 the select board welcome everyone we do have a busy agenda tonight and we also have a a hard stop for our meeting with the with the fire department so so let's get started first of all or the how many of the board members are planning to participate in the fire department meeting. I will. Liz, Steve. By Zoom right? Yeah, it's Zoom. It's Zoom. Okay, thank you. Thank you very much for that. We're gonna have to have a little break because Sarah's gonna hop in her car and run over there and connect up but let's get going with our let's get going with our select board agenda. Will that be using the same link? Yeah, so I'm not going I'm not gonna end the meeting I'm just going to I'm gonna have I I have an impossibility I can't take minutes on a on a computer that we're using to record on Zoom so I'm just gonna have to take the minutes the best I can hand-wise or maybe I don't know it's not a great situation but you'll just have to bear with me. My my idea is that I mean we have no agenda from the from the fire department so recording in progress. I don't know what they're I don't know what they're thinking about but my idea is there were seven o'clock we're gonna get an update from them we're gonna meet with them and talk to them and then we're gonna get off and they can conduct the rest of their meeting we don't need to we don't need to stay for the whole meeting nor do we want to I don't think nor do they want us to so we'll see how it all goes but that's that's my that's my plan of how it's gonna go so I'm hoping I'm hoping 15 or 20 minutes will be the will be it but we'll see we'll see what happens so with that the first item on our agenda is a Lister's update on hiring NEMRIC to conduct property tax appraisals authorizing the treasurer to sign the contract action likely so is that Amy and Eric we're gonna hear from that's it you got us both okay thank you so you're on all right should I start Eric with okay we send them a copy we didn't we we got the copy back from NEMRIC earlier today so contract worked out yeah we have a contract workout with them but the long and short is this contract was negotiated before the departure of the third Lister so this will be a Band-Aid and then there's gonna have to be additional discussions down the road on what to do about that other seat specifically who's gonna do what duties whether you probably don't need to go into too much of it right now because they've got a big meeting but we can talk to you more in the future but the long and short is that you guys know I'm I'm short time I'm done at least at the very end of the year at the latest and then Eric election town meeting and he's planning to rerun and the third Lister that was appointed when no one stepped up to run for Dick Alderman's former seat resigned on Monday so the town may be in a situation where you have no Listers on town meeting so that's a conversation that definitely you'll want to will want to have but not tonight in the meantime let's go back to the original business so the contract with NEMRIC is for work to begin in October and go through June billing would be from October through June and then of course as with other types of contracts we could extend it the town could extend it as as agreed upon it is for NEMRIC to do the inspection services the term appraisal does not in this instance we're not talking about a reappraisal of town this is the assessor the assessor and inspection services that the Listers typically perform so the work that Eric and I have been doing basically maintenance the maintenance work all the all the inspections on permits sales and new builds things like that that we've been doing for years so Eric's been doing for way longer than I have obviously the rate is $95 an hour and when they have to travel the travel is $47.50 an hour and then when they need their senior appraiser to step in maybe on some of the more complicated commercial properties that we have in town that'll be built at $145 an hour actually some quick thoughts on that it's probably limited to some of the more complicated commercial stuff possibly some of the larger subdivisions yeah difficult grievances yeah but anyway right but those are the rates 95 an hour 47.50 an hour for travel and then the senior appraiser builds at 145 an hour we expect based on how efficient they operate they're they're doing this for about 20 other towns around the state right now as well they they're going to knock this stuff out and probably a quarter of the time that it took the two of us to do it and in the contract well we will forward you a copy of the contract once we take once we get off the call we'll send it to Sarah to to share with you but you'll see that there's a checklist the contract's very brief the checklist sort of outlines what Nimrick will do and what the town listers will do and many there's crossover in many of those areas where the listers will notify Nimrick for certain things and again this contract was set up with the expectation that there would be a lister available to do administrative services an experience lister an experience lister so this contract anticipates again the Eric you're on through town meeting but at least through that point he or I as long as I'm on could be doing these things hopefully well somebody else trained by first of March by first of March the ideal situation otherwise we're back to square one yeah and it will be difficult Nimrick's already made it pretty clear to us that they do not want to do any of the in-house clerical but we consider clerical type functions they only want to operate in the field and so this could be a real problem down the road but at this point in time we just don't know it's not that they do it too I just want to quickly clarify pardon me Peter it's not that they don't want to do it they don't have enough people because the demand is so high for these services because so many towns are in exactly the same spot and they're going to be getting a lot more okay so inquiries for other towns the town of list a town of Chester I think was listed today put off an ad today for for an assessor I mean there the ads are being posted weekly monthly for towns looking for full-time assessors so so just just to follow I mean that's you're right that's that's a conversation for another day unfortunately as much as it's a as much as it's a concern um tonight we need to deal with this contract and get it in place um so our our town attorney hasn't reviewed this at all right no when we forwarded to Sarah obviously she could send it on to Rob so it's pretty it seems to be a pretty standard Nimrick contract and assume it's been you know vetted before by other town attorneys no I'm sure but I I don't know I just uh I think I can read over contracts pretty well but how much what's what's our what's our estimate of how much money is involved in this um so I don't we are at my house we don't have the budget information in front of us handy but um basically well first of all we don't know we don't know exactly what the numbers will be but time wise um if we were to look back at the number of hours that Eric and I both build for the last few years we would expect that to for a lister lister will still need to do administrative work so there'll be some hours maybe I don't know maybe 10 hours a week at top for administrative work if you had somebody experienced I would say less than less than that with experience but it's four hours a week well through until until you get to until you get to the grand list um period the April one any anyway it's a hard look guys I'm not trying to make this complicated yeah I'm just trying to get a sense of how much money we think we're going to be paying Nimrick to do this work and you're saying they can do well just listen to me for a minute so if they can do it in 30 less time than it took you guys to do that how many hours is that I don't want a ballpark it because I don't have the numbers in front of me that's what I'm saying so I don't know off the top of my head how many hours each of us put in last year but that would that would be one thing to look at if we were equal hours I understand guys I just you're you're asking us to sign a contract when we don't know how much money it is and we feel like we're we're I at least feel like we're having the gun put to our head but yes Mary we're not going to sign it tonight are we what we're supposed to start in October we've got to sign it pretty damn soon well that's otherwise we're going to lose them hi yeah yes Dave Peter um we haven't got the contract to even look at it ourselves and neither has Rob so if they forward the thing and Rob takes a look at it can we sign the contract or have the contract signed for the next meeting and then that way they can give us the information on how many hours they think and and approximate cost of what Nimrick will be yeah we are not we are not going to do that that is what we were just saying we've talked about this Eric and I have talked about this we are not going to ballpark how much Nimrick is going to bill what we're telling you is based on our conversations with them the fact that they are professional assessors they will be able to accomplish this based on their own estimates in about a quarter of the amount of time that we took okay then let me put it this way Amy Amy can you just give us what you guys put in last year that's what I was saying I don't have those numbers in front of me and I don't but that's what I'm saying if you just provide us with that information we can circulate it's actually in the budget book if you look in the budget book from last year the town meeting you can see the year before and it was it was that it's so far this year we haven't done the grand list compilation so but you could look at last year's town meeting book and see what was spent the year prior you could look at the year before all that information is there all right one other thing or two things that are really important that you guys need to be really mindful of you're going to the town is going to be in a situation where you the town may not have any listeners any assessors period come march town meeting and you can't be in that position and the statutes require that if you are in a position where you have one lister you're supposed to hire an assessor so this I'm I'm not pushing into a corner and either is Eric but what we're telling you is it took a month and a half of phone calls and communication with Nimrick to get to this point we have a contract draft here for Rob's review you guys obviously your authority is not governing the scope of the work of the listeners or the assessor your your authority is to authorize the treasurer to sign the contract so we'll forward it to you it should go ahead and forward it to Rob it's literally a page and a third the contract plus the checklist that goes with it is up two pages it's really brief it's really succinct and when's the drop dead date where we have to sign the contract we should have signed this at the first of september peter but we didn't get it from nimrick until today okay so we're we've really been trying to get this done now because we brought it to your attention what in august sometime early early august and it's just a question can we get in before other towns before we lose our seat right before we lose our ticket basically well here's what I would suggest and here we go again select board and I'm willing to go along with a go along with the sense of the board but if there is an issue of needing to sign this contract so that other towns don't get in ahead of us I think we need to ask Rob to take a quick look at this and be ready to have a quick 10 minute especially to agree to sign the thing I mean I'm I'm not going to agree to sign it before I can read it and I don't think we should so Peter yes isn't this isn't this as far as the warning was going we were going to just authorize dorinda to sign that's right so all we need to do is we get the contract Rob looks at it and sends it back dorinda can sign the contract that's right yes no I don't I don't just I don't disagree with that but what I'm saying is and if I'm wrong I'm wrong but I mean isn't the process that we the select board should agree that it's appropriate to do this contract or is it or not it is the Lister's responsibility for this work to be done and the even the way the contract is written that work because Lister's are elected officials the work falls to the Lister's the select board can't oversee the work of an assessor because you comprise a number of key individuals on the appeal board the bca so there has to be a division of power in the town government it's really important that the select board isn't overseeing the assessors because asking to oversee the assessors I mean is is is the fact of the matter that we have no authority over signing this contractor not if it is then why are we even talking about it because the select board is who has the authority in town to bind the town you have the it's it's it's like signing a warrant you're giving the authority to the treasurer to sign the warrant to issue the funds okay thank you I got it so if we're going to give the authority to the treasurer to sign it I think it's the responsibility of the board to review the contract and to have Rob review the contract and then we say okay madam treasurer we agree it's good with you we're not disagreeing with you we're just saying absolutely that's what we're saying time is of the essence so we're bringing it to you we got it today okay I would tell you that the budget for twenty one twenty two for wages for the zoning was seven thousand dollars not zoning Mary this is lister budget that's a different part of the budget the zoning and then it works with the planning commission so where is the lister section we've budgeted approximately thirty thousand dollars for the listers which was equal to six hundred and fifty five hours for both Eric and Amy for the current year we're in okay but what about um Dave well he