 So, we'll call the meeting to order. Are there any changes to the agenda tonight? Uh, I have one. Unfortunately, I would like to take the consent agenda off the consent agenda because I have a question and everything. Okay. So, um, boom, boom, boom. We'll just make that item three. Right. Action item. All right. Anything else? Okay. Then public comment. Do we have anyone from the public with us, Charlie? No, I'm aware. No, thank you. So we'll move on to the next item is the consent agenda that we've taken off the consent and it's a regular item. So, um, let's see, does someone on introduce it or should we just go to Jim with his questions? I think however you want to do it, if you want to just go to Jim. All right, let's go to Jim. Okay. It's, I'm sorry to take it off, but I was a bit confused and I couldn't find the answer. The bottom of the page says the staff and the TAC recommendations is to recommend that the TAC approve the amendments. I went to the TAC agenda minutes for their meeting and I couldn't find in there what they did on this. So I guess my question is, what does the TAC recommend? Sorry. Um, it is the recommendation to approve the tip amendments. Okay, I'm sorry. That was, that was the question. It was my lack of I'm We approve everything on the consent agenda then. Okay. Is there a second to that? I'll second that. Is there any further discussion on this item? If not, all those in favor signify with a raised hand or saying aye. Aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Anyone wish to abstain? And that was an MPO item, Mr. Chair. What's that? That was an MPO item, right? Yes. Do I forget to say that at the beginning? I didn't vote. Okay, I just wanted to make it clear that was an MPO item. Thank you. Does anyone tell me who seconded that? I'm sorry. Defted. Thank you. Next item is the approval of minutes of the May 19th meeting. I'll make a motion. We approve. Okay. Might be edited. Okay, second by Garrett. Any comments, corrections, edits? Jeff. Amy, I am not the alternate for the time of essence. I am the member. I am the appointed member. Elaine was technically the alternate, but when she wanted to attend because she was chair of the select board, I deferred doing it. Thank you. I'll fix it. I also have one simple question. Where'd it go? I think it's the top of, where are my notes here? Top of page six, I believe. Yeah, top of page six. And then a little bit further down here that it's talking about the steps that they took and then it says we considered and a few other places as we did, I think it'd be better to actually qualify that and say who we was. Like the CCRPC staff or whatever, so that it's clear who we is. I think it's a page line one and line four. I believe both have the wheeze in it. Yeah, we can do that, Jim. Thank you. OK, any other comments or corrections? I was waiting for Catherine. I guess nothing. OK, no, no, I was good this time. I mean, you know, I, you know, we need to Catherine. When Jim's getting his last lips in, that's true. That's true. OK, so saying something is we should worry. Here, no other comments. All those in favor of the motion, please say or signify I. I I any opposed. Any abstentions here? Abstention or no, OK. All right. Next item we've all been waiting for. Is there a drum roll someplace? The election of officers and executive committee for FY 22. Andy, are you going to introduce us? Sure, happy to. So the Board Development Committee met on April 7th and came up with a recommended slate of officers for FY 2022. We submitted these to prior board meetings to the board members. And so I'm pleased to present the following recommendation and nominations with Catherine McCann as chair, Chris Shaw for vice chair, John Ciccone for secretary, treasurer, Jackie Murphy as the outlarge for towns over 5,000, Bard Hill for outlarge towns under 5,000. And Mike, you get to be the immediate past chair, whether I want to or not, right? Jeff, I think it's a great slate. I was part of the nominee group. And my one regret was we weren't able to create a second media past chair so we could prolong the agony on the ending. How many years? Oh, maybe we should. A dozen. Maybe we could make an amendment to the bylaws. The permanent position. I'm on the Board Development Committee in the bylaw committee, so I'll make it. I'll take an effort on that. We'll bring it back in the door. Great. I'm moved to approve the slate of candidates. OK, Barbara. Second. Garrett, Garrett seconds. OK, so technically, I guess we have to open any nominations from the floor. I'm moving to close nominations, Mr. Chair, seconded by Andy. All those in favor of that motion, please say or signify aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Any abstentions? OK, hearing no nominations from the floor, then we will take a vote. I think there was a motion, right? For the slate or was there not? Yeah, so we'll take a vote on the motion of the slate as presented. All those in favor, please say or signify aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Any abstentions? OK, congratulations, Catherine, Chris, John, Catherine and Bard and Andy for finally stepping down. OK, it'll be tough to follow, I'll tell you. Next is the FY 22 meeting calendar. Charlie, do you want to take this? Sure, just in your packet is the proposed meeting calendar for FY 22. This is something we need to do every year, and it's pretty much the typical calendar. So I'm happy if you caught any calendar errors, please bring them up. But hopefully these dates work as best we know for now. Move to approve the calendar of meetings. OK, Barbara, seconded by Garrett. Any discussion? If not, all those in favor, please say or signify aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Anyone wish to abstain? OK, motion carries. Moving right along, worn public hearing for FY 22 to 25 tip. Christine, I assume now you're under your own name. That's going to be yours. It's me again. It is. Yes. And I do have a brief presentation. We're just warning the public hearing. So I'm not sure how much if we want to go into detail about it tonight or if we want to save the excitement for next month. I guess I'll just go through quickly. And if you want to talk more, stop me. Then please do so. So you see the presentation, correct? Thank you. So transportation improvement program, federal fiscal year 22 to 25. As we know, the tip is a list of projects. It's physically constrained. Basically, it's required by the federal government. All MPOs across country are required to develop a tip and their specific federal requirements, describing how it's to be developed and what has to be in it. There is also a state transportation improvement program, the STIP. And the tip becomes part of the STIP. It's wholly incorporated into the STIP. So the STIP covers the rest of the state and the tip just covers Chittenden County. The intent of the federal government is that the MPO is supposed to work with the state and transit entities to make sure that the federal funds are being spent effectively. So so there's a statement. The tip is supposed to be based on a continuing comprehensive transportation