 I'm going to call the meeting to order. I know Perry's trying to call in. I'll just keep waiting for that. But first item on the agenda is public comment. This is comment on anything that's not on the agenda. I'm not hearing any. Next up is approval of the agenda. Move and approve the agenda. All second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. Next up is the consent calendar. We don't have the meeting minutes yet. Are there warrants? I don't want to approve. No warrants other than what the board has reviewed previously, but they were not in your packet. They usually are. Motion to approve the consent calendar. So moved. You guys go tonight. Motion on the second. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. Next up is a new business, the town meeting morning. There was a draft sent out in advance. I can share with the select board that all of the requests made by the board were included in the draft. The version of the draft in your packet included several articles that were highlighted. One, I believe, was article 25, 26, 27, and 28. Those drafts were highlighted just to indicate that those are the drafts that had remained unresolved. Article 24 was special appropriations request by the White River Valley Chamber of Commerce. That actually has been resolved because the chamber finally submitted their required paperwork to be listed as a special appropriations, which leaves only articles 25, 26, and 27. Article 25 and 26 are related to the opt-in for the one retail of cannabis and the other is for the licensing or integrated licenses for cannabis. They all include, at least they, yes, they all include the language that involves a planning commission and public involvement before retail and before integrated licenses are made available. And then there's article 27, which pertains to the Randolph Center Area Fire Association. That article, the language for that article was borrowed from a previous town report or town warning and is very similar to the one-year abatement of taxes. All right. So any comments on items one through 24? I had a question. Did we not have any capital budget general bonding and taxation items this year? In terms of seeking loans, we're not seeking any loans this year that we would require voter approval. Last year, we had the $25,000 from repayment of sewer debt to the general fund to be transferred. We still have to repay that sewer debt. One of the trainings that was completed by Joyce and then also by Cliff reiterated kind of a practice that most municipalities have, which is the place, I think superfluous is a strong word, but the continue to place over and over again articles that have already been approved by the voters. The training indicated that these articles may be removed because the voters have already approved those acts. However, with towns continuing to list them, we essentially risk the voters saying, well, we don't want to do it this year. And then it obligates us to listen to the voters because they voted to contradict a previous approval that they had issued. So the training essentially said, if the article doesn't have to be there anymore, get rid of it because you're only complicating things going forward. Joyce, does that sound accurate? That's correct. So did we have a vote at one time to do that? Are you saying? Yes, every year prior to this year, that $25,000 had been included on the ballot and the voters had approved the transferring. And that article included a description as to why the $25,000 was being transferred. And you're saying because it got approved each year, it's OK not to include it? Yes. Well, I'm not saying that the state agency that conducted the training is saying that. I'm just reiterating what they said to the board. Whether each year because it was never dealt with as a policy rate or something we were going to do in total. Can you repeat the question, Pat? It seems like what they're saying would be legitimate if there had been a vote originally to do it that way, then you wouldn't have to vote it every year. Well, I think that the vote is legitimate and the entire transfer is legitimate because the article had previously said, we're doing this because it's a $25,000 transfer. I don't know that we have to have another vote to approve that 25 because the voters have already done that. Is that what you're asking, Pat? I'm just saying from what you said, it would seem like that would be correct if we'd already voted, say, $400,000. We wouldn't have to vote 25 each year. But we never had a vote on transferring so many $100,000 to from Seward to the town, right? There was never a total amount. But the wording, I don't have the wording in front of me, but if memory serves me correctly and I think Joyce may have the wording in front, the wording was always in the effect of that an amount is being repaid. And so do the voters also authorize a transfer of $25,000 to repay this other body because they were charged inaccurately in the past. And so if the voters have authorized that one part of the town to repay the Seward agency already, regardless of the amount, the will of the voters is to repay that debt. Any other questions on items one through 24? Hearing none, any questions on items 25 through 28? Yes. I want to know more about what it means for articles 25 and 26 to be subject to a public hearing and review process. If the town votes to approve these articles, what it seems like we're putting the cart before the horse is that the right expression? That normally we have public hearings before we have a vote, not after we have a vote. So I'm not sure what the point of having this hearing and review process is if the town has approved it. What am I missing? I think we need to clarify that language some, Larry, because the intent for the discussion was that we would vote on it, allowing the Planning Commission to weigh in on where these activities could take place. So it was to say, first off, do we want this taking place in Randolph? And if so, then we move to the next phase, which is the Planning Commission to hold the public