didn't get really budgeted um at the time we put together the budget we had dick in there and he was only in for 90 hours which amounted to about a couple thousand dollars okay okay um is there anything stopping at Amy and Eric from sending us the contract so that we can at least look at it now we need to get it yes I I did say a couple times now I will forward it to you as soon as we get off the call but I can't get into the lister email while we're on zoom okay that's fine forward it to Sarah if you would if you would just forward it to Rob and tell him we need him to take a quick look at it and tell us if he thinks it's okay you can spare yourselves I think you can say that you provisionally authorized to Rinda to uh to sign the contract provided that that doesn't fight any glaring errors requires especially that way we get this dining over us that is my bad would somebody make that motion Steve I just did Peter okay it was everybody second that motion I'll second it thank you Mary all in favor of the motion please say aye aye aye any opposed okay good deal okay thanks before you go Amy did you say that you had a ballpark of how much percentage of what had been budgeted or do you say that was actually all of what was budgeted they said it would be a quarter of the uh time what are the hours but it's a much higher but they're well I had a quick calculation of 655 hours divided by four multiplied by 95 and I got about little under 10 000 dollars okay one other really just to kind of remind you guys we we we're not going to be buying that software that we last minute we're told we were going to need and then turns out we shouldn't buy it right away so there are also places in the budget for this year for the listers where there is money budgeted that is not going to be spent for those purposes just so that you are reminded of that as well um everything to do with our work has been a complete whirlwind and frustrating and not nothing to do with the town it says everything to do with the state okay all right okay all right thanks thanks Amy and thank you listers yep thanks y'all we'll see you around and we'll send that right away Sarah okay okay thank you that was 655 hours each Mary just in case I don't know if you've got that it wasn't total twice as much so it'd be like 20 000 but it's still in the ballpark of what we had put into the budget in wages we had put in 30 000 but you've already you've already six months by the time this happens you're going to be four months into the budget so well I think we just put in order of magnitude and so so it's not going to be like a hundred thousand dollars in other words no based on those numbers you are looking at like 31 000 dollars though if it's 25 percent of those numbers that Dorinda just said at 95 dollars an hour it's just over 31 000 dollars yeah and that's not counting that what they've done for six months there's no choice no there's no choice but they're not buying the software so there's some money there although I don't know how much that was but I think we're going to be I think we're going to be buying the software next year so get ready anyway like everything else we seem to do the expenses spiral on and on but uh we're already behind schedule so um signing a warning for the October 19th site visits and public hearing are in down-breeding class 4 section of Dolan Road action likely this is hypothesis is that we have to not hypothesis but the procedure is that we have to actually meet at the road so what I'm suggesting is hopefully we can do that at 4 30 if we can't do it till five we'll have to do it at five and then no you can do it whatever you want it's uh I left the motion that I sent you the warning that with that time blank if you guys can figure out a time or settle on a time therefore the slide board would be at Dolan Road at blank p.m on Tuesday October 19th so if you guys pick a time we can we can do that you want to pick it for I don't know whatever works I mean I know everybody's got crazy schedules so well I'm I'm fine with 4 30 we got others who can do it at 4 30 Phil yeah the working woman right that's fine but we'll probably be there for a half an hour and then we have to get back to our computers well I'm hoping we're going to be there 15 minutes I don't think we need to be half an hour I know but then we still have to drive back no by the time we get back to wherever we're going yeah we're going to lose half an hour so I wonder if you we need to do it at four is my point I would hope not just because it's I'm I I can do whatever anybody else wants to do but you're the 15 how about I just don't think it's enough time for everybody to get back for the five o'clock meeting okay I agree I can't get I can't get from Dolan Road yeah that time unless you guys do you want to start by four I see or I'm fine it's fine okay four then okay we're all good to talk about a class four and did you guys read this at that notice seems fine to you 832 section of Dolan Road we've already chain measured it so we're good to go I think okay we can come in and sign this you can along with the orders that are waiting for you and right all policy and all sorts of yummy things okay I will be in tomorrow morning okay I come in tomorrow I will what time what time will you be there Sarah in the morning 9 a.m okay I'll be there probably between 9 30 and 10 tomorrow you guys want to vote on this and then we can yes we need to vote I'll make a move approval of the motion on Dolan Road for the for the site visit on October 19th at four o'clock okay is there a second second okay thank you um today did Phil sign the orders today I did Mary yeah first first please Mary I'm sorry we need to finish the vote oh sorry I'm just trying to have some kind of reasonable order here so all in favor of the motion please say aye aye any opposed okay now Mary no I just I just wanted to know whether or not if everybody else is stopping in whether I need to I drove right by there and I completely forgot to stop in I'll be there in the morning and Peter and I'm never there so if somebody needs me to be there they have to ask Peter's gonna be there Phil has already done it so that's I've already been in yeah so I don't need to do it either no okay correct moving right along correcting the town personnel policy action likely um so these are the corrections we discussed at our last meeting that's just ratifying what we had done earlier right those are you moving Steve to ratify our actions I am I'm seconding it any further discussion all those in favor of the motion please say aye aye any opposed okay um and once we do that Sarah maybe you've already done it but once we do that could you send us all out in each and update it correct it whatever we call it yes well you have to sign that too when you after you're done signing it tomorrow uh I will send it out to you into the road crew no okay perfect thank you um please go to David David's resignation Victor just hold on a second Mary would you just make sure that the road crew knows that that is a correction of the previously approved changes to the personnel policy they are always very suspicious that we are taking something away or changing something yes I can do that okay I'd appreciate it thank you Chad but are you are we gonna is the town gonna require them to sign that again or is it just gonna be a correction what's the harm in having him sign it what's that what's the harm in having him sign that well that kind of winds them up but uh are there not nothing I guess the bottom line is unfortunately they should probably sign it so they've signed the correct copy of the personnel policy if it becomes a huge issue then we'll have to figure out what to do but all we're trying to do is make sure that our personnel policy says what we all thought it said and what we told the road crew previously that it said so right yeah and all fairness and also and all fairness feeder they they they really want the same thing it's just no I know they do it's just been a frustrating process for them and it's been a frustrating process for us so let's let's try and bring it to a happy conclusion and all of us get on with our lives very good what's what we'll do okay thank you you're welcome um accepting the resignation of dade smith from the following post lister delinquent tax collector and assistant town clerk action likely is there a motion I'll make that motion that we second resignation okay you second it or mary yeah okay i'll be okay all in favor of the uh motion accepting dave smith's resignations uh please say hi hi hi any opposed I do have a question what if we didn't accept it well he's I think he's still gone he's he's gone anyway I mean I I'm I'm a little uh I mean it's a discussion for another day but I'm a little miffed I'm not really upset but I'm a little miffed that he would just walk out and say I'm done it isn't like he's starting another job it isn't like he's doing anything and it's just one more issue that we're trying to struggle and deal with and would two weeks make a big difference probably not but at least we'd have a chance to try and do something whereas now we're just thrown right in the soup yeah so I thought it is what it is I thought he quit because he had another job you're saying he doesn't have another job my understanding is he does not have another job he's looking for full-time work correct Sarah yes yeah I'm just going to add in the minutes that uh the board will advertise and post notices for that the vacancies you have to do that within 10 days of accepting a resignation of an elected position to consider nominations to be appointed to those to fulfill those vacancies right that was part of Steve's motion wasn't it was yeah because that's what I thought I was seconding yeah Sarah could you refresh my memory you are able to um hire an assistant town clerk and that's not a uh appointed position I I can hire an assisted town clerk I can hire four assistant town clerks so that's not really something that has to be part of the whole process but if it's an elected position then someone steps down from it you have to post a notice within 10 days after the the select board has been notified and accepted the resignation so that people can submit applications or their requests to be considered to be nominated by the board to those two positions and those two positions are collector of delinquent taxes and lists okay great yep and the truth of the matter is you would hire the assistant clerk and Garinda would hire the bookkeeper so it's really the two of you tag teaming trying to hire this full time right you guys just have to uh uh approve the money right right right and we have put the word out everywhere we can think of right I can't think of someplace where I haven't put the word out did you put it on all the um of the uh local front porch forums in addition to middle sex I did not put it on the local front porch forums in addition to middle sex but I did call every single town clerk in the in the entire area I put it on job link I talked to the department of labor I put it on craig's list I mean I've just been that's all I've been doing this week is just posting job that I'm pulling people aside I may have a candidate for I may have a really good candidate um just by she just ran after me at the farmer at the market and said she was interested so let's hope let's fingers crossed please contact just a little bit because sometimes you have somebody in one of those towns read front porch forum who's not talking to the town clerk I will I will get it out there I just it's been it's just I have to find someone to post it for me and a lot of the town like Cal has posted for me um so I have I just haven't gotten to bury into Montpelier but I will get that by that even here in East Montpelier and you know yeah I know but also people could read it from other towns they could read our postings from other towns and they're shareable so okay we're getting the word out that's the important thing yes Steve has a question yes Steve my question is it's not related to hire in that but do we still have a an advertisement for a road I also did Steve I also did the highway department at the same time so I did I did uh and we had to get approved by the state of Vermont so that took 24 hours to do the job link thing that I did that and everywhere and also Craig's list and we did get an application today for the road crew but I would not want to say that person's name okay great thank you and maybe maybe that person who said they were going to apply when Vic was on the morning going to the dump section well that's the other thing I also talked to WDEV so Rick Tiles going to have me on on Monday talking about actually this particular situation trying to find qualified people to during a time of the pandemic when nobody nobody seems to be willing to work and I've also talked to WDEV about doing some advertising spots it will cost for a municipality you can get 30 second spots you can get three 30 second spots for the price of two and the other thing I think is interesting is that according to their advertising person she said uh advertise in the beginning of the week because everyone hates their job at the beginning of the week not so much in the middle and the end of the week interesting Sarah you're on top of this thank you for your diligence well we're doing everything we can I know Dorinda's doing stuff too we're just we've really spent a lot of time working on it we just hope it works well thank you Dorinda as well gosh that's great I don't know if Dorinda has any sound yeah it's back I had to switch computers three times oh my computer updates okay so we're back we're back a little bit ahead of schedule so that's good so uh Susan Rickstead and Doug Lupart sending us sent us a letter requesting that no overnight parking signs be installed behind town hall and there's a question of whether that would require a town-wide ordinance and over to be enforceable action possible um I'm not aware I understand they had