planning process that's carried out by the state, the MPO and the transit providers. So we work with VTrans and we work with GMT to develop this tip. The tips have to be ready to spend money. They have to be they have to be ready to spend it in order for the funds to be obligated. So we don't want to put them in too soon or the money will not be spent in Chittenden County. They have to have funding sources identified. And then also the projects have to also be in the transportation capital program, which is what authorizes VTrans to work on the project. So for us, all projects that are spending federal transportation dollars have to be in both the tip and the capital program. The tip is made up of three sections. The introduction just has some basic information. Talks about the transportation performance measures. There's an adoption resolution. There's a glossary. And then the section two is what we're really interested in. That has all the funding amounts for all the projects in Chittenden County. And section three is just some tables and figures to kind of tell a story of what is in the tip page one of the tip. We've seen this projects are organized by alphabetical order by town. And then we're most interested in these four columns in the center. These are the federal funds in each of those years in there. Generally in the phases, scoping preliminary preliminary engineering right of way or construction. This comment, I just point out the funds to be obligated in FY 21. That just means that this project is being constructed right now. We don't expect it to need any more money in the next four years, but it's just listed here for information. So the bottom line of this tip, two hundred and fifty four point seven million, that's a lot of money. Fifty seven point eight million and twenty two one oh five point two million and twenty three sixty six million and twenty four and twenty five point seven million and twenty five. These are federal funds only and just to give you a little graphic of how this relates to previous years. So the aqua is the tip projects and the green ish color is the Burlington International Airport projects, which are shown for information, but we don't have authority over those projects. So what you see with this chart is that twenty three is the really huge year. The other years are pretty consistent in what we've seen previously. And what's going on in twenty three is just a few big projects and a lot of little projects. There's two projects over fifteen million dollars in that year. Champlain Parkway and Exit 17. I mean, that's not the whole funding for those projects, but they do have a big chunk in twenty three and then two projects that are spending over five million. That's used to paving in Bolton Richmond and Exit 16. And then ten other projects that are a mixture of intersections, park and ride, paving and bridges that spend over one million. So there's really a lot of different projects that are made up in that number. When we look at the tip by use category, the largest use category in this tip is the new facility, major roadway upgrades, twenty seven point one percent. And that is because we have a number of large projects that have been delayed for numerous years. And now we are finally getting them constructed. Those are the list right in front of me, which I put aside Champlain Parkway, Rail Yard Enterprise, Parkway, Rail Yard Enterprise, Exit 17, Crescent Connector and then Exit 12 are the new facility projects. And just to kind of show that while that percentage is high, this table shows the amount of spending in the years twenty eleven to twenty twenty. So you can see that our actual spending in those categories is quite in that new facility, major roadway upgrade is quite low, six point one percent. By far the largest spend of the largest category is paving at twenty six percent, followed by transit and then bridge. So there's a lot of projects in here. This kind of gives an overview of where they are. I'm not going to talk about specific projects unless you are interested in talking about any of these categories or what's included in them. I will just point out that the CIRC alternatives. So as we all know, two thousand and eleven, the CIRC Highway was cancelled. CIRC Task Force met between twenty eleven and twenty thirteen and recommended thirty four projects that totaled ninety nine million. So of those, the projects were in three phases. The top list are the ones that have been completed, like Blakely Road, Laker Lane and Colchester, two eight, two eighty nine in Essex, Vermont, fifteen improvements post off the square out of five corners in Essex Junction. Some signal upgrades on two A in Vermont, fifteen, the two A James Brown Drive in Williston and some sidewalk projects in Williston. So there's two remaining phase one projects, sixteen and Crescent Connector, and those both are programmed for construction. And this tip, there are four remaining phase two projects that are also programmed for construction. And then the phase three projects, there's six listed there that are moving forward in this tip and there remain another six phase three projects that have not started yet. That is about as fast as I can do this. So we're looking to warn a public hearing for July. On this tip. OK, any questions? What Christine presented? And if not, I look for a motion for a public hearing on the flight twenty to twenty five transportation improvement program for Chislin County for our July twenty first twenty twenty one RPC for a second. OK. Jeff, second by Dan. Is there any further discussion? Hearing none, all in favor of the motion, please say or signify aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Any abstentions? OK. That passes. Thanks, Christine. I think you're probably up next, aren't you? CPSP two. I am up next. And I have yet another slide show. Deep in the Christine show continues. Yeah. Now we know why you wanted to be a Lenny today. All right. So do we see this? Yes. Yes. OK, great. So we've talked a lot about VPSP two and we are now coming to the end of the year one pilot where we will be submitting our transportation value scores for the Chislin County projects. So just back to what we're trying to do here, the vision of VPSP two was to develop a performance based data driven project selection and prioritization framework that maximizes transportation value. And then this transportation value is just was worked out with groups of stakeholders to determine what the criteria are that should be considered. And and then a workbook was developed to score projects on these eight criteria. And I just there was a process to develop the score the point system for each each criteria. And all this was done in several meetings that happened over a long period of time. So the eight criteria we've talked about these before are listed on the right of this slide. The the green the green boxes are indicating that these are these are criteria that are scored by VTrans. The orange ones are scored by the RPCs and there's two that are green and orange and those have a piece of it is scored by VTrans and a piece of it is scored by