hearings and go through the process of where in town that could take place. So I don't think subject is the right word. It may want to be in locations identified through a public hearing process by the Planning Commission. So in locations, are you suggesting just inserting the word in locations prior to subject in both 25 and 26? I don't think we want the word subject, because the voters are going to vote on it. And what we're asking is that it then go through another process by the Planning Commission. So if they say, yeah, cannabis sales allowed in town, we want that ability for the Planning Commission to then say, OK, but not next to the school, not next to the playground, not Boys and Girls Center, fine, but here's a public process by which we're going to shade the areas that we don't want the sales taking place. Yeah, so how about instead of the word subject, say, I'm just thinking here, in locations to be determined through a public hearing and review process conducted by the Randolph Planning Commission. I'm fine with that. That works for me. So Adolfo, you said that in your email that this language was language that VLCT proposes. Is that the whole article was what they proposed using? Or you do use some language and then modify it with the public hearing and Planning Commission details? Yeah, all the language that was recommended by VLCT is essentially the first sentence and ends after subsection 863. Everything else after that is just us attempting to tailor the article to our needs in town. Right, OK. Have we had an attorney look at this language to make sure that it's enforceable? I haven't heard back from our attorney yet. We sent the warning to them, but I haven't received a response. OK, that would be my concern would be that the voters would approve it. And if they approve the part, the first sentence that maybe that's now done and we might have trouble getting the rest of it worked out to our satisfaction. Well, ultimately, regardless of the retail, it would fall on local zoning. So if the board were to approve a process that would have to go through the Planning Commission, it is a process that the Planning Commission has authority over. They could say, no, we don't want retail here. We don't want retail there. And they already do that. It's not as specific as to the type of retail, but it's retail in general. And that is enforceable through the Planning Commission. But they could not say we don't want retail anywhere, could they? Because if the voters say they are open to having cannabis retailers in town, that vote could not be overridden by the Planning Commission saying, no, we're not going to authorize them anywhere, could it? Because it's cannabis, it's different. It's not like any general retail. So the Planning Commission now, let me take a step back and say that if the town does not opt in the cannabis sales, and there is no cannabis sales at Randolph, we have to say yes, we want it here. But if we do say yes, we want it here, then that retail is subject to the zoning regulations of the town. So a cannabis retailer can't say, I want to open next to the high school, because the high school is in a zone where retail may not be permissible and have to go back to the land use regulations to check. But if it is permissible, it would have to be approved by the DRB through site plan approval or something like that. A more appropriate comparison might be a liquor store. I'm wondering, to Larry's point, I'm wondering if we're not adding more complexity to the question by creating a mechanism for Planning Commission review when that will happen anyway, regardless of putting any language in to that effect. Let me weigh in here just for a second. So the Planning Commission is unaware that this is coming down the road, because I didn't feel it was appropriate to have that conversation with them until we actually had a consensus from the voters. So at that point in time, when we have that consensus, I think then the Planning Commission can address this. And I think we as a select board at that point can have an opportunity to express our, whatever you want to call it, desires, concerns, whatever, to the Planning Commission to then take that into consideration. That make sense? Is everybody comfortable with the recommended change, or do you want to remove the Planning Commission process at all? And I think it's important for people to realize that what they're authorizing is the sale with a public process through the Planning Commission. If it's helpful at all for me to share this, I think the concern of advocates for the sale of, I think it's one of these situations where, I'll use Jay Hooper as an example. I think I'll refer to him as an advocate for these two articles. I think advocates would say, including the Planning Commission language in there, may complicate the issue and create more problems. But if I may, I'd like to say that I think the board's intent was to help the advocates for the retail and the processing of cannabis. By convincing residents, look, this isn't just going to be a free for all. The town is continuously involved in this. There is a Planning Commission process. So on the cover, it looks like the town is opposing this because it's adding more restrictions. But really, adding the Planning Commission portion of it should really be putting people at ease in that this isn't going to be a free for all cannabis sale. Everyone's going to be walking around with a doobie in their hand. It's going to include an official process. People will have more involvement, thereby reducing the anxiety of somebody who may want to oppose cannabis sale or processing in town. If I could respond to that, let me read you. The reason I stepped away for a moment was to pull something out of my files. There was a petition circulated in Pomfret, which did not gather enough signatures to make it onto the warning this year there. But it was circulated in part by one of the select board members there who is an attorney and who vetted the language, or so he told me, with the League of Cities and Towns. And it