 You're saying 6.15. All right, Frank's phone says it's 6.15, and here we go. It's October 24th, and we're a select board of the town of Rochester. And we have posted the agenda in three public places, right? And on the website, and emailed to interested parties so we can move forward in person and on Zoom. And if people don't know how to work Zoom, they should Google it and figure it out, but you can raise your hand when you want to speak. So there's a little button on the bottom to do that with. We don't have any guests here. We have the prior meeting minutes from October 10th. And they looked pretty complete to me. Any changes from you guys? No, sir. You're good. Move to approve those minutes. I second. All in favor? All right. All right. And under new business, we've got a park use application from the library for Halloween stories and crafts on 1029 from 9 to 11 AM. So not at night, free trouble. So I've got no problems with that, so I'd move to approve that. Second. All in favor? All right. All right. And another item on the new business is the five by eight constable utility trailer, which we have offered to multiple different sheriff departments. And you've done a bunch of research on this. Yep, we offered it to fire departments in anything that was non-profit. It was purchased through the Vermont Safety Council, through a grant application in 2013. The trailer is a 2014. We can't sell it. And so I talked to this lady at the agency. And her name was Sarah Webster. And she gave me the information that I needed to give her so we could process this thing and get rid of it and put it into somebody else's hands that can use it. And so we've talked to Ridgeline. I talked to Larry Strauss and Greg White a couple months ago. I'm just getting around to finalizing everything. And it's basically, we're just going to gift it because that's all we can do. And they'll be able to use it for storage of their light tools. And they've got a DR trimmer, and they can use it going forward. Sarah thought it was a great idea and a great group to give it to. So it's a non-profit, and that's what we had to give it to. So it'll be a good asset for them, and they'll accept it. So I'd like a motion to, I guess you make the motion, or I can make the motion. Well, I'm going to have you leave it there. I'm staying because I'm involved with the trail club, so I won't give it to myself or that's good. I'd like to make the motion that we accept the offer that we have had towards gifting this trailer to the Ridgeline people. And that would be it. A second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Ayes have it. Alrighty. Got Ms. Tony on there from the library. Yeah. No? And we have cooters not here from the highway, but Frank, you said they were working on a culvert up on Sand Hill? Up on Clay Hill, they were just, the road stops there short of the turnaround there, but they, they, we use a Harvey land there to so we can turn our trucks around. And there's a bad spot there. So Mike, Harvey had purchased a new culvert and John was going to help them. And the road crew was going to help them bring some fill in and make it so that that doesn't wash out again. Last winter it washed out and it was just a mess there. So they wanted to fix it and John wanted to get that done. We have pretty much put the budget in, tried to make it as best we could. So that's about it. He's just gearing up for winter, bought new tires for the grader. That's, they don't give those away, but no, I heard a mountain. Then there was, yeah, there's probably some choice words coming out of the ground. I would imagine pretty big boom. Martha has a question. Pardon? Martha has a question. All right. Keep raising your hand. Hi, I didn't know if this was the right time, but it has to do with a road crew. Every year I call the road crew the week before Halloween and ask them please remove the benches and the picnic tables from the park. And so I left them a message this morning and I haven't been out today. So I don't know if it's gotten done, but hopefully by the end of the week it will. They've been kind enough to do that every year. Didn't know if I should mention that. No, no, it doesn't hurt to mention it. Thank you, Martha. Okay, thank you. Yeah, and the porta potties are also getting picked up, you know. Terry got anything exciting on the, so you know. You told me, so you mentioned him. There's definitely, you could notice a uptick in the sewer usage over the weekends. Well, you can see it all summary, big, big difference on the weekend versus during the week. So I think a lot of that is from the increased Airbnb traffic in town. Could be, yeah, that could be a lot of it though. Yeah. I mean, I didn't think of that, but it probably does play quite a part. Yeah, probably. You probably use three to 4,000 gallons more a day on the weekend. And all day, we can cross the road three days. Yeah. Interesting. Is Jeff get part in the world out there? Yes, he is. He's unmuting and coming to us here. All right. Good evening, all. I've got just a couple of things. I sent the board an email last week regarding a question being asked by the Bethel Energy Committee. The Bethel Energy Committee is applying for the Vermont Council on Rural Development's Climate Economy Resilient Communities Program. That's actually the same program we went through last year, but renamed. And what they want to do as a part of their participation in that program is discuss with the Valley Towns and Randolph the possibility of hiring a regional energy coordinator. And so it's there's no commitment to moving forward with that. If. You know, it was studied in Rochester or the other towns decided they would not want to go with it. But what they're asking is whether the town would be open for the and participate in the discussion toward that end. I'd