 call to order the meeting for Monday, December 7th, 2020, select board meeting. There was an agenda that was sent out. Carla, was that today? Well, it was posted Saturday, but I didn't even like to send you all the copies. There's one additional item on the agenda. So hopefully everyone has it and we'll catch it if not. I believe I have it in front of me. So first thing I'll take the motion to approve the agenda or anyone would like to add anything? I would like to, one thing, well, I make a motion to approve the agenda as as presented. I also based upon today's the 79th anniversary of Pearl Harbor, give thanks to all, put in the minutes, give thanks to all of our veterans on this day. Can I get a second? I'll second that one. Any further discussion? Who's seconded that? Chris, I'll raise. Any further discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Consent agenda items minutes from November 16th meeting and errors and omissions letter dated December 3rd, 2020. Take a motion to approve the consent agenda. Second. Any further discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Looks like we do have a couple members of the public. I don't know if anyone on the call would like to speak. Can I make a comment, please? Sure. It's like Ken Bellowbo, Chair of the Planning Commission. A somewhat related item to the Planning Commission. I wanted to take this opportunity to congratulate Alyssa Johnson on her new job and to just say publicly what an outstanding job she did in terms of attending our meetings, which are not always the most exciting. I know it's a surprise to everyone, but you know, Alyssa did a great job and I want to congratulate her on her getting her new her new opportunity and we will miss you. Thank you very much, Ken. And I agree. I think you're going to be messed Alyssa and good luck with your new gig. Anything else from the public? And we'll move on to select board items update on draft unified development bylaws and timeline for approval. Who would you like to address? Steve on the call? Yeah, I'm right here, Mark. Yeah, I wasn't sure. Typically, I think Steve kind of drives, but Ken, if you want to speak to it, I believe this was added on out of my request because I was in a DRB meeting last week and there's some discussion on, you know, there is a specific project that's looking to come into town that is struggling to navigate our current zoning regs. And I think a lot of it has to do with just when they were written and some of the newer businesses like breweries aren't necessarily clearly defined in there, especially micro brewery. So, you know, one of the comments was, well, we've been asking the select board to do this for five years. And I know it's been a lot of work has been done and I was just hoping I know we have some new members that haven't been on since, you know, the only on since April. And I know we've talked about it from time to time, but I was wondering if we could get an update tonight and talk about a timeline. Sure. Let me try to address it at least briefly. So the Planning Commission has been working on this comprehensive rewrite of the town's development regulations for, I think I may still have had hair when we started. That's how long ago it was. It seems like it was that long ago, although it wasn't quite that far. But suffice it to say that even with the absence of all of what's transpired in the last year with COVID-19, it has been a painfully slow process. And I think there's a variety of reasons for it. One is the enormity of the scope of the project is very, very big. And to that end, one of the things that we've tried to do in the last few months is to sort of to whittle it down rather than trying to tackle the whole town all at once to focus more on the village downtown area, if you will, in the interest of number one, getting something accomplished because we were spending a lot of time and not really getting anywhere. We had some interruption because of the COVID-19 stuff and we have been meeting in person up until recently. Now we're zooming like you folks are that no doubt will slow things down further. So that's where we are. And I looked at the agenda and it sort of suggested what was the timeline and it's like God only knows. It's a very slow process. Part of it is also other than what I've already offered is that the planning commission is made up of laypeople who other than myself don't really have a lot of background. And I would I think suffice it to say they've taken their charge very seriously and they want to understand things really well before saying I'm okay with this and I'm okay with that. That causes things to move very slowly. What I would say and I pose this as a question to the board is that if there's a particular part of all that where the select board would wants to say here's where we want you to hone in that might I can't guarantee anything but that might help you know the planning commission to you know to stay focused on task but it has been a very very slow process Mark that's that's that's the way it's been. Steve I don't know if you want to add anything to that. Sure Ken I'll just add a little bit I think you outlined it really well I think one of the challenges with any zoning is to find areas where there's consensus and one of the things that the planning commission discovered when we were dealing with rural areas is that there wasn't necessarily good consensus especially among landowners in terms of how to deal with rural density. I think we're going to find a different dynamic with the village areas because especially when it comes to density and I think use is as well to some extent and in fact at the last meeting we talked about the downtown district which is currently the downtown commercial district and had a fairly lengthy discussion about breweries interestingly enough but I think we're going to find that this is an area where we can build consensus. We have a meeting on January 11th with the planning commission and a fellow named Jake Hemmerich with the state the state has put out an excellent publication called Enabling Better Places that really focuses on how to develop village areas appropriately and downtown areas and so on. So one of the missions of the state interestingly enough is to encourage planning commissions to break down their amendments into workable pieces that can move forward. So we're going to specifically talk to Jake about their recommendations on how to do that. So to me that's very encouraging and we'll really need some guidance. I think maybe a joint meeting with the slack board at some point to discuss where there's good agreement where we can move a piece of these zoning amendments forward effectively so and I think that the village areas the downtown area is one area that we can focus on. So Mary has joined the call and Mary is a champion of promoting density in the village areas. So Mary can introduce the topic and I just added about our meeting with Jake Hemmerich and moving a piece of this forward. So Mark is it all right if Mary gets a chance here to add? Yeah absolutely. You're on mute Mary. You're still on mute. Not on mute. Having missed the introduction and the you know Ken and Steve gave and the question other than you wanted an update I understand about our progress. I'm going to sort of wait to hear a little more of the discussion and some questions. Yeah Mary I think most of it had to do with the conversation in the DRB meeting about an issue with a permit and use and potentially the use that was it was brewery and the definition of that in our zoning regs. Alyssa maybe can speak to a couple projects I've heard of about hair salons not being able to be on Main Street or in some of you know so there's there's definitely some uses that over the years people have applied for and run into issues with maybe zoning that just isn't you know doesn't have all the uses or for some reason had decisions that I think a lot of us could agree that you know a hair salon could go into the eye care building that's down on Main Street but and I think Alyssa currently has another hair care place that is struggling to find a place to to hair care. You know and that's the question and I'm glad to hear that there might be an opportunity that we can take this and kind of chunks and move some of it forward I think I know that taking the whole thing on is is a great magnitude but I would hate to think that we have projects that are trying to move forward and running into some of the work that you know the work that you're already doing that might help some of these projects move forward easily and not run into some of the headaches and ultimately costs or loss of business or you know anything like that so I was hoping just tonight to understand any kind of timeline and now hearing that there might be an opportunity to break it apart you know just letting us know what that timeline might look like and how it might come to the board and I think you know unfortunately every year we have turnover of some select board usually so I think not all of us know exactly what changes are coming and I think that would be important to keep us in the loop there and I know that you've asked for some select board members to attend your meetings and I think that's going to be important as well. I think the municipal plan currently supports are looking at more density and kind of the continued liveable downtown idea that we want to promote and we've had a lot of discussions about how to do that responsibly and you know the balance between business and residence and there are currently three planning commission members who live in what was the former village area so we we each bring a slightly different take on things but I think you know all five of us recognize that finding balance is really our biggest challenge and you know it's one of the things that the select board members may want that I've been thinking about since this came up for tonight may want to do is look at the map revisions that we are considering for you know the downtown area because we are looking at some changes which would affect this potential brewery location and my you know my understanding you know right right we tried to create boundaries and it's not finalized but it certainly creates in my mind makes a little more sense than what currently exists that you know one use is allowed you know I don't know how many steps but just around the corner from a place where the same use is not allowed in the downtown area so we're trying to clean up those kind of things and I think it would be really helpful because we've we've been down this road before as those of you that have been on the select board for a while know that we pulled together what we think is the most responsible recommendations for the select board and then there's not the will to support it so the more input we have now the better we're going to be able to be in alignment with what you might be looking for so those are a couple of my thoughts Bill I talked to Bill this week too and Bill you had mentioned that conversation surrounding zoning that focuses more on look than use as well I'm blanking on the terminology right now but I didn't know if you wanted a comment on that I know I've brought it up in the past I think it's form-based zoning and I know that there's been some feedback from the planning commission that they didn't want to pursue that but I I just feel I'm saddened a couple DRB meetings recently just because of the one project on Foundry and then the one there on on Stow Street and just the the the what the DRB is kind of making applicants go through in terms of floor plans and trying to say that the breakdown of you know space is as representative of the use and how and you know what the primary use is I just I fear that sometimes we're not maybe talking about as much as what's happening on the exterior of these buildings and I see some projects that have gone up that you know I would say could have been architecturally done better and the focus there and making you know creating value and in historic look versus some of this use conversation I feel like could be as or more important and I didn't know if you wanted to talk about that again is an idea and I didn't know if you could do it where that's just the downtown or or what your thoughts are on that well yeah I think I think Ken and Steve probably are in a better position to describe form-based zoning than than I am but I think you're on the right track that it does focus less on the uses and more on what the structures look like and how they relate to other other development in the particular area I I agree with what Mary said a minute ago that the current bylaws that we have in the current plan that that informs those bylaws you know you have these it's okay to do this here on Stow Street and or not on Stow Street but right down the street where I could throw a rock from one building to the other it's okay and I think that's really the challenge that we have I don't know a lot about form-based zoning and I don't really know what its definition is and when I suggested that that is something that might be looked at I'm not sure that it hasn't been already by the planning commission so I would defer to them on it but I do want to take this quick opportunity to let you know that the current situation is not a happy situation for anyone right now the planning commission has been doing a lot of work they're all laypeople as Ken said and it takes a lot of time it's a pretty daunting task that they're undertaking and now COVID has made that more difficult the DRB and his only administrator frankly they have to live as well as the developers do with the regulations that we have right now and I think that's where the the rub really is there's a lot I get I get a number of calls from people I see Jason is on here but not just from Jason his his project was the subject of the DRB meeting last week but a number of developers call me Alyssa talks to me about can't the zoning and planning staff be a little bit more flexible and help people a little bit