 We're going to start with the agenda, which is going to be altered from what you see there in the consent agenda. We did not get three items into the packet for you. The purpose of the consent agenda is for you to see the material first, to go over it, to be able to think about it, and then decide whether you want to pull it or not. Since you just have it on your desk when you're sitting here, the consent agenda will only consist of 3.1, which is the minutes, and 3.5, which is the program updates. And I'm pulling 3.2, 3.3, and 3.4 out of the consent agenda, which we'll just go into the ordinary process. There'll be an executive session added on any other business. So, to start, are there any requests for items of 3.1 or 3.5 to be removed from the consent agenda? So, in that case, where only the consent agenda item is going to be the minutes, and by unanimous consent, without objection, the consent agenda is approved. Do I hear any requests? In that case, it's approved. Do I want to address public comment? Is there anyone here from the public? Would you like to speak? No, I'm good. Okay. Thank you. We thank you. So, the first item on the agenda is the community cleanup fund. We have to go back and address 3.2, 3.5. Oh, yes, I'm sorry. I was hoping we could. So, we have the finance committee warrants on reports that were on your desk in front of you. Are there any questions on this? Any observations? In that case, we'll move on to the bank balances, observations, discussions. All right, we'll move on to 3.4, executive director report. Any questions? Observations? Yes. Yes. What do they do with the food waste, and that sort of thing? Nothing. It becomes part of their residue. It goes into the trash? It does. Okay. It looks like you had a very interesting trip. Very interesting trip to South Carolina and Alabama. Very long. We met a lot of very interesting people. We were able to see some new equipment that we hadn't seen as well, at least a company that I hadn't seen yet, BHS. The Dirty Murph was massive. It was well over 100,000 square feet. It was a huge facility, and for what they do, they do it well. Don't believe it's what we want to do, but I had never seen one before, so it was good to be able to have that experience and to understand what that business is, and that it's working well for that air of the country that doesn't have the programs that we have here. Do they have a pit where they put the residuals? Their landfill is literally across the parking lot from them. So they have that, and they also have an incinerator nearby, and that's what they make these bails, the fuel, bails, fuel packs. So they will bail up what the incinerator wants, and then the rest, which is almost the majority of it, gets landfilled, and the landfill prices are very, very low. Is the incinerator monitored for its gas? We did not get into those details, and I don't know how old the incinerator is. It was a very interesting trip, yes. Can I just request, if you have an RA diet, that you send these out also via PDF? Ah, yes, we can do that. On to program updates. Yes. I apologize, I didn't use the system right, I should have called Sarah, but somehow that just slipped my mind after I found the, but the, the spreadsheet that has solid waste management fee, fiscal year 20, budget versus actual, the blue column has dollars per month at 676, and I think that should be the, should be more around 300 and something, and whatever. You're all right, I copied over my mistake, thank you, we will correct that. Okay, and then the second item is that we used to get a spreadsheet that had pounds per capita per day, we didn't get that spreadsheet this month. So we are, we've been thinking about what are, what are the charts that we, that you all want to see and what is important to you, because we're wondering how, how these are used, are there ways that we can represent the information better? Quite a lot of the charts seem to say the same thing in slightly different ways, so we're wondering at the usefulness, that may have been one of the ones that I got to go to a quarterly report versus a monthly report, so we are looking to try to consolidate some of that wherever possible to help us in some ways to see trends, because it's sometimes hard to see trends month to month, but you can clearly see something quarterly or semi-annual annual, so that may have been one of the ones that we had moved to quarterly, but I will double check. For me, that's more valuable than the one that's in there that talks about percentages. Thank you, Michelle. Any other questions? Well, that one's open. Okay. Now we will move on to the Community Cleanup Fund, the revised guidelines. Somebody is going to present this. Michelle and Lauren, I believe. So for those of you who haven't met before, I'm Lauren Lane. I'm the community outreach coordinator. Perhaps I've emailed you a few times. Hopefully you've gotten them. And so we just had, there had been a request earlier in the year to expand the community and revise the community cleanup funds. And also we've, I've noticed some projects coming through that perhaps could have been, seemed like a worthy project to use the grant funds for, but in the guidelines as they were, they didn't meet that. So the main updates to this are that originally this, to give some background first actually, originally this was just like a legal dumping fund back in the nineties. And it was just for disposal costs. And then it was updated after a few years after that to include like dumpster rental, reimbursement for supplies and labor as well. So that, it got upgraded to that. And then also, I think around 2000, I won't go through the dates. They are in your memo. They, we updated it to include, because the community cleanup fund is just for municipalities, I should have mentioned that before. So you can only reimburse a town. And our other two grants, the waste reduction grant, project grant and the waste reduction container grant are matching grants. So it was updated that if a town wanted to buy recycling, compost, trash containers, that the waste reduction container grant would be 50% of the costs. And then the town could use community cleanup funds to cover the rest of that cost. And so what we've added or suggested to change is that the community cleanup fund could involve waste reduction and prevention projects in advance as well. Not just cleanup, because it was very hard line of just disposal costs for cleanup and other cleanup events. And within that, pairing for the municipalities, pairing the waste reduction project grant as the 50% of the cost and then the community cleanup fund from that municipality or member towns fund could be used to cover the other 50%. And then it was also suggested to have the funds cover operating, marketing, planning costs for the waste reduction events. Not just for the project or disposal itself. To give an example, there was actually two towns at the same time kind of had a stream cleanup event. And the town of Williston had asked if the cost of marketing to get volunteers for the event could be covered and it couldn't be, or also costs to plan the event. So they had to go out and look at the streams. There's actually a stream team that goes out and kind of writes the area to make sure they know what they're going to be doing when they go there. And those also couldn't be put into the community cleanup funds as they are, because it wasn't about disposal. So that's the main updates we're suggesting. Questions? Yes, please. This is just formatting on page one. It seems like there's a first paragraph that's lined up. And then for page two, the community cleanup project may be next after confirmation of the project pool. I think just from our experience last past couple months. It's a project that's going to go forward anyway. And I would want, it just seems like that line there may see it in the way of an opportunity. Yeah, and we have been sort of flexible on that when. Okay. So I just kind of wanted some clarity on that, where certainly the project would go forward. But our preference is to get project approval beforehand. Right. And it's a coordination on eligibility for beforehand. Because I know John's a little bit, he talks about funding provided after for various purposes. I still feel comfortable with that, but I just wouldn't want the talent that they can't go forward with the project. Now, that makes sense. It's a preference that it be all approved and everything before the project takes place, but we wouldn't want to not fund a project that's worthy of it. Just because the communication didn't get. And then just a very nifty thing. Three of the last instances is dispersed to the community directly. I just would prefer to change that to member town. Mm-hmm. You know, it's advantageous for any of the others. Yes. I've got a general question on the cleanup fund. So I had a couple different projects that I was considering to do, but there's a problem with the town. You know, say you have an approved project. Okay. Funds are supposed to be expended by the town and then reimbursed. According to our treasure in town clerk, they don't have the mechanism in their accounting to do that because it's not the town's funds. They're the district's funds. Not quite sure. I understand why that the town wouldn't pay first. It was approved by the select. They have no mechanism to allocate money in their budget to do that. Mm-hmm. It's a bookkeeping thing. Okay. That's above my pay grade. I must admit. Maybe we could have... We'll reach out. Yeah. Communities get grants from the state and everything. I mean, this is nothing different than that, Michelle. I mean, so there's got to be a way that they get road grants and everything from the state for the gravel roads and this is no different than that. Yeah. When I first approached them about this and stuff, it's as well, we have to have a line item in our budget to handle this. They didn't know that they were expected to pay for everything, then get reimbursed. It's like... Who does the bookkeeping? The district or the town? I would advise that you contact the Vermont League of Cities and Towns and ask your select board to ask them about this. Because that's not a problem that we can solve here. But it sounds like there's some misunderstanding on your select board's part of the process here. Okay. To me, the process is fairly clear. You get a project, they do it, they expect the town to pay out the money, then give you the receipts to pay for the stuff, because they don't hold the funds, you hold the funds. Well, the problem is that until the event happens and the bill has been paid, you might not know exactly what it is. So, we would be sending you money based on an estimate. And we just can't do that. For our accounting, it has to be based on an actual expenditure. So, I think that is there something that we could do to help Duncan communicate with his select board of process? Well, we know how they have been done in the past, and it has been that the town makes the payment and then we reimburse them. So, what's happened before? That's why we're saying is that the town pays for the project first and then they send the receipt to get reimbursed. He's talking about the opposite. That we pay them before the project happens. Right, and I would say if clean and front projects have been reimbursed before or the town, how does the town manage that reimbursed? So, we can reach out and just have a conversation directly. I'm not sure that that has happened, but we'll find a way to sort this out with them. Yeah, I also have the historical history of all the projects that have been funded in the past so I can see what Bolton has done. From my knowledge of everything, Bolton's never used the fund. Yeah, it's a matter of if