMP is really to involve solid waste management entities with biosolids, but it really is handled by the municipality that generates the biosolids. And there's not a lot that we can do to change the outcome of biosolids in terms of waste reduction. There's not really much we can do for education. So there's just not a lot in our jurisdiction and that is an issue where PFAS is cropping up as well where again we need state leadership to look at what are we gonna do with biosolids if land application is no longer an option, which it looks like it's going in that direction and if land filling it becomes not an option as well. So looking to the state to help resolve or help solve that issue or to look at that issue when they're considering regulations on biosolids. Is there anyone in ANR that you're aware of who's actively addressing or at least having discussions about these bigger items in terms of disposal capacity, MSW disposal capacity and or biosolids? I mean, are there any conversations being held at the solid waste agency or is this something like that they're just waiting like Congress is waiting for the debt ceiling default to the very end and they're gonna wait till everything blows up. So I don't know, are you aware of any action being taken at the state level? Well, I did spend a lot of time at the legislature in the last couple of weeks and I did talk to Matt Chapman quite a bit who is with the agency of natural resources and head of the solid waste group and they are definitely talking about it. There's definitely concern. So action is another, there's no action being taken at this time but there's definitely conversations that are happening. Okay, good, thank you. That's what I mostly wanted to make sure the state wasn't asleep at the wheel and was beginning to really look at this because I think these things are gonna take years and years to resolve. Yeah, they're aware and I think, as again, this was a way of expressing our concern as well and we're here to start having that conversation with them. Okay, thank you. Rem. Related to that question, has CSWD thought about any contingency planning for finances or just being kind of fiscally aware of the need to send the materials out of state and what that impact might be to the district and to the per capita that we've been able to avoid thus far. So when you say send materials out of state, Brian, what do you mean? I've been sending them to Coventry. So are you talking about MSW or? Yes, wait, yeah, the trash. As far as I know, we haven't built any type of contingency for that. I think we're 10 plus years away from that evolving. So we're certainly concerned about it and it's why we've started talking about it more publicly and trying to get people to talk about it and be thinking about what are we going to do? Thanks. And again, just to remind everybody, there's one active landfill in the state owned by Kasella. I guess there are a couple of other locations that are technically, are they permitted but really not viable for future landfills. So it really is a problem, I believe, going forward and something that's certainly bigger than Chittenden Solid Waste District that we need to have a voice and raise the alarm. Leslie, Leslie, your hand was up, you're muted. Sorry. Chittenden Solid Waste is certainly the biggest generator of municipal solid waste. At the same time, I think the staff have been really terrific in staying on top of technology developments in the sector. And I'm wondering whether there wouldn't be an opening for us to take something of a lead in reviewing technical alternatives to landfills for municipal solid waste. I know we sort of played around with waste to energy in the past that didn't really go anywhere, but there may have been technological advances that would be worth looking at. Do you have any, Jen, any response to that as an opportunity for the district to make a contribution to the state? Or are we just gonna sit around and wait to see what the state comes up with? That's my... Honestly, I've mixed feelings about it. I feel like CSWD has always been a leader. We have been leading the way quite a bit, I think, oftentimes for the state. And I think our current capacity for staff is we don't have that at the moment to look at technology, alternative technology to landfilling, but I absolutely agree it needs to be done, Leslie. It's just a question of who has the resources and the ability, and I think the state does have the resources, and I think that's something we have a conversation with them about and talk about what the need is and what the approach might be and how they could help. So I have mixed feelings about it. I would love to do that on one hand, but I also feel like the state should probably do that as well. Well, my only concern is yes, we can all agree that the state should. The question is, will the state, and is there going to be a vacuum there? But I think we look to you, Jen, to come back to us and give us a sense of something more than what Paul stated in the tabler raise, okay, they're talking about it, but how are they talking about it? What are they looking at? Who is somebody, is somebody going to be designated to take the lead on it? Is that person gonna be given any funding? You know, it would really be good to start to get some answers on a more detailed level rather than, you know, sitting around and hoping they give us some information, you know. That's something we can raise with Sarah. That's a full burden on Jen at this point, I think. Did we lose something? But it raises a very good question in the absence of leadership at the state level, what's our role? Yeah, well, it's gonna be minuted and my comments will be minuted and Sarah will respond, I'm sure. Yeah. Jen, I did have a question on this. That has to deal with the last bullet point