gets to this issue. But if you permit me a minute here, I'll read what it says. Shall the voters of Pomfret permit this operation of cannabis retailers, comma, which are licensed by the state of Vermont, pursue it to an Act 164 of 2020, comma, subject to such municipal ordinance and regulation as the select board may lawfully adopt and implement. So that takes the Planning Commission out of it and leaves it in the hands of the select board to adopt and implement. Presumably, it might be recommendations to the Planning and Zoning Board of Adjustments. But it takes the specific language out putting the onus on the Planning Commission. But it still suggests that we are going to draft ordinances and regulations related to the operation of cannabis retailers, or in the case of Article 26, cannabis packages and growers and so on. Yeah, once more, Tom. Sure. Shall the voters of, in this case, Randolph, permit the operation of cannabis retailers, which are licensed by the state of Vermont, pursuant to Act 164 of 2020, subject to such municipal ordinance and regulation as the select board may lawfully adopt and implement. So I'm not out to create any more work for the Planning Commission. I think as a layer of, call it what you want, oversight, concern, public hearings, whatever, I think that would behoove us to run it through the Planning Commission and let the Planning Commission, you know, make the recommendations about where the locations are going to be and those kinds of things. Yeah. Simply because I think there could be a lot of concern from the community on both sides. I'm just hearing that rhetoric. Yeah. And I think if we toss this to the Planning Commission, the Planning Commission can then, you know, hold their meetings, involve the public, have the public hearings necessary, and then submit that to the select board for final approval. So I would dislike, and I feel more comfortable about having this extra layer. And maybe that's what you're saying. I don't know. I just think we should have this extra layer of community involvement here so that it doesn't look like we just ramrodded something through. And so far, I'm still trying to figure out how we as a community benefit from this. So if anybody wants to throw that one at me, I'd love to hear it. Before we answer Perry's question, I'm wondering if, and I probably should have mentioned this more towards the beginning of this conversation, but, you know, it's, today is January 27th, and the town meeting is on the early side this year. So we're looking at really like four weeks and a few days, right, to town meeting. And I'm just wondering whether this, I mean, I'm not really sure like, exactly how much of a big deal this is gonna be in general at sort of at large in the community, but it's certainly not hard to imagine that it could be a pretty big deal. And I'm wondering if four weeks and a few days is really enough time for the public to sort of mull this over and have a debate, you know, in, you know, the Herald and find out more about what this all looks like and learning about the experience of other communities. And I just wonder whether this is really, whether we're giving enough time for this to be considered. And I'm not sure how I feel about it, but I think it's something that we should at least talk about for a minute. Well, Larry, in any other year, in any year, actually, if this had been submitted by, what was it? January 14th was the deadline for submitting petitions. If this had been submitted on January 14th as a voter backed initiative and had the requisite number of votes, we would be looking at putting it on now anyway. So I'm not sure that the vehicle by which it arrived before us is in question here. We'd still, regardless of whether it came to a petition voter backed initiative, or as is being asked here for us to voluntarily move these questions forward, we'd still only have five weeks to talk about it. So, and that would hold true for anything we're putting on, whether it be controversial or not. Yeah, I just, I'm just putting it out there. We do have the choice, even though you're right, if it had been done with enough signature as our date, we wouldn't have a choice. It would just simply appear. But the fact is we do have the choice. And I'm just wondering, you know, because not only is it a short period of time, but given the fact that we're not mailing out ballots and this isn't gonna be on the floor, like we might be looking at a smaller than usual vote this year also, and honestly, I don't know if that makes it more or less likely for this to pass. So for the people who are advocating it, I'm not sure if it helps them or hurts them. I wouldn't be surprised if it actually hurt them, but just as another piece of the puzzle, you know, it seems like for something that's kind of a big deal you want as much public way in, you know, as you can get. And we might not be getting much of that in a few weeks. So I'm just, I'm really kind of a stream of consciousness here, but that's, I'll leave it at that. People would have the opportunity to discuss. If it wasn't for COVID. Not necessarily that. They wouldn't be affordable. I don't know that it would have been a four vote because it was, they were going at it from a petition point to have the question on the ballot. So I believe they were going after this as an Australian ballot item. This year. Yeah. And typically it would be a four vote. It's not a monetary issue, it's a policy and people would have the chance on the floor to discuss it thoroughly. And this year is an outlier because it's an Australian ballot. Right. So, yeah. Without all that being said, I don't know if you're necessarily gonna get there participation you might like because there's not gonna be a floor discussion until sometime later at the next meeting that we postponed to. So maybe we postpone this until such time that we can have a discussion from the floor. It can happen until late 22 anyway, right? May 1st or October 1st? May 22. Yeah. Where did that language come from Adolfo? I haven't seen that in any other, it wasn't