this is the procedure notify somebody in your accounting has to notify them this is the procedure, this is the only way you're going to get the money and stuff. I feel stuck in the middle. We'll get you out of the middle, Duncan. We'll reach out to your town treasurer or whoever is appropriate the town manager, whoever and figure out how to get this process working for you. Any other questions on this? Yes. Well, just to clarify, I have to confess my ignorance, I've got Underhill's history, but it still seems like the funds are being underutilized and I can't really address whether these new steps will really significantly increase the utilization of those funds. So I'm just asking, your sense with the requests that you've seen from all the times, do you really think this is going to make a meaningful opportunity to be visiting this thing in years to come? I've gotten the requests for projects for the past almost two years that I've been with the district and I do have a few in mind that could have been. So I gave the example of the stream team to market these events or perhaps even do a lot of towns use them for extra green up day costs. So I don't know if there's an expansion there that the town is usually. I think that there are quite a few potential projects that were never broached with us because it was deemed I'm not going to bring this up because I know it's not appropriate or there's no way and part of that is us, we're going to be doing more promotion of this and I think when people start seeing examples of broader applications then that might spark possibilities that they hadn't thought of before. I think we're going to need more utilization of the funds. We do get a report at least once a year I've been called seeing it. So we'll all be reminded that if we're still looking at a big balance here that this isn't adequate we've got to do something more to use the money and improve the environment. And as the projects occur and our fund, Lauren can start the report on that as we go. So it wouldn't just be a once a year and that's easy enough to do. There are examples of what's happening in all the towns so that board people can see good ideas. I think that's really important. So I usually send more of a account balance community cleanup fund balance for each of the towns at the beginning of the fiscal year and then halfway through in January. So I guess when I do that in January perhaps I could not just send the money this far. Is it correct that it's sort of our responsibility as commissioners to make sure that the town is aware and considering using these funds too? I think we can all do our part there. I know in Williston I think it's not super well known and there's a lot of excitement about it when I brought it up. Yeah. So who did you bring it up? Did you announce it in a select board meeting? How did you publicize it in town? So I usually email our select board just an update from each meeting of what happened in the meeting and they were happy about the idea of pursuing this and I also brought it up at a community group that I am involved with. I've also used from porch forum to announce it that this fund is available for these reasons or for these reasons. I'd like to recommend that this revised process and procedures sent to each town. Is that the standard practice that this would go to the towns so that they have what we've just approved? Yeah, they got the original memo from last month and all the balances and then I said that we'd be bringing this to the board so I'll update them after. Okay, once we approve this you'll send them more. And I send that to public works departments just so that they're aware because usually that's a place that needs they often end up doing the projects. So I don't know if that's I'd recommend sending it to the select board themselves. Oh, yeah, no, I send it to the town clerk. Yeah, and just so that they if they have any projects in mind. To address Kailin's issue, so we do make them aware of this. Any other discussion? This does need to be approved. So there wasn't a resolution in the packet. But I will present. There's no resolution. There's no language. There's no language. So I'd like to propose language which we have not always done so that things are clear everybody understands. Be it resolved that the Board of Commissioner approves the community to clean up fund procedures and guidelines as presented on September 25th, 2019 requesting for funds that exceed a community's availability of funds must be approved by the Board of Commissioners. So you can if you need request extra funds but that would need to be approved by this Board which actually I think Westford has done once. Anybody wish to move this? Can I comment that with revisions requested? Yes. As revised. And this is exactly why I would really like to have resolutions in the Board packet Any other discussion on this? All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Resolution is passed. Thank you. Any financial presentation? Now the fun stuff. So what I'm going to do is go over just some quick highlights and then we're going to go deeper into the actual financial the income statement in the balance sheet. After this the first thing I'm going to show you is just a consolidated income statement for all of CSWD and then after that I'll show you a schedule which will show you how each program is doing against the budget that they had for FY19. So some of the highlights net income we had net income of 871,000 after all budgeted allocations last year. Operating income was favorable to budget by 934,000 going through this presentation a lot of that was because of favorable revenue that we had due to the solid waste management fee and some some of the MRF fees that we had to adjust very early in the year in order to accommodate our ACR average commodity rate. The support programs which the support programs are all the overhead within the organization that would include like accounting and human resources O&C they were favorable to their budgets in total by 275,000 for the year so that's that's favorable expense. The operating programs which are the programs that generate revenue within the organization had favorability to their operating income of 659,000 for the year. We had 1 million contribution to reserves that were before the 871,000 net income and some of the reserves that you can see below there the capital contributions of the 148,000 community cleanup 12 and then we have the two rate stabilization funds the dock rate at 263 and software the solid waste management fee of 66. Another highlight is that we had over 600,000 in capital spending for the year including the new baler that we have at the MRF and again this is spending that we did last year that is not an operating expense so these are expenditures that we paid for that went right up to the balance sheet as assets and weren't included in the operating expense and the only other thing I want to mention is that these are preliminary financials and that we're going to have an audit in mid-November for these to be final I don't expect them to change very much quite honestly but I just want to make you aware that they could change a little bit after we meet with the auditors in the middle of November so this first schedule here and I apologize for it being so small this is a good thing you have handouts so this is the this is a consolidated income statement for CSWD and that first column there is the FY19 actuals the next one is the FY19 budget and the third one is the variance to the budget positive numbers being favorable so you can see the favorable revenue that we had in tipping fees material sales and the solid waste management fee so the tipping fees and material sales were a direct result of the MRF and what had happened is that our ACR average commodity rate has really gone down tremendously over the last year or two so in order to accommodate that and to make us all we have to raise our tipping fee for hollers coming into the MRF as a result of doing that the revenues went up but as you can see if you look further down to the 6600 item for materials management our cost went way up and the reason for that is because of our contract with Casella they were the arrangement that we have at the MRF is that we pay them a processing fee to run the facility and then we share the revenue they get for our recycled product and so once the recycled product revenue went way down because of the collapse of the market we had to negotiate with them a market stabilization fee in addition to the processing fee and the shared revenue so that they could break even or make money running the facility so net net the MRF was actually slightly below their budget because of that even though we had increased revenue so again all of our most of our expenses were down from the budget which is very good you know we did a and what you'll see in the next schedule is that the overhead budget which is the support programs was quite a bit down so this schedule is a little bit busy but there's a lot of good information on here and what I've done is I've just taken those same numbers that you just looked at and if you look at the bottom of the schedule you'll see you'll be able to tie back the net income and the revenue and the cost and I've broken the P&L down into support programs and the operating programs and again the support programs are the overhead and the operating programs are for the most part the revenue producing parts of the organization so it starts from left to right I have the revenue the operating expense and then that first column there is the operating income and that's what I'm using when I'm comparing against the budget for the year because that's really the best indication of how that particular program is doing is to compare that operating income before allocations are made so when you over to the very right you'll see the budget operating income and to the right of that the favorability against that and just looking at the support programs if you look at the far right hand column you can see all the favorability there with the support programs and a lot of that favorability is because of grants and advertising and printing that we didn't do for last year so that was a big part of the favorability another part of the favorability was headcount and salaries and also had a significant reduction in our insurance cost as well health insurance cost going down to the operating programs so you can see that the the biggest favorable variance there is with the solid waste management fee the tonnage came in at 13% over what we thought it was going to be so it increased quite a bit over where we thought it was going to be the other large favorable program there for compost is that they didn't spend nearly as much of expense equipment as we thought that they would so they were way under budget there and then you see the MRF even though they brought in almost $700,000 of additional revenue the cost of that market stabilization fee more than offset that and they ended up with a unfavorable variance of $200,000 for the year and then below the operating income before allocations those other allocations and adjustments are the transfers that we do are related to the transfers that you see up above so to the right of operating income these are all the transfers in subsidies that go between the programs so it's the revenue producing programs in the solid waste management fee subsidizing the programs that don't generate revenue so to get them to zero from them we have to allocate expense up to them one of the other things I wanted to point out here is that there's the very bottom there's something called gap adjustments so what we've done in the past is that depreciation on our equipment which is about $850,000 does