 All right. Well, I would like to call to order the steering committee meeting, which is a joint meeting of the school board and the city council on Thursday, November 2nd, 2023. Item one is welcome and introduction. So I want to welcome everyone to city hall for a semi-social conversation to get to know everyone. There's some new faces on both boards and I think it's always helpful when you know a little more informally some of the people that you need to work with across the city. So that's why we kind of plan this dinner. I certainly want to thank Carol McQuillan. Yay, Carol. Common roots for putting on a fabulous meal. We're fortunate to have a culinary expertise as well as some food that she grows. It's so good for us and our children and our community. So that's lovely, too. So the next item, I guess, if that's enough, do you want to say anything, Kate? I just appreciate us being together tonight and thank you to Carol and to everyone who's putting the energy to arrange this. Good. So agenda review, are there any additions, deletions, or changes in the agenda items that anyone has? Okay, we're seeing none. Are there any comments and questions from the public not related to the agenda? Wendell. So it makes messages, but my understanding was that originally this was scheduled as a social council and board with no warning and I didn't think we were going to talk about football all that time. So I'm very glad that it's now fully open and worn to the public. Okay. Appreciate that. Any comments for people who are joining via Zoom? Okay. Seeing none, we'll move on to item four, approving the minutes from the July 10th Steering Committee meeting. I would entertain a motion for approval or I would move to approve the minutes for a second. Are there any discussion or changes or all right? So all those in favor signify by saying aye, I approve the minutes as presented. So item five is the kind of the social interaction time. So we had some good conversations as people, I think we're, I mean, with people sitting next to you, but we thought it would be interesting to have everyone just go around the table and introduce themselves and share what brought them to service in South Burlington. Maybe a little bit of what you've done in the past that you think is kind of frames who you are, if there's been work or travel or family or whatever. It doesn't have, we don't have to get real intimate details or anything, but those kind of general things just so we all have a context for understanding who everyone is. So is there anyone who would like to start? I'll start. Okay. Thank you, Tim. My name is Tim Barrett. I've been on City Council since 2016. I moved up here in 81 to start a job with IBM right out of school. And I was on the DRB for four and a half years before City Council and I was on the Library Board of Trustees for six years before that. So the reason I ran for City Council was because of what was proposed to happen right behind us here, there was some turmoil about central school and an offer made by developer to pay $7 million for the property and plans for city center. And I just said I'm going to run because this is a discussion I want to be involved in and I want my vote to be directed. So that's how I got started. So thank you everybody for being here and thank you to Carol. Carol's not here. It was a delicious meal. I appreciate it. Okay. You want to just go around the table? That sounds good. Okay. Kate Bailey, South Burlington School Board. I moved to South Burlington in 2017 from New York City. I started Vermont being home when I went to St. Michael's and graduated in 2011, grew up throughout New England, went to college here, moved away, came back in 2017. And my professional background is in health care policy and community organizing. And I wanted to run for the school board seat after seeing how our schools in particular and our communities have been so impacted by COVID and thinking about learning loss and how closely related our health care and education systems are to one another and how dependent things like mental health services and social emotional learning and our climate change policy and our kids classrooms all overlap with one another. So, yeah, that's a little bit about me. Partner, two dogs and a cat. Well, I am Megan Emery. I'm City Council. This is my 14th year. I was raised outside of Chicago in a very political family. And I had my dad from a very left-leaning family and my mom from a very right-leaning family. I would say not as right-leaning as they are today in the Republican Party. So more what I'd call the Republican going back to Abe Lincoln. So we had very boisterous conversations growing up. And I decided to, after thinking about architecture, I decided to go into French studies and to become a professor. So I chose the topic, which was existentialist French philosophy, which I teach at UVM. Yeah, I teach French literature from the 20th century through the 21st century. World War II. Thank you so much, Carol. Decolonization. And so the French Republic is something that I have studied in depth. And coming from a very political family and understanding the American Republic to some degree. This was just a wonderful outlet for me, how to get into it. I was first in the PTO. And then back in the early 2000s, that's when there was a movement to have the school and city budgets put up for a vote. And I was recruited in the effort to make sure that it wasn't three strikes and you're out. You'd have to revert to the previous year's budget. And so I was one of those parents that you all know very well, very active. And then I was asked to go into the Charity Review Committee by a counselor at the time. And I said, that's interesting to me. So I did that. And then a spat became available on the city council and the same counselor said, you should run for city council. And I did that. So that was in 2008. And I have to say it's one of the most rewarding things I've ever done in my life. And we have at the same time raised three children, the third one is in seventh grade. So I know the city from both the school side and the city side and it's an amazing place. And I just feel so privileged to be able to call it home. So there we go. That's me. Hi, everybody. I'm Tim Warren, and this is my, let me check, first day. Congratulations. Congratulations. I tell you how I ended up on the board. I'm actually a native of Vermont. I grew up in Milton. Went to the University of Vermont. I have a German studies degree. I'm a good couple. So after I graduated from UVM, I worked with my father for a while and then ended up bumping around. I wanted to figure out what I want to do when I grew up and ended up as a paraprofessional and self-grown for high school for four years and working in special ed. So that was my favorite job ever, but I sold out to corporate because they just offered more money. And I ended up at IDX for quite a few years as a training, believe it or not, radiology software, which I know nothing about radiology, but they teach you all of that. And then it turned into basically an instructional design job. And that's what I've done for the last about 20 years. I developed courseware training materials for radiology, software, radiology, stuff like that. So how I got into this position. So about a year or so ago, I decided I would start attending school board meetings just because I wanted to become more educated on what was happening. One of those community members who lets everybody else do the work and it's too busy. And I finally said, well, at least I could, you know, come up to speed on stuff and just started attending meetings. It's been there. I think I missed two meetings this year. So I'm sometimes the only one in the room, but it's been, it's been very, quite a learning experience. And then when the vacancy came about, I was one of the ones who said, hey, you should fill that. And I felt awkward that I should probably apply because I was insisting that it would be felt right. And then here I am. So I'm excited to be on the board. I appreciate the opportunity. There are some great people to work with. It's a great community. I do have three children, one graduated from South Brompton. And I have two girls who are juniors right now in the district. So we've gone through the whole system. It's a great district. And I just want to see that continue. I appreciate that. You were one of the members who said fill the seat and then we applied. So we had a lot more people say fill than we did apply. But I'm Chelsea telling us to school board. This is my first meeting without my little baby with me in attendance. So I just had a baby two months ago. And I was saying that when I was running for the school board seat, I had just had a baby three months ago. So my oldest is two and my youngest is two months. And, um, yeah. Yes. Um, amazing. Um, when I became a parent, I just had this overwhelming sense of, uh, responsibility for not just my children, but our future generations and children in general and children of our community. And, um, I really believe my parental model as far as to model what I think is, you know, best, best behavior. And so volunteering and supporting your community is the important piece of that. So that's the reason I decided to run. I thought that school board members were activists and those are two very different things. So I've learned pretty quickly what school board members actually do. Um, and I'm still happy to be doing it, even though it's not what I thought I was supposed to be doing. Um, just some history. I grew up in the Northeast kingdom. Uh, and I was born and raised in Vermont and then you know, yeah, my best friend is, yes, it is. We used to like to say our high school soccer team to warm up for games. We would do a two mile run from Vermont to New Hampshire to Canada. We didn't tell the other team that it was two miles. We'd make it seem like it was more than that. Um, and my best friend is actually serving on the school board in our hometown now, which is fun. It's just, it's interesting to have conversations with her. Um, that district is one school, K through 12. Um, I think the whole population of the school is probably less than one of our elementary schools. So it's different metrics, but still fun. Um, and I moved to Burlington to go to UVM. I studied microbiology and then after spending four years in the lab with fluorescent lights, I decided to start a business training dogs outside and not be in a lab. Um, and now I'm thinking about going back. So it's just a little bit about me. Thank you. My name is Andrew Chalek. Um, like Chelsea would drives me is really concerned for our kids and future generations. Um, most of my whole life that concerns kind of been manifested and worrying about farm and ecosystems that support all life. It's without that. Nothing else really matters. Um, and when I first got to South Burlington in 18, I immediately joined the energy committee. Um, because that was how I thought I'd be able to contribute from that perspective to the city. Well, behold, like a day after I moved here, we learned that there was this massive development proposed down the street and all the neighbors collected and what are we going to do about it? Um, I think it's really important for me to get involved in the city. Um, much more heavily than, than I really thought I would. Um, immediately from the start and, um, realize that there's a real ability to, to make change and to improve things, make, make things better. And, um, I never fought again to politics, honestly, but through that experience and, and meeting folks and meeting really good people and really, I, um, thought, well, you know, kick it up a notch and, you know, make things, make things better from the, from the council. And it's been great, great. I really love it. My background kind of facilitates it. My whole lot, yeah, I've been an attorney and an engineer. And so I've got different skill sets that I'm able to kind of apply to the problems that we face. And, um, it's useful to me. So, yeah, it's great. Good evening, everyone. Violet Nichols superintendent of the school district. And, um, happy to be here with you all having, um, this beautiful dinner and, um, let's see a little bit about myself. Um, I, uh, like many of you share the belief that, um, we live in an incredible city and I happen to also believe that, um, that our community is the most powerful investment that, that I could make, um, in our current futures and, um, the futures of all of those students in our community. Um, I think the work of educators is, uh, the most important work that, that I could be in and find it extremely rewarding and, um, supportive of our whole community. I grew up in Virginia, so very small school system. And, um, I did my undergraduate in Florida. And I was going to go to law school and one thing led to her, another, and I ended up getting my master's in education and, um, started teaching and have never gone back. Um, I've been a teacher and, um, mathematics instructional coach and consultant. Um, curriculum director didn't love the principal pieces. That was a lot of, um, yeah. Um, you know, janitorial being the nurse, uh, picking up the, the vomit. We're not, we're not as, uh, rewarding, uh, in every moment. Um, and I've done that everywhere from. California to Vermont to Peru. Um, and, um, so I, I really, you know, mean it when I say this is a special place to be. Um, let's see. I have two wonderful kids, uh, two cats, one dog, great husband. Um, and, uh, I've checked all the boxes. Thanks again, everyone for being here and I'll pass to you out. Hello, everybody. I'm Alex McHenry. I'm a school board member. I've been in South Burlington for about 15 years. I'm from the area pretty much. So, uh, grew up here, went to school here. And, um, when an opening came up about six and a half years ago, I thought, Oh, this would be great. And previously I had been on the school board in very city around the turn of the 21st century. So I served three years there and figured, well, I've got some experience. I can do this. Um, so I figured I'd go for it. And I did. I, I enjoyed very much and, um, looking forward to keeping at, with keeping at it. Um, I've got two kids. I've got a senior and a sophomore. And so I'm very familiar with the schools. Um, and I'm very familiar with the schools. Um, and I went to the, um, some of the school tours that we had a couple of weeks ago. I thought, yep, I know this. I know that because I've been to every single one of them either as, uh, when we had board meetings or summer camps, the schools out summer camp, or just as, as a parent picking up my kids at school. Um, I'm an avid runner. You might see me out there sweating. And, uh, let's see what else. I can do. Yeah. Thank you. I'm Sue Allen. I have taken minutes for this and other boards. 