under policy work, if you could just explain a little bit for me, that bullet point, evaluate existing variable rate pricing guidance and consider changes to achieve statewide waste reduction more effectively. What does that really mean? Yeah. Why would that be important for CSWD? That's a great question. So when we were working on what's now Act 148 that passed, I believe it was 2012, there was, basically it was every tool in the toolbox with the exception of extended producer responsibility was in that bill and is in that law. And so it's parallel collection of trash and recycling in public places at the curbside at drop off sites, food scrap, bans, recycling bans. And then there was variable rate pricing and when I was working on this bill, Nancy informed me that variable rate pricing was proven to be the most effective tool in terms of getting people to generate less trash. And what variable rate pricing is, is you actually charge the consumer for the amount of trash that they generate. And there's such a spectrum of how you can implement that it can be extremely effective or really not very effective at all. So if you think about current situation with curbside collection, I had curbside pickup for a while and I got one of those great big totes to put my trash in that I never filled up but I could have put more trash in it and equal tote for recycling. There really was no incentive for me. I was paying a set dollar amount for that trash and recycling removal and I could have generated more and that's because the tote was so large, right? So if the hollers had small, medium, large totes or small and large totes and you were charged a lower price for the smaller totes, then that's a more effective variable rate pricing and I'm not suggesting that that's what should occur but that's just an example. Our drop off centers have a pretty decent variable rate pricing mechanism with a small, medium and large bags. But what the law required of the state was to set guidelines for variable rate pricing and the guidelines were so easy to meet that they essentially were not effective and I understand why there, it was hard. People do it different ways all over the state and they wanted to accommodate that but I think there could be some, I think the bar could be higher, honestly. So that's what that comment was about. Thanks. Other questions or discussion on the Gens Memo regarding the Vermont Materials Management Plan? I do have a question. Go ahead, Rick. I'm finding this a very interesting discussion because I didn't know about this plan until these minutes came, the agenda came out. I had a couple of questions, one of which I was able to answer with a Google search. The other one has to do with rulemaking because I assume that the plan before being finalized would be subject to some sort of rulemaking process. I did a little Googling and I found that there's a formal rulemaking process for the Public Utilities Commission. I already know from experience that there's one for the Agency of Education. I'm assuming that this gets reviewed somehow outside the context of A&R, doesn't it, before it's adopted? Yeah, the MMP has to go through a public review process. So there's a public comment period and people, we can comment on that. It doesn't go through rulemaking. Oh, Bryn, do you wanna correct me on that? Yeah, unless something's changed, it goes through ICAR and LCAR, which is the Legislative Committee on Administrative Rules. But they don't have, but it's not part of the solid waste rules. It's an interesting nuance. You're correct. It's not part of the regulations, but it does go through rulemaking process. Okay, thank you. So it's reviewed by legislative committees, appointed committees and approved. Yeah. Thank you. Okay, thanks very much for this discussion and presentation. Again, this was part of the consent agenda. It's not an action item, but it's just a report and memo. So we're ready now to move on to the legislative update portion of the meeting. We have Jen's memo, which appears through on page 27, item number five. She's called out a couple of key items on there, but Jen, I'll turn it over to you for initial discussion. Okay. Comments and open it up for any other questions. So yeah, there were two, as the memo indicates, there were quite a few solid waste-related bills that were introduced this session. We are in the first year of the biennium, so anything introduced this year will carry forward through the next legislative session, starting in January. The two bills that were taken up and heard by committees was H67 and H158. H67 is the extended producer responsibility for household hazardous waste bill. And extended producer, well, I'll just say what the bill basically does. This bill, we've, this is the fourth version of this bill that we've worked on. It's, there's been a bill or two every biennium. And this bill, what it will do is it requires the producers or the manufacturers, why it's called extended producer responsibility, as it's the producer, which is the manufacturer of household hazardous products. So think about paint thinner or cleaners or drain-o. Requires those manufacturers to pay for and provide for a collection system for their products when a consumer wishes to dispose of it and there's leftover products. So essentially what our household hazardous waste program does. And we have other EPR legislation bills that have passed other laws. We have one for paint, one for mercury lamps, mercury thermostats, batteries, electronic waste. And what they all do is they require the manufacturers to form an organization to write a plan, submit it to the agency of Natural Resources for approval of how they will go about providing convenient collection services for consumers to collect their waste. And what ends up happening is they work with the