 Hey, good evening and welcome to the pandemic version of Montpellier Civic Forum, the version where you don't necessarily have to go on town meeting day to vote. You can do absentee ballots, but you still have to get out and vote. And before you vote, you have to be informed about what you're voting for. And that's what these shows are about. We've got some excellent candidates for school board. We've got some city council candidates who are very good. We have a candidate who's running for a five-year term on the park commission. And that's good. We've got Bill Fraser coming in talking about the budget. We have Jim Murphy coming in on the school budget. We've got a lot of them. But the one I really enjoy is the one tonight, which is Anne Watson, our mayor and former city council person who I used to interview as a candidate coming in to talk about from the mayor's perspective what's going on with Montpellier. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for having me, Richard. I think this program is just so great. I want to make sure that you get enough credit for doing all of these programs. I mean, my goodness, I think this is such a service that you do for the city. Well, you know my wife, and this gets me away from her, so it's a service for her as well. Anne, we did one of these last year, and everyone enjoyed it. And what we do is we challenge you in your mind to envision driving around Montpellier with the mayor. And we're going to drive around. We're going to look at projects. We're going to look at proposals. We're going to look at things that might be, things that are, and things that we hope will be. Yeah. Right. So let's start, Barry, where we're trying to get the communications together and coordinated. That's been an ongoing effort for years. Yeah. What's going on with that? That's been an ongoing effort for Montpublic Safety. Absolutely. Yeah. So they are, so just in case folks don't know, just to catch people up, Montpellier is in a collaboration with Barry about public safety. And so what the focus of that group has been lately has been looking at our dispatch services. And so particularly what the technology needs are around making sure that that infrastructure is going to be functioning well on into the future. So what they've been doing recently is they've put out an RFP for- Request for proposal. Thank you, a request for a proposal for someone to do a needs assessment for just looking at the infrastructure we have and where it needs to go in the future. And that report is supposed to be finished and presented to the group within the next couple of months. So we'll know pretty soon what the results of that are. And that'll dictate potentially where we spend some money. If I recall, and I did an exit interview with Tony, an entrance interview with Chief Pete. Yeah. And Tony said the two systems weren't totally that far apart. Yeah. So I know one of the things that we are looking at now, and actually pertains to the current budget actually that's going to be on the town meeting day ballot, is we're looking at potentially buying some new console infrastructure for our dispatch folks. Because the model that they have now may actually not, I think the manufacturer is actually going to discontinue it and so replacement parts may not be available readily. So that is one indicator anyway that we may need to actually to change that system. Now, as far as like how well those systems are compatible with each other and speak to each other, you know, I think- That study will tell you a little bit. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So it will give us some fiscal parameters on what it might take to get those to mesh? Well, that's my hope, right? So it's going to give us an assessment basically of what our gaps are. And so if there are technology needs to fill those gaps, then my hope is that they'll give us a ballpark about what that might be. What's the advantage of having these two systems meshing? Well, so being able to- There is some usefulness in terms of redundancy, right? So if one goes down that there is a way to redirect calls and inter-municipal communications as well as thinking about basically the reliability of the infrastructure themselves. So whether that's based in radio or fiber optics, all of that is sort of at play here. Is there any talk of a police chase in Montpellier that's heading towards Barry that somehow this equipment would give them a better heads up or vice versa? Well, I think we're just going to have to see what that study says. Yeah. When we came to the water treatment plan, how is Berlin on this? Why are they not members of this? Well, we in the past anyway have made offers about water deals and they didn't want to take it. But in terms of this communication equipment? Oh, in terms of the communication equipment. Yeah. Why are they not involved? That's a good question. I know that there are- So as a part of the Central Vermont Public Safety Authority, I know there is an organization that is a part of it called the Capital Fire and Mutual Aid Group. And I don't think that Berlin is a part of that, but I'm not- Why Berlin walks through its own drummer. Yeah, yeah, I suppose so. Let's stay in Berlin for a second. Let's go down the hill. How are the speed limits doing? When we were talking a year ago, the neighbors had just come in saying, we want 25 miles per hour on that street and console had come in and said, 25 miles an hour, maybe 35. Yeah. Well, we haven't heard much about that since actually. We haven't seen folks coming to us saying that it's- Since that discussion saying that it's still too high, but we're certainly open to having that discussion. I believe they put a- Oh, what's the word for it? A speed sign, right, so that you can see how fast you're going. And I think that's been helpful. I'm going to stay in that neighborhood. Okay. I know that Dan and Jay, the counselors for District 3, have been looking jointly at opportunities for parkland. And we had talked about this last year. They've identified, I believe, now