42 plus years. Uh, and the reason I do it is because of people like you. Uh, I like to be around people who are doing something worthwhile who care, who are passionate. Keeps me going. We'll continue the passion to keep going. I grew up in New York where local government, I grew up in five boroughs of New York where local government was, at least as far as I knew, wasn't. Uh, I never knew that we had one. I presume we did, but, uh, it was never something that was accessible, uh, or that kids ever learned about or anything. And, uh, when I came, I came to UVM as a very young, 17 year old, uh, and took a course in local government. I didn't know what the words meant. Uh, older men. I had no clue, uh, but I have a degree in English, which I did know. Adam asked a degree in English and two thirds of a doctorate and a couple of things, but, uh, I love what I do. I love what I do. You could still finish your thesis. No. I would rather write, I have written three books. I would rather write cookbooks and write poetry. Thank you very much. Um, I'm Jesse Baker. I serve as your city manager. Um, I've been here for about two and a half years. I am of a mantra as well. I grew up in one of the various center and graduated from Hollywood. Um, and then went and got an undergrad degree from Columbia University in psychology and anthropology. And a master's in policy and planning from Tufts. Um, I started my career in child welfare. So I was a foster care case worker in New York city for a couple of years and worked in child welfare in Boston and really thought my career was going to be about changing the child welfare system and making, um, Children and families as healthy and successful as they could be, especially those of our kiddos who don't have a biological link necessarily to their families. My fatal flaw in that was that nobody pays you to change the child welfare system. So I got into program evaluation. I took a lot of statistics courses and graduate school and really loved that and found myself and that's, you were saying Chelsea's sitting in a high rise in downtown Boston analyzing data from a child welfare agency. It was just so far away from community. Um, and I was living in Summerville, Massachusetts at the time and really love that community. Summerville is to Boston as when you ski is to Burlington in a lot of ways. Um, and wanted to work on community. So went to do program evaluation for the city of Summerville to the city of about 80,000, 100,000 people. Um, so I worked there for five years. I was the human resources director. I was the mayor's political aid. Um, I was a data analyst and then want to move back to Vermont. So came home in 2011 been here since I've been the assistant city manager in Montpelier, the manager and when you ski and I've been here two and a half years. So I was realizing when I was telling this story, Violet very kindly invited me to her leadership team meeting this week and, um, A connection I hadn't made before was that my, my mother went back to school. So my father was the chief of child care licensing for the state for his career. And my mom was the daycare center director and kindergarten teacher. And then when I was in middle school in high school, went back and got her doctorate and taught students how to be elementary school teachers. And I was also a post college teacher. And I had a really good school experience as well. I had really learned how to supervise student teachers at our cot and orchard in a chamberlain for about eight years. So I remember coming home from college and hearing stories about Mark Pot and the teacher, she was, meeting at Mark Hot and what their experiences were. Um, and actually did her dissertation on teacher retention. Um, featuring teachers at Mark. That's really interesting. And I hadn't intellectually put that together until I was thrilled that we're having this conversation tonight and loved being here and being part of this team. Thanks. Hello everyone. I'm Steve Rock. I serve a dual role as your deputy city manager and your fire chief. I'm native here in Vermont. I spent the last 32 years in the professional fire service. About 25 of those in White River Junction where I spent most of my career. I spent seven years as the fire chief of the city of Burlington and then about 18 months or so came over here. I've been married for 32 years to an educator who is a principal in a neighboring district. So I hear a lot about the educational system and we have two grown children. So I'm very privileged to work for Jesse and I think you know as someone who's I've worked for the manager form of government and worked for the mayoral form of government and when the opportunity came to come over here and help you help us write the ship on some struggles we're having it was a great place to come to. So it's me. So Larry Kupferman, my first meeting. So I moved to South Burlington in 1976 and have been very active in Burlington for a long time. My work primarily was with Champlain Valley OEO doing anti-poverty work. My interests in South Burlington and during retirement which has been these past few years is really affordable housing and conservation and those two things sort of butt heads quite a bit. So there's some tension there as always but good tension really. We had our two daughters went to South Burlington schools. What else was I going to say? Oh I was going to say but that should be plenty. It may or may not come back. It's great to be with you. Okay I'm thrilled that we're all together and this is great. I'm Helen really and I chair the city council. I've been on this is my 12th year on the council. Prior to that I was in the legislative, well I worked on in a couple healthcare nonprofits. One on quality improvement and one on encouraging young people to look at healthcare as a career and supporting their experiences and and also helping allocate some state dollars to help retain primary care and psychiatrists and nurse practitioners in the state of Vermont with some help with their debt, their school debt. Prior to that I served in the Senate for eight years representing Chittenden County except Colchester and then before that I was in the house for ten years. At that point I lived in Burlington and then we moved here and I ran for Senate and before that I was a teacher for about ten years in middle school. I worked in South Royalton Elementary School a little K through 12 kind of situation and then I worked at Camelshaw Middle School just the age group that I really loved was middle school. When I got into politics it was sort of worked well because I had children at the time I was three daughters and I could in the legislature here you're just there for like six months so the other six months when you weren't running for re-election I could be home with my children so that sort of worked really well for our family. Clearly I'm married and to the same guy we celebrated 51 years which was sort of unusual in his family because both of his parents were married four times so we were setting a new record not copy an old one anyway. And then when I left the Senate and the nonprofit organizations my husband said oh there's an opening on the city council you should run it's only two meetings a month. Well okay but you know what I'm not gonna campaign because I'm just tired of campaigning I've done it so many times so if I get elected great if I don't you know I think well I did get elected. You ran on a post. Yeah I ran on a post it was pretty easy. And then it turned out it was a lot a lot more than two meetings a month but I would say I I enjoy this far more than any of my legislative experiences because this is kind of right where it happens. I can recall my some of my first meetings and it was kind of like oh we're gonna vote on this tonight. You know it wasn't six months of testimony. It was like a little bit of testimony maybe and then you make the decision and then it it gets enacted or carried through with city government in a way that state government isn't quite as efficient I guess. There's so many steps to go through to really have a piece of legislation become what really happens. So I find this really fascinating and satisfying and I would agree with everyone this is a you know wonderful city to work for and with and I'm you know very happy with sort of how we're moving and I look forward to helping that along. I am not a native though. I grew up in New Jersey and when I came to UVM I can remember distinctly the first weekend I said man I hope if I find someone I want to marry they want to stay in Vermont because this is where I live. So that worked out. Good evening my name is Sean Burke and I have the privilege of serving as the city's police chief. I spent the last 30 years in Vermont law enforcement starting at the Woodstock Vermont Police Department with five members. I did about two years there and then I did the better part 22 years with the city of Rowington Police before being hired as city of South Rowington Police Chief in 2018. I'm married to a career nurse a woman that I met in the emergency room at UVM MC while we're at work with two sons. They went K through 8 at St. Francis Xavier School in Winooski where I served on the school board for a number of those years. They're now one is a sophomore at Norwich the other is a junior at Milton High School and disappointing football season looking looking forward to a great hockey season. They didn't have football when I was there. So that's a game no pun intended. I guess just a reflection on local government I do like we're able to actually move the ball in the field and that's having spent unfortunately a lot of great amount of time testifying before the legislature and seeing how slow that process is and how unpredictable some of the outcomes are. I really appreciate how nimble a local government can be. Great. Well and Tom's here and then Violet does have some stuff online too. I don't know if you want to have them introduce themselves as well. So Tim Jarvis is on and Patrick Burke and then Tom's here in the audience. Okay yeah Patrick you want to start. If I can figure out how to unmute myself. Can you hear me? Yes we can. Okay great. I'm Patrick Burke. I've been working at South Burlington. It's my 27th year at the high school. I've been principal for 23 of this my 23rd year as school principal. I feel very strongly about the education that is provided to our youth pre-k through 12 in South Burlington. I'm out of our accomplishments but also pretty focused on improvement and seeing how we can get better as our students certainly deserve the very best. So I'm just kind of lurking this evening so I wasn't really ready to introduce myself but thanks for giving me that opportunity and appreciate you letting me join virtually today. Okay thank you and Tim Jarvis. Can you hear me? Yes we can. Alright thanks for letting Pat go first because I wasn't ready to say anything either but I'm the senior director of finance and operations for the school district. I was born in South Burlington, went through the whole school system. There was no K back then so I have to say it was only one through twelve but I went to I went to Rick Markott school and Rick Markott was still the I think principal at the middle school before he got his principal job but in any case very deep roots for the community. My father was on the first city council when it when it went from transfer from being a town to a city and was very much instrumental in local politics and and and civic groups and policymaking. He thinks that South Burlington has become much more complicated since then. It gives me a lot of anecdotes about what it was like in the early 70s to run this city which is very different than it is today. But anyway I left South Burlington to go to college, went to Dartmouth, went to the Peace Corps for two years in Africa. Thought I would be an in-mind prop in my whole life and instead I got recruited by Morgan Stanley to start up their operations in Luxembourg. So that kicked off a 34-year career with leaving financial institutions. I asked my boss if I could move to Vermont during COVID. She said yes. I bought a house and I needed to find a place to pretty quickly because I have twin girls who at that time were about to go into sixth grade and so we closed on our house I think on August 12th and they had to start school two weeks later in the middle school. After having attended private Catholic school in New King and Connecticut so the transition from that where they had been going to school one class per grade with the same girls you know for K through five. Stepping in the middle school was a huge transformation for them and I'm very proud that they've embraced it. They're now in eighth grade and I decided after taking a summer off probably to figure out what I was gonna do in my life with the rest of my career after having left the corporate whirlwind and I saw Violet's advertisement in her newsletter for this job for finance and operations and although I had absolutely no experience in public policy governance, administration, education, construction or any of those topics I thought I must have some transferable skills that I can apply somewhere because I love this city and I want my girls to enjoy the same level of wonder and excellence that I enjoyed when I was going to school