 So it's six o'clock. I'll call to order the liquor control board meeting first Please join us in the Pledge of Allegiance led by Deputy Mayor Thomas Renner Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God Indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Thank you Jenny, please join us for our one item Capiche ink First-class liquor third-class liquor renewals restaurant application renewal all conditional They haven't it's a good evening. They have an inspection on Thursday All right Any concerns issues from staff side? No Any questions concerns from council? Okay, well hearing no concerns with someone like to approve the liquor license renewals and restaurant application renewal for Capiche ink on a Conditional basis for the inspection Second motion by Thomas second by Charlie all those in favor, please say aye Motion carries. Thank you. That is the end of the liquor control board meeting agenda. Do I have a motion to adjourn? Second motion by Bryn second by Aurora all those in favor, please say aye Motion carries, so it's six oh one. I will call to order the city council meeting Agenda review is first any concerns about our order this evening Okay public comment Anyone here to make public comment? Excellent. I shouldn't say that. No, it's a shame. Okay Moving on consent agenda. We have our our minutes from our January 16th meeting and accounts payable January 17th any questions from council Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? Second motion by Bryn second by Charlie all those in favor, please say aye. Motion carries council reports Aurora would you like to start? Sure. I don't have anything you need to report. Bryn quick updates the airport commission met last week and They're working on the next round the next phase of home insulation sound insulation So they may be reaching out to folks in our community about being part of that next phase And if there are any questions I encourage them to reach out to city staff to the city manager or the housing director To help facilitate getting those questions answered But that is under way the next meeting will be the first Wednesday of February The moving out from that the Municipal Infrastructure Commission met on Thursday, and we discussed the short and long term traffic scoping on La Fountain and Dion and The Commission was well tended by some additional members of the public that came and In person as well as online And the Commission voted on both short and long-term alternatives that will be moving forward to the Moving forward in the scoping more details will be probably on the CCRPC website As that moves forward That is No reports from me. Tell us downtown Leweski did meet and they wanted to thank council for the approval of the Forget how it's right the non-loan payment the prepayment the prepayment So they were able to pay their IRS bill which is huge for them Which if you remember Melissa had briefed us opens them up to receive a lot more grants than they were able to beforehand They spoke about a variety of things About trying to vitalize downtown more coming up with some Parking benefits for folks who are visiting the local businesses They're trying to bring in some art installations into the downtown area, which will be really fun A lot of conversation about the bridge project and just how that's going to impact them once everything starts kicking up dust And that that was kind of really it. They're starting their budget conversations. So they're going to be working on that in their finance committee and then The decision that blingo will continue Okay moving on to city updates Elaine Oh So tonight's fiscal year 2025 budget meeting will include the final budget vote and public hearing But this isn't last year last opportunity to learn about the budget the city and school budget presentation Community dinner is on Monday, February 29th 4 p.m. At the O'Brien Community Center There'll also be a town many-day annual budget presentation that will be on Monday March 4th at 6 p.m. At the Winooski school district performing arts center residents can go and view any of the presentations from previous previous meetings from council on the budget or a meeting recording by visiting the budget page at Winooski Vt.gov 25 as in fiscal year or email budget at Winooski vt.gov if you have any questions Speaking of town meeting day. There are many local official position Office positions to run for this year including mayor city counselors for two seats school board trustees three seats seats And a Champlain water district representative as a reminder all legal residents regardless of citizenship status can run for these positions and vote on them At least on the city and school items during the election Also the Champlain water district position To run you must file a consent of candidate form and petition with a minimum of 30 signatures By 5 p.m. On Monday January 29th 2024 visit Winooski vt.gov Slash town meeting to get started or stop by the city clerk's office for assistance Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. To 4 p.m The town meeting day election will take place from 7 a.m. To 7 p.m. At the Winooski senior center Early and absentee voting will be available as always learn how to register and find helpful voting resources at Winooski vt.gov Slash vote and finally the Vermont agency of transportation and the cities of Burlington Winooski are hosting a Project update meeting for the Burlington Winooski bridge replacement project tomorrow night January 23rd at 6 30 p.m. At the Winooski school district to learn more about this project visit Burlington Winooski bridge dot v. Trans projects dot Vermont Dot gov or simply Google search for Burlington Winooski bridge All right. Thank you We are on to our regular items first is a on for discussion the fiscal year 2023 audit reports Welcome and yeah Unfortunately our auditor John Boulay was not able to join us tonight He unexpectedly had to travel for work But he will come to present at a February meeting the formal presentation of the audit I can tell you that audit fieldwork was completed in October Staff completed the financial statements and sent those off to the auditor just before Thanksgiving We received our final audit on December 22nd, and it is an unmodified opinion which is There are no findings or recommendations at this time That's excellent news Thank you to all staff and especially you Angela for leading this annual process. I Don't have an exact number, but I feel like there haven't been any findings for several years in a row Which is indicative of really sound financial practices. So exactly. Oh and thanks for treasure as well. Who's here who? Supports to some extent. Yes, are there any questions from council? Any questions from members of the public and if you're on zoom you can use the raise hand or chat feature Okay Well, thank you for that we will move on to item B We will welcome our treasurer Jonathan Fennie up to walk us through our quarterly budget projections Good evening council. I'm here to present some key takeaways from the second quarter of FI 24 financial report So based on Q2 financials the city's general fund is forecasting an annual surplus of about 73,000 with a net fund balance of 2.1 million Which is about a 4% increase here over a year for reference the previous fiscal year's ending net fund balance was 2.05 million general fund reserves Rob sorry general fund revenues are forecasted at 9.4 million which is about a hundred and fifty thousand over estimates The city's main driver of revenue collection property tax is estimated to bring in 6.6 million for the city this fiscal year, which is an increase of about 3% revenue year-over-year Like FY 23 where we predict that external factors in the market will contribute to an increase in net assets Rising interest rates accounted for over 90,000 of additional revenue last year So we're projecting interest earnings as fiscal year to surpass last year General fund expenses are forecasted at 9.3 million, which is about 74,000 above budget like FY 23 There are some cost savings due to staff vacancies across multiple departments Vacancies reduce forecasted salary fringe and other employee related expenses however Forecasted cost savings from vacancies are decreasing since filling administrative vacancies an effect We may continue to see the general fund small margin dwindle as forecasted expenses continue to rise We are also Forecasting growth or to break even in the following funds the water fund wastewater fund Combined parking fund to fund community service fund and community and economic development fund Conversely, we're also forecasting deficits in the rental registry fund In general the city of Newsy you can use to forecast small surpluses across most fund balances this fiscal year as The year progresses we expect these surpluses to continue to lower closer to break-even levels as on unanticipated costs occur throughout the year as a reminder specific details to get to support Current forecasts can be found within the respective financial report on The city when you ski website, please bear in mind that this is a Q2 report and that projections are a best guess Guided by the financial activities we realized so far and therefore our subject to change as we progress throughout the year Are there any questions? Thank you. I did just want to make a quick comment that I feel like this is maybe the most concise report we've received so far and that it Had the information I want to see like very good good to hear like that feedback I Have a couple of questions Understanding your last sentence and that these are projections that will be updated in the the first piece about the general fund with property tax revenue at an increase of 3% year over year Are you? The 3% is surprising to me since the last budget increase was significantly higher than that Okay, so I'm wondering if that's a projection issue or something else is under there That I'd have to dig into it to answer specifically, but that's based on the forecasted Tax revenue as it stands for Q2. Okay, and then Another similar question is the rental registry It's projecting a $40,000 deficit But the fiscal year 25 budget Notes a $10,000 deficit And so I'm curious about that discrepancy that may change if I believe it's the Winooski, Angela Crock me from Ronnie the green ski housing authority that we're working on an agreement with and if we can Sign off on that then that's why the they made the forecast may change closer to budget. Correct. Yeah, I Think it's that the Winooski housing authority. Yeah, that's that's what I was Checking on you with Angela on Okay, yeah, we did include someone new ski housing authority in the budget I just checked the 24 Taxes compared to last year's taxes and it is about a 6% change and in property taxes But he John may be looking at the total taxes budget Which includes? Pilots and the local options tax, which would okay those things were level funded so that would reduce the percentage I did have one more question and this was about Spinner place revenue being expected to double What is underneath of that? Well, I know part of that is parking meters Collecting more revenue than anticipated or being forecasting above budget than we initially budgeted So we we budget for the baseline for the spinner place contract for the parking garage For what their contract has as a minimum because they flex from month to month they have consistently been over that minimum But it is not something that we can guarantee every year so we don't budget based on it Okay, that makes sense so our forecast is way higher than our budget and Today that excess has been being transferred into the TIF district per the TIF covenant any excess revenues must be spent on TIF debt Thank you Are there any questions from members of the public? Or folks on zoom, okay, thanks guys. Thank you so much on them. So we will move on to item C Okay, a public hearing has been noticed for the consideration of The proposed FY 25 budget and capital fund. I'm sorry capital plan across all funds At this time, I would like to open the public hearing and take comment from members of the public Unless Elaine you wanted to do any like summary first No, I'll have some remarks from the next item. Okay did anyone here come to make comment on the fiscal year 25 budget Please join us If you would please introduce yourself Thanks Robert Lloyd basically, I'm just I'm I don't know. I feel I'm being priced out of taxed out of my house. Okay. Um when I first bought my house in 2020 my taxes were $1100 my taxes are now $7100 Okay And not that it's your issue, but recently about eight years ago my my wife or myself had a catastrophic injury She's now on disability. So basically I lost 30% of my income. Okay, and I Really personally I had to at one point I had gone to the school budget meeting to find out what was going on and I was really pleased to hear that With it with changes that are being made that the school budget was not going to increase And then I see some of the other things and that okay, you're asking for five point something percent to increase but then the And I don't know exactly who made it But then the statement was made basically well because we're not increasing the school taxes you feel that It's okay to a 12% increase on town tax I don't and the statement was made that you believe that It can be afforded or that well, I'm here to tell you whatever stuff that little by little I'm being eaten away at you know I'm older means I have to work harder To to make the tax payments. Okay, and if I earn more money that means I get less back from act 60 So basically it's a two problem. You're increasing my taxes and I'm getting less back because I have to earn more I'm also older. I'm trying to make it to retirement get my house paid off so that I can actually Maybe find another job, you know, it's not your issue, but Asking for 12% I especially with The the new assessment property reprisals going I think it's and I use but not nice or that Asking me for that when I'm not sure exactly how much my property is going to be route value that's okay You may say it's only 12% which in my case. I think on this way about $250 a year But then there's The other side of this sort of stuff that if my property increases, which not really and even if it does it doesn't do anything for me It just means I have to pay more taxes, you know, I can't I can't bank on this I can't I already in past years to fix my house had to refinance my house or whatever stuff because of No property, you know And the other thing too is um, yes, I understand prices have gone up You know because inflation inflation is actually leveling off and stuff like this, but the prices are still up there So I not only have to deal with that and this is when we see I understand that the incomes are fairly low What's up in in Windows key? But I not only have to deal with the extra increases that everybody else has but by increasing my taxes like this I have an extra burden, you know, so I'm just I Guess my whole point is I want somebody to stop and say hey Why can't we think about the guy as you say your main course of Income there for the stone is property taxes. When does somebody stop and say hey when we ask these people to pay too much? Or maybe maybe not because like I told you my my fiance my wife has that so I lost her I had to tighten my belt Why I don't feel like it's unreasonable for me to ask other people to tighten their belts Now and some of the things that I was looking at The fire department you're asking from one that I'm great with you know certain things are fine and some of the the community aspect I Thanks, it's I'm getting to the point where Paying so much that I try to get don't get me wrong You know when when the Hawaii when the fires what I gave when there was floods up in Montpere I gave you know, I feel you know that I'm well enough and that I Make enough that I do better than other people, you know, so why not give and help them out? But I'm feel like I'm being made to Push to a point where I have to make a decision that it's being you know taken from that the decision of who I give and why Help is being taken away from me. Oh Um, and like I said it is like it to me. It's considerable. I like said $1,100 a year to 7100 and it's going up, you know, I'm being like said pushed out and It's just I don't know. I guess there's more things I want to say But I just I want somebody to stop and then think and say hey, you know tighten the belt and I understand that that things are There's a lot of things need to be paid for but asking for that extra 7% Like that and then like I said the term that that like I said it really bothered me that okay Well, since how we're not the school taxes are rising that it's it's kind of justified that you can get another 7% Out of me or that that I'm at well. It's to me. It's not okay, you know 5% I saw was good and there was even one section that was like 8% It's like came a but 12% I think you're getting a little over but you know, I'm not trying I don't want to be angry or anything else But I feel like somebody's got to stand up here and say, you know, how much you know Mortal I got I give you know, it's I don't mind giving I don't I don't have children the school bus I paid a lot in school proper tax and I Sometimes I But I give I get that right you know kids whatever stuff But even even like the teachers in that aspect as I went to there saying well, maybe I mean if I get a raise There's most of my raise go, you know in the taxes It's like the teachers and stuff I know this isn't but I feel like maybe once a while that they should stop and say hey, you know Maybe we may not take so much, you know, I mean, yes, you're taking care of but it's at somebody else's expense I have to go out work harder. I have to put in more hours. I have to try and earn more You know to pay for something that granted school when you're teaching kids and stuff, but it's not it's not Kind of a Profit-based or whatever and stuff, you know in schools, you know, there's nothing they're not doing anything to build Probably, you know to make income on it. So I have to go out do it on my end It's just like I said, I want somebody to stop and think about the residents, you know And yes, I know there's things we need to believe in the same way my house like I said just put on new gutters I had to put on a new roof. I have to pay for these things. I have to save for these things or whatever So I still need new porches might my house is not the best shape And you know, and I have to say well there goes that savings there goes at least part of it, you know So it makes it like said more difficult on me and I've done it sure. I'm not the only one I'm the only one here that you know, so I just show up and stuff and this is usually not my thing But I'm feeling more than I have to that I have to stand up for myself and to make my voice heard to some extent and Like I said, it's it's harder for me to say for the things that I need to you know have my house, you know And I just I really should you reconsider or stop and think about the 12% you know The 8% I'm not happy with but it's a little bit over. Okay. I can say so and so, you know And I understand the 5% everything's going up, you know, and and it has to be you know Take care of it better better to kind of take care of it I understand that now and to say for you know before things, you know I'm that kind of person when I use up whatever right to the end till I can get no more use out of it You know, and then I go get something new understand, you know The town is up you may need to change things better. It's gonna be easier to make well, you know But like I said, I just I was really like I said disturbed by that statement that figuring because the other wasn't going up that they kind of Give somebody their right to say I can get that other 7% from you now Or that you could afford it when ain't nobody come to ask me whether I can afford it So I guess that's why I'm here to say that. Yeah, it may not sound like a lot But overall like I said 1120 years 7,000 great. I'm not saying I don't get something back to back 60 But the more in my hair taxes go up the more I have to earn the more I have to earn the less I get back So it's a it's a two-edged knife on beat, you know, and it's going up and it's making it more difficult And I like when it's you know, I mean, it's always been good, especially when my my wife got sick and stuff I was close, you know, I know other people have to travel Many miles to get the hospital I was lucky enough that I didn't have to a lot of time to work and things like this But I don't want to be pushed out. I don't want to be forced out You know, you know, if I leave I do it on my own not that I can't afford it anymore because somebody's not saying hey Jeep, you know somebody else is paying and and the community programs and stuff It's all fine and dandy, but I may wind up being one of the ones because I don't use them I don't use the food shelf. I give to the food, you know the food shelf and stuff like this So I give to these programs. I feel like I'm getting the point where I may be one having to start turning to these programs And then who's gonna, you know, then you're gonna need more money for, you know Rather than keeping me off these programs to let somebody else that needs it more than I do And like I said, I've got no problem giving just when When is it enough when it when is you know, it's like, I'm feeling it's becoming too much It's you're asking a bit too much of me That's really all I have to say Well, thank you for taking the time to come in We have heard some similar comments at least via email or like privately I'm glad to hear that I don't know if people here are interested to voice their opinions Thank you You're welcome Is there anyone online who wanted to make public comment about the budget? So seeing no additional comment, I will close the public hearing And we will move into item D, which is the final discussion of the fiscal year 25 budget and capital plan So council last week did direct staff to present a revised budget that represents an approximate 8% tax rate increase Down from the city manager's 12.67% increase that I had proposed And that prioritizes fire and necessary municipal infrastructure with a secondary priority on the library The revised proposal represents an estimated tax rate increase of 8.07% And I'll review the revisions one by one Oh sorry for Angel, I forgot to ask you Would you mind sharing the spreadsheet version? I'm going to need somebody to give me sharing privileges There we go Awesome, thank you The spreadsheet So again I'll go over the revisions one by one Maybe increase it so that just prioritize column A I'll be explaining column E so we don't need to see that Can you make it a little bigger? Great, thanks Alright starting at the top So note that items 1 through 15 represent costs from the manager's budget that are either in or out of this revision So I'll start, I'll go again one by one So the first item, 16th police officer, restoring the 16th police officer Given that we're unsure whether we can fill up to 15 and can apply for our COPS grant for a 16th If we do get to 15 My revision removes the restoration of the 16th officer from the fiscal year 2025 budget To be clear, we do still need the 16th position to ensure that we don't overwork who we do have as we have been for some time overworking them Whereas community policing, which is the style of relationship first policing that Winooskians have told us that they do want That does take time Vacancies are not uncommon given the climate for the profession nationally and locally And having 16 will allow us to be at a manageable 15 or 14 when we're down from vacancy and or an outage Which is not uncommon rather than 13 or 12, which is very difficult on officers who are then on shift for sometimes 18 to 24 hours The second item is the password manager I've left that out. It's currently the current condition so there's no change to operations. There's a potential security risk But I deem that fairly low so felt comfortable leaving that out Traffic calming staff had proposed this to be responsive to the resident concerns that we had heard But this is an aspect of municipal infrastructure investment that we can delay with less consequences than some of the other items that are still in Four and five fire department wage increase from minimum wage which in Vermont for calendar year 2024 is $13.67 to increase to $15 an hour And adding the evening fire captain those two items these are in reflecting council direction to prioritize fire and it's not changed from the city manager's budget Number six equity funding increase that was in the city manager's budget was removed. This does not mean we are stepping down our commitment to equity We have been ratcheting up our equipment our commitment since Yasmeen's departure best we could without that expertise of an equity director There are still funds remaining for equity with this change Line seven senior center staying at three quarter time so that's a removal from my budget Number eight the second part time circulation assistant for the library stays in per council direction Number nine when Exqui Valley parks district stays at a $1,000 increase in this revision Line 10 or number 10 we've left the rental registry and the general fund in this revision so that the true costs of this important service are visible We did add under item 21 near the bottom revenue that I consider very likely that would offset this estimated deficit That revenue would either come from short term rental fees or from an increase to fees paid by Winooski housing authority Both are still pending but as I think both are likely budgeting and offset is conservative Item 11 an increase to the capital budget for what is necessary in fiscal year 2025 again according to council direction That includes an increase for streets and sidewalks over historical the normal amount would have been about $100,000 to $140,000 This year's budget is for $255,753 note that in years past the public works director has budgeted for streets and sidewalks with what was available after all other necessary expenses This is because streets and sidewalks are a more scalable expense compared to fleet or equipment replacement that is usually the other items in the capital budget But this made this has made the maintenance backlog and streets and sidewalks worse so this is the emphasis on municipal infrastructure that council requested Note that the usual amount that is put away for capital includes the scheduled police cruiser replacement and the public works garage required boiler replacement Additional debt is in for a small 2012 dump truck and engineering for the Bloomington Winooski bridge project Note there are other necessary municipal infrastructure capital investments for fiscal year 2025 but they're being paid for from reserves not the budget so it doesn't affect the tax rate Item 12 user use of undesignated reserves for street work was removed to preserve undesignated capital reserves in case of a project overage Number 13 riverwalk capital needs study was removed to reflect what isn't necessary for fiscal year 2025 Number 14 snow and ice brine making equipment is not actually necessary for fiscal year 2025 but I've left it in because it will save money within an estimated less than five years However, it is something you could remove for an additional change to the tax rate downwards Number 15 concrete and curb work at Reginald Roger Gale and Bernard streets is retained from the city manager's budget again to reflect council direction Number 16 as I alerted council by email Green Mountain Transit lately told us their board approved a budget that represents a 9% increase for Winooski of their on their assessment Which we have very little if any power to change so that is in this revision The remaining items number 17 through 22 are savings or revenue changes from the city manager's proposed budget that contribute to the around 8% goal Number 17 savings from staffing turnover we had a very long serving employee retire in the last month so that creates cost savings as a new employee hired to replace them will start at a lower wage Number 18 as community sources director noted during his presentation we updated staffing projections from the Thrive program and it turns out we can budget less for fiscal year 25 than we thought we needed to When that budget was being developed and when we had less data to go on so there's some savings to the budget there Number 19 my contract includes a wage increase for cost of living and step increase this revision eliminates those for savings and wages as well as wages based benefits and that's about 16% of the total number Number 20 regional dispatch admin funding is still in there to ensure that we have something available to help address staffing related issues that regional dispatch is supposed to address whether or not regional dispatch advances in fiscal year 2025 Generically the solutions to those include staffing and technology for technology that would be computer aided dispatch software although such systems are expensive enough that we would not likely purchase that ourselves on our own it is possible that Winooski could share in another municipality system in fiscal year 2025 Number 21 I already talked about and then number 22 Angela and I recently made progress with how keen on keeping up with their payments so we increased the budget from a partial to a 100% payment from them And I'll note to the deputy mayor's comments last week given that we were able to get to around 8% without adjusting when positions start during the year or their weekly hours we have not tinkered with those. Are there any questions on these changes. Thank you for walking through that very clearly and to you and the full team for making adjustments based on our direction last week. I would say like let's first do questions before we get into the approval and support part of the discussion. How much is the other regional dispatch line item like what we would have been what we would be paying into that because that's our not not our only regional dispatch item. What do you mean other because we would have paid into it yearly correct. We weren't budgeting we weren't planning on that for FY 25 no. Okay. Are there any other regional dispatch lines. No. Okay. Not in this budget. No. This proposal does still include that 79,000 remaining in the professional services budget for the police department. In other words line 20 is proposed instead of going to dispatch admin to support other technology needs that you just described. Potentially that was an example of what it could be used for since that was a detail that was missing from your consideration before. Okay. But just so plain talk. I was just saying the 79,000 wouldn't be going towards regional dispatch. It would still in the proposed outline here but it would be retained for safety services. It seems unlikely to me that regional dispatch will get going in FY 25 but if it does then this money would contribute to that if it doesn't then we could use it for the things that it was supposed to address including keeping internal to address public safety needs. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Am I understanding you have removed your own wage increase? Yes. Fully? Yes. You've level funded yourself? Correct. By amount. It seemed an important gesture to me given for example what this was gentlemen was saying. I have mixed reactions. Agreed. Are there other questions about the content? I, when did staff know about the GMT increase amount? I got the email I think on, I got it on Friday before the last council meeting. That was the first notification. Yes. There was an email on in November, mid-November that apparently was going to be a 4.5% draft increase which unfortunately I didn't see at all. I just missed it. The GMT new general manager, very new general manager had emailed me in December asking when he could present. And I said, well I'm remembering it's a level increase of so we can delay until February. And he didn't respond. Again he's very new and he's getting a lot of email. So I functionally did the same thing to him, right? So not throwing stones there. But he never responded and so we were operating on the assumption it was going to be level. And he sent us back in the October, November timeframe. Do we, I'm assuming, I know they answered this question but I'm going to ask it anyway. FAIRs are proposed to be reactivated in March. Does this, do these increases account for the FAIR? I'm sure they do because that's the budget that they pass would include both revenues and expenses. That is frustrating that they're not, they're putting the FAIRs back into effect and they are not increasing their service to Winooski. But they are increasing the amount of money. My understanding is that the new manager's assessment is that they have also been under funding for a long time. So I understand of course it's frustrating for people who really need the service. But that's, he's, I think he's doing what some of us are trying to do which is catch up. But there will be a hearing soon virtually that at least people can wait and hear from them directly and express their own views. I believe they're also losing federal funding in a similar fashion that we did last year. That's true too. For line 12, the street work. So it's mentioned that that is proposed to be removed because it's considered scalable. Oh, no, I'm sorry. I jumbled together a lot of information in that one item. That's what has happened in the past. Okay. The limiting that it's an increase that's reflected here for over normal. So I think line 12 was a proposed use of the remaining $9,000 of reserves that are undesignated to offset some of the additional costs. It was something that I strongly recommended against doing because we do often have projects that have cost overruns and the only source to cover cost overruns is the undesignated fund. It seems like I would have expected street work to be more than 9,000. So that was a little confused by that. Yeah. Sorry. I just answered the question for 11 not 12. So Angela answer your actual question. I just wanted to thank you for getting to 8.0 7% including altering your own salary. So as we've been hearing and as we addressed, it was really high and you came pretty close to what we asked for. So I know that was a lot of work and stuff to do that. Yeah. The staff did a lot of work to get there. Any other questions from Council? I'm curious. I'm less. Do you have any questions? Line 21 feels that like what's the probability of that? I know it's included here, but it feels like the probability is less than 50%. Are you talking about short-term rentals? So I think based on what you saw before, I wouldn't blame you for thinking that we have met with this is and we're still in discussions. But we went down to not inspecting every year as part of the new ordinance. So if not, we are projecting conservatively $10,000 surplus after contribution accounting for some contribution to the housing trust fund. So I think with just on that item alone, I'm feeling pretty confident that we'll realize savings there and related. There aren't any other fees or fines proposed in this, which has higher probability of happening. Well, I would then call this even more conservative because you haven't considered the other ones yet. So we don't have any sense of where those are going to go. We had a better guess of where your thinking was on short-term rentals. But we are coming back to you with the amendments to the fees chapter in February. In addition, I have heard from Ray that his proposed revenues included the estimates that he is incorporating into the fees chapter proposals. But all of the community services changes are already accounted for in the projections. Okay, anything else from Council? Any questions from attendees, from members of the audience here on Zoom? So hearing no other clarifying questions, you know, last week we had a discussion about how much uncertainty there is and how reappraisals are going to impact the education fund side of our tax bills. One of the reasons that we decided to provide the direction to back off on the 12% increase. There's been more information over the past week that gives me concern about excess education spending. So I still don't feel good about that side of things. You know, what I said last week was I don't want to include anything that isn't critical for the next year. And I want the opportunity at our annual strategic prioritization to kind of reset on what we think is critical core service and what we can afford as a community. I don't love having you flatten your wages fully. I appreciate the effort. I would also support you not doing that for, as with all employees, like we want people to be fairly compensated, rewarded, retained. I would delay the Bryan system as much as I hate to do that to the one thing that is going to save us money in the long term, but it doesn't feel as critical. I also don't feel that the circulation assistant role is as critical as the fire roles, though I understand that other city counselors were supportive of that. And in our last meeting, that's why that's included. Those are my two cents. I'm otherwise generally pleased with what's been presented given where we are. And would love to hear from others. I think I generally agree with you. I would feel comfortable leaving the brine making equipment because I feel that if we don't do it this year, we'll probably do it next year or the year after. And our increases are likely just going to continue either way. I also think on top of the savings that we'll see in four years, there's also the environmental aspect to consider adding the brine making machine and that will be polluting the river and lake less if we were to use that. So I agree in the fact that it's not critical at this moment, but I think it seems that we're all on board for it. So I feel like if we don't do it this year, we'll probably just end up doing it next year, spending that money anyway. Which it may be more expensive next year if inflation continues to rise. Might as well start getting the savings out of it sooner rather than later. Probably to the surprise of no one, I think we should pause. Let's use that. Let's bring that word back. Let's pause the regional dispatch funding. Because we already put money into it last year, like there is money for this position from last year. So I'm thinking about, yes, this is a critical need, but I don't feel like staff has, like, I'm not convinced that we need that. Staff has not given me the proof where I feel comfortable putting, this is a percent. That's pretty much an entire percent on the tax budget for this one item, which is a position that doesn't exist. So I appreciate the critical need, but I feel we already have the funds and if regional dispatch doesn't happen, we have the funds we've paid into that, which will come, I assume, as we've been told, should come back to us with some interest. So to me, it sounds like we have the funding to maybe pilot these other programs or even to stand up this position because we already had it in the budget last year. So I would feel comfortable pausing it this year. And then if regional dispatch comes back, it's also something that we're hearing from, like, coming from the state. So I'm wondering if there'll be additional funding sources that the city doesn't need to cover because this is such a high level need. And I think with taking that off, we can add things back like the city manager's contractual raise as well as the senior center position. And that would still put us then under 8%. And both the senior center position and the city manager position are positions that currently exist that are doing real work for our community right now versus a position that doesn't exist and we don't know if it will come online in the next year. So I think it is that critical need that I would love to discuss when we get strategy some priorities. I'm not convinced this year is the year to put an additional $79,000 on the budget for something that doesn't exist. I'll voice my support of that as well. To be clear, the 79,000 is the position in the current year budget. So this is not new 79,000. This is that same position. I know, but we already have that money from last year. It was in the FY24 budget, so we have that salary from FY24. Are you saying that we could allocate that money towards hiring a person in FY25 if it came to that? Yeah, because we already put the, yeah, that would be my understanding. We already have a full salary from FY24 that we budgeted and we put money aside for, right? As the treasurer just presented our projections for FY24 are just a surplus of 74,000. And that is nearly 100% related to the investment earnings that we are getting. We are actually projected to go over our expenses by about 75,000 even with that position in the budget. So that funding is not going to necessarily be available at the end of the fiscal year. Can you just clarify there was a certain amount set aside in escrow for the Chittenden County Public Safety Authority? How much was that? Angela, do you have that handy? I do not. I have been turning over funds at a variety of times to the CCPSA, but I don't know what of those funds was expended for studies or resources versus what has been set aside in escrow. I guess the clarifying question is, when we put $79,000 into the budget, did that go into the escrow for the Public Safety Authority? Not in the current fiscal year, no. Not in the current fiscal year. That money is not unspent is what you're saying. Yeah, the vacancy savings from PD, the amount that we are having to spend on overtime to backfill all of those vacant positions hours that they would normally work are in excess of the vacancy savings, including the amount budgeted for this position. So there's not, the only money that remains is the piece sitting in escrow that we can't use. I can't say like straight face that there won't be a surplus at the end of FY24, but right now we are just projecting a surplus that is 100% related to the investment of funds and the additional interest earnings that we're receiving because of that. Okay, so to be clear, we don't have money left over from FY24 for this unfilled position. Correct. We're talking about then a single fiscal year 25, $79,000 for a position that if it doesn't come up, the money would be pivoted to other public safety issues. Correct. Related. And the last we were hearing from the state, I wouldn't bet money that they would be able to make enough action in FY25 to result in money coming to us to address these issues. They're grappling with a statewide problem which we'll take in the CCPSA's estimation, the Chittin County Public Safety Authority, that's supposed to be standing up regional dispatch. And their estimation, that would take a state level champion where that was like they were going to put their head down until it was done because there's so many pieces that need to be coordinated. We do not see such a champion surfacing. So it's just feeling less and less likely by the day. We have to keep pushing for it because there's huge issues, but they're so complicated it's hard to address them. So I know my increase would be a small piece of that, but I would much rather try and save that funding for that than have my increase because that's how important this is to address in the city. Are you still in conversations with South Burlington about an interim solution? Yes. I would support keeping it in. I have a question on line 15. I just need a refresher on the status of that work, why that's considered essential. John, you want to jump in here? Sure. So this is the street resurfacing work over on the east side of town. We had previously scheduled to resurface the streets in FY23. However, the curbing and sidewalks are in very poor condition. And in order to resurface those streets. It's advised that we replace the curbing. Some of that curbing is not even frankly there. There's like some is missing where it has like a quarter inch of reveal. So that's why we're requesting to reallocate the Hickok Street funding over to this network of streets so we can do this concrete curbing and sidewalks, which will effectively let us to do the resurfacing work in FY26. Okay. So we do need a little bit of additional funding that 55,000 because the Hickok Street reallocation I believe is 511,000. So, we did an estimate of the concrete curbing work for that. The other pieces, our crew has already done a pretty considerable amount of work on those streets as far as getting all the structures rehabbed. So the street is ready for resurfacing. We just we're looking to do this work ahead of it. Okay, thank you. Any other comments? I guess council heard. I don't know if after that explanation, if you still had questions on that. I appreciate the additional detail, which I feel like I've been asking for. So I'm glad to finally get it a little disappointed. It's now I, I don't know, it still doesn't feel great. I got to be honest. Is that an area that we could, you know, reduce it to say 70. So if it's either of those things staffing or technology with a community computer aided dispatch, it will likely be more, more needed than that. So I don't know what help it does to make it less. Is this an area where, you know, we've talked about how their police funds that we can't touch, except for certain things would getting that computerized dispatch help, you know, qualify for any of that? I don't think so, because the purpose of it is really to support fire and potential EMS, not police. So why is this in the police budget? Because the dispatch, that's where dispatch has been funded from. I think it was a placeholder. Angela, do you have any? It's because that's where dispatch is housed. Our current dispatch does also do dispatch for fire and EMS, but if the technology is only to support fire and EMS dispatching, I don't believe that we could touch the police asset for picture fund. But wouldn't it also help the police or no? I guess it depends on the details. Because if it wasn't for, I don't know that we would need to do that. So it would be in the gray area where it would help police potentially, but I don't know if they would consider that as qualifying. Yeah. Well, I don't know. This is just more raising concerns for me, because there are so many gray areas and no answers. And again, this is an entire percent on the tax rate. Sure. Thank you, Sean. Okay. Good evening. So remember, this has been a long discussion, right? Yeah. I came on 2017 as chief and it was identified then dispatching as a pinch point bottleneck for us that we knew was going to continue to grow as a city group. Regional dispatch was a great look for Winooski and many other communities because it brought more dispatchers under one roof. It brought computer aided dispatch and then moving there, it created a hole for us with the admin positions. Yeah. Hopefully that kind of lines things up for folks. Regional dispatch is likely not to happen. I agree with Elaine. You know, that's been a 30 year discussion here in Chittenden County. They got as close as this is this last run was as close as they've gotten in 30 years of discussion. I don't know how they move forward. I don't know how the state efforts help Winooski or Chittenden County. Right. So, you know, we've populated parts of the state. They're really focused on the rural parts of Vermont and that sort of thing. So if nothing else, it's really going to slow down the process and hurt Chittenden County because the demands are growing so much here, right? What's good for us is, you know, there's still some serious concerns with fire and EMS dispatching in the capacity in which we have, you know, a three alarm fire the other morning, one person sitting downstairs with no other help trying to deal with police, you know, everything. They are our lifeline. They are your lifeline when you call 91. It's answered by the state and then it's either sent to St. Mike's who does EMS dispatching. You know, they're not even trained. They're public safety, you know, they're part of the public safety team at the college. I shouldn't say they're not trained, but they're not as highly trained as our folks are downstairs. In some cases, you've got college kids answering the phone and dispatching ambulance. You know, and then, you know, the fire comes here. So there's calls where we're dealing with two different dispatchers. There's just, there's lots of holes that were, that regional dispatch would have corrected for us. And we're trying to be able to pivot. It is unclear to us whether it's staff or technology. I think it's likely a mix of both. But I can tell you the need is critical for Nuske now and as it continues to grow to start to solve some of those gaps. Okay, that does. Can we call it something other than regional dispatch funding? Sure. Yeah, I'm just thinking, yeah, again, like, it's funding formally known as, yeah, funding formally known as. But just again, thinking about how are we describing it? How are we presenting this to voters that they have that question? I had a lot of questions. Yeah, certainly that's part of the challenge. We could call it something else. I don't know what that does for CCPSA's ability to claim continued support if that becomes a possibility. Okay. But I mean, I, yeah, I can understand what you're asking for. All that clarifying information was really helpful. Well, we were finally able to provide it. I just want to share for the record that I feel really uneasy about reducing childcare. It's hard to imagine that the demand is going down or how long it will be sustained for. It feels like if anything is consistent statewide, it's that childcare needs are maxed and stressful for families. When we have a school system that is highly reliant on, you know, having new families and young families and I just feel super uneasy about reducing hours on that area. I bet Ray is right there, but to be clear, this was not to be reducing the hours of programming. Yeah, I appreciate that. I think heard and understood and definitely agree that childcare is critical and certainly we are viewing it that way. I think this adjustment is really based on the afterschool program, not summer. So I want to be clear, these hours adjustments are based largely on the afterschool part of our Thrive service. Where again, we've seen numbers drop, we think partially due to the availability of an afterschool bus. And for whatever reason, other colleagues around the state who run afterschool childcare are seeing a similar trend where generalized childcare numbers seem to be dropping. Specialized programs seem to be super popular. And so I do think the other thing to consider is that there's a 21C program which we work in partnership with through the school district and then our recreation programs as well that we run afterschool. So there are other pieces outside of the Thrive program where those savings are proposed to come from that are kind of supplementing around the edges of that childcare piece. I think the other thing that I would say is that over time Thrive in particular is fairly scalable. So we do have some reserves if we suddenly have a bunch of kids land and need to quickly change course staffing wise. But the advantage is when we do have numbers go up, there's a revenue stream that comes along with those kids. So generally we're able to adjust course over the course of the year as those numbers go up and down. So I feel comfortable with that change in the proposed budget. And I don't think that's going to impact our ability to provide great care for the kids that needed one. Yeah, I just don't want to make a decision that would lock us into something for a full year when there are a lot of unexpected changes that can happen. And I do think I feel confident if again we start the year and see numbers are way up, I think our revenues would also reflect that. So we have some flags to be able to bring staff on and be staffed up to address that. Can I ask that kind of a follow up on that? If say the two other pre-K classrooms go online at the school, that would be a whole bunch more kids that might need after school care. So unfortunately our license is not, is only for K5, so we wouldn't be serving pre-K kids through Thrive. At this point we've talked about it in the past as a concept, but really the finances of it have never worked out for us in paper. So yeah, so that wouldn't impact Thrive as it exists now unless we expanded the license to include pre-K. Gotcha, thank you. Just building on that question, so I appreciate the ability to adapt and pivot and to have some revenues to help account for that. What about funding from the state? So we are looking at, there's a grant that just got announced in early January that we are looking at. The challenge being right now, a lot of the funding streams that are coming through grants in particular are for expansion or for new initiatives. They're not often for kind of base operations. And so generally with those funding streams, if you are going to accept those or go for those, you're going to be proposing to grow or change or do something new. So again, we are looking at that. That was just like a week or two ago that that came out from the state. And just to clarify, are those funds coming from the new child care tax? I am not sure, to be honest with you, if that's where those are coming from, because I know that child care tax is largely supporting the expanded access of subsidy. So they expanded subsidy criteria to allow more families to access that. And so I think the child care tax is helping largely to offset that larger group. Are we anticipating any of that? We are. I mean, we have not really seen that take off yet, but we are certainly hoping that more families will access that system. But we don't really know exactly what that's going to look like at this point. Is that something we apply for then? So no, in theory, the family is responsible for applying. We do a lot of work with families to support them, though. Claudia in particular and Zara as well did a ton of work helping families get through that system. But in theory, that's something that a family applies for independently. Okay, thank you. Yeah. Well, unless there's something else someone wants to dig into, I don't hear any alignment and changes to what I see here. And would entertain a motion to approve the fiscal year 2025 general fund budget and capital plan. So most. There's a motion on the table. We can have more discussion or somebody can second it. If the motion fails, we have we would need a different motion or a different budget proposed. I'm happy to make any changes to this tool that council requests. Does someone have additional questions or a proposed change? The password manager. That's $4,000. It's not a whole lot. Is are you convinced that the risk is not that because that could be really bad. Pinky promise Elaine, we won't get hacked. We have also potentially discussed finding alternative financing or other funds that could be utilized. Okay, I was wondering if that that was a possibility to. Yeah, 4,000. It's the one thing on there we could we could try and adjust ourselves mid-year. I appreciate the concern. Personally, just I'm supportive of an evening captain. I'm not convinced that that needs to be an FTE. I feel like it could be a non-call position and have some training component to it as needed. But I'm not I'm not convinced that it needs to be an FTE. That's going to have your over your impact as well with salaries and benefit increases. So that's one area where I'm supportive, but not exactly as proposed. So I just kind of say I that is an area where I do feel that we need that full FTE because of as described this will not just add another person, but will hopefully support both retention and not just training, but the retention of folks we already have and maybe even then bring some additional people in who are on that more per diem and part time. So that seems to that retaining those people has been such an issue. So if having this position not only brings that additional support, but also hopefully helps retention, I think that is really needed. I agree with that. I think we already have trouble with on call staffing. Also say that without getting into personal details, we have our full time staff is over text. So having someone reliable there will help help that the few that we currently have. I think it's also potentially we have future coming retirements. A lot of our full time staff have been here a long time and so having someone new on the scene to correct carry on some of that. Are there any proposed changes other points of discussion or does someone want to second the motion? I'll second the motion. Got a motion by Thomas to approve the general fund budget and capital plan as presented seconded by Aurora. All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any nays. Any abstains. Abstain. The motion carries. Thank you. Thank you. Sure. Yeah, let's have a five minute recess. It's 716 so 721. We will reconvene. I will reconvene us. We are on item E. This is on for discussion or approval. The Burlington-Wanewski bridge bond resolution and warning. I think Angela is kicking us off. I mean I can but definitely any project related questions and maybe deferring to John Rauscher. So included in your packet is the language that was drafted by our bond council at Paul Franken Collins, Thomas Maloney. It includes the preliminary warning and the bond question and a bond reimbursement resolution component as well. We directed Thomas to make the question as broad as possible so that if we were able to reduce our portion of the project that we might be able to reallocate any sort of debt service to other bridges. There was a typo in the draft question that Thomas sent over indicating that the rail bridges were over the river. That portion of the question has been removed. Thanks, Angela. I appreciate pointing out that correction and then just having the language. We are still working on trying to do something about this, the 5% match total. And so having the space to continue that even if we as we move this forward is very helpful. Folks have questions about what's presented. I might remind us all of that when this project was presented to us late last year. We did indicate that we were willing to put forward a bond vote to voters in good faith of supporting the project. Any questions from attendees? Either here or via Zoom? Jenny might be for you. When this goes to the ballot booths, is the language translated for this? Yes. The whole thing? The whole language. Okay, great. Okay. Hearing no questions, I would invite a motion to approve the Burlington-Wanooski Bridge Bond Resolution Warning. So moved. Second. Motion by Charlie. Second by Aurora. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Motion carries. Thank you. And thank you to the project team, who I know some are on Zoom. Okay. Moving on to item F. This is also for discussion or approval. The reallocation of unexpended Hickok Street Bond Funds Resolution and Warning. Again, Angela, you're named first, but we have John as well. Yep. So at the end of the Hickok Street Reconstruction Project, we had come in well under budget. We borrowed 1.3 million and had just under 600,000 available. That funding has been sitting in a trustee account that we cannot touch unless we are drawing it down, either for bond principal payments or capital related costs associated with the project. There are many other allowable uses other street reconstruction projects if approved by the voters. One of the things that has precipitated us asking for this reallocation of funding rather than continuing to use it for debt principal is that we have incurred an arbitrage fee. The money has been sitting so long and has earned so much money, we've earned too much money per law and have to pay a fine. And it would continue to accrue that fine annually as long as it sat there. So we think the best use of the funding would be to put it into construction. And John has recommended using these funds to do that work up on the Gale-Bernard neighborhood that we were unable to do last year due to the cost of the funding. That was a project that we were saying would need to be bonded. This way we can use existing bond funds without going out for new. It's clear, yeah, we can't pay bonds back early and we aren't supposed to be making a profit off of that money. So here we are. Are there questions from council about this one? Any questions from any public? Okay, does someone want to make a motion to approve the reallocation of unexploded Haycock Street bond funds resolution and warning? I'll move. Motion by Thomas 2nd by Bryn, all those in favor please say aye. Aye. Motion carries. And finally we're on to item G on for discussion approval, the town meeting day election warning. This is pretty pro forma, but Jenny, did you want to add anything? Preparing the initial warning that was in your packet. I omitted article three, which was the champagne water commissioner to your term. So the new one is corrected. And I noticed that today. Thank you. The water district commissioner also need 30 signatures. Yes. So in your packet for signature is the correct warning. Angela, you reviewed the bond language. Yep. The spawn language is the language that was included in your packet. And Jenny has four signature one, which includes the correction about removing the language on the river and has a version that now includes the budget amounts that council approved earlier tonight. Okay. Any questions? Any questions from our audience or folks on zoom? I'm going to call Angela to act and put she's faxed acting. Yes. Sorry. Nicely and turn into a dad. On that note. Motion to approve the town meeting day election warning. Second. Motion by Thomas second by Charlie all those in favor please say aye. Aye. The motion carries. We are at the end of tonight's agenda to have a motion to adjourn. Second. Second. Second by Charlie all those in favor please say aye. Aye. Thank you.