not get budgeted with the programs instead wait until the end of the year and record that as a one-time expense but don't allocate it to specific programs the other thing that's in that is we had inventory adjustments so we do inventory adjustments for compost for our blue bins that we sell retail and those were actually favorable for the year by probably $70,000 any questions so far is this your recommendation on how we're going to present the financials to the board and to the public going forward? no but in the scenario that we talked about in the meeting this is going to be the as is scenario and then I'm going to provide you the additional scenarios as we discussed that will kind of show you how it all works so you'll see the schedule again when we meet and we talk about that some more so this is kind of the last view of the old way we were doing things great depreciation in the operating program is going to have a huge impact yes I agree and what's been done in the past is that they've always in effect figured that they were going to have to contribute so much to capital to replace capital so in a normal private enterprise the best indication of that or the way that you would do it is just to include the depreciation in the operating expense so it would be expense there and you would have to account for that so that's what I'm looking forward to is getting that depreciation in the budgets so we have it there and then we can have a discussion after we've covered our current assets and realize the cause for those in the programs what else do we need to do to fund the capital program going forward so what we'll be seeing is something that first of all instead of truing up to GAP at the end of the year what we'll be seeing is a disclosure that is GAP right along which is going to actually be a more realistic and truer with the expenses as ongoing so it's more transparent it will let us plan better it's going to be a little bit different but I actually think it's going to be simpler it's going to be much simpler for us to follow this with this new one you see this new absolutely the results will be a lot more consistent with what you've seen in the past questions on this I just had one other I just wanted to show you the balance sheet so we have 11.5 million in current assets 12.1 million in fixed assets very little debt we have 2 million in current liabilities and half of that is payables which are due in 3 days the other part that's in that other current liabilities is we have a landfill closure cost that we're required to do by the state which is to figure out how much it's going to cost us to maintain the landfill over a lot of period of time which I believe is 2025 and beyond probably 2018 most likely so that's almost $700,000 of that other current liabilities you see there so yeah the balance sheet is in great shape the count receivable that 2.1 million 99% of that is in the current to 1 to 30 category so they're all current receivables and of the current to 1.30 85% of those are all current so they're not even due yet so our receivables are very good yeah so any questions when we buy a machine and pay for it over time is that in the accounts payable or is that in current liabilities it's in actually we don't have that right now we've been paid for the the bailer that we just purchased we paid for it with cash with four installments over the period of about four to five months we did have leased equipment that we were paying for and that would show up in the current liability well there would be a current portion of that which is due within a year and then a long term portion outside the one year you would take the rest of that liability and put it in long term but we're all done with our leases we have one more lease payment left and then we're done next is the revised finance committee and the changes the finance committee Leslie is not here the committee looked back at the instructions that they had from the past and what you have is a revised changed objectives and structure for the finance committee pretty much the same as it was a few minor minor tweaks yeah essentially what was removed was and I apologize for not providing a red line strike out but essentially back in 1990s oh you do have that okay I don't good I'm glad you do so essentially what we had back in 1996 was certainly not as fully fleshed out of a staff at the time and the finances really needed very close oversight by the board which is why the board decided to delegate to a finance committee who was very very closely engaged with day to day month to month so as things have evolved that has become less and less of a need and the finance committee has been focusing more on budgeting and that has been an investment and that has been the main charge and what this finance committee has been wanting to do is to focus more on planning and certainly still on the budget that is a key function on tracking and looking long term at financial health of the organization and to get more into so what you're seeing is is that to allow for the possibility of expanding the committee right now we have three members but to allow for an expansion as needed and then used to we had settled into meeting really during budget time only but now we're trying to meet much more regularly monthly when possible but more regularly and then outside of the budget timeline which I think has been great and important and just to talk a little bit more about engaging also the members of the committee in assisting and talking about the budget and the communities as may be needed and every now and then actually I've benefited from having members when I go to present the budget they have been able to step in and talk about certain aspects that may be of interest to their communities Alan's been fantastic about that Leslie helped out this past year as well helping to clarify at the local level some of the priorities and some of the decisions that were made in the committee and by the board so putting that in there was important because I have found that very very helpful the main main updates and that's really what this has been any discussion, any observations concerns and the reason this is coming to you is because it was originally charged by the the board back in 1996 with the five members is the potential that you could lose five members and have a whole new board and I wonder what you might consider having two members go on for two years and then start a a staggered appointment to the board if that sounds reasonable I mean it possibly could be the commissioners are you do have two year terms what do you think it's not as Paul knows it's not terribly easy to get people to volunteer to agree to these we have to kind of do it as we can have the volunteers that we can find I think that the number with the three actually works well you start getting a committee above three or maybe four and you start it starts getting almost board like you want people to be able to focus and not get a myriad of voices that aren't necessary but I agree with all of these revisions I think that the potential of going to five if we're in something very serious very complicated I don't see that happening an example maybe we may want to consider five in the if we agree to do the Murph and there may be some more things that as an adjunct five but one year or two years it might make sense to have additional we want to at least allow for some flexibility if the chair since it was prescribed three so now we have the opportunity to bring in other members who particular expertise might be necessary or just we need more voices so are there any any objections any concerns in that case again there was no resolution in this packet so be it resolved that the board of commissioners approves the structure and functions of the finance committee as presented on September 25th 2019 do I have a second thank you you probably shouldn't actually make the motions but you read it and so I think Alan moved it for you and then I seconded it well I'm reading the motion I'm not making it that's why he said moved sorry so he moved it and you seconded okay thank you and I did not make the motion I wish it had been but there should have been a motion in here so I'm reading a motion any other discussion now that it's officially on the floor then all those in favor opposed abstain motion passes next there's been a request by Cassella and they get an approved SWIP into our SWIP for a transfer station a changed process right so they Cassella has applied to the state to expand their facility Red Avenue B and because it has been deemed a major amendment then that did trigger re-inclusion in our SWIP yeah we considered a significant change it was a major amendment that they submitted to the state for with their solid waste certification just so everybody knows and sees in the packet we did include the language for the process for inclusion in the solid waste implementation plan that's the back document you'll see towards the bottom if there is a significant change in someone's application we do need to re-include them in the SWIP and that goes to you all for re-inclusion just wanted to make that clear also one other just quick point of order is that the resolution did change and so I have an updated resolution here and unless anyone objects I'll just read it when I'm done and then it actually needs a signature from everybody so I'll just pass that around as well I just wanted to mention the application for an amendment put forth by Casello for the transfer station on Avenue B essentially was an extension of their FW web building they're going to install a de-packager machine in that for organics management as well as a baler for recycling management generally just cardboard that comes off of that de-packaging operation and then the C&D management over to that new space so that's primarily what the amendment was for staff has reviewed the facility management plan submitted to the state and we have commented on that this action done by this board is one of the last pieces that the state needs to actually provide a draft waste certification they're waiting on us to do this we're expecting the state to have looked and considered our comments after they submit a draft to Casello we'll have a 30-day public comment period where we have an additional opportunity to make comments on the draft certification of facility management plan and then there's actually an appeal process after that certainly if we don't see our comments reflected in their new facility management plan there's plenty of opportunity afterwards that we can submit further comments but the SWIP process is really just to say on a baseline if the district can support and if we need this type of operation and that's why we brought it to you folks saying recommending that you adopt the facility included in the SWIP which would be sort of a re-inclusion into the SWIP plan the other thing including your packet was the letter from Casello requesting the inclusion we also included a copy of our notes on the original facility management plan just so you understand what was actually included here in your packet I missed the item and I didn't see anything in the notes captured that's being discussed but I noticed in the letter from Casello that they were planning on attending that meeting correct so they did not get their letter in in time for it to be included on the August Board packet so it was not an item yes so after the packaging process the organic material that they have is that going to still go to our organic recovery facility or is that going someplace else I believe the intent is for their material to go to a digester but Mike Casello are you able to enter this facility as is so if you have packaged products you've got to get the packaging from the food so the only way to do it is to break it apart and then process it it goes into a tank and then you send it to an anaerobic digester which would either be in a middle barrier or any of the digesters volume wise, pound wise how does that affect the amount of material that we're going to have disposed of leaf litter within the county and those were some of our questions that we had for their plan and so it was unclear at the time that we submitted our comments as to exactly how much they intended to process through their facility so I don't know if Mike you want to enter that now or if we want to we met with the district we met with staff about the last six months maybe two or three times to say we're going down this process we want to partner in some sense that how do we partner, we're going to partner I don't know if there was much interest in a partnership there so we said you know we're going to keep moving forward with this process we're looking very minimal tons right now I think we've got big generators a lot of the food manufacturers like Ben & Jerry's you know Cabot, you know Green Mountain Coffee those types of materials that have to get de-packaged obviously so our separated organics could be a piece of this as well where if you guys said hey we have too much food waste and we don't want all this food waste at our facility because we're running out of space because I've heard some of those concerns before too that you're going to have to do a massive expansion and go out and bond for two, three million dollars and we could kind of take that material and handle it as well so those are all things that we're working through right now that the main focus would be to handle packaged products and de-packaged and then handle organics but what's been missing has been the number so I think that's what you're asking about is what's their number and we haven't seen a number I mean currently super market and that number is kind of a shot in the dark so in some sense for us to give you guys the number I mean we're building it we're hoping that we can get material I think we're confident in our estimates but their estimates right so I mean to even put a number on it to say hey you know I know the customers that we have under contract yeah these ones that we're already sending to a de-packed facility out of state those definitely we could handle but other than that it's kind of playing a guessing game we're hoping it'll happen but we don't know and Alan one of the questions that we are asking our consultant who's working on our project now to answer is that question is can the county support too what does the tonnage look like etc so that's part of our analysis I'm sorry Abby was had a question I was just pointing out that Hanna-Fords and some of the other supermarkets already have a contract with Agrisource and it's being shipped to Maine and so but it's just looking at the whole picture what is I don't know how this relates to the SWIP but what is CSWD's role in looking at all of the food organics and where it goes and what sort of policy questions do we have about what is the best use how do you have the lowest carbon imprint how do we use that resource in the most local way just questions like that so what how does that factor into this particular SWIP issue with is a great question and I think I've said this to this group before is that for a believer in managing your ways as close to the source as possible for a wide variety of reasons and I think and I won't speak for Kasella but this would seem to match that philosophy to try to bring some of that material back as local as possible it may not be possible we don't know what the contracts look like for Hanna-Ford or any of the other commercial vendors out there but as much as we can reduce that footprint and benefit local sources as well I think that does make sense for us and that again is also part of the equation and part of what we're studying with SES engineers right now so that will be part of that but again what they're proposing does not run contrary to anything that we would need to have in the county but again those details and some of the questions that we've outlined and provided you with we will be following up just to make sure that there aren't any unintended consequences that we can't foresee so we're just dotting the I's and crossing that T Is it a true statement to say that whatever they do with de-packaging would not detract from the food waste we get which we use for compost and leaves is that if we're looking at the and we're trusting in the original DSM estimates as far as food generation in the county there's plenty in the county well we don't know necessarily is how much of the food waste that's being generated is the packaged kind that needs this type of facility and the material which is currently going to landfill so you know the impetus for Cassell and for us is this July 1, 2020 deadline where all the food scraps need to be kept from landfill disposal is what I'm trying to ask is any of the material we get food scraps at currently is it material that would go to them not necessarily you know particularly for materials that have dropped off at our facility we would not run them through a de-packager they're already source separated we would continue to support source separation this really is an industrial or commercial application that where there's a need for that in not just Vermont but in the region as well one could argue that it's really better to send the de-packaged materials to anaerobic digestion because of the chemicals in the packaging the PF OAs and PFOS Sure and the Salisbury Digester has broken ground they are building so that is happening and we'll be up and running they'll be testing their equipment next spring they hope to get their bugs in line by this time next year Yes So just in I think program notes seeing a downward trend in the tonnage for GMC already would there be an additional decrease anticipated? Well some of that was from so that would most likely remain steady again a lot of this material that could be destined for Cassellus Day Packager is being landfilled right now or it's already going out of state so some of the price dropper accounts those are going out of state we're anticipating that we will begin seeing an uptick probably starting in February as more awareness is in the public of July coming so Yes Tim I think this gets what Alan was asking about my assumption is that I'm not sure what percentage of the stream flowing into our facility today is collected by Cassellus in their residential organic program but the assumption is that whatever that volume is then going to be further to Cassellus and Cassellus I can speak to how this may affect their life that's a piece of it I think when we originally looked at the space constraints we were saying if we offset a thousand times does that give you guys the growth capacity that you need too and how do we work through those things to say when I looked at doing our projections and modeling and other things we said hey I know I've got this package product this is just benefit if it works between all of us to say hey we want to redirect stuff plus we might actually be sending more material to be composted as well like if we had bread products there's actually like a dry and a wet component so there's different ways to operate the equipment so you can actually like say you had like fry ops and they had a bunch of packaged bread product you would actually get the bread out of the packaging and you'd leave that dry so it'd be dry regular just bread crumbles almost that you then would send sometimes animal feed depending on if the plastic wasn't in there and other things and you could make sure it was clean enough but I think composting would be another option so those are all things that we're looking at but we're talking very small scale tonnage from the deep back side right now we're not looking at taking other commercial haulers and we're not looking at having residents drop it off at this point we're saying hey let's build it get it up and running we have the tons let's tweak the system understand how it works because it's new technology for us as well we've definitely looked and done our homework at other haulers that have this throughout the country and think it can work but I think it's primarily going after the large manufacturers and the collections oh yeah that's I mean yeah the other questions would you be comfortable sharing your directional capex for a deep impact facility directional is 0.2 but I gotta go back and start negotiating because that seems kind of says we got 8 million on the panel so we can do that but it's all called for it's a problem that's the other thing we're in the building trying to figure out how we can we might be tricking the facility down because I don't when we got some of those construction aspects back they had to scrape me out of the ceiling because I knew I was going to have to go in front of our team and I would have been crying we're going to stick to this topic if you'd like to would like to get together after and do a financial deal so for Josh has a resolution yes first any other questions from the commissioners would you please sure the Chitton solid waste district's board of commissioners hereby resolves that the all cycle transfer station on Avenue B in Wilson Vermont be included in the district's solid waste certification plan to incorporate their expanded operations as detailed in the solid waste certification application dated April 19th 2019 and most recently amended on August 14th 2019 contingent upon all cycle waste obtaining and maintaining compliance with all necessary local state and federal permits a lawyer second any more discussion all those in favor opposed abstain the next is the discussion on the on the bottle bill I'd really like us to have a kind of an open a bit informal discussion with Jen about the bottle bill what we feel about it what we think about it where we would like it to go we have been just watching this proceed kind of without our input it's been kind of directionless from the board to Jen so she's been acting on her best instincts which have been very good but I think it's important that we have a discussion with her about what we think where we would like to go so if you would reintroduce us a bit to your yeah so I just have two slides here last meeting I explained the mechanics of the bottle bill the costs compared to recycling and what the potential impact would be on our MRF if the bottle bill were to be expanded in some pros and cons Leslie Nolte asked at the end of the presentation if we were the only ones that really had concerns about an expanded bottle bill and I pointed to Kasella having equal concerns as well because they own the other single stream MRF in the state but I neglected to say that there are some other parties out there the distributors certainly aren't too excited about an expansion and the retailers and grocers are as well so I just wanted to let people know yeah the distributors are the ones that are quote-unquote the producers of the manufacturers in this case so for example if you were to expand the bottle bill to include hard cider or water that would bring in the current producers that distribute some of those materials and they don't really they don't support that they're doing this because they're required to underlaw but it's costly for them to be doing this and particularly since the sheets are now going to be removed from their funding for the system it's going to be more expensive so the retailers and the grocers are somewhat in the same category there's some retailers that have their own name brands that would be subject to the bottle bill and then also if they sell beverages at their stores they have to provide collections and systems for them with limited capacity in storage that would put another strain on their business excuse me and if she's wearing the bag you do get trapped yes yes if they're taking the beverage containers back yep that's a good question I think there would be definitely some negotiations some concerns the again if you look at retailers they are also brand owners in a lot of cases so traditionally that has been a concern in other producer responsibility laws that we've had say for example Lowe's when we were working on electronics they had their own brands and they had some concerns so it would be the same thing for packaging our beverage containers I think the distributors may be a little less so because the sheets are developed and there's the handling fees which are very expensive for them to pay so it's kind of either or maybe EPR might actually be more favorable but that's to be determined in the details of how that would look yeah so one of the slides that I had was if not the bill bill maybe some other policy options to present or move forward on extended producer responsibility is certainly being discussed in the working group that I'm involved with at the legislature we just had our second meeting yesterday and that was the topic of that meeting was extended producer responsibility and there's quite a bit of interest there's been discussions with various stakeholders on just placing an environmental fee on glass because glass is difficult to manage and that the fee would support markets market development and recycling or put an environmental fee on the beverage containers to support both clean water and glass recycling instead of a bottle bill or instead of an expanded bottle bill there's another scenario perhaps that we could move forward with that I'm looking into a little bit now with a bottle bill expansion maybe we could receive some revenue for some of the displaced material that would come out of our bottle bill system so as Michelle said what do you mean by this price that's removed so if the bottle bill were expanded to include materials that were removed from what we're collecting today at Irmer the water it impacts us financially negatively correct so perhaps we get into a sharing of the sheets to offset our loss basically figure out audits that we perhaps do on our materials at the MRF the bales but it's just an idea that I just started thinking about and could be a way that we could support an expansion perhaps if that's where the board wanted to move to but that is what I'm really interested in hearing about from the board is there was some facts and figures last month about what this would potentially mean for revenue at our MRF $150,000 a year given the markets that we have today which aren't very good about a 6% loss in our total recyclable commodity revenues and a fairly minimum increase in diversion from estimations that we see so I want to get a sense because the bottle bill is something that a lot of people really do support and would like to see it expanded would like to see it modernized increased from a nickel to a dime or more and there may be some of you that feel that way as well previous slide are people that are opposed to it is that what it said yeah I should I should really not have been so strong on that slide have concerns but I think that it's my belief the CSWD ought to be up on that list and I don't think that I don't think that we do a good job publicly to inform folks as to how much of what they think is just being thrown away is really being recycled you had some charts last month that showed that slight differential between and I don't know how we do it either now it's my turn in the paper or something there that we get the word out because the legislature and some of the administration is looking at that eschutes money or whatever it is to fill some voids it's just going to cost the residents of the county a lot more money that's my biggest concern here is that the eschutes are being used for a purpose to fund another class of need the Clean Water Act I think that there needs to be some transparency about where the money goes and why and if the state really needs to increase the funding for the clean water which I think they should they should address that directly and not make it a side effect of this bottle bill the bottle bill should be addressed for its impact on the materials in it and not be mixed with another need of the state I agree with that one entirely and I'd like us to address that it went back to the distributors yes so that's consumers money that would basically should would in many other states Vermont is one of the only states with a bottle bill that hasn't been put as we saw in the presentation last month that the sheets were going to be going to support the starting October 1st that starts now correct they haven't been returned to the government at all in the manufacturers which is fine I mean I don't think that it necessarily has to go back to the manufacturers if the state wants to increase the funding for the clean water act then they should be looking at a funding source that is more direct to that instead of this this avenue I think that there needs to be some real clarity and transparency on why a tax and where that tax money is going for what purpose sure I'm sorry about that I think you have a lot to put in here and if you have a point of view from your job I think that we should hear it I think that's part of this conversation I think that engaging in the legislative conversation around looking into the clean water board will offer some education for those who are billed online share that with Sarah I hear I'm concerned about our decisions but the flip side of the point is that anything that makes generating waste more expensive is actually going to go ahead and hopefully push the reduction of consumption of oil too which is one bottle of oil to drive down the consumption so there may be some benefits also but yes there will be I'm not sure that an extra dime is going to stop people from buying their bottled beer taxes are but I mean it's a point yes money moves opinions that's a part of this has there been consideration of glass only expansion? I wanted to ask that because on one hand we potentially could lose a fair amount of revenue with the PET additional aluminum but if we pushed for a glass only expansion we're of course removing more of the problematic material from our stream so I would like opinions on that one of the things we talked to to the state about we've been talking to them for a few years at least since I've gotten here was not restricting it to talking about a glass only solution for items that currently are contained in glass so you're looking at pickle jars or mustard jars or other food or beverages that are currently in glass that just aren't a beverage so if we're really talking about looking at the universe of glass consumables and glass well maybe we need to expand it beyond beverages one of the things that we had and again talking about opposition well the grosses may not like that either but what is that universe and is much, much larger so the caveat in my mind would be okay let's put in more glass whether from not just beverages but also food pull out the PET and the aluminum into the MRF system so getting as much of the hard to handle stuff out and the very easy to handle stuff traditionally handled stuff in so that was another thing we tossed around with them as well was don't just settle for beverages think about other potential options too yes this is a really basic question which is like what are we seeking for in an outcome like what is the motivation for the bottom bill or in the MRF what are we trying to that's a good question and because it sounds like by commodifying these materials we're getting worried about the financial situations but from an environmental perspective like where does the two systems the concurrent systems how are they performing with the materials where are they actually going what happens what are the life cycle analysis and costs of those concurrent systems so on the slides last month there was the at least the diversion from the waste stream right so we know that the bottom bill as far as Chittenden County goes is not significant in an impact in diversion they're very it's pretty comparable to what our recovery rate is when you talk about the cleanness of the stream and that was one of the great things that we saw on our tour in South Carolina was a PET processor and definitely they want bottom bill material and nothing from single stream MRFs and that will go to bottle to bottle recycling we have outlets for our PET it's not getting landfill it's getting used for some other recycled commodity market so it's you know is is it our interest to look for the bottle to bottle recycling and really push for that or do we are we okay with it going for say fiber for clothing it's still getting recycled so that's a good question the life cycle analysis is complicated yeah think about the bottom bill I just from a 60,000 foot level this is just an incredibly old fashioned and inefficient way of handling material and I have an instinctive reaction against it to add it to more products and you've got people they buy the glass product they've got to set it aside at home and they've got to take it to a redemption center somebody's got to handle all this redeemed product and it's all manual labor it just doesn't make sense from an industrial standpoint the system made sense for a long time in the region in particularly Vermont where not everyone across the state had access to recycling so that changed with Act 148 so this was the only real recycling method for many of the rural areas of the state but that access is now nearly universal which was the goal so this is why the time is good to look at do we need to continue to have a bottom bill system that operated the same way it did 40 years ago when it first came and there's a lot of acknowledgement of that fact and there's a lot of acknowledgement of the estates that the state was the only one that never captured them for 35 plus years so a lot of things are coming together not the least of which as well is the pressure on the markets the pressure that the markets are putting on the recycling system in general and saying how can we get the best out of both infrastructure because we have two sets of right of competing infrastructure and how do we maximize both and that's the question one of the questions so going back to Abby's point what what would be our vision what is the goal what is the ultimate goal that the Chittenden County solid waste district would like to see for the recovery of these materials if this system doesn't work or it's not as efficient and effective as it could be what what would we like to see what would be our vision of this I think that focusing on commodities or materials that are highly recyclable isn't really moving us forward that much whether you know through an expanded bottle bell I think focusing on things that are more difficult to capture and recycle and somehow influencing upstream design and decisions is where our focus should be whether that's extended producer responsibility or something like that to move the needle for CSWD expansion of the bottle bell is not going to move the needle right can we deal with it financially yeah we can just increase the morphotic fee and move on from there or we can push for we are pushing for alternatives and looking outside the box and having those conversations not to say that we're not doing that but we're not pushing against the bottle bell that much expansion and that's where I'm just not clear whether we should or shouldn't the alternatives and getting creative and thinking outside the box in various circles and groups and I welcome that input from the board as well it's whether or not Michelle goes out with a piece that we distribute to legislators that gives them the well gives them more than the facts just basically states we're not supportive of this we can give them the facts and say you can go ahead and make this decision this is how it's going to impact single stream recycling and we would probably do that but to take a position on it we don't support this or we're neutral and here's the information that's what I want to get a sense from and we don't have to decide that today obviously the legislative session isn't happening but it's a good time to start thinking about that because I'm pretty sure the conversation will come up from my perspective I believe that we want to stay true to our mission and our battle of course is you know one of the foremost parts is the reduction of ways it goes into the landfill so whatever results in that I think is what we should support and if that means we should advocate against a particular proposal I think we should do that then again it may not be clear I understand it might not be a clear path I also think I recognize that a lot of people are emotionally invested in the deposits in that kind of returnable system so I do think it's going to be difficult to change public opinion on that so that's another concern and I think we should look at that in terms of a public relations where do you want members to see us as you know that's why this one's a little bit tricky because people do feel pretty strongly about it and as you saw from last month it's complicated it's very complicated to explain to people and for them to understand and frankly when I talk to a lot of people they think they're getting money put into their pockets when they bring back their deposits they're earning money somehow yeah is there any sort of alternative proposal that either starts here or some sort of Frankenstein's monster from the different constituents the distributors retailers stuff like that is there any sort of working group towards like not only do we not support this type of expansion but we have this idea that builds on that core foundational question should we even be playing this game at all or is that are we just really and are the other people who are against this really just thinking we don't want to expand yeah so we have met in groups with folks that are not excited about an expansion and EPR has come up as a potential alternative to the bottom to the bottom yeah yeah and back in 2011 there was a bill that was introduced that was EPR for packaging and it you can explain EPR yeah so extended producer responsibility is where the manufacturers of the product have a requirement to help finance and fund the take back system of their product so we have that EPR system for paint we have it for electronic waste mercury containing lamps so when batteries when you bring your lamps paint batteries etc to a retailer hazardous waste facility you're not charged for it and the producers are paying for that in their program so this was something that was introduced for packaging back in 2011 and as part of that bill it sunsetted the bottle bill and that's what sank that bill because it was really a lightning rod there was in fact no conversations about extended producer responsibility it was all about people flew in from all over the country to oppose that bill because it it sunsetted the bottle bill there are models for with other municipalities or governments like I think I'm recalling that British Columbia has extended producer responsibility I don't know but I think from that is some innovation about packaging which is an outcome that we would want I mean of a certain design of a certain kind but so there's kind of three goals from EPR it's funding for it so that people participate and they don't have to pay for the recycling or their paint or what what not and it's a really financial relief for municipalities that are providing that service there's better education and collection service so higher participation and higher diversion rates so that has happened with all of our EPR programs and then the final one is the hope that it will help influence the design of the product upstream so that producers make that material more recyclable or they reduce the packaging amount or they increase recycled content so that is EPR for packaging is they do have that in British Columbia as well as Quebec and Ontario they have EPR for packaging and many European states as well for the last 30 years the United States is the only country that doesn't have EPR for packaging in any of the states but there's a lot of states looking at that right now including Vermont so I don't think it's a question of if I think it's a question of when ultimately we will be seeing that at some point so message then as I said it's not taking something that's already pretty easy to recycle other than the glass but and manage in a separate system the interesting thing about British Columbia and a lot of the EPR programs is they do they've had bottle bills in place prior to those programs and they're still in place yeah so they do because people are really passionate about them yeah what I'm hearing is hearing a sense of well if we're going to say no and we oppose we should at least bring something else to the table right so it's not a no not this but maybe that so I've heard that across a couple of what I'd like to do is to go around and ask each commissioner I don't think that this is the end of this discussion I'd like to bring this back up next month too so that we can keep this going and keep an eye keep our minds on it but I'd like to hear from each of you what else you think you need to know about this for decision making and any observation you have on what you think we should do right now with what you know so what else do you think you need to know and what do you think about where we are right now so Logan would you start this is what I guess we're never going to be late again sorry I think I'm curious about learning more about EPR and thinking about regional consortium so that not only in our district and the ways that we manage our state in the area but across the states that are around us and ways that we can enhance the heft with which we push for EPR as a strategy to put more pressure on folks who are further upstream on this regional I would agree with that understanding what EPR would really look like and if it has a chance of being supported in terms of sort of where what I also feel like just more time digesting all of this not having seen the last presentation where I feel like I'm landing now is thinking that it seems like the time to weigh in on how the E-sheets are being used seems like it sort of has passed and that it's better to focus on the possibility of expansion versus how that money is going to the Clean Water Act and thinking about again just aligning with our values and the highest possible use of material as far as expanding even glass only on a deposit set up I've talked to one of the local redemption centers and stuff they've been running the same system for years and they don't have any room for expansion on their voice so where do you expand to? Do we take our closed reuse zones and turn them into deposit well now you're talking also there's talk about let's get rid of the bottom world totally well same people oh that person, that person, that person are out of job just like that a lot of this is who's going to handle all this stuff as Abby pointed out I would like to see some modeling maybe how you mentioned in some European countries up in Canada how they're going about it and you said some other states are moving forward with the extended producer responsibility and what steps have they taken and maybe incorporated some other alternatives in the way they present it secondly I'd like to understand the Canadian and European models a little bit better now for the CHOMS their parallel systems that they have and I'm interested in if there needs to be an extension or expanded model for application only for glass to exercise retaining the easier to recycle materials in the system and that doesn't in parallel with that the EPR for difficult to recycle packaging to just be more focused on easier to recycle materials in the movement Tim what I would love to have is the answer and it speaks to how it just points to how complex this issue is but I think it really highlights an opportunity I think for the district overall I think we have done a very good job of working on the tactical execution of the drop off centers and we do have a fairly large budget set aside for things that are not operational related we spend a lot of time and energy focusing on education but I think that we really face a challenge here we need to look at how we invest our time and our money and our resources because we really should be default later not just in Vermont but in this nation for how we enable this and I don't think we are today well I was on a national call today talking about Vermont so pretty regularly talking nationally about Vermont oh I'm sorry I'm not belittling anybody's I don't take that personally at all I was just saying that CSWD is seen nationally as a leader for sure that's why I'd love to see I think we are really uniquely positioned to be able to put forward an answer we have a tremendous amount of credibility as a district I think we might be telling ourselves a little bit short that said I think we are going to have to invest in some resources we want to go ahead and needle through the details that's why we're having this discussion exactly Abby I guess I've just been thinking about the students the climate strike and using that as a lens and a witness test for us which is sort of what you're saying have a really high standard with a big picture of what we do about this complex issue I will say that we heard a lot about that in the Senoko conference that we went to and it was really interesting very interesting and you would be surprised at some of the things that the outcomes of those conversations and more specifically looking at the environmental analysis versus recyclability and how sometimes those two conflict with each other so it's really complicated I want you to know we are looking at that too for sure in the narrowest sense I think it makes sense to attach costs to the most problematic material that would be glass so it would make sense to expand I agree with you I think it's essentially a tax it's a complicated route but it's essentially a tax and I'd rather be more straightforward and just tax the product rather than go through a bottle bill mechanism ultimately I think the most important thing is the extended produce response I think we have an overpackaging problem throughout the nation and creating incentives to reduce that packaging and lighten the burden of glass and aluminum and plastics but all packaging is really the right thing to do and that's what I think we're here for is to reduce the amount of material that either goes into the landfill or has to be recycled attacking the extended producer responsibility creates the incentive for them to think about it and stop marketing overpackaged products to the consumer what he said I would also add that I think whether it be a tax or deposit the sheets that money should go back to the MRS to improve their facilities or maintain them I think that just makes a whole lot of sense let's ask staff I'm getting I'm sorry I must Michelle you can rule me out of order but if we had political if we only have so much political capital in Montalier I personally would rather see us expend that on getting a deposit put on all tires because it bothers the heck out of me on spring cleanup day there are so many tires and that's been killed by the tire dealers I think over the years and I'd love to see that change because to me it's crazy we don't have a mechanism for residents to be able to return those for free so that we get a whole lot less roadside tires disposed so that's my two cents I think the whole system of redemption it adds an expense without any environmental benefit and if you're going to charge a nickel that nickel could easily go back to the MRS because we've done a lousy job teaching people that recycling costs money and sooner or later they really have to believe it and it's a good idea for that nickel go I truly believe the legislature is going to do something this year and we don't have time to do an extended producer responsibility for this year I mean they're going to make an action this year and I think they're going to come up on the table and either support like a glass only bottle bill or add all glass to the bottle bill and educate and educate and educate people about how we fund the MRF through aluminum recycling and PET and whatever because I mean all these other things are great those people up here are going to do something this year and once they do it we can see the current one's been 40 years and once they do it they're going to change it in the near future and we're going to be stuck with whatever it is that they get past so I think we've got to be proactive and fight for those materials to stay in the MRF first of all I'm against taking the money today and putting it into clean water I don't see where what disposing of waste or recycled material has anything to do with clean water and I'm against that I almost like to propose that you do away with the whole bottle bill and just say it's another recyclable and then put it back on to the producers to help support our MRF in expansion I mean today we love the fact that we got a nickel on a metal can an aluminum that we can then resell at a significant higher price but it's still a case whether it's glass or whether it's aluminum it is a tax and I think it's a matter of trying to balance the recycle activity as opposed to a disposal activity and how do you manage the materials but it definitely is a case that what's been in place for these number of years of a nickel deposit the world today is more interested in recycling and I think we need to push that end of it more even though it may create a problem for us in terms of the material we would then have to handle for me I'm kind of a combination of Paul Stabler and Alan I think that we need to have something an opinion on the bottle bill for this year because it's going to happen and having the extended producer responsibility is going to take longer than that but that is very very very important I'd like to see us do a proposal for expanded glass keep the bottle bill as it is keep a bottle bill but make it something that will actually work for the worst offender which is glass I also agree that tires are a real problem if we're looking at this globally we're talking about something that it's a hydrocarbon but first I'd like to have them figure out some other thing to make tires out of than a gasoline based product but that not happening we do need to address tires at some point certainly not right now this was a great conversation I want to thank you all and I'd like to for next month to have you think about what you heard try to make sense of what we would like to hear and continue this yes if we look at the potential policy options the glass only bottle bill without any retooling of our infrastructure EPR could require us to change things but may not the fees probably there would be some weird mechanism where we get part of that expansion with then money coming back to the MRFs it's going to be a tough sell so is it really coming down in terms of what's actionable for this legislative session coming up useful in terms of our current capacity to be really considering do we go glass only or do we we have two choices we support expanded glass or we support any changes to the current bottle bill as it is does that seem a reasonable analysis on the expansion keep in mind too that the expansion is taking more PGA right so it seems not helpful to us so it's just saying we don't want to do an expansion unless it's just glass only for this for this session so we can get something in a positive statement that allows also for just greater education if we say glass only that's an easy win to say and this is our education outreach to the community about not only glass and recycling broadly but it's like a win-win for everybody thank you summary done well Jen's going to make sense of us she's going to figure us out on Friday right Jen that's right and I don't know what you're going to come up with but this will be back on the agenda next month so that we can get to some kind of a conclusion thank you very much next the Heinsberg drop-off center construction contract so we have Renee Marshall here who is the Heinsberg town administrators so thank you and I just like to remember thank you and so I appreciate you both coming out tonight to be here for this any questions that the board may have about the process of the project so as we had mentioned several months ago we were going to you had approved us to go out to bid for construction with the caveat that obviously we could bring back to you the cost so that's what you have here in the memo and as we had mentioned as well and we've been talking with the town about if we are to proceed with the project in Heinsberg it will not look the same as what had previously been in Heinsberg so it's something that can be seen as part of our movement towards redesigning our system as a whole and this can be seen as a first step and what we've done with this project is again given the configuration of the land that we have available saying okay well let's take a look at what are the needs of the community and everything that we've been hearing from the community when we were having to decommission the old drop off center was we really just want back the trash and the recycling and some food scraps and that's what we want back so that was our base case where I was to start there and then we designed around those needs and also around what are some of the other more commonly generated items that people might have on a more regular basis than say a bulky item things like the compact fluorescent bulbs or batteries that tend to be generated a little bit more frequently than once a year or once every five years in the case of a mattress or a couch so we're really looking at streamlining our offerings and making them more safe more cost effective as well and looking towards the future and part of the looking towards the future was trying to get away from containers and where we can add things like solar or other items that can help us to reduce our footprint and to keep our costs down we're looking towards that as well so this can kind of be seen to as a almost like a initial dry run a pilot to test out some of these assumptions and some of these theories going forward so I want to kind of keep that in mind as well as you're looking at this we were thrilled that we received five qualified bids from very good companies and Josh and I the bids came in last Wednesday and Josh and I evaluated them on Thursday and we wrote the memo on the road on Friday and so I appreciate that you were all open to receiving this by email so again all of the bids were responsive and complete so that was also welcome so good quality proposals and the low bid from, I should say Stuart, we have Stuart and Stuart so Stuart with it Stuart construction out of extension is the low bidder and their base price is what you see on the page one of that memo 411300 and their the total project price if they're including the solar array is another $12,915 for a total project price if that is included at 424215 as you'll recall Brian's initial engineers estimate for the project came in at 445 so we are under that we are over what we had budgeted in the capital plan we budgeted $325 for this project so that is where we stand now and we welcome questions and comments can you speak more about the solar installation and why and what your so solar installation was brought up by the board when we brought it forward for final design in June and one of the thoughts was let's start looking into green infrastructure so one of the things we did was see where a good placement of a solar array would be it's in the north western corner of the facility the way that the site is designed is that we'll bring all the conduit to that area and then if it needs to be something that gets installed later we can do that or we can do it now working through that piece as far as how that would look as offsets for our energy uses we have to explore a little farther to be honest so we've got it as far as construction is concerned about the benefits we do do a little more investigation on that to clarify then would your proposal be to actually install that this year or is this part of we also do need to if we are going to go forward with the solar project we would need to go back to the DRB in Heinsberg for an amendment so we put it in here as part of the project in the event that the staff decides that it makes sense to go forward so that we don't have to come back to you and say oh we want to extend the contract amend the contract ask for more money we have it here in the event that it does play out and make sense for us and that the town agrees and the town may not agree not sure if it applies but the federal tax credit drops by 4% at the end of the year for solar I'm not sure if it applies here but there is a tax credit so that may only be for residential for all I know but if we don't pay income tax I don't think we'll get benefit correct the panel will be there and the conduit will be there all that conduit price included in the 12,000 earthwork has trenching involved so that's included in the earthwork piece so it's kind of spread out through the project and the only thing that's available for solar is the array the materials to build the ballast and then the electrical hookup for it so that 12,000 plus is for the above ground yes was there other green infrastructure considered in the evidence no this was it no there wasn't much opportunity the we could potentially look at requested to be put into the asphalt that we put down we could look into the future because we do have the meter and the capacity on our panel to maybe put solar on the booth itself it just doesn't have a very big footprint yes so that kind of and then our pole barn which has a decent size footprint is facing the wrong direction so we could figure out what to do with that but as far as the design went to look at green infrastructure and solar the placement we have the most optimal to be kind of out of operations and also minimize the impact on the town garage because it's out of their way it doesn't impact their operation either all set up through green power we did not look into that they would probably jump at the chance to look for this I mean it's worth looking into I don't for future projects I think this one is probably too yeah this is pretty far along we're running up against you know the construction season I mean it wasn't something we presented to the town so we wouldn't want to change things up in the last minute but for future projects we will keep that in mind how are we proposing to pay for the project so we reviewed the capital project for non-critical capital projects and there's room to make sure that we get everything that we need to get done done at other facilities and also meet the cost of this project there's room in there we verified that for sure anybody else can you redefine that statement a little bit more yeah so throughout each of our facilities there are things that we would like to do or should do should do is not the right way to say so there are some things that are not necessarily mission critical for this year there are some projects like green mountain compost that depending on the direction of where we go with the compost facility we won't be doing making some of those purchases or doing some of those projects so that's really where the biggest potential savings are there are a couple of other smaller things some of the drop off centers there is a power washer that we don't need to buy so there are some smaller things in the realm of 15,000 here 20,000 there that when you add them up they add up anybody else 90 day project completion so as soon as we give them the notice to proceed the clock starts ticking we have contingencies that if they don't finish within the 90 days there is a period of damages of $1,000 a day every day after the 90 days so they say they can do it and then they should probably do it anybody else can you resolve that the board of commissioners wait, wait, wait I have one question you can still have this question I'd like to do it now thank you Burt I have a question for the town has this project been fully approved to go forward by the select board for the DRB first and there were a couple of changes that's been made by the select board there were a couple changes that CSWD made to the plans and so that was the only reason it went back to the select board so there was just needed to be some more confirmation from our highway operations to make sure there wasn't going to be any conflict there and then we have another active construction project for a floodplain restoration that's going to be going on at the same time as this one and so I just wanted to put those two together to make sure that they can work harmoniously at the same time in this area and there's good communication between those two as well so we feel confident that this will work that this will work and the select board does as well so that's why I wouldn't be here in person just to okay so being confident and being approved are two different things it's been approved and what the confidence was I'm confident we have a good communication going forward that we'll be able to work through navigating the two construction projects going on at once well so that was the confidence it has been approved okay be resolved the board of commissioners authorizes the executive director to enter into a contractual agreement for construction services with Stuart construction of Essex Junction, Vermont for an amount not to exceed $430,000 for the purpose of constructing a drop-off center in Heinzburg, Vermont construction shall be contingent upon successful negotiation of the terms of a lease agreement between CSWD and the town of Heinzburg for use of their property so be it further resolved that the board of commissioners authorizes the executive director to enter into lease negotiations in Heinzburg and to execute such lease as soon as both parties are satisfied second second any other discussion on this can you provide some clarity on that last comment about the lease so we are obviously because we don't have a drop-off center there now we don't have a lease so that is the piece that Renee and I will need to negotiate and what the town has now is our boilerplate and then with each drop-off center there is some little detail that is specific to that town or that city that needs to be inserted so I would get the language into that lease handed over to Thomas they would hand it over to their local town solicitor and then it becomes executed so this is subject to the lease it's condition we are not constructing until this and the view of how long that lease will be we are we are presenting our standard five-year lease with three five-year options to renew for the total of 20 years Paul can you confirm that the agreed upon these prices of dollar a year that is what is in the draft correct yes yes that would probably not be satisfactory so it is to our mutual satisfaction and just to be clear the construction season getting real tight so the lease agreement needs to probably take place within the next week or full disclosure we won't be able to move forward and this will get pushed to the spring so everybody else is confident with that we are not going to build in February do you have a question about the term? yes we we approved tonight additional on the this one negotiations correct but does the lease thing come back to the board? what have we done in the past? I haven't been here I'm pretty sure those have come back to the board and so I think Tim is right I hope you should double check me well what we can do with the time crunch here is that we can have a phone meeting and do it as an emergency I'm confused the motion here includes language that says authorize the executive director to enter into the lease negotiations with the town of Heisberg and to execute such lease as soon as both parties are satisfied so essentially that you're right the way that is written would allow me to go ahead and you're saying that yes as our terms and conditions are met as long as the town's terms and conditions are met that you do give the approval for me to sign the lease so essentially you would be approving that tonight as well I understand the sense of urgency but at the same time this is not an emergency if it slides a year if it slides we have been kind of painted into the corner here where the town made a decision that we were going to go ahead and close the drop off center so now we have all the member communities chipping in to make the close to a $1 million investment and now we're being told the decision needs to be made I'm very short notice and we're going to have to kind of hustle and pull together a meeting to review a lease I don't see any need to go ahead and rush if it takes more time it takes more time I mean you know how I feel about the whole entire process I'm hopeful that this is the last time when a member community is going to go ahead and force the hand of every other member community to spend $1 million if we need to with deference to the effort that has been put into this both by the staff and by Heinsberg if we need to have a call next week of this board of directors to approve the lease we will do it with a rational burden on us it doesn't have to be at five o'clock the call could be at seven or whatever is a more convenient time for commissioners to be able to get on the phone but if that's what we need that's what we'll do all I have is one vote right that's all I have that's all we all have I would just make the recommendation to that it would seem to be a bit strange to have a lease with four or five years rather than much longer time this is a standard this is what we have done up Paul, go ahead personally if the lease is the same as what's been negotiated with Upparanta, the NYSICS and Williston then I'm fine with it going forward if it were to deviate from that personally I do believe that should be brought back before we just vote can we amend the resolution is that what's understood that the resolution says resolution has a lease in it and Sarah as a representative of the board knows that if there's any changes that are significant that for her well-being that she would probably come back before anyone better not be satisfied I mean I have no as the motion maker I believe that we can move forward as long as everything is there okay the hammer has spoken so that understood that the the motion would include approval, pre-approval by this commission of the lease if it is the standard boilerplate that we have had for our history frankly and that it would meet the same criteria as we've had with Heinzburg in the past if there's a deviation then that change would have to be brought back to the board because we all know the standard boilerplate so the leases that have existed for the last 40 years something like that we did just approve some of the others what was it last year there were standard renewals and they didn't change much although it was changed was the materials accepted and things like that that's not true I believe the South Burlington lease had a clause in there that said that they could go ahead and not accept trash from Burlington and we voted on it I don't understand these aren't all identical if this is the same as what they have had and what is the standard with the others then it is understood by this commission that that's what they are approving if someone would like to amend the resolution Logan as somebody who's still relatively new I don't quite understand what counts as a significant deviation from the boilerplate lease and how it works against South Burlington or Essex or Richmond or others the more I think about it I'm not sure that I could realistically have a say or have an informed opinion about the lease that gets signed by any of us without having read it or having some explanation of what changed prior to the execution of the lease by our group or for you as the executive director right so when we last round most of what had changed was the materials that were accepted because again we started plus years ago we ran through all the terms and then when we got them it was took a lot more than we did back then so those were some material changes the general terms and conditions are boilerplate and it was a term to keep throwing around I'm fine to circle around to everyone what I had sent to Rene as the boilerplate that we currently pay a dollar a year for all the other properties so if this came in at $25 a year then that probably would be a significant change we do the 5 and 5 and 5 and 5 those kinds of things that are the major requirements of the lease it's pretty basic I do find it somewhat ironic that we jump through a lot of groups to make sure that we don't violate open meeting laws that's a law I'm sorry Tim but we are not violating any state law it's not comparable it's not comparable Paul are you done? I find it ironic that we spend a lot of time to comply with a law which has to do with open meeting laws and giving warning in public notice and yet here we're saying okay there's going to be something that we're going to go ahead and prove in advance but we don't have it in front of the board and we don't have it in front of the public if this commission would like to change the resolution it can if you want to propose a friendly amendment or a hostile amendment the resolution you may and if you get a second then we will consider it in a revision so you have an opportunity to move for an amendment I suppose that the board go ahead and call the special meeting via phone to go ahead and approve the lease I'm not going to second I think we're protected here the language says to execute such lease I think if Sarah doesn't hear from us or doesn't understand that there's only one level of satisfaction and that is that the lease has to conform to what we've done in the past she's going to know she's not satisfied she can't execute the lease she's going to come back to us and say what's the direction of the board and if she doesn't do that then we're not satisfied with her so I think the language is fine as is so any more discussion I'm going to ask for the vote there's no need to move it so all those in favor opposed abstaining one motion passes now we we're going to have a brief since it's 20 past 8 I was hoping to end this meeting at 8 we're going to have a brief executive session on a legal matter so if someone has it or can read it I'd appreciate it the motion for an executive session take two second all those in favor aye approved we're out thank you