RPCs. And as I said before, the scoring is done with a workbook that asks just a series of questions. There was an attachment in the board packet that showed all the inputs that are going into the workbook. And there are a lot. So what we're doing now is the highway mode, the other modes, rail, walkways, trails and paths, transit and aviation will be scored separately. And that process hasn't really been established specifically yet. So this was a schedule that we used for this. The first three steps have been completed. VTrans developed the budget targets. They identified asset driven potential projects and the asset driven projects come out of the transit asset management systems. They're established systems to maintain all the roads and bridges and everything. Those scores were provided to the RPCs. And so today we're going to look at the asset driven project scores. And then the RPCs are also able to identify regionally driven potential projects. And these are just projects that that RPCs can recommend to be added to the transportation capital program. They will be scored and compared with the asset driven projects. Following this, the scores will go to VTrans. They will create a statewide potential project list. And then they will send it back to us. We'll be able to review it and the list will be finalized in October to November timeframe. This lengthy list are all the projects that we looked at. So the projects on the left are the asset driven projects for Chittenden County. And as I said before, these just come out of the systems that say the paving system just says these are areas where pavements are deficient. The roadway projects here are just slab removal. So they're also sort of paving, enhanced paving projects. And then the traffic and safety. And so then we identified using the MTP, our scoping project list and the TAC. We identified a list of 11 projects that we scored. I believe we showed this list to you at least once before and maybe more than once before. And this is the table of scores, which I'm sure is difficult to read on the screen. So the top section, we put the paving and the slab removal projects separately because they're a little bit of different types of projects. And then in the bottom, we combined the asset driven, roadway, traffic and safety and regional. So we could see housing score altogether. The reds projects are the asset driven. Those are the ones that come from VTrans and then the other ones are the ones that come from CCRPC. And these are in rank order by transportation value. What I can say about how these rank under this methodology is projects that are in state designated growth areas, projects that have a high crash history. Those are big aspects, projects that have, that are on important bike routes, transit routes. And those are kind of the things that you will see that come to the top of this list. So we did also look at, I'm gonna come out of this for a minute so we can talk and then I can go back into it again. But we also did a preliminary look of equity in this and went through quite a lengthy process that Brian was involved with and Eleni was involved with, where we had projects in high, medium, low in an equity category. We ended up not applying it at this time but I'll let Eleni expand upon that if she would like. Yeah, sure. I mean, so Christine, you're still sharing, by the way. I am? Oh, I just, so I just undid the slideshow. Thank you. It's okay. Now I'm not sharing, all right. That's okay, sharing is fine. So I'm just gonna say a few words and Charlie, please chime in forward the rails. But Christine said, and as you know, and we talked about this before, that equity is not part of the VPSP2 methodology at this point. We felt at the CCRPC strong enough that we should start investigating that. And we did, Brian did a lot of research of what other MPOs and state DOTs are doing about equity screening. And we, the staff came up with the methodology to basically apply an equity screening on top of the ranking of the projects and the value of the transportation value of the projects as he came out of the work that we transcended. We share that with the TAC and the Executive Committee and we all agree at the end that at this point we need a lot more work to do on this methodology. It's a great start. It's a, and we do recognize that it needs a lot more thinking and a lot more data. We also, as staff reached out to Mark Hughes of the, and I'm gonna get this wrong. I think it's the Racial Equity Association. Racial Justice Alliance. There you go. Racial Justice Alliance. I got it totally wrong. I'm sorry. You're both correct. We're both correct. Okay. All right, so we reached out to him and we had great discussions. He provided his thoughts and some ideas of how to move forward. But at this point, the TAC, the Executive Committee as well as staff think that at this point we need to just send that methodology to veterans because veterans and all our PCs are gonna be working to develop a framework, an equity framework that they're gonna apply to the VPSP2 methodology as well as other transportation processes. And then at this point, we are not asking to apply the equity methodology to change the ranking of these projects but it will be coming in the future. Charlie, do you wanna add anything else to that? And I think that the recommendation from us to the board indicates that we would like also for you to vote to send all the work that we did on the equity to VTrans for consideration as well as the rest of the motions that we have which, Christine, do you wanna go back to the motion and list? There is a question. Oh. Yeah, are there any questions? All right, any questions on the actual transportation value of the projects? One thing I will note is that this list does have one form of equity considered in it which the TAC discussed when they were looking at this list, which is some level of geographic equity and making sure even some of the smaller towns that maybe their projects didn't rise up on a pure store at least had a project on this list. And so there was a kind of discussion like if Burlington had four projects, I think there's only two on here or two or three. So not all of the highest scoring projects are here which is kind of a negotiation attack suggested out of a sense of fairness with towns in our region. So I just wanna kind of mention that dynamic also went on in case you're from a small town and you're wondering if you're getting any credit in this process, I think the answer is yes. And I had a question. I was curious, and Jame on me, I had a bite at this in the executive committee but the resiliency as an example, they seem to be clustered four to six but in general or even there's one even at three Burlington Main Street, Battery to Union, multimodal, is there an example of that only? What resiliency might encompass? So the resiliency comes from a statewide map that considers a number of different factors in whether the facility is at risk of flood and then the importance or there's the critical closeness and also the vulnerability. And these are values that are and I can give you a link to that map