 Okay, so I'll call the select board meeting of June 14th, 2018 to order and I will call the Ascension Trust to be in order and I'd like to invite everyone to rise and join us in the Pledge of Allegiance, please. Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, the Interior Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. It is Friday today, so we did much of it. I'd like to welcome everyone to tonight's meeting, it's a joint meeting between the Select Board and the Village Trustees, I'm glad to see you all and the audience there. So, Mr. Municipal Manager, do we have any additions and changes tonight? Just handed out copies to your sheet, it's part of the item 5A, the Ascension of Member Random Agreement for Consolidation of Public Work Services, there are some modifications, track changes from the Review by Towney and Village Attorney, based on some feedback from those trustee meeting on Tuesday night. Okay, so that's no new agenda items. No new agenda items, that's just came in today. Okay, so that's part of 5A then? Yes. Okay, very good. And that's it. Okay, then on the Select Board, can I get a motion to approve the change of the agenda as amended? So much. Thank you very much. Do I have a second? Second. Thank you, Elaine. Okay, all those in favor of memeing the agenda, some 5A saying aye. Aye. And I'll make the same motion for the trustees that we amend the agenda as discussed. Second. Who seconded? Andrew. Danded. Danded. Any further discussion? All in favor? Aye. Thank you. Okay. Next item on the agenda is public to be heard. That's a time for the public to speak to the Select Board and the trustees on any item that's not on the agenda. Is there anyone here tonight wishing to speak to public to be heard? If you could state your name also. If you haven't signed in yet, please be sure you do. So we have that for the minutes. Paula, just state your name. This is just a point of order from me. I have something to say that's related to the, the goals. So I assume when I will say it, when you get to that one. Yes. If you have something about the goals. Yes. And does this work so that after you've had your discussion, then I get whatever. Yeah. We'll make sure that you have an opportunity to speak at that time. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. Is there anyone else wishing to speak on anything not done on the agenda? I did want to mention that Mike Plaguen is not here tonight. He's on vacation. He did call in. He was on vacation at the last lecture meeting to call them, but tonight he's unavailable to do that. So it'll be the four of us here tonight. Okay. There's nothing else for public to be heard. Then we're going to move on to our first item of business, which is the joint meeting with 5a. And that's extension of the memorandum of agreement for consolidation of public work services. And Evan, did you want to take that one? Well, just passed out is a revised version of the agreement. It had gone to the select board last week and to the village board. And there have been comments that were asked to change some language in specifically. You'll see that on the first page there's a couple of changes to the warehouses. And then really what it does is it was a little, it was on the big side as to the powers of the manager. And having it be more that the alignment efforts. That makes you happy Mike. By the way, there is no good side. So the powers of the manager, it could have been read that the manager was to go off and consolidate the public works departments in town highway without coming necessarily back to both boards. And so there's clarifying language that this is a process by which staff will come back to both boards for approvals of any further actions in public works of consolidation. But there are also some recommendations in there of some work items to be done in the next couple of years, which would get us prepared for a future consolidation and give the boards a preview of what a staff recommendation of what it would look like. And so those are some changes. This document was co-authored by the town attorney and the village attorney. So this is their agreed upon language. Both of them feel that they've addressed the comments for the most part as they could that have been brought up. So with that, we're open to a discussion. And any sudden corrections could that be done and brought back at a future meeting? Okay. Evan, normally we get this in our package and we get talked about just since this was at our table here, would you be willing to just go since it's a appreciate the track change copy to just go over? There's not that many track changes. Would you or that maybe give us just a quick, you know, background for each of the specifics and then I think we can have a better discussion. So it is the second whereas it used to say that whereas the town select board and village trustees approved the final report of the review committee dated October 2nd, 2017, that recommended full consolidation of the village and town public works departments. It used to the original set based on incremental steps and recommendations contained in the report. It now says beginning with a process of studies and reviews. So the actual basis of this first amendment is to establish a process to study and review the things that would be necessary for future consolidation. We then go down a little bit further. Evan, actually before you go on there, the trustees had a chance to discuss this and have their changes. Maybe we could just make sure that the select board is okay with each of these changes too. Sure. Well, the village board has not had a chance to see these changes. They have made commentary like you had an opportunity to last week. You may want to discuss these changes as I bring them up. That's fine as a process. Okay. That way we can take them off one by one, get to the end and if there's anything left yet unresolved or have questions illegal, I can get those done and we'll bring this to the next meeting. Okay. So then why don't we do that then for this first change and see if everybody's okay with that. Any other comments? I think I could maybe abbreviate just for the select board's sake some of the key issues. The original agreement said, as you recall, last October we accepted the report but we did not approve the report. It's a subtle difference. We accepted the report but there were a lot of recommendations in the report that were pretty interesting. That would have probably touched on policy areas and so we wanted to make it clear that we accepted, we didn't find any of the recommendations unacceptable but we weren't quite ready to see every single recommendation that was in the report immediately implemented. And then the second piece was in paragraph two, the original one said the manager shall have authority to address the select board and trustee's approved recommendations. And again, we sort of said, well wait, we didn't approve the recommendations, we accepted the recommendations and address, the village attorney felt that address maybe could be interpreted as implement. So that seemed to say we're giving administration full authority autonomously to implement recommendations that we approved and we didn't approve recommendations and we kind of feel that there should be more of a oversight of any big sweeping consolidations that take place. And we thought you'd probably agree with that. And approval by both boards of any sweeping consolidations, not just what the unified manager believes he has a mandate to do, or she does. So we'll have two bites at the apple then because before they get lined up and ready to be implemented, we'll get a chance to look at them. And then the budget process which enables these will also get a chance to look at them. And any of these changes would require the moving of people or positions or equipment or et cetera, which is a budgetary issue, which is a policy decision, which is passed by authority. It wasn't clear in the writing of that document of that move. And as I would say to you, and I have before, there's one thing I would like to say to you and then there's another thing that's written in agreement of what my powers are. But I acknowledge that there was a little bit of confusion and any of these reviews, processes and next steps would certainly have to come to both boards. Okay, even though it really is in your authority as the manager is to do this, but I think this is a good check and balance as we look forward together to be sure we're all on the same page. And I think all of that would hold true for any future endeavors with the departments that are not yet consolidated. Obviously there's parks and rec, there's fire department, there's libraries. This may be a template for future actions and certainly not have to rewrite every agreement completely differently. It could be a good template. Okay, thanks. So how do we want to do this? Do we want to do it step by step? All these track changes? Sure. There's not that many of them. So are we going to discuss them as we go or go through them or go through them again? Well, what would you like to do? I was thinking we could do it as we got the overview and now we're going to get the details of it and we could discuss it as we, for each of the changes. So I'm okay with this change that we just discussed. Everybody else do? Yes. Okay. So let's go on to page 2. It is the fourth whereas, it was starting on page 1 whereas the town and village further agreed that both an extension of time is needed to achieve full consolidation of the bullet works departments of the town and the village and further, used to say actions that obstruct studies and reviews are needed to better align the department's prior to full consolidation. So basically, to construct the word action and change it for studies and reviews. Top of page 2. Top of page 2. Did I go with that too? Yep. Great. Let's keep going. I don't believe there's any changes below that. Terms stayed the same. Number 1, recommendations of review committee. Unified manager referred to as the municipal manager in the agreement which is the original. It is responsible for directing staff any outside experts and or others as may be needed to it used to say address the select board and trustees approved recommendations which George just mentioned and is changed to or others as may be needed to conduct the reviews and studies set forth. That is attached here too as attachment A in a timely manner and shall provide periodic reports to the town and village on the progress being made to conduct the studies and reviews contained in the report that's new language versus study or implement the recommendations. So back to it's really about conducting studies and reviews that were contained in the report of October 2nd. Would you go with that too? Yes, I'm just concerned about the numbering. I see numbers that are being crossed out. I don't know what that means. I thought it was appropriately numbered in the draft that we looked at. It could just be a formatting. When and if this is approved we will make sure it's incorrect formatting. Billy? I recall that our trustee made a conversation that I don't think we finished about the length of the amendment but the length of the agreement and we have five years here. I don't remember the conclusion of our conversation. I don't think we really came to a conclusion and I don't see a change to that paragraph. So I would like to either at this point or at the end when we're done reviewing the other changes just review with both boards and I'm comfortable with the five-year term. Well, because it was added at the end there with the termination clause maybe it sort of makes that moot in a way. Yes and no. I have thoughts about that paragraph too. Okay. Number three other tasks in order to in addition, sorry let's go with that, other tasks in addition to the word the is struck to furthering the studies reviews and other recommendations contained in the report the unified manager shall create a plan for consolidation of public works comma to be presented to the town select board and village trustees for approval, comma which shall also include the following items. There is an A, B, C and D those items did not change from the original document. So that would be the changes to number three. Okay. Everybody okay on the other tasks? Great. Okay. Do you want me to read those? No. Before time frame for completion of studies and reports no time frame has been set in this amendment one for completion of specific tasks reports studies is agreed that full consolidation of the public works departments is a priority to the town and the village and the tasks here's the change and studies described in the report and referenced in this amendment shall and in this amendment one shall be prioritized period. Reports on at least a quarterly basis shall be provided by the unified manager or his designee to the town select board and the village trustees on progress that is being made on the tasks there's a change and studies. Period. Everybody okay with that? Good. Number five termination shall have the right to terminate the agreement and this amendment one upon a minimum of 90 days notice to the other party period should either party choose to terminate the agreement and this amendment one both parties shall cooperate in either continuing to maintain the existing coordinated public works department services in the same manner as existing at the time of the termination notice or comma if directed by the town of Essex or the village of Essex trustees shall separate any services or functions in the and here's the change in the following fiscal year now it's all new there's also a new chain of the language and the reason for the changes you can have a 90 day notice except so many things are intertwined budget wise and taxation wise you really couldn't make it any changes effective until the next budget following year and that's why we have a term because they caught that right okay so this is a potential I have one grammatical question change on the second to last line of that paragraph town of Essex select board or the village of Essex junction trustees my concern about this is if directed by the town of Essex select board or the village of Essex trustees approved by voters we can direct that things be separated but the budget process if we're separating I'm assuming that that means we're returning the village public if we're not going to keep it the existing coordinated public works in the manner existing at the time of the termination we're separating services or functions there may be a budget budgetary aspect of that which would require the cost of public works for the village to be separated from the town budget and added back into the village budget so that would require a vote so you can't predict the future and I don't know if that would happen but I think we could say just a quick phrase like and as approved by voters as necessary or as warranted or something like that kind of all this stuff has to be approved during the budget process by the voters right but when we started this we asked for a vote for the village trustee for the village residents and the town voted to bring that budget into their budget so it was a special item it wasn't just approving the budget it was a special item so we just approved it during the regular budget process okay so in