I might be wrong, I think they're looking at that highly disputed piece down off of two that used to have the old house on it. Oh, Five Home Farm Way. Exactly. Yes. What are the legal hassles that surround that, or is that just- Well, so how much time do you got? So that property, well, so it's got a lot going on. One thing that's important to know is that there was a non-profit that was there that has since dissolved, but on the way of, I guess, before they dissolved, they sold a right of first refusal to another organization. And then there, at the same time, there were two conservation easements or historic preservation easements on that, one being on the land and one mostly being on the building, though that part of the land where the building is as well. So it's not totally clear who owns it right now. And it's not totally clear how to resolve who owns it. And I know that a number of parties have been meeting to try to answer that question because it is a really interesting piece of property. I mean, it is right down there by the river. So part of it is in the floodway, which means that that portion of it can't really be developed. But there's this historic preservation easement on the building because that property was owned by Jacob Davis, who was, I guess- It's an old property. Yeah. Well, it was the site of the first resident of Montpelier, which was Jacob Davis, but apparently that building that is there is not actually his house. So the building doesn't go back as far as that fellow, but- And you can tune in tomorrow night for the rest of this story. It goes on. So don't expect anything this year on that except for exploration. Yes. Well, and I do hope that we figure it out because I think that site has a lot of potential. Let's go up the hill over behind Sherwood or above Sherwood. We had talked about that last year. Could you describe that piece of property that the city owns? The Stonewall Meadows. Yes. Well, so my understanding is that we are in the process of- No, we own that. Yes. Yes, we own. And I think there is some question about some of the boundaries. So that's still, it may be resolved, the last I heard, I think it was resolved, but it might still be in process. But the hope is that we can turn that into a park for that side of the city. What do you envision that, a park that would have swings and stuff like that or picnic table? Well, I think- Or is that actual forest park? Well, so I think that will be potentially a part of some input from the surrounding neighborhoods. I think that would be a really great process to go through. Do you see what are the needs, what are the wants of the folks in that area? Is there any other space that we have, a green space, public green space, potential in District 3 on south of the river? In District 3, that is probably the most promising site, particularly because we own it. But other than that, I don't, nothing comes to mind on that side of the river. Now, I'm going to hop and skip you downtown so I don't forget it. What about next to, between the grocery store and the art store? That lot right there, that either is going to become a building or park space. Is there been any movement on thinking about what that empty space that people are walking and driving through? Yeah, so a couple points about that. So one is that we had to make a decision about whether we were basically going to ensure that we, the city, had the title to that property, or whether we would basically give that property back to the state, which is also its own kind of long story. But the point is we, if we were going to have it be a park, then we had to own it, right? And so, plus if we wanted to sell it, we could still do that if we owned it. And so we did make the decision that we would like to have that control of the property. And so we did actually make a plan with the state so that we could have the title to that property being clear. Is there a possibility it might be a building? That is still a possibility. Which has yet to be resolved. But the second point is that in the meanwhile, we've actually applied for a grant to turn that into sort of a little pop-up park space, which I think has a lot of potential and is very exciting. On the other side of that bridge? Yeah, right. So exactly between Shaw's and the drawing board. Yeah, just next to the bike path. I'll walk you further. I'm just going into open spaces right now. Sure. Yeah, go for it. Making sure that open spaces are covered. Yeah. Dog river. There was some discussion at one point of dog, no pun intended, of dog river being a dog run. I fenced in dog run. Yeah. Is there any discussion that's going on about that? That's a great question. We, a few residents contacted me about being interested in dedicated dog park space that could be fenced in. And so I ended up working with the parks director and connecting the park director with these residents about some potential locations. And there are a number of sites in the city that could work for. Dog river is one of them. But there are a few other places around town too that were potentials. But the structure that we were looking at for that was to have the kind of system where a group of dog owners would be sort of the champions and caretakers of that facility in terms of like, you know, the city could provide sort of, you know, help and whatnot. But we were hoping for some self-regulation. Yes, and some dog-loving champions to help make that happen. And so that's still in process as far as I know. How would that affect the policy and the current policy in Hubbard Park? And how would that affect the policy over by the baseball field? Yeah, the North Branch. So I think for now, if we were to, I think that the rules would likely not change for now. Based on what's already established in Hubbard Park or the North Branch trails. But I could picture this space where that's all fenced in, could be a space where dogs can be off leash. And so we would make, perhaps, I would anticipate anyway, making an exception for that kind of space. But I don't think it