more throughout through this process and from my position I don't see them as as choosing to be unhelpful but when when you have a use table and you have to make a determination all right this is the use that's being applied for is it allowable in this district or not and if it if it isn't and that's the case that we found ourselves in last week that the zoning administrator determined that the use being applied for was not permitted in the district she can't just send it to the DRB and say well this looks like a good project figure it out she has to deny it and then that you know that initiates an appeal and it's a quasi-judicial a somewhat adversarial process because now the applicant has to tell has to get the DRB to come to a place where they say well the zoning administrator's decision was wrong it really is allowable so we're we're kind of in a tough place right now and we're in a tough time where people who have invested in properties especially in the downtown they see now opportunities to get something done to get a building filled with tenants to get a business up and running so that they have a chance to make it and I think there's a lot of feeling on everyone's part and Steve's on the call I think from staff's position there's a big feeling that we're just being that we're hamstrung right now especially in in this downtown district that the the use table is a bit antiquated I guess out of date so I was glad to hear Steve and Ken both talk about where they are in the process and maybe I missed something but Ken is it possible to to concentrate on one particular district and then you know bring those bylaws to the select board for for a hearing and and adopt this in series or does it all have to be done together and I don't know if it's you know whether it's possible if something can be possible but it almost it might not feel right either so a is it possible and b is is that does that make sense well so the answer the last part of the question is it possible there's five members of the planning commission if we can count to three on any individual question then it becomes possible so that's uh that's the first challenge that was really what I had suggested I think it was last summer when I said let's focus on something and let's break it up because you know we were we started with this whole big it was a big picture sort of thing and then we were out we were out in the more rural part of town and you know as Steve alluded to earlier it was clear that there was there was not a consensus and there was we were getting significant pushback from property owners and it looked to me and I think the commission agreed that we were kind of stalling out we weren't getting anywhere and that's where I had suggested that if we were to focus more in the downtown area the village area that we we might be able to more easily reach some agreement some consensus and and and part of that in the interest of getting something accomplished because you know just spending a lot of time on this project and not having anything to show for it it's it's not very gratifying so I would I'd also address one of the earlier questions you raised Bill and Mark as well alluded to form-based zoning or what's sometimes called a form-based code what was prepared by the consultant has what I would call some form-based elements in it which in a downtown area is is is really the most appropriate place for that kind of stuff I don't think I would call it a form-based code per se but it has some form-based elements in it and so you know that's part of what we're trying to deal with in the downtown area is trying to make it simpler trying to make it more workable but at the same time we also don't want to make a lot of what's already there non-conforming so you get a lot of different things that are going on because you know you've got this historic design pattern that exists in the downtown area and and that's not going to go away anytime soon and I and I and I think that's a good thing that being said it does present some challenges I don't know what Mary's thought is on this but my thought is that that I find this discussion to be helpful and you know we can bring this back to the commission and say we had this conversation with the select board and and let's see if we can focus and try to get something done I think that makes a lot of sense I would just reiterate what I said before that the the map and what we're defining as the downtown it would be nice to know that the select board is on board or if they're not on board what is it that they would like to see different because that helps also for us to take a chunk it's not just what the bylaws are going to say in terms of allowable development in the area but do we have the boundaries in a way that we're going to get support for because it it doesn't make any sense so we ran into this with the flood hazard regulations that you know people who weren't completely flooded in Irene were now in a zone that they were regulated by the realities of what happens with our flood plain so that would be the only thing I would ask in advance of us as the planning commission bringing it back to the full commission to say do we want to just complete this one zoning district and what's allowable and propose that I think the boundaries some agreement or consensus or go ahead with the way we're looking at it would be important all right Chris yep go ahead Chris a couple of questions here I mean whenever we get into zoning regs and economic development issues it's always a tough issue to negotiate and my first question is is there any state legislative time frame for rewrites and how would fragmenting process taking for certain pieces of this play into that if you're supposed to meet some process some legislative deadline for a complete rewrite and my other concern for fragmenting the process not to say that it can't be done is continuity in the entire process I think you need to when you're when you're taking a look at certain aspects of regulations kind of have to reflect on other parts of town and their zoning districts as well and then as far as the form-based type regulation system my concern with that would be all similar issues like kind of like I've got next door where you've taken a fairly quiet restaurant and turned it turned it into what some people might consider a slash nightclub you'd have to be careful that that didn't continue to migrate beyond the limits of reason on certain areas stop there but Steven and Mike yeah just to answer a couple of your questions Chris in terms of the time frame there are two options one is the the conventional review and approval process for zoning bylaws and that is the same for a small group of bylaws versus a comprehensive unified development bylaw the planning commission has to hold at least one public hearing then they forward a draft the slack board slack board has to hold a public hearing and the other option is interim bylaws you the slack board has approved two sets of interim bylaws as I think you'll recall for first signs relating to Main Street reconstruction and then for the tents for dining and our rec program and that's an expedited process where there is more of an emergency situation and the COVID pandemic is certainly that context so so the so zoning bylaws can can move through in either fashion I think with interim bylaws we want to make sure that there's there's some consensus around whatever is being done and you know we've done that a number of times after Irene we passed a couple sets of interim bylaws as well so the planning commission can talk about options I think for how to move a piece of this forward I would be glad to send the slack board the map and have you take a look at the village area and try to do some explaining about that but I think it'll be it would be good if the planning commission has a chance to talk they meet next Monday about kind of how to how to respond and how to move move this forward Bill sorry Mike I think I said you were next and then Bill unless you're gonna speak specifically to Steve well I just want to try to I think specifically answer Chris's question the the only legislative mandate that I'm aware of with regard to the town plan is that they have to be reauthorized every so many years it used to be five I'm not sure if it's seven or whatever it is now I don't think the process of of kind of updating the bylaws on a on a in a series is any kind of problem you know you're you're you can adopt it now when you get the next one done you can you can re-adopt the first one and that one at that time and by the end when you're finished you just adopt everything so I don't think that's an issue at all and as far as continuity is concerned I agree with you but I think Ken kind of spoke to that already that just in the process that we're in there's a number of new people on the planning commission there's new select board members and you know that happens all the time and we just have to kind of live with that so I don't think that's a big issue like it um I too one have spoken to Bill about this issue it to me it's it's it's frustrating I know I was on the DRB for many years that can relate to this um I was always frustrated about things that were out of our control because they were in zoning uh you know applicants would complain about some issues and we couldn't do anything this is what zoning said so I'm not pointing any fingers but I think something has to be done in a reasonably short term and maybe the way as Steve said is through some interim zoning bylaws uh we just have to you know for the sake of economic development and especially we're in an era of COVID you know there's going to be a lot of things to hopefully keep our town sustainable that we're going to lose projects to different municipalities if we don't streamline some of the and existing problems and I think as a few have mentioned probably the downtown is probably the place to start I know it would be nice to be have a comprehensive but if we could have some sort of interim bylaw changes that we could deal with some of the very distinct downtown issues that would help a more livable downtown as well as create some economic vitality but I think ultimately you know I I think at least I'm gauging from what I'm hearing from the select board members that there's will to get something done and you know it's a matter of us sitting down with the planning commission and or the drb and let's work something out and get something out there and you know you know hopefully we could get some change or we're not creating any new districts correct there's some work on boundary relocation I understand the density conversation but within each one of those there's the map change but is there are there any new zoning areas to be added or is it just order movement I think what we were looking to do mark was actually to reduce the number of districts and and at the at the simplest level you know there's no longer a split between the town government and the village government we used to have two governments right so we used we literally had two sets two sets of zoning districts because you had you had zoning districts that had the word village in them well that you know that distinction no longer exists so that was one of the things that we were trying to do but we were trying part of our objective was to try to simplify rather than complicate as much as we possibly could we we do have some new districts and we have some combined districts we have some changed boundaries that's why the map is it's not just what the bylaws say but it's looking at the map as in the draft so you so use table couldn't be the first focus because the use table will involve newly named districts correct so you couldn't really do it that way well we've we've looked at a new draft of a use table in conjunction with I mean they're and I'm just talking at the top of my head but they're like three different aspects that go into the use table there are definitions of what those uses are there are districts and what's allowable in a district what's conditional in a district and the the third issue is sort of the overall plan that governs you know what what the goal is if you will so it's it's layered if I don't know if Ken or Steve could say it a little more succinctly but that's how I see it I think that's where really the update needs is on some of the uses versus maybe where the districts are and mapping has to change some of the definitions of they're interlocking like I understand okay I have a little bit of a planner's background right wait but I but I we've tried to pull out we we worked through the use table and we have some I think some real um promising recommendations for how it can be changed but we haven't refined it because we're now looking at each district and saying okay is that what we really want is that what we mean and we're finding you know cross-referencing things so it's not as simple as just taking a table and marking it up a little bit I just don't I don't want us to suggest that we we're trying to do this responsibly and I don't want to suggest that it could be oh let's just take the table and make some revisions that's all right but that's where I'm kind of seeing is that we we were kind of at this four or five years ago you know looking at this and we need something to bring our town forward now and I'm that's that's why I'm seeing is maybe that's where as Steve presented some sort of an interim bylaw might be a way to go to get something at least on the table and moving and then moving from you know interim to you know then we could look at comprehensive bylaw change well I'll just speak briefly to this the one district interestingly enough that hasn't changed dramatically is the downtown district the main change is that we've taken some of the industrial pockets like the end of foundry street the area where ever coffee had the eagle oil depot there are a couple pockets of industrial industrially zoned area and we've incorporated those into the downtown district and then added some of the limited