here so Violet convinced me it would be a good match and next week is my one-year anniversary so I'm very happy to be here and happy to work with all of you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay any little follow-ups anyone has something that they're gonna get Tom now. Oh, Tom, yeah. It's another local guy. Good evening everybody. Tom DePietro, Director of Public Works. I've been with the city just under 18 years now in the Public Works director role for just under two years. I would say what brought me to public service is probably an example set by my parents so my mother was active in our local PGA though at the time my accuser of doing it just to keep an eye on me. She really enjoyed that. My father was very involved with youth sports and from a police tracking dog, hunting community, things of that nature so I really enjoy working with the community where I can envision a project or take the vision that you all lay out and take that sort of from a soup to nuts start to finish my final construction I'm able to stick with it through maintenance as well. I'm going maintenance as well so. Any other little comments anyone wants to make? Is something in your bio that was important? Okay exceptional group of humans. Yeah, yeah. No it's impressive. So our fifth No, our sixth item is to discuss some shared values around community and school safety. I'm not exactly sure who wants to start that. I don't know. I mean we all of us want our kids to be safe right that's obviously your common goal. And I would love for us to make some progress tonight. Breaking through some of the stalemates and making progress on other things that happen stalemate but maybe you're going a little slower than the community likes and I know we've been all working hard on it but it'd be great to make some progress. From my perspective there's kind of two goals. One kids need to be safe when they get to school and I want to be able to want to be safer kids to to walk and ride the bikes right because there's a lot of other goals that we're trying to accomplish as a community and those that satisfies those goals and how do we how do we make that happen? They both have to be safe and parents have to proceed and it's safe and for that to happen it needs to be safe to cross major roads like Kennedy and Dorset and Heineberg and you know Shelburne and so we we need together to break that stalemate and make sure that it is safe for children to be able to do that. I have some of the thoughts but I'll pass it on from here. I'd like to thank Andrew in particular for working with me personally and and together as a sort of collaboration on our shared values of how the city and schools I I think I don't take for granted that we're all on the same page working towards a city and a planet that is livable for our future and and to try to combat the impacts of climate change that are already so present in our lives and I really appreciate the work that and the the conversations that we've had particularly how like the city's climate action plan and bike pad and the school districts all sort of overlap and we really want to build on that work together and not duplicate resources and tap into the expertise that we share in our cities and in our community and so I just want to back up and share a little bit of a timeline from my perspective when students and parents and staff raise the issue of street safety and in particular my familiarity in this conversation was you know the four way inner the intersection right out front here at city center with Rick Mark hot I am not I don't pretend to be a street expert or have any sort of expertise in infrastructure but I care about the issue and you know was listening to our constituents and we had a community member who's who's here tonight I recognize you over here mention complete streets and safe routes to schools so I started doing a little bit of research after I think our January 2023 meeting where we had to discuss this for the first time at the steering committee meeting and since that seat had been planted I had and we've had ongoing conversations I reached out to our neighbors and advocates at local motion just to figure out what was happening and what this looks like in other communities and sort of tapping into the expertise of this wonderful nonprofit that I'm a tandem bike rider and so local motion is where you go to ride tandem bikes and so that's why I love local motion so much and my partner and I ride tandem because obviously we need a partner to be on a tandem bike so local motion has this level of expertise and coordination that I think South Burlington could really take advantage of and they have already they've already done so much technical assistance and work in Shelburne in Burlington and I've shared I don't know if I've shared with everybody in this room but I've shared with multiple people in this room they're sort of they have a travel plan that looks at Burlington in particular most recently just in the last year and they're taking a really comprehensive view of what it means for children and families to get to and from schools it's sort of the same way that we'd envision city planning or master planning with the biped but through the lens and prioritizing our students and I think that their model and their expertise is is something that we could really take advantage of I also really appreciate that they have paid staff to coordinate this and our sort of neutral experts with all of our best interests in mind in my opinion and so they have in Burlington a safe routes to schools task force and this model brings together folks like DPW the police department our school principals and administration and city council and school district to sit together at a task force that is facilitated and managed by local motion and it has two sort of prongs one being infrastructure and what I think of is like the public works piece and you know crossing guards and intersections and crosswalks and then the other wing is education and safety and planning events like walking to school days and doing that sort of education piece and it's happening at the same time in a coordinated effort I think this is really important also because none of this comes for free it all becomes with budgetary asks and priorities from the community and I think having all of that coordinated together by local motion gives us an opportunity to work collaboratively from the beginning so I know there's been a lot of back and forth and a lot of conversations at other steering committee meetings over email my offer or my suggestion moving forward would be for us to collaboratively establish this this task force and and then lean on those experts and follow through with the recommendations of that task force that's my idea yeah I appreciate that too and that is something that that idea came from a conversation that jelly Jesse and Helen and Kate and I had as a city school team I was doing some reflecting this evening and I think you know Andrew and I were saying we we all have the same goals here and we share we serve the same constituents and and I don't doubt for a minute that everyone in this room wants all of our community members our students to to be safe and to have a more walkable and likeable city and my hope too is this evening we can come together and and find a way to you know continue to make progress I I realize you know something I shared with Megan the other day is for some of you this is a fresh conversation and for me my heartstrings have been pulled because since I started in this position so for about a year and a half some of the first meetings I had were with parents who are really deeply concerned and worried about their kids and then as construction begun and has continued the concern that we've heard on the school side has been palpable and you know we've really for the last year and a half tried to work with with families and you know I brought this to Jesse in August we had you know parent community members asking about lighting and school streets on Dorset and you know at the time we said you know the lighting is in line with our climate action plan and you know school zones we've gotten so used to this nimble environment that we live in that many of us discussed and you know this process of together developing safer Rooster School for our community isn't as nimble and yeah I appreciate the forward progress and the partnership you know as the city does change that we work together to make some of those changes but so let's see I appreciate the resources Jesse brought safe fruits to school to our attention and I shared a lot about the bike and pet committee that the city had and so we've really tried to work to develop those routes for our schools as well our school administrators are doing incredible jobs and you know I want to thank all those in the city who are working to support that and you know we're seeing a lot of progress with the funding of the temporary traffic monitor at Marcot during construction and I was one that found because I drove through it today and I saw the principal and I saw Sue only yeah so the person who is in the role was overwhelmed by anxiety of traffic management and so you know we've drawn this district distinction so at this point I think there's we're finding that we're kind of burning through crossing guards because what we need are people who are able trained in traffic control and that's what we've been hearing from our staff and that's been a difficulty and we don't have anyone on our on the school side who understands or has expertise in traffic management it was curriculum development I can coach it but we found that we've been you know the staff that we are able to recruit our our haven't had that expertise and so that's some training that you know and we've suggested you know hey we've thought about you know we've talked about this so many different ways and you know and in reading the steering committee meetings minute meetings from January talked about hey the school could staff and recruit traffic crossing guards at the time and then we said actually they really need to be traffic monitors off the back of feedback from employees we're saying they were really out here putting our bodies in front of cars we said okay you're right so we modified job descriptions and you know now it's it's to the point where we think you know as a school side you know we're happy to talk about cost sharing but you know not seeing that it's made sense given the staffing patterns to have them on our side so you're we're again looking for traffic monitor at Marcot which is a concern of for parents you know because they're watching this school you know just it's in the middle of obviously a lot of active construction so and the sidewalks are cut off and so we hear you know you're gonna have to forgive my frankness and in correspondence we are hearing from just really concerned parents and you know looking for this team to come together to find some solutions and a path forward so I'm I'm hopeful that we can continue to make some forward progress tonight I think the action force is a really great way for the two teams to collaborate under facilitated expertise which I understand does not come at an increased cost for the city or the district correct so that's another benefit there the task force yeah so I think you know that's a nice option and our neighbors have benefited from it so I think the the way has been paved for us in a lot of aspects I appreciate that suggestion Kate so we had a chance to contact the builders the responsibility in this matter yeah it's their construction that is keeping this keeping us safe dirt a safer in my opinion yeah and the other thing about traffic is you need you need to have somebody who enforces traffic I mean I don't I want to say a policeman but somebody who has all the gear and the sign and the equipment the yellow everything just like traffic controlled us they're wearing they're wearing it I had two questions in my response to sue yesterday that I the one was answered now about the crossing second was the path that had been you know agreed to between the principal of central and and our our city staff so there's that path that's right behind the new construction right over there is it still being used so we've had a lot of iterations so Snyder Brayman has been fantastic they have been extremely attentive to to school safety and worked with Alyssa the principal of Marcos school significantly they are they're concerned about so the path is has been many different things many materials it's it seems to be open closed and they're finding different ways I think it's closed right now they or the Snyder Brayman the there's been a lot of different ways that kids have gotten to school because sidewalks have been closed off or reopened in a lot of different areas so the path that we're referring to is has not been open consistently during construction so depending on where they are in staging Snyder Brayman approached Alyssa this week Alyssa and I talked on Tuesday and she said they're wanting to write a letter they want to they're concerned about traffic and Alyssa wanting to write a letter no Snyder Brayman approached Alyssa yeah and they're trying to reach out to Green Mountain Flaggers they're they're concerned about the lack of traffic support and on market street for their equipment yeah okay well I think it's the the drivers of the heavy equipment are concerned about the children and the traffic right yeah I think so Snyder Brayman is concerned about student welfare as the focus not not their employees they've been they've been extremely attentive to the student and staff needs and so they're worried sort of with the nature of Rick Markot being boxed in by construction what they described as a lack of safety precautions and and that's what we're hearing from parents as well so they I think they were working on some correspondence that they were going to share but you know as you described Larry we're we've found that we're not able to attract or retain people for the traffic