in the Pomford petition language. Where did those dates come from? That's in the statute. Yeah. It is. Oh, okay. All right. So can we explore Perry's idea for a moment? It sounds like an interesting idea. Is it possible for us to put off a vote on this to have it be a town meeting vote? And I'm not, I don't know. I'm not sure that that's necessarily the right way to go either because it's a very different group of people, right? Who show up for town meeting and actually vote. It's usually a subset of the people who vote Australian ballot. So on one hand, it would give us more time and we'd have a real thorough discussion but we would probably be limiting it to a much smaller group. Well, I'm not, I don't think that's true, Larry. I think we actually would get more participation. So, you know, in my mind, go ahead. If you do it as a floor discussion, all you get are the few people that show up at Chandler. Whereas putting it out on a ballot, you potentially get, you know, whoever asks for an absentee ballot plus those that show up in person. You know, there's a lot of people that can't make it for one reason or another when we have our town meeting day. And I think on that path, you squelch them from participating and that may create another type of upset party, you know? If I may ask, I think this also is predicated on when the select board wants to have the actual business meeting, a current draft of the warning indicates that residents would gather at the steps of Chandler only to start and then recess the meeting until town meeting day, February 22nd, 2000, or until 2022. So, we would have to pick another day this calendar year if a discussion was to have happened on the floor. Are you suggesting that we would call a special town meeting or the regular town meeting? Could we conceivably, and this may be what winds up happening in Pomfret, by the way, the select board member who passed this petition around in Pomfret is considering petitioning for a special town meeting later in the year at which a cannabis question could be considered by the town, but that would be a two-step process. You'd have to petition for the special town meeting and then you'd have to recollect signatures on this cannabis petition in order to do that. There were two other things that he was bringing forward, but I'd like to see us deal with this in this calendar year rather than wait until town meeting of 2022. That would be my personal preference. Can we put this up for a vote like over the summertime when we do primary elections or in November when we have, I guess we won't have elections in November. Just, we won't have other elections. That's right. What am I saying? There'll be no primary. There'll be no primary. There's no elections and nothing going on. I should know that. Yeah, yeah. You should be thankful for that. I would think that's true. We're all thankful for it, frankly. What's that? I think that's a great idea. I see no need to rush this through. I think there's a lot of community involvement here on both sides. I'd love to hear it all. And I'm kind of feeling like we're rushing this. And if it requires having a special town meeting at some point when maybe the whole COVID situation allows us to do that, I would be in favor of that because I don't want to be in a situation where somebody says, well, you guys just push this right through and no, we never got an opportunity to talk about it. Right, right. In my mind, and I don't see why it's that urgent. I mean, why does it have to happen this year? What would happen if it happened next year? Are we missing some opportunities that I'm not privy to or something? I don't get it. And like I said, nobody's answering my question about how it's beneficial to the town. Well, to that question, it's beneficial to the town because it opens up the possibility for more retail operations and then therefore more of a tax base. A lot of the same reasons that the economic development advocates argue for this is just another business. This is a little unconventional. Are we going to be able to tax this? Well, I think there's supposed to be a, how did the bill end up? There was going to be, part of the discussion was there would be a tax on it and some of that would come back to the communities that allowed the sales. Well, can we level a municipal sales tax, no different than what they do in Williston and these other communities? I mean, are we able to do that on a specific product? I don't think so. We can do a local option tax but I don't think we can make it specific to a particular item. And that's where I have a real problem with this whole situation because I don't see that it benefits us tremendously to allow this to happen if we are not going to see any substantial revenue from it. I mean, we're just making it convenient, my opinion. So not, I don't care whether we do it or don't do it. Okay, to me it's no different than liquor. But if there's no significant benefit to the community here and we aren't able to tax accordingly to be able to benefit from this, I don't know why we're rushing this through. I'd much rather let somebody else take that lead. You know, Pari, the only thing I could think of that would answer your question is article 26, the part that talks about growing and cultivating like that, that's a business that could take a while to get up off the ground. And if you're planning to have it be open on the first day that it's legal, so you have it all set and you can capture your market share, you might want a whole year to plan that. And that could be a substantial, could be a substantial operation, you know, taking up some significant warehouse or manufacturing space and with- Okay, Larry, I'm just gonna share with you. I heard the whole same story about hemp and that's gone nowhere. Yeah, I'm not saying it's gonna happen. I'm just saying that's an argument. I'm just, yeah, yeah, but that argument is not valued because nobody has shown me that that's been beneficial to anybody yet. I know a lot of hemp growers who got stuck with products or crops sitting in the field