industrial uses into the downtown district so I think if we were to think about any area that that might be suitable for something in an interim that that might be an option I think the planning commission is going to have to talk about that and see if that would be workable but once you get beyond that the the unified development bylaw really strives to reorganize districts simplify districts and add add residential density and some of the areas and more flexibility but I think this will take some further conversation and then maybe some kind of a proposal back to the select board on on what might be done in an interim basis interim bylaws are a little tricky but they've served us well I think in the times when when they've been well thought out and have been able to move forward. Lisa I don't want to put you on the spot but I know you've been working on this quite a bit as well and kind of been interacting with a lot of the groups trying to do business in town and wondering if you have any thoughts before we we see you depart on Friday. Well belated thanks to you and Ken for the kind words it's kind of serendipitous I joke so a reporter calls me every year from Vermont Business Magazine and says you know what's happening in Waterbury and in October 2017 three months into my job I said we're doing a zoning rewrite it's going to be it's really good for the community Maddie Hughes been working for the Waterbury record wrote about how it's going to be like writing a cookbook and we're going to do the different levels and so you know it's something I've definitely jumped in with both feet and I give a lot of credit to Ken and Mary and Steve and the planning commission for trying to work with everyone I think I echo the point a lot of folks have made here about figuring out what we can get over the finish line and sooner rather than later you know I know I'm as much a part of the complication and the reason this process takes a long time because we do want to get it right for all the different stakeholders and businesses that may have contacted me you know that being said I think the group has really stepped up with these interim regulations and saying okay this needs to happen soon and gotten something to you all and you've gotten it done I think similar to you Mark and Jason I've done a lot of interacting recently there's also some things that just need to get cleaned up and like our local regulations don't meet state statute for how long you need to notice a hearing you know three sets of town staff had noted that it's no one's fault and they're really good in your communication about saying you need to warn this 15 days ago but why do our regs say 10 days and it's been however many years so I think I'm encouraged by this conversation and seeing what the select board and other people can work to get something passed quickly and I know that the you know Mary others have spoken to things are so inter mingled so I know defining uses and districts is harder I will say Steve I think we're extending the downtown a little because I'm laughing there's an available space for a hair salon in south main street but it's over the illustrious park road dividing line so can't be a hair salon and it's hard to explain and again there's a million examples but I would say my takeaway if there is any is figure out what can we break up in terms of both easy fixes because I do think there's some admin cleanup and yes it doesn't make sense to do that if we're going to have new zoning regulations next year but that's what I said in 2017 so I think figuring out what can get over the finish line and maybe it's adding a new definition maybe it's focusing on the downtown would be great to see because I understand again as folks have said no one's really happy but I think the select board and the planning commission talking more and getting some things fixed sooner would be great did anybody else want something yep go ahead yeah this is it well I've served on the old planning commission and the drb and I agree it's very complicated in the village and I mean there's the historic district on top of the business district on top of on top of on top of and if some of that can be clarified I think that would be wonderful because people get confused and I know it's difficult it's not easy and I applaud all your work on it because I know what it's like been there done that Mark one last thing yeah good um thinking about this whole thing if you think back in history of the town of Waterbury the village especially had a lot of different aspects of different types of businesses everything from a plywood mill a cannery to a furniture manufacturing facility to ccc camps here here in the village so redrafting zoning regs when mike said something to the fact of bringing a town forward I think that's going to be an ever endless story because you know times change businesses change and I won't you know no ill words here but I think it's the squeaky wheel scenario that drives a lot of this because until somebody comes to the table looking to do something that might be outside the normal box of the regulations regulations stand at the current time fairly fairly good um it's an until somebody's trying to push you know either into a different area based on available space or demographics or some other scenario that drives them to want to put a business somewhere where we don't qualify it as being right now then the burden falls in the lap of the planning commission and the drb to work out this you know this urgency to try to make changes and you know I've said it right along forever that one the good the one funny thing I wouldn't call it good about human beings is typically when we don't like something or something doesn't suit us very well uh we always change it we always change it to suit ourselves in some manner and sometimes it's not always to uh to the benefit of the planet per se but uh I commend the planning commission and the drb for all their efforts and the zoning administrator and you know Steve you as well it's an endless changing job and um I wouldn't I wouldn't choose on for a minute yeah I think I agree to some of that Chris but I think you know just watching the conversation surrounding this project on stow street that's trying to go into that new building you know referring to a micro brewery as a canning facility or a bottling facility or bottling plant to me I I would be surprised if I went to the planning commission and they agreed that that was the right definition so I think that's where there are some businesses I think we saw the success of the alchemist and as they struggled to find growth um in an area town that allowed for it or you know unfortunately had sewer connection um you know we're gonna we're gonna have to review and then I remember having a conversation with the woman who bought the building for the eye care facility right there on park row and and her friend had the hair salon where blackback is now and they had no idea that a hair salon wasn't allowed one street over and she left her lease on main street thinking she could go down main street and found out that she couldn't put her hair salon in that building so there are some real implications to some of this that I really think is causing quite a bit of of of grief and headache just because of some things that could be changed and I think are going to be changing these new regs and you know hearing about two more hair salons today is another example of where I think we do need to just start to say okay let's let's start moving stuff forward and and we can't sit on this any longer and I agree that this is that this is I think we're fortunate to have a town that has not a lot of available commercial space but our strength is only in you know our process and and all of these regs and I think that if we have businesses that can't figure out how to do business here and they go elsewhere that's you know ultimately going to hurt our values and development moving forward even smart development and grand list value and supply demand so I think that we really do have to take it seriously and and if we know that there are some things that need to be addressed we need to address them as soon as we can. So Chris you had you had made you had made a comment about a squeaky wheel and back when Mike Bard and I were sitting on the DRB some three years ago Mr. Wolf came and very animated at one of our DRB hearings because there was a pretty blatant miscommunication between the administration and you know a perspective somebody who is just really wanting to get a business started downtown and well he's still sitting here you know he's he's still in front of us he's he's going squeak squeak squeak so there's a you know there's a case in point and I and I have no doubt you know I've been on the DRB I have not been on a planning commission but you know there there it's a it's a hard job and it's a hard job to muddle through all those details but you know for somebody like Jason who's just saying hey I just I just want to get something done here I think we owe it to these people that want to get these businesses going downtown that we need to fast-track some of this stuff and and if there's any way that we can help if there's anything we can do I'm in. I'd just like to say thank you and I completely agree Chris I have spent a little bit of time not a lot with with a number with Mary and with Ken and with you Chris and with with Steve on the planning commission and I fully appreciate the challenges and and and I and I don't mean to critique anybody but it is frustrating because I I see a ton of opportunity for Waterbury and we are I mean we want to build you know we want to invest and make nice things that I think will be attractive to as Steve said you know there should be a collaboration I think most people will agree that they will support the types of projects that we're we're talking about and the one that brought up was an office space on on Main Street just across the street from the municipal offices which I think was consistent with development and and again I just I thank you all for the time you're taking to talk about this it means a lot yeah I don't want people to misunderstand me I'm just trying to explain the the need for these changes is through change in business through through entrepreneurship through uh desire to you know start a business in a town and and typically especially in Vermont where we're kind of like small town still uh and in the past you've kind of made it through with whatever businesses were there but there's always a new set of shoes walking through the door with with some other idea that doesn't fit the book that we've written uh and unfortunately usually time is of the essence and so it's difficult for the planning commission in the in the whole process to react you know in a split second but yet I understand what you said Nat about Jason being here for three years but uh but to that point and and this will be the last thing that I say and I don't want to show any disrespect to what Mark or Alyssa are talking about with the hair salon but you know it's one thing uh to suggest that maybe a business isn't properly defined and what Jason is trying to do with the beer folk is not a cannery and a brewery that kind of thing is understandable but I really don't think that we need to take responsibility when somebody gives up a lease on place a to move to place b when it's pretty clear if she just asked the question before it happens that we would have said no it might not be reasonable that it's no but when it's no the the applicant needs to take the initiative to ask and not just say oh boy the town is really sticking it to us the regulations whatever they are are the regulations and you got to deal with them and it doesn't fit to deal with the process but the the hair salon thing while I don't disagree that it should be changed the fact that it's hugging some people up and hug some people maybe out to dry isn't our fault can I say something go ahead go ahead Mary um I what I love about Waterbury and being part of whatever process to kind of continue to support our town and grow our town and keep our town the way it is all at the same time um is it that thoughtful responsible people like those who are have spoken tonight um demonstrate is what's really helpful and in the long run I think the decisions are made I what I would say though in my time on the planning commission which I've lost track of how long it was um sometime after I read one of the things that that's difficult and it's goes to the squeaky wheel comments there have been times when either coming to the planning commission or public hearings or to the slack board there have been um individuals who want to do something that is a little outside of you know all of what we've been talking about and there have been attempts to try to see what could be done to support those individuals and what I would really love you know and sometimes that's made things better sometimes it's it hasn't quite frankly you know there were some there was a big squeaky wheel for I'll go back to the flood hazard regulations where um I don't know Steve would remember but 20 feet instead of 22 feet or something it wasn't you know there was going to be a business that was going to come into town and it is um you know if the regulations are the way they're proposed and that business will never come and so the slack board moved in the direction of that squeaky wheel and that business has not come into town and I I I think the slack board members understand this but I and I'm not pointing any fingers or suggesting you don't but I just think for the record it's worth saying that we as a planning commission and make sure everybody is aware that we really tried to weigh a whole lot of things Ken mentioned making current existing business is non-conforming that's not a good thing to do at the same time you know it doesn't make it didn't make sense it's not just an issue of whether somebody knew the regulations ahead of time for the hair salon it doesn't make sense