monitor position because we're mostly dealing with educators right like someone who might serve as an interventionist in our system for part of the day and then the traffic monitor and others and they don't we cannot provide the training or the outfitting that's necessary so those are those are concerns of ours as well so is Snyder Brayman looking to the flaggers you know the ones you see to hire them or are they believing that the school or the city should be hiring them yeah we have I haven't discussed that with them at all they've Alyssa brought it to my attention they just felt that the support was needed so and you know so I've engaged in no conversations about finances but for me it's really the safety issue that I want to solve first so but I'll certainly share out any additional information I get on that another question I had and I had posed it and I think it was a no at one point but I'm gonna ask it even still is there is a driveway that goes to listen road why is that not being considered what why has that been taken off the table I don't know the answer to that is that the so is that the driveway that goes through the florist no it just it's just on the west side of Rick Marker just on the west side and it goes straight to Williston Road and to my mind and I was in civil engineering before studying French existentialism to my mind it was waste management that stopped me but anyway now I love it now anyway we all get there eventually we get back to those fluorescent lights last so that that's the question I have is you know sitting there in traffic you know trying to come west on Market Street I could see I could see Sue Conley I could see listen McDonald and I saw people moving in and people moving out and to my mind if we just keep the flow moving one way it would just make it so much less kind of scary because you could see Sue's not comfortable I mean that was obvious she's not comfortable and I felt for Sue and she's doing it obviously because she cares and you can't find somebody else to do it but to my mind just getting that one-way traffic flow would resolve so many issues yeah is there someone here who has expertise on that I I don't know the answer to that so I think that's great idea and I think we should definitely think about the orientation of Mark Hott to Williston Road I guess I would like to I I feel a little bit like this is the elected officials conversation so if there are elected officials who want to speak first and then I'd like to abstract away a little bit just from Rick Mark Hott because clearly I mean it is catalyst I think yeah but it's but it's this it needs to be broader conversation I mean Rick Mark Hott needs to be solved but it's also transitional and temporary that will you know we'll get there but there's lots of other hot spots around this city needs to be trust and I'd love for us to all agree that we need traffic monitors or crossing guards at various spots around the city and I'm gonna thank you up on something you said and throw out that personally I'd be happy for the expense to be shared on the two budgets so we can get away from who pays for an issue and just you know drill down into you know who's best place to really train higher in fire and monitor and place these folks and that's a conversation I think you probably can happen away from the council with experts and kind of break the stalemate that way abstract away from the budget questions let's just agree to share it and then have the experts agree on on who the should only play a relationship so we can get back to the community and say we're gonna have you know your kids can be safe we're gonna have traffic monitors crossing guards and this one I have to say I've said this in an email I see it at the elementary school and I you know having the kids my kids go through Chamberlain we had a crossing guard and there still is a crossing guard I don't see it at the middle school high school and the reason why is they're gonna be driving when they're 16 and if people cannot manage to use the crosswalks and the lights and I have tried on Sheldon Road and it's very safe it's across it's the curb cuts that are not the safe parts and you'd need to have I don't know how many crossing guards to help people get across curb cuts okay so to my mind our lights are safe and we're gonna be placing in these children's hands at the age of 16 car keys and if we do not expect them to be able to navigate crosswalks with crossing lights at the age of 12 I think that we are not giving them the responsibility that we should be giving them and it is a philosophical question and I shared with everybody after Kate sent the local motion study just an article that happened to land in my inbox on a movement that started some years ago where parents very concerned about the level of anxiety increasing level of anxiety in children and in teenagers that they they started to sense that it had to do with too much parenting and too much concern for their children's safety that if we can empower our young people when this age appropriate to take age appropriate risks like pushing a crosswalk button waiting for the crosswalk signal and crossing the road and all of our crosswalks have adequate time for you to get across the road that that would be giving the students and these young people who are again we're going to be giving them car keys when they're 16 years old giving them a sense that I can do this and I can I can navigate I can navigate in my city I can navigate and I have my 11 year old now she's 12 but when she was 11 and I trained all my kids to do this I live off of Myers court okay on Myers court I walk them to school the two boys got to the point where they could walk themselves to school but they also learned to cross Williston Road before the wonderful crosswalk that we have now to cross Williston Road on their own to go on Ruth and on Heath and then actually know it I was another road that cut through St. Fiany I did this with them I trained them yeah you know where I'm talking about thank you Davis Parkway that you can cut through to St. Fiany's parking lot then you go to the entrance the St. Piany's and it goes to Barrett Street and then you go down Barrett Street and you have the back door entrance into the middle school high school campus I taught them at a young age to do that I taught them to look both ways I thought them to be careful and they did it from I would say 11 years old that they got themselves to summer camp and I don't know they're probably 13 years old I said okay you want to go see a movie here are bus passes cross Williston Road again they're right now it's amazing okay I press a button the car stop I walk across at the time you had a look and to make sure you go across the street you wait for the bus at the bus stop they had their bus passes that their mom had given them they had you know the timetable they knew when the buses were gonna come they rode down to majestic 10 watch their movie got back to the bus stop and came home so again I think that the reason why I like the idea of the task force is because it has this dual infrastructure education components so the the pop-up events teaching kids how to do exactly what you're talking about and for for families who may not have time or energy or understanding to provide that education that is something that the the task force I think would include an incorporate and I hear that I'm not a parent but I have lived in a lot of cities and I think that one of the best ways that in local motion actually I think share this perspective one of the best ways that kids and humans can gain independence is by walking and biking I think it's a fabulous way to connect with your community and build the independence that you're talking about and I'm not a parent but I would I would not walk or bike on Dorset Street and I refuse to endorse that campaign while the speed limit on Dorset Street is 35 miles per hour it needs to be 25 miles per hour and we need to have a school zone in order to then be able to invest in the education and the independence that you're talking about okay again my daughter 12 years old with a girlfriend walked from the middle school down Dorset Street to you mall all right so they crossed then they went from you mall to the library and then they walked home okay it is doable it truly is doable you just have to know where the crosswalks are how to press a button you wait for the cars to stop and you cross it is doable and I I sense that you know it's something you may not have tried and I walk on this road at home and I I do not find that side so I walk unnavigable and I simply I want you to try it before you say we can't let our students do it because I do it Chelsea did you want to yeah please so I actually walk to the middle school frequently from my house on Swift Street and Swift Street does not have a sidewalk so when I have my strollers or whatever I'm like running up the hill as fast as I can to get onto the bike path and the Kennedy Dorset intersection the speed limit is what it is but it also goes to 189 which has a 55 mile per hour speed limit and people who are using that connection and this is just my opinion are in a hurry to get somewhere and that's the quick connector from one side to the other side and I have had strollers and bicycles and I have multiple times have had adrenaline rush panic attacks because I think that my strollers gonna get hit by a car and I'm not an anxious person I'm really not and my other thought or or contribution is it sounds like your children are very like privileged and lucky to have a mother like you who will teach them and has the time to teach them and that is not representative of all of our students or all of our young citizens not not all of them have someone who can teach them and show them not all of them have the the same capacities that perhaps your children have and so I want to advocate for the safe safest possible option for all of our citizens and and and make it accessible and I love the education that you're talking about I completely agree with that parental philosophy but let's make sure that the framework that you're teaching on is as safe as it can possibly be not just good enough well I think our lights are but I would say the school district provides school buses and that's also a very liberating thing for a student like cooking your own dinner is a liberating thing for a student it doesn't only have to be what my children have done on the roads they've cooked dinner I mean there are things that we can do as parents that don't necessarily you know require you to teach them like I taught my children to do because we have school buses I mean we do have other ways not all parents are home all day in or like not that I wasn't there that's not what I'm saying but like some students have to get themselves up and out the door into school all on their own that's a lot of independent learning and it's not due to a lack of caring from their parents it's just the reality of their situation so Jesse would like to make a comment so I I'm so excited that you all are talking about the safe routes to school concept I know that that's something that we've been talking about for a while and I think the introduction of local motion into that conversation is really interesting I worked with them a lot in Wuduski and they are great facilitators of community conversation and you're absolutely right that that combination of education and infrastructure is really powerful I think standing up a task force like a joint task force as you suggest would be a really exceptional idea and and even more so because I think a lot of the conversation we're having is really in the technical expertise that Tom and his staff team staff have about intersections and lights right now I think the reality is our infrastructure is really safe I think that there's a perception that that there's not safety and so how do we as two elected bodies and two CEOs help change that conversation around the perception and make people feel and engage in their own safety in the community I also think it's really important for us to keep in mind that we can't focus on just what's on the street right now because that's going to change dramatically in the next five to ten years so thinking about the bike and ped changes that are going to happen in city center in addition to the housing construction the commercial space construction that's going in you know we're going to have a shared use path on Williston Road we're going to have a boardwalk to city center park it's going to be a great cut through for students to the back of the high school property right now garden street open I think if we had a task force like that that was really thinking about not only what we need now how we get through the those construction phases and what it looks like in 10 years would be really powerful if we could all do that together and walk through those stages together I think there's going to be a lot of change and it may that change may open up options for perceived safety in ways that we don't know right now so we can't make decisions about it tonight but if we stood up this kind of task force that had leaders from from both sides of our house and community members and you know principal Burke or students or folks on the on the task force then we could do that education infrastructure improvement and what I think of is like little c little d community development so we're partners in safety we're not directing each other in safety so how do you what's the next step to sort of pull that together do you and violet sort of come up with this is someone on my team or these are two people or I mean I for one would support that I don't know if you need action from the council or the school board to say yeah go do it or if we can just sort of nod our heads and say well that makes sense why don't we um task you too or whoever to pull it together I don't know what this other task force in Burlington who was on it but um you know that might be a model where we can just come up with our own I mean I