 Hey, good evening and welcome to another edition of Montpelier Civic Forum. No, it is not February and no, we don't have town meeting coming up and we don't have candidates running for office. We have a former candidate but we don't have candidates running for office. What we do have is an extraordinary circumstance, an extraordinary time in our town and we have a series of these that are special and they're a great series. You really should watch them all. We have Bill Fraser talking about the hit that the city budget took and talking about city services, how they're being delivered, how he believes that our town will reopen and we even have a section on policing in that that's really worth watching. We also have Libby and Jim from the Montpelier Roxbury School. We have our superintendent and we have our board president. They're going to talk about what happened in the spring. They're going to talk about the graduation that wasn't, but it wasn't, it wasn't and they're going to talk most importantly about what the plans are as they evolve towards the fall. That is a really good show. We have Carolyn Brennan who's the director of the library service co-director actually of our Kellogg-Hubert library and she comes in and talks to us about the Kellogg-Hubert that is and the Kellogg-Hubert that's evolving as they try and figure out how to open. We also have the two police chiefs, Chief Fakos and Chief Pete, which is going to be an excellent show. It is an excellent show actually where we frame what their vision of community policing, which is 21st century policing, what that means, what is happening in Montpelier today and what the vision is to where it will evolve. That is an excellent show. John Odom is coming in to talk about elections, talk about what he thinks is going to happen in August and what he'd like to see happen in November. He'll probably end up, I haven't filmed that one, he'll probably end up begging for election helpers. We'll see. I also have Anne Watson, our mayor and Anne has been on this numerous times not only as mayor but as city council person and a long time ago she was candidate Anne Watson, yes? Yes, yeah and here we are and I've been the mayor, now gosh this is going into my third year. We last spoke in February and that was a long show and we covered a lot of territory. Was there anything we left out? At that last show? Yes. My goodness that was a long time ago but of course at that point who could have anticipated that we would be dealing with a global pandemic. Which hit less than a month after you and I were here in the studio with our show. Shortly after town meeting day that is when everything started to close and in addition you know here we are also in a long overdue reckoning about racial justice and so big happens. But we discussed that. Actually we did discuss that during the show in February. That's not something that's simply now. That's fair, that's fair. We discussed it in fact because as people who watch this show know you are our town's physics teacher. Yes. And you teach every time that you go into that school you pass the Black Lives Matter flag. That's right, yes. That was an initiative a couple years ago by really a group of students to have a symbol that fell that they felt represented them. And we were the first in the country to have a school raise a Black Lives Matter flag and. We've been fairly keenly aware of that issue. We have commission. We have a panel that works on that don't we? A racial justice. So the school has a racial justice alliance club and the city has a social and economic justice committee. We recently gave them some money to contract out some services to do basically an assessment of how we're doing as a city. Now that is not a reason for the rest of us to depend on them to do the thinking around issues of justice in our community. I think it's everyone's responsibility to be having those those conversations and difficult conversations even. Now at the same time we'll head over to our police chiefs. Sure. You were involved in the process of hiring a new police chief. I was actually not involved. I was not on the hiring committee. There were other members of the public that were on the hiring committees or part of the groups that that were involved in hiring as well as I know some of the staff got to meet the candidates ahead of time and vet them as well. But that was not me and it was not council. But council did set out kind of the overall spec, the overall job specification that pointed towards the type of chief that we were looking for. Well I think it was pretty clear that we wanted chief who was in line with our values. What are our values in terms of policing? Well I think it's I think it's pretty clear coming from especially from the current soon-to-be retired chief that one of the well so speaking generally I think we have a high value on treating everyone fairly doing our best to serve and protect particularly vulnerable populations and taking a sort of a whole-person approach and a compassionate approach to policing that I think resonates with our community and a lot of that is embodied in something called the president's report on 21st century policing which outlines some best practices for policing that that really do embody a sense of compassion and fairness for all people. How does that compare to community-based policing? Well it's related and I mean community policing can mean a lot of different things and we're gonna as a city we're going to be having more conversations about policing on into the future as we get to know our new chief and as we get to having these hard conversations around race but I also think you know we want to take a look at what our data says and what how like basically where is Montpelier's growth edge and actually you know to to our to Tony Fakus's credits and to the the staff's credit we've all we really have already started having those conversations I mean this coming fiscal year the police are hiring a social worker to be a part