that um on one side of park row a hair salon's allowed in the other side it's not and in the same district there's a a service station and a you know an auto parts store I mean we try to look at which is and simplify things but also have them make sense not only with what's there but what we want the town to be and so I would really like to have some input from the slack board and that you said if there's anything you could do is really what is it that you're really looking for in a little broader picture not just let's make sure businesses that want to help grow and sustain our town have a place to go but what is what what is I don't know that I've heard from the slack board um you know as a whole or individuals kind of what what would be your definition let's just take the downtown of what it should be like because um that would be really helpful as we try to weigh and find a balance with all of these competing interests yeah and and I I'm not I totally hear you and I I don't know how you know I just I I recently went through the process of a zoning application and I think one of my requests would just be a streamline and and I think that the the rule book is there but um I was a little surprised at the process and I need to do a little bit more reflection before I want to comment on it but I'll I'll try to take the time to think a little bit more about that but I think the process and Alyssa maybe can speak to it but um I would love to review that um but and you know the other thing that I've noticed comes up in some of these meetings is the parking where years ago was you get the approval and then you go to the village trustees and they would they would go like that with parking and I heard that they never denied a project parking came up in the meeting that I attended the other night and and I I feel like we do have to address that head on in the conversation surrounding and I and maybe you already have in the new regs but um you know I think my pillar doesn't even have a parking requirement unless it's residential um I just fear that that's coming to a head in these meetings where they're it's really becoming a focus where it wasn't in the past and I know that we have conversations around parking and whether we have an issue and then we do a study and then you know I think we got we've gotten lucky with some private parking lots that have luckily turned even the paid parking lot a years ago I thought that was a bad idea but now I love it I love the idea that somebody kept that parking lot instead of developing it um but yeah parking is something that I definitely would like to have a conversation about and just what the plan might be there um but yeah I'll try to do that and you know as a board I you know sometimes I think it's hard for us to think some of that through when we're on the stage so maybe it would take more of just I know we have a couple select board members that were on the DRB so they they understand that process and maybe some of the hiccups they've seen so that's great we have two I don't know if Chris you were on that on the DRB before but you know we have some knowledge there that maybe we can we can help you with that and I hope we can we can help move it move it forward that'd be great Mark yeah one just very quick thing and maybe I really appreciate everything that the planning commission is doing but I'm going to ask very point blank to Canon Steve can we have a date that we could at least look at interim zoning bylaws you know some yeah I'm not going to say exact date but pretty close one month three months one year five years you know I think we got to know I think we got to you know work toward a date that we could we could move at least some of this forward well one one thing you should understand Michael is that interim zoning isn't required to go through the planning commission by state law so interim zoning is something that you as a select board would enact now I know in in the time I've been on the planning commission there have been a couple of different things where interim zoning was enacted and the planning commission was part of the process not because we were required to but it made some sense I think that's what we would want to do right well you know as Steve mentioned earlier the planning commission's next meeting is a week from tonight so you know we'll have to bring this conversation to the planning commission and you know see if we can get something done having said that we're in the first week of December we only meet a maximum of maybe 22 times a year right twice a month you get some holidays in there to get in the way a snowstorm who knows so could we get something done by this summertime maybe again you got to be able to count to three Mary and I are only two so we can only promise so much here tonight but certainly what I can promise you is that on Monday we'll bring this to the board and say let's see if we can focus on something and get something done in the downtown area so we can bring it to you this summertime summer 2021 okay um thank thanks for your comments Ken and Mary to partially answer your question and I as I'll mirror what Mark said and I'm going to give this some more thought but my simple answer would be if somebody asked me you know what what could be done to to make the process more simple for the applicant is to streamline the process to the point where the initial conversation between the applicant and the industry professional who is the zoning administrator is a transparent easygoing conversation where the rules are explained in a way where they're understandable to the average client who comes in you know the average business owner the average homeowner so that the language is is understandable and so that by the time if it's needed by the time that an application does get to the DRB parties are informed and the rules are the rules are not in question the rules are are are understandable by all sides and um you know I know that that's that's a pretty broad statement but that's that's kind of at the basis of the conversation problem that I saw was between the applicant and uh staff of just misunderstandings of what could actually happen is it possible to do that don't that is it possible to define anythingregs as such a manner that there's no convoluted ability to to to misinterpret them uh I think that's a case of with almost anything that's written in legislation there's always a way of I won't say splitting the hairs or that's why we have lawyers that's why I mean let's face it I think we all understand that the zoning regulation process requires lines in the sand yeah if we don't have lines in the sand we'd have a free-for-all and sometimes those lines get in the way and you know does it mean we scribble out a few lines here and redraw them in a different way by not only meaning but also areas um that's that's the tough task if I could comment if I could comment just briefly on Nate's point question which is that I mean I agree those are all those are all you know great goals and you know when when a potential applicant comes into the town this should be a straightforward and cordial and business-like conversation and you know that's the way it should be having said that you know perfection is an illusory goal you know we live in an imperfect world the other comment that I would make is sometimes applicants don't hear what they want to hear and they could come in the office and they could have the most cordial friendly straightforward black and white conversation on the earth but it may not result in the answer they want to hear and so sometimes and speaking as somebody who's worked on that side of the desk for a while um an applicant shows up at the DRB and says I don't understand they they didn't explain to me why it was I can't do whatever it is now it doesn't mean that what they want to do is a bad thing necessarily but sometimes things do get represented in that way um having said that I do agree with you you know and it's been part of our goal is to try to make this as simple as we possibly can understanding that there are a lot of complexities and hopefully uh eliminate some of the the definitional challenges that exist under the current regulations all right I I really appreciate the time we've taken on this tonight I want to move the meeting forward if no one has anything else I think we'll move on but I really appreciate all the members of the planning commission um attending tonight um thank you so much and I think we look forward to moving forward Bill good thanks I think about 45 minutes or so both Steve and Ken talked about you know uh a tangible thing that can be done right away is Steve can send out a map we can all agree on what the downtown is and where it is so we don't have the this side of park row and that side of park row kind of thing out there I think that's the first thing that we should do and and then right after that I think both Miriam and Ken as well as staff has heard that you know you want to be a little bit more flexible with the regulations than they currently are written and I think just some of the definitions will need to be updated because there are things that don't fit and there's as Chris just said there's no way that you're going to create a use table that covers everything that somebody might want to do unless you say you can do anything you want in this distance you know that anytime you start to delineate there's going to be somebody on the outside looking in so uh the problem I can't know the illusory I think is the term can use that and it's true it's there's not a perfect system out there and we can make it better but I don't want anybody to think that it means that we'll never have this conversation again great now we can thank you thanks again um we are going to move on to discussion of special appropriations and articles thank you thank you thanks thanks for everybody's patience so mark um special appropriations and special articles um I think all of you uh select board members received an email last week from Jim Boylan from the Mad River Valley and he raised the issue of um somehow evaluating the requests for special articles and I sent an email back to him that I included all of you on that indicated that while I thought his goals were laudable I I think that I saw a lot of problems in what he was suggesting but Mike asked for this issue to be on the agenda tonight he got in contact with Carla and me on Friday so I'm going to let Mike talk about it because he's the one that asked to have this conversation sure uh thanks Bill um this has always been an issue I know I've brought up in the past and I think it's something that's worth some of our attention I think uh in uh Mr. Boylan's thing he said in his first sentence let's face it special appropriations is a mess and there's a lot of truth to that uh if everyone read that he included in his research you know whether they should put special appropriations you know as articles for for um Australian ballot I don't think that's a good secret but a good a good method that we should probably be using but I think there needs to be some more scrutiny if you looked at the application that he had for nonprofits that's going to be very onerous on a lot of the nonprofits the bigger nonprofits the senior center the child children's room etc those groups may be able to do that some of the other groups are going to have a fairly hard time one thing I think that's really to me that's really important is that every group has someone who's desi that's designated to be able to speak at town meeting and I think you know in my opinion I think these special associations deserve to be heard at town meetings I think for time's sake we have developed a good system on grouping the smaller items together but I do think what deserves some merit is a little bit of a questionnaire but being very much streamlined compared to the one that mr Boylan developed I think that was just you know would be very you know you know as he put I think in his email you know any nonprofit worth the soul would be able to do this in several hours I think several hours is not really a fair representation for someone looking for 250 dollars I think it's something that should be able to be put together within within an hour good basic information most of the time you know I'm looking for and this this is what I would like to review in a special appropriations request I want to see how it's affected waterbury citizens I think that to me is the most important thing I think as he puts you know some of this is more charity and I don't necessarily think cow money is really designed to support charities just in general I think you know there are a lot of things that people could support on their own because there are good organizations but I think in any organization that we do have a special appropriation should have benefit to waterbury citizens and I don't know that's just my thought again I don't know if I have there are any other comments because I thought if we used a you know an application similar to the one he presented I think that's going to I'm I don't know if people think that's a good thing by eliminating some of the you know small appropriations I would like to keep those because I think there are a lot of worthy causes that community members would like to see support but I want them to be used by waterbury citizens and I'll let leave it open to anyone else to comment well a lot of these appropriations go towards organizations that serve the state a statewide boundary line and you know in the past we used to have people come to the town meeting and stand up individually and talk about the mission of the organization that they're working for the only way to somehow try to guarantee that your money's not getting thrown out the window now do you know that that would work is to have some form of a list of achievements that from year to year that these organizations without getting into too much of the weeds something that you know could be easily fact-checked I think I told a couple of the different board members or different groups of board members at a couple of town meetings that years ago there was one town that looked into a lot of their especially our article organizations and found out that there was a fair amount of abuse on certain organizations and they pulled the plug they pulled the plug on those people those organizations and they gave the money towards the ones that were really doing what they're supposed to be doing um that was a news clip that was you know on tv that talked about that and how they went about doing it is beyond me I don't know I feel like I think you had mentioned at one point that there's nothing to be said that some of those couldn't be moved on to the especially ones that have been there for years that we have agreed maybe with the historically for the same amount of money over time that they could move to the budget instead of necessarily being a special article because there are some budget items that are basically special articles that we've just moved on to the budget side I think you've just muted yourself I think those tended to be the larger ones versus the smaller ones yeah but and and for the you know maybe maybe this process that this guy Boiland laid out could be used to evaluate whether you're going to move it from a special article to into your budget I mean we've got you know the senior center gets thirty thousand dollars from Waterbury and what we've done and it it goes back a number of years where you know they would get in ten thousand dollars a year in a special article then we put it in the budget and then they wanted thirty and the select board at the time said well we're going to budget for the ten and we'll put the twenty on as a special article and see if the town wants to give that to you and we've just kind of left it like that for now maybe after a time that they've been receiving the appropriation maybe the evaluation process that Mike is talking about or Mr. Boiland is talking about could be used to move them from special articles to to budget line items but I appreciate the problem but you know if you if you set up a system for special articles that's going to take an organization any longer to do than it takes to get the 200 signatures that are necessary I mean this guy Boiland is kind of saying well fill out this whole application and we're going to review all this and do all these things but if the organization submits a petition to the select board with the right amount of signatures it goes on and warning the select board can still maybe try to get the information and maybe they can recommend at the meeting to turn something down but I think that would be a difficult challenge but I do think the thing that Boiland said to me that was most interesting was that Vermont is almost unique in that it allows municipalities to use tax dollars to appropriate to social service agencies without having some quid pro quo that there's not a contract that you're going to do X, Y, and Z for us in other places they don't let this happen I just sent an email at the beginning of the meeting saying you know I agree with the issue of special articles and I've commented to all of you that we go through this big process where you know you've told me now we want a 51 cent tax rate again in 2021 we might have to make cuts to our programs but none of these special articles get any cuts you know so I told them if you really want to make inroads on this you got to get the legislature to change the law that says it's not legal to do this but you know we'll see how quickly they take that up so anyway Bill what risk is there pro or con against you know for putting these things some of these things perhaps right in the budget I mean looking looking further down the road well the so to those who would say that well you're you're putting it in the budget and therefore you're not letting people vote on it that's not true the budget gets voted on by the voters and at open town meeting if the people spoke up just like they did a few years ago and asked us to have a full-time rec director they could say hey we don't really want to pay this money that's in the budget for that particular agency so putting it in the budget doesn't take it out of the people's hands it's not a direct vote on that particular appropriation but people can still ask about it so I don't think it really hurts that way the major pro of putting it in the budget as opposed to the special articles is that you know compared to the budget discussion the special articles take about three times as long to get through a town meeting to me you I could see a lot of things that could show up in the budget is things like green mountain transit you know things that really benefit the community that you're going to see some you know some benefit the things that are a little bit more nebulous I may want a little bit of a discussion you know it was good when you see their town report and that they include how many water barrier residents I think that should be always required that they include how many water barrier residents that they did serve and to me that would be a test after a while if they're not serving water barrier residents maybe we don't want to you know maybe the select board has some ability to say you know you know the select board doesn't want to entertain this particular charity because it's not benefiting water barrier residents my opinion yes that was going to be my question if it would put in there as a budgetary item does the select board have the chance does the select board have the opportunity or the ability to adjust that number whatever it may be one way or the other doing during you know we're doing that in budget conversations you know when we go through the budget when we do it in January February etc you know to determine what our budgets you know that we're giving bill guidance and if we saw that green mountain transit was asking for $75,000 and we didn't think that was a reasonable amount yeah I think we could cut that back I agree with that thought so I think there are some things that are definitive that you can I think put as budget items I think there are a lot of other things we would start again I you know I'm a big strong proponent because that we want to have require someone has a representative to speak to the to their organization you know I always hate that you know the same two three individuals they know a little bit about the the organization they say oh it's good mom and apple pie but they really don't know enough about the organization and no one's brave enough to to say no that's the only benefit to Australian ballot things is a lot more people would click that button or get the pencil to say no on a particular item and I'm not wanting to take money away from these organizations but you know and that's why I think they do deserve discussion at town meeting versus being done on Australian ballot Bill did you want to talk about anything else on this tonight or should we move on I'm all set okay discuss options for town meeting okay we we're in December I'm in the process of starting the whole budget building process we'll really get into that in January at your December 21st meeting I hope to have a couple of budgets anyway that you can review we'll have to make a decision no later than we have to publish the warning about how we're going to conduct town meeting and I think Carla may have sent out a link to you folks to look at some of the things the legislature is considering and has already decided upon I guess the big thing from Carla's perspective and mine to a little bit lesser degree is how are we going to conduct town meeting this year we are an open town meeting town that has been our tradition and I think most of us appreciate it and like it the legislature has already passed rules that are applicable to 2021 town meeting only that will allow any town by vote of the select board to conduct its town meeting by Australian ballot completely without the requisite having a town meeting to get the town's people to vote to go Australian ballot which is the normal procedure so you know here we are in December we're pretty much under pretty strict orders from the governor about you know keeping crowds down staying at home when possible not visiting family not having groups more than 10 people what have you and March is not all that far away and it seems unlikely given what I think we're all seeing on the news that anything dramatic is going to change that before town meeting gets here so if we decide to have our town meeting conducted by Australian ballot that will have to be decided in January it's only a month away when the warning has to be done it's probably what the third week in January the fourth week in January Carla that the warning has to be ready to go pretty much the last day in January the 29th okay so we have all of January to think about this what you need to know though is that while the legislature has already allowed towns like ours to have their select board choose to have an Australian ballot meeting they did not waive the requirement that says if you're having an Australian ballot town meeting you're required to have a public information meeting no later than 10 days prior to the meeting so if town meeting is on March 2nd or yeah March 2nd this year you know we would have to have a public information meeting no later than 10 days before that so the last week of January probably would I mean the last week of February would be when you had to do that and if we're going to have an Australian ballot town meeting in order to not require everybody to get together we're going to have to have the special public information meeting by zoom and and you know I've already got staff looking into our zoom license right now we're limited to the number of people that we can have on one of these zoom meetings I can't remember if it's 50 or 100 right now but it's certainly not enough to take care of everybody that might want to come to town meeting or special public information meetings so we're looking into what we have to do to up our zoom meeting capability but I did want to ask the board given the fact that we're going to have to have a public information meeting we have three choices really we can either just say forget it we're going to have open town meeting and just do it like we always have and we'll all see you at the school in March I think that would be unwise and we might be shut down by the governor's office saying hey you can't do that if you have to have a public information meeting by zoom some are saying well why don't we just have town meeting by zoom let it be an open town meeting and do it by zoom that to me seems rather unwieldy trying to figure out who's trying to make motions who's wanting to ask questions you know all of the parliamentary procedure that goes along with an open town meeting would apply if we had open town meeting by zoom so I think from my perspective thinking about it the easiest thing to do would be to have all of our public questions by us gentlemen ballot and then sometime the last week of February have a zoom meeting and do basically what the school board does with the Howard budget which is you know we're going to meet at seven o'clock on Tuesday whatever the date and we're going to present information about the budget we're going to present information about other articles let people ask questions but you don't have to worry about all the parliamentary procedure that goes along with having an open town meeting so I just wanted to kind of toss that out there right now and see how you board members felt about this I think we can accommodate anything that you decide that you want but I don't want to have to accommodate it by finding out about it for 11th hour so we're talking about it now yeah given the restrictions that we're under right now bill I I mean I think what you've proposed sounds like a well it sounds like a good way to proceed I don't see that we can hold any kind of in-person assembly it's just it's just not going to work I would also add that it's very complicated to have in-person voting on the day of town meeting we have to take great precautions to keep people safe so I couldn't see us in the gym doing that with other people in the gym as well we need like to hold the gym to space people out right because if we do go to australian balloting college you know there's discussions happening in the legislature now and we'll be more when they're when they're going to session in january but you know there's talk again about you know mailing ballots sometimes have chosen that they're going to mail a ballot to everyone on the checklist I think that's not our recommendation I think we would recommend that we conduct the australian ballot meeting that tell meeting the same way we do any australian ballot meeting which is we'll have a the polling place will be open on town meeting day and people who want absentee ballots can request them and have the mail to them in advance I think that's Carla's preference how many on the checklist Carla over four thousand yeah so when the when we just went through the general election the state took all of the all of the responsibility for mailing those ballots and for providing the postage for both the mailing and the return envelope right that's correct and you know with four thousand ballots you know if you had to mail them all out and then you know require return postage you're you know you're over four thousand dollars pretty pretty easily and I think that allowing people to request the ballots and having them mailed in advance is is fine and I expect that participation will be high again since COVID has struck participation I think in all of your elections have been really high comparatively haven't they Carla I I would say so yes yeah so Carla Carla how many people do we have voting at a normal town meeting election between seven and eight hundred okay that's about what I thought that's the that's the number of ballots that that get right probably a hundred ounce and tea and maybe six hundred the day out right and we have you know at the high point of of our open town meeting you know we might have a couple hundred people in the in the room but the six hundred or so that Carla's talking about is the number of ballots that are actually cast for you know select board positions and school board position most things right and I can't it's impossible to run a safe election in a third of the gym right so the the zoom meeting public information meeting to me sounds like the best way to do it rather than trying to have a you know open town meeting by zoom and you know having people making motions and amending motions and everything else I think that would be rather chaotic and bill according to that Vermont legacies that they said they we can't hold the town meeting including a floor voting remotely they said no so that's not even an option they said no to that yeah I'm looking at it right in front of me all right well the legislature is going to go in and I just saw news thing tonight they may change that in January but if it's no everything's fluid I know that's what we would live with but even if they do allow it so if they if they do address that issue and allow it staff's recommendation is that we have australian balloting for this year and have the open public information meeting by zoom because this is the answer it says no there is currently no explicit authority in vermont law for municipalities can to conduct town meeting they're held from the floor by electronic means vermont league of cities and towns advocacy team strongly encourages municipal officers to reach out to the legislatures legislators and request temporary voluntary authority to hold their 2021 town meeting remotely please contact our advocacy team if you have further questions so it could potentially happen because I could see where some towns will have zoom meeting and it's going to be authorized yeah I and that's what I'm getting at I think I think that there is a movement by some towns to allow that I thought it I didn't realize it was not allowable already but really I believe there are going to be talented asked for that I think that's a cumbersome process when you're our town and especially by zoom you end up you could have a lot of people trying to participate so I think the for one year of the australian balloting is a better option with the public information meeting the legislature has already made it clear that this is a one-year only deal and then you go back to how it was before it's it's the board's call so you don't have to make a decision tonight but we've got to make it relatively soon so bill I guess one thing I'd like to say is that the board has kind of pointed you in a direction as far as our tax rate if that happens to stay to that close number I don't perceive a lot of things really changing so to have huge debates over our budget when it's basically a do I won't say a duplicate of last year but probably close facsimile and imagine there'd be any reason to to have anything other than what your suggestion well that works for me bill how do how do we amend like for instance we always have a discussion of the budget and we may kind of you know in discussions this or that kind of happens and something may cause an amendment to you know the budget I assume that can't happen if we're gonna we're gonna basically say here's a dollar amount the information the informational meeting is going to present information as to what we're why we did what and then they're either gonna have to say you know five million dollars yay and a right yeah there's there's no amending it in us in an australian right exactly you're exactly right and that's why you know in general I don't like the australian validating option I think it is helpful for us to be able to have the discussions that we have but this year I think like so many other things it's just a different year and this will be I think it will be the most efficient way to do it and I agree with what Chris just said so that's how I think we should do it for 21 okay so we won't make a motion tonight but it sounds like we're all on agreement on direction so all right um we'll go to manager's items HMMC property tax appeal to vermont superior court okay good um so I sent out on saturday a whole series of pdfs uh and gave you some information about this this is the second year in a row that the hunger mountain child care center um appealed their um the fact that they're a taxable property taxpayer to the board of listers and um I don't remember if last year they appealed to the bca as well I think they did um anyway this year they did the same thing they they have taken issue and believe that they should be a tax exempt organization ask the listers to exempt them from taxation based on uh state law the listers that they did not meet the criterion and denied the request it went to the bca and the board of civil authority um in a decision on october 28th uh upheld the listers decision and indicated that um they did need to pay property taxes um last week we received in the mail um an appeal of that decision from a law firm in ruttland pratt vreeland mealy martin and white uh who are the attorneys for the hunger mountain child care and they have appealed that bca decision to superior court so tonight my request to you is to simply ask you to uh authorize uh stitzel page and pleasure to enter enter an appearance on behalf in court and i sent you um sometime today i sent to you a motion that i hope one of you will make and i would recommend the board pass that motion um i i think we probably shouldn't go into a whole lot of detail about the case right now until we have uh legal representation um i don't we shouldn't say anything one way or the other how we feel about things we just need to respond to the fact that we have been um that our decision has been appealed so for tonight i would ask you to accept my recommendation to engage stitzel page and pleasure and uh jill mclean will probably be the lead attorney on it and then at that point once he files the requisite paperwork with the uh court uh then he through uh through me will advise the board as to where we're going and then at some point we may end up having to have a meeting with them bill well or mark i guess what i moved to authorize stichel page and fletcher to enter an appearance on behalf of the town in the appeal of hunger mountain children's center from a decision of the board of civil authority and take such other steps as it deems appropriate in consultation with the town manager to represent the town's interest and or defend the appeal second any further discussion all those in favor please say aye aye all right thank you uh next up zoning enforcement legal action okay similarly on this one um i'm giving a little bit more information here but um there's been a property on moody court uh darin tbow owns the property at five moody court which is over off of park row park street uh you know little private road that goes in off of the just beyond the train station and he's got some structures there that don't need setbacks and more importantly there's a quite a bit of junk that has built up in his his yard uh the measurement i guess is that it can be seen from public highway it can be seen from park street park row uh rhodarian way and and moody court itself and uh this has been an issue that the zoning administrator has been working on for quite some time i think we have exhausted all of our efforts the first the actual notice of violation that dina sent to mr tbow was sent over a year ago in october of 2019 she has followed up uh we've had numerous complaints from from neighbors about this particular property so beginning of november i um contacted uh dav roue at stitzel page in fletcher who helps us with a lot of zoning issues and um he on behalf of the town wrote what he referred to as the last chance letter to the owner of the property in question and said look this notice has been issued to you you're in violation of the bylaw please clean it up take steps to you know get your um issue get it permitted if it's possible by uh december fourth and if you don't the select board will potentially take action court so december fourth was friday um i checked with dina nothing has happened so my recommendation to you is to allow the zoning enforcement action to go forward which means uh filing um filing the enforcement action in the uh environmental division of the superior court so that's my recommendation i did send you a emotion that i'd like you to make and pass earlier today would anyone like to make that motion yeah um i moved to authorize stitzel page and fletcher pc to commence the zoning enforcement action in the environmental division of vermont superior court against darin tebow at five moody court based upon his failure to remedy the zoning violations addressed in the zoning administrators october 9 2019 notice of violation second any further discussion all those in mark i would like to ask just one general question um go ahead chris bill i don't recall what the line item for um legal issues was in our budget i think it might have been around 70 000 between this and the other do you have any concept of pure speculation any concept on whether or not we could exceed that line item um no it so the 70 000 used to be when we were dealing with the north hill radio or cell tower um in our general government budget right now we had a budget of 5600 this year and the zoning by law and the zoning budget we had a budget of 5500 i think the general um the general legal line i don't have it right in front of me but i believe we've exceeded that we've had some things that we had to deal with with regard to covid we had that whole issue with school board election in the spring that we end up having to pay for you to know it's the school board's election um most of this isn't going to happen until 2021 anyway chris so i'll be able to talk with the lawyer and and try to narrow it down but this should not cost anywhere near as much as what it costs to try to prevent horizon from putting that cell tower up so i don't think it's going to make a huge budget next year okay that's all i had okay anyone else all those in favor please say hi hi hi right next item consider responses to request for proposal for financing per capital expenditures right so i um i sent you um in that email on saturday i think it was yeah um the uh the four different offers that we had so i sent out an rfp um seeking to borrow the one million what was it one million three hundred and sixty six thousand eight hundred eighty dollars i sent the proposal to four four banks the people's united bank the union bank the community national bank and uh northfield savings bank um i was surprised that the people's united bank which is the bank that we currently uh where we currently have all of our deposits uh they were actually the had the the least competitive bid uh and whether it's a matter of that they're just getting a little bit um you know taking us for granted or whether the other banks are really hungry i was surprised that their proposal was the highest interest rate um my recommendation is that we uh take the loan from the community national bank uh 1.55 percent or 1.5 percent whatever it was i can't i got it right here um community nationals offer was yeah 1.55 percent um you can't really get money much cheaper than that um so that's my recommendation is for you to authorize me to accept community national banks offer and then it will require us to have a little legal work done you did if you rent the proposal you know they will have to get an opinion from our lawyer that we'll have to pay for but it shouldn't be it'll be in the hundreds of dollars maybe a thousand but it's not going to be a huge expense um and we'll you know get the money borrowed here i expect if everything goes right i'll work with the bank and the lawyer and at your next meeting on the 21st have the loan documents which you'll be able to uh authorize to be signed and then we'll have the money in the bank before the end of the year so unless you have any questions um i would ask you to make that motion the only one question i'd have and you kind of brought it up when you said people's have all have all our other stuff is there you know is there a possibility of bumping it all into one and get it all refied through a different bank yeah we don't have we don't have very many loans outstanding chris uh they you know we have our money deposited there our checking account where you know how we pay our expenses and everything else we i think that to to we could pay off loans and ask other banks to you know refinance the loans but most of the loans that we have with people's are if we have any i don't even know if we have any of the people's right now maybe perhaps i misunderstood you no i what i meant was um we do our banking with people's united banks so we have you know at times a couple million dollars in their bank that we're using to pay our bills and pay our our expenses and usually in the past when we when we've uh put these rfts out they're always the lowest when it comes to a proposal for for an interest rate on the loan and when i talk to the other banks that have you know given us a little bit higher rate they would tell me well if we have your deposits we could give you a lower rate well now you know people's has our deposits so it's it's a lot of work but it the thing that i would consider in the future is hey peoples do you really do you want to keep our checking account you want to keep our billions of dollars in there at all you know maybe we should move back to community but anyway um we do the town does not have any direct loans with peoples united by account chris i had this discussion with bill earlier today and what you're seeing is in the banking environment a lot of the large regional banks which basically peoples united would be one or they're moving to an environment that they're less likely to like banking with small entities even such as small rural towns and i think that community national banks the north fields you know they're that's what their business they want to cultivate and again they might be able to give us better rates with our checking and saving so you know because that's sometimes where a big bank will try to give us some loan if with some loan volume in order for us to give us their checking and savings accounts you know that this may be in a reason to move some of our accounts so you know i asked that of bill and you know bill said the biggest thing is it was you know community national bank at the most advantageous rate and they're a they're a good local bank i i would highly recommend them so for right now the recommendation is you know authorized me to to take this loan from the community national bank and then you know we can look at whether we want to change our bank at a different time that can be a different issue but for tonight i would just like the board to acknowledge the receipt of these four proposals and accept the manager's recommendation to uh take the loan from community national bank that's all you have to do tonight the motion is really very simple and then at the next meeting we'll have borrow loan documents and everything else ready to go and uh can i get a motion i i move that we accept the manager's recommendation uh from the proposals that were received to accept the proposal from community national bank second any further discussion all those in favor please say aye hi and you you did notice if you read the proposals i did ask that um the um that there would be no prepayment penalty so when we get into 2021 if we decide we want to refund some of this note you know that it's a it's over a million dollars and the bulk of it is for fire trucks that have a long useful life we may want to uh you know refund the note and turn some of that into a bond and there's no prepayment penalty so we we're we're free to do what's best for us uh in in this proposal so thank you very much all right next on the list consider renewing memorandum of understanding for fire fire positions special aids on for community transportation projects and special assistance for grants management and emergency planning yep um do i send you two and more news yes i saw yeah i saw one there were two you know i i intended to send two anyway um we've had a we've had an mou with fire fire um since she left armada which was the company that the town hired to do the uh flood recovery projects and i think it was 2014 that she left armada and came to work for the town and she finished up the the management of all the long-term recovery projects including including the construction of this building and then as we were transitioning from uh needing to do those recovery projects to the all the transportation projects that we had a hand in or were impacted by you know from the interstate bridge project to the route two and route 100 retaining projects and then ultimately the big three-year mainstream reconstruction project fire has been our liaison and and and all of this due to covid um it just kind of slipped by me that you know the the mou has typically been in place from April 1st in one year to March 31st the next and then it gets renewed there is an automatic renewal provision in there so the fact that we didn't renew on April 1st 2020 really didn't matter too much it wasn't problematic because of the automatic renewal provision that was built into it and as i indicated there was no increase in pay for bar she's continuing to work at the same pay rate that she was receiving starting on April 1st 2019 so i would like the board to approve the 2020 mou employment agreement between barred fire and the town and approve it retroactively to April 1st 2020 and since we're having to do this in December i rather than have it run through March 31st like it did before this proposal would run from April 1st 2020 through the end of December and then the the second proposal that i hope i sent out i would recommend that that start on January 1st and go through December 31st next year so that's what i would hope that we could do on the 2021 maybe you should take care of that 2021 there if i if i read it correctly there's a 2 increase and her hours that cut back it's like that right no four hours or so the one for 2020 her hours her hourly rate is the same as it was in starting on April 1st 2019 for the 2021 mou that starts on uh that i propose to start on on January 1st having a trouble getting back onto my screen here where i can't see everybody there we go if the retroactive one ends the end of December wouldn't her new one start January 1st yes January 1st 2021 you're correct on that January 1st one there's a there is a two percent pay increase in the hourly rate but her hours are going to drop back from 24 to quarter to 20 so we'll actually paying her less in 2020 than we did in 2020 in 2021 than we did in 2020 so if you also it's not it's not an overall it's not an overall contract two percent increase it's based on her hours yeah the hourly rate the two percent increase will apply to her hourly rate but because the hours are going to be cut back she'll actually be making less it'll cost a pound less in 2021 than it did in 2020 yeah and if that position go ahead i'm sorry if that position gets eliminated then that'll be a savings of what 75 or whatever 76 it's not quite it's not quite that because um if you remember uh part of what she does for us what she does for the main street project gets reimbursed by v-trans so i think the net to us is about 42 or 45 or something like that Chris it's 75 and then i think the v-trans is a little over 30 with the reimbursement will be for 2021 but barb has been very very helpful in in many areas but i as i said i believe this will be the last mou the last contract that we'll have and when we get to 2022 um i i i don't see a reason for this particular contract to extend past that and i know barb doesn't really want to work past 2021 so yet she's been wanting to get done for a while but you know she's committed to see the main street project through and i highly recommend that you approve both of those mou's that i like to uh offer well she's certainly done a fabulous job since the time she's been on board here so i i got no beast with um approving this mou so i moved to uh approve the two mou's the one from 2019 retroactive to the end of December 2020 and then the new we do want at a time bill you can yeah do do the uh just like a motion to approve the 2020 retroactive to April 1st and then vote on that and then do the same thing for the 2020 2020 we have we have a motion can i get a second second any further discussion all those in favor please say aye hi hi all right second mou i move to uh approve the new mou between barb far and the uh as special liaison um to the town and the community for the year 2021 starting in january 1st to the end of december i'll second that any further discussion all those one quick thing before we vote um bill is barb wanting to kind of continue through the end of next year i don't okay just want to clarify that yeah yeah i mean the main street the actual construction project should finish up around we're hoping june 30th we hope it doesn't have to go out any longer than that there's already some talk by mcdonnell because you know they got squeezed at the beginning of this year that depending on how weather goes they may have to seek some extension but i don't think it will be a very long extension right then after the project is done there's some there's some closeout work that has to be done and then uh you know goes through the end of december i don't believe it will go beyond that might but that gives us okay i thought i thought she wanted to retire kind of earlier that's that's was my question well if if we finish up and everything gets done she might not be working through the end of december but i want to cover the basis in case there's some you know snap through with right some need that we have are available to us if we need to totally understand all right uh motion has been moved and seconded uh any other discussion all those in favor please say aye hi all right um last managers items discuss opportunity for town input on operations of the ice center yeah thanks so um john siegel mike thompson and i think bob perret are on the call there's jonathan's face coming in and mike i don't know if bob are able to to share his image with us or not but they're here um the three of them are on the board of directors of the ice center of washington west um i think most of you know these gentlemen um they've been involved with the ice center um really going back um at least jonathan before its inception and bob and mike uh probably uh almost as far back anyway um so the ice center is a private not-for-profit organization provides recreation opportunities through ice skating to the greater waterway slash harwood community uh you know the harwood hockey team plays there uh there's a youth hockey league that's there there's numerous um you know private men's and women's and co-ed leagues that play there uh there's public skating it's it's a facility that gets a lot of use and and i think over time uh most of us have seen it's worth to the community not only for the recreation opportunity that it affords us but also um you know opportunities for for business people come from all over the region to play games there certainly um you know scholastic um varsity hockey for harwood uh they play games here for both the boys and the girls teams so um and then the youth leagues uh you know there are people there are kids that come here and play from from all over the state and probably greater new england and maybe even into canada so there's opportunities for restaurants and and lodging facilities and gas stations and and uh what have you to uh to do business with the people that come into the community the ice center is closed currently um and it it um it was open through march 13th when the governor closed kind of everything down uh fortunately the hockey season uh the school hockey season was just ended at that point in time and i'll let uh john and mike and bob talk to you about how operations were affected but in this in the spring through the summer while the facility was closed uh they didn't they didn't have ice in the facility so they they did what they could to keep their expenses down um just so you know as board members uh the ice center has a loan through the uh edward fryer utility district's new dive fund this goes back uh to the to the beginning of of time with them they refinance they they've taken additional loans over time and uh the utility district uh to help businesses not just the ice center all the uh eight businesses that have loans through the new dive fund um the commissioners agreed to suspend interest in principal payments and actually cut interest to zero so not only um uh the borrowers not having to pay anything right now their loans are not increasing because every month there's an interest payment that comes due interest has been suspended for the time being um that certainly helped i think all of these businesses the ice center in particular um i think they put ice back into the facility and reopened and and now because of the most recent uh executive order from the governor's office has have had to close again um and you know they've been in conversation with me i had a meeting with uh mark fryer and skip planters skip is the the uh chairperson of the e5 board of directors we had a zoom meeting last week just to talk about how things were going there and one of the things that the ice center uh folks talked about was you know maybe we should find a way to have better communications more transparent communications with the community not looking for anything specific but maybe there's an opportunity to have a representative of uh the town and possibly e5 serve on the board of directors so with that long introduction i'll turn it over to the guys from the ice center um and make plain that there's no request here for anything to happen they're not you know saying we're going under you gotta take this over that's that's not on the table right now and i don't think is is going to be on the table at all but um i'll stop talking and let john or the other two guys uh chime in here and then you can i'll ask questions if you want so i i guess i'll start um hi uh bill's right we shut down in march we took out our ice and kind of just everything closed down over the summer we put our ice back in the beginning of september started up with all the protocols and covid things you had to do and then i guess it was a few weeks ago we shut down again when the governor said that he was suspending school sports and whatever but we still have our ice in so now we're kind of in limbo we have the ice in we're trying to cut our expenses but our primary expenses electricity for refrigeration um and we're just kind of waiting to see what happens whether there's going to be a hockey season or not and other than that um i don't know what else to tell you maybe bob or mike has something they want to add to that we're basically just kind of treading water at the moment treading ice i guess you guys have anything to add or i mean i just say operationally when we did open it was a nice surprise that almost everybody came back as best we could we had a we had a red less ice for cleaning protocols but you know the youth groups came back the adults group groups came back when they had to wear masks they wore masks so we didn't really see deterioration from a demand standpoint we saw some usage slip agent some higher costs because of the covid protocols but it was certainly nice to see that the interest was still out there from the youths all the way up to the adult groups and you know if we gotta clear our answer you won't have to make a decision but you know if we knew we were going to be closed for two or three months we'd take the ice out if it's going to be six weeks we could leave the ice in so we're just rolling the dice right now waiting for more information to see if we should take the ice out or not so