would, at least at first anyway, change any of the rules for the other spaces. Is there any way of enforcing North Branch? I know people are upset because North Branch, you are supposed to walk dogs on lead. Yeah, yeah, no, that's a good question. As far as I can tell. It's an honor system. Yeah, it is basically. And if issues escalate, then call the authorities to at least make a complaint or let folks know. Or actually even the Justice Center to let someone know that problems have occurred, especially if they're recurred. Are we considering better signage there so that people are more aware? Well, I think that's a good idea. As far as what we can be doing to make that better, certainly better signage would be part of the solution. I want to stay up on Hospital Hill because that's where we were. The water plant up there, what's going on? What's going on with the water plant and the finance of the water plant and our water bills? Yes, yeah, fair enough. So we actually were just talking about that at our most recent council meeting. So the city adopted a 50 year plan for both the water treatment plant and the water resource recovery facility in terms of our water and sewer rates. And so we do need to increase the amount of funding that we're giving to our water and sewer infrastructure. And so those plans call for sort of a steady increase into those water rates so that we can be replacing and repairing infrastructure at a more healthy and sustainable rate. And so I think we're looking at for this next year an increase of I think it was about because inflation was 1.4 so I think we were at 2.5 percent. Yeah. Do we foresee any shocks in water usage? I know the last great shock was when they changed the toilets at National Life and made it more water efficient. And we hadn't planned for a decrease in National Life water usage that was that profound. Yeah. Well actually in the last couple of years we've actually added some more users to the water system. So actually the amount of usages has gone up. So we're back in Berlin. Berlin's not going to come in. Well as far as I know no one has contacted me about them jumping on, no. We talked about this when you were a candidate how many years ago. Yeah. We spoke about Berlin coming in. Yeah right. Let's stay up there. Okay let's talk about Berlin Pond. That's nearby. What about Berlin Pond? What's going on with that? We spoke about that a couple of years ago. Yeah so there's not really been any developments no pun intended. There's basically nothing new on that in the last couple of years or so. Yeah. The dire consequences that we predicted did that happen? So far it hasn't which is good but we still need to remain vigilant. Some of the risks up there are people transporting boats across different bodies of water that might be bringing in different kinds of algae basically and other microscopic organisms. Particularly you know at the time we were very worried about cryptosporidium which is very hard to detect but can make people very sick and that's still a concern and we certainly hope that people are taking precautions if they move their boats between bodies of water. Now that entire issue not only involved the courts but it also involved Montpelier in the legislature. Yeah yes it did. Is there anything sitting before the legislature right now in terms of Montpelier in the legislature? Well yes not necessarily not not pertaining to Berlin Pond. Stay in that boat of no pun intended. Just stay in Montpelier in the legislature and things that go before the legislature. Sure so within the last couple years we passed a non-citizen voting measure which did not pass the legislature last year. It did pass the house but got stuck in the senate and that bill has already been reintroduced for Is there another city or town that's also that's passed that sort of legislation? Did Burlington pass that? You know I'm not sure I don't know where other cities are at with it. I know they were considering it as well as Winooski. They were also considering it but I don't know where that is at right now. We have some new leadership in the senate and so I think we have a fair shot of that passing potentially this year. Now speaking again of Montpelier in the legislature marijuana and a marijuana place where one can buy marijuana that's going to be on the ballot. Could you explain what we're voting on on that? Yeah sure so what Montpelier has currently is a cannabis dispensary for medical purposes. Where is that? I believe it's down by oh gosh where the bear naked growler is down that part of the way. I always think of that as like where restore used to be but like that's not a helpful reference anymore. And the computer barn used to be. Yes yeah right so but it's down down that way. So the difference between what we have now and what's on the ballot is the the legislature provided a pathway for towns to approve retail cannabis or basically non-medical cannabis to be sold in towns and in cities. But it has to go through a particular approval process and so one of the steps there is that it has to be approved by the voters of the town. So it's going to be it is on it's on our town meeting day ballot on March 2nd and so the the city Montpelier will be able to weigh in as to whether or not that's something that we want to have in our city. If we say yes on March 2nd 2021 when do we possibly see a marijuana dispensary and is or a marijuana retail store and is there any zoning that would have to be changed to allow that? So that's a good question. My understanding is that it would still take quite a bit of time potentially like a year or so before we would see a store opening but I'm not sure about the zoning question and that that's that's a valid and very good question and I think it's worth revisiting yeah. So we're talking about 2022 I think so yeah in real time in stoner time possibly 23 or 24 is there anything else that the state is doing that affects us that other than allocating COVID funds? Well I was going to say the COVID funds are are pretty big right now I mean we are