be happy as either energy coordinator or as a leader of the Valley Towns and Randolph the possibility of hiring a regional energy coordinator. I'd be happy as either energy coordinator or as a leader of the Valley Energy and Climate Action Committee to participate. They they really sound like they want energy coordinators, energy committee leaders and a select board member from the towns that they're trying to engage in this. So it it's, you know, possible if one of the members of the board wanted to be a part of it rather than just have me report back as to how the talks are going, that's certainly within what they're proposing and would desire here. So they're looking to hire a paid employee as a regional manager. Yeah, yes, they are. And they actually in the letter from Nicole Sear talks about a couple of other activities that this that entity might be able to perform for multiple communities. I'm not looking to, you know, leave the the post of energy coordinator or stop leading the energy committee. Necessarily, but, you know, this is a model we've seen working in other Vermont towns. Jeff Martin with the two rivers out of Quiche is running a similar group as a regional coordinator. We actually did talk with them, but they we were too far off the map for what they had in mind. So did they put forth any requests for contribution to salary for such a coordinator? I think that that that would be a part and parcel of the discussions, I believe. Yeah, should should the towns agree to, you know, something consistent that then could be identified in terms of the labor cost. I think it doesn't hurt to look at it. I mean, they're not asking for any money now. Yeah, I know. I would think I'm just trying to find the path to this, whether it's something that we would be plugging into a budget or would it become an appropriation? That would have something that we'd have to look into before we made any decisions. Yeah, there's still still a lot of questions there about the nuts and bolts, right? The idea, the idea is fun. But how would we actually implement it? I think we have to look at it, but I don't pose if we want to. So I would be happy. I would be happy to, you know, attend the discussions on behalf of the town with the understanding that I have no authority and that any decisions would be that those of the board or the community with the board. You know, and I, you know, certainly can report back as to where the discussions are going and, yeah, that'd be great, Jeff. I think that's a good, good start. It's going to be a tough budget year. So we will need to know, you know, all the ins and outs of this. Yeah. Well, I'll attend and participate and brief the board regularly. Should they win this program? I mean, that, that, that isn't even known at this point. Right. Okay. The other issue is the north and south walls of the library. I talked to Cody Downs and he installed a piece of flashing, running the least the length of the north side. I didn't look at the south. It's right where the building, the first floor and the second floor break and there's a protruding piece of millwork that he put a little cap on. It's almost like a piece of drip, drip edge, but it wraps around a little more. I have, you know, it was what Cody was asked to do, not faulting him in any way, shape, or form. You know, he, he got the piece of metal up underneath the clabbered without breaking them all up. And that's a challenge. But, you know, we still have gaping holes in the window around a couple of the windows there. And I really suspect that we have water intrusion, whether it's on the, on the second story or the first story, what I don't see when I look in the holes in that building and what I didn't hear from Cody is that there's any kind of weather resistive barrier that is installed on the building shingle fashion to keep pushing water to the outside. I think what is needed is to take a strip of clay cladding, the clabbered cladding and the other, the lower cladding off of the building from the top to the bottom to clearly identify the assembly and its needs. It really, I think to fix it, we're going to wind up needing to strip at least the lower half dependent upon where the water is coming in. If the water is coming in up above, it's really stripping the whole wall there to get a weather resistive barrier on and then close it back up. Jeff, can we meet with you and I meet with this and go over some things on this at some point? Yeah, sure. And then we can have a chat about it. And I think what we have to do is have some kind of contractor come in and look at that and give us some idea of what they think they should do there and address it that way. Because it's going to take, I think it's going to take a crew to figure out what we need to do there in order to make this go away, so to speak. I'm pretty up on the building science, building science principles from my 28 years doing that. So I, you know, it's, it isn't a rocket science project here. It's just that we've got a wall that doesn't have a drainage plan. Right, exactly. And to see what that's going to encompass as far as what the time element for something like that would take and what the cost, rough estimate of the cost of fixing that. I mean, if we were to see, if we were to take that strip out, then I can, I could write up a scope of work for it at that point. Okay. I'm just not comfortable doing it blind. I really have to see what's going on behind the clouding. Right, exactly. I agree with you on that. So let's get together at some point here pretty soon and chat about that and we can maybe find somebody that could help us with that. Sounds good. I will be going to their next trustees meeting to talk about some things involving their website, thinking that their website might be a good location for some other