there is obviously then given what you just said there bob there's a cost to taking the ice out and i'm sure there's a cost to putting the ice in right yeah yeah i mean just the electric and gas propane use on a weekly basis is you know north of 2,500 approaching $3,000 a week so but it it'll cost us 20 grand to put the ice back in by the time you have to take it out put it in lay it lay it back down hire somebody to come in and do it you know all the refrigeration that's take place then to you know get the ice back to back to temp so you know call your break even eight weeks something like that but every week we go by if we're gonna have to close it we're just thinking money right now but we'd rather not close it if we think there's a chance we could open in late late uh january early early february so except except for the fact that you've got uh able to read the barometer and had everybody come back in a sense it's almost too bad that that the governor you know that things looked up and and you were able to put the ice back in it would have you'd be in a better position probably if you had just kept the ice out and we just kind of limped along to the end of whatever this is right yeah or done what other rings did and some rings opened in late june we decided to wait it out and then it actually caught it hurt us more than waiting in that sense hurt us we probably would have been a little bit okay i mean the man seemed to be there in the summer would have been there in the summer but we chose to take the safe way out and wait and then you know it didn't really didn't really pay off we were worried about a spike in the virus rate around here and it didn't really happen and then we opened up and then it happened not at our rink but it happened in the state and it happened in another ring all right and you've you've been in operation for what 17 18 years something like that 17th birthday is december 15th okay and and without before covid i mean nobody's getting rich down there at the ice center right but you're you're you're making ends meet right you're paying our bills you're able to to offer this this facility and you've been able to pay your bills right yes you have a high high high point and a low point of revenue extreme during the course of the year you have that information off the top your head when you're bringing in the most money and yeah so basically from november through march our peak months and that's where we you know where we we're generating positive cash flow and then the other months where you know summertime some of that area those months were have negative cash flow so this is hard because this is our peak season yeah i was wondering as we delayed opening the ice putting the ice back in in the summer because we thought you know even though there was demand it's not our typically strong season so we thought to open up in our week season didn't make sense we thought september would have been perfect and had this infection rate not skyrocketed in the state the way it did you know a month ago we'd probably be doing okay but and we did get ppp money and we got some from my grandmother so that carried us most of the way through the summer right and as i said you know the the commissioners at e-file have been i think very generous uh they've given consideration to most everything that i've recommended to them to consider and uh you know they're committed to the fact that you know we we want to see this organization succeed and i think it's safe to say that e-file is trying to be as creative as they can be and will continue to be so so you know that that loan itself you know you you've never missed a payment and uh you know i'm sure that once you get back on your feet again and you're able to start running as normal um you know you'll be able to do that again and i i just want the select board to know that uh the the commissioners with e-fund this is udag money it's not taxpayer money um you know they've been pretty um pretty conscientious about how they loan the money what terms it's lent to the various businesses on and uh you know but they are able to be flexible and i think that what will probably happen is that e-file will continue to be willing to you know defer things and let the the uh ice center kind of catch up with everything else and then when the time is right we can turn the switch back on again so um i i want the select board to understand that i think e-file is doing what it can within reason to help out but john and bob and mike you had talked to me when we met uh a month or so ago that you know maybe there's this opportunity to you know have some representative on your board from the town in e-fund you want to talk about what what your thoughts are there at all to see you know i don't think they have to make a decision tonight but what what's your idea behind that well it was mostly just to increase communication and we've kind of been like operating in a vacuum in our own little corner of the world there and things have been going on pretty well but uh it'd be nice if like we owe the village udag quite a bit of money and it was the thought was maybe they should have a representative on our board um we've got a very lean board there's five board members mary brown and charlie barber are also board members they're not in on this meeting tonight um our rink manager quit in the middle of the summer we hired timmy griffith who's a local guy um he's done an amazing job um keeping this thing going and running it i've been very impressed with his managerial skills um so things are going okay um like bill said initially we're not looking for anything we're not coming here to ask for anything we're not coming to you know change any policy except that offer that if the town and if i'd wanted to be more connected and involved we're open to it and that way everybody knows what's going on we'd like to think we're a good member of the community and that we're as bill said we attract a lot of people to the the businesses in the village and whatever and we hope we've proved our worth 17 years is pretty good track record i think we're proud of it but jonathan has there been any consideration for possible fundraising to try to help ease the pain at all well we don't really need to do that at the moment and we've never fundraised for operations any fundraising we've ever done has been for capital projects and um most you know there about 25 indoor rinks in the state and all but three of them are owned by municipalities or schools so us montpelier and manchester uh from aunt and if you see what goes on in some of these other communities stow is a perfect example they spend a half a million dollars plus every year subsidizing their rink and we don't need that i mean we've been doing pretty and we're very proud of the fact that we pay our bills and we've been doing okay but um you know we're in uncertain times right now not quite sure where we're headed but we're confident that things are going to work out all right but this could go on for a while yeah i applaud you i applaud you for your efforts and uh the ability to sustain yourself for through these times leach for the being hey are there any are there any funds coming through from some of the schools or did some of the funds come you know on they were expecting to go do you have any revenue sources from the schools that use your rink no now buy and think so only we they we we rent ice so the schools don't the high school does for the varsity boys and girls right there's youth hockey program hardwood youth hockey um but they pay for ice time they don't just give us money it's like they know i understand there's an hourly rate we also rent to sx youth hockey and a lot of other the youth hockey programs in the region and then there's these pay-to-play programs like the glades and the flames and whoever yeah i was looking at more anticipatory you know they were anticipating i don't know how your your payments go do they pay in advance or they pay just you know when they use the rink they pay for hours rented hours right after after it right after the fact correct okay katie go ahead um i was just going to volunteer as a representative of the municipality if you um if nobody else was interested in that i had two questions one of them is um what are you guys running your ice lab temperature at currently and have you done any other things like shaving down your ice to cut costs of ice maintenance yes we have we've shaved the ice down i don't know i think it's down to about half an inch and they've turned it up to you guys remember i think it's like 24 or 25 whatever is that it's right it's live and it's normally at 22 or something like that so yeah that's trying to cut back on the electricity we're trying to find that line where you can't have it melt and then bleed the paint or or uh mess the lines up so we're right on and we're also taking the opportunity during this time to do training uh zemoni driver training as well with some of our staff they were doing other maintenance around the ring the ice is basically soft enough it's too soft to skate on right now but it's cold enough that it's staying put unless we don't want it melting so should probably pray for really cold weather and then open the doors don't think we haven't done that before too i was gonna ask the same question but i didn't want to be naive how many employee how many employees do you have um no full-time employees we have our rink managers about three-quarter time um we've got a couple other quarter to half time employees i think 10 to 12 10 to 12 but some of them are just zemoni drivers that do maybe one shift two shifts a week which would be i don't know what six eight hours a week something like that yeah i was going to say um the e-fund commissioners meet on wednesday and this issue is on their agenda as well um you know i kicked it around obviously e-fund has a a little bit bigger vested interest in that they they've got money loaned out to the ice center but you know the e-fund really is a utility district it's not a village anymore it never had recreation so i think you know the the interests of of the community in terms of getting some community representation on the board i think a representative from the ice center for the purposes i mean from the e-fund for the purposes of just kind of keeping a little bit of you know information flow going as a as a no holder if you will that's really e-fund's interest i think having a select board member on as representative working with the board attending their meetings it's you know the town has recreation as a as one of its missions and i've already talked to nick the rector rector he'll probably attend some of these meetings just as a representative of staff appointed by me but i think that that's the reason why the town should have an interest here is that this is an integral part of the waterway recreation scene and we're fortunate that you know we're not like still having to sink a half a million dollars of taxpayer money into this and we have it in our community so i think paying attention to it and understanding the the needs is worth our while so katie what's your background in the ice business you skater uh yeah i've been skating for 22 years i also figure skated at the ice rink and i think i'm the only member of my family who hasn't served on the board of the ice rink or managed it so you ask great questions for you i wish you guys luck you are an integral part of the community it's real asset to our community the ice rink thank you thank you i agree anything else we need to discuss tonight thank you guys for coming and taking that time thank you for having us thank you for having us you want to formally appoint uh katie as the town's liaison to the ice center board of directors sure is that is that through a motion yeah i think it would be helpful to do that so moved is there a second any further discussion all those in favor please say hi hi hi thank you very much katie for doing that thank you katie thanks katie happy to have you thanks guys okay thanks thanks everybody for hanging in there for this long night i told my wife there's out eating dinner before or after and i said i better eat it before because i got a feeling it's gonna last a little bit into the night so thank you still kind of early but appreciate everybody from hanging in there now thanks for having us and sorry we kept it a little later good night everybody night everybody all right no one else is anything else i'll take a motion to adjourn sorry my laptop died earlier that's why i run upstairs motion to adjourn okay very katie katie good i was going to say if i don't see you before you depart um thank you lisa for all of your work and it's been really nice to get to know you and all of your um all of your commitment to the town and there she is still there she turned on i was saying i'm here i just you could only plug in the ethernet so many places up no really thank you all it's been an honor it's like the perfect first job excited to be a community member and uh share my personal views at meetings so you'll see me around and thank you all for the support there's a little party on friday as well that uh you can attend via zoom that our deputy's thrown for alissa what time is that at four o'clock i didn't think she knew about it mark you want to go all right mark no i don't have it forwarded to me by people other than you so for the record this was not a mark thing um and i think it's thursday at three but i've just been told i have a check-in meeting with karen and trisa so if other people were there um see it's right there this is this is a surprise so don't let her know mark will make sure the night have you have the town secrets oh my god don't do anything else it's fine it really it got forwarded to me with you're leaving question mark question mark question mark oh god thank you you can't keep those things secret that's for sure i apologize uh all right i'll with that i'll take a motion to adjourn so move and a second second tonight all thank you a great night everybody tonight