and couldn't do a damn thing with it. Okay, and we've been nurturing and kicking that one down the road and there's still no legitimate hemp crossers in the community or in the state community. So I'm not quite sure that this year, okay, you know, because of all the regulations that are gonna need to be required and all the hoops you're gonna jump through, first off, you're not gonna be growing this up in the field. You're gonna have to grow it in the building. You're gonna have to go through an active 50 process to get a big enough space to grow it. So I really don't know if I quite buy that story. So Perry, in the statute, it allows the municipality that hosts to establish a control commission similar to our liquor board, right? And we can issue licenses for which we could charge a fee for these. And then they have, we can adopt bylaws and do all kinds of stuff with that. So there is a way for the town to have some form of revenue through the licensing process. And I'm okay with that, but I think we need time to put that all together. So I would really love to let Kicks and King down the road a little bit, okay, to be able to figure out what model works the best for us as a community. Because like I said, trust me, I don't care whether it's a liquor store or a reselling cannabis, it doesn't matter, but I'm not interested in doing this unless I know that somewhere's down the road here, there's some benefit to the community because we're all gonna jump through this hoop, and we're all gonna be fielding phone calls from people who are pro and con. And I would love to have a story to be able to say this is why we're doing it before we do it. Joyce, if a citizen wants to call a special town meeting, petition for a special town meeting, what is the requisite number of petition signatures that they would have to get to call for a special town meeting as opposed to a voter backed initiative? Or is it the same? It's the same, they would have to get 5% signatures on the petition. Okay. Currently that's about... At 173 when Jay was doing this. Yeah, 173. So if Jay or anyone else wanted to petition for a special town meeting later in the year, they could just do this again, right? I mean, they could go that route. Yeah. Would it be possible if we did have a special town meeting that there would be, that that would be the venue for a discussion, but then people could vote using an Australian ballot or is it one or the other? During this calendar year, my understanding is anything that you would normally vote from a public question type of vote from a Florida meeting can be voted on by Australian ballot due to the Act 162. But that's optional if I understand it correctly. In other words, we could still... That's an optional decision. That's an optional decision. If conditions improve later on in the year, you could have a normal town meeting where people can meet and you can have the discussion and you can have the vote from a score. Okay. The statute requires the state to actually collect all the fees and then pay them to the municipality quarterly. And that's any local fees and whatnot. But I don't think we're putting in this on, they were talking about taxing the marijuana and then a percentage of those taxes received were supposed to come down to the communities that had the sales in them. That's what I thought was supposed to happen. I'm not knowing where that went. Oh, it's not in the bill. Yeah, so that's disturbing. It's just license fees. Yeah, so are we going to charge $10,000 licensing fees? Well, if it's good sales, if you don't want to pay it. Are the licensing fees at the municipality's discretion or are they mandated by the state? It does not say that the state sets those. It says local fees first. There you go. Well, what I said, I have to pay a fee to put up a tent. It doesn't go on private property. So I'm just kind of, I'm not relying upon the state to look after our best interest. I guess that's my point. Well, I think there's two questions here, right? The first one is whether the town even wants to entertain it. And the second one then becomes what it looks like when it gets implemented, if they do want to entertain it. Yeah, I think the question being asked right now is do they want to even entertain it? And if they do, then it goes to a much bigger process. And I would agree completely, Perry, that it ought to be handed over to the Planning Commission to look at what that looks like. Because out of this year creating a municipal board and what authority is going to be there and what's the process to apply? There's, I don't know that I agree that kicking this down the road is the answer because I think there's a good year, year and a half of work here before they could ever even think about how to apply and how to move it forward. I'm okay with running the question and seeing what the community interest is. And if the community interest comes out and says, okay, yeah, we think this is a good idea, let's investigate this and come back and provide that information to the community through public hearings. I think, and I think that's kind of what I'm hearing from Larry is I think that's the process that we should be using. So let me go back to the same language that I read earlier and it would simply substitute after the word subject. I think this gets at what Trini is suggesting what Larry's suggesting. And I believe if I'm hearing you correctly what you're suggesting, Parian again, it's to subject to such municipal ordinance and regulation as the select board may lawfully adopt and implement. And what we decide to implement could be, give it to the planning commission to decide what, you know. Absolutely. And if it gives us a little more flexibility. Absolutely. If that's the path we're gonna take, I would be totally like, let's do that. Okay. Well, that language gives us the option of directing this wherever we want. And the planning commission obviously makes the most sense from what I'm hearing from everyone tonight. But it gets to the question that Trini raised. It gives the public the opportunity on