a problem one weekend or one evening or whatever but this this has not been an ongoing problem has it Sarah uh no so a couple of things uh what I did talk to the Varan state police and they did some they had to do they had to research this and the bottom line is for the state police to either ticket somebody or have somebody towed we definitely needed ordinance and that raises questions like well if you say behind are you going to be specific or you're going to say all of town property does that apply to the town forest does that apply to the town's right of way that type of stuff so there's that um there seems to be a trend from what I understand because I've been talking to other town clerks about this who are also having the same problem we're getting a lot of people in RVs who are Christ in the country who don't want to stay at Walmart and somehow the words gotten out that you can stay for free behind town halls or in public property so that is where we are um the state police guy this officer I talked today from the middle sex barracks said if you wanted to you could put up uh no parking from dust till dawn signs if we can find them uh it just might be a deterrent but this just know that the state police won't have any authority to come and pull somebody away unless they have a yeah I think to do that informal one and see if that does the trick then we don't have to deal with all the legal issues yeah well so so here's my here's my only concern and I think we're looking for a solution to a problem which doesn't exist based on based on one event and I'm also aware over the years and I don't know who all it is but they're probably village residents who park in the town hall during snowstorms because it's plowed and their driveways may not be plowed or who knows why they do it but in the wintertime when I go skiing early in the morning there are frequently uh there are frequently cars parked there and to the best of my knowledge that's never been an issue or a problem other than you know when our guys come to plow but typically they don't plow the town hall parking lot until later in the day because they're busy doing the you know the the main routes in town and and making way for the school buses so I just I just want to be sure we're not creating more of a problem than we're solving I'm not aware that we have had anybody in a in a motorhome or RV or tent or anything uh in our in our town hall parking lot or town garage or school parking lot or anywhere I just I just the if we're going to do anything I certainly would favor the informal approach even though it's unenforceable and hope that hope that does the trick but you know at the same time I kind of hate that because that's kind of a waste I'd rather have us spend our time working on our highway ordinance and our and our speed ordinance which we now know is unenforceable because it desperately needs to be updated rather than rather than put our work and time and effort into creating a parking ordinance but I feel like you know if what Sarah's saying is true there may be more people doing that and if it's from dusk to dawn the people who are parking there because of snow storms they would just have to move when it gets light up that's all all I'm just thinking is well they didn't ask a lot of us and we I just thought we should be good neighbors that's all Peter yes um what why couldn't we just put up a couple of signs and it's not going to cost very much to just say uh no overnight RV parking just leave it at that that isn't what our neighbors want though they want no parking no they want no overnight parking I mean they can't say parking at town hall we have to have parking at town hall right I'm just saying no overnight no RV overnight parking or what a no overnight camping or something yeah something some little simple verge two signs one on each side it's not going to cost very much and just try it and hope that works yeah I think that's a good idea Steve so again let me just circle back and say so we're talking about putting these signs up beside the town hall and behind the town hall but not in front of the town hall I just think it's our residents who are using that parking in the wintertime and I'm not aware that it's ever been a problem so but but if we use RV then you know they wintertime they're not parking their RVs out there no but the point is I mean Jesus what they would the the issue they had was a car I believe not a not an RV was it an RV I think it was some sort of uh see an RV some sort of okay okay well then I'm fine I'm fine with the RV then okay well I not just revisit if it becomes an issue I think it's a one and done I I agree with Peter I think I think we're making a bigger deal out of something that's not an issue um and to expend the the time and the resources on trying to deal with stuff that's a non-issue um can always revisit it at another point in time I'd much rather see us spend time and and financial resources on making something that's enforceable if it's an actual issue so what say you what say you board I like these recommendation I don't see why we shouldn't try and be good neighbors they haven't really asked a lot of us are you putting up a sign if it's not going to cost us a lot of money and not take up a lot of time but I also agree with Randy I if it's one time that this happened I would just say you know let's just wait and see and we're willing to do something if this becomes a pattern Peter yes um I haven't used that and some of my family have used that like if you're going to go you park down there like if they're uh it's uh and just leave your kind sometimes uh they don't get back and so it's there overnight and I mean where any intention wasn't to leave it overnight but but we did well Steve says it's only RV so I mean how about a motion I make that motion please Mary we put up a couple or three signs saying no RV parking overnight around the all area is there a second to that motion yeah second it okay all in favor of the motion which is to put up two or three signs which say no overnight RV park with the understanding that we can enforce it all in favor of the motion please say hi hi hi any opposed okay so how do we get these signs who makes the signs well I'll I'll talk to Shane who might have some contacts I'll figure it out okay thanks thank you um reviewing and possibly approving and signing a memorandum of understanding our republic access to proposed overlooks to be constructed behind planetary matters action likely sandy did send us does she want to be part of the meeting when we oh there she is timing sandy welcome um uh I did get the uh I did get the email and I presume all of you did with the uh with a map and the language I I read it over it looked pretty straightforward to me uh I don't know if anybody has any comments or suggestions you're recommending approval sandy correct yes as I as I said in the email I worked on this with our town attorney Rob Halpert as well as with um Russ Bennett at planetary matters um and it's the public access agreement which is a key piece of the overall grant for the overlooks that planetary matters will build the overlooks and the town will have a public access um to those overlooks yep I uh I read it over too and uh it's really basically an easement plus um but I had one concern about the last paragraph in section three use it says they can close the right of way if they're doing construction and what I was concerned about is construction of what is it like can they close it if they're doing construction of a building or is it just if they're doing construction of the overlooks or if they're improving the right of way if they're gonna put gravel down I mean I just wasn't clear about the limits of the construction reconstruction or repair that's all that may that may not be as clear as as it could be my understanding is that it was you know during construction or if they're moving the overlooks or if they're doing some other construction on the property that it would be a um you know close for the period of time that the construction is happening so any construction on the property as as written now I think that that's how it would be interpreted yeah I do too I think it could be any construction and so if if the town's happy if they're okay with that then I'm not going to complain I just thought it was if it was only well to be limited then we should limit it is this owned by planetary matters all of this or yes this is all property that's owned by planetary matters so like if someone were to fall and die that's under their insurance yes though there is a is a very clear statute that says unless you're charging somebody for the use you there's no liability I think and that's that's referenced in the yeah in the contract um when I uh when I looked at the map which was very helpful sandy when you when you sent that along because I had no idea where this was it basically goes as you as you look at the red hand it is to the left of the red hand right down there property lines yes it actually goes right along that well they own both sides of that they own two properties there they own both sides of that there's a drainage I you know call it a stream is pushing it it's the drainage from the road goes there so it's a fairly significant golly there's actually an old road um that went that went down there they've cleared some of that already but so it's um within the setback of one of their properties but they own the adjacent property as well but all I'm all my only point was and I've I read that I read that language to Mary but I thought you know it's very unlikely that they're going to be constructing something which is right there or in that way is oh you know might they do something to maintain that yes but I don't I mean who knows they're they're they're giving us this I think we have to cooperate with them as they improve and work on their land so well I I'm just I'm not against it I just wanted to clarify you know whether we should limit it or not no that's fine well yeah my comment is at the very start of this access right here this they have a 10 foot wide right of way and if they're working on their property nothing to do with the access out there but if they're working on their their property the driveway or that building for construction I could see that but it says as soon as the construction is done then it would go back so I just wanted to throw that out the other the other reality is the intent of this agreement is to protect access to the grant funded improvements that are being made and the reality of this as I look at is let let's say they have to close off a portion of that right away for some period of time people are just going to walk around it and go on back there I mean they're not going to have somebody out out there telling them they can't can't walk behind the building and walk over there people walk all over that property now so I don't see it as a big deal and uh I I would recommend that we uh that we approve it just one more quick question uh this is Liz so the also there's is there a broader intent that this path excuse me this path that goes to the overlook will also get extended possibly to say you know the fire station or something like that is that this is the same thing that I mean there are many people in town who hope that that could happen um we're a long way from that actually happen no yeah I know um but my question is you know it's saying things like there's all these things prohibited like picnicking and skis and snowshoes like would that be this could potentially be changed if the event in the event that there were a larger path is that correct yes my my understanding this is this is the starting point and given that these overlooks are on a fair on a fairly steep area um didn't want to have people riding a bike down there that that could could be dangerous but that you know it would be the owner the owners would be the planetary matters folks it's their property that they would have some say over what's you know who what sort of activities are going to be allowed um it could be expanded going um it could be expanded in the future for more significant path we're to okay we're to we're to develop and in in this regard it's similar we borrowed some language from I think it's the mad river path where similarly the you know the owners retain the ability to move a path they just they allow public access on their path but since you know the public is using somebody else's land it's um recognize that it's the landowner that gets to have the say over what sort of uses can be on their lander okay thanks anything else anyone someone willing to make a motion yeah I'll make that motion that we uh approve approve that memorandum of understanding for the public access whoop I think it was a little both second at pick one I Bill has been trying to move a motion or second it for a while I know you've been cutting me off Mary you just see it too quick I just shut up this time all right guys so uh all those in favor of the motion please say hi hi hi you opposed okay you want to uh Peter it only requires one signature I assume that the board doesn't need to designate you as a signatory since you're the chair but y'all I'm gonna throw that question to you no I'm fine as long as everybody else is fine I'll be down in the morning okay it's gonna be waiting for you okay thank you thank you thank you very much thank you for all your work on this sandy I think I think this is going to be a nice thing I think it'll I think it'll be great it'll be really nice um just you know what while I have you and it's still before six o'clock this is you know just I'll flag these issues um coming your way is the new enhanced energy plan the planning commissioner will have a hearing on that first but then it will be going to you we talked about this at our last meeting when we met in July and we also forwarded the planning commission nominated assistant zoning administrator of sarah berger so I think that should the actual appointment