but they come directly out of that information. Every transportation segment in the state has a score. So if you had a wide culvert, for instance, it would be less resilient than a very narrow, small culvert that might be more resilient or the other way around? It would depend on, it wouldn't just be, it would be the characteristics of the surrounding area more than that facility. So a small culvert in an area that has Yeah, that has flooding. Yes. So it's not scoring, it's not scoring. This is not a score of the project that's being developed. It's a score of the area that the project is in, if that makes sense. Yes, it does. Thank you for answering. Yes. Sounds like we need a board development session on scoring, including our incorporating diversity. Into it. Because this is new, we're going to send it off. I'm assuming that the board will say, fine, but I think the board, at least in my view, needs to have a deeper understanding of all these scores because these are kind of new, this is kind of a new system. And what I want to try to avoid is going fast forward through the diversity issues without the board fully understanding how they're being incorporated in very specifically. So that would be useful to me, but I'm only one board member. But I really think, and Laney and Christine, it might end up being two half-hour sessions or something like that, where we go through, this is the asset-based approach. Here's how diversity gets in, and it's our best thinking at the time, even if that's not likely where we end up. And I actually would like to have our consultant in to talk to us about the things that drive unfairness to certain underserved populations from the standpoint of transportation. I think, I know enough about it to know that sometimes we build roads through neighborhoods that we shouldn't build roads through, but I want to understand more granular way what we are doing as a board in our world where we don't necessarily have those kind of urban problems and what's driving that. And I'm assuming that it includes all modes, not just roads and bike paths and the sidewalks and the signalization, but it also includes lots of other things that the board should be sensitive to as we're going through our journey of discovery elements. Jeff, are you talking about also, I have several slides, I have a slide for each of these criteria, these criteria explaining further how these scores are developed. Do you want to look at that right now? Not right now. I would like to do it in a workshop board setting, okay? Where people can ask questions without them feeling like they're holding up the board meeting on a beautiful day. Point taken, Jeff. Yeah, we can definitely set something up for that. So we'll reach out to you and set up to whoever wants to participate. They are very welcome to just have a workshop and go through all the scores. And then I wanna make a pitch, particularly for new board members and new alternates to attend these things because it's difficult to get up to speed, even for somebody that's been on the board for a couple of years with what we do already. And now we're augmenting and adding things and those kinds of things. So even board members who believe they understand all the acronyms and all the things that we do, now they I think are seeing, we're becoming more nuanced and we're becoming more inclusive. And I think it behooves us to really have at least two or three sessions where everybody understands this stuff so that they know what we're doing so they can talk to their communities properly about it. Yeah, typically, as Jeff said, the board development has encouraged the pre-meeting starting in the fall for to cover various topics like this. And this would be a great one to start with because it is, as you said, so new and nuanced that even the long-term members are gonna work in their way through the process, let alone, as you said, diversity. I was thinking that by September, Catherine, we would have our head around the diversity issues better by then and that we could have a real conversation about that as individual board members so we can recognize what it is that we need to do to be successful and what it is we're attempting to do. Yeah, and I do like your idea though of having two sessions, one just to get us, everyone including the new members, familiar with the VSPS2 process and then the second would be on how diversity would be added into that. There's a whole lot to talk about much more than a half an hour's worth of it. And I believe the staff is doing a great job but it's not up to the staff to do this. It's the commissioners themselves that have to do it. Yeah, I mean, this is just fabulous stuff but it's a lot to think about. Charlie, did you want to add something? Just, no, I think that's a great idea and there is a lot to digest here. Christine has been, I think, very sensitive to how much detail is in the inputs to these numbers and so wanted to give you all that extra detail but you actually need to walk through it in a deeper way to get a better feel for it and frankly, this is still a pilot system. So I think that it would help all of us if you walk through it with us and maybe bubble up some issues that we should talk about and convey to VTRANS. So that's a great idea. And then same thing on the diversity equity issue, the legislature and VTRANS that committed to developing a transportation equity framework, we can kind of talk about that and then bring in our consultant and think about how we might best do that and frankly, VTRANS is going to be working with us to get input on that. So this fall is going to be the perfect time to give them input for recommendations back to, well again, to VTRANS and the legislature by I think December 15th. So that's a great idea and I think we'll follow up on both of those. And if the board is okay, I think we kind of had scheduled probably a couple of meetings October, November to have trainings. If you're okay, we'll focus on those two topics. Yeah, that's a good idea. Dan, go ahead. Yeah, on comment, as far as scoring for the projects and starts equity and diversity and how it impacts the BIPOC community and other minority groups and such in our county, it's easy to drop a metrics where you can gauge the traffic impacts in pedestrian and vulnerable users such as bicycles and wheelchairs, what have you on projects obtained to transportation but as far as the impact on BIPOC and minorities and other groups, it's not as black and white or as easily defined. It's more of a feeling of how that impacts them. I think it'd be interesting to see how the state is going to address this. And I mean, there's a lot to take in and to address because it's not clearly the final teaching. Everyone has a different feeling of what's, when they're being marginalized or taken advantage of, I guess you could look at it by a project or whatever not considered important enough. Dan, I talked with Michelle about this effort today. Actually, we're talking with all the transportation planners statewide with the RPCs tomorrow about this too. And there definitely is a desire to try to make it as quantifiable as