don't think it's um you know too difficult to sort of figure out eight people or whatever the right number is to be on the task force to represent the the different um constituencies or stakeholders and if you pull it together and you've missed someone you can all of that um our bike and pet committee I would hope would have somebody who could be part of that and we got that local motion work with at least Chamberlain school I don't know um because Chamberlain school's been trying to develop that you know safe bike and and ride to walk and ride to school and they actually have drop-offs like you know the park and rides where parents I don't know how many times because it's been a while since my kids have been there but um where the parents would drop their kids off or the buses they'd get bused would drop drop the kids off like a JC park and then the teachers would train the kids how to cross the road how to cross patch in because we don't have even a sidewalk on the north side of white street right we did that study and the residents didn't want it so they have to cross from JC park cross over across white street then white street across patch in go all the way down white street um you know and there are two curb cuts two streets there including Myers court and then the crosswalk again cross over white street to get to to get to Chamberlain school and that was done at least twice per year in my memory but I don't I'm as like I said I don't know what's happening now but it was to train kids you know like I did with my kids so local motion worked has worked school by school um in the past with South Burlington they haven't done a district-wide study and the last one that was done was 2012 there's a couple from 2010 and then 2012 so our city has changed a lot and our streets have changed a lot between 2010 and 2012 and now and to Jesse's point they're going to continue to change and so thinking about that um planning for the future and our current pieces I think are really important to continue exactly the types of practices you're talking about um I would suggest there are lots of folks in this room who have much more experience than I do in terms of how to put together a task force or committee but I would suggest because um I think community members and parents are so aware of that this conversation has been happening at school boards and at city council and there are going to be like I said earlier budget implications and and high level accountability and responsibility I would suggest that we have um maybe one school board member and one city councilor um bring together the the task force and I would be happy to volunteer myself as a school board um if we have a city councilor counterpart and then I don't know how best to coordinate that from there but I would be eager to hear how that would work and the school board is I believe willing to put this on our next agenda for adoption if that's the correct process. I think local motion facilitates the development of the committee as well and I think that's sort of their role is to be that. That would be great. Expert. Right and then they bring together our police and our principals and our experts and I and I think that sort of shepherding through the process would bring a lot of legitimacy and faith in us and our you know our concern constituents you know that we're working through this in a in a systematic way you know considering the educational pieces that we all feel are so important. We have three-year-olds who when bus 11 is cancelled Traverse Shelburne Road alone right and three-year-olds pre-k students um we have pre-k and all in all three of our elementary buildings How is that allowed? So wait let's back up again. Yeah yeah How is that allowed? So you have a bus driver We do we do. That's I really like to get to the core of what the issue is here because I think one is you've got a lot of construction going on here you have sidewalks that are blocked but you also have a problem fulfilling all of your bus routes and that's creating some pressure on some kids to have to walk to school is that the correct statement because you have an awful lot of parents that are driving their kids to your schools every day some of them probably needlessly but for some reason either pre or post-pandemic or whatever they've decided that they have to drive their kids to school up and down Dorchester Street I see kids jumping into cars all headed down to the middle school or wherever so I and whereas the bus drives by and it's half empty pass a bus it's half empty and and that's a sad thing right because why are we running at buses if not everybody is taking advantage of them because then we have to drive their kids to school that's a whole nother sky so I'm trying to understand so if you have pressures where kids are are being forced to walk because there's no bus that's something new that I didn't understand yeah I appreciate that question so Tim it's been difficult I mean we have there's a national shortage of bus drivers there's a state shortage I think we have been relatively fortunate as we are in many areas with bus drivers we're in a position now where we've been able to look at student enrollment data as recent as the end of September and look at our bus routes and we've collapsed four different routes so we've been able to optimize the capacity of each bus you know most of our you know there's one that's very close to capacity which is 75 elementary students that's the marcot one of the marcot runs and others that are 50 capacity due to their routes and the timing of getting kids to school we've also got different times of day we what we run buses so we've got pre-k programs that are all half days in each of our three elementary schools field trip runs we have physical education that takes place at the edge right so buses have a lot of different routes to run during the day that impact the time but the bus driver shortage has certainly been really difficult again nationally statewide for us we're in a position now where we could make the operational decision to have a planned cancellation of a route every single day which would mean that every day someone or some group of students can't get to school in either the morning or the afternoon or both we've decided not to do that however in the case of bus 11 who you know parents of really I'm mentioning this because parents have been really concerned that there are equity issues associated with who are we prioritizing in our bus routes and so right now the answer is we're we're prioritizing all students and getting to school without cancelling one in advance every day but when say bus 11 gets cancelled we're in a position where there are a large number of students who are eligible for free introduced lunch whose parents might not be there when they go to school who are members of historically marginalized groups and who are people of color and they have the lowest attendance rates period in these early elementary grades so pre-k, k, one, two and you know those parents who it's a big equity issue so those parents who don't have the ability to for whatever reason get their kids to school when a bus is cancelled is something you know we need to be sensitive to it can happen to any of our buses so there's no one more than the other we try to pull subs together I think when I sat in this room actually Jesse had invited me to one of your senior leadership team meetings and at that time I think I shamelessly begged for any extra CDL drivers you know could we have agreements for part-time support and that's you know again a year and a half down the road something I would love to explore more right how can we work together for sub-CDLs even um be that as May I just want to have to say sure I I want to make it clear from my perspective I've been getting for this for our safer streets and as bike friendly and walk friendly as possible is not an ulterior motive because of our bus shortages our buses aren't going anywhere we're not going to be eliminating our buses we're always you know gonna have buses they have multiple needs and we're always gonna have walkers and bikers and what I'm seeing as a community member and I I don't have children so I'm not I don't have a personal direct state but I see the investment in an expertise of South Burlington in the bike ped committee in the capital improvements in the there's been a lot of investment into making our cities as bike and pedestrian friendly as possible and I don't see our students being prioritized in those conversations and so it's not an ulterior motive because of the transportation shortages it's because I want to make sure that the top priority in any investments that we're making to make our city as commutable and climate friendly as possible as our students at the start of that conversation and not as an afterthought it does because we are more and more moving towards protected bike lanes and even local motion was brought in for market street and the design of market street and garden street and the fact that we have shared use lanes not on the road but off of the road is specifically thinking about our young people and same thing with what's happening on the south side of Williston Road that's going to be a protected bike lane and mixed use path and that is specifically because we're thinking about young people people want to mean that there wouldn't be the same on Shelburne Road where we have orchard on Shelburne State Highway and I will let the transportation people take it away that's we have no control over Shelburne okay yeah we have no control we can question do we ask do we know um what percent of the students in each school walk by you know drive ride the bus do we have that data yeah and and do do we know for the kids that get driven why they're not doing one of those what what did the parents say what did kids say yeah um Tim if you if you can hear me can I can I put you on the spot do you have any rough understanding of the percentages of students who take the bus we can we can uh I would hesitate to give you a number right now I could look it up I think that we were talking about 2000 students being serviced today based upon their registration information and that would be what's the denominator of that for a total number of students about 2600 25 2600 so yeah but that's about 77 percent of the 2600 students are registered to take the bus now that doesn't mean they get on the bus every morning especially high school kids who are driving but um that's that's the rough number for the number who have registered to to transportation services thanks Tim thank you I often hear so um Tim my goal too is to not have you know so many cars driving students on Dorset Street and Marcot I I um we have that shared priority um and you know something I'm sure you're hearing from constituents that they bring to me is that they're not comfortable with their students walking or biking um and and it's the communication I've shared with you the specific you know the major concerns or Dorset um Shelburne Road, Hinesburg Road um are some of the top ones and parents are citing you know traffic um Dorset Street um it's um I hear drivers you know all the time when I try to cross they're like slamming on their brakes they're like sorry and I think it's just difficult um visibility to see crossers from the interior three lanes if you will if you include the turning lane and so those are the concerns that parents are bringing to me most often is I want to walk or bike or have my kids do it independently and obviously that varies seasonally too so those percentages you know those 2000 registered probably higher in you know colder weather um but ultimately I you know I think we could work together to make some progress on putting in some precautions so that we could get fewer cars coming to Marcaud into our middle school um and in order to do that I think we're going to make some progress on um making those roads safer uh to cross particularly thinking about the you know and Megan I appreciate it that you talked about the developmental appropriate um ways that we teach kids to cross don't you still have a different question? Sure we're very committed to that um however we can all agree I have us for you at home for your old at home and I would never let her cross our driveway alone right so um and I and I think um you know those community members who are in that position have shared that concern and and so I do feel a real responsibility to bring that to you today to say let's move together you know work together to um get some more forward motion um so that we can get fewer cars on the road more of our students crossing these busy intersections safely. Well it sounds to me as if there's some good consensus about creating the task force or whatever you want to name it to start to have those conversations in a in a very um specific way around different streets or um educational opportunities and collaboration with the elementary schools and and the middle school and the high school to to do that that certainly I you know I think everyone would agree with that I think there the other issues around for the specific issues around marcot are a little bit different because this will not be forever it is certainly problematic um and potentially it would make sense to me to really think about is there a way we can use the entrance to Williston Road I mean I suspect it would have to be a right hand turn you're never going to get across that road to take a left hand turn to get out which for some people it's like I can't where I want to go you know but that's that is the way you might have to go but it might help with the um the pathway and making it a little less congested um in this area I you know I I remember the conversations about closing that off and I think a lot of it was just um we're going to have this new school street or whatever we whatever they come up whatever name they come up with they haven't named it yet right there so um they're actually yeah working on in touch this week and um I I'm laughing Tim Penny Melvin once