solid waste management system contracting with solid waste management entities like CSWD to provide for that collection. They provide education and outreach as well. They usually have to set up a website. So this is a really exciting win for us. It's the first in the country which is really phenomenal. Oregon had a bill a couple years ago and it didn't go anywhere. And it's going to save us a significant amount of money. We anticipate that the one thing that we made sure in this legislation was that our facility and labor costs would be covered as well. So in terms of the products that it covers, it only is covering about 25 to 30% of the products we collect because we already have paint and other products covered under other EPR programs. And then there's just some things that aren't covered like old gasoline and things that don't come in original consumer containers such as that. But even so, I anticipate that it will save as 100 to $150,000 a year. It will help provide more education, make people more aware of how to properly manage their products. It provides an incentive for manufacturers not to produce hazardous products and maybe make their products less hazardous so they don't have to be handled and managed in a special way when consumers are done. So yeah, that's age 67. The governor has not signed it. It hasn't come to his desk yet. We don't anticipate that he will veto it. We are pretty careful with making sure there was no fees or taxes in the bill that would instigate a veto. So we anticipate that it will either be let, you know, go into law without the signature or we'll get signed by the governor. Fingers crossed. Well, congratulations. Well deserved win on this issue, Jen. Thank you. Yeah, we're very excited about it. And then H158, which has to do with the bottle bill. That bill does a few things that are in the memo. It expands the beverages that are subject to the redemption system. So essentially it's expanding to cover pretty much all beverages that are consumed with the exception of nutrient beverages and milk. And so that's one big part of that bill. The another part is that it changes the whole system and how it's managed to an extended producer responsibility system where the distributors would have to form an organization to manage the whole program, submit a plan and kind of do the same thing I just talked about with hazardous waste, provide for a redemption program which would involve the redemption centers that are currently in place and probably additional opportunities for the consumer to redeem their beverage containers. And another thing that it does is it moves the sheets over from the state to the clean from that that's currently going to the clean water fund. The sheets are the nickels that don't get given back to the consumer because the consumer didn't redeem their beverage container. They put it in their blue bin perhaps. Any deposits that don't get claimed by the consumer called the sheets and that that money is currently going to the state of Vermont. The change in the bill would give it to the producer responsibility organization for about five years so that they could have some money to get the system in place. And then finally, there's a systems analysis that has to be done on what the cost would be to Vermonters to solid waste districts to Marfs. So there'd have to be an independent study done contracted by A&R to provide that information back to the legislature. That bill passed the House. The Senate made some substantial change well made some changes to it where it had to go back to the House. And it was not, they didn't have enough time to vote on it in the House when the legislature adjourned. So what we've heard is that it is possible and likely that the legislature will take it up during the veto session because it really was barely, it just really was very close to the finish line. It just needed the votes in the House on the floor and the votes were there initially from the House to pass the bill. And so that that would happen in June during the veto session. And also what we've heard is that the governor has said that he does not support the bill and that it is likely he will veto it. So if that happens, as I said, the legislature, the bills still are in play next year. The legislature can take it up again and try to override his veto. But the Senate when they passed it out did not pass it out with enough votes that would override the veto. So it's more to come and there's a lot of ifs. Paul Stabler has a question. Okay, Paul. Yeah, it just struck me the other day. This would put a really big increased burden on the redemption centers it seems like. The ones that I go to seem just packed to the gills and adding this much more material. I mean, has there been input to the legislature from the redemption center operators? Yeah, so that's one of the reasons why so the redemption centers are in support in general. A lot of them are in support of this but they're also in support of it because of the changes that the producer responsibility organization would have. Vermont from what I've heard is the oldest in terms of technology, bottle bill state. And there are a lot of efficiencies that can be gained. And again, why the sheets would go to the producer responsibility organization is because there's a lot of automation that could happen with the bottle bill that is not happening now. There's no way that redemption centers would be able to handle an expansion at this point. Thank you, thank you. And Allen has a question to Paul. Sure, go ahead, Allen. Yeah, I'm just curious how the bill will affect our cash flow at the Murph. So I did provide testimony about that. And that's a really hard question but we did our best in trying to figure out how it would have impact our cash flow. So what you're talking about, Allen, is