both the retail and on the integrated license question to say, hey, yeah, go ahead and pursue this or no, we don't want it. And it's, you know, depending on how they weigh in on each of those two questions, we go from there. Either it's a done deal and it doesn't happen or we roll up our sleeves and start to look at ordinances and regulations to make this happen a year and a half from now or a year from now. So we're back to the question. So first, do we wanna put this on the ballot this year? And if so, which are we more comfortable with Tom's language that Pomfret had and what's drafted currently? So yeah, I'm good with Tom's language. I do think we need to launch some form of PR campaign so that people know what we're thinking. So this isn't like, nobody goes rushing off and going, oh my God, the Randolph approved cannabis sales. So I wanna make sure that we're clear about this is kind of a, you've given us now permission to investigate and come up with guidelines. I think that's where I'm feeling comfortable. If I'm not mistaken, we need to have a public information meeting within 10 days of the town meeting. Am I correct in that? That's right. So there's an opportunity, it would be potentially a big Zoom meeting or maybe we could have a hybrid meeting which is being done in some other towns where a limited number of people are allowed into a specific location like Chandler or the firehouse and then the remaining people have to zoom in. There's an opportunity to at least have a robust discussion about this and explain what it's all about. On top of any kind of PR campaign, we might engage in, but there are gonna be opportunities in the next five weeks, including that informational session which we have to hold to illuminate why we're doing this or to explain why we're doing this and to explain that it doesn't mean, yeah, I mean to really address some of the concerns Paris raised and there are gonna be concerns on both sides of this issue, but I think there's ample opportunity for them to be aired before the Australian ballot. And I would like to suggest, I would like to move that we, if we are gonna move this forward that we substitute the language that I just suggested from Palmford. Well, I also think we should substitute that language. I think it gives us more flexibility in terms of making sure that we get adequate public input and control over the process. And given what the discussion that we've just had, it doesn't seem like we have other good options in terms of getting this in front of the voters this year besides doing it this way. And I do think that if we're gonna, we shouldn't wait a whole year to do it. So I'd say I was uncomfortable with putting on the ballot with Tom's edit. And to your earlier point, Larry, about, I know this was pushed forward to us by Jay and the advocates that signed his petition however many signatures he had before five o'clock on the 14th, in my personal opinion, is they're running on a bit of a risk here. I'm not sure this is a slam dunk in this community by any stretch of the imagination. And I would not be surprised if the people of Randolph vote this down, but that's not for us to say, right? It's, let's give them the opportunity. I could reread what I have just to confirm that. Tom, what you read is what you're asking the board to consider. Okay. I have, shall the town voters authorize cannabis retailers in town pursuant to seven VSA subsection 863 comma subject to such municipal ordinance and regulation as the select board may lawfully adopt and implement. Yes. Yes. Cross everything else after that with the exception of the final sentence which would then say, the retail sale of cannabis will not be permitted to commence until after October 1, 2022 or just delete everything after awfully adopted and implemented period. I don't know that it's necessary to have either of those deadlines in the, I don't know, that almost feels like something you would have in a narrative or that you would explain at the informational session. I don't know how to- Isn't there, you know, I mean, first off, isn't there an issue that state has to approve this? So putting a timeline on it, we have to meet state regulations first, I would assume. Yeah, yeah. I don't have any issue one way or the other with a timeline, but- Go ahead, let me see. I think the timeline needs to come out because I think we're, you know, we're gonna be at the liberty to adhere to whatever the state regulations are and that's not finished yet. Well, those are the state regulations as they stand now. I thought that's what Trini said earlier. That's what the state language is, but they do have their own commission that's set up that's gonna be building out a lot of this in the next year. What the process is, what people have to do and all that. I don't have an issue with taking those out. Yeah, I'm okay with taking the dates out. I don't see what it really adds. Okay. So with my planning commission hat on, okay, one of the things that we at the planning commission do is we look to the state for a lot of guidance. So, you know, we're gonna need that same amount of time to see what the state rolls out and says, okay, you can do this and you can't do this. So I think we eliminate the timeline. Okay, I'm fine with that. And Adolfo, the language you read after the word subject is exactly what I read. Okay, so I will have it, and immediately after the word implement, it will be a period and then delete everything else after. Shouldn't it be a question mark though? Because this is a question mark. Oh, yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah, question mark, yeah. And the same would hold true for Article 26, correct? Yes. Okay. I'd like to move that we move Articles 25 and 26 forward with the language as amended and the deletion of the date, the timeline information in the final sentence in both Article 25 and 26. And I just wanna clarify that in 26, it will still include the language businesses that grow, cultivate, dot, dot, dot to the end of that sentence. It will still include that. Oh, the descriptor