of the department which I think is very shared with Barry right shared with Barry yes which is really progressive like that's sort of a different approach it's not normal for police departments to have social workers embedded right in the department and in addition to that in the last in the FY 21 budget we also hired or there's money to hire a street outreach person to particularly work with our unsheltered population to try to help get them the resources that they need and that that's separate from the police department and that was intentional because you know some folks that are living out on the street might be wary of someone who they felt like was associated with the police department and that that's fine so but this person is really there to just you know keep in touch with that community and help connect them to resources and opportunities so really grateful for the council's willingness to be creative and think outside the box on those things and and I think that that is going to continue and we're going to take in you know some honest look at our own data what when the chief posted on Facebook his introductory post he mentioned not only minorities and he mentioned LGBT I always mess that up I'm an old guy but he also meant people with mental health issues yes could could you elaborate on that a little bit because the two shootings that we had that involved place both involved people with mental health issue or well so there's there's a lot to be said about that the one of the one of the difficulties around mental health issues is that it's not always apparent you know a lot of times if there's a you know person of color a lot of times that is apparent and you know we we do keep track of our racial profiling data for the city but again you know we're not asking people necessarily to disclose if they have mental health issues but it it may not be clear right away when a police officer walks into a tense or difficult situation if that's what's going on now this is one of the reasons why we hired a social worker to be a part of the department but you know sometimes when it's you know three in the morning that social worker is not necessarily on call or on duty well the shooting on the bridge over at the roundabout was five there weren't even social service agencies open right that's and so it's it really is a tough situation but at that same at the same time our police do have trainings around mental health so you know all that is to say you know our staff is was working hard trying to be you know as proactive as possible around those types of issues and you know we're always open to to suggestions and doing better if there's if there's better ways of doing things so you know it's an ongoing conversation and we'll see how it evolves when you hear people say deep on the place what goes through your mind as a mayor and as an experienced civil city council person sure sure so when I hear that a lot of times well first I would say I started thinking what does that phrase mean to that person and why why are they saying that look what are they where are they coming from on that and I feel like part of my job as mayor is to listen honestly to everyone and recognize that people have lots of different backgrounds from which they may be saying those things and and to be fair you know a lot of that you know I have to process as like you know is is there an opportunity to defund the police is what is the cost of of doing that because there are I think there are hidden benefits well perhaps hidden benefits but also hidden costs to that and I think there's also there's there's just there's a lot to process around that and I think we're gonna that conversation will take a long time and that's okay in a sense defunding is a zero and in one sense it's a zero some game if you add something you take away from the police department to add that when people speak of defunding aren't they speaking of rerouting towards people like a social worker and it and a person to go out on the street aren't we in essence offering those services that the defund police people are desiring yeah I mean I think sometimes people don't always know that we've done that is there a more opportunity to do that kind of thing possibly so even if we are doing well is there opportunity to do better sure I think it's also important to understand the national narrative around that as well because in Vermont in particular we our social services generally speaking are provided for through the state and municipalities generally speaking don't provide the kind of social services that might be embedded in say you know a town like Los Angeles or Portland Oregon where they're big enough that they do have their own set of social services or even like Burlington necessarily now that's not to say that we couldn't do something but but we do we we are already going down that path again could we do better quite possibly anyway open to that conversation reshaping the police and adding in the show that Bill did which is an excellent show and you should watch it and it's on orca the orca channel on YouTube he spoke of a city budget that's been devastated could you talk about the city budget oh sure so when we first saw that everything was closing and maybe Bill has covered this already but it makes no difference you have to assume people haven't watched okay fair enough fair enough as everything was starting to close and we realized that we were going to have a shortfall of revenue the initial estimates were that we were going to be looking at about half a million dollars for just the last quarter what what for us is the last quarter with the major portion of that being the parking parking is a little funny it's free right now it was free right now yes but there are other losses of revenue particularly with programs not happening with the rec department or the senior center that that kind of thing and local options tax exactly that that's really the big the big one was that with with restaurants and