he said what about Lissa Lane I swear that's a really nice ring to it because she's done such a nice job um but yeah that's in the works and um Helen I fully support that I think it's terrific and you know while we're at it I hope that a component of this task force can be that we can be planful and working together with the knowledge of what development is planned so that we can um right now put in uh precautions that are we're not going to outgrow in two years or three years and and so I I look at um marcott and I um certainly didn't anticipate a few years ago it looking like it did now and you know if I had a time machine I would have come together with this team and said hey what can we do to ease um the difficulty you know community members are seeing now around um student safety with the construction and with what's planned ahead I don't know all those details and I would love to be able to troubleshoot uh with our teams together to say you know what this hotspot will be the new marcott in five years so what can we do now and I I think that this is a great way of doing that because the folks on the city team I mean Tom I imagine you get recruited to be a part of that right yeah no I think that would be helpful that's almost an additional focus um for perhaps a different kind of task force and maybe that's really a an internal operational thing for the city we know where the hotspots will be let's share them with the school department and troubleshoot or think ahead so what will that need is that going to need a new cross walk that we don't have now or crossing guards or you know whatever those issues are well I I think we know a lot of that from the traffic engineers you know a lot of these plans are are in 30 60 90 design um I think that the challenge what I was trying to highlight is that what we need today to change the perception of a lack of safety and what we need when you know the boardwalks being built and what we need when we're doing construction on wilson road is going to ebb and flow and if we could have a team of a task force a team of champions who are looking at that and helping with the communication and education and advising on mitigating factors during construction I think that would change the conversation because like quite frankly I think that the 10 of you elected officials are the ones who and Violet and I of course and our teams are the ones who are framing the message for the residents so if we're talking to the residents about this is unsafe this is terrible we need all these new things people are going to feel unsafe if we frame the message as our infrastructure is safe we are working to incrementally improve it as we always do we always are thinking about ways to make it better and if we were doing that in partnership with education and thinking about the iterations that are going to come as our community continues to develop I think that's really where this group's power comes from is changing those messages just yeah I'm sorry I really gotta respectfully disagree I think there are real safety challenges I don't I don't think they're perceived and I don't think the message is coming from us I'm hearing from concerned parents who are saying it is not safe to have my 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10-year-old Cross-Shelburn Road and it's cool cool I'm saying there are real safety concerns can be very intimidating yes it's a four five lane road I don't doubt that I just want to go back a second and say what is not broken the whole Orchard neighborhood feeder system into Orchard is not broken it's all just back you know residential streets that reach all the way to Stone Hedge and up to Spear Street if it's safe and all the way up to you know Deerfield and that whole area can use bike paths to get to Orchard there's a lot of I think walking bike into goes on there the others coming from Orchard Park that's problematic because of Silver Road right I think you could talk about Dorset to other roads my point is I think there are are real safety concerns taking one example something that's not sure right I think they're probably feeder for Chamberlain in general with all of the residential areas in there is not broken in general this is a little more problematic because you've got all the construction and I and I get that but the first question is I mean how many kids that are three four or five or six have been crossing Shelburne Road in the past anyway I maybe this is too much you know granular you know conversation for this meeting but you know maybe that's something for the task force but I need an itemized list of the complaints to look at and talk about and then argue about and then find consensus and it and some of them are really obvious and some are gonna be like what are you talking about it's on a city council agenda I I'm sure that you will get community members sharing their personal experience but we could you know for the purpose of moving forward together I think we could you know look at this from a macro level and say you know Dorset Street speed limit of 35 is it 35 in front of the schools right so we could talk about some of Marcot right so we could talk about some of the bigger roads and and I think that this team has done a wonderful job of putting a lot of safety precautions into infrastructure in our city and I I don't agree that it's top down messaging that there's concern I I think it's a grassroots that I'm really I'm hearing from constituents that they are concerned and they're bringing new and different concerns to me all the time and so you know it is my role to advocate for that and I do think there are real concerns at the same time if any parent is saying I expect my three-year-old child to be able to cross Shelburne Road alone that's I don't think that's the expectation okay good because I heard that said tonight and I I was just saying some of our youngest students are three no I the I think you know we need to be reasonable no but but just you know trying to close Shelburne Road down to have three-year-olds but I'm saying that's what you said and so that's how you received what you said okay our youngest you know some of our some of our I can I'm happy to clarify I don't need to be misleading you know our youngest students we started pre-k and so those are three-year-olds and so right but that doesn't mean that they are alone crossing these roads I sometimes it does hit it we then you should be saying how can we help support this family because this family clearly needs help we're certainly doing that right I mean there's a lot of absolutely so there's there's a lot of ways that the school system is supporting families a hundred percent I know this isn't the only way but I don't think that any crossing guard in the world should be responsible for that three-year-old to get to school I just I'm not I'm not saying that I'm saying I think that's asking too much I agree just want to make that clear okay so so my point is is that I think if we were to make some you know school zone on Dorset street with reduced speeds I think that would make it safer for all right so zooming out and I'm talking about one specific age group so it's just I don't necessarily disagree and by statute we need the engineering study which the council allocated funding to do which we are in the process of doing so we can sit here and talk about those things that we're currently doing and that we've done the city council has done and top team has done in the last couple months or we can talk about how to with those things that are in progress come together to talk about all the other things that are also coming I think that's what the task force does you just put the task force could do right I mean because you're right we are having the studies made we encourage you and we're pursuing with as much speed as possible the school zone issues it's not a something that can happen because we want it to and we say it will and then it happens it takes some study and some effort and some work and then it can happen but that's what we're working on we're not on different positions on that I think the council creates that school zones some might be a little trickier I think Dorset street is probably a little trickier but also the kids are a little bit older so that provides a little more comfort that there won't be second graders crossing that street to get to school it'll be get six and up so there's a little more responsibility or ability to take on that activity safely yeah and I would be in favor of 25 miles per hour and Dorset within that school zone I would be I think that the cars should be able to slow down there oh that's that's reasonable nine per road lower two yeah okay we didn't get what we wanted well that's its date route whereas Dorset well true the issue for some of the intersections is not you know does the infrastructure provide an adequate level of safety but a perception is it safe and some intersections are very complex and I will tell you we are not helicopter parents and Alice had said she wouldn't let Annie cross a middle school Kennedy it's just it's just too complicated there's too many cars too many lanes some cars go you know make a turn when they shouldn't it's just too many variables just too much going on and I've really love to understand and maybe this is a survey how many parents feel that way whether it's safe or not it's about perception and if parents perceive it to not be safe they're not going to send their kids to school on their bike or let them walk and we're not going to accomplish our goals so you know that that you know maybe we need some a survey of feedback like which intersections do parents perceive are not safe just that that's where you went and how do you think we change that perception we show them data that's no we have a we're perceiving this incorrect I would rather have a crossing guard I'm really not getting royalties for every time I plug local motion tonight I swear but they do a lot of surveys they have a survey structure that feeds into well that's the first start that's the start first up can I just ask like and maybe this is a question for the task force but on the door set Kennedy I want to like zoom out a little bit so there's a light at the driveway to the middle school and then there's a light at door set in Kennedy and in between those two lights there's a crosswalk with a button that you push that has lights for the trains why like because those two lights there's such little space between the two of them and of course there's always going to be that traffic that's trying to rush to get through the yellow light at the next or turn right onto the 189 and it's just lights like if you and sometimes those lights go off at different like if nobody pushes that like sometimes lights go off and there's nobody standing there and so as a as a driver I'll look and I'll see I'll be like okay there's nobody but sometimes you can't see because there's cars across the three lanes I'm just asking like why is it even an option for pedestrians to cross and I'm not expecting anyone in this room to know the answer but like if you're driving at 35 miles an hour and you start it just it just seems like I don't know the history of why are there's two there but my point is it just seems safer to have people cross at a red light than to cross with just the blinky lights on four lanes of traffic and I'm just curious like why those are there I want to just talk for a minute then since we focused on that for the moment about the doors of street signals and all the work we're doing there so hopefully folks have noticed the new masked holes and masked arms the new buttons the new lights the new no turn on red they're actually used the old ones again but they're fine but that's all new with this new stuff allows us to program things different so now there's exclusive pedestrian crossing phases so you push that button now and everybody stops well they're told to stop right um as part of the study guarantee everyone follows we are looking at development of a school zone there that could come with changes to speed limits that will be within the purview of council once we get the engineering study back I'm trying to move that along as quickly as possible so we can time that with the kind of part four phasing of paving of dorset street I don't know how quickly I can move these consultants just like we have trouble hiring bus drivers and folks in public works consultants are very busy right now but I did find somebody who's committed to do it on timeline so we can hopefully move that forward all are also going to look at the lights out there in a more systematic way and both just saying you know we need more lights or whatever so I think all of that's in the works hopefully um I think some of that's in this memo here I know some of that's in that memo folks can read that and see some of those particular improvements but we're going to look at the crossing if we are asking folks to slow down cars do tend to drive as fast as they feel comfortable so we have to have some sort of traffic calming in there whether that's those pedestrian islands like you've seen on Williston road so something of that nature is going to need to go in as well I think I've mentioned before that's a more complex school zone than some of these others with complexity comes cost so I just want to make council aware of that as we move forward some of these I'll call them low cost even over like $40,000 school zones this one's going to be much more than that so we're going to have to have that conversation as well I'm not sure I really do appreciate you know the work of so many at this table and the communication that you know this memo our letter to the community was really helpful and you know off the back of that um I you know I imagine like you do or you know you've mentioned this probably be a more complex school zones was the city and the council develops um you know your FY 25 budget um you know we would just request that um whatever insist that you pass for the development of a school zone on um