possible. Yeah, so it's not, how do you feel but there's some data driving that decision. So to be developed and determined. So we'll talk more about it this fall. Great. Thank you. I just put up the recommendations. We can go back to the scores again if we want to look at them more. But the recommendation is to accept the scores and as presented and submit them to the trans. There was one comment from the TAC that we wanted to submit with these scores. And that was under the category mobility and connectivity. Projects got points for being in a high priority bike corridor but the high priority bike corridor was defined as by V-trans and did not include regionally significant corridors. So that comment was made to ask them to also give points for regionally significant bike corridors as identified in regional plan. And then as Elaine mentioned, we're gonna submit our preliminary work on equity and then any other additional comments that the board has on either the results of this process or the methodology of this process. Mr. Chair, I'm moving forward the recommendations of the staff with the addition of their comment from the TAC on bike paths. Okay. I'll second. Was that Jim? Yeah. Any further discussion? I actually have one question. Sorry. That's okay. I'm wondering, you've separated out the paving from everything else. I'm wondering how the recommendation goes in. Do they sort of fit in to all of them together or do they go in like as a separate category so that number one there is number one versus number one in the lower list? So they'll be grouped in the categories paving, roadway and traffic and safety. So in the top category, so we didn't, we don't have any regional identified paving projects at this time. We could have and we still can. So the paving will be on their own. And then the two that say slab removal, those will be combined with the roadway projects below. And the reason that we didn't separate when we did our scoring, we didn't separate traffic and safety from paving because it's a little bit of a gray area, what defines one or the other. But the list that we submit will be submitted, will be divided into those categories. And if you wanna see it, we can show what we think, which ones we think will be traffic and safety and which ones we think will be paving. But the answer to your question, sorry, is I'm rambling on, but they'll be submitted they'll be three separate groups and V-trans will separate them into those three groups. Great, thank you. Any other comments? And as I can't see everybody, just if you have a comment, just please speak up. Now I can see everyone. Okay, seeing no other comments, then I would ask all in favor of the motion, please say aye or raise your hand. Aye. Aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Anyone wish to abstain? Okay, that passes. Thank you very much, Christine. Next draft Velco plan comments. Yeah, I think Regina will address this. Yep. So following Velco's presentation to you at your board meeting last month, we've got a memo in your packet and a draft letter of comments to Velco. After the presentation last month, there were a couple of different questions that the board had about what this means for us going forward, excellent question. So there are actually a number of different things happening right now. The state comprehensive energy plan is getting updated. The RPCs are collectively working with DPS to look at the criteria that was established for the local and regional energy plans now that it's essentially been about five years. And we've got now really quite an active climate council going. So we are going to be starting to update the ECOS plan next fiscal year for adoption by June 2023. Because the state energy goals are now law, they're in statute, we don't really anticipate these transmission problems changing the overall direction that we're going in. But we certainly have to figure out how to accommodate this. So that's one piece. And I think as we were thinking about that, it certainly made sense to at least get some of these comments on the record for Velco. You'll see the way the letters worded that some of this is not necessarily in Velco's hands. And so that's how the letters worded a little bit. And we're also participating in in providing some feedback on the state comprehensive energy plan as well. Cause certainly this issue should be addressed in that plan also. Before I get into the letter, another question too was in the meantime, how does this impact our reviews of the section 248 projects, the solar projects? And I think at this stage, it doesn't change anything for us. Our role is driven by our regional plan. We're not intending to change that right now. And we do include a siting criteria in there already about being connected to places where the transmission line is okay or mitigate that in some way. So I think we're okay with that for now, but we may see some changes with that as we go further down the road. Any questions on that before I get into the letter itself? Okay, so then in your packet, you've got a draft letter. Essentially, first comment is just that we agree that trying to avoid transportation upgrades is a good idea in the short term, but long term, we're really not gonna be able to meet the state, local and now regional and now local energy goals by just sort of ignoring the issue. So we've got a couple of different comments in here about that. And we're also brought in the point about that we talked about at the last meeting, which is we've kind of seen this play out on the transportation side of things where everybody gets their permit to develop in a certain corridor, develop in a certain corridor, develop in a certain corridor until the last person can't get approval because now we're at a capacity in that roadway and it's on them to figure out how to finance that. And we've tried to address that and get that corrected on the transportation side. So we're suggesting and comment to be that something like that be considered and figured out for the transmission system. Also really just in terms of next steps, trying to get this dealt with all the stakeholders and players that are required to do that. And then the third comment is really just a little bit more technical. It's not super easy to see what clearly the next steps are for addressing these transmission problems. So if they could just sort of call that out a little bit better, explain who the stakeholders are and the players are to try to address this. That could be helpful. Any thoughts, questions? Garrett? Thank you. I appreciate the work you put into the letter. You definitely hit on the issues as I saw them. I'm not a political animal. Is it strong enough? I was really concerned in their presentation about how little long range thinking there was to meet the energy plans and renewable energy projects, whether it be solar or wind and also electric car infrastructure. So I know that you do address them. Do you feel that you've addressed them strongly? Question, I think it's a little bit light-handed and a lot of that is because it's not necessarily Velco's, Velco's not necessarily authorized