would need to be done by the select board so you could take that up at some point in the in the future as well tonight so we can't do it no we got noticed for tonight but yeah are you are are you is the planning commission still scheduled to speak to the board I think I've got you down for the 5th of October yes for the 5th of October if that still works we'll give you an update on other things that we're doing and sandy we are straight finally on that contract right thank you I heard that you got it you signed it that just to let me know I get I get so much stuff I didn't realize that what they were talking about because I knew I'd signed that one thing anyway okay I'm sorry it turned into such a kerfuffle that's my fault for not paying better attention to what I was doing I apologize and that was just an extension of the grant agreement so that we have until the end of September to complete the work right okay thank you thank you sandy thank you sandy thanks treasurer's report dorinda um don't have a lot to report I did send you an updated um status budget status it had a lot more in it than just the the budget itself but um a couple areas of concern which is um I mean there's some like legal fees are over double what have been budgeted I got in a significant amount of highway bills this week that worked for last year's budget but did not receive them until just recently um so that's going to affect this year's budget um so there's just you know as you go down through it you'll see there's just a few areas of concern that you know have got that are over budget or and certainly several areas that are already over where we really should be at for right now um also uh delinquent notices for late payments of taxes those will be run next week without the delinquent tax collector whose is their responsibility I will send those out thank you thank you are there a lot this year a lot more than normal or about the same or do you know yes I haven't really looked at it the last time I got a report was it was probably a couple pages long so maybe 60 to 100 wow that's a lot but those are late payments so it could be people missed their august 20th payment um but we have another one coming up in november so we'll see yeah um that's about it okay Mike did you want did you want to bring up that thing that you said us about the step increases or you're not doing that as treasure I'm not doing that as a treasure that's uh that's a discussion for the board that was just information that I found and offered up that maybe it's a way to look at how to you know move forward on this whole process I think that you know you are going to need to very soon set what you anticipate for uh at least a range of pay for um both these positions um the one that Sarah and I are looking for in the highway position um because that's you know at least if we have a range we would have something for an initial interview um but and you know so I with that along with what people are currently getting paid I think you know um you know you need to look at everything I don't think you can just look at the one position you're trying to fill and pull a number out of the hat no I agree yeah thank you part of our as part of our uh I mean we we typically do not during budget time spend a lot of time you know we we we talk about what the overall race should be but we don't we don't jigger and figure and really look at what people are getting paid and whether we need to make adjustments or not and I think this is going to be a year where we we really need to pay attention to that and improve our improve our practice of how we uh of how we do that I think I feel like I feel like we've we've learned our lesson and uh we just cannot be hiring people without paying attention to what everybody else makes and I'm not saying we didn't pay some attention but maybe we didn't pay enough attention um I ran some rough numbers just using just real quick numbers for um the assistant treasure uh assistant uh clerk and bookkeeper and with benefits and all attached in which is something that you know was never affecting those two positions before so that's another thing you'll have to consider because it does add probably you know another seventeen thousand dollars to the number yeah yeah well I know I know Washington like to co-op and we add all the benefits in and we have floral on case of the venture plan it's another 40 percent about out of pocket to add all the benefits on so I if you've done yours done that as a percentage but maybe you can't because you don't know what we're gonna offer the to pay right and I you know I just took in the spreadsheet that I use when I put together the budget is what I just I use that and just plugged in an hourly rate and extended it over guessing that the person might have a single health insurance plan they might have you know you don't know what it's going to be until you you know get the person hired right I mean we have a we have a better idea at least at the current pay scale of what the road crew person would make but this new position is going to be a work in progress right and I think you know I don't know if you want to look at it as to are we going to think of the position being 5050 or is it going to be you know a 30 a 33 66 position in the past date was working like three partial days a week and the accounting department was working like a day and a half a week but I don't know if you know if it that'll all change it's certainly gonna you're not going to be able to track it separate right so it's going to have to be just a you know but you're talking from a low of uh $21 and we were paying mark like 25 so you know yeah but isn't there like that those positions I mean they're going to be intermingled every day every day right just like it's just like it's just like sarah's sarah's position now where she's you know where she's time clerk one minute and she's select board assistant the other minute so what dorinda is just saying is we're going to have to say okay this is the rate of pay for the combined position and we're we're just from an accounting point of view saying it's 60 40 or whatever the percentage is right so when you figure what those positions are worth because certainly you know in what I looked up I tried to do some search on the internet today and you know bookkeepers are paid in this range and they didn't list an assistant clerk but I could find a range of a clerk so you know it's uh yeah it's just figuring out what you want to do well the important thing and the overarching thing for me is to try and find the best person we can find and then we've got a got a backfill all these other pieces it's not very productive I mean it's good to think about all this stuff I agree but until we have somebody and we know what what we're going to have to pay them to hire them it's kind of a it's kind of a moot point at the moment I think and whether I kind of disagree in that to one respect that you know you can't hold an intelligent conversation with somebody unless you can say the first question I've been asked twice already is what does it pay and you know you've got to have a range you know is it going to be between 20 and 30 is it going to be between five and 10 you know whatever it's you've got to just give so what would you recommend I don't I don't know if it's my recommendation or not I mean I think again it goes back to without you seriously looking at what other people are making because I can tell you right now that if you go out there and you know offer a position like this to somebody for $30 I can tell you there's a person sitting right in front of us that probably isn't going to be happy absolutely absolutely okay so by the same by the same talk look look look look it's one of these chicken and the egg conversations we've got the same issue potentially with the road crew we have to look at what our current rates of pay are how they match up we can't hire we can't hire new people and pay them five or six dollars an hour more than we're paying our current people it just doesn't work right it's got to be some kind of a of a compromise and you know we need to figure that out but certainly you're right about that Dorinda no question so I think the conversation needs to happen sooner than later I mean that's what I'm trying to say I'm happy to work with Dorinda and with Sarah if she wants to and do some research and what people are paying in different towns and stuff like that and then that would be great I think you know the the hard part about this is I think it's likely I mean I'm not saying it's impossible but it's it's likely that the candidate we're going to get is not going to be somebody who is currently working for another town but we don't know I know but what Dorinda's done some work looking at what uh looking what at what bookkeepers make I can I can make some calls and find out what's going on in the in the business world these days in that regard I mean we can we can do our uh we can do our homework but check at capstone too I know that we're hiring like an account payable person administrator for 18 an hour right and I have less than a bookkeeper but you know I I did find where you know bookkeepers are down in the lower 20s they're not you know we were 25 which was a very attractive offer and um that was with no benefits too and that was with no benefits that's right person to approach me today said um she said the appeal for her about this job she is currently employed she's not working for another town and you're right we're not going to get it from other towns but I think what Mary was saying she just wanted to figure out how much other towns pay for bookkeepers like that and it's really kind of hard to pull them apart because a lot of times people are assistant treasurers or treasurers and they have multiple duties including assistant town clerk it's not a really unusual combination so you can get somebody who's assistant treasurer assistant treasurer assistant town clerk collector of delinquent taxes E911 coordinator I mean that's how towns do that and which is what I'm going to also suggest that this person do take on some other responsibilities such as being an E911 coordinator um but the person who I talked to today who is interested in this job who has a who is bookkeeping although she says not to the degree that Derrinda has in the ad so I think some people might be intimidated by the ad but you know that's what you want um she said this distraction for her is a decrease in stress and uh working closer to home so I mean I think those are things we have to pitch to people it's like you know we won't be able to work remotely because we just really can't do remote in this job but you can say well if you need to come in on a saturday and do bookkeeping without anybody around you could do a but your saturday those are that I think is going to be the attractive part of this job Derrick can you remind me um did we decide that we or maybe we didn't decide um it that's probably not best practice at the bookkeeper is also the treasurer but it's not against regulation for them to be both it's not it's fine did we decide on that the treasurer has to be a resident of our town though right right and was this person not a resident of our townster this person I talked to yeah she it's she's got a funny situation she lives with somebody in this town but she is actually a resident of a different town well does an assistant treasurer have to be the person but the clerk doesn't have to live in town the town clerk has to live in if they elected town if you're elected you have to be a voter in this town but if you're an assistant or assistant treasurer you do not have to be a resident not it's only if you're elected that's the that's where the key is this position isn't asking for an assistant treasurer is it no not no okay thank you so yeah I mean after all that and we believe it or not we do have for once we have a little time uh unless unless victor has a 45 minute report for us do we want to uh do we want to discuss what the pay raise what the pay range should be or could be why not yeah why not but we may not have enough information all we're gonna do is get to a starting place I mean based based on what I've heard I think we're in the in the low 20s to a to a max of the mid 20s per hour with benefits I agree I don't think we I don't think we can stretch it anymore than that we're gonna have we're gonna have problems left right and center if we do well I didn't the benefit really can I speak um if if this person is doing other jobs are we how does it work they they're they're not getting one hourly rate at this job and one hour or are they no which we're gonna pick a rate which reflects the hours that they work so if if the bookkeeping position is higher paid position and the assistant time clerk would be a lower position and they're 50 50 you just say okay you're you split the difference in the middle and you know as whatever the percentage is you have to agree on one rate of pay otherwise it's just chaos right and the last thing you want to do is make somebody turn in a time card every week and say this is how much time I spent being assistant time clerk and this is how much time I spent big bookkeeper doesn't work tonight it's a night it's administrative nightmare yeah okay I just wanted to make sure so then we also need to come up with the salaries of all these other things before we can present this person a number if in fact we someone we get applications we need to kind of know and I think that's what Mary was saying she would work with maybe Sarah and Derinda to figure out the timing because you're going to have to figure out I assume we'll charge the $20 an hour like everybody else is getting for the other jobs right if they're doing other things isn't it sort of this flat $20 rate we've been giving everybody well it's gone up since then so but except with the um delinquent tax collector um they were making more because he I think Dave came in at um a rate that