as part of the, okay. Yeah, very good, Larry. I think that's important because nobody's gonna know what an integrated license is. Exactly, yep. I'm not even sure I fully understand it. I mean, I do, I'm kidding, but. Okay, but I'll second your motion. Okay, we have a motion and a second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Aye. I'm abstained. Motion carries. Sorry, Perry, was that, was that a no? We have the judges. No, I. Oh, that was a five zero. Okay. Any comments on 27 or 28? If not, I'll entertain a motion to move the draft to a final. With one further. One further. You have to have spelled my first name right. You know what? Oh. Oh, with a W, sorry. Well, it could be, it could be L-A-W-R-A-N-C-E, but I think actually for select part of purposes, I'm just Larry's afterwards. Would you prefer Larry? Sure. Okay. No, pardon, mess that up. I'm pretty sure. Dignity out. It's been that kind of week. Delphal, how do you spell Larry just for interest? It's like Larry, Moe, and Curly, right? So, yeah, thanks to the context, Tom. I didn't mean it. I know, I don't know. Was there any analogy there already? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I was thinking Larry, Tom, and Perry, myself. Okay. All right. Motion to move the warning. Is there a second on that? I second that. Thank you, made the motion, Perry. Oh, yeah, that's right. I did. Sorry. I'll cut it. It's not the video screen. All right, we have a motion and a second. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. Stained motion, Perry's. Next, we have town report photos. For this portion, we have Emory on the call and we're just going to share his screen so you all could see photographs. So, Emory, you can now share your screen. Delphal, can we go back to the town meeting warning? We do need to have at least three select board members sign it for a good portion. Sorry about that. Joyce did ask me and I completely forgot. Sorry, Joyce. If we could have three board members that are available tomorrow, stop by to sign the warning that was just approved. We would need the three signatures to start posting. I can do that. I can do it. What time can I come in? As early as eight in the morning, 8.30. Okay, I can be there. Yeah, I can be there at some point during the day. Thank you. It's going to be hard for me to be there before late in the afternoon. I can come in earlier if you want. Perfect. I could also, if you all wanted to text me and I could meet you somewhere in town, if you're on route from one word or another, I could meet you there. Okay, so I have Perry, Tom, and Pat and then potentially Larry. But I could text you Larry if I already have three signatures. If you need me and you want to come to my house and slip the piece of paper in front of the door, I could run downstairs real quick and sign it, but, or I could do it later in the day. It looks like you've got three, so. Yeah, I think we'll be fine. Thank you, though. Thank you. Emery, can you share your screen? Yep. Okay. We, I think Emery, once the screen is shared, we'll share with you all potential photographs of the hall and each Randolph. And we're going to ask that you tell us which photo of the hall you think looks best as a group. And then we could try to Photoshop as best we can to make it look better with the limited programs that we have. Can you all see it now? Mm-hmm. Okay. So there are 10 total. This one is an example of the Photoshop. It's the only one we have right now. Did it take out the scarecrow or? Looks like it's fine. Yeah, it looks like it's falling over. That's back to one, right? Yep. There's one in there is the East Randolph church. So that's an easy one to eliminate that one. Yeah. Oops. And there was some of the, with the snow before it got all plowed into piles and whatnot. Where did those go? Before the Valentine decorations. I don't think I received those. Should go to number two. That's not bad. Although it's got the wires in it, which is kind of... Trini, did you send those along? My apologies. Yeah, I emailed those to you and then I forwarded them to Adolfo also. That building needs to be painted. Yes, it does. It needs more than that. It's nice to know it's still gonna be standing before you paint it. Picky, picky. I can go quickly find those other ones if you'd like. Yeah, it's gonna give you a date. It was right after it snows. Is my screen still up? No. They were sent on the 12th, Henry. I'm not seeing anything actually. Adolfo, do you know? I don't. I don't see them either Trini. January 12th? January 12th is when I forwarded the others. So I've been having the issue recently where if it's too large of a file, I won't get any notice of it. Yeah, that's good. I've noticed. Trini, do you have them at your disposal and can you share them? Yeah, I was gonna see if I could. Any email to all of us? Would that be easier? Well, I went and took them with my good camera. So they're like 10 megapiece. Oh, that sounds pretty well. So that they would be easier to manipulate. Yeah. It explains why they didn't go through though. That's probably it. Yeah. I thought they would be easier to play with that way, Henry. That's definitely a good way to modify and clean them up and whatever you need to do. But from a file standpoint, it's too big. But do you have a Dropbox? I can make one. I don't think I have one specific for work. All right. Just kind of thinking of Trini could get them to you and you could get them to Dropbox and you could share the Dropbox with us. If it's helpful, I think the biggest issue was selecting what town facility or what thing to show on the cover. If the board is, you know, amenable to this, it could just say that it votes to approve the photograph selected by Trini and Photoshopped by the town of the hall in East Randolph. And then... I can live with that. That's not a problem for me. I mean, the important thing for me is that it's East Valley Community Hall. So if you've got a great photo, fine by me. What I could commit, what Henry and I could commit to doing is once the photograph is selected, once it's Photoshopped