to do more than what they're doing right now. So I think that's why we're sort of taking a light-handed approach, whether that's useful or not is a great question. Love some feedback on that. Who is responsible if Velco isn't? So some of it, and I do not understand the whole entire system very well. Yeah, I get it. It's not simple. It's not simple, but certainly some of it is within the Public Utility Commission rulemaking. And so some of that I think even backs up further to the statute needs to get changed as well. Regina, this is Jeff. I think it's a PSD issue. And they break the rags and they open dockets based on how things conform to the 20-year electrical energy plan. So if the Public Service Department is putting out a 20-year electrical energy plan that talks about the need for ubiquitous charging stations, then these folks and the distribution utilities will do what they need to do to affect that. So maybe it's participation in the 20-year electrical energy plan that's the key in that particular point in time because you're right, Velco and all the distribution utilities including the cooperatives are just functionaries related to that plan that's developed by the Public Service Department. Well, and I would just add too that the Velco transmission plans also tied into ISO New England. So it's part of the regional planning network. And I'm not sure how much that influences what Velco and the state can do with regard to the transmission system. Bart's got his hand up, but that was gonna be my suggestion. Sorry to jump in Bart on you. But my concern is, and I raised it with them at the last meeting last month, is that we went through that period of time with that clean energy cable. We went through this whole thing with transmission lines through New Hampshire, transmission lines sent for main power, all those kinds of things. And I get the feeling that Velco is not worried about that until something happens in that regard. In terms of somebody with a stroke at the pen all of a sudden opens up the spigot on the 800 pound gorilla renewable energy source to our north. And so I don't know how we do it and maybe it's not in this letter and maybe it's more a little lags of it's outside their purview right now, Regina. But it seems to me it's awfully short sighted and not to think about that particularly because in response to my question, they said that being a conduit for Canadian hydropower to Southern New England is very much on the table and expired to 10 years. That's an opportunity for us to get some pay force for our transmission system that will help us with the distributed power sources increasingly widely distributed geographically power sources that we're encouraging people to do. But I'm done. Sorry, Bart, I didn't mean to jump in on you, but I- My comment was gonna be about letter content. I think we could phrase it such that we're not holding them to task but we could express our concerns that this issue does not seem adequately addressed by them or anyone else. And so we have few opportunities sort of send up the flares to say, this is a concern. It seems pretty obvious gap concerns like if it's not your role, then whose role is it? And to frame it in a way that puts it on the table without laying blame if we could walk that tightrope. Ask a question. Don't make a declarative statement. Yeah. Any other comments? I will offer just a Jeff kind of made reference to this about the Comprehensive Energy Plan that's done. And that is gonna, that's actually in process right now. So heads up probably six months from now we'll have a letter commenting on the Comprehensive Energy Plan. So. Also, if you didn't get it in your email yet, you will. We are hosting a regional input to the state energy plan on the 28th, June 28th from six to eight PM, just so folks are aware. It's the next item in your packet if you're looking after this class. Okay, any other comments? Okay. So I'm sorry, did we get them? I don't think we had a motion, did we? No. So we're looking for a motion to Garrett. You're making the motion, but. Yes, I was busy unmuting. I moved that we, well, here's a, I'm not sure exactly how to put it. May I ask Regina a question first? Go for it. Are you, do you think it should stay the way it is? Or do you think it might want a better modification to address some of the things brought up? I think that we could probably with Bard's phraseology make the point a little bit stronger that we're being totally sort of short-sighted here. I'm a little less clear how to work Jeff's comment in, in terms of if within the next five to 10 years we actually are going to be approached again for a big conduit from Quebec down to Massachusetts. If we should take at least be open and aware and planning to take advantage of that so that that can help, that can be revenue source to help us pay for some upgrades. I could probably get that in there. If that's, if I just relayed what you said, Jeff, correctly, I could probably get one. Probably Regina, those are competitive quarter proposals. And if Velco is just reacting to something when it comes up, they aren't doing us or themselves a service in terms of generating revenue that can help with some of the needed transmission upgrades. Depending on the environment I don't know. Maybe Garrett, if you don't mind me rejecting the way to do this is to say with appropriate staff additional comments and not add an addition. That's where it's going. Based on the board's discussion. So I moved that. Okay. I'll second it. Regina, is there a deadline for getting this comments in? Really a specific deadline, but I believe July 1st they have a deadline they have a next step in their process. So ideally these comments would get to them by then. Okay. So folks are happy with that. I was just wondering if the motion is fine, but if when you get that finished, if you just run it by us for any input, especially across Bard and Jeff and Sharon and Garrett or whatever. Honestly, Mike, I don't need to micromanage this. If we just make a point that we would encourage them to take a broader view beyond just what specifically they're statutorily responsible for doing at this particular point, that's good planning. And we would ask them to remain open to some of the issues I think that Garrett and Bard have raised and this whole issue of being a conduit for the delivery of hydro power from the collective Southern New England. Okay. That's fine. I just bring it up. I don't know if folks are good with that, then we'll go with it. Okay. Any further discussion on the motion? I'll just make one sort of sidebar editorial. It's probably not lost on us that hydro power originating north of us has some impact on First Nation peoples, something that we were just talking about, right? It's still considered renewable power in Vermont. Yeah. Okay, so all that Bard said was totally true. It just illustrates competing goods or competing interests perhaps. Yep. It's due less damage in this particular situation I guess. Theme issue with fracking, which is not allowed in the state of Vermont. Okay. Any other comments? Then I'll ask for a vote. All those in favor of