the filing of fiscal year wouldn't that be the vote so that's implied we can spell it out that's implied to me they may say absolutely not and then we have to figure out what we're going to do I guess it's a cautionary tale that your actions will have to go through a budgetary process and understand what may be involved with that and therefore if you're planning on giving notice either party I would suggest some type of a council of what the agreed what's the agreement is there a solution and if it's the solution of the agreement that would be a final action but you should know in advance what you'd be facing but I think the wording is correct and yes you would have to go to the voters that that town and village meeting actually I read it in random I also want to add the word junction okay thanks so when we talk about budgets the votes are at different times so the the concern and I guess a couple things I'm trying to get to I guess one is you know we work on the budget through the entire month of January we put together we warn it we have public hearings all the things that we do to get the budget ready for town meeting is there any concern about having do we need to have any language in there that says when during a fiscal year I appreciate that I think you're on to something because if something horrible happens like June 1st it's horrific right because you've got 30 days versus say October 1st or something in the in the budget lead up time we would much rather know as we were going into the budget versus the last so just the timing of when such a decision gets made could have major implications would you like so I'm wondering right do we need to have some sort of language in there that says by January 1st or for the next budget process in the next vote can we be clear and say for the next so it could be a year and a half so it could be a year and a half later maybe I defer to others who have come through the process Greg I'd say by December 1st we would need to know that'd be the latest that'd be a heck of a monkey wrench after December 1st it'd be a heck of a monkey wrench anytime but certainly after December 1st through the town and village meetings and so if you want us to block off that period we could find the right language that's what I think you can't be the next fiscal year if it happens after December 1st since you've opened up the door a little bit let me now that I've got a little clearer thought on this you have several different abilities you can leave things as is as of the day of the agreement what that means is all the things that are done to date today tomorrow the next day two years from now stay in place and it could stay in place in perpetuity per the agreement until such time of change and then there's the next step which is we don't like the agreement really much at all wipe it all out and redo it or we don't like this piece let's change that piece and so you have those different steps sort of contained within the freedom of the language of the agreement so total change we need as much time into the next budget year to try to figure out separation and its implications in budget to both communities minor changes obviously we need less time to deal with that and then leave it as is as the day of deciding we need to stop but keep what we've built to date obviously no changes needed but nothing further is going if that makes sense does it make sense so Andy I don't know you're very good do you want to give it a couple minutes to think of some cut off dates to put in here or do you want staff to do it I I'm fine with you doing it but it's still that was a guess you can certainly remember October is when the village starts it would be an impact on both budgets so I would say October 1st October 1st and then so by October 1st of any year we need to know yeah in order to implement it into the following okay so then if we I know we have a little bit we have one more line to go and then I think there are any more changes so Andy so the other shoot a drop here is that there's the town vote could we say we have to go to a boat the town vote is on a different date than the village vote so one could say yes and the other could say no in either order also anybody could stand up a town meeting and say no take that entire line item out of the budget and it could get passed that way right so the residents of the town could initiate this at town meeting without our recommendation right so they can always do that I'm new to this game right you can't take that you can't take out a line item they can say sorry I gotta back up they could vote to remove the exact amount that it comes over it wouldn't matter because you'd say yes thank you we'll take that money out of you can vote to take money out of the budget it's not necessarily going to come out of the budget the other thing if I could say is that since we're starting up with either party can terminate then maybe that gets around the issue of the differential in the voting dates because if the select board says we want to terminate this even if the trustees don't want to and we vote later wouldn't matter if you vote to terminate it then it terminates according to this language then what happens after they've approved it it's a short term that's what I'm trying to think of can I ask a question so there was no termination language in the original agreement and we trustees had a conversation the other night that we would fully expect the status quo to continue so do we need termination language in this agreement since this is not implementing anything it is studying and making recommendations plan forward I hear you that's why we're talking about this I'm trying to think of the actual circumstance under which we would terminate this and it would have to come in as sort of a catastrophic a lot of other things would be going on besides that so I just think we do need that language in there like you're saying it could be a catastrophic but we were saying we don't know the five members that are going to be on the board or the ten members, nine members whatever, what have you they're going to be on the boards and whatever how long this goes on for if we just who knows it's not a bad idea to have a termination language I'm just coming out of another option it's not a bad idea it doesn't hurt to have it in there I think there's more to it but I'm not having it there I think one of the things I would suggest if the boards are reminding that you're amenable to the language as presented so far adding October 1st in I think the attorneys need to address the next step of the process which is town and village vote I'm writing myself a note so I don't to address language for town and village vote on budget and then we can make an approval subject to a final form of the attorneys just for that language the language alone I just as I see it is no different than you're getting married you ask for a prenatal agreement some people look at it and say well then you're expecting a divorce you're doing a plan for that you're protecting yourself against that just in case it does happen it just protects us if say five years now a whole different group of people are 20 years so however long it goes on you know I may just throw an idea out to get maybe a simplifying get around this when we did this back years ago with an agreement between the trustees and the provincial committee we had an evergreen and it's like this contract is self-renewing unless at a certain date every year you say so it would be this contract just keeps going for five years unless by October 1st either party steps up and says we don't want to do this anymore and then that gets everybody you know either party doesn't do it by or one or both doesn't do it by then we're locked into it for another year until the following year but we still have to go through what the process is for the voters you have to go through the process which we definitely need to add until the date that full it's in term or until the date that full consolidation of the public works occurs whenever occurs or whatever it was earlier so so in in term after N23 or until the date occurs earlier George you're asking then say it continues unless and continues unless stated by October 1st earlier you were talking about picking a date that would be advantageous toward the vote is October 1st the date curious if another date would be a better date to set the decision by just to work it through the process so it doesn't linger beyond a fiscal year into another I said we let the lawyers figure it out and come back to us and maybe for the boards and for the people at home yes the original agreement is stated to end July 1 2018 you two are the parties to that agreement I don't sort of treat right now July 1 as New Year's Day nothing changes it's just a different year you're both in agreement that you want the agreement to continue to go you're both in agreement that you're working on the new language therefore whether it gets approved on July 1 or whatever the date of your next joint meeting nothing changes in what we're doing agreed? and with that is the last lines which I don't believe I'll have to re-look at it I don't think there are any more changes after that one after five termination there's any more changes now I believe did Ms. Subject have comments after this? I was thinking about the length of the term of the agreement but if we put that evergreen language in there then that addresses my concern so I'm okay with that where would that evergreen language go? I'm thinking in term the section of term may be the best way to do that assuming that in the interim between July 1 2018 and 2023 should either board wish to make changes it can be brought up and discussed and I believe there's in any agreement there's two sides and I believe both boards have at least acknowledged that through this joint process that you can bring up anything that's related to your task which is merger and becoming one community I think the other side be remiss if it didn't give you the opportunity to address an issue any issue in anything that you're doing together whether it's in this agreement in a department in a policy, in a procedure and be remiss to not want to have a discussion to clarify a question so with the evergreen clause is this to fully replace the five-year term so that it wouldn't end 2023? I don't know, that's a good question then you could just keep studying this forever for decades into the next century I prefer not but it's a good point you could say either five years or it's just self-renewing if you think that maybe it might take a little longer but you're also looking at maybe things will, there'll be no need to continue after three years I think, here's the thing I think in five years we can complete this work, the studies and the proposals after that, I don't think there's any more work on a staff part it's a political decision and a voter decision not I mean we'll have this work done by five years I would hope we'll keep that five-year piece in here but if we do need a little more time we need to get a little more time and does that have to do with the evergreen clause in term would that remove the termination section? would we remove the termination section? no, I think I think you should cross that bridge five years from now and decide if you still need that clause I think after five years the agreement could sunset it could live on just because the decision hasn't been made but the reports and the studies will leave your hands okay so termination would sorry the reason why I brought it up is because the evergreen clause that we had with the Prudential Committee is that this just continued in perpetuity this is a five-year agreement so there is no annual renewal there's no need for us annually to come back together to approve this so is the evergreen even necessary I meant in the sense of saying that if we don't make our wishes known by October 1st then it continues for one more year that was the sense I meant it just goes year to year and the only time either party gets to say we want to terminate this is October 1st and so logically speaking you'd probably want to give if one party was intending to make your wishes known so that by October 1st we say okay we're choosing the state to not continue this but it was just a thought it doesn't have to be that way then it takes all the rest of the banks about the annual meetings and the voters out of it they would have to figure it out at that point but we would be locked into the agreement for another year and we certainly can take this to the attorneys and discuss how to best work the term contract the term clause year to year would be a 190 day notice before October 1st or leave in the five specific years and figure out the language I now know you're in time okay so we need to go back to the attorneys to get reworked meaning we can't really approve it tonight but it terminates before our next joint meetings and again do we need to I think what you should do prove is subject to you know that your agreement stays valid until such time as the new amendment takes effect and I think you can just do that by voice voting I think we are all in agreement that we want at least at a minimum continue the existing agreement that we all signed we want to continue that it's not anyone's intention to stop that until this gets to the new one the new one basically just continues and Evan is right the agreed parties in this who are upset that the contract wouldn't be signed by July 1st is us so if we're not agreed then it's not a problem no one's agreed by me everybody okay with what we talked about I heard some conversation about the town vote versus the village vote and I wondered if you could say in that fifth termination clause would we talk about the town and village voting on this if you could say town-wide since there's a lot of confusion about what town means in each context and that way we're crystal clear that there would be a town-wide vote that the village residents would be invited to as well as a village vote which outside the village folks wouldn't be voting in where in there I mean specifically you had written in read us in addition about town and village voting I put down a dry town and village annual meeting vote you okay with that as long as we're talking about the annual meeting I heard town and village votes which got open to I put annual meeting address town and village annual meeting vote great that works if there's no further discussion so I'm guessing so here's the plan the idea would be to get this to be the attorney tomorrow Monday latest have them take a crack at it hopefully get something back within say a week and then redistribute it well in advance of the next meeting versus at the table at the next meeting because I think the next one is like third week of July well we have one June 26 we still have one more June meeting no I'm talking about joint meeting so this will be ready for your next joint meeting great we'll not go back to the individual boards just back to the joint board sounds good we need to do a vote to sort of signal our agreement to continue to maintain the current agreement in place until the new agreement is signed to extend the deadline can't hurt I'll make a vote I'd like to just open up to the public is there anyone in the audience that would like to comment on that before we