I was making at the time or something um so that was the only one that seems to be higher than normal um but we're not talking about the delinquent tax collector now though well no but I'm just she's but you're talking about these other positions you said right Liz yeah like if we're hodgepodgeing together all these jobs we need to know exactly how much we're paying for the other positions so that we know what kind of hourly rate we can offer this person right so currently we're paying like I said the assistant clerk was at 21 01 an hour and I don't know if you want what you want to use for the bookkeeper position because the one we really hired into that position was mark and that was at 25 how much did you pay uh uh the woman from Berlin oh she was weighed down she was like I want to say she was $18 an hour or something like that Patty oh my god 18 or $20 an hour right Steve you had your hand up yes well I mean I was doing some little figuring here before this and I had already written down a range and I'm brought I might be way off but I had written down a range of 21 to 26 so I mean I don't know but I mean that's a during this looking for is a range can I say something you know not a slut for never so just looking at some research in uh about affordable housing and Vermont wages the average uh the average wage in Vermont is $30 per hour that's not the median that's the average so uh and a livable wage for a housing wage which Liz can probably talk about is $22.78 an hour so I think the question that you know I would put I would say that you want to you don't want to pay somebody something where they would have to go on food stamps or where they'd have to it's like a Walmart situation you know pay a low volume so much they can't live this is going to be a full-time job with benefits and don't you probably have to get you know a livable wage that's not fine but Liz probably knows this is probably right up your alley right yeah but I mean I'm just thinking more along the line so we could think about it in terms of of yearly as well so that $18 an hour that I mentioned is $37,000 a year plus benefits um and you know so if we're looking at um say 45,000 per year which is kind of high that's higher than Sarah makes like I don't think this person shouldn't be making more or I don't know what you make Sarah but it's also a 32 hour I have we have 32 hour week jobs you know we're not working 40 hours oh you're doing 32 hours okay um I've already made I've already calculated a federal health list yeah what did what did you get so at $25 an hour it would be $41,600 with benefits it would be 58,000 little over 58,000 okay and if it's at $28 an hour it would be $46,592 for the regular wages and benefited it would be $63,689.54 How much was that 62? $63,689.54 and again that's just guessing that the person would be taking a single health insurance plan and this would cover the HSA contributions and the VMware contribution and horse taxes um here's what I I'm just going to throw hold on a second Randy I'm just going to throw this out uh you know I think we should I think we should say the range is from is from 25 excuse me 21 to 25 with benefits um I'm fine with 26 I think if we start going up to 28 or 30 we're gonna we're gonna have a bigger problem because we're gonna have to increase other other wages we're just going to make it even more expensive and you know that that's that's the range and if that's if that sends people away that sends people away I I don't want to uh we can't screw up our whole town pay scale completely or we're going to be in real financial trouble so I think that's a good place to start unless anybody just agrees. Randy you had something you wanted to say? I was just gonna you basically just said what I was going to say I mean if if Dave is down at the $21 mark it seems like the 20 to 25 an hour range because Dave was at the 21 mark uh the mark bookkeeper mark there I think you said his name was he's at 25 with no benefits um you're falling right right within the range of folks that you were paying the only other consideration that I think about when I'm hiring folks is uh the ability to offer them any kind of increases over time based on you know the the learning curve or whatnot um so you know hitting the top of the range when we're when we're looking at some something like that um oftentimes uh folks get disgruntled when they sit there and if you give them everything you can right up front and then they sit there forever without any kind of uh increasing oh well I've learned this job so well now I've been at it so anyway I I agree with the ranges that that Peter and Steve have have put out and it seems appropriate given what folks have been being paid. Can I just ask for a point of clarification is this the range for the combined job we're talking about not a bookkeeper? Yeah yeah I think that you know if we offered I like what Randy's saying and I agree with it you know if we maybe offered to hang on the person obviously but 24 gives them right almost at 40,000 for 32 hour a week if we offered 24 an hour. Well that's going to be up to the ones that are hiring them and what they see their experiences right that's what I mean yeah okay yeah their experience you don't have to talk about 24 yeah okay I also like the idea of a six-month probationary period with a review and then possibly a bump if things are going well at that point so that somebody comes in realizing there's you know there's a learning curve and if they work toward it there's there's some reward a few months down the road. Yeah that sounds good wait we forgot to go to the fire department it's not seven oh we have a oh I thought it was six. They said it's a seven and they wouldn't. Oh okay sorry I thought it was six that's a long way away. Well I know that's why we asked for a good seven. Hey listen for once we have for once we have a chance to have a good productive discussion and I think we have I think we've I think we've kind of beaten the horse to the ground for tonight as long as you're comfortable with those numbers to render in so far as a place to start. Yeah the person asked me she said I think she said am I just guessing that this is this job pays to low 40s to maybe 50 and first I thought she was saying per hour no that's what she meant so I mean I think that that's what people are expecting if they're applying for this job. So low 40s is going to be a lot higher than to 50 is going to be a lot higher than 25 per hour. It's over 32 hours and it's you can do it on the weekends sometimes if you want as long as you've got certain hours in the office. I think it's also important to make sure I understand the value of the benefit package. Yeah stress that to her and she is at the right age she's in her 40s she's got a kid in elementary school which is like yes you know somebody who might be long-term interested in in in this town. 26 gives you um 43,000 you already said so I'm wondering if she's you know she's gonna be like oh no that's kind of too low. Well we don't we don't know if we're going to get other applicants yet or not I just think that we need to be prepared when these start coming in. Yep. Yep. Well if we if we get forced into changing this we may have to change it but we just have to understand that they're going to be uh they're going to be other ramifications and costs more than just the uh cost for this one person. Right. And I believe me I agree with all the stuff about paying livable wages and and everything else. I just think you know I I agree with Phil 100% you know and I've I've been down this road so many times in my uh in my business career people do not value benefits. Once in a while somebody does but for the most part everybody pays yes Sarah. I value them too. There you go. So guys we actually only have we used a lot of time I got to get out and close this at 645 so you get to the fire department. Okay well we need we need to uh get Victor his chance and we've got a few other things we need to talk about quickly here so uh. Vic can you turn the light on so we can see you? It is it is on uh that's the natural light Vic there is no light on your face and I know you have a light on your face in your kitchen. Say hey let's end this discussion right now and why don't you come over to my house and I'll show you and then you won't have to bring this up okay. You got an open invitation Mary. There you go. The issue. All right. Yeah. Okay let's go Victor. I don't have anything if you don't want to talk about anything we don't have to talk anything. The only thing I got to say is you got one more truck in the hospital. Serious newest truck newest truck is in the hospital uh it's it's got a fuel fuel problem that uh it's going to take some issues to to fix it. Yeah. Injector. No no no I think it uh I think it's uh like the injection pump. Oh yeah yeah. Which is a little bit more big one injector as you know see yeah. Yeah. But it didn't go back to freight liner uh the warranty is just out I don't know on it. It is. Bootsies. Point to Bootsies and Barry. Yep. So Victor I know uh I know we had a discussion Shane was Shane was saying uh I forget exactly when it was but that we need to get our our ducks in a row and get this truck uh that we need to buy next summer ordered up soon real soon. Right. Do you know where that stands? Um we're just waiting for one last uh quote from the last guy that was in there and then we'll be moving forward on that. Okay. And uh I have one comment which is the the grader has been working on East Hill yesterday and today I believe and it was my first chance to experience what that roller compact or gizmo can really do. Right. It makes a big difference I think. A big difference. Good. I'm glad you're going to be interesting to see how it holds up. We're going to get some rain in the next couple of days but I think having the road compacted the way it is the effect of that rain is going to be way less than it has been on our newly graded roads in the past. Exactly. Great minds think along the same line. Shane said tonight I know we're going to get some rain. I hope we don't get a hard driving rain. We're hoping that that comes out is like more of a soaking rain because those hard driving rains do bother the roads no matter no no matter how good they are. Yep. Right. Can I ask a quick question that pertains to the roads? What's the status on the Lafayette Bale? We're still holding that second check. The status is the same as it was last time. So Shane promised me I don't know a week or two ago that he was going to make that call and settle that. So would you just tell us about that we need to get that resolved? Yes he did. He did make the call and Brent was going to call him back but he hasn't called him back. Okay. Well let's keep the problem. Glad he made the call. Let's keep the pressure on him. I mean obviously we're not paying the bill but we need to get it resolved. I don't know. Like we said you can blame the state if you want but for telling them that it's okay to do it if that actually did happen I don't know but the state's not going to give us any money. No. So we're going to end up paying it anyways. It's my suggestion. We offer a half a good faith and we're not blaming anybody but we're just saying it shouldn't be us paying the total cost to this though. You know if they're willing to get great if they're not then we've got to go forward from there I guess and make a decision but they ought to be able somebody in that organization ought to be able to look at this and make a decision. Well I'm sure they will. Yeah I mean I can see it both ways if they were told that everything was okay and it wasn't. Yeah. I wouldn't want my money either if I was doing that. But 50-50 is good. Go ahead Steve. I just think we should pay the bill. I mean that company is an extremely reputable company and I honestly believe if they were told to go ahead I mean they do stuff for the state all the time and they don't just go ahead and do work without being told and I think it will for that amount of money I think that we should pay the bill and be done with it. That is my my assessment. I cannot disagree with you. I don't disagree with you Steve. Other board members? I think we should try the 50% offer. Liz? I'm fine either way. I like the 50% off or just pay the damn bill. Yeah. Well let's do that. Probably pay the damn bill because we're just wasting time and money to try to figure it out. Since we've already made the phone call my suggestion would be if everybody agrees that we wait till the next meeting and if there's no action by the next meeting we just pay the damn bill. Okay. Yeah Agreed. Is that okay with everybody? Yeah. Okay. But there's shame to get make another phone call. I will do that. Can I just ask a point of clarification? Who is Shane Calls? Is he calling the state or is he calling his? Brent Tuxbury of the owner of FR Lafayette. Okay so he's calling the owner of Lafayette not the state. Okay. They know and we know. They know and we know we're not going to get anything from the state. Okay. Sarah would know disrespect to Steve. That's what it used to be called. That's what I could but if you were correct it's highway specialties. Yes I'm sorry I know that. I mean Lafayette is called highway specialties? Yes it is. Okay. You're deleting yourself there Steve. No I know it. I can't help it. Okay. Anything else anything else for the highway department? No. Thanks Vic. All right. Thank you Victor. You're welcome. Thank you. Okay approval of minutes of the September 8 21 regular select board meeting and the September 15 2021 special select board meeting. Is there a motion? Bill. There you go. Got three moving. There you go. Pick one Sarah. Is there a second? I'll second it. Okay. Thank you Liz. That was very clear. Okay all those in favor of approving the minutes for September 8 and September 15 please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? And yeah okay. What? Aye. No. Yes. Wait a minute. Who voted in favor of the motion? I did. Okay. Okay did anybody vote against the motion? No so we've approved the minutes. Thank you. I just also like to tell you that all of you have been sent the NEMRA contract. Thank you. Thank you Sarah. Okay. Kurt Cut for Joe and Pauline Goslin at 74th North Bear Swamp and you sent that to us Sarah. Yeah. Thank you. Move approval. Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Before we get well let's keep going. Correspondent Sarah anything? No. You basically. We made a plan to sign the orders. I have just one thing on the any other matters that may come before the select board and I feel like I'm sick of talking about this. But I want us to either fix and use and get trained and set up on the town email or spike the whole damn project. And I said this two weeks ago I offered to help people I didn't hear from anybody. I know Phil asked RB Technologies to help you Mary. I don't know whether that ever happened. I'm on. Steve's on. And Steve is on. I believe has an issue with you Liz is that correct? Well I have it on my phone and I don't have it anyplace else. Yeah but if you go into whatever it is rockspace.apps whatever it is just type that into your computer and put it in your username. Well I did. I tried it to hook it up to like um Outlook or something. And I just didn't and I might have something to do with my work and I maybe I shouldn't be combining the two but it's actually combined on my phone and so it's a little bit. I just haven't tried. I do I would like it on my what I'd really like it is to show up on my Gmail. Is that a possibility or no? Yes. Okay so. You want me to have Holland call you? Yeah have Holland call you. That's what he walked Mary through. He walked me in. If I could show up in my Gmail that would be great. That's exactly what mine does. Mine shows up in my Gmail says you know it brings everything up on both of my yeah. Okay. Okay. Well sounds like a problem. So are we good to move forward with it using that new email? Yeah. Are you okay Liz? Even though yeah yeah. Okay so Sarah and Darinda and everyone else we are now going to communicate using our new emails and it's behooves all of us to check them and pay attention. Well I do I just didn't stop doing it because you guys asked me to. You said start sending it to other emails. Oh no no I understand but we've got to uh you need to cross the river and get in the new world. We've been settling around with this for a long time. Could I ask somebody to can I just make somebody the control for this meeting so that I can close my computer and go to the fire department without losing everybody? I think we're ready to adjourn this recess. What I'm saying is that if I close my we're adjourning the select board meeting right we're going to participate in the fire department. You can't. No it's all. It's all a select board meeting okay. All select board meetings. So when we leave when we leave the fire department then we are adjourning the select board meeting and they are convening their meeting. Correct. Okay well I will explain that to them when we start. Well the way I viewed it is that we're bringing the select board meeting to just so they understand what's going on. Okay we wish them luck. So I guess what I'm saying is can I appoint somebody a host so that I don't accidentally close everybody out of the meeting? You can do me. You can do me. You can do me. Okay. Hey Phil can I ask you about the email now? Me? Yeah. I grab your down host. Bye guys see you later. I just have a good question though. There's like I'm seeing the instructions but that's for like the original before I had a password and stuff. So right um now that I have a password and everything I use my regular password right to set it up under. Yep okay. And then if you go into app stop. Recording stop. You'll um you can find various help menus for setting it up with different clients but I think it's probably just as easy for the sake of a little bit of time to have me have Holland just call you and walk you through it. It's probably just faster. Yeah. Anybody have a good joke? Good story. We'll find out how fast Sarah drives. Yeah I'm gonna go get a cup of coffee. That sounds like I've got mine. I wish it was something else but it's coffee. Yeah I'm on water. Let's hope we get let's hope we get some good candidates for these positions. I'm just I cross my toes every night. I mean the other thing I can do is just set it up as I'd rather have it go to my Gmail. I could just set it up as on my browser as a regular thing I check but I know I won't check it. Well see that's that's the way I have it set up it's on my browser so when I when I go in there it pops up right in front of me and it's right next to my my link for my Gmail so I click on one and then I click on the other but anyway. I love having them together because they all come in just as if they were all g-mails. Yeah that's what I want. My problem is I still get an I still get an overwhelming amount of email and just I struggle searching for for stuff in the morass of all the email but anyway that's my personal problem. I've got my finger in too many paws. Is that cute child we're looking at Phil? Oh he's getting himself a coffee. It's probably his grandkid. Yeah oh I imagine. Yeah his daughter's his daughter's kid. Yeah little baby girl. So I have a I have a question which has nothing to do with any town business at all but I'd be interested to see what people think so I've been trying to figure out when and if I should get my third Pfizer shot and figure out what the timing needs to be between my senior flu shot and my third Pfizer shot and I can't give anybody my doctor won't give me a straight answer the health department their website won't give me a straight answer I can't seem to get a straight answer from the pharmacy I'm frustrated. Well you're not supposed to get your booster until eight months after you had your shots. Well I'm eight months I've eight months past and I'm 75 years old and I have diathetes where does that put me? That puts you in getting a booster but you might like I didn't have my first booster till February and then the second of March so I'm not ready until November so if I were you like flu shot right away. Peter you can ride down you can go any day. Well that's right that's right here but when you go on I mean you know I tried to talk to the to the pharmacist at Kinney I waited I waited on hold for 30 minutes and she never picked up but you know when you go on the Kinney or the CBS website they don't say that but I've had people tell me they just walk into CBS and get the shot so I don't know. Just thinking are they going in to get the booster shot now? Yes. Yeah. Wow. My sister has got her third shot she got it in Florida. So I was told by Rite Aid or Walgreens that they are doing booster shots but you have to be considered someone who is immunocompromised so you might be taking and you have to be taking a specific medication so they have these questions that they ask you to see if you're really immunocompromised or you're just trying to sneak in and so there are certain diseases or medications like I said oh well my father's 87 and he only has one kidney and it's you know considered severe kidney damage well does he take a medication that makes him immunocompromised and I said no so they said he's not eligible. See that's crazy. That doesn't make sense. So but they also said they're not that you could probably walk in and say yes I do they're not checking anything but it's probably not the nice thing to do but if you were a Pfizer person it's just a matter of days before you're going to have access to it anyway. I heard it on the radio. You're supposed to wait 28 or 30 days between getting the regular flu shot and getting another COVID shot or vice versa? That's correct. That's what I'm going to call. Yeah. Which one of you is first? I think it's like calling the health department and asking them what to do if you have COVID and what you should do. If you talk to 10 people you get 10 different answers. I will tell you I don't have any immune compromise or anything and I have an appointment on the 23rd in November to get my third. So I don't I guess anybody by any chance listened to the governor's press conference today at noon? I was not able to listen. I was going to try and listen to what he had. It was very boring. It was very very boring. No good information from the press conference. So Victor if you wait 30 days should you get the flu shot first or the COVID shot first? A COVID shot first? Yeah the booster. Yeah I'll probably get that first. I mean I haven't even signed up. I haven't asked my doctor about the if I'm supposed to get the regular flu shot or not or if I should get it before or after. I haven't asked him so I haven't solved that problem. So why are you making an appointment to get the booster shot if you said you could just walk in and get it? I didn't say that. Oh I thought you said you have an appointment on the 23rd to get the booster shot. I do. But why do you have to November? But why do you have to make an appointment if you could go in tomorrow and get it? Because my eight months isn't up. I got you. All right that's all that's all. Sorry for not being clear. If all of us are having a hard time figuring this out imagine what's going on with the rest of the population. How'd you like to be in a third world country? Yeah although every day I wonder if we're becoming a third world country but that's a whole different subject. That's not one we want to get in before we start talking to the fire department that's for sure. Oh well I get a good night's sleep and I'm on top of my game. I think things are pretty good. When I get tired and frazzled I get discouraged and I think oh my god what's happening? So do we do we want to discuss Steve's proposal at this meeting? Because Steve had put together that proposal with a decision to be made in the middle of August. I don't know Steve's still on. I'm here. Well I think and we're you know the meeting's recess so we really shouldn't be talking about this. Should we discuss it with the fire department when we're back on the record? Yes and I think we have potentially an an alternate proposal to suggest but I don't want to talk about it until we got everybody we got everybody on. All I'm saying is that I don't know what we're gonna hear this gonna show. Please let's let's not talk about this until they're on the call or on the zone. Is it middlesexvermont.org? Yes. Yes. You smell Vermont out. It's not VT. Right. Yeah that's a big cup of coffee. It is. That's a whole lot of caffeine late at night. No it's decaf. You slip a little a little B&B and in a couple of shots of B&B it approves it dramatically. I know I wish. That's after the meeting. I already poured it. Thank you all for hanging around for this. I appreciate it. I think it's important for all of us to be involved. Sure. It's a lot easier than having to physically go to either place. Well it's an interesting question and this this gets back to other stuff as well but I mean I understand if the fire department's doing training they have to do that in person but shouldn't they be shouldn't they be zooming their meetings as well if we are in other town entities are but of course they're not part of the town so who knows. Liz are you working on that right now the email? No I gave up. Okay I'm gonna I'm gonna email put a trouble ticket in right now. Okay. When when do you want me to have him call you and which number? He can call my cell at 802-279-1711. Okay. And then let me look at my calendar. I mean do you think he'd call tomorrow or it would be like a while? It might be a couple of days. He's been they've been pretty busy I think they're like everybody else they don't have okay staffing right now. Well you know I actually have vacation day on Friday I'm not doing anything so he could call me anytime on Friday and on Thursday it looks like he could call me you know anytime after 10 o'clock I just have okay. I think I'll leave it with Friday there's more likely that that might happen so okay. Set a time Liz I mean I set a time of 11 he called me a few minutes before 11 it was really nice to have that time to know to be available. Yeah tell him how about um yeah 10 or something. 