certainly hopeful that the city Montpelier will be able to get some of these funds for potentially making up lost revenue as well as construction projects so that's that's on our radar besides that I can't think of any other bills that we have pending yeah but we're we actually have a legislative agenda this year that has laid out what our priorities would be as a council that things that we hope well what how does that differ from past years? Well we've we've had legislative agenda here we have better communications we have you know. Sure yeah and the like and the like we've so in the in the past you know when you know for example John Holler was a mayor he was also a lobbyist so he was up there all the time so we had kind of a direct connection to folks in the the legislature but you still don't you have a former mayor who's head of the appropriations committee? Indeed we do which is great. And don't you have another former council person who is also in in the senate yeah right so you know so we certainly do have connections but we've been making at least as a council we've been making more of an effort in the last couple of years to to have our legislative delegation in to council meetings to talk about our agenda what we hope they have on their radar and what what what we hope they will pass yeah so and yeah just anticipating that there are things that are happening in the legislature that affect us and there's money to be had that we could maybe potentially tap into. Again speaking of state initiatives that impact Montpelier I believe on your phone you have an app for the for the Jitney bus? Yes yeah so would you talk about that program? Sure yeah absolutely so it's called My Ride and this is a program that's pretty similar to Uber or Lyft if people are familiar with those apps where you can it's a flexible schedule flexible route situation where on your on the app on your phone or you can call or you can use the website you can say I would like a ride from this location to that location at a designated time and so it'll it'll show up basically at your doorstep and deliver you to wherever you want to be um within a certain area uh within Montpelier and and actually Berlin yeah so that would include going to the hospital exactly yes would it include going to Price Trafford or Shaw's up on the hill um I don't know if Shaw's is in the zone I'd have to check the the region but we were intentional about having it include the the mall and the hospital yeah so people can get to doctors what are the hours for this um the the standard hours that we have for the circulator yeah uh yep so I believe the earliest that you can book a ride is 7 a.m. and it goes till about 6 p.m. Is there a copay? No oh thank you it's free so uh that uh for me like was was pretty appealing I actually use it just about every day um it is because I I both live and work in the designated area and so it is how I get to work uh and home from work every every day basically yeah now this is not a sucker question you know which you probably don't have an answer um will they if and when the mountaineers are playing this summer will they pick people up from the the stadium it's it's within Montpelier yeah so uh I was actually just talking about this very question with Brian Gallagher um not that long ago who's Brian Gallagher thank you Brian Gallagher um is he the executive director of the mountaineers I think that's I think that's um true so uh yeah so I was talking with him actually about what his what the plans are for the mountaineers this coming summer and they're hopeful still they're still uh waiting to see what what all happens but they're still hopeful that they will have a season um this coming summer but I was talking with him about whether or not this could be extended uh in terms of hours for it to to work for the for the mountaineers games um and I I think that's a lovely possibility but I think it would probably take some uh you know some collaboration obviously between the mountaineers and green mountain transit who is running uh the my ride program so any possibility under discussion not this year certainly Montpelier high school about what now being able to transport kids from general areas to Montpelier high school oh that's already happening um certainly I mean I I think that's sort of happening in an ad hoc kind of basis but uh the all the administrators are aware of the program and have been advocating for it with students uh particularly like if if they are stuck in need to ride home uh if they if they live in the area um that the bus serves or that the uh the vehicle serves then you know there's that's it's a great option I think one of the limitations though is that it does not serve all the the areas of Montpelier yet um so what areas are not served well well one of the areas that comes to mind right now is sort of out by uh dog river like the translation of the creamy stand um that is not in the service area presently but if this is a successful pilot then I think it is very likely that the service will expand it include those places and I know the area around dog river is a favorite of yours because it has one of your favorite projects the treatment plant that's true would you discuss the project at the treatment plant which was which you shepherded through well I I think a lot of the credit really should go to the the staff uh there for but it's an imaginative project oh indeed it's absolutely it's very um it's very forward thinking and I'm I'm just thrilled that that is moving forward could you describe it yeah absolutely so um so it one of the reasons I love it because it gets a little sciency so I'm going to try to not go too much into science but okay now stop yeah right what do you do for a living oh sorry thank you um so I in addition to being mayor I am the a science and math teacher at Montpelier high school mainly I teach physics that's uh that's my passion and a former coach yes I also um have coached ultimate frisbee for many years as well so let's sorry anyway right so for any wastewater