the motion, please signify or say aye. Aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Aye. Anyone want to abstain? Okay. Motion carries. Thank you, Regina. Thanks everyone for your comments. Thank you. Next item, chair and executive director report. And Charlie, I don't know if you were gonna mention Jim, but since we found out that today's Jim's last meeting as a rep from Charlotte, want to thank you, Jim, for all the years of service you've given to this board. I believe MPO and RPC both. Yeah. Thank you very much. And I'm sure we'll see you back at some point. Thank you. Even as a visitor. You can be the public comment person. I want to mention that the new rep from Charlotte is on here. I believe Deirdre, if I think... Actually, Deirdre's are alternative. Oh, okay. I was gonna actually say a few words under member comments. I'll let you go now if you want, Jim. No, okay. Unless you want to, you can wait if you want. I don't want to put you on the spot. That's okay. But I decided not to seek reappointment for a variety of reasons. So I really just wanted to thank everybody, especially the commission members for the past commission members and the present ones for their commitment to making our community as good as it can be. I wanted also to thank the CCRPC staff. It's one of the most talented and committed group of professionals I've had the honor to work with, either as a commission member or actually as a transportation and planning consultant in the area. I want to quickly thank the town of Charlotte for its support of my interest in being a part of this commission. Unfortunately, I want to also thank Marty for over 20 years of cooperative work with her. And then last, I want to actually thank Dana, Dana Hanley, who will be our new Charlotte commission member. For her willingness to step up and be that member. And also to Deirdre, who is on to sort of get a sense of what's happening. Thank you, Deirdre, for coming. She's stepping in as our new alternate member from Charlotte. So I just wanted to thank everybody. And as you can hear, it's now eight o'clock. So... I got seven. You and myself. I hear the second alternate position is still open in Charlotte, if you're interested. That's a window. But I do thank everybody for all of the kind words that I really appreciate that. I wasn't really expecting it. So thank you. Thank you, Jim. And Deirdre, welcome. Hello, thank you. Would you like to introduce yourself a little bit? Or again, I don't want to put you on the spot. You don't have to. Well, I can say just a few things that I've been, let's see. I've lived in Charlotte for 15 years and the last four or five have been active on the energy committee. My official background is in planning with an ecological specialization. So I've been looking forward to kind of taking things from the town level and exploring and familiarizing myself and being able to be more involved at the regional level. Great. Thank you and welcome. Thanks. Charlie, that's all I've got. Unusual that I have anything, but there you go. Well, I will, thank you, Mike. And thank you, Jim, very much and welcome, Deirdre. But I do want to say this was Mike's last meeting as chair, so I want a big thank you to Mike for his leadership during these last two years. I really appreciate it working with you, Mike. Not that we'll stop because you'll be past chair emeritus for however many years now that Andy was handed off that torch, but... I'm not trying to break Andy's record, let's put it that way. And the incoming chair is gonna do a fantastic job, so... Yeah, congratulations to the incoming board members or officers, yes. Looking forward to that. So just my report, I'll try to get through this quickly. 89 study update, just to let you know, we have entered into a contract with RSG to supplement some of the 89 work in what, and I'm not gonna get this name right, Eleni, but is it strategic modeling? Yes, you got it right, Charlie, strategic modeling. Yeah, to really help us dive down a little bit deeper in how to reduce travel demand. So we'll take some deeper look at that. The equity leadership team update heads up. You are going to, if you haven't already, you're gonna be getting an email asking you to participate in an interview with the consultant team from Creative Discourse to just kind of see where you're at in terms of thoughts about equity, what are we doing or not doing well? What should we or could we be doing? So, and I can't remember the dates, but Amy's, I think, or Emma will send out an email to you tomorrow. And there'll be, I think two date options. They're trying to kind of, just because the board is so large, split the board into two groups to have a functional conversation. So heads up on that. They're doing the same thing with the staff and other interviews with partners and things too. So don't feel picked on, you have a good company. The SEDS update, so the Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy, we're working on with GVIC, as well as Central Vermont, Rutland and Addison counties in what we're calling the West Central Vermont SEDS. There's a public meeting on that tomorrow evening. You've probably got an email from Emma sometime in the last couple of weeks about that. Please join in if you'd like. We're kind of early stage, getting input into what should be included in the strategy. Comprehensive Energy Plan, Regina mentioned it, but the next document in your packet is the flyer announcement for the Central Vermont Energy Planning Forum. And of course I have it scrolled to a place I can't see. The date is June 28th. So again, if you want to dig deeper into the energy work, please dive into that meeting. And then finally, legislative update, just to review kind of the direct RPC impacts of the legislative session, mostly financial, but also that comes with expectations about additional work to be done. So there is a little bit of money that they are providing to RPCs to help municipalities comply with ARPA requirements, including if we can help you try to prioritize what you want to work on with ARPA funding, or just help make sure that you're combined with the federal reporting requirements. We have some funding to do that. That's in the realm of 12 to 13 grand a year this year or next year. Then there's $75,000 that got added to our regional planning grant, mostly because they haven't given us an increase in that grant in a long time, but so that's a little bit more general funding. We can spread that over the next one to three years, I think. And then the big one was they approved a million dollars going to RPCs for regional energy coordinators to help municipalities implement your town energy plans. So we are kind of working on that right now, but that is gonna be about $120,000 or so dollars coming to Chinden County RPC. So expect to see a job advertisement out there pretty soon. We're trying to get that out in the next week or so. And if you know somebody who loves to work on energy, we're hoping that the legislature follows through on the discussion and funds that position for three years. Of course, they approve their budget every year, so we only have