10-ish? Yeah. Okay. His name is Holland. Yeah H-O-L-L-E-N-D. Yeah from Rockspace. Yeah he's a nice guy and he's very patient. Oh good. He's from RB Technology. Right. Not at Rockspace. Okay from RB Technology. Okay. Is RB Technology is that the one that was out on Main Street and Barrie forever Phil? Um no. No. They're in Eastmont Pillar now but I don't know I don't think they were ever ever have been in Barrie to my note. Peter might know he's. Yeah no they were they worked out if they was out of Ruben's house for a long time which is right next to where they are now they're now in the old uh the old airplane hangar. Right. That was an airport up there at one time. There used to be a computer shop that started up doing like computer repair type stuff for forever that was by the Paramount Movie feeder in. They've been gone. They've been gone a long time. Yeah they. I could have sworn their name was RB Technologies or something to that effect but it might not be the same place. Slightly very I don't think so Randy only because uh Noel Johnson did and still does business with uh with RB and we were in and uh in at almost the very beginning so anyway but I could be wrong I mean there might who knows but uh I don't think so. So how well you did Peter you work for Noel? I was Noel. I was Noel II. Oh yeah 44 years Randy. I was Carol Ayer. Carol Ayer was my partner and then Tim and then a couple of other people became minority owners along the way but yes when we when I started out there in 1974 or three we had three people working three staff people working full-time and two principals and our total payroll was under $90,000. That was five years before I was born. That make you that make you feel old Peter? I don't need that to make me feel old Randy. You should see me crawl out of bed in the morning and go for my Tylenol bottle. Oh boy. Hey Peter when did Tim noise uh Tim noise uh when did Tim join? Tim here. Tim thanks. So I'm just I mean a long long time ago he was he was basically almost right out of college. Yeah. So you know 35 years ago or something like that so he's the senior member now? Yes. Then Sean and David or the other two? They're the up and they're the up and comers. Yeah. So I sold I sold I sold my stock to them and now it's time for uh I have I have one more nice check coming to me in the spring and then they're all done with me and they've got to start buying Tim out. But so far our internal perpetuation scheme has worked. It worked for me and hopefully it'll work for him. It's a tough it's a tough thing to uh it's a tough thing to do I can tell you. We did it for Noyl but now I believe now I believe they have uh almost 60 employees so it's quite a quite an operation. It's taken me a long time to say they not we. Hard to let it go when you're when you put so much into something like that you know? Well it was it was it was hard for me. I uh you know you spend you spend in my case most of my working life all but a couple of years building that business and then you got to figure out how to pass it on to somebody else. It's a real shifting of years. But anyway it's you know it's great to do if you can do it. It was a wonderful opportunity. Noyl Noyl promised me when I went to work for him basically I worked for Etna for two years in in Burlington but other than that I was right out of the service and Noyl said to me if this all works out you'll have an opportunity to be the owner of the business and and he lived up to his uh he lived up to his promise and they're all work. So pretty good opportunity for somebody from Princeton, New Jersey who had experience and radar repair and a history degree in college. Doesn't quite line up does it? Nope. Nope although you know like everything else the the skills you learn along the way are all applicable. I mean getting along I was I was saying my three years in the army was my graduate school learning learning how to muddle my way through the army and get along with people and and survive was a pretty good education for me I can tell you all different kinds of people. So somebody must have a joke or a story. Come on. We're being recorded by Orca by the way you know. Oh she didn't stop the recording. Well we've got to make an important story then. You can't you can't stop Orca. I stopped the town's recording but I didn't stop. I can't stop Orca. That's all right. So you gotta be careful what you tell for jokes. Yeah I agree. We should be careful anyway. Yes. Well here's not a joke. I cannot figure out how to cancel my son's health insurance at Northeastern. They make it so hard to wave it like I can't find it anywhere. Pull them up. That's what you'll be doing all day Friday Liz is sitting on the phone with somebody. There goes your day off. Yep. They tell us when the deadline is they don't say wave it here with the link. I've done it before but I just can't find it anywhere. They suck you for every penny they can get out of you. That's a common complaint. Hey there she is. It's on. Sarah just went out to get her phone. Okay thanks. Unless you couldn't connect. But I got it connected. You got it connected? Yeah I'm surprised. Yeah we didn't touch a thing. It just turned on. Probably didn't let it start up long enough. It should be right back. Yeah. I was going up with a 450 service trooper grade. I've never... Yeah I did it. How'd you do it? I didn't touch a thing. All of a sudden they were talking at me. We have spotty internet connection. So do you want me to remain host or do you want it back? Well I'm going to be taken minutes late over fashion way. Okay well I don't think anybody else is going to come on so I'll just stay as host. I got to start the recording again though. Let's see. Do you want to make me host? You can make me host. I don't mind. That's okay. Well if it's a shaky... Oh you've gone back. I think you are host already. What really? Yeah. Recording in progress. There I am. You are host. There you go. Good enough. Can you guys see? Let's hope this work. So is everybody there who's going to be there? Jeff and Doug are in a meeting right now. Oh okay. All right. I'm going to just do it like this. I don't know how to do it. There. Can you guys see stuff? Yes. Okay. Okay. Hey sir you might want to mute them until they're ready to start. Okay here we go. So good evening. I did up a summary like I did last month and added a few more details where our call volume... Jeff can you just hold on for one second? Sure. So I just want to be clear that as much as this feels like your meeting, the first part of this meeting is still actually a select board meeting. Okay. Not that it matters but that's the way it needs to work. So what I envision is and hopefully this works for all of you is we'll have our discussion with you and hear what you have to say and we may have some comments or some reaction to that but then we're going to adjourn the select board meeting. We will withdraw and you can continue your fire department meeting. Does that work? Yeah. So that said we have with us, we have the select board, we have Randy Jury, we have Vic Dwyer and we have Darinda the Treasurer with us and it would be helpful if you could say who you have there. So far we have Doug Hansen the Chief, myself, Eric and Tia the Captain. People are still, our other Captain just came in, Secretary just came in. So that's Robert Kaczpa and Jess Kaczpa and one of our juniors, Robert Jr. Kaczpa, we have Barge Bauer who's head of the fast squad, we have Stephen with us and where's Jamie you know. Oh there you are. So we have and then we have Scott with us as well. Okay thank you. Thank you so go ahead with your report. Thank you. So total for the year we're up to 43 calls. Over the last month since we last met we've had 10 calls. We've had two mutual aid outs, no mutual aid ins. The max number of members that have responded have been 12. The minimum number were three for an average of 6.7 people per call. Engine one has been out seven times, engine six three times, tanker one four times and the rescue has been out seven times. The calls that we've gone to are a vehicle fire fire on 89 that ended up not being a call it was a blown turbo charger. We had a fire alarm at Red Hen which ended up being a false alarm. There was a structure fire in Berlin that we responded to with a tanker for mutual aid. We had a vehicle versus bear up on 89. They apparently had been sitting there for a while and some passerby apparently had called. We ended up being cancelled before we could respond. There was a missing missing person search and VSP was the director of that. N50 the intersection of route two 100B which is a fatal accident. The structure fire can't meet. One of the buildings there right behind Red Hen. We think it was a situation with that lightning storm that we had some real close hits and it was probably a there was more and then there was part nine. The gap that we talked about last month was turned out being dead. It would cost too much to repair it versus buying a new one. So we purchased a new we used $499 in the end committee and then the remaining $195.45 was from out of our donation fundraising funds. The chain saw that we had is waiting parts and parts delivery is slow. We're looking at the possibility of voting someone on the department tonight. It'll be discussion on that. Training for this month was basic life support CPR. So that's above just the average citizen CPR. We finished everyone finished that at the beginning of the month. Any questions on so I mean I guess the I guess the question is so how are you doing in your in your recruiting efforts? How many members do you have at this point in time? 13 so we're up three. Yep, which is great. Yep. Any questions other other board members? Are there any of the new recruits who are in town all day? One of the ones is works in town and and she can leave and she works over on on the school side of the town so she can leave during the day if she has to for a call. So that ups our Annie on on in town daytime responders. So Jeff do you all the figures you gave us do you have those written down and you could give those to Sarah so we could all get a copy? Yeah I can send her that. That'd be great because I started taking notes but you talked too fast for me to get it all. Sorry about that. No it's okay it's just there's a lot of information in there. Anybody else have anything? Board members? So I've been giving a lot of thought to our process and where we're and where we're going with this and and I very much appreciate the the effort you guys have been making over the summer. Originally originally we said we were going to make some kind of decision about how we were going to go forward by September 1st and obviously that date has has come and gone and at the same time I think overall we're we're pleased with the with the progress you guys are making. That said though we still have the elephant in the room question hanging out there about how we would how we should proceed going forward from an organizational point of view the issue being should the fire department continue to be an independent non-profit fully fully funded by the town or should it should it morph into in fact a a town fire department and in thinking about this and how we should and how we should go forward and this is not not decided at this point in time but I wanted to talk about it and and the other select board members haven't haven't heard this either but in in thinking about it my recommendation is in thought is that we keep we keep going forward the way we are through the fall and then make a decision as to whether we put this to a town vote on town meeting day rather than have the select board make that decision and I don't know how other board members feel about that the more I thought about it I was uncomfortable having it be solely a select board decision it seems like it's serious enough and a big deal enough that the whole community should be involved in making that decision if in fact we go forward with that with that step but I wanted to let you know that and also let you hear the reaction if any from select board members about that thought Steve yeah Peter I think that's a good idea but I just wanted to clarify that all of the information that I put together in that proposal if you will or whatever it was a plan and and those dates were arbitrary arbitrary for me and trying to do it in a manner but I just wanted to put that out there that that those dates aren't just hard and fast but I think the plan of going back to what you just said I think that's a good idea that if we move forward with this that it goes to a town-wide vote I have a question Peter yes how does this um how does this address whether or not they remain their own entity or they fall under the town how does this address the issue around um paint like mutual aid with with other towns so the I get the feeling the other towns want us to come up with something that somehow supports them more and whether or not we take over the fire department not take over but whether they fall under us or they are themselves what's going to change that prevents us from having to pay Waterbury and Montpelier for their services how will that affect it right so the answer is the only way it will affect it that I see is that the town will be more involved on a high level in the fire department and communicating with other and potentially communicating with other other towns and organizations the fire department whether it is a municipal fire department or an independent organization the way it is today they're taking the steps they need to do to do that by recruiting new members and and building up the fire department that is going to that is going to resolve that we've already had some positive comments from Waterbury in particular about the progress they've seen already so you know it doesn't we we are not it is it is not the intent of any of this that we are going to meddle in the affairs of the fire department on a day-to-day basis what I'm more concerned about in this is that we all work together and we assist the fire department any way we can in meeting their goals and objectives and at the same time they work and cooperate with us in terms of meeting the the town goals and objectives which are basically to provide good fire service and fast squad service to the residents of our town but also support the surrounding community as they support us it's not you know there's no things we're not going to be I mean I would like to think we will continue having on some basis joint meetings because I think it's important to to communicate back and forth no matter no matter how we go forward and at the end of the day if we get to December and we're very comfortable with the way things are going and it's the sense of the select board that we should continue the way we are then we continue the way we are on the other hand if if it seems like a good idea to put the question to a town vote then we can go ahead and do that I'm not saying we're making the decision tonight to do that I'm saying that's what I see is the as the process but again I've heard from Steve I haven't heard from anybody else on the board and I haven't heard anything from the fire department. Another thought too is and maybe this is something we can ask Grace when she comes from central amount regional planning commission I wonder if there's any benefit to the fire department being under our you know as a municipal fire department in case maybe some of those ARPA funds could be used for things like the air tanks right um if that falls into some sort of you know COVID need or or whatever and then you know that would be that would be a reason why we'd actually want to do that or are there some funding opportunities that make sense for the fire department to be under the municipal umbrella. I think the answer to to both those questions is potentially yes although it's hard to uh it's hard to quantify that but that's exactly you know that's exactly the kind of cooperation and and help that we can provide but more than anything else I think the important thing is is good communication back and forth which we haven't historically had necessarily and there've been bad feelings on bad feelings on both sides about that and I'm hoping these meetings can tend to improve that I mean I very much want to know how the fire department is is feeling I hope they're they're proud of what they've accomplished already I'm I'm glad to hear I mean three three people makes it make a big difference on a small department especially especially people in town and you know it sounds like the training is better organized than it was which which I very much appreciate um I think that's important etc etc but you know we're not going to become uh the select board is not going to become firemen except for maybe you Liz you're already taking the first step yeah we can sign you up for a six month first select board members I'm go ahead Jeff I'm sorry we can sign Liz up for a six month firefighter one course I just have one more question yep you just um so I you know Montpelier yes yes okay that Montpelier is going to like what's going to be good enough for them what in terms of what it says having had having had conversations with with both communities what they want to see is progress I mean they know we're a small town and we're going to have a small fire department and we're not going to have you know unbelievable equipment and this and that but they want to feel like that we can be as reliable as we can be first responders in our own community and be able to support them when they need us they're not there's no there's no secret uh there's no secret formula I don't believe one probably going to be the former that they're going to want to see us respond because it doesn't sound like they call much for help anyway is that right Jeff Jeff would like to be recognized yes Jeff so first off Montpelier is most likely not going to call us unless we become union firefighters that's just the way they're operating under the current administration uh previous to this administration they would call us quite frequently so their their main plan is to call Berry City for any structure fires that they have so until they see that we're somewhere at that level which realistically we're not going to have five or ten um union firefighters in this department at least not in the next five to ten years so um the the proof I think the proof's in the putting since this summer the structure fires we've had we've not needed to call them in fact we haven't called them since the church fire um and we are going out of town significantly more than we're calling for mutual aid in um I think that that in itself shows that other towns are very happy to call us and realize what we can bring to the fire or the table as it may be um when they need assistance and they're they're not hesitating to call us so Montpelier is I don't see any change in Montpelier's hesitation to call us quite frankly no matter what we do we did invite them to the training we had and no one cared to show up yep I think you're probably right about that I mean what what what what both Waterbury and Montpelier were concerned about is and never say never but on a regular basis they don't want to be the first responders in our town and for this year and and as it shows this year they are not except for the correct correct so you know I think we're I I think we're on a good uh on a good path I just think you know we all need to be thinking about um the opportunities and issues with regard to this reorganization concept the other thing I want to be clear about is in my mind at least this does not prevent the the non-profit entity continuing to exist in in Waterbury as much as it's a Waterbury town fire department they have a non-profit entity which is part of their part of their fire department and they use that for various for various activities so um you know I don't know I don't know how that work could work we could think about it so I would really like to hear uh I would real and I know I realize I'm uh I'm kind of springing this on everybody at the same time but I I thought it was important to uh to bring it up and at least talk about it so so Mary and Phil I'd love to hear what you think about this I think it's worth it's worth considering but if we're going to take a vote uh we're going to have a town vote voters really need a lot more information than we have now and if we're going to wait and to do that until December I don't know if we can get the information together that we need and we need to I think because as we go forward here we need to work on that I mean certainly certainly uh they're gonna they're gonna need to understand exactly how it how it could work and what it would be and what the benefits what the what the positives are and what the negatives are both from the point of view of the of the town and the and the fire department but I just like the idea what I am what I am reticent to do is have a select board meeting on some rainy night in November and make this decision I think that's the wrong way to go um so you know if it's a town-wide vote yes I mean the the town needs to be uh the town needs to be informed well informed and some people pay attention and some people won't but right now I'm sure if you pull people in town and ask them uh if they knew the discussion that was going on with the fire department they would say they have no idea yeah so well I'm confused about what you're what what you and um Jeff who said about Montpelier Jeff says they won't call us because we don't have union we don't have union firefighters you tell me that um that the city manager is calling you and putting a squeeze on you to make a decision on whether you know what we're gonna do to beef up our fire department and uh they're not they are I I would I would just amend what you're saying to say you know it was a concern not us not a squeeze well I I didn't come I couldn't come up quite with the right way I wanted to say it I just wanted to say you told me they've been pressing you to make a decision well no they haven't been pressing me to make a decision they've been pressing us and the fire department to show progress so that they don't feel like they have to be the first responder to events that occur in our town that was their concern we they said we are always willing to help we're going to provide mutual aid when you need it that's not an issue we just don't want to be the first responders right that was where the so have you raised with with Bill Frazier the fact that the issue that Jeff has raised that that uh that they won't call us because we don't have union members I don't think that's a concern their concern was more that exactly what Jeff is doing I mean they're recruiting people they're they're training more they're doing I mean Jeff is doing all the right stuff right now that's what the Montpelier wants I just wondered whether or not you know you're kind of talking on two different planes that's all because I thought that they said that we didn't respond to mutual aid too but you know maybe I'm wrong about that but anyway have you discussed that with Bill Frazier I have not had discussion with him recently I had a discussion with him about six weeks ago and I know I'm a phone call but I was waiting I was waiting to get through tonight's meeting before before I call them but I will call them and I will also either either Steve or I will talk to to Garrett I think Steve has already talked to Garrett who you mean the Waterbury the person the Waterbury yes okay anything else Phil what are you what are you thinking about this still still there Steve still anymore I think Phil just got dropped to be honest with you yeah yeah well for a while Steve was off too do you have to back in no it just it apparently everybody's using the internet and it just dropped me out and then it let me back in all on its own so any any questions about any of this from the from the fire department well you've got us so I would I would say right now our morale is very high with what we're doing and the calls we're going on both in town and out of town and I think we're showing the towns that we're questioning our commitment we're showing them that we we are committed yes we're small but we're I mean as you know it's hard to get people to join the fire department it's hard to get people to sign up for government jobs so we're doing our best and getting new people when we when we have them we're like I said morale is high with what we're doing I think the while we're not doing it for the money I think the increase in pay has shown an increase in in in responses just makes it easier a little bit easier of course nobody'll see that until December but just knowing that you're getting paid more than 250 an hour is is helpful remind me again did you raise it from 100 to 300 is that right or am I wrong about the for each time they appear $10 an hour or part thereof so if you're out for 55 minutes you get $10 if you're out for an hour 10 minutes you get $20 I thought there was a stipend too you don't have the stipend anymore that's change that's what the stipend rates are going to okay gotcha that's so that they're they're per hour yeah I remember that so Jeff what do you think about this proposal to have the town well personally I I I like the way things are being run right now I think we're doing a good job as far as budgets I mean we bring you our budget we you see every time we're spending stuff and the only thing that we really have any um slush to play with is equipment purchases and that's about $3,000 on a line item for our total budget the rest of the budget be it what we submit as an operational budget versus the total what the town what you all put in our budget to 100 and whatever thousand very little that is at our discretion to do any any spending with so it's it's really from that aspect I think you have as much control over it now as if there were any changes being made so I don't really see the need for a change I other than I think the the meetings whether we continue one month we come there and one month you come here or we come there every other month to give you an update and on our what's been going on but I think it's it's a lot better that we're talking to each other because yes that has been a difficult situation in the entire 17 years I've been on the department so and I I I'm hoping we're going to continue these uh continue these meetings I think they're I think they're valuable I think you know you guys can can learn a little bit about what we're thinking and why we're thinking the way we are and we can we can do the same we can do the same on the other side so I appreciate your all of your time and attention yes I see him he's looking he's looking at handsome as ever till sorry my computer died yeah I had to go rust off the court anybody else on the fire department of any other concerns or anything they'd like to say okay well well you've got us here anyone no chance now they're all they're all shaking their heads no they're enjoyed listening to what you all had to say thank you everyone for your service yeah thanks for our pass so these guys have a meeting you know no yeah I didn't you want to get Phil's opinion as well while you had all the select board with us yeah so so Phil now that you're back I was just kind of polling the board members to what they were thinking about this uh this idea and I realize it's uh it's all brand new and you haven't had any chance to think about it but does that approach make sense to you it does I yeah I like that idea that you know we continue on as we are um continuing to communicate take a little a little bit more time to um decide the best way to move forward with this and I I agree Peter I think um a vote um of the town to um finally you know make a decision about this is probably the way to go I I think there's actually a number of people in town who don't realize that the fire department is uh a non-profit um they they don't understand that it's not under that it could be it could be the majority but uh anyway at least a few people that I've spoken to over the summer have said I I I didn't know that was true so um you know they were rather confused about it but yeah I like this approach Peter I think uh that's a good way to good way to move forward thank you so uh with that unless anybody has anything else um I would suggest we adjourn the select board meeting and fire department you can get on with your uh regular meeting and we would expect you to come uh uh be part of our meeting when Sarah when would that be okay well that's going to be the very very busy meeting of uh October 19th oh and that's when we're starting the budget that's when you're going to oh yeah the visit to Dolan Road uh the uh CVRP uh person is coming to uh talk about ARPA funds and you're starting the budget you can't possibly have your budget ready by the 19th can you of October no they can't have the budget ready by the 19th of October no well let's let's plan to have a let's plan to have a uh short meeting with the fire department then I just I just want to we start postponing these meetings we'll stop having them and I don't want to have that happen okay so the next meeting with the fire department's going to be the 19th of October is that okay that works for them and then our next meeting our next meeting at the fire department would be when I don't know my calendar sitting here all right well we can cross that we can cross that bridge November November 16 okay so uh thank you everyone for participating and I am going to adjourn the select board meeting and leave the fire department to your business thank you all very much thank you very much thank you good night everybody what when it gets closer to