that currently we receive material that is not subject to the bottle bill such as water and Gatorade and iced tea. And that goes into the recycling bin and goes to the Murph. And our Murph receives a significant amount of revenue from aluminum and PET, which would be subject to the expansion. And we've done some analysis. We did a PET bail sort a few years ago to get an idea about how much if the bottle bill were expanded, how much of this PET bail is water bottles and Gatorade bottles. And so we have an idea on that, but then there's consumer choice of am I gonna redeem this or am I gonna put it in my blue bin, which we have no control over and no idea really what they're gonna do. Current redemption rates around 72, 73%. The bill requires the producer responsibility organization to hit 90% by a certain year, 10 years out. So there's gotta be some real convenience that's met for a consumer to go through that trouble, which it's out there. There's bag drop stations currently in Maine where you can just put your redeemables in a bag, put your barcode sticker that's related to you as your household. You put it in a grocery store, a bin that's out in the grocery store parking lot and the money shows up in your account five days later. So there are some conveniences that could happen in Vermont that would make that 72, 73% redemption rate go up higher. The other variable that we have no control over is markets. Markets for PET and aluminum, right? So when you're doing your analysis and you're looking at, okay, I kind of know what's in the bail, but I don't know what the redemption rate's gonna be and I don't know how much we're gonna get for this material in years out or even month to month now. We don't know, it goes up and down. But what I came up with with a three year average was approximately somewhere around 10 to $16 a ton loss in revenue. So that would have to be made up by tip fee unless say markets are great for paper. And if markets are great for paper, which is 70% of what we collect are paper and cardboard, then we wouldn't have to increase the tip fee, right? So it would impact the MRF. It's going to impact the MRF if it passes, but those are the factors that make it hard to figure out. And my concern was we're starting to move forward on a new MRF and it's gonna have a bill associated with it. And if we're gonna lose 8, 9% of our revenue stream, it's gonna affect our ability to pay that off. I would, I just wanna jump in here before recognizing Ken and Leslie. I've had conversations with Sarah about this and as I think as Jen has expressed this, the future is not clear. There are some opportunities. There certainly are some downsides. The thing has to shake out. We don't know what the final legislation will look like. I can state, I've seen in the trade press, Bicella came out against it. It operates a MRF in Rotland and it felt that Bicella felt that this was not in their best interest. But I'd also point out as Jen said at the end of her memo that CSWD provided neutral testimony. And I recall a presentation you made probably three years ago with some of these factors and just kind of laid it out there. Some positive and there's some negatives. We will have to adapt. Ken. Hi, yeah, I saw the neutral testimony comment as well, Jen. V. Perg's position is that CSWD is against the bottle bill and they'll tell that to anybody who's listening. So I guess my question is, if they're getting that vibe, are they getting it a vibe? Is it for real reasons? Is it because of misinformation that certain senators have? And how can, what is our position other than neutral for this bill that seems very environmentally positive? And how can we address the perception that we're against it, if that's true? And one of the reasons cited was that Thomas Chittenden tells everyone that he's voting against it because he does what CSWD wants. So are we talking about misperceptions? Are we talking about something that's not being said here and that we should know about as board members to talk to our people about? Right. That is absolutely a misperception and Thomas Chittenden does what Thomas Chittenden wants and has voted this way on the bottle bill consistently. And I've talked to him and he's come to his own opinion about the bottle bill. V. Perg has been in the rooms when I've testified, they've heard what I've said and I've never said that CSWD is opposed to H158, which are the magic words from any witness that tells the legislators what side you are on with a bill. V. Perg has not appreciated some of my testimony because I have raised concerns about the cost of recycling for Vermonters and I've told them outright it will raise the cost of recycling for Vermonters. There's no doubt about it. So that's just a fact that legislators need to know when they're making their decision and I think it's important for CSWD to provide that information having one of, well the only publicly owned Murph in the state. Okay, so we don't want to support this bill. We want to be neutral about it. Yeah, so a few years ago I did provide a presentation to the board as Paul referred to and the board actually signed a resolution that at that meeting opposing an expansion to the bottle bill. So the problem with the bottle bill is that there are a lot of people in favor of it and it's a hard issue to stand on one side or the other I think for a board collectively and this is why we've been very careful about just providing the information and the facts because that's what our job is with the legislators just to provide them that information. I mean, we've advocated for EPR for hazardous waste but when it comes to the bottle bill we just want to talk about how it impacts recycling and that's the only area of our interest, right? So we're not taking a position for or against it just providing