one year of funding firmly committed, but there is an intent to fund it another two years after that. And I feel like I'm missing something. Well, the other thing was brownfields. We'll get another $100,000 of brownfield assessment dollars, which was great because we were, I think on our last $5,000, so that was a good timing for that to hit. And there's lots more budgetary stuff going on in the state. Lots more investment in water quality, lots more investment in broadband, lots more investment in energy transformation and implementing our energy plans and goals. So let me know if you would like some more information on any of those things, but there is a lot. And I will say as the, from a staff management standpoint, it's definitely there's some stress on the staff right now. So we will try to keep our good spirits and humor and patience. And if you can do the same with us as we're going, yeah, I think this year, this next year or so or two are going to be just really busy, not just for us, but I think for our towns and for the state agencies, there's a lot of stress in the system. And I'm not complaining about the federal money. I am just letting you know, there's some stressors going on. So I appreciate everybody supporting each other working through all this. And I'm happy to take any questions. Jeff, be careful not to build the kingdom on an unsustainable funding source. Yeah, and the board members outside of the executive committee may not be too aware, but the staff all work on one year contracts. So we are essentially a public sector consulting agency working on performance agreements with state agencies. And so we actually, we're dependent on that flow of money from state agencies. So we have had a tradition of doing annual contracts with the staff. So if something changed, we're all kind of, we have our eyes open on that, like funding could change in a state agency that would impact our staffing. I just don't want us to be unfair to people. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, and if we like them enough to hire them, we don't want to just hire them for a year and say, oh, sorry, we got no funding. Yeah, it's a really tough situation to be in. And yeah, we may also, it may turn into some consulting assistance. And it's an interesting thing. The legislative conversation wants to build capacity. So they want to build capacity in the RPC staffs to help towns implement their energy plans. You know, whether they're sustainable funding after that is a real open question. And Regina, did you want to add something else on the broadband issue? Yeah, just wanted to let folks know that we are reaching out to the state to really just get a solid handle on our options. I think we've talked about this before, but roughly Chittin and County, we have approximately 2000 households that are underserved in low pockets all over the place. So we are working on that, and then we're gonna probably call a meeting together of municipal stakeholders so folks can have the information in terms of all the different options available and what might make sense for Chittin and County, it might be different things for these different pockets, but we will work on that over the next few weeks and then figure out what our role specifically is at CCRPC to sort of help those things move forward depending on what makes sense. And just for context of that, people may have caught that the state's making big investment in broadband, but a lot of it is directed towards communication union districts, and we don't have one of those. Regions around us do. And so it may be, yeah, some of the options may be partnering with those adjacent communications union districts or maybe one of the options is we actually need to set that up, the funnel money into towns or utilities locally. So anyway, yeah, we'll try to outline that. Thanks for doing it for reminding me of that. Anything else? Sorry to go on long there. It's okay. All right. Thanks, Charlie. So we'll move on committee and liaison activities, reports that information is in your packet. Is there anyone on those committees or anyone has any question about any of that or want to add anything? Okay. Future agenda topics. Yeah, on the second page of the agenda, you'll see July where we'll obviously have the tip. We typically look at committees and the members. So that's your welcome. It's a good time to next month to look at the committee assignments and see if you might want to join different committees. We typically review that in July and then finalize it in September. And then, I don't know, we have a couple of question marks. If you have thoughts about whether we should dig a little bit deeper into what's going on with the SEDS or teleworking trends, those are possibilities. I think the teleworking came out of a conversation a few months ago here at the board. So if you'd like to hear more about that, this is a good time to let us know. No meeting in August. Oh, sorry. 10th. Okay. In September, I think we talked at the executive committee about getting a feel. We're thinking that you will have our annual celebration meeting that we typically would have had tonight in person in September. And I think we want to get a little bit of feel of, I know it's still three months away, but people think that they would be, well, maybe I should ask the negative. Are there any board members that would not want to attend an in-person meeting in September? Jared, raise half a hand. Yeah, I'm a little hesitant to bring it up at what the heck I will anyway. I realized that we're on the honor system on vaccinations and I've got major issues with that because if the last four or five years in this country have proven anything, it's that the honor system is dead. I have concerns about, I'm vaccinated, I'm not worried about it, but I have family members that can't be and that sort of thing. So I am concerned about the whole issue of whether or not people are vaccinated because the jury is not fully in on whether or not vaccinated people can be carriers. So I'm not saying I would require this, but I wanted to toss it out for discussion, not tonight with the commission consider requiring vaccination or a mask if you're not vaccinated. Yeah, that's essentially the policy we have for our office. So yeah, maybe we'll talk about it at the executive committee or Barbara. Would there be an opportunity for people to still remote in or would this be in-person only? I think there's really gonna be two aspects, right? As we do with our annual celebration, there's kind of, we try to do a little bit of business and we were just at Hula today. I think that we would have a remote option for the business part of the session and then for the social aspect, I mean, I guess you could dial in and watch what people are doing if you wanted, but I wasn't thinking that was too much of a priority, but we couldn't figure that out if you wanted to. So yes, we will have a remote option for the business part, for sure. Okay. Yeah, Jeff. The science says have it outside. Yeah, there is some outside space. So maybe that does kind of work. I can't remember, Mike, was there more input you wