 So, anybody like to start? Connie, are you sort of raising your hand? Yeah, I'll say. I don't. Would you introduce yourself before you? I'm Connie Riggs. I live down in the village district. And I just wanted to commend you all for what I was very impressed with the plan. I learned so much about the town from reading it. And I mean, I just think you did a good job. I mean, I didn't know that. I didn't. I didn't. Tend to agree with the plan. So I just came to support the plan and also to see what other towns, people thought of it. Thank you. Those are wonderful words to hear. It was really good. There will be, um, once the plan finishes. The, um, I think we'll, um, We'll, um, Pursue village center designation, which you may be interested in working on that task force. You know, regarding your. Your proximity to the village and an energy task force. And so those will be citizen based and, um, and sort of part offshoots of the planning commission. So I hope all of you think of that as, as we go forward because we'll need good input. I'll just, uh, my name is Matt. This is Genevieve Kim Brown, uh, with me and, uh, we're, we're on the same page as Connie. We just joined, uh, to show support and hear comments. And thank you for all your hard work and thank the absence too. Absent. Thanks guys. That's, that's great to hear. Tony, I think it was one of the best written plans that I have seen. For the town of Worcester. There was a lot of thought putting into it, put into it. And, uh, honestly, I can say if Meredith Prandtl was involved in that. I could see where that helped you out a lot. She's a smart gal. Yes. So I guess, uh, one thing I would probably emphasize, uh, on the town plan is that it's just that it's a plan. And we can look at it as being a blueprint. Blueprints can be changed. Uh, they can be moved around. Interpretations can be changed and so on. But, uh, the town plan is just a blueprint. It's not a law. It's not binding in any way. But, uh, I think, uh, all of your hard work, all of their, all the team members, uh, probably gave Worcester one of the best, uh, town plans that I think I've ever seen. Not only in Worcester, but in a lot of other small communities as well. So thank you very much. Well, thank you, Roger. Genevieve, were you raising your hand or just waving? Uh, that is silent clapping for meaning. Okay, great. Thank you. Thank you for that. Thanks, Roger. You know, I think I've said this before. That in the process of, of putting together this plan, I have read a lot of plans in, in, um, in Vermont and it sort of impressed me after a while that the plans really seemed like they reflected the town, you know, if the town was kind of small and rustic, the plan was kind of plain spoken and, and straightforward and, and maybe a little rough around the edges, other towns, and I'm thinking of Stowe here that has a full-time planner on staff. You know, it's just, it's, it's, I, it's almost unreadable. It's so specific and it's so perfect and it's so, um, everything a plan should be, I guess. And, you know, if this plan reflects Worcester at all, boy, that's, I will be happy with that. Hi, Zach. Hey, so Zach Sullivan, I'm actually the chair of the East Montpelier Planning Commission. So I don't really have a dog in this fight. Um, I did just one comment I would make based on our own experience. I know you've got a little, a short section on scenic highways and the importance of Route 12. You might, you know, in addition to talking about solar and transmission lines, you might put something that telecommunications towers in there, um, you know, in that list just because that is something that was a hot topic for us recently. Along the road line. Yeah, or the view from the road line probably won't be close to the road, but sort of thinking about that, you know, some of those views like up to the mountain. How did you guys handle it? Um, part of the reason I'm here is so that I can crib off of you for running one of these hearings because we got president putting an amendment to our down plan to more thoroughly deal with it. Um, the, the issue became moot because neighbors bought out the development rights, but we would have, we did have a scenic resources section that was what would have been the key town plan section, you know, governing whether the town supported or opposed to the tower proposed. So your issue was basically confined to the roadways or the sides of the roadways, not necessarily. Or the view from the roadways and we have areas where some, yeah, some, you know, we have certain sections of dirt road that essentially function as public parks, you know, people come in park and then walk on those sections of road. So it's a question of almost like how do you, you know, how do you protect the view from something that is functionally a park? And we do actually have some of those in the same way that you've identified route 12 as being a really significant scenic road. Yeah, those identified by name. Okay. Thank you. That's, that's great input. Did you find exact that maybe some of the input that the town was giving. It's just for basically like solar farms will put it that way along the roadways, but it has nothing to do with the residential solar systems and that they have on their houses and so on, or how'd you handle that? So we haven't dealt at all with, you know, with residential solar. I mean, with the exception of saying that, you know, we do, we do want people to be able to offset their own use. We did have one use with one business where the business owner has converted his entire fleet of vehicles. And so wanted to install enough solar capacity to charge, I think either four or five Chevy bolts, which is a lot of power. And we ended up supporting that with, with asking for a couple of modifications for screening. But no, I think we do, like we do talk about things, you talk about sort of next iteration, you know, we do talk about things like foreground versus middle ground and long view of the foreground where you can start to really see details. So that's, we do not have an approved enhanced energy plan. That's probably next on our to-do list. So our, our energy section looks very, very nice. And I think it's very well written and would not have a whole lot of sway with the public utilities commission. Thanks. Anybody else? I got to chime in. Okay. I think after, when did you all start on the town plan? Yeah. Oh, let's see. It started in earnest, I think when Katie came on. And so Katie, you've been there for. Pardon? She, she hasn't, you haven't been there since 2015. Katie hasn't. Yeah. I think I came in. Are you talking about me, Katie? No, I am. Yes, I was, but we were getting mixed up. Yeah. I mean, it's a long time. I mean, it's a long time and there's a lot of thought that has to go into it. And a lot of hard work. And so. I have to. Thank you. For doing that work. And putting. In on it. In 2020. Maybe like sometime in the summer of 2020. And there. But before that there was. There were iterations before us. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's a long time. And there's a lot of thought that has to go into it. A lot of hard work. And it's a long time. And it's a lot of hard work. And putting. You know, trying to project into the future, like what, what we want to see the town look like. And what's going to happen. And it's, it's difficult. Mainly because. We don't know what the future is going to look like. And we, we might have some control over it. You know, what, what we're. What we want to see happen. And. I guess one of my comments would be if the. If the town does get. The village center designation. And it is available for, for some funds. What, what would those funds. Be. And, and. You know, what, what would the. You know, what. What would be the future. What kind of changes do you see in the village center, if any. I'll start and then I'll let other people chime in. I think that my view, one of the biggest advantages in my view of a village center designation is to be able to protect what we have. It's not necessarily build something new or fancy outside, but I think that Worcester. As a town has the bones of just a perfect village center, which is different than all of our, you know, callus or middle sex or Berlin or any of many some. Surrounding towns. We have the nice intersection of roads. We have the river running right through our town. We have beautiful green space right in the middle of our town. We have a nice cluster. We have the school. And the post office and the church. And the general store. And put in the cafe. You know, we have the ball field. You know, we have the soccer field. It's. It's, we have the cemetery. It's really. Almost perfect. And. You know, I think that. We should protect that. So, you know, I think that's a really good point. The village center designation. I think also offer some tax benefits. Do you know about that, Zach? Is that, is that true? Yes. So it offers tax benefits. Primarily for your renovating and restoring historic structure. So, okay. I don't know if, if the list of places that Tony just rattled off is, you know, it would be considered historic, but if they are, you like, say, they're not going to be able to use the tax incentives that would make that cheaper for them to do. And so you're not, you're not in a situation where you're looking to use the tax incentives. To get something started back up in the way that we are, frankly. But you know, you. You know, but those tax incentives would be available. Really to private businesses. To help maintain what is already there. So those tax incentives are still in almost daily use. So. Maintaining those would be. Pretty high on the list, I think. What is Katie saying here. 50% technology tax credits. Yeah. I just have a short list. Hold on. Sorry. I'll mute. I'll start the video. So just the short list. Would be. Sorry. Sounds like you back in the sixties. Get on mute Katie. Okay. How's that? It's not coming from Katie. It's coming from someone else who has their mic on most likely. Okay. Okay. Okay. Just talking. Just talking. Ready. We have a 25% facade improvement tax credit, 10% historic tax credit, 50% code improvement tax credit available up to $50,000 for elevators sprinkler systems. The ADA. 50% technology tax credit is available up to $30,000 for installation of improvements made to data and network installations, HVAC, heating, cooling ventilations. Priority consideration for state grants, priority consideration for state buildings and general services and neighborhood development, development area, eligibility. Okay. The designation, the village designation is huge for across the board for, for additional funds. So that, that's the short list. Of what will come after we can apply. And, and be reinstated as a, you know, a designated village center. I just wanted to add that. Thank you. So, um, does anybody, oops, I better get off. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I just wanted to add the ideas of what. Um, what we should be thinking about. Although there will be much, lots of pre-work done before. Before. You know, that happens, but. But any other idea, village ideas. What you don't want to happen. The first thing everybody always says is no dollar store. No dollar store, no Walmart, no zoning. Um, I think one improvement that I'd like to see personally in downtown, what's there is some sidewalks. Um, potentially right along route 12 there. Um, I think that would go a long ways to. Improving walkability and pedestrian safety. Um, and there are grand dollars available out there for sidewalks. But the question has always been. How are we going to pay to maintain it? To keep it clean in the wintertime more equipment, more personnel. Uh, if you get a sidewalk, you got to keep it clean when you're on route 12 and you have state plows going up and down the road all the time. You're pretty much going to have to have somebody out there full time with storms just. Clearing the sidewalk and. Does the town want to pay for all that? So that's always been the question that's never been answered. Might need some creative thinking about pathways. Well, if we, if we. I understand the idea of the maintenance, but if we think of a cycle. Um, I think that. It would be another way to at least have a pavement. Like a protected pavement calculated with a line of paint. That would just be maintaining the same way than the road, but at least the side would be a proper width for someone to comfortably walk. So that would be a state right away. They have a distance on either side of what is now paved and there's a state right away. So that may be something that could be approached to the state and department of transportation and saying. You know, because of the population and because the amount, we do have a lot of bicycles, a lot of motor bicycle traffic back and forth on route 12. So it would be nice if we're in a congested area like this, if the state would put in some bike lanes on both sides is what basically what you're saying, and that would give enough room for pedestrians, but still not having it left up to the town to maintain it. Okay. And another point. I don't know if it's completely, if it's mentioned in the plan because I haven't read it. Completely. But I know there's a lot of rule concerning. Ladd field. But and I with keeping the maintenance. Thing. I have a few idea that, but I'm, I would, I would wonder if it's here that I could check in to have. And answer about, for example, if we would plant just a few three. Along the path that is mode during the summer. So the walk is a little nicer. And we could say it's only a native. Three local trees that grow here. Or it could be food tree, but I mean, when I say food tree, I know there will be like the maintenance that will come in. But, and I know there's, there's a lack of shadow during the fort of July party and another. Light line of three. And I say line just for the mode to keep it simple for the more, because I would see a fantastic English garden. But. But I mean, at least it would make a row of a shadow. Maybe then the neighbor will complain about the view. I don't know. So it, I know it contain a lot of line. But personally, I would, I would plant a few trees in that big field. And maybe put a couple of picnic table, which is again, like another, who will empty the garbage. I'm aware of all the line, but. Would that be an undercommentee or. You do such a good job of arguing with yourself. I think, I think all of those are good ideas that should, we should talk through when, when we talk about village designation. It's not, it doesn't make sense to get too far down that path right now, but it does, it is time to start thinking about those kind of ideas. So keep doing that. I think our first move will be there's, there's a person at in state office that, you know, I think that's his job is to oversee the village center designation program. And so we'll invite him to a meeting and get all the details and, and learn about what we need to do and how it would benefit or how it might not benefit us. I mean, I would admit, I don't know that much about it. So we'll just look into it. But I think it's a, we'll get started. I think we'll have more, more ideas with it. Thank you. I have another question, but I want to make sure, does anybody have anything else to say about the plan? Do you want, you know, I don't want to leave any stone unturned. I want to get this approved. Well, with, with the plan, the way it is right now, Tony. Once it gets approved and it gets forwarded to the state and so on and so forth, there's nothing that says that we can't make changes to that without waiting for five years. I mean, could we make changes after, you know, next year? This plan is act is actually good for eight years. Eight years. Okay. They've extended it. It used to be five. So I think that if we make changes to it, we do have to apply for an amendment to make it, you know, recognized in the eyes of the state, but we will be doing that anyway, because if we get this village center designation or enhanced energy plan designation, all of those are amendments to the plan. You know, those are become part of the plan and we just go through a simple review process and add that. So there will be other opportunities to change things. We don't have to live with exactly what's written forever. Right. So I mean, and then you would just go, if you're going to make any changes, you do the same thing go through a public public hearing and warning and so on and so forth and then submit it. Yep. Okay. Um, so, so Tony would, would, would lad field with that fall into the, into you mentioned something about the town center designation. Yeah, I think so. So that, um, because I just, because lab field isn't really expressively included in the town plan at all. It's mentioned. It's mentioned. Yeah. But it's because it does have it's, it's, um, it's on overseas committee, right? Well, it's supposed to. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That was, that was all given to the town with some caveats in there and so on and so forth. So there may be some things that we think would be a great idea for that area, but it may not mix with the, how it was given to the town and, and kind of the instructions they gave on how we're supposed to treat it. And it's also conserved right by the land trust. Or does that only the other part of the field? I don't know how far the land trust goes there. The land trust. Um, I think. I'm not sure how I think that. Land trust. Conserved by the land trust. Yeah. I guess it would be the whole, I guess it would be the whole thing, but you know, the land was granted to the town. Under certain. Under certain. Stipulations. Yeah. Caveats. And, um, I don't know. It might be the type. I'm wondering. Is that something that would be it? Worth while the appendix to put. In the town plan. And to pull what, what would be, what would we, what would we add? Uh, just basically the, the, the, um, I don't know. I don't know. So right now, the landfill, the whole recreation area has its own policies and rules. That were established by the recreation committee. Um, Probably. I want to say like maybe six, seven years ago. And then before that, there was the, there's basically the. The. Legal document that explains. Um, Who granted. Ladd field to the town and what the. What the guidelines are for its use. Um, and something like that would be. Would be helpful. Um, for, for people that, um, have a vision on what they'd like to see that area look like. Um, it would help give them some, some guidance. So you're thinking, uh, Ted, before this plan gets, uh, Uh, submitted that maybe we add that little caveat in there someplace about, uh, so that we have it in the town plan now. And it'll be good for the next eight years, but that'll give us a way to work with the recreation committee and with other people. So everybody recognizes in the town plan that we have this plan, but there are some caveats connected with it. And those things would need to be reviewed before anything could be done. Yeah. I mean, and it's, it's a significant part of the town. For sure. Yeah, you're right. And the valuable part. Yeah. Yeah. I'll look into that. If there's no more comments, Ted. I kind of just want to stay a few minutes more in case anybody else shows up, but do you want to take this opportunity of these excellent planners present here tonight to run some ARPA ideas across? Oh. Or is that premature? Were you directing that question at me? Yeah, I was. Yeah. ARPA funds. Yeah. Um, well, uh, I don't know if everybody knows what ARPA funds are, but, um, they're just monies that have been given to the state by the federal government and this, and they're, they've been given to the town individual towns. And the monies can be used for, um, they're all, they're, they're for, they're, they're for mitigation of COVID related, um, incidences and the funds can be used for, um, for. I wrote them down. You want me to read them? Yeah. I think one, one is economic for, for basically reimbursement of loss of economic funds. The second one is providing, um, frontline workers with premium pay or hazard pay. The third one is for loss of governmental funds. Um, and then the, the fourth one, which I think draws the most attention is to rebuild or for improvements in, in municipal infrastructure, um, water and sewer and broadband. So, um, and the select board, we've been approached by the town. Water. Um, commission. And then we've also been approached by CV fiber. And, um, other than that, we don't have a lot of other ideas on, well, we do have ideas on what to do with it, but we are definitely looking for other ideas on, on how to spend some of these funds. I think we've kicked around some ideas and some of the funds for the town hall, maybe for ventilation, uh, you know, because the town hall is used for the food bank and so on. And, uh, there's a lot of public traffic back and forth through there. And with the height of the pandemic, there were people that were having to stand outside in the middle of the winter before they could file in one at a time or something like that into the town hall for, for the food bank. So, you know, there could be with, there's been some talk about maybe using some of that funds to improve the town hall, which serves the entire town. Um, but there's been other discussions. We have some issues with the fire department floor that we need to address. Maybe there's money there through the recovery plan as well. Um, but it's, it's still in a discussion plan. And we've also, Ted has suggested to do that. We just hold public hearings about this, but we wanted to get our ducks in a row and say, here's the money. Here's the things that we can spend it on. What do you want us to spend it on and get town input on it, rather than just having the three select board members say, well, this is good. Let's do that. So, um, that's, I think where we're, where we're at now, but some of that money could definitely, um, like the historical society, Tony, that would be, of course that's nonprofit and so on and so forth. But that would be another building, historical building in the town. Yeah. Okay. You know, one thing that I, um, think sort of figures into that kind of planning that was for me, a learning, uh, as part of this develop plan development is that. Worcester is getting younger. And dramatically so. Well, the rest of. I think in all over Vermont, the, um, the, the tier, the age tier that has the most people in it is 45 to 55. And for the rest of the state, the second biggest tier is 55 to 65. Getting older in Worcester. The second biggest tier is 35 to 45. So, you know, that, that, um, that's what I think is worth thinking about as we think about the future and what kind of services we're going to need in town and. And so far. Well, we want to hear from. That's right. I'm one of those people. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think, um, I think from the perspective of like the planning being on the planning commission and reading through the feedback, um, from a survey in 2019, there's definitely, um, a lot of desire for Worcester to generally keep the feel and like look the same while increasing community engagement and just a lot of, um, like we already have a lot of great community engagement. Um, and we only saw a focus on that and also a focus on wanting better internet, you know, like having, you know, just, just improving that infrastructure there. Um, but as someone who runs a business in Worcester, having better internet and, um, putting funds towards reliable. High speed internet would be amazing. Cause even though we run a farm, we are emailing and we're advertising. We use our website. Like we really do, you know, even our bookkeeping is online. So, um, that would be a huge one. And I think it does help attract. Families and, um, yeah. So that, that I would vote for putting ARPA funds towards, um, I think that's the biggest one for me, but I also really love the idea of ventilation in the town hall. Um, That would be great. Cause we, you know, we've loved working with the food shelf and the Wednesday lunches when they happen. Um, and even having, you know, occasional music nights or different community functions there. It's definitely a really special spot in Worcester. That would be great to be able to have it opened up again. Um, so yeah, I love that idea. Well, um, Katie, we've already put, um, we've pledged $50,000 to CB fiber. And right now what they're. Their, their first phase is their, their, um, I think the first phase that they're working on is, is accessing the underserved, um, houses in Worcester. So it's people at the end of roads basically, which I think might include you. But it's, it's kind of a, it's a large number of, of people, um, that don't have that access. Um, but it seems like it's still a long ways out. And, um, But I was encouraged to hear that the state received a bunch from. The recent, um, Infrastructure bill that just got passed. Um, I think the state received some, but I, I want to say I heard a number of like a hundred million dollars. And I think the CV fiber project, they're estimating they're going to need $50 million. So I hope it was more than a hundred million dollars. Cause it's going to cost a lot of money. So does it seem like we've solved all the problems that were capable of solving tonight? I had one more comment. If I may. Sure. Um, I went to, I did a webinar with the Vermont city, whatever it is, league of cities and towns. And they were talking about the state ARPA funds. Um, like what, which is different than the municipal funds that Worcester has. And, um, I was just listening on behalf of the water district, but what I heard that I thought was relevant to Worcester. Is some of those state funds are available. For upgrading septic systems. And they were talking about the state ARPA funds. Um, like what. Which is different than the municipal funds that Worcester has. Um, For, for upgrading septic systems that are endangering waterways. So for, especially with like low income people. Um, or households. So I just didn't know, you know, I swim and minister Brooke and periodically a whole bunch of soap bubbles comes down as if somebody's. Dishwasher or laundry washing machine is. Um, I just thought if we could, it might be worth advertising that because then the state will come. I mean, the state will then dedicate some of their ARPA funds to. People who need septic upgrades to protect the waterways. So just thought to throw that out there. Good. Thanks. Thanks. So you'll be hearing from us in the future about. Um, your citizen participation in. Um, Village center designation and then also eventually energy. So, um, Please consider all of those things and talk to your friends. About him. But for night for tonight. If that's everything. Okay. Okay. From Ted. Roger second. All in favor. Hi. Hi. Public hearing adjourned.