to make it look nice, I could send it to the board. Ideally, we would probably do this tomorrow before all the final documents are sent to the printer by Friday. And then everyone, if there's a serious objection, I could schedule an emergency meeting and we can talk about the photograph. I'm fine to me. Does that work for you, Emory? It sounds reasonable to me. Yep. Trini, just one just went through. The ones I sent were right after the snow before it got plowed, but before they put Valentine decorations all over it too. I just sent two of them, Henry. I've got some. Yeah, I've got them. I've got some of some cute kids. Cute kids are always good. Jeff, remember any pictures of children you need permission from parents? Yes, that's right. All right, I can screen share of these two if you'd like. Do we need to take a vote on that? No, no, go ahead. OK, don't hear anything. Straight on. I like the first one. Yeah, that's a nice shot. Can you, can you, it's a small thing, but can you Photoshop out the wires? Josh is the one with the application we can do our bed. You should be able to just pick up on the clouds and then and colorize the wires and make them look just like the clouds. Are you requesting the ones on the top or even the smaller ones on the sides? No, it's not so much the ones on the side, although there's no reason because they're not over anything. There is no reason, you know, he couldn't take those out as well. But I just find the ones in the upper right corner really kind of detracting from the. Yeah. And boy, it does need to be painted, doesn't it? I especially on this in this light, I think when it's an overcast day. Yeah, this our house looks terrible this time of year. Yeah, yeah, the White House. You could also crop this a little bit to take the garage alongside it. It looks like a garage. That's the arena fire. OK, yeah, yeah. The other picture shows it sitting beside it more. Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. Well, I'm not sure that we should edit it out. I think it would be interpreted a certain way. Yeah, I take it that in that respect. Then this might be a better photo because it shows more of the of the fire station. And they are they are too sort of, you know, you have the other photo could could be cropped and then it would just show that the hall, I think. Right. But but but Adolfo suggesting that might. Well, it's just going to be cropped. It's not like you're going to be editing it out. That's true. That's true. And I would leave the wires that are down lower because if you take them out to someone looking at the picture might be like, there's wires going up the building, but then there's no wires going out. Like, what happens to this? Right. Yeah. Yeah. I agree with taking out the overhead wires. Yeah. And that picture. Then Amory, can you put the Valentine's back on the building? Yes. And it could just and it could be cropped to center the the hall in the image a little better, too. You know, that's not a bad photo. But do we want the cover of the town report to have Valentine's on it? Maybe. It has a little color. I mean, and somehow it doesn't look as badly in need of paint in that photo. Most Valentine's do give it interest, I think. I think there's way too many people talking about this right now. Yeah, I'm reminded of an old adage from my days as a publications manager, which is that a camel is a horse designed by committee. You notice I can't say it, so I'm just staying out of the conversation. That's right. It's one of the advantages of phoning in. So if it's helpful, you know, we could work on picking the final photo, the final draft photo, and then I could send it tomorrow to everyone to say, you know, here's the photo. We've eliminated as many big wires as possible. Let me know what you think. That's good. OK. I'm OK with that. But are we going with the hearts or without it? I don't know. I don't know if I'll go in the morning. Yeah, I think we're going to pick that tomorrow. Then we could send it out. Just see where your hearts are tomorrow. That's all. OK, did you have anything else on the agenda? I think the final thing was the the draft message that Tom circulated for the select board. I look fine to me. Emery, is there any issue with that being longer than half a page? I it's a matter of it'll cost extra if we get over a certain number of pages. Right. So I've been asking every person or entity that's been entering narratives to keep it to half a page. OK. I have had to kind of enforce that on like a dozen of occasions. Yeah, that may not be. But the time it gets typeset right, it will be narrower margins if that makes a difference. Yeah. Yeah. If the board likes this message, and I think at this point we're a bit under the gun. And if the board thinks the current version looks fine and we could just go with it. And then I could tailor a message that I would write to the remaining size of the page. And it would just be a shorter message for me. I thought the message was fine. I just wanted to point out that the sidewalks on the merchant road project was also paid for with grant money. And since we were talking about grant money at the end there, and I just want to make sure that I can't remember now when we got what grant money. But does I feel like we might be missing one or two big grants that we got in the in the previous year? I went back through all the minutes and those were the ones that popped out. But I can't say I, you know, I can't say I didn't miss something. So what's our plan? Those are my only comments. I thought otherwise I thought it was great. Look good to me, Tom. I'm good. So we'll I guess we're going to go with it. And then Adolfo will just curb his curb his tongue a bit in his copy or whatever. Great. OK. So I'm already in Adolfo. If anything proves problematic, I mean, just get back to me and I can I can try and trim it a little bit. But, you know, let's see how it goes. OK. Great. Entertain the motion to adjourn. So moved. Second. All those in favor. Aye. Post motion carries. Good night, everyone. Good night. Thanks. Bye bye.