treatment plant uh they that that that uh effluent that um where I should say that waste uh generates methane and methane is a greenhouse gas on its own and it's very it's it's flammable right so uh we could actually burn that methane uh to uh reduce the amount of greenhouse gases that we as a city are emitting and at the same time generate uh heat or electricity uh which can then offset any fossil fuels that we might be using for heat or electricity so this project uh was designed to significantly ramp up um a the amount of intake that of like um liquid waste that we were taking so that no we have new liquid waste customers I imagine yes exactly um and those are all still in in process because it's um still being constructed uh but the plan is to significantly increase that amount of waste so that it is economically feasible to uh to burn that methane and that's going to make the wastewater uh the water resource recovery facility uh be thermally net zero or in other words it won't require any fossil fuels to heat that facility which is a huge win and then in anything over and above that's uh of energy that's generated uh will be turned into electricity which we will then sell back to the grid which obviously also is great because uh since that's an organic um uh source that uh counts as as a renewable resource and is a a great base for electricity because it can be on all the time and it's not dependent on the weather right like a wind or an or solar might be dependent on the weather uh so it's a it's a uh wonderful resource for the the city of Montpelier and you take pride in it oh i'm i'm thrilled let's go back to district three again i'm top scotching around which i didn't want to do um okay and that brings the elephant in the room as we cross the street going south yeah and we head across that bridge yeah and we stare at what would be a parking garage in a hotel yes right what is the status besides it's still caught up in court no that's that's exactly it it's still caught up in court and and again we're we're just waiting for uh decisions to be made about that and and we'll we'll roll with it whatever it goes is there any indication given covid known in the realities of tourism is there any indication whether there will be a hotel you know again as have the bishara family spoken to have you asked the bishara family that issue no not to my knowledge yeah yeah so we'll we'll just we'll just have to see yeah and i think you know i think we're all certainly hopeful that uh we will get to a point where travel is no longer restricted i mean we're obviously not there now but with the vaccine on the horizon i'm certainly very hopeful that that the restrictions will start to be lifted that will start to see the the tide turn there and that that was i know this is not what you were asking about but i mean that was that question of what is the timeline for covid was a relevant question for us when we were making our budget for this year so well so have you had your meeting with bill yet i i hate to say this no okay but by the time you're watching this it might be on the air sure uh well so just for so you may end up talking about this with him as well but just for context uh we had a significant shortfall in revenue in the city budget uh projections for this year and so to make up the money the one question was you know do we look at delaying projects or do we look at cutting positions and really that was a question about is this a short term or a long term problem because if it's a long term problem then we have to be honest about the services that we are going to be able to afford to provide when you talk about projects does that include the level funding of streets of it does and what is the level funding of streets sure so i know what it is but everybody else doesn't yeah no fair enough so a number of years ago we realized that uh there that we were underfunding our streets right so in order for streets to maintain an acceptable level of condition uh we would need to be putting um five hundred thousand dollars yeah right it was it was a significant amount of money in more than what we were putting into um uh our capital projects uh capital improvement plan uh funding and and so we we went on a track to to ramp up our funding of streets and sidewalks so that we could be at what we would consider a level um basically a steady state uh level of funding for all of our streets and sidewalks so that they could maintain an acceptable condition uh over time right because it's always better to uh to be doing that sort of routine maintenance that needs to be done so that they can that their longevity uh can be fully realized because otherwise if you start to let them go then the rate of deterioration accelerates then we're constantly patching not and not just patching but doing major overhauls um over time um so the construction projects that we are uh are looking at putting off um in the short term are um they're more of these sort of bigger construction projects while maintaining some of the more um just maintenance level so it would be we try and do one street or two a year where we do a complete street yes right and would that be postponed for this year so there are yes so there were some streets that were postponed but not all of them so for example uh Hubbard street is also is still on the list uh there's a stretch of berry street that's still on the list um things like that in terms of sustainability of the budget eventually we're going to have to yes sit and return to that or we're going back to losing hubcaps absolutely and so we are going into that eyes open and planning for that now and so we're already talking about uh having a bond to do that catch-up work when it feels more fiscally appropriate to do so what happens to the project's pre-pandemic the big projects that we were discussing when we went through this city budget last year and i'll give you two of them yeah the downtown master downtown plan where we had traffic circles and we had major sidewalk adjustment what happens to that and what