Dorset street um be implemented by this team do you think it would be helpful um I don't know how active the PTOs are I'm assuming that a lot of the parents who are members of the PTOs are pretty concerned yes maybe not all of them yes and you know sharing this information with them in terms of what is happening in a timeline um and listening to them might be really a helpful way to start some of the education yeah we've been and and changing the perception that yes it's pretty scary now but it sounds like or I didn't know that the that four-way intersection on Kennedy and Dorset will now be stopped in all directions so you can walk is I mean nothing is 100 percent I mean someone can have a heart attack and so I have fun to the sidewalk and kill your kid I mean we can't protect you against that right of course but um you know things that kind of information might be really comforting to some of the PTOs um so that there it's not just a complaint um kind of development but rather here's what we're doing and it's in the works yeah we um I've heard as I said I'm hearing from a lot of concerned parents and so I've started a I have a weekly newsletter and I have a section in there on school safety and I've I've actually linked in each time you know some folks from this team have written anything I've linked that in to try to you know provide that um technical information I did link in the most recent memo from four of you in this room with those updates um and um you know trying to keep folks updated on what's happening um and the message I'm hearing is it's a it's a lot of technical information right and so um we can you know certainly work to continue to communicate that um and I think shared communication around that is a real opportunity too for our teams be happy to engage in in any of that um but I certainly am happy to support that um you know I want our parents to feel safe um and um I do think in order for them to feel that way you know they they need to see some more changes and you know I've also shared information that that this isn't that nimble process that we so often enjoy so you know these things do take time um and I think you know for folks to know yes we came to a consensus around lighting or traffic monitors or that the council will budget for um a school zone at Dorset I think those assurances are ones that I'm really hearing from um folks on my end I imagine you're hearing similar ones I'd love to be able to share that with constituents and you know happy to work together with Jesse or Helen or you know Kate on any kind of shared messaging very open to that and and something that could then be taken over by a task force because that was the ultimate request right was that we would have a task force that then would be working on that education piece right just so important yeah right right right yeah and I could report and make recommendations and yeah for actions for both the school board and the council yeah you know based on some good data some good thinking from expertise you know versus just I got 10 15 phone calls this morning yeah and yeah we're worried so is the four-way stop signs working well yeah um I um I I'm hearing good things yeah I think um again we did just lose the traffic monitor there I um you know that is um I think it's slowed traffic and I think that um there's less confusion about who's going in and out and again with my layman eyes those are just some of my observations on how things are going um and you know greatly appreciate the implementation of those in the school zone um all that you all did to do that I think it's um a real step in the right direction and um I if if Lisa we're here I think or you know some of the parents whose students go to mark hot I think you know they would introduce newer different concerns and you know I um there's still a lot of challenges with crosswalks being blocked at sidewalks um and and with the traffic flow um and um again you know if we had when I when I talk about you know traffic monitors through this iteration where we said hey we can do it and now we've just realized we need someone with the skill of directing traffic which we can't offer on our side so um I'd say those are the main concerns right now at our cot so in terms of the um you know the flaggers that are the the different construction sites and and paving companies higher and stuff um just is that something the city can inquire about and or the school district can inquire about so what is the cost to have a flagger or you know whatever they're called I mean they're not really flaggers I guess if they're directing well they would be directing traffic I guess or it just seems to me that if the truck drivers express concern yeah and the construction is is making this it's on them to do that it's on them to have traffic control on the on market street especially if there are trucks coming and going because they're coming and going from areas that are not traffic they're dumping here you know they're on the vacant lots and they're coming moving material but if that hasn't been explored that's something that might be explored for them yeah I can tell you Larry um I looked into um cream mountain flagging last year instead of desperation and we didn't have stuff available at the time right yeah I mean they're closing down Champlain you know Champlain Parkway is they're moving you know they're getting things done over there there's lots of flaggers there's more aren't there right where are they now I said send them our way well I mean I just if you can't find a profit guard the higher maybe that's another way to go about this but I agree with you if it's it's the truck drivers who are concerned and you know maybe so rightly so I mean they should be concerned well it would ruin their day if they yeah and their career and everything else no kidding window yeah that's a pure question but are there any of these places you're concerned with that aggressive speed bumps would be the best way to go I say it's not a pure question so speed bumps are one of the things that the when we do the traffic studies and the engineering studies that are evaluated as part of that traffic calming that Tom mentioned so they are one of those tools that are considered and effectively used in the studies and I'm literally referring to speed bumps not speed bumps because they're different animals but I would you know I'll put on my other hat I'll be I will advocate against the speed bumps and more so you're gonna do them just speed tables speed speed bumps are very difficult on fire trucks these speed tables are much much more manageable I would say I think that the stop signs because I I come up and down Marcus street a lot and I think it has slowed down the speed on market street all the way to Heinsberg road even after you go past it so I think it's done that I think for the most part I mean I'll always be someone who speeds but for the most part it seems like people are really not going over 20 or 25 miles an hour in terms of people getting in and out of the school I try to avoid this street when it's drop off or pick up time which is good yeah I came just on a field trip to find out what was going on but right people should learn to avoid it yeah that's kind of the culture and the etiquette that you develop right but I think it has slowed things down so in that respect I think it's it's a real plus and I think having a four-way stop and doors that will be because I do a lot of walking and I'll cross that and that would be nice I think that would be helpful for a lot of students who are provided they wait you can run in place if they're jogging up to there you push it run across and everybody sits there waits with nobody there okay well okay yeah yeah well that's like going up an elevator on some of the have you ever been on one where someone's done that oh god never pardon me I saw Bart Simpson do it once unless you're on it I just I want to show you some sorry some you know blank walking routes for students are not they're not optimized and they're also not aesthetically interesting or pleasing and they're not that much safe like so for once I used to live in the east was neighborhood and once a year when we do a you know group walk we walk down of feral street right and there's a crosslight there we take that and we take the bike path back to feral park but then over to lindenwood I think it was right but then we had to walk down shelver road on the sidewalk there's no alternative to it it's god awful it's the worst morning traffic I wouldn't want any kid to have to do that because it's just it's it's a horrible experience to be on that sidewalk with with hundreds of cars passing you you know and idling and whatnot until you got to one of the ciceries you could cut in and get back towards your school so there are some routes that just don't lend themselves to being traversed by kids either on bike or by foot there are plenty that are but there are also also some others which are going to be improved like williston road on the on the which side of the south side is going to be improved with a better bike lane in the next two years I think or so yeah I think that's great and part of what local motion does is they help determine the safest routes to school with existing infrastructure which is really appealing so exactly as you're naming and we you know we want that expertise of saying we can't revise everything in the city there are places that that are shouldn't be walked and you know the educational components coupled with the infrastructure and I think those three together is the ticket and there's always going to be outliers right and there's always going to be accidents and but I think those are our best bet together and I think I think if the community sees us working together on that that will be the assurance they need to know and and I think that's what changes perception so yeah great points to well let's get her done great let's get it set up should take long a city councilor who'd like to work with me but well I think we should um actually take your suggestion violet and contact local motion and have them organize it and if if there's a school board member who wants to be on it I'm sure they would say yes and I don't know if there's a a council member and Kate's already been working Kate's made that connection but I think that's sounds great thanks thank you guys that's great though I'm not a committee of three so far local motion and you two and they can only go better get better great great to have some parents on it oh yeah sure yeah if you refer to your residents for our concerns yeah that'd be great yeah some kind of areas that are mover and shaker and whiner I don't get I would really recommend Nick Anderson Nick Anderson is on our bike and pet committee and he is a parent like me he trains his kids oh my he's a remarkable ride ride he's fabulous he's working yeah he's working but that's not our bike yeah yeah yeah Nick Anderson is fabulous during the pandemic they bike to every single utility box that was painted in the city yeah that's incredible it's one of our projects yeah yeah I'm sorry yes so I think this is a great idea I would love to see this organized with that bike and pet committee so that there's a shared list of priorities and we're all on the same page I would hate to see something else get developed which is needed but then being conflict is something we're already doing oh we've been working hard to get a process kind of citywide for you know other non-school related kind of traffic concerns as well right so if we could kind of bring all that together that would be beneficial get more than just in person and in our goal not always great as we develop those districts bike pet bike pet committees we don't want to do it outside of what the city already has we want to work together and build on what the city has already put in place that's very much our hope we don't we're not we're not experts in these arenas and yeah we would love to develop what you have in place yeah yeah that's great build so we haven't certainly finished this conversation but I think we've discussed a lot of values and have some actions going forward and we'll take it from there are items seven unless someone has something else they want to add about the school safety item seven is discussing future community conversations the two elected bodies want to have in the future until I would put that out there and you know ask what is it that council members and school board members feel would be important to discuss jointly going forward of course one I always feel really really important is you know the future growth plans and you know bonding and and all the kinds of really infrastructure big cost items that you have to go to the voter store kind of having that coordinated is really important and I you know I don't we don't have those answers right now but that's something that is a future really important in my mind joint conversation about you know where the entire city is going not just the city side and not just the school side but as a whole community so it would be one piece but there must be other thoughts people have in terms of bigger conversations for both legislative bodies no takers me as a question so would it be helpful as you think about school infrastructure if there were a more predictable growth rate in the city that you do you know each year there'll be 90 units not 301 year maybe 100 next year and 75 or who knows right depending upon what poses uh developers get through the DRB would would be helpful if it was a steady number each year predictable kind of predictable number yeah be great information as we you know tackle school facilities our goal is to plan for the community years ahead so and we we reached out to get an updated demography report and part of that report Paul Connor's been so great I started working with him when we were developing impact fees and he had some really good projections I thought that he shared with a team at that time and our demographer reached out to him in the development of that