put a motion on the table if you could stand up and state your name first yeah first post count of Essex outside under hill the issue came up about somebody making a motion that's approved in town meeting either to add something or reduce a line item and I've heard that it's only advisory to the board when I was on the board I asked Jim whatever his name was I forget his last name it was the consul of BLCT he said no there's nothing in statute that says that then BLCT changes policy so what is the is there a statutory prohibition against this if so what is it an unwritten policy of the board or a tradition that says you can't do this my understanding Bruce is that since at town meeting you're approving a one number the voters are approving a number the budget, the final budget that they could either add or subtract from that one number but they are very able to tell us what they'd like to see but they're really only talking about the total number but you're talking about a line item and it would be at our peril to not take your input into a serious consideration but it's only that number that you can change that's the traditional answer what I'm saying is is it statutorily prohibited or is this a policy decision made by the board an unste... it's not written down anywhere it's just a tradition it's a rationale I want to know what is the specific statutory provision that says this and when I say statute not only mean general state statute but the charter because that's a statutory provision as well so where is it specifically I don't know if we can answer that but we could probably look it up can somebody get me an answer on this please and nothing against that max but you're doing what we've done for years and I'll send you a copy of the memo I got from this guy from VLCT and they changed their policy and VLCT is a lobbying group and they're not the final word either I can only tell you the new person's perspective and what I've been told by the town attorney is and I believe it was Steve Eustace as the moderator is exactly what we've said you can propose a change to the budget but not they ask for a specific line so that everyone knows what you're talking about but you only ask for money to be added or subtracted and it is the town board select board or the village board who then has to administer it and as they have stated they know the public's wishes so I will find out whether the state law but either way you would be very much on thin ice with your public if a town vote they went one way and you didn't do it and you served I want to know if there's a statutory provision because then we can have a debate if there's not a statutory provision working people debate that this is a policy, it's a practice it's not written down anywhere it's just what we hear every year at the annual meeting and there may be no justification for it, statutory that's what I think is important thank you Bruce anybody else like to comment tonight hello that's again from the Essex the question I have is around the reports and research that you have and you're setting up this MOU right now do all the people in town and all the people in the village know what the terms are for this MOU the terms of the MOU for the public works I don't understand where the money is coming from and who has governance over the public works I don't think so because nobody on my block does and so I I'm just concerned that you are you 9 plus 1 kind of thing it's one of your people here said do people understand what this decision is about and you're going to wait until December to let people know that they can have a conversation about where your minds are already made up about the budget and do we really have or is it not really I'm not really clear you mean you think that there's something different you mean in terms of the actual contract between the village and the town or where the funding is coming from for the public works departments I want to know do people know in terms of this MOU and shouldn't we have a vote on whether we agree not just the five from Essex Town and the five from the village just making the decision this is an impact on everybody and I don't think people understand what it is you're crafting because I think a simple merger not simply done but a simple merger is a lot cleaner than doing all of these MOUs yes I would agree with that but we're not there yet and we're on a path to hopefully get there but we've been on this public works consolidation for a number of years now and it's discussed at town meeting for those that attended and we walked through it what's in there as far as getting the consolidation between the village and the town I certainly hope that means that they're making an informed decision when they vote so I would say at least for the people that attend that yes they understand so the people that attend is the real issue then isn't it we need to keep it to your main and that's one of the things we're going to talk about okay two seconds because as you say it's at town meeting that it gets discussed but you already have your budget and as you told Bruce that you know we can take down that line item and you can still fund the item is what you're saying so the question is that there should be prior information about this before that because not a good representation of the 20,000, 19,000 people in Recreation 6 are at town meeting who are voting on this and I think that you need to be careful about doing all these MOUs adding up to what it is taking you three years, two years four years to do this one MOU let's just do a merger in this year thank you Betsy I think I saw Elaine? Betsy in terms of the MOU for public works that we're working on right now because it was a budgetary issue for both the village and the town our budget process is open to the public at all times and we have to have public hearings before the budget gets to annual meetings so there are for every year regardless of what we're talking about there are multiple meetings where the public can come and hear what we're doing and talk about it and in this particular case because it was something unusual that we were doing we wanted to educate the public as much as possible and both boards took the opportunity to do public outreach you might remember that some select board members showed up at basketball games with a table and a handout with the information there was a lot of public outreach and there was a lot of discussion of it in the Essex Reporter but that was extra outreach because it was an unusual thing we were doing but every single budget process has multiple hearings and multiple opportunities for the public to have a public participation issue in that it's very very low for it lower than most towns in the entire state but you know we're addressing it within all the legal means that we have Laura did you have something to add? Nope you need something to add Anyone else like to address? Okay I saw Paula and then I'll come to you Paula Paula Paula Paula she had her hand up first and then I'll come to you Paula Paula Paula sorry whether or not this is something that is an aspect of whatever said that there was to be a new communication person when that he retires who is going to be trying to put the stuff out there in a better way for people to get at it because it sounds to me like that's an inappropriate place for putting the contract in this information Yeah that's true Paula What puzzles me was we all know why a lot of people don't come when we're talking a population of 20,000 we can accommodate a fifth of those I would think the interest of the board would be to try to get the support of the community not to squeak it through or you should have come to the meeting on July 12th at 7 o'clock you might have heard that particular issue I do think that it is someone coming on the board and it's not going to be easy to figure out how to get the highlights of this proposal sufficiently disseminated so people do understand what they're doing I think the problem is going to be is that when it comes to a vote there's going to be a significant number that just doesn't know and it's going to get voted against it so I would suggest that you work that trying to figure out how can we consolidate the language the verbiage get it out to the community and then hope for the best Thank you I'm going to try and do that right now for everyone that's here and is watching so the amendment the extension of the MOU that we're working on is changing nothing that we have in place today we are simply saying that the next step is that we want the village manager the unified manager, sorry and staff to look at the recommendations from the committee that was charged with further consolidation and come up with a plan we have specifically stricken from this language the ability for the unified manager to implement the plan Unilaterally so it is simply to say everything is that we've had for 5 years 3 years 3 years and saying come back with a plan to do the rest of it and then obviously we will do our best to get out to the communities to say we may or may not approve this come give your feedback but I'm probably going to say something that's not going to be well liked but everyone is a community we have an obligation to find out the information as well we're doing the best we can but just to be clear this is changing nothing that's in place today I would like to add my name is Jerry Fox I live in the town I'd like to add to what Elaine said there was a significant discussion about this in both the village and the town reports so if you really wanted to know it was there it's been there every year for the last 3 years as they tried to go through this step by step thank you Jerry one quick thing we throw around acronyms for the people at home MOU stands for memorandum of understanding so when you hear MOU I apologize it means memorandum of understanding the full term that both they understand what they're signing Lori's comments are true when and if the staff comes through with these plans they will be brought for at public meetings such as these joint meetings they will also if to be implemented will have financial ramifications in both budgets those have to be addressed and maybe to Mrs. Dunn's comment those are the types of things we're going to have to separate out into like sheets what is the actual financial impact to the village to the town and what do they mean that's why all of this work has to be done in studies and reports and brought back to the boards for action it's policy it's the community not just the unified manager saying this is what we're going to do so I applaud the conversation and the attempt for clarification but it will have to be done well in advance of the town meeting but it will be in the document as well Jerry, thank you for that comment it will be in the documents and we will have to do outreach as well is there anyone in the audience who hasn't had a chance to speak yet that would like to thank you again for your comment so I'm going to bring it back to the board we're going to look for a motion and to I will make a motion that the trustees signal their agreement to continue the original public works consolidation agreement until the new amendment is signed later in July I'll second any further discussion is that the motion makes sense to everybody yep all in favor? opposed let's see select board I would move the same as George on behalf of the select board thank you very much do I have a second any further discussion on that just one more question sorry George the statement was made later in July what if we don't come to agreement in July do you want to give it a later date like September 1 or something like that so we have a couple of meetings before we because I don't want to just make it an indefinite you can reverse it if it takes too long or as I suggested we could bring this up but the July meeting we're not ready then so I will I will accept the motion as proposed since I seconded it any further discussion on approving that motion although it's a bit of a shame if I was saying aye aye of course it just happens it just happens okay so looking forward to that new amendment and so now we are on to last time we had a homework assignment to come up with lots of definitions for commonly used words about consolidation and we consolidated the definitions we consolidated the words about consolidation and Lane and Irene were the stars of that show and so I'm going to turn it over to I'll decide how you want to do we'll just give a little so we met twice and went through the trustees impressions of the words the select board's impressions and the staff there was also a document of staff's definitions and we reviewed all of them together and these definitions here are an amalgam of those and in many cases we reviewed all of the definitions and said that one by this particular one is perfect let's use that most of the cases it's an amalgam of multiple people's definitions and we didn't want to get super prescriptive we just wanted to find appropriate definitions for the terms as they relate to this conversation of consolidation so that's it that's what we did if you have any questions or want to know how we arrived at particular ones we can try to explain that one or two of them required three of them four of them required multiple you know sometimes a word has more than one meaning so four words in this list have more than one meaning as related I just want to say one thing thank you because I do not know if the committee would have been way too much for me imagine you two talking about each individual word thank you it takes a special personality to do this kind of work and I don't mean to be critical but they got the job done I would like to say I would like to mention one definition in particular Mr. President one definition in particular town it's super obvious as we have the entirety of Essex including the village and all 21,000 plus residents but under that we wanted to emphasize all of us at the table need to be very specific when we're using the word town make sure that when you're talking about whatever it is you're talking about whether it's staff or town outside the village or whatever town wide take a second to use the right verbiage so that we minimize confusion which is what I read just a few minutes ago I read that so yeah we can't redefine the word town it is what it is so we need to be more careful with the way we use it Elaine and Irene maybe you can I'll get you next time did we do why didn't I ask you to do this exercise maybe give a little bit to not only the people in this room but the people at home why isn't it so important to do these words in any big undertaking where you're going to have reorganization or creation of something new and there's multiple participants from different perspectives it's really a good idea to identify any potential pitfalls in terms of defining things because you don't want to get deep into a conversation and realize that this person is talking about one thing this person is talking about something completely different but they're both using the same word so any big process like this should have a common language and so these were the words that the trustees the select board and the staff identified as the most important vocabulary of this conversation of consolidation so having common language is really important