bars closing we were not going to see the meals rooms and alcohol tax and as well as hotels closing as well so with that shortfall of revenue we have half a million dollars we knew there was we were going to need to take some drastic action to come out basically even or to make that up and so as a result we asked the staff to take voluntary furloughs and a lot of that was well so people people did volunteer it was about a quarter of our staff that that ended up taking that option now they're coming back soon well this yes they are and they it's not clear that everyone's gonna be starting on the same day I don't think I think people in fact will not be starting all together on July 1st or whatever but we're going to sort of phase into getting everybody back but it also depends on how things continue now with the furloughs that just happened it turns out that we were able to basically break even for this FY 20 this current fiscal year which ends at the end of this month which is very soon for as things unfold with FY 21 starting July I think fiscal year yes yes thank you fiscal year 21 we are just gonna have to see how it unfolds now at our last two council meetings really we looked at basically a triage budget so if things continue to in a triage situation someone dies well well one hoped not right so but it's sort of like thinking about what would we do if if the revenue continues to not come in or continues to be less than we had anticipated well it's going to be less it's going to it's going to be less the question is really how much less and so we approved a budget that does have some cuts to it and ideally the situation turns out to be better than we expect and we'll be able to roll back in some of those cuts that we made the federal money that came the billion dollars that they're discussing on the state level yeah is any of that coming to the municipalities my understanding right now is generally speaking that it is not oh yeah brutal yes yes and we'll see how things progress at the federal level that there were some some glimmers of hope there but I'm not sure that now for those for those of you who watch the bill show you get a much more complete explanation of what I'm going to say but there's a state program called pilot which is payment and lieu of taxation for all those government buildings that we have in town and the problems that we're having with pilot is that it's funded by the local options tax of not only our town but of a number of towns so that we won't possibly get the degree of pilot funds that we thought we would get yes it's much better than oh yeah right exactly and especially is a lot of our businesses are still particularly you know bars and restaurants are still only starting to open many of them are still not open that will that will also continue to affect our revenue so what did that budget look like that it's a preliminary budget I take it well yes and I was really glad that we were not in a position where we would be going back to voters and saying actually we need more money that is very much we really want to avoid doing that that is that is we were definitely looking at cuts before we look at you know going back are we going to voters for a new recreation center so a little shift of topic there but it's the same topic of coming I see what you're saying the current recreation building that's on Berry Street needs significant work at one point back in March really we were talking about having a bond to do in August as soon as August possibly in November because those would be the two you know the August one is along with the primaries and the November one is along with the general election it is looking like we are not going to do that we are I don't think anybody is in a financial place where they're ready to think about taking on taking on new debt taking on a new project that would potentially be in the millions of dollars so so that's pushed off yes and this preliminary budget that we approved a lot of I mean they were the staff is really looking for big ticket items you know that could make substantial deferring purchase of capital equipment yes capital equipment and projects which it really does affect the maintenance plan that we had been on we we worked many years to street maintenance street maintenance exactly we worked really hard to get back to a level of funding where we would be funding our streets and sidewalks at a sustainable level like this is what it would take to maintain all of our streets and have them be an acceptable pavement condition index PCI so where we have to do at that in theory it just becomes routine maintenance after we've invested exactly once we've gotten everything up to a certain level then then you can sort of it's easier to it's cheaper even to maintain things that when they're at a high quality already and we've skipped a cycle well that's so for some parts of Montpelier yes we will be a little bit behind will be a year behind in that maintenance schedule so you know that that means that it's possible that it's some future year one hopes that you know we will have recovered and things will be you know healthy again and and we'll be able to make up that difference but we are in basically in a gap right now were there any other major capital projects we put off well nothing specific comes to mind right now I mean it was generally the big one yeah yeah paving and you know that kind of maintenance as well as equipment purchases were there any other initiatives that the city was going to take that we're delaying well so we did end up I think taking some funding from the Montpelier Development Corporation but that's you know all part of the discussion even for next year so let's talk about something we're hopeful okay our transit plans yes we discussed that at some length in February as a geez I hope that this were to happen yeah could you update us sure well if I recall we talked about microtransit exactly back then I so that's an initiative of a committee of people and I