happens to the post pandemic recreation center that wasn't budgeted to have a significant ventilation rehab yeah no absolutely those were two projects that i was particularly looking forward to to seeing um some change some progress towards our complete or our berry street main street traffic study exactly yeah so what happens to that and what happens to the recreation center well so it it just gets delayed i mean these are projects that are still on our radar that we have uh plans for and it i mean the the berry street main street uh traffic plan was always going to be realized in pieces so we were always going to have to take it one piece at a time like one chunk at a time and my highest priority was uh the fixing the berry street main street intersection the dangerous intersection yes which we had decided should there should be a traffic light there uh but we the we just don't have the funds this year does that take out smart lights as well uh i believe the cost difference was um we were i think we were going to go um smart lights or what are smart lights uh so they're coordinated uh lights with other lights in the area so they would be coordinated say with um memorial drive and main street but that uh i i'm i'm not too worried about that part of it i think that transition uh if i recall we were we were planning on just going straight straight for that what about the solar panels on city hall and the like the the idea of putting more solar capacity on on city buildings has that fallen to the wayside um i am not so i don't think we actually have solar panels on i thought there was a discussion of increasing well so we have solar presence so we do have uh so so this the city has um what's called power purchase agreements with two solar fields uh one is actually on log road in Montpelier but the other is in Sharon Vermont uh so one of the discussions that is upcoming is that we will have the opportunity to buy those the um those arrays uh and i i think it will likely be in the city's interest to do that to to buy those it will be cheaper than paying this third party uh but but it will take it'll take money to do that and we know whether that's something we start setting aside money for now or whether it's a bond i mean that's that's still a part of the discussion yeah how are the fiscal's looking for the district aid uh well so i don't know if you saw the recent times article times argus article about that but uh you know in terms of i realized this is not your question but uh in terms of service i think uh the city and and folks generally speaking are satisfied with this level of service that they've been provided unfortunately you know no one anticipated that the price of oil yeah the oil prices would be as low as they are and so the the projections are they're just not as good or the i should say the the cost savings um that we were hoping for are not being realized right now um but you know like who also who would have guessed that you know there was going to be a pandemic right like it's it's really tough to anticipate how those prices are going to go so i'm i'm still hopeful that that that will be uh have been a good decision for folks um in the long run particularly in terms of climate change you know knowing that uh folks were able to switch over from burning oil to burning wood chips i mean that that is a good thing yeah i'm gonna stay on that side of town we're in that that building at 302 at the roundabout yep we're right near the bicycle trail that's another one that that you take pride in oh my gosh could you talk about the bicycle trail sure and and and visit the distillery at the same time sure uh so i mean as everyone probably knows we we we were able to complete that shared use path um basically just in time for the pandemic my goodness that was such a lifesaver back in last march when we were sort of told to uh to not be you know going going places but we could still be on the on the bike path that was that was huge um and so that that stretch now completes uh it's it's called the Sibawina B path which is an abanaki phrase for um river water i'm glad that you said it not i yeah i had to practice it um and so it connects basically gallison hill all the way uh through to mains oh not to main street to the rec building another is you know we're part of that that intersection yes right discussion of the intersection of main and berry yeah right and how so part of that connects berry main street traffic study was to figure out how to connect uh just that short section between the rec building and where the shared use path picks up on main street uh and uh yeah so we'll do people use the walking the multi-purpose path oh my goodness they have it has been significant uh we were getting lots of wonderful positive feedback about uh the shared use path well when you talk about bad timing the distillery has to have had bad timing well you know so uh for what i hear no one has told me anything about uh that um from from their perspective but it's a lovely facility it is a lovely facility and i am thrilled that they were able to uh convert to to making hand sanitizer i don't know if you if folks are aware that you can buy hand sanitizer from them that's that's huge uh and uh you know i think with the the distillery along with other restaurants and um bars in town uh i you know i think it makes a real difference to them when folks purposefully get takeout uh are able to you know spend their money at at these these businesses now we're walking down berry street yeah we're walking by the distillery and we turn and we look north yeah do we see housing well i'm talking about this year next year well what is going on with savings past year that's a great question so um you know there's been a lot of i know there's always been a lot of talk about uh housing in savings pasture but one of the uh things i can talk about for sure is that we as the city have uh we actually just at our last meeting looked at some potential zoning changes to is that on top of the master plan revision uh you mean yes