to minimize disagreement so Andy had his hand up yep the definition for consolidation contains the phrase as well as maintaining or improving the quality of service delivery I always get nervous when I see that because it's frequently interpreted to mean no lessening of services I mean if I think that when we're looking at consolidation we also need to consider what we're going to stop doing but this definition doesn't allow for that if you interpret this to say we have to have the same level of services because it says quality of services which means they have to be really good services but if you do fewer of them you can still do qualities sorry he's trying to interrupt me sorry sorry we'll go ahead so you can still have quality services you can still maintain quality services but do fewer of them but the way this is frequently interpreted the way I've seen it done before I was involved with the wreck governance discussion it always came up that we can't take anything away from anybody but I really really think we ourselves at disservice we don't also look at things that we want to stop doing or that don't make sense to do in the context of a consolidation I differ I would thank you for pointing that out I would have two answers to that one is I would interpret the word maintaining what we say maintaining or improving the quality of service delivery maintaining the quality of service delivery does not prescribe how we maintain it we could still maintain it but lower the physical work that's done or lower the budget for it as long as the quality is as perceived as good the other answer I would have to that is when you're thinking about that phrase that you would have to look at the definition appropriate level of services which is a separate definition but is related and is up to the community what they expect, what they need, what they want and what they're willing to pay for the whole concept it's very ambiguous it's very subjective and for us to quantify what's quality services and everyone's going to have their own opinion obviously that's the way it is as we see with the vote with whatever whether it's REC or what have you but services in a community that are our size the quality of services it depends on where you live too as I brought up before you live in a village you expect different services when you live in a densely populated urban area as compared to a rural district of the community to cast a broad statement like that I have a tough time with that whole thing you know everyone has the same expectations Andy everyone in our community is a whole the town a whole has the same expectation of services as everyone else whether you live here in the village or you live in the far reaches of the hinterlands of the town could you tell us what changes well I just I guess I wouldn't get so hung up on I guess I would I'd say maybe change the verbiage I can't think of a good way to put it but it's a very difficult thing to quantify to explain thank you when the staff was discussing consolidation and the process of let's say alignment we took some of the all the comments of the boards and said look why would we be doing this okay if it's not to maintain the levels of service and of the things of the town and the village residents why do it so we wanted to be specific that the practice and the process of consolidation was not about changing service levels as part of our discussion it's how to put the organizations together it is then once they're together and even during for the boards to come and ask look money's different this is what you do in different but the process of consolidation isn't about specific maintenance of levels we just assume the maintenance of levels until such time as there's monetary change or board change as to direction but consolidation is more about putting it together how does it look, how does it act and not changing policy to what we do and how we do it as long as the service levels of that day are met that's how we view it and that's probably why the language is such I think that ultimately over the next 5 or 10 years you will probably go through many of the different policies and service levels and have conversations and give direction to staff that's kind of how I look at it whether we're together or separate you should always look at things how do we do sidewalks when do we do sidewalks whose sidewalks do we do has nothing really to do with the act that we're doing now it's based on board direction and monetary I would just say that with the definition I like the definition it makes a whole bunch of sense in my mind with what you're saying Andy I wouldn't see this as saying we can't look at consolidation in a way that would then possibly reduce the quality of services maybe there's one less sidewalk in every street, two nodes but that for our understanding when we talk about consolidation here's what we mean and if we mean something different with whatever the phrase or whatever the word may be we all just need to be aware of what we're trying to say similar to what I'm reading with town if what we're trying to say is consolidating something to departments and it is a possible service reduction then we just need to be vocal about that and make sure we're really elaborating what we mean Andy? Just to spend my experience as I said when I was on the I was the alternate in the rec study committee that that phrase was in there and it was frequently referred to as we can't stop doing anything that we're currently doing today and I do not agree that we should have that phrase in there that we need to, just because we've always done it, we need to continue doing every service that we provide today it's just my position I would strike that I would strike that phrase completely as well as maintaining or improving quality of service delivery we address the level of services in the prior definition okay so I completely understand what Andy's saying but to me maintaining or improving the quality of service delivery is a very I don't think it gets to a specific service that we would not be able to stop or change if we needed to and I think we need to and maybe I think we need to have something about maintaining quality in here and so maybe we reference a appropriate level of services in the consolidation what can I propose an alternate and their option would be just to say as well as maintaining quality of what period of performance of service levels of service of the roads of quality is an important aspect of this and one of the reasons why we're doing this is to maintain quality right but I think if you don't say quality of what I think you're getting different perspectives you wrote it from the perspective of the of the citizen what's the quality of life that the citizen sees and you're seeing it from the perspective of the provider you mean we're going to have to keep doing everything exactly the same way we're doing it and I think what Elaine's going for is what's the quality of life that the average citizen sees we don't want to consolidate but have that deteriorate have the roads aren't being applied as often or rec programs aren't as accessible or available anymore and it doesn't really and I think what the way this is written it's to say the intent here is that yet we may change a lot of things we may change structures and how things are done but overall we're going to maintain generally the level of quality that the average citizen sees you're saying but I get totally what you're saying we're doing everything exactly the way we're going to consolidate everything but also keep doing everything exactly the way we're doing and I get that maybe it really needs to be from the perspective of maybe that needs to be put in there from the quality of life from the for citizens and how we achieve that or maintain that is up to us to figure out it talks about goal of efficiency and I think that's kind of what you're talking about I think that the definition right above it it says appropriate levels of services covers that question and it doesn't need to be repeated in the consolidation thing because as again I'll say it for the third time that when I was in the rec thing and I remember suggested that something be stopped I was always shut down because of that phrase that exact phrase that was in the rec governance goals or whatever and so there was no no discussion about stopping anything that's why I I understand all the words all those words can be right we're doing this right because there's words and I'm fine with leaving the definition it's the way it is but as soon as somebody tells me we can't stop doing that because we've been doing it I'm going to say oh remember that discussion I had back on July 12 because this this will come up well how about including including the possibility including the possibility including the elimination of duplicate services or unnecessary services putting a phrase in there efficiency a cost of effectiveness I think there's already a definition appropriate level of services I agree with you Andy but I think that needs to be referenced in consolidation because if someone isn't looking at this document in its entirety they're not going to know what that means so if the phrase says as well as an appropriate level of services instead of saying maintaining and approving so is the the recommendation for it to say combining of two or more departments committees or service areas with a goal of efficiency and cost effectiveness as well as appropriate levels of service services maintaining pardon as well as maintaining an appropriate level of service appropriate levels of services comma so that the resulting entity operates under a single point of authority yes everybody go with that sure thank you okay good yeah got it thanks because I was I was speaking any other comments on the words or the definitions Andy governance the definition that's here it says the persons who make up a body for the purpose of administering set policy and exercise authority on behalf of the electorate doesn't the structure of said persons also isn't that also part of governance because it's not just the people I mean it's the act of governance we've had a lot of definitions for this and we streamlined it to this definition because there were so many different ways to interpret it the persons who make up a body so the body is in there governance can also be considered the policies that the body in acts it can be considered the hierarchy which goes voters select board staff I mean there's we had like five or six different definitions for that we didn't want to use all five or six so I mean that's the board's pleasure but this was actually the one I had a note that usually I don't comment on this kind of thing because as I mentioned to Lori this isn't my strength governance seems like the one where in my mind there would need to be multiple because of exactly what you said it means so many different things so many different times I can't see this being one definition we can bring back an earlier version instead of words missing here for a lengthier definition we can bring back another version can I make an attempt at a concise one governance the act of governing to establish implement and monitor policies by members of a governing body who exercise authority on behalf of the electorate could you say that again please the governance is the act of governing to establish implement and monitor policies by members of a governing body who exercise authority on behalf of the electorate that doesn't answer my initial comment that the structure of that body is also I think an important factor in governance you mean like number of members or the council manager the representation that they it's the structure of the government isn't it that's going into a separate issue then you're governance is the broader aspect definition of the whole you're going down to a sub structure of governance governance is broader than just the board itself I think you're looking into the smaller you know I just look at governance as a broad term covering as Max defined it whatever it could be defined as countries governance for the country for the smallest town but then when you talk about the board makeup and the structure and how that works that's getting outside of that terminology in my opinion we have a representation definition too so I just think it's going outside of it. I think that governance as Max defined it sounds great I struggle using the word to define the word using govern as a definition of governance I struggle with I'm trying to find the packet where everybody's definitions work because I had like a four part definition for governance so we have the subcommittee if they're so willing to work on this one we may have some other one and then try to submit it here and we'll be here that's what we want subcommittees to do it and then come back the process is working well but I think maybe we should move on and say we're stuck here and ask you if you could continue can I move on to another word tax equity I think we need a statement in there that says that services are equally available so if everybody's paying for them everybody else has to have access to them that seems fair so can you propose something I'm proposing some reference to access to services I think also if I'm paying for a service if I'm not allowed to have access to it I don't think that's tax equity well you could have all property owners pay their fair share of property taxes to support the town of Essex that includes the village of Essex Junction municipal services and have access to all those services regardless of where they are where they live in the Essex community and so forth just need to have some everybody over there okay that's a good thing to add can you send it we'll come to you after we're going to have the board discuss it first it's kind of our practice we're going to join exactly that after municipal services comma and have access to those services comma regardless of where they live okay do my next one well everybody okay with that then that is okay transparency it says the ability for people groups and organizations outside the government to obtain complete accurate and timely information about activities of the government I think that we inside the government also need to have access to all of those things so it's not just people outside looking in we also within our own group need to understand need to be able to see everything that's going on so just scratch that phrase yes yes so but you're the government but you're saying you don't have access to yourself I did not say I don't have access to myself I just want to make sure that there's no barriers to my access to documents things that are being discussed among I mean this is an open meeting law kind of thing as well you know we can't have site discussions private conversations that's I didn't miss that that's our cast I didn't mean that that way I just sorry I just wasn't sure what documents wouldn't you have access to I don't know you don't know what you don't know so that's that's the law can we then add basically on that too at the end say in accordance with freedom of information legislation that covers everybody's right to get access but that's all in accordance with that I guess that's a similar part yeah you don't have access to everything right but there's a law that defines