the facts. It may be worth if any commissioners want to learn more about this. You could reach out to Sarah and we could find, I thought it was maybe three years ago when we had a presentation at the board level and this resolution was passed. It might be, you might be interested in getting the minutes of that meeting and seeing what was said. I think there was a PowerPoint presentation as well. I'm sure some of the information has become dated but it might help educate you more on the issue. Leslie. Thanks. It seemed to me that there was one aspect of this bottle bill proposal that would be helpful to CSWD and that is including wine bottles which might mitigate our continuing agonies over glass disposal and when you tried it, when you figured out the impact on CSWD cash flow was there any adjustment for perhaps a reduction in glass handling and disposal? Yes, yes, absolutely. In fact, a different bill was proposed the year before and made it through to the Senate and they at the last minute removed wine bottles and we opposed it for that reason because of the impact that it would have the financial impact that it would have had would have been greater on the MRF. So the calculations that I used included wine bottles being part of the redemption system which would definitely be advantage. And I've spoke out in my testimony, I have said that we do support an expansion of the bottle bill to include any glass containers. So that is one area that I spoke very positively about expansion of the bottle bill. Thanks. Bryn. Yeah, I just wanted to mention it's, at least from the state agency side of things, it's not unusual for state agencies to take a neutral position on proposed bills as well. So legislature usually asks the agency that has regulatory oversight, where they fall on approve or are neutral or reject or oppose the proposed bill and the reasons why. So I don't think it's unusual for neutral positions to be taken. Thanks, Bryn. Other discussion on these two bills that have the most action in the legislature. Jen's memo included several pages of tables with additional proposed legislation. It looks to me that very little action has been taken on any of those. I don't know, Jen, if there's anything you want to point out about any of them, we might want to be paying attention to as they went their way through the legislative review process. Yeah, there hasn't been any action. There's been discussion, there was discussion about the Coventry landfill that came from Northeast Kingdom representatives of wanting the state to look for a landfill location other than Coventry, but nothing was really taken up. And then there is a lot of discussion, there's a lot of concern and conversation about PFAS, but nothing was formally taken up either. I think they're waiting for a study. I think the state is reporting back to the legislature in January on some testing that they're doing on PFAS, and they're waiting for that. Any other questions for Jen on the legislative update? Thanks very much for your time, Jen, tonight. And again, we really appreciate your expertise and the dedication you have and representation that you bring to the table in Montpelier. Oh, thank you. We are now ready to move on to item number six, which is an executive session, which is a Flynn Avenue update. I have been advised by Sarah that it would be possible for us to continue or to have that executive session via this Zoom link provided we turn off the recording and the people in the Williston meeting room who are not an invited party or not a commissioner if they would exit. We have no other members of the public present. And I've been told that... That's okay. So this discussion, will I be recusing myself from this discussion in executive session? I'm not sure what is gonna be talked about without Sarah being here. Well, I have some talking points which are essentially what was covered in the exec board meeting the other day. So I think we're uncomfortable with having you to be present at the beginning of the meeting to hear what's said, review it, and you could offer any insights that you might have. But once we get into a discussion about the particulars and how the board might respond to anything that's presented, at that point I'd ask you to refuse yourself. Okay, because I did recuse myself from the executive session at the executive board meeting. Was it the entirety or was it? I believe it was the entirety. We were talking about two, I think there was two separate issues with, I can't remember. Okay, let's go. I was in there for the beginning and then when it came to the Flint Avenue, discussion I recused myself. Thank you, let's have you recuse yourself then. Oh yeah, I just wanna be consistent. Okay, thank you. And again, there's no other action at this point after that, so if you don't wanna hang around that'd be understandable. Okay, so I will, if you're staying here then I would just sign out of this Zoom meeting. Thank you. Okay, thank you. We have a motion to enter executive session if the secretary could read that in. Motion that the board of commissioners of the Chittenden Solid Waste District go into executive session to discuss the contract negotiations with the city of Burlington where premature general public knowledge would clearly place the district, its member municipalities and other public bodies or persons involved at a substantial disadvantage and to permit authorized staff, other invited interested parties and the Solid Waste District Attorney to be present for this session. So moved, South Burlington. Seconded Essex. Thank you, it's been moved and seconded that we enter into executive session for the purposes of discussing the Flint Avenue property. All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Thank you. We will enter into executive session with the understanding