yes that yes this is something that's um we're we're going to be taking up in the next couple of weeks what with those two so this was mostly about looking at traffic impacts because if if we are able to put more housing up in savings there may be some some traffic impacts and so we were looking at how the zoning talks about traffic and the requirements for new developments uh their impact on traffic now i might be wrong at this and if i am we're going to cut this out of the script okay um that that entrance into the distillery is called gin oh gin lane gin lane oh is it gin lane yes gin lane yeah right the gin lane could actually go straight up that hill that it was designed so that gin lane could go up the hill yeah so especially as uh the distillery was being planned there was a lot of coordination that happened for potential future um development in that savings pasture area yeah and there was work done adjacent dealing with infrastructure matters that would benefit potential development indeed there were there was infrastructure that we put in for water and i'm not sure if it's sewer as well but certainly at least for water in connection to the distillery but also under the railroad tracks for any potential development across the way there in savings yeah now the economic development corporation was working on this yeah montpelier alive is still around yep the economic development corporation what is the status of that project oh sure so the montpelier could you explain what the economic development corporation is so just a little bit about the history we had an economic development master plan edsp development strategic plan um that laid out some goals for the city in terms of housing and jobs and out of that one of the recommendations was the creation of this development corporation so we the city voted to form that and they have their own board now and their so and their own their own charter i suppose their own their own rules but yeah so they've had a couple of executive directors over time and where they're at now is that they don't have an executive director but rather they are um hiring people uh for uh specific projects are they in the city budget this year they're not yeah so this year they there's there's no funding planned for them but uh but you know we we're actually actively talking with them about what makes sense for the future so um you know i don't i don't uh i'm just speaking for myself i don't see them as as going away i think our relationship may change or the way that um yeah there there was there may be some changes but i i think uh they've there's still some great potential there we're walking down berry street by the recreation center is it gonna be closed this summer given ventilation and given the masks and and all that you know uh again tough to say sort of where we'll be at um by the time we get to the summer i all i can say is that for now it is closed uh yeah what is the current thinking in recreation about the summer camp over by the pool and what is the current thinking of the pool for this summer yeah yeah so the uh the camps well so just for context the city did run camps last summer uh and we were there were provisions that uh you know childcare providers had to meet in order to operate and we were able to to meet those provisions and so we anticipate that we'll be able to do that again this summer um that and there's certainly a demand for it you know with um parents kids penned in their houses yeah right absolutely you know that that sometimes is a matter of uh the question of whether or not people need to um so you anticipate ample demand oh yeah ample demand exactly i mean people are uh potentially staying home from work if they don't have childcare right so so this is a huge a huge need for folks um what about the pool again well i think we'll just have to see it was closed last summer yeah well and and and that is absolutely a possibility for this summer as well yeah so we'll again we'll just have to see where we're at we're walking downtown let's skip downtown because i'm gonna come back to it in a second we're going up to hubbard park yeah anything any changes that you see uh any will there be activities on that little stage that they've put together or that uh i get well so um i believe i saw that there was a like a hot chocolate uh event that was happening up in hubbard park and i know they've been doing uh walks through hubbard park and there was a a version of the enchanted forest uh that they did back in october um and i i think we can continue to do these kinds of socially distanced events but that's that's about it so hubbard park the life of hubbard park remains the life of hubbard park yes well i mean we may not have park of palooza but uh but generally speaking yeah and we certainly want to encourage people to to use the park let's go back downtown uh we're we're heading down towards downtown and we're gonna turn over the bridge and we're gonna go north on main street yeah and we see the source of controversy we see a big sign what's your take on the controversy over the signage yeah yeah no i i certainly hear folks folks's complaints about the sign you know i um just from a perspective of the process of what it went through um that that uh all of the the sign designs uh went to multiple council meetings uh for approval it just took so long it was so long ago it was it was it was a long time ago in all honesty when i saw it go up i was like oh right i'd forgotten that that was even happening um and then it did go through uh it went uh before you know the design review committee um and they were able to uh give feedback and some of those suggestions i i guess were taken into account in the the design but um but yeah you know it it did make me think about uh i think mostly folks is the the complaint that i was hearing the most was like well we didn't get to see this right like you know i i didn't get a chance to weigh in on it or you know again the delay was so long ago yeah yeah i was like why is this a surprise and i i hear that you know i it really made me think about like well what are better ways that we can that we can communicate about that sort of thing and it was a long time ago and so uh you know open to suggestions there you know how can we be using the the city website better or list serves better like that that kind of thing well there are some subtle public policy things on those signs uh the business district to the east when you go out of town you can actually see that there's a business district to the east yeah that's a policy decision yeah that's huge uh berry street you know that's a policy decision that that people are pointed towards that yeah several of the signs point to hubbard park for the first time yep tell people that hubbard park exists yep it's key is everyone on council pretty pleased with that project you know i think so uh i uh we actually haven't talked about it very much but uh as far as i've you know talked about it with with folks on council um i think people were were pleased with the signs uh generally but um you know the the difficult part now is that of course if if people even wanted to move that that one sign i think mostly people are generally okay with most of the signs um it's just the the one right that is um the sticky point it would actually cost us quite a bit of money to to remove it um or or even to move it at all so um so you know i think well if we can't shrink the domino sign we certainly can't move that one right yeah it's true um in terms of downtown yeah when the eviction freeze eventually ends yeah what 30 percent of small businesses across america are behind in the rent payments yeah do you foresee a jigsaw puzzle downtown this is not only our downtown this is every downtown in every city suburb no absolutely do you foresee a jigsaw puzzle with some unsightly pieces missing well you know i uh i do worry about that but uh my my normal optimism is like somewhat uh sobered in this because i think it's really important that we be honest about uh sort of where where we're at uh as a as a downtown uh where are we at as downtown yeah yeah well so actually i uh was in touch with dan groberg the executive director of montpular alive about this very question and he uh said that back in december uh about 75 percent of businesses were reporting self reporting that they were making at least 75 percent of what they made in the previous december the pre-pandemic uh december um and there were a significant number of those that were that had made uh at least 90 percent of what they had made the previous december so that is um that i i found out was was cautiously encouraging um that folks are starting to to reemerge uh financially um that that does not necessarily parse out how retail businesses are doing um as separate from you know bars and restaurants and it must be brutal for bars and restaurants indeed yeah right so i i don't have clear data about that but and and that's the the part that um i think you know bars and restaurants play a key role in the culture of of our city and so you know it's something i'm certainly paying attention to um but at the same time we can't discount the idea of the arts and trying to yeah make a play work with a third of the people oh yeah no absolutely the audience absolutely the the arts industry also significantly affected uh by by the pandemic so again also that's an industry that i'm um you know keeping a close eye on again uh but is there anything that we can do to kind of bring ourselves back together and rend the whole so that people are out communicating with each other and and basically being Montpelier as we knew it in a sense well and so i i hear that it's it's also a tricky ask right because we can't have the kinds of gatherings that we that we used to have at least not under the current restrictions uh but i think as far as as we can for those who are able it means the world to uh to the to the arts uh industry as well as to to bars and restaurants when you um purposely uh spend money locally you know um so that that's something that i've i've tried to keep in mind um even for for myself that it that it's it means a lot to to those folks i'm gonna close this the same way i closed it last year except for now the mayor doesn't have mayor's hours anymore what what's the status of city hall opening again uh so uh city hall is open i believe um something like Tuesdays and Thursdays um but it is otherwise closed um and uh well it was open i i actually should probably go check so i apologize that i don't that i don't fully know but you can also make an appointment um to to see any of the city staff you need to see the mayor still does not have her hours right when we're allowed to and city hall is open yeah will you re-establish mayor's hours i would like to yeah no absolutely i there were people actually came to those office hours to the to the mayor's hours and i would like to do that again but in the meanwhile i am happy to have conversations uh to have meetings with folks anytime so just be in touch and we'll find a time that works is the mayor of Montpellier zoomed out oh my goodness so many museum meetings you know for as many zoom meetings as i am a part of i am always happy to still to still meet with people yeah mayor thank you so very much yeah i i look forward to next year when we'll do this walk around the town yes and we'll talk about hopefully we'll talk about the um resurrection of the community of Montpellier and how successful it's been yes i look forward to that discussion for sure what i look forward to is you voting on tom meeting day isn't that a good segue of you getting out there and actually responding to your absentee ballot is showing up on town meeting because it's really important in fact it's more important now than ever to weigh in and that we have wider participation but before you do that watch the shows get to know what the candidates are about hear about the budgets and basically tell your friends it's on orca media on youtube on the youtube channel and it's on the cable channel and i thank you for watching