report and found it to be useful so I think that's a piece of it but if you know there are folks on this team who have the knowledge of different projects or if there's information that would be really critical in developing a slightly direction because you can only project so much you don't really know it's going to come through the door right and I saw in the demography report it said that we're not including things we don't know because we can't obviously right so but a neighboring town and Meg and I have discussed this have explicit growth management you know plan and growth plan it's it's written in their roles that they you know set a cap which can be lifted for you know for certain projects that provide significant community that community benefits but you know they have a cap which generally allows them to to plan each year and one of the things that they say as a reason for the cap is to plan for schools among among other things right so you know it seems to me it might be worthwhile for us to have a conversation around should we be thinking about something similar what I found interesting in the the demographics report was that you know it's also the age and these different the three different school areas and how you know the turnover so the chamberland area is going to be turning over is in the process of being turned over and I saw that central school was getting older right that part so that was an interesting thing too that you can't necessarily plan on either right so it's not just construction it's also we're downsizing or you know homes that have been bought by young families right so it's it's a complex picture and I it reminded me to be this is one of my favorite stories of Bridget Burkhart she came on the school board when the the same demographer was saying well our schools are going to be losing population and she came with her degree and she said let me dig into this a little bit and she did if remember Alex she did an amazing job showing no our elementary schools are going to be cracking at the seams so you know these kinds of reports you always have to take with a grain of salt but I was really just reminded that you cannot possibly know what the future holds right that's unless you plan for it yeah I knew you were going in that direction it has not been just this one instance that you refer to Megan in which the demographer was not right right right right right but you can just take a look around the city and see what's getting permitted what's going to be permitted green fields which are going to be broken probably in the next few years and what's going to go in there and make some pretty good predictions about what types of people be going there and whether they will have kids or not how many kids they'll have that's what demographers job is the writing is on the wall it's going to be a lot of growth unless we control it if you want to otherwise you're going to have to boost the impact fees say we have to pay we have the tools we could right any other concepts to discuss on the future or issues that come to mind well infrastructure here I put aside growth but I mean obviously that the eight hundred pound gorilla is yeah it was cool high school well yeah that's not going to be the IP that's yeah no but how do we know how the people want a rec center all these things cost money I would love to to partner on a rec center with the city I think that it's another opportunity for us to share resources I know a lot of community members are asking for a rec center and it was something that was a part of the proposed 2020 bond was a rec center and I would love to think about how we might be able to work on that together I don't think we as a school system can count on 30 funds for construction aid as there may have been in the past I think it's unrealistic I'm hearing projections of 10 at best you know costs have skyrocketed from the state 10% from the state potentially that's it's a soft figure that's been discussed by some business managers right so so I don't know what it is or what it will be I do know that you know we's our south burlington schools as a whole not just our high school have been named 11th for greatest need in the state another way of saying that is 11th most deteriorated and I think there's educational impacts environmental impacts and I do think the heart of every community is a for me it's schools and I know a lot of people who come here want the quality school system that we offer so part of that is facilities I think for a long time we've been patching schools but we will need to make decisions shortly on how to move forward so it could be as soon as a fiscal year 26 bond you know potentially as we wrap up the ZEMS we will which was a massive undertaking and look forward to the completion you know we'll move our attention toward infrastructure and we love partnership you know from you all on that I appreciate the support I've heard from counselors on projects we've had just preliminary discussions about having as was done in 2020 somebody lead some visioning work so find out what our community wants to do that would be a first step you know an RFP for someone to fulfill that role working together with with district and city personnel community members from there and take that visioning bring it to life with architectural design and moving forward so it's going to be an in-depth process I think if there's anything I've learned from the investigation of the 2020 bond work is that the community engagement in the process is the ticket and without that and then without the community's understanding no project will move forward and I'm mindful of the costs of these projects too so I think you know one of our our goals is to we started a we were able to allocate some surplus funding to a construction reserve fund it's our hope this year and our budget that we can have a you know a facility's maintenance line a lot of districts use that and I'm sure you're familiar with that in Winooski that's something that they did typically about a million dollars annually it's not been a historic practice here at the south burlington school district but I think it's a in my opinion a responsible way that we can start to plan now for the facility needs ahead but wrapping the ZEMs first grateful for the community support on those and the room that that'll give our students and then turning our attention to the development of an infrastructure committee and engaging our community with visioning. Can I ask a question though I mean you almost have thought about this post ZEMs is the focus going to be on adding on to elementary schools or looking at the high school in particular. Yeah it's a great question so there was a wonderful committee that was established called the enrollment committee they brought a recommendation forward June year and a half ago to move forward with the ZEMs the recommendation with the ZEMs said move fifth grade to the middle school redistrict so that you even out the population of the middle of the elementary age students and at that time have a build a new high school on the to the east field of the existing middle school. Staging is important here so at that time you move the high school students to the new school middle school students move to the current high school renovate the middle school that was the idea then 2020 right well the ZEMs have come to fruition so if that was separate from it was connected that's why the history there is important so we've nearly completed the ZEMs so we've got some time before we have over enrollment at the elementary schools so we need to turn our attention to middle and high school but then it'll come time who knows based on these demography reports that in the future we will have to have another elementary school somewhere or make other decisions about elementary schools if the community doesn't support moving the fifth grade we would need elementary facilities sooner so up next is certainly the middle and high school conversation the order in which that happens is yet to be determined because we don't know what the community wants to do with fifth grade so they're all they're all interconnected of course. Oh I had a question and then it went out of my head um because the the ZEMs are are eventually going to how what's the lifespan of the ZEMs? Hundred-year lifespan uh we had to do galvanized piles which is a um a um it's a structural support right so foundation um which reduces the functional life of by 15 years there but they could the buildings themselves well they could be moved again with if you address the foundation so they're also movable so they the ZEMs could be part of a staging process um if used for middle or high school right the I wouldn't advise that given the cost of engineering um and all of the the you know Brigham or all associated with like permitting design and engineering architecture I mean this was this was a significant uh project so this could be long-term I don't know if there's I don't I don't know um they're designed they're they're solar ready so I that makes me think not um but um I I don't know but I remember the the next question where are the the hillside folks uh where are their districts with their school with that question I would email uh Paul Connor and he would help me with a map so the district lines at this point are are something that um they're not as predictive as they used to be so with the you know the development we all know you know there are some um place there are some neighborhoods in south Burlington where the children go to all three elementary schools so I I don't know um off the top of my head Meg and I would I would I would reach out to to you all for support on that maybe this is inside the um the old farm and the land farm it is the old farm yeah that's chamberlake that is chamberlake south of kennedy drives and east of hindsburg road I think is the border okay any other I just want to add a quick piece as we have these these conversations um I think this is probably more obvious in maybe the speaking about um school consolidation in much smaller towns throughout vermont but I back to you know our shared messaging and perception I I envision and my philosophy of schools is that they are truly a community resource and I think that this is particularly apparent as we think about climate resiliency and think about communities throughout vermont who you know lost power or flooded where do we go and we need to gather as a community and when we need emergency shelter and I want us to my vision for new and improved school infrastructure is that it's also as climate resilient as possible as aligned you know cutting edge um with our climate action planning so that you know I don't have kids in the district but it's the place that I go you know when my house gets flooded and or when there is a natural disaster that we're going to have to face at some point and um just to have this truly shared ownership not just I'm a taxpayer I'm paying for the school but also that I'm an investor and I see that our school buildings are truly uh an investment in our community and not just in the kids that happen to be in school right now so well we have a citywide emergency plan and the schools are identified as places to go I mean it includes the school personnel and there's a lot of training that goes in and there's a whole network of absolutely it's in charge and where you go and then orchard had the um boiler and the hot water figures go out this week so it's like I want to make sure that our our um or so I would make sure that we are resilient as a community um which includes the resiliency of our schools sure with air pollution like the the wildfire smoke that we've been seeing having our buildings each back ready or even equipped would be sure I did yeah that is kind of a meeting into what I could say for number seven is um I did send to Kate and to Violet and I forwarded to Andrew who's on the climate action test course for the schools that there are schools in Europe that are um adding HVAC adding heat pumps adding insulation to the outside walls they have school buildings very much like ours so that you know they could just add things to the outside of the walls and and make thicker walls that are insulated for seven million dollars that is very reasonable uh and they're they're net zero afterwards and these are schools on that like it's failing for for energy um efficiency so there are there are solutions out there when we talk about you know looking at ways to make our buildings you know truly top-notch in terms of the environment that are not necessarily costly we don't have to tear down a rebuild we can we can reuse so I really hope that we can have that kind of conversation too even 577 same kind of building you could just add to the outside um and you could put in the HVAC and the heat pumps and off you go I mean it would obviously need to have an engineer it's not me just saying it yeah I'm very I'm very interested in making those improvements and happy to discuss environmental um improvements district-wise one of our main goals of the climate action team that we've just developed okay is there any other business this is my first in-person steering committee meeting so I just want to thank you guys it's really nice to have these conversations now I think in person I mean zoom is terrific if you're sick or as a public member and you just want to listen in but certainly face-to-face conversations I think are the most effective sometimes they take more time but I think they're a little more effective and I appreciated learning a lot about even some of my fellow counselors thanks I didn't know so um thank you very much for and we miss Laura tonight I don't know she's that she I can share publicly she's she's working she's at um parent teacher conferences she's an educator and so she was unable to be here this evening but since her regrets and um you know see her next time we'll we'll send her the link okay thank you so much hope there's no other business um motion to adjourn second all in favor aye thank you very much