that the commissioner from Burlington will recuse himself and that we will have our council remain with us and no other parties will be allowed into this discussion. So as soon as moved and seconded that we exit executive session and return to public session. All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? We're now back in public session. Next item on the agenda is other business. Is there any other business that commissioners wish to bring before the full board? Rick, you're muted. I told it to unmute, it just wasn't listening to me. So I've got three questions that I think all stem from the program updates. The first one is a reference to the Williston Observer article with the headline, I didn't look at the article because I didn't have the patience to deal with the paywall but the headline claimed that there was a reduction in hours with the changes that we are implementing. I didn't do the math because I figured somebody had and could just say, is there in fact a reduction of hours? It sort of intuitively seems like there ought to be an increase in hours with a bunch of the drop-off centers now being open five days a week. So is it accurate to say that there is a reduction in the drop-off center hours? I'm not really feeling I'm the best person to answer that. I believe I've seen something, I can't recall where, I'm probably on the CSWD side announcing the new hours or the change in hours and it was promoted as being an expansion of hours. I think without doing the numbers, that would make sense. We're adding days. It would certainly be correct to say the number of days are being reduced because we would no longer have one location open on Monday. This is Jen, I can speak to it a little bit. I was out of the room for a few minutes when this conversation started, but then- Related to the Williston article. Oh, just the Williston. Oh, okay, thank you. I missed that part. But yeah, overall, we're looking at drop-off centers as a whole. With the change of the hours, it's an expansion of service. The Williston drop-off center is a reduction, but other centers have increased. So overall, there's more hours. Which raises a thought, I'm sorry, go ahead. Well, I was just gonna point out that people can use any drop-off center. It doesn't have to be the one in their town. Well, my question really stemmed from concern about messaging. If the Williston observer is claiming that we're reducing hours, are we doing anything in terms of outreach to say, no, we're not reducing them. In fact, there's increased opportunity to access the drop-off centers. Yeah, we are. The Messenger article came out, it's like two weeks ago maybe. And it was ahead of our messaging, and we are rolling out our messaging now, which will include that message of the overall hours are increasing. But we're also including in that why we're doing it, which is consistency, giving employees two days off in a row, the whole reason is behind the decision. So that's rolling out now. We don't wanna get too far ahead of it because what will happen is people will think that the hours have changed now, if we message it right now. So we are getting, the drop-off centers have a sandwich board out that is giving our customers the heads up. They have handouts at the booth that they're giving every customer with new hours and new fees starting July 1st. And then there will be some advertisement that we do when the date gets closer and into July and August to let people know. Okay, thank you. My second question, it's really following up on what Margie commented on early in the meeting. In the section of the minutes from the last meeting, section four, the Community Cleanup Fund update, there's the statement that staff will send a draft email to board members so that they can send information out in the front porch forum. And it was also requested that CSWD and board members provide information on what other towns have used the funds for. And I just wanna make it clear that what I need is that information. I would love to be able to put something in front porch forum, try to gin up some interest here before the money expires at the end of June, recognizing that there will be more money starting in July. But it just seems like a good time to put this out, but I just don't know enough to put it out. So I'm really waiting specifically for that email after which I may still have some more questions, but that would at least jumpstart my understanding of the Community Cleanup Fund. So I'm hopeful that that's on the way or if it has already come out, somebody's gonna need to resend it to me because it's not in my inbox. Noted. So that's just a request. The third question is, there was something in the program update that made it sound like the waterline was a done deal. What is the status of a waterline extension? Updated information on that, but I can ask Sarah to send a follow-up email tomorrow. I think last we get reported there was a delay in obtaining the actual meter wasn't there, I think. I mean, we paid, I think we paid Williston, but there was a problem getting the head or the water head installed on site because of what I remember last. I don't know, Jen, do you remember any of that? No, I can't speak to, I read it in the program updates and that's the most I know as well. I can ask Sarah to send an update tomorrow and Rick, we can also do the draft email and make sure that she's aware of that to go out. Thank you, I'm done now. Okay, thanks Rick. If there is no other business to come before the board tonight, entertain a motion to adjourn. So moved, Essex. Second, South Burlington. Thank you, it's been moved and seconded that we adjourn for the evening. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Good night. Night, everybody, we are adjourned. Thank you very much. The recording stopped.