know the sustainable Montpelier Coalition is a part of that group and I don't know where they're at with that I think they were hoping to be rolling out an initial trial a pilot but they got funded but yes it did get funded but I don't know what their timeline is now they were hoping to be starting it this summer but I think it's I think everything sort of been delayed now this is simply at this point in this show this is insider language how would this differ from the circulator sure so microtransit is very much like uber if you're or or Lyft if you're familiar with those technologies but it would be more publicly funded ideally cheaper I believe and and also accessible so there would be let's say what would be the basically how it work is that you would log into the app and say I am here and I want to go there and then one of the van drivers would come to pick you up and might it might pick up a few other people along the way so it's it's actually a little bit more like a shared uber or a shared Lyft as that so you won't have ghost buses driving around with no one in them well right well there could still be times when it's not used or times when there is still just one person in it but but it all depends on the uptake of that technology like how many people actually use it to get to work or to get to you know practice or to whatever they need to go and I believe they were looking at trips specifically that started and ended within Montpelier which theoretically I mean that's that should be the kinds of commutes that are easy to to transition to that kind of system so we'll see how it goes and should be should be fairly flexible in terms of people actually coming to where you are so we'll see how it goes so in theory and this is wildly in theory those people who work downtown and take up parking spaces while they're working downtown wouldn't be taking up parking spaces and it would free more parking space quite possibly quite possibly one would hope or it might lead to remote lots and the ability for people to park at a remote lot and get into town sure that they could do that or if we do ever build a parking garage that means that we could centralize the parking in downtown and free up other spaces in our downtown for other uses what what is the status of the hotel in the parking garage is the hotel still on as far as I know we are all still moving forward in hopes that that project does still happen it is currently still in litigation welcome failure yeah right and so we'll we'll see how how it turns out design review can we talk about two like we're in the happy section of this before we go back into the pandemic sure that corner where our restaurant is across from the pavilion we have a building going there yes do you mean in front of faux capitol exactly yes right right on that corner so yeah so there's a developer that has put forward a developer a developer is there Tom Tom Lowe's on who was your peer in Barry for a while yes this is true former mayor Barry so he has put forward a building design for that lot three stories I believe so and the hope is that there would be like a bank that would go into that I know they were at one point considering it as a drive-through bank and I don't know where that stands necessarily at this point but that's under under review currently I think but that corner will be developed again yes will the ugly frame of the sign that was disappear I once that construction happens I imagine it will yes disappear that's good news yes I agree for those of us who've been in the town for a while Grossman's Grossman's lot yes so where is Grossman's like yes I was gonna say for those who aren't familiar that is the building that is next to the roundabout with 302 sort of going towards over by the auto dealership yes by the yes exactly for dealership and it's sort of a cream and salmon striped building and that so that property I believe has I believe it's been purchased and there's some plans for what that that property may look like and I know that site had been relatively contaminated and I believe also that they've been doing quite a bit of cleanup work on that which I think is a real win for the environment there and the health of the Winooski which is very encouraging and we picked up a restaurant that will sell Indian food downtown I'm pretty delighted about that we haven't had an Indian restaurant in Montpelier and as far as back as I can remember and so that is wonderful wonderful addition anything else oh what's going on with that house over in that neighborhood oh by the roundabout there okay yeah so that is a better topic of council discussion for some time now that building came to our attention as potentially being a nuisance building in that it was a hazard to the public that it also the historical value didn't it yes so that property was the site apparently of the first resident of Montpelier it's associated with the founding of Montpelier however the house that is there was not that man's or that family's house it was not it was not his house that was built later now to be fair it is still a very historic house and there's a historic preservation easement on on the house now it's very long it's a long story but basically where we're at now is that the city has declared that it is a nuisance building and as a result we boarded it up to prevent people from wandering into it as it was unsafe or you know from animals getting in that that sort of thing but the future of that property is still under debate and as we are trying to untangle what's going to happen with that property it's still it's still not super clear what so what the city has said and we actually only just said this last night was that the city is going to do periodic safety assessments building inspections of that building to ensure that it's not imminently going to collapse and that is going to continue to be our role well that's the question who owns it right like that that question is actually the you know the million dollar question