what you do have access to and I just like to say add that to say according to law according to law okay everybody go with that are we okay? any other words out there that you pull out any comment on from the board I mean I just wanted to mention that because I was re-reading the minutes of our last joint meeting Mark Banks had suggested we add the word community and I neglected to bring that up because it wasn't the words that so I'd be glad to add that word it's okay with people yep so we're going to do governance and community so should we should we just table this until those are done and then do it all do it all at once do you want to do that make that suggestion instead of some torturous motion okay is the board done I'd like to open up to the public okay there are comments from the public before we go to Yeager I saw you hand up but I know Paul was jumping at the bit here go ahead Paul it's just a little confused on tax equity I think what I've heard and I may be wrong and let me boil it down is that today if the village would like to purchase goods and services beyond what the town provides then they can do so and finance that with revenue they obtain from businesses within the village assuming that to be true what I thought I heard if you live in the town you have access to all the services be they in town or village and I'm not sure that's fair to the village people I think that if they wanted to charge additional fees if you live outside the village that's reasonable since they're paying now I may be wrong in what I heard but that's what I think I heard if I boil it down yeah I'll tell you Paul I understand what you are saying and in the past there have been some village politicians and folks who would like to try to charge people to go to the library but it has been long standing village policy that everybody in the town of access and everybody in the town of sx has access to village services it's never been a denial I think the only thing where we've limited it there are things where we can only fit so many kids at once and we get a lot more kids showing up than pool to fit in some rec programs they give a little bit of priority or they give a break in service to families within the village but families outside the village in the town still have access to those programs but they may have to pay a little bit more well that's what I mean I live outside the village and I have no problem paying for services outside the village I think that's only fair I think what the problem one might run into and again if I boil it down to the words I think I'm hearing is that today the tax rate would be the same in the village as it is outside the village if they bought no additional goods and services and so forth but today it's probably higher because they did and they have gone beyond what they had wished so there's going to be two camps that are kind of bunny heads so again my only point here I see no problem being outside the village paying for services the village is paid for for me to use because I think that's only fair that's what I consider equity I just like to just go I would just expand on what you're saying a little bit for example planning and community development in the village we have our own planning and community development department in the village we pay entirely for that in the village but we also contribute to the towns planning and development office which doesn't do any planning and development in the village same thing with the capital the capital fund the village has its own capital fund for repairing village roads and infrastructure which we fund entirely within the village but we also contribute to the towns capital fund those kinds of things when you hear village village people talking about tax equity that's the real guts that we're getting at is that we're we're funding two different structural sorts of things that government must provide so it's not just we're buying the library and the recreation department we're also paying for some fundamental services as well Jerry I now have two things to say the first thing I have to say is that when this is all settled this is wonderful just for the reporter to bring the community in and say here's where we're talking this is a a thing, an entity that you can take credit for and say consolidation and so we can all speak the same language and you should get I think you should get this published when you're ready thank you I have to say and I've said this before in this room I live in the town my future is the village the whole town of Essex is becoming an urban area will continue to be this and so these guys are planning for your future because in 20 years the people living here aren't going to want to be the town they're going to want to be the village right now most of the people who live in the town want all the services the village has we want sewers we want water pipe to our house we want gas, we want our library services we're becoming the town is becoming an urban area that looks just like the village a little bigger watch thank you Jerry Paula did you have say thank you to you you're welcome Paula did you somewhere on this list and you might want to put a price of these definitions are not inclusive I can't think of the right word here what I'm thinking is that some of these things are definitions and descriptions under which there can be many detailed definitions especially consolidation for it's the best management practices could be a whole list so this is legal I'm just thinking in terms of an escape hatch if somebody comes up and asks you why something else isn't under a certain word this is a good point thank you it's consolidation you also have it says operates under a single point of authority and have you defined who that single point of authority is it's deliberately unspecific because for example it could be all of the village staff and town staff are reporting to a single unified manager the public work staff in the village and the town are reporting to their individual managers but at some point they're going to report to one manager at some point it's possible that these two boards will be one board and it will be the one authority so we wanted to make this as universal or general as possible so that it could apply to multiple situations if I could the idea of current tax equity it's a term we use it literally and we should think the definition is correct I think it's aspirational in nature because there are laws about current tax equity and the debt incurred by the village and the residents who voted for that debt stays in the commitment of those property owners until such time as that debt is paid in full so tax equity itself is a liberal construct until such time as that debt is paid in full by the people who voted for it that's the law so while it says what you're trying to do it's aspirational because there's no time for that to occur in full really good point understand that and any debt incurred between now and emerge would stay with the entity that created it the town does not have that because the town if it incurs debt which I believe it has not except for the police facility or by all of the property owners of the town is there anyone else in the public who would like to comment Bruce? Bruce Post same residence as before it did change in the last point I'd like to also say the town of Essex outside Jericho and thank you for your points on consolidation I think they were well spoken and you raised an excellent issue so thanks for that on some of these definitions I think it would be helpful to elaborate with examples for instance on identity I could read into that what do you mean specific what's behind it and representation I don't really want to talk about that tax equity again I think needs explanation again fair share what that necessarily means but what's behind that and there should be some commentary with the definition I think it would be very helpful on transparency Andy around a roll tonight you hope people inside can have access and I know when I was on the board I had trouble getting access sometimes it was denied me and I thought that was crazy Andy I think I'll stop culture again what does that mean give me some examples let people understand why you've arrived at that I think that would help people understand where you came down representative discussion what does it mean the presumption of board members honor publicly made commitments what does that mean some commentary might help me understand that better what does that mean I think in general I like what Paula asked earlier which was Paula was suggesting that we put a disclaimer on here because these definitions are not comprehensive they are there's multiple meetings in multiple contexts and sub meetings and the purpose of these definitions was to help these two boards communicate clearly to each other and because we have had trouble in the past misinterpreting each other's words and using the same words for different meetings so initially the purpose of these definitions was to talk clearly it will definitely be helpful if as Jerry suggested we publish those definitions for sure but I would not say that they are the end all and be all of meaning for this conversation and over time as we become more conversant with them in the way we intend them people will understand what we're saying specific examples I believe will arise as the conversations continue on which department we're talking about which initiative we're undertaking I think everything will become clear with time but this is a tool for us right now to start conversations on the same footing again I think commentary might explain some of these things better with specific examples and I know when I was on the board we had this impulse that all votes had to be 5-0 we had a proposal by one board member that if you dissented from a vote you couldn't go home and tell your wife about your reasons why we never adopted it that was part of the discussion so I'd like to know what's behind this with some commentary and then we understand the definition better and I was I try to be involved in this stuff so I'm not coming at this I know I'm not an expert but as an informed citizen some of these things to me are too amorphous thanks anyone else who hasn't had a chance to speak yet on this topic okay so we'll bring it back to the boards then it sounds like a couple things to do one is with tax equity the other is community no governance governance and community and perhaps if you wanted to consider any examples if you think it would help good okay thank you both again for the board to do thank you very much okay so we will move on to setting goals for evaluation of unified manager and this was Andrew, Irene, Lori and Mike and I understand that because of time constraints and vacations and self-worthiness and conflicting schedules this didn't completely get done but I would like to say that there is some urgency to this because if we're going to give Evan goals we have to give them to him in a time when he can actually achieve those goals and I did notice that there was a wonderful list of goals and I'm wondering if we could just pick some tonight what do you think is that a possibility I'll just throw that out there as a possibility and then I'll leave it up to Andrew and Irene and Elaine and Lori um Elaine, I'm sorry I took your name in vain you were not involved in this but Andrew, Irene and Lori if you want to sort of lead us through this and any ideas and maybe it would be possible just for us to pick some out tonight I know I'm one of the big reasons why we haven't met yet and that for work purposes you're not the only reason for work purposes my schedule will allow for many daytime meetings um so as far as as far as I'm concerned I don't mind trying to go through and do it now also understanding we're at 8.42 in the evening and we still have more to go okay we do have a meeting schedule next week can I say let's just just wait okay but that means we want to take option one I think and postpone it but if we're going to do that I think I'd like to also then move the assessment for February to March so move it a month so that Evan still has the same length of time for these goals and we don't condense that runway do we need to go on now do you think so hmm I think we wanted to do take option one but I would propose that we not only send a deadline for establishing these but also for review maybe it would be after before we do a moment just a question on that in terms of contract I can't remember when a pay raise is supposed to happen is it higher date or is it fiscal year if it's higher date then that's probably why the February date yes that's right I'd like to say how about this let's not get into an extended debate about how we're going to extend it in time I would just like to say if we could wrap this up at our next joint meeting with the understanding that you just shaved another month off so we got to get those easier if you could do that how about that was that a possibility consideration yes he's not exactly he's got stuff to do so instead of voting to extend the deadline when we keep the deadline it's in there do I get full credit for these meetings absolutely you can have another moment okay does that sound good yes so we don't need a motion then let's show a little bit we don't need a motion to select option one I think we need a motion to do option one that extends it we just won't do what I was proposing there's a contract we'll see you next month wasn't there a member of the public going in the comment before we put a motion on the table I'd like to open it up once again to the public right here if there's any comments on the topic 5c that we're talking about the goals for the meeting I know Paula you reserved right to tongue so we'll start with you Michael 7th and Carmichael 3rd I'd say I'm just blanking through here again my first question I guess is I see a couple of things about having Evan set goals and Evan at the end having a bold alignment so my question is has Evan given a list of what he sees as his goals to the board I would say yes yes he the one big one was he he has posed doing a lot of the alignment existing practices of village and town departments and looking at things like personnel manuals for personal processes for the two different libraries, recreation departments and trying to sort them out and get them aligned so he came up with he and Greg came up with a fairly substantial work work perspective we already had input absolutely I'm going to raise something since I'm not inside the government I don't know what happened one unified manager was hired and what goals were implied that he would be expected to achieve other than a general one in consolidation but what I'm going to address is something I see as critical economically that may not have been one of the goals that he was given when he was hired so I don't know whether this is fair or unfair I just think it's critical and I want to talk about affordability in a very specific way the select board here knows that trustees may not know that for the last three years I've been trying to get on the agenda establishing an affordable housing trust fund in essence and I brought it up again to add in a general way in public to be heard at the last board meeting I brought it up last year as a resolution to add the town meeting and I'm not guiding one and it's in the report on a believe page 77 you can talk of you want about tax equity, taxing and financing and attracting businesses if people, if the corporations and they have said this already to the unified manager they cannot find people who will come here they cannot afford to live here who is going to be buying from the businesses that you're giving these tax breaks to to me it's whether you're going to have what you're going to have in the horse, the back of the front and I would like to make a couple other points related to this. I had a conversation with Magina Mahoney at CCRPC yesterday asking her what was going to be the follow up to the housing meeting they convened about six weeks ago, two months ago and he was there and the unified manager and Robin Pearson and a couple other people, I mean for Memphis the hot topic is the night went on and it was a 12-hour meeting was affordable housing trust funds and several municipalities, like Burlington Burlington was there Shelburne and Heinsberg, Shelburne the managers has had people working on this for some time, his comment was that then you go to the planning commission and the boards and there's no political load to do with. Heinsberg didn't know anything about it and was very interested and wants to find out more so when I talked to Virginia yesterday I asked her if there was going to be a follow up and what it would be and if this might be it and she said yes, that was the biggest thing about the topic that came back is wanting to follow up so the next meeting in September or October is going to be on affordable housing trust funds and how you set them up and how they operate that's coming before the big housing meeting in November which I think Mara Collins is involved in and I'm aware that Mara came to the trustees meeting the other night and more or less demanded a housing commission I'm sorry, you said one you said one Mara came to the trustees meeting, is this correct and talked about establishing a housing she asked her to come and talk about it she didn't demand it, we asked her to come okay, that was something I was told so we'll be there I heard you were demanded anybody demanded anything so in any case the affordable housing trust funds are basically set up to help and virtually help as they grow the developers with their fees is there a goal? is there a goal in there? that was I'm sorry one thing they do is help the developers with their fees I think she said you're saying you want to have us incorporate a goal in Evan's review I'm trying not to run off I feel like this may not have been a goal that was originally part of the unified managers contrasting to some extent it's unfair to ask him to do this now but when you're looking at the economic picture here if you leave this out I don't see how it can be left out anymore it's definitely going on for three years at least and I don't see how it can be left out Paula can I I don't want to cut you off but maybe I can help we did, we met with more Collins and that was follow up to our meeting with Regina Mahoney and we have been on the trustees very aware acutely aware of the need for more affordable housing in the village and our thought was after meeting with Mora was that this should probably be a joint meeting with a joint effort with the town and the process that we're going to do is Elaine and Lori we were going to probably talk to the select board tonight if we get to the point of open discussion about if some of them would like to join with us in having a kind of an informational meeting with the manager to begin the discussion of having either a housing committee whether that might lead to an affordable housing trust fund or some communities have that as a strategy others put just more effort into creating more affordable housing there are various strategies and so that is something that we anticipate getting to go whether that's actually going to become a goal for the manager is something that the boards would have to decide it's possible for the select board members who are not at the village trustee meeting there was Mora Collins who came to talk about doing an assessment first and then the question was does the village and the town want to work on this together that is the point you guys were not here for that would have been the discussion I would suggest not putting that as a goal of the manager within the next six months it's not going to occur it's not remotely going to be up and running in any way shape or form within the next six months and therefore I would suggest since we have to do goals together we do things that are achievable and are in the smart goals genre I appreciate the suggestion but maybe for next year or future years but to put it on the manager since it's a policy discussion and something that's now in my control I agree it's possible but I think that we anticipated that if we set it up we would not want just put this as a body of work on the manager it would be on a committee and it would be maybe staff and citizens to take care of it and they would have to do the work manager would be involved manager would have some oversight but I can't as Evan just said it would make him responsible for the success of something that's not only his control exactly it's a big issue I mean it's not just village and town it's a regional it has to involve the schools it's a big impact on that so it's a big conversation and the schools were even here one of the members of the school was here saying hey if you are going to take this up the schools would be interested actually that person was not a member of the school board he was just suggesting thank you and we're a little off topic but I also mentioned that based upon what is occurring in the organizations our plate is quite full and I think there's been any acknowledge of that so I'm very wary of taking on major initiatives based upon what we're doing now too but I think if it's done correctly and thought of in ways that staff's involvement is more of a support role than a lead role maybe so it's on our radar any other comment Paul I don't think you had a chance to speak on this topic it sounds like it's not going to be accommodated his cycle but assuming that it has been talked about in the past as affordable housing what were the first thoughts as to who was going to fund this was this going to be taxpayer dollars is this something from the state of Vermont or federal government as I said we're going to have a group get together and just have an informal discussion about that because we don't know, we can't give you an answer for that right now but you are sensitive to it and one speaker did speak about how expensive it is to live in Vermont and just adding more and more taxes doesn't quite ever bring you to a no anybody else ok then we're going to move on to our last we need to do a motion right and he has a question no I was just going to propose I move that the select board amend the memorandum of understanding to extend the 2018 deadline for establishing defining and prioritizing goals and performance objectives until August 1st second thank you ok heading for the discussion on approving that option 1 all those in favor signify say by saying aye aye I was wondering that's her legislative position she's just sorry trustees are your same same thing and he said we need for trustees instead who's second to do ok now Lori this is when you get to all in favor aye opposed ok good we're on we're moving on to the last business item which is 5D and this discussion next steps for governance structure options and timeline Kevin or Greg do you want to hit that one off I think I think based upon comments and commentary let me think of something you both boards have had excellent meetings and I commend you for that I think the first three meetings have been very productive very collegial and have come out with a very good direction to staff I believe one of the major things that has come out is a goal one community one government the real question is how right that's the process that you all have decided that you're going to do and staff is going to be there with you doing this and governance is the definition as we stated earlier is broadly termed and we've been using it as many things but I think one of the things that we define and work done and cannot be done in one hour increment meetings is what's the body government such as you are today select board, village board, what's the composition, what's the voting how does that all work that needs to be brought before you with not so much thoughts but what's allowed in the law and what's not just a thought but what's possible and what's its implications and to that fact I was Greg and I Julie Miller Johnson from Economic Development Commission we're at a seminar conference today in Kilington on many topics but VLCT was there and I asked Miss Collins if she would be a resource for us to come to our next meeting and talk about who else other than VLCT has seen mergers and sections and things like that and they are legal they are lawyers and such to come and talk about what's possible because there's so many pieces to representation and board structure and having to take it down the mountain earlier for approval so the idea is that this discussion needs to be a priority and a lot of things hinge on the two boards agreeing to have discussions and opportunities to look at different you know the pluses and minuses of different systems and it's not just representation it's what they need and as you potentially grow into one community who votes in what district or in totality at large has different meanings of what you're going to and how you're going to operate long into the future so just the idea of having you all having that conversation a little bit tonight and then letting you know that VLCT would be a resource we'd like to use to bring them here so that you can ask questions and maybe even the public about representation and form of government and what are those implications we just weren't ready with them tonight because of the timing of meetings and we have to actually schedule them and the July meeting has a date and so we'd like to bring them at the July meeting I think where we left off last time I think I wanted to get a charter change onto the ballot in November where we consolidated two boards but maintained two separate charters could have consolidated Village Town Board basically all of us execute both charters keep the charters in place and then work on everything else but then it would alleviate some pressure from staff it would maybe lock us more on target of what we want to do and as I understand the Devin you talked with the Village Attorney I had one main concern with it which was that it goes to tax and representation and because we would have people from outside the Village being trying to execute the Village Charter and potentially expending Village funds that that might not be acceptable under general statutes that you just can't vote that you can't just have voters decide that within the framework of the Vermont Constitution you may not be able to do that and as I understand it what Claudine our new attorney said was she said yeah that's probably correct it didn't smell like that would work and probably the to really get a solid answer would probably be significant legal research on her part probably the part of another lawyer and they might not even know the answer because it's probably unprecedented so it might bottom line there's no way to answer the question within a reasonable time frame so that model is probably not going to work and everyone is everyone clear what I'm talking about? I don't know why town outside the Village people on an expanded board would be voting on Village stuff the idea was that we would have to we would keep both the both the charters both the Village and the Town Charter in place but the authority to execute the Charter would go to this new consolidated board well that was the model we had that's what you proposed that's not my fault I'm trying not to I'm trying not to be personal and say I proposed it or you I'm just trying to say it was a proposal and we thought that there was a flaw in it and that was something that can't happen so that basically doesn't look like it could happen and something going the other way or anything like that probably couldn't happen just as a precedent didn't the school districts when they merged that vote you know accomplished that kind of thing where suddenly this entity that's the new school board now takes on debt that the other school and property that the other school districts but they dissolved all existing charters they exalt all existing charters Essex Town School Charter was dissolved and they created a new Charter entity and we're the simplicity for the audience the idea is that dissolving the village in town charters means you've got tens of millions of dollars worth of property streets that you have to figure out where's the new Charter you're going to move this to and that's the work that we're about is trying to figure all this stuff out and there's no way we can accomplish that but the idea the prospect before us is that we were going to spend the next three or four years while administration is trying to consolidate or align services that we were going to try to solve this over arching problem and but at the same time each the select board has to keep running executing its Charter it's town Charter the trustees have to keep executing the village Charter and then we have to keep having joint meetings like this one and it seems like it could potentially be an exhausting schedule to keep up for the next four years I put the idea out there as a way of us seeing if we can't all come together and maybe cut the meeting times in half and we could both Charters and then also have a conversation about governance at the same time it was just a thought it was a way to take a shortcut but it's not going to work I would just like to suggest that you talk to the village attorney and you talk to VLCT today I think an even more knowledgeable source of information has not been mentioned and that's the Secretary of State's office and I would like to propose that we still in spite of this realization that it may not be what we were able to do we still have VLCT come to our July meeting but we also have the Secretary of State's office come because if VLCT doesn't know it the Secretary of State's office certainly will maybe ask them before they'll lead by them give them some background as to what we're attempting to do and they're already very familiar with because there's lots of people from this community they have called them with questions about this process over the years but I would be much happier with that authority in the room I would just like to throw an idea at just one point out before we do that because you brought up the issue of the school districts consolidating and I think some of us have had a little bit of trouble at least I have what the school districts did what they did not do was say we're going to keep the Essex Town School District intact and we're going to move all the other we're going to move Westford and Essex High School in the village into the Essex Town School District and the Essex Town School District just got bigger and everyone else went away and I have a sense that some people think that maybe that's what we're talking about in terms of consolidation with the village in the town that the town will basically just stay intact and will slowly dismember the village and move pieces of the village into the town and that's consolidation that's not what the school districts did they created a new entity and both sides moved all their stuff into that new entity so that's a fundamental question that we three sides three sides I'm sorry three districts well it was four school districts it was Union 46 Westford Essex Town and Essex Junction three minutes but the point is that I think that there's a fundamental question we need clarity on before we have BLCT because we have experts come in and if we don't have clarity we could be well wait a second that's not what I thought so maybe we want to make sure that we have some clarity on this is a fundamental question what is it that we're doing do we think that we're creating a new chartered community and we're going to move everything into that new chartered community or do we think we're basically trying to figure out how to take all the stuff that's in the village and move it into the town does anyone have thoughts about this? I do I feel extremely strongly that we and I said this before and I said it Tuesday night I won't bore everyone with what I said Tuesday but I feel very strongly we need to do the same thing that the school districts did we need to have one new charter for our community and I will say here because I said it Tuesday I will no longer be voting to consolidate individual departments we have to find this solution I agree I agree with Lauren new charter I mean anyone I have nothing to do to have it's just the path to get there is the question that's the question and I've proposed at prior meetings a 10 member select board that's expanded so the town charter is intact for now it just has a bigger select board and the five village trustees become the people with the most acute knowledge of those issues the experts if you will and the five people from outside the village are the experts in that district but everyone votes at large on everything that's town wide if there's an issue with EJRP or some other village entity the still trustees whatever they're called votes on that issue when the outside the town outside the village burning ordinance or something else that right now has no board to administer it comes up there will be five people from outside the village who for the first time in 125 years can actually legislate appropriately on those types of issues what kind of charter a new charter old charter whatever the lawyers tell us and hopefully next month we won't wait until the LCT has an opening in September I really hope you will call far and wide and have whatever expert you can find here on July because if I'm driving back for vacation I don't want to not have an attorney here just to be clear this is something that's really important to do and to do soon in my humble opinion anything so with the as an alternative to your proposal to have you got please Andy yep thanks Bruce as an alternative to George's proposal at the last meeting I had suggested that there's an alternative way to possibly do this that I don't know if it would be legal or not which was why you need the experts the state legislature gives municipalities the ability to contract with other municipalities to provide services so if we form a union municipal district between the town and the village to govern that entity it may be a way to do what George proposed without a charter we could do it with a but it has all the hold you know we went through this union municipal district thing before and it had its issues but it may be a way to look at this I'm not advocating for it but I'm just saying that may be a way to get there I thought I did ask that question and you also had several times asked are there special rules for consolidating libraries and I said I wrote those up and I gave them and Evan sent them to the village attorney and she just gave very casual because we didn't we didn't want to say do a full board legal research on this I mean it was one of these things we kind of put her in an awkward position give us your first blush response and so her response first for the library she said yes she believed there would be some she can't say unqualified but there would be some special rules about consolidating libraries but she would need to look into the board but on the municipal district why would you want to do that and I don't know I think that she wasn't clear why why we why that would be I think her response was it seems like a more complex thing to do than to simply do a merger in a new municipal it would be the potentially the temporary to keep the two charters intact having union municipal district that allows you to if it does, if it works this way to work together the two boards could union municipal agreement of the municipal district I'm getting tired of my own words here if you're allowed to do so you know have them act together as a single entity with special circumstances of course to address representation and taxation and all those kind of things as a temporary measure so that you can have that single board scenario without a new charter if it's possible and if you could ever work out all the details I think that would be a question for the attorneys and I would want to get to your point Irene I think we'd want to try to get these questions nailed down as much as possible because they're not I don't think if any attorney is going to say oh I know the answer but they're going to need time significant time to come back with an answer so I might suggest that you pose questions to me over the next a week and I will send that on to whoever you know secretary of state and or NVLCT as specific questions to be addressed then I would like to just also throw out the question to the board to both boards about for about process we had again setting the agenda up last week and looking at realistically at the schedule for the rest of the summer and then moving into the fall even if we get answers we get some specific answers from the attorneys and so forth going forward is this is the full board process right now moving is this good or we had talked about the possibility of setting up maybe a subcommittee a couple of selectmen a couple of trustees to look into some issues do some research get some ideas and then come back to the boards and then bring it up also for public comment and not that the public wouldn't be able to attend the subcommittee meetings but is that a way again just to get just to sort of take some of the pressure off staff maintaining in this joint meeting process at a high tempo for the next year or so is there some other way we could approach this to move fast in light and get some answers and flesh out some ideas and then come back to the boards that was sort of what I was hoping we would come up with specifically for that reason I'm really concerned about the amount of work we're putting on the staff and we don't really until very recently use the tool of subcommittees because we're small boards but when we're two boards together it's more feasible it would be awesome to have the LCT come here and the Secretary of State's office come here and have a public forum with questions that we can all answer perhaps there could be a subcommittee of board members that compiles the questions and starts the research so that the staff doesn't have to it's too much but it's also incredibly urgent so I prefer the subcommittee approach to present options for governance structure at a time I just also want to say in the previous discussion with Evan's goals it was some underlying assumption that Evan was hired and has a goal of consolidating that's not Evan's goal and Evan's job is to manage the two communities it's our job to consolidate and it's our job to make these decisions and the responsibility should not be placed on Evan's shoulders so I think that if we can hopefully move forward and organize ourselves and have staff and keep it to a minimum not that they wouldn't be welcome but to sort of shift it to make sure that it's not we're not saying you set everything up for us and if ultimately we need lawyers and we need an expert we're the ones who figure out who we call and we bring them in and we don't say Evan go get us go find us somebody because that puts a lot of again that's just my thought on the market hiring attorneys I don't know if that's a proper process but you can speak to that not me I don't think we need to start with our village and town attorneys yet let's go to the secretary of state and start with them because they have the most intimate knowledge of the things we're discussing and that's free we can go make an appointment there there's multiple experts in municipal law we can go sit and talk for hours and get answers to questions that board members submit ahead of time explore options get our warnings, find out everything that we shouldn't be doing and then bring it back to the board that's what subcommittees do so in addition to sending questions Evan's way to be able to send to the VLCT and secretary of state do we want to do a subcommittee then to work on I think that's about it to do the research and present options I go to the board give yourselves the extra month and bring it and not have it at July meeting and have it at the August meeting and give the subcommittee time to come I'm on vacation during the August meeting and I'm really far away that's a problem we can't get all the time to celebrate we can take a break I think it's a realization that November because if there was going to be a valid question it would have to be done by Labor Day or at the earliest of August I don't think you're ready for it I just think that I guess that's the whole point I think that a valid question at this point to me if you can't get it ready if we can't have it by September then it's not going to happen and I don't think we're going to get something coherent onto a valid by September so I think that we keep the discussion up but I don't know I think take the pressure off ourselves to get something on a November ballot I agree I agree I think the subcommittee would be a great way to go in terms of the whole ballot piece I know I brought this up before when I was mentioning I was referring to the 2020 November ballot not the one coming up this November because I don't think that we'd be anywhere near that far okay okay so if we agree on a subcommittee then what should the make up be you know I don't want to keep delaying things but we each have another meeting we each have a trustee meeting you guys you've got a select board meeting before our next joint meeting and I don't know what's maybe at each of our meetings we could kick around ideas see who's really got the burning desire and what do we want to have a subcommittee look like you two could do the same and maybe have a couple of different suggestions in our next joint meeting make a decision do you want to do that or do you want to decide right now what's everyone's point it's probably you know one village trustee and one select board or two and two I think it's kind of that's choice right I would suggest two and two so then why don't we do that then at the next village meeting you can decide who the two would be is that good select board meeting we can do the same is there a reason we can't do it tonight um I think it might be good to spend some for us all to spend some time thinking about it plus Mike could probably be back yeah and I know Mike said he'd like to be on that committee so it'd be nice to have you to be able to weigh in you know if there's three of us that want to be on the committee it'd be nice to have that conversation can I mention one other thing I you know I'm trying to be I know that we go on and about tax equity because really from our perspective on the trustees that's so much of why we're doing this it's really what it's so fundamental to what why we're doing this and I know you've raised the issue of representation for people um outside the village and I'm questioning you know I try to wrestle with it with specifically what are people outside the village concerned with and maybe just a suggestion for the select board to think about is you can't create a committee of people that's just outside the village because you can't exclude village taxpayers from your committees but maybe you could create some kind of a make some kind of an effort or committee where you ask people outside or you try to assess why what's concerning to people outside the village what is what are they concerned about looking at consolidation what don't they understand what are their fear and what would they like to achieve we have that we I think as a trustee I have a pretty good understanding of what people in the village like and don't like and what they think but I have to say I don't have a sense of what folks outside the village and you've raised this issue so I just throw it out there as an observation for you guys to wrestle with but maybe down the road that might be a task that you could achieve and get some understanding of what folks outside the village are looking for to have consolidation and not have happen so as far as this subcommittee we want to do it so yep but we're not going to choose that tonight we won't choose tonight so we can have the we can talk about it at our next meeting but we should do a motion that says we want to do that before we do that yeah is there anyone out there comment on our business identity about the next steps Gary Lori I'd like to ask you what do you think is wrong with the current town I honestly don't know but I think we've tried to do this so many times and I think the school district did it right where they said we're going to be a new entity all one together and we're going to figure out how to do it together and that's why I feel very strongly I'm not saying there's anything wrong with the town charter or the village charter it needs to be a new charter I guess I don't understand go ahead as long as I've lived here a little time I've always felt like we were one community village folks wanted some additional services and were willing to pay for them so they formed a village now I got to admit when the high school was built that fell apart the village wanted the town to go in I think it was 50-50 and the town folks outside the village couldn't see that they felt like they didn't have enough kids to pay 50% of the taxes some folks didn't agree with that the majority felt that so I just don't see why you need a new charter if you're just pulling all consolidating all the services back under under how do I say this single department heads not necessarily under town department heads but the single department head because you really want the best guy whether he's in the town or the village or because you go by the last man standing principle or however each individual department is done so I just I really appreciate that and I appreciate the fact that you do believe we are already one community but there's a lot of people who don't and there's a lot of ill will that has occurred over the previous merger attempts where if we continue with the process where we're going and consolidating individual departments they will end up under