resources, a resource list in town. So I think that's November 8th, which is the next trustees meeting. So if we could meet before then it would be great. Yep. All right. Thank you, Jeff. I appreciate your persistence on these. You're welcome. So in the old business we had on the agenda of a master financial policy sections five through seven, and which is about the debt management policy and thinking that this is something that should be discussed in the budget and finance committee a little bit more before we just outright adopted. What do you guys think of that? It's pretty complicated. Yeah, it is. There's a lot there. It's not a yes, no question on a lot of it. No. There's a lot of stuff involved there. So we'll table that until we've had a chance to toss that around with the budget and finance game. We had the auditor here, right? Nathan was here. So did he have anything to say about the way things are going there? As far as how everything was working through? They said things are going well. Yeah, so he didn't have any issues? No. And he knows that we're doing this financial policy, right? Yeah. Yeah, okay. All right. So we'll table that. We'll research that a little bit more. Another chunk of old business, we'd been approached by Nick Darvaloff a month or two ago about this chunk of land that he bought up off of between Route 100 and South Hollow Lane. And he is, it sounds like he is interested in accessing his property from the South Hollow side. And that's, which is using his desires to use the legal trail to access his land. So that's the discussion that we're gonna need to expand about how we treat that. I think we need to bring in the planning board. This involves the town plan and how we intend use of the legal trails versus a class three or four road. It also is factored in there is the desirability of expanding the tax base. And do we want to, you know, how do we treat that previously pretty wild chunk of land? Is that something that we wanna encourage development or, you know, or not, but it's his property. That's not a decision we're gonna make tonight, but if he's gonna request the upgrading of that road that starts a whole other process of public hearings and so I just thought I'd give an update and he's decided that approaching it from Jerusalem Hill Road is too daunting, even though it would be a shorter section to his building site needs a little put off by the intensity of that road. So that's my report on that. He hasn't made an official request. He just emailed me saying that's his thoughts as of this point. So that's to be continued. To be continued, yes. Again and again, we'll get there. Yeah, yeah. Martha has something to say about that. I'm sorry, Dune, I didn't catch his name. Nick, I think was the first name, but what was the last one? Darbaloff, it's D, apostrophe, A-R-B-E-L-O-F-F. Okay, and is the A capitalized? The A, yep. Okay. At least on this email it is. The D's not. It's not? Not on this email, no. I don't think it is. Okay, thank you. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Sorry, I didn't understand that. Yeah, no problem. And the other piece of old business, we had a brief discussion in the last meeting about, could you call it a sign or a warning that Bill Carlson's barn, he has a backend of a school bus sign and he's communicated with me about his awareness of the zoning rules against lights or flashing lights on a sign. So he's willing to de-energize that sign. So it's not a flashing light, but he also contends that it's much higher than a legal height of a truck or a log truck. So he's not concerned that it's gonna impede traffic in any way. You've looked at it. I've seen it. Have you had a chance to? Oh, I've been by it several times. I've been by it several times, yeah. Yeah. The only issue I think that comes up is, is a building, is it considered part of the building through zoning? If you have a sign that sticks out and you have a building that's non-conforming, is it part of the building? In the village I know when I was on the zoning board, you have a lot of structures that don't meet the setbacks in the village. So whatever that structure was, including any steps or eaves, was considered part of that building. Right. So is it still that way in zoning or has that changed? Because if that is the case, he has made the encroachment even worse by having that there. I'm not advocating for removing it or anything else. John has purchased four signs to put up there. Two from coming in and two coming the other way to warn about the danger of the drives. Yeah, it's a tight spot. It's a tight spot. And I instructed John to buy a couple of signs he bought for and they will be installing them up there at the warning of the turn that's right there. And the blind corner and so hopefully that'll alleviate some of that, but no guarantee. So Bill was happy to hear that, that we would do that. So I don't know. And I know we spent a lot of time doing it, but I would wonder if that does encroach on the road more because it is a non-conforming structure to begin with. Does it require a building permit? Is it PENCIL or the SCI? That's the other thing I'm saying. Well, those are more like business signs and it's not really a business sign. That's kind of a ornamentation. It's always a gray area. It's got a few of them. Yeah, ornamentation. Yeah, that's a good word for it. I know if you're going from north to south, it's much more imposing than if you're going from south to north. Turn around and come back towards Rochester. It's like, wow, look at that. I've not seen it lit up. I have neither. I have. It's quite striking to be honest. You got the red flashing lights in there. Does it? It's so people now. That's what he's trying to do. I get it. Yeah, he's commented that in the 30 years he's lived here, that road is, you know, we say his buildings are encroaching on the road and he feels that the road is encroached on his buildings. It's much wider than it was when he bought the place. But I know there's a town right away on the Class 3 road is what it is. Right. Yeah, yeah. My man, the horse has been mowed. I asked him about what would it take for him to move it. I talked with him about that. And he was like, he'd spent some money on putting this thing together. And he had scaffolding set up there to put it up and all that. And I understand where he's coming from. I would just think that it's more of a question for zoning. I realize it's high enough. But if he does have braces that are lower there. So it's really a question of zoning for me, I'd say. But it does come right to the edge of the travel portion of the road. Kind of like mailboxes. Right, yeah. Only it's higher. Only it's higher. It's a bigger thing. Right. I mean, yeah, a regular vehicle or even a dump truck, probably it's not tall enough to clip it if they were going by it, but a long truck could be. Well, they can't be any higher than 15 feet because that's what the wires are. So as far as zoning is fine with it, I know John said he didn't have an issue with it. Yeah, right. But I have requested John to put signs up there. Martha, I just wanted to tell you that when it was brought up at the last meeting, my boss, Tim Caldwell, who's a photographer, he went up there and talked to Bill and took a picture. So there should be a picture with my article this week for the select board article of the increase traffic on the road because people are going to want to go see it. Well, I can ask him not to put it in, but I'm not sure. I'm just kidding. He may or may not. They should go slow. But I had told him about it. So is it my understanding that you guys aren't going to make any decision about it tonight? You're just talking about it. Yeah, well, as Frank was pointing out, this might be more of a matter for the zoning planning than the select board. All right, thank you. Yeah. But as he did recognize that the blinking lights were not in compliance, so he's going to not power them. I just think, yeah, his main concern is just the speed and how with the good job that we're doing on the roads, that people feel like they can drive a lot faster than they probably should, but never hurts to mention that. Just because a speed limit is 35 doesn't mean you have to drive 35 miles an hour. That's the limit, not a mandatory thing. I requested that John get some signs that gave the warning of solar speed right there, just not to dictate that that's a speed limit, but just a suggested speed there, so whether they work or not, who knows. But at least it'll help, hopefully. We also had kind of pending out there, the agreement for the defender, the stormwater unit down there we're still waiting on the as-built from the engineers. Exactly, and I'll call Kristen again and see if I can't get them. He said he would send them and that was the last meeting and I'll give them another charge. Give them another, okay, okay. Bone him up again. That's all I had to add. You guys got something to anybody out in the room or on Zoom that wants to speak about something? Hold on just one second. Robert Franks is on his computer and is unmuted and it looks like he's called in, so perhaps he has something you'd like to say. Hello. Hello. Hey, thank you for taking my call. Well, you've got to either do the computer or the phone, but you've got both going right now. Well, I've been focusing on a very nice comment on the Zoom platform. Can you mute one of them? Actually, it says that you have to raise your hand and unfortunately, like Martha, I can't raise my hand because I don't have a camera on my computer and I attend many Zoom meetings where there's an icon at the bottom of the screen when you want to raise your hand and it puts a square around your name. So there's something not right, but that's maybe something that Kristen and Julie can look into. So the last meeting, I was kind of laughed at with the fact that I couldn't raise my hand. Well, it's a fact. Could not raise my hand. So, you know, let's move on with some sense of humor. I thought of Frank, with regards to Bill Carlson up on Townline, he probably would have paid a thousand dollars for that four by eight blinking traffic sign and take his school bus sign down. Just a couple of facts. Bill has been trying to reduce the speed of trucks and cars up there since I've known them. And, you know, I just went through this process with the town of Bethel. Therese did a great job. Mr. Bump was involved. And we finally have some at least cautionary signage at the end of Hooper Hollow intersecting with the Bethel Mountain Road. You'll notice that there's one sign that has the Hooper Hollow Road identified. And then there's another sign that says, watch for turning traffic. Bill, I know he's going through trouble, but pulling out from Hooper Hollow onto Bethel Mountain Road is taking your life in your hand. People come over at 80 miles an hour, and it's still not slowing them down. And, you know, I said to Therese, I said, you know, she said, no, she said to me, she said, you know, Robert, it's really weird in the state of Vermont. You cannot lower a speed limit. You can raise a speed limit, but the state will not allow you to lower one. Because I believe up on Bill Carlson's road, it should be 25 miles an hour. But it'll take 20 years for some legislation to change that state rule. Definitely. And unfortunately, even if they do it 25 miles an hour, people will probably drive just as fast as they drive now, just as it's less in nature with people driving on a back road. If you get on route 89 and the speed limit says 60 to 65, most people will do 74. And just to make certain they're under the wire. But there's a couple of ways. Maybe when we keep getting smarter cars, they'll have cars that are self-limiting that are only allow themselves to drive as fast as the posted speed limit, and it probably will come to that. Well, I don't know where their destination is and what hourly rate they're gaining. But someone should just maybe, Frank, and you, June, should just go up there and hang out for like midday. I believe that it's happening. That's not a question. Well, anyway, there's a couple other things. I just want Martha to know this. And Patty and I attended a state representative open meeting at the up in Granville. I think it's almost two years ago. And the Secretary of State made it very clear, very clear, that any digital content shared by selected or appointed members of the select board or town officials, especially during a meeting, which includes texting, during a meeting, is a pretty serious situation. So there are a few people that I see texting on Zoom that should probably request a document regarding open meeting rules and law. I don't see anybody texting here right now. And I don't know if you do. If you watch the Orca Media videos for the last year, you will see texting by certain people that aren't aware that they cannot text during a public meeting. Just because people might be touching their phones doesn't mean that they're texting. Yeah, I'm sorry. Just because people are touching their phones does not mean they're texting. And sometimes. Why would someone touch their phone if they're not texting? Because when we have the five-minute limit, we use our phones as the timer. If someone's trying to. But that's not announced at the beginning of the meeting. It is when it comes into play, that when we do feel the need to time public comments, we do announce that at the beginning of the meeting. Well, I would think that the chair would designate the timing of the meeting. So that would be a situation where we would maybe wish we had done that in this meeting. But also we'll use our phones to look up information if someone has a question about something that was communicated. Then we'll look up a date of time when is a meeting going to happen. So you're assuming that people are texting, but I can assure you, I think I have responded to texts when my wife has texted me, asking me, can I take dinner out of the oven? How much longer is the meeting going to go? And so that would be the only time that I've texted during a select board meeting. But it's not amongst the other members of the select board. I don't know about you guys. Mr. Anyone that's stepping in, even though there's only six of us here tonight, especially a new landowner watching the meeting, he's like any smart person would say something's not right. Cooking dinner has nothing to do with the town meeting, even at the meeting. That's why I don't bring it up. I don't think laughter is appropriate. Robert, we've got your point. And there's no need to beleaguered the fact, but we understand that it is inappropriate to text amongst ourselves and try and hide anything from the public meetings. And we don't do that. It's pretty fair the public meeting laws. What I would recommend to the town of Rochester, like Bethel, is that each select board member and appointed or hired people have a designated cell phone specifically for town use and nothing else, because there's major liability with it. That's all I'm trying to say. I'm not trying to be a jerk. Thank you. I'm just trying to alert you guys that it can turn into a serious problem. All right. OK, so noted. Thank you. You're welcome. Anyone else have some concerns to talk about? Then I think we're going to close the open meeting and move into executive session to discuss real estate and employee issues. Thank you. Martha has a question. One more question. Yes, Martha. You're on mute. OK, can you hear me now? Yes. OK, I just wondered, obviously, I can't stay for executive session. So is this either of those items real estate or employee, something that you might possibly make a decision about when you come out of it? So I should call the town office tomorrow to find out if there is a decision that was made. It's employee review. There's employer. Yeah, there's no significant decisions. I don't think that. So I don't need to worry about calling Julie tomorrow to get it to find out. You can always call her. And if there is something that that's that a decision that was made and important, then she can let you know. All right. Thank you. OK, thank you very much. You're welcome. Hello. You and I forgot to say this regarding Mr. Gephardt's concern about the library. Years ago, I was asked to quote the window cleaning at the library. And there was one thing that I seriously noticed as Mr. Gephardt has shared that the north side of the library, the water is wicking up from the foundation into the clabbered and the structure. I always thought about every time I pass the library, I think about it, that there should be a contractor brought in, I believe, that should probably go at least 10 feet down and three feet or four feet wide and fill that area with really big crushed stone as the French drain. Because the water is just seeping under the building and up through the building. And I never really communicated that to anyone. But I believe that anything above the first or second level is moisture coming up from the ground. So Gephardt, you're still in there. So he can, no, he's not in there. Well, we'll communicate that to Jeff. And when he does his analysis of the building. It's something to consider, because superficial clabbered replacement isn't going to cure the big problem. Yeah. All right. Thank you. Well, listen, God bless. Thank you. Good night. All set, meeting adjourned. Meeting adjourned. Yeah. All right. Have a good night. Recording. We're done.