but just to finish this other thought we're going to continue to make sure that it is not an imminent threat safety hazard to the public while the parties work out the question of who owns it and so and because really what that means is who is responsible for shoring up the building for bringing it back to its once former glory or demolishing or demolish it like who's who's even responsible for doing that it's possible that if it gets to be such a derelict state that it is eminently going to fall down we as the city do have the right to go demolish the building but it's but again it is it's messy legally so one of the things that that we would like as a council we took a sort of straw pull on this last night there's sort of two sections to that property there's the back acreage that goes along the Stevens branch of the Winooski it's sort of it's a lovely spot back there it's got a scenic view of the gas station well actually it doesn't really do you mean like the Grossman's lot yeah no you can't really I guess you probably could it's a little from the building you could probably see it but there's a whole back section of acreage that I think the city is potentially interested in acquiring and whether that is a you know a park or used for agriculture or used as a dog park or all three or you know some other use we I think it could serve some city interests that property is also difficult because it's in the floodway so there's very little that you can do with it anyway but what happens to the building is more complicated so we'll see I think it's going to be yet to be told over some time I'll revisit our discussion in February district three we had two seats in district three yes and we had discussion of a park in district three a possible area that could conceivably be leveraged city property for a park any movement on that are you referring to like the stonewall meadows exactly yes so I think that is a property that we are still well so we own part of I was just saying the city owns um part of that property and I think it is still on our radar as a property that we would like to develop into a park but again with all that we've got on our flights exactly with all that's going on right now and our staff being largely furloughed um that has been very but it hasn't it hasn't disappeared for those people in on district three yes no absolutely and I think it would be a wonderful addition to the parks in the city and so that that is still on our radar and I hope that that's something we can see some more movement on in the coming years our park staff is starting to return from furlough some of it what's your view on on what's going on with hovered park in what way what do you mean is it open fully open is hovered park fully open yeah uh well yes I would say so the shelter houses can you you know yeah so uh people can uh my understanding is that um people are going to be able to start reserving uh those spaces soon and um yeah so that that should be returning to normal uh now the some of the mowing and the upkeep are are slow but um yeah that's the sort of where we're at in terms of of um we're heading back downtown on the um on the trail on the the walking trail the bike trail sure popular people using oh my goodness yes the Sibawina B path uh that's the official name of the the uh shared use path through Montpelier that what what is the name Sibawina B that is I'm glad that you say it and I don't have to yeah uh I believe that's an abnaki uh phrase for I think it's river water um yeah as it follows right along the Winooski River so that has been wildly popular uh through especially through the closures due to COVID it's been really wonderful to see people out and you know there's been various reports of people either wearing masks or staying socially distanced and I would certainly encourage people to stay distanced by the way both of us are 10 feet apart yes exactly we're going to unusually far apart from one of these interviews uh but I would certainly encourage folks to continue to stay six feet away um from everyone else as they are passing people on the on the shared use path or as they're you know coming across other other folks going in a direction and also as you can please do continue to to wear masks we're going west on berry street okay to the senior center yep open uh a lot of those that programming is well actually not a lot of that programming is still closed and even though the the governor has recently had some advice as to how senior centers can reopen our senior center continues to be closed and we're going to phase into opening slowly over time so but no movement on that yet let's cross the street the recreation center uh same same still still closed the camp the recreation center camp I believe they're going to try and make that happen oh you mean for for kids yeah yes we are hosting camps for the summer and you can look for the sign up uh availability for that on the internet on the city's website let's cross the parking lot to the pool okay the pool is closed the pool is closed for the summer yeah we made that decision well the staff and the city approved it um gosh a couple weeks ago I know that's a real bummer for a lot of folks that the pool is closed but it's just a matter of safety for everyone as well as our furloughed staff situation and so I see that as an opportunity for folks to explore other places potentially so rightsville reservoir but there's also some great swimming that I um you know part of you it's nice that like not a lot of people know about this but I think it's underused uh there's some great swimming down at the dog river fields uh there's a bend in the dog river there and uh there's a beach um well that fun is now gone isn't it well I think it should be more used than it is and I know some some folks may be sad that I'm saying it because it's like oh it's like a cool secret little place but uh you know round rock what's that round rock round rock yeah big rock or big rock yeah yeah that's also a great spot to go swimming so there are other opportunities and you know if all else fails hopefully you can you know connect a hose up to a sprinkler and and jump through that uh you're not going to be uh marching in the parade on July 3rd because there is no parade on July 3rd Dan Groberg talked about the sad time for him to have to inform not only a community but all the vendors and all the people who participated in the parade yeah yeah but we did have a Juneteenth celebration uh recently just a green up happened and green up day happened yep uh that was uh I'm so glad that some of these uh events are emerging and and also continuing to happen on Dan Groberg's show which is also well worth watching and it's on the youtube channel uh the brown bag are coming back he's having uh not as many but my failure live will be sponsoring the brown bag concerts great great talk to me about Langdon street that's a great question last night at our council meeting the the city council approved a plan to change the things around on Langdon street so we had heard some calls to close Langdon street entirely uh that proved to be pretty complicated uh there is a parking lot off behind uh three penny and there is a parking lot off um to the on the left hand side across from onion river outdoors and people need to continue to have access to those spaces so fair enough so we we then considered uh what if we were just to close uh half of it you know from those parking lots on uh and turn the remainder of Langdon street into a two-way traffic kind of situation that turned out to also be difficult in terms of is everything difficult in this time well we like to be careful right like we like to be thorough and that's you know that's okay but the that closing Langdon street really was going to be of substantial benefit to two restaurants on Langdon street the Langstreet Tavern as well as Sweet Melissa's so with that in mind we came up with a plan that leaves one lane of traffic well it is one lane so let me back up basically the plan that we approved eliminates all of the parking on Langdon street from those two parking lots on and allows the Langstreet Tavern as well as Sweet Melissa's to set up tables uh out in the street basically but with all of the the parking gone for that half of the street uh we're able to keep a one lane of traffic open so that people will continue to be able to use it as a one-way street and fire vehicles can go through well I'm sorry and fire vehicles and fire exactly safety vehicles will still that was a must uh safety vehicles will still be able to make it through and it will still be a one-way street and so the functionality basically of the street is still maintained uh less the parking but it also is going to be providing of this benefit to a couple of businesses that I think can can really use it so there's that plus especially right now while parking is free in the downtown people should theoretically hopefully be able to find parking elsewhere um you're also dealing with parking spaces on other streets downtown besides Langdon you're offering the merchants a chance to yes so avail themselves of that exactly especially as one of our focuses through uh managing the impact of closures due to covid is trying to be particularly responsive and sensitive to the needs of our business community and to do that we wanted to be flexible around uh the idea of parklets and so for for those who are not aware a parklet is um using a uh parking space on the street for it could be a public parklet in which it's just uh sitting area space and maybe some plants or maybe some shade uh but it could also be a private parklet which is to say that that business pays the city for the parking and is able to um if it's a restaurant be able to serve people out on the parklet uh we we also envisioned you know if a if a retail shop wanted to spill out into a parking space in front of their shop they could do that as well um but especially as parking is free right now it doesn't make sense to have people uh to have businesses be charged for the use of the parking space a good example i think it's easiest if you give examples there's one in front of j morgan's and there's one in front of positive pie yes yes exactly and there was one in front of down home last year right which moved over to j morgan right so um with all of that uh we wanted to make the opportunity for parklets more accessible to businesses and you were also encouraging them to move on to the sidewalk in front of their shops as well yes we wanted to um you know in as far as uh it was not encroaching on the the lane of pedestrians i suppose uh that we wanted to make sure that that was uh clear that businesses retail um shops could use some of the sidewalk space as well uh so and actually as i hear apparently we have two applications already from businesses for some new parklets which is exactly why we revised the parklet ordinance so that was very encouraging and you know hopefully there will be more even was what was behind the city council's decision was city council forced by the state to require this before i go into my wife's store fair enough right uh we were not forced to require masks in fact there are places that are not requiring there are municipalities that are not requiring masks in businesses but the governor did say that uh municipalities could make that decision for themselves and not to get too uh technical or legal but i i i always think it's kind of interesting that uh vermont is a state where municipalities only have the right to create ordinances um for which they are expressly given permission to create um those ordinances so you know we we can't regulate things that we're not expressly told that we're allowed to regulate so it's basically the governor's um statement that said that we are allowed to make this provision that that gave us the authority to do that and so we as a council heard from the business community that many of which were already requiring exactly they they were exactly many were already requiring masks as people came into their stores but we heard from them that they wanted the backup of having it as a requirement from the city and you know we we agreed we see we understand that you know it's a public health issue and so we went ahead and said that anyone going into a business into a public establishment public business would be required to wear a mask as long as their their medical exceptions and that's fine and also um uh they're required to wear masks to the extent that it does not interfere with the primary purpose of the business which is to say that if it's a restaurant you're allowed to not wear a mask while you eat uh or drink and uh if it's a you know a salon uh you're certainly not required to wear a mask as you're getting a beard trimming or you know to to have cuts like around your ears that kind of thing so I think ultimately it was a very reasonable ordinance or emergency order technically I feel like I spent half this show plugging my other shows we had Carolyn Brennan from the Cullock Hubbard they're going to be requiring masks oh they're staying in conformity with the rest of the city I think that makes sense when can I wear a mask into city hall oh that is a good question um I think we are uh starting to open up and we're part of that is figuring out the bathroom situation what is the bathroom situation I know I Carolyn speaks of that at Cullock Hubbard yeah so not all of the bathrooms will be open in city hall um it's and I I think it's just the the bathrooms on the lower level and at Cullock Hubbard they're puzzling through how to keep these things sanitized how often to keep yes they're still pondering how to how to make that happen yeah yeah I imagine Bill and you are oh yeah well not not me particularly necessarily that's that's sort of a that's a that's Bill's domain but um yeah but that is absolutely part of the question of reopening of which John Odom will be speaking of how do we vote in August if city hall hasn't reached that point yeah yeah well and I have been as I've learned more about mail-in voting I I am increasingly intrigued by that and you know we'll see if we have solely mail-in voting or whether we have some kind of hybrid we'll see but I I think it's I've been really interested in seeing that the turnout the response has been so much greater when you just have a system that automatically mails ballots to folks that are registered your mayor's hours we spent so many times so much time in February speaking about you were so proud of your little office I was and I was and I was holding office hours and there would be people that showed up to it and of course that came to a very abrupt stop when everything started to close because of covid and we're not we're still not meeting in person as a council and even as our committees start to reconvene we were asking our committees to to not miss and commissions yet to with a few exceptions but generally speaking they were not meeting because particularly because of trying to lighten the workload for our staff that were not furloughed because they were taking on so much work of the folks who were out and so just to lessen that we asked well many of our committees and boards and and commissions to not meet but with the new fiscal year that is that's now available but we are still asking them to meet remotely as the council is also doing again in the session we had with Dan Groberg from Mount failure live another plug he spoke of being zoomed out of the number of meetings every day that he does on zoom yeah is that consuming you uh yeah I spend a significant time of almost every day on zoom I suppose it's less now that school is out but but it's still still pretty real that's still a thing I found that I found like the highest part of my kitchen to place my laptop on that so I could stand during some zoom meetings so that's worked out well for me I find that I sometimes need to just move around a little bit just even to keep my my body like just to keep my blood flowing and to stay present it's really important in terms of after the election the city council holds a retreat where they set the new council priorities for the year yes this retreat happened right before the city shut down it's true and we set our priorities and goals for the year pre-covid right how has that changed what which of those goals is really having difficulty I'm trying to remember if it was pre-covid if it if it weren't then it was very early in the process I was going to say it must admit that was too I think we did we we were setting our goals amid COVID and particularly the reason why I know that this is true is because we had an entirely separate category for addressing the impacts of COVID like that was that rose to the level of being its own the part of like the largest heading I mean so we have large heading goals like community prosperity and being an inclusive community and inclusive and equitable community we have a goal that is environmental stewardship and underneath that we have a lot of some subcategories of specific actions that we would like or ways that we would like to manifest those big goals and right along with environmental stewardship and equitable and inclusive community we had addressing the impacts of COVID-19 just to keep it really front and center that it's it was that important so we figured even then that we we knew then that there were going to be financial impacts and that those financial impacts would potentially affect how we were able to accomplish those goals and priorities and so we knew that even then that we would have to revisit those and potentially tweak or adjust those goals in about six months so that's that's part of our plan just two more questions you have almost a half of your council that are new gosh that is two in district yeah yeah so Dan Richardson is relatively new Jay Erickson is relatively new in district one didn't we pick up and just well so Lauren yeah I mean Lauren's relatively new yeah she's been on longer than Dan and Jay but yeah yeah yeah what's it like to have so many new people on council well I mean I guess I would say generally speaking I have a lot of respect for not not even generally speaking I have a lot of respect for for all of our council I think they are reasonable folks willing to hear people that have differing opinions and they're they've come to council prepared and I think it's actually healthy to have some fresh eyes on old topics I mean I think there's also value to have to having some institutional knowledge to say oh yeah I remember I remember when that happened and you know here's the history of of of that topic and I know Jim shared yeah all right sure but at the same time I it's good to have some fresh perspective so I think it's actually a really nice balance right now I'm actually I'm actually the longest serving member of the council which is sort of shocking to me I'm the longest currently serving member of of the council and you know and that that sort of helps just knowing this part of my job is just knowing how to navigate procedure and so having had a fair bit of experience in terms of seeing how different types of situations played out and knowing how to what our role is as the city I think has been helpful as people have watched this show know my wife has a downtown store how do you get people downtown how do you re-establish this sense of community again in the show with Carolyn from the library we were talking about the library as a social hub of our community an important social hub right how do you re-establish that sense of community when our social hubs are not social hubs anymore well that's a great question um I was recently reading an update from our from the Montpelier lives recovery navigator Jean I'm Kisner yes yes um who I thought had some really excellent insight into that which is to say that there are members of our community that feel that that feel safe coming to down you know coming to our downtown as it is and there are members of our community who are hesitant but willing to engage at a very limited level and then there are folks that may they just may not engage with with the community until there's a vaccine and so I think it really comes down to our how safe it is and our sense of safety with our downtown and to be fair I think having the mask ordinance is ordinance emergency order is important for that to help people feel safe and to and to be safe as they come downtown again that's tricky because we know that part of that safety is still maintaining distance and so that means that we it it's really hard to have a festival I mean this is why we canceled July 3rd so I mean one of the things that I think we all love about downtown is is having it feel like it's bustling and having it feel like it's you know there's there are things happening and there are events but we do have the farmers market back up we do have the farmers market yes but it just it everything looks different now because everything feels everything feels different because we have to stay distant and so as Vermont and Montpelier continue to go through the through the I was to say like the the health recovery that um you know as with COVID like as we continue to be safer I think people will start to emerge and especially once there's a vaccine but we may not have big festivals until that exists big step will be eating in restaurants downtown and drinking yes well and now people now can eat and drink at restaurants if they you know there's limited capacity at the restaurants so that's that's encouraging and I know some folks are starting to take restaurants up on that offer and some restaurants and places are are still continuing to have online shopping experiences and online ordering food experiences and you know certainly hope that people take advantage of that as we try to make it through this time so there we are constant contact with the state that's going through bill it so it does go through bill but he he sends out all of the updates to the council so that we are kept abreast of all of the developments yeah and city council still is picking up interest of people to sit and comment on your work oh yes yeah no we certainly have um lots of people avail themselves of council well so we are still available by email of course that's fine the emails are found on the website yep all the emails are available on the website and beyond that I would actually say it's uh well I would say that uh the volume of public comments that we have had at our zoom council meetings is more than we would typically get in an in-person meeting now to be fair that could be an artifact not an artifact a function of the national dialogue around race and you know maybe we would be seeing increased numbers at an in-person council meeting uh anyway but it's tough to say but I would say so far there have been a lot of participants and I think that's great are you hopeful generally speaking is our town going to weather through this I think we are I think we are I think we're going to get through this I think our downtown may look different uh I think a lot of our businesses are going to make it through maybe not everyone but but we also have sort of a regular turnover anyway if businesses we're gonna see tourists for leaf season I think we will see um maybe not as many but I think we we still will I actually had a friend of mine from college who lives in Pennsylvania say you know all my kids summer camps have been canceled and so we are going on a road trip and we want to come to Vermont where where can we go in Vermont and so of course you know can I make a suggestion sure Montpelier exactly right um and so I you know I think it made it may just look different um so we'll we'll see how it goes mayor thank you so much for again appearing here and might I say that when the town reaches another milestone in its opening I would hope to have you back absolutely happy to to be here chatting with you and and with all the the public as well