the right department heads because all of our department heads do a very good job but if they're all going to become town employees and as villagers we're saying but that's not how it should be we should be one we need to be one community and if we just get eaten up by the town what does that mean and we have the same conversation when we were talking about recreation the town recreation department at EJRP and the village was bigger the town didn't want to be eaten up by the bigger entity and they wanted to have a new entity so I appreciate every point and I'm sure there's a lot of people who don't agree with me but that is how I feel about it thank you Bruce? couple things what is your authority for doing what you're doing now with all this alignment and consolidation what's your legal authority to do that we're elected and we have the power of restraining by what your charter says just the fact that you're elected doesn't mean you can do anything within the laws of the charter is there a law that says we can't do it? I was told when we were on the board we were operating under something called inter municipal agreements that's what I've been and there are union districts too and I think that's something VLCT can talk about or some attorneys because that's what I was told we're using the inter municipal agreement to do these things which are now two municipalities to agree on certain services and how they're going to portion costs and that may answer your question about what's the authority one municipality contracting with another to do things so I think we need to be clear on that and I worry by the way I agree with you that subcommittees will they be subject to the open meeting laws? yes they warrant I think when we had a subcommittee to negotiate the MOU for the $200,000 for the fire truck they were held privately so I want to make sure that subcommittees operate under the open meeting law that they're announced and people can even though they're not going to be a quorum of members they'll still be warrant and open I think that was an agreement of the boards that they would be as an interpretation by the Secretary of State and that's it so again inter municipal agreements you might have checked back but that's my understanding and there are certain procedures you have to follow under that and it can maybe even do a number of things and I hope what you're doing now and thank you for the answer on the subcommittees thank you Betsy so I think four years ago four years ago we had a governance day down at the high school Max I believe you were there Irene I think you were there I can't really remember almost all the trustees and select board I was not there we talked about governance then and I would encourage you to go back and look at that because I think you've got a good cross section of town and village voices there just as a leading thing to go into this plus several years back we tried to do another merger of the two towns of the town and the village and I think you have a template there that you can work from and maybe there are things you'd like to change looking back on it so I don't think you have to recreate the full wheel of the new spokes that you need to kind of pull out and amend for what you've got to think it should be now but I would like to see if you can do this before November which I don't think you have time to do but at least by March because again it's a set of time for the voting you don't have to have a special vote where it costs that much more money to do the process and I do agree with Gloria I think we do have to have for all of us to live under and one representation format whether it is select board or trustee board or as it works you know we have districts within the full town of Essence whatever it's going to be called but you know that's really important because it makes it so that it's clarity that say there's 20,000 people maybe a few more and you have so you say 2,000 per each person to represent so each area a little bit of gerrymandering maybe but you have to figure out the areas but you've got 10 people or 10 people voting on this board so you could have 10 districts same thing representation everybody feels represented everybody has a fair representation there's not more than one or the other it's not people from outside the village or inside the village it's just the community and I think it's really clear it doesn't even have to be on political lines it's just people they know they want to have represented anyone who hasn't spoken yet okay I'm going to go in the corner yeah, back in the back corner Mary Lou Hurley I agree with you Laurie I think we do need a new charter I'm sure people get very attached to the charter that they have but I think it's really clear that it has to be a whole support you with that anyone else who hasn't spoken? Paul? I just want to put to rest people outside the village are very concerned if the board isn't balanced and we do believe that it can be balanced it's not against the law it may be you want to give it five years for that five to five bills away one issue number two one of the concerns justifiably or not and I mean this kindly the village decides to build a water park to the tune of one and a half million dollars and they vote it through and I'm in I'm outside the village I'm paying part of that I would dare say that's what kind of defeated the recreation pulling it together our taxes were going up I believe in consolidation I really do I have a concern that we continue to consolidate various departments we're going to get to a point it is inefficient more expensive I think that the village needs to take a look at its charter they want to give up the ability to tax buy those things that the town feels it cannot afford to keep the tax right down and we have a new charter where the town does the tax includes all of the revenue and then it's being able to allocate it to where it's needed Amen Thank you so much Paul Anyone else who has any other chance to speak yet on this topic Okay You want another crack at it? We haven't been allowing to but if it's quick I would argue that authority to do this is the approval of the town and the village budgets where everybody knows that this budget is based on proceeding consolidation because the consolidation is past what's going to happen Okay I would request that as an act of good faith that the boards only appoint an equal number of people from both districts so to speak to this committee so that their equal teams will get this issue on both sides I think that was an assumption going in We're going to have that discussion We'll have that discussion The trustees are going to be from the village Yes but Mike is also from the village and he's not selected That's the slide board's discussion It is I don't want him to have the expectation he's going to be appointed if the trustees are appointing the only trustee I don't think he has that expectation He volunteered Okay is there a motion that we can do to form the subcommittee I'll move that the select board appoint two members to a subcommittee to explore governance Do I have a second Any further discussion for me subcommittee to research and present options for governance structure and timeline I just have a question for Mr. Watts because at some point you indicated at a prior meeting that you weren't against subcommittees Will you be willing to serve on this one for example? Depends on when you're going to do it But you're not opposed to the subcommittee idea itself I I just want to clarify before we go into a meeting and find out that there's nobody from the outside of the village to fill those two potential seats I thought we were going to have that discussion later but they would be illegal for us to rule out Elaine and Mike from being on that committee because they're duly elected as much they're as eligible to be on that committee as I am So that's the discussion we were going to have ourselves and so I'm a little concerned I guess now that you've brought this up about voting to form this committee if we're going to have the inability to come to any agreement as to how we're going to form it in our own meeting So I'm going to I think we have to assume we're going to find a way but I think so we have you made a motion? I made a motion and he said Any further discussion? All those in favor signify by saying I I who? Do I hear a simple motion for the trustees? So moved except instead of select Yeah I moved the trustees with two numbers so committee to research governance issues consultation and go back to the board with suggestions I'll second it for all my previous motion And I just I'll just add in discussion if it turns out in our discussion there are two board meetings that the two person committee thing isn't going to work and you want to adjust it again the only agreed parties are sitting here at the table there's not a high authority that's going to get upset so if that doesn't work out then we can make some kind of an adjustment but for now let's see if we can't keep it to a two person committee four person two from each side that's what yes okay yeah I think it might be the point of order when we've got a we have a motion on the table I mean not that I know I absolutely want to hear what you have to say but I think I need to call unless someone other trustee has that comment within this all in favor I did want to comment I just I do find it unfortunate that we can't do it tonight as what we heard earlier today is that staff are weary of additional initiatives we also heard earlier today about a desire to do additional things such as an affordable housing committee whether it be an affordable housing trust fund we also talked about other things that we'd love to try to do and I find it unfortunate that until we solve this big issue of governance we've got to keep pushing things further back and we're going to push this conversation of governance to study it another one comes back understand why it's just an unfortunate thing what do you mean another month back we can't pick the four people now well I think the select board is not ready to pick the people and so I think it might be and I think until our next joint meeting and we have it all set up then the committee wouldn't be able to do anything I don't think they see putting it back if we could define the four people today tomorrow a doodle poll could go out we could find dates the meeting could happen as soon as a week or two from now maybe even after the fourth of July I don't know all I'm saying is I totally understand why it's just unfortunate that it still has to wait I get you I add on to that as well thank you Andrew I just think we need to all be realistic on what we're trying to do and to me honestly doing a housing committee right now is more important than this because we've done a lot and Evan and his crew have a lot to do to further align what we've done so as much as I want to stop paying taxes on services that are duplicative to villagers I think we need to just take a breath and say what are we trying to achieve and what timeline because if we can't even pick a subcommittee how in the world are we going to do governance so I would like to add to the motion that that's the motion but I would like to add that the trustees have a conversation in our next meeting on what we think is realistic and other priorities that we've been putting off in the village that we feel really are important to get done I couldn't agree with you more Gloria but I think the thinking of the subcommittee is that this would take the place of these joint meetings which would be great for the next six months so that just a subcommittee would be able to keep the conversation going and not have to have full board joint meetings going let's outline that I guess so let's make sure we're all on the same page when we figure out the subcommittees what we expect timeline that we expect that's why I want, I think it's probably a good idea to put more formative discussion off until our trustee meeting and the select board can do the same so what they expect out of the subcommittee is it okay, Evan has raising his hand in the middle of our just for clarification the next meeting is scheduled for the joint meeting the joint meeting is the 18th to the 17th 17th if we can agree the day 17th, okay is there still going to be a July meeting Irene is coming back from her vacation to be here at that and if so there is going to be a meeting on the 17th are we to have the secretary of state and the VLCT here I want to be clear because this is the summer if you want it in August we'll do it in August but I Evan let me stop you, we have a motion on the table that the trustees need to vote on you're digressing a little bit let's go back, we're going to get right to that but let's get through the trustee motion first, okay Dan I moved all in favor okay, Evan you're on what would you like and if so what do you want on that agenda if not do you want to skip July what's the board's plunger it's open to the board can I ask a question are there other business items that the two boards need to do together in July or August Evan's goals anything else public works signing agreement the governments the depositions right what I was trying to get at we do have a need we have a reason for July meaning is governance going to be with the sub-committees update or is it going to be in August if there's no pressure going to November Fallon I'd like to make a suggestion we hold the July meeting to do the business that we all just piped up about we skip the August meeting we let the governance committee do their research and report in September so July is goals and contract public works August is aloft no meeting in August is governments that's what I recommend with consultants you know with consultants in the board etc if everybody okay with that sounds like we got some head nods thank you so that's it for now do we have a September date though I thought we were doing every other for a while so we need to do for that I just want to make sure that we have a September I think we were just doing every other I thought we did I think we have a series I don't know if you have one in September but we can schedule you can do it make it happen good so should we move on to the reading form sure can I say one thing schedule from Tuesday July 18th is the next meeting I just want to make sure we have July 18th, August 22nd October 11th and December 5th so we don't have a September 1 and I think that was intentional because there's a hotlers labor day and we did work out this schedule together as a group I think October is realistic for our subcommittee that's fine that's fine so you will meet in July and then your next meeting after that will be October right in the meantime the subcommittee will presumably start beginning some kind of a conversation and they may be meeting but the full boards won't be meeting or maybe not so are we meeting in September or just until October sounds like we're meeting in October July and October next meeting next meeting meeting October okay alright comments on the reading file anybody I don't have any comments are you alright with that then there's no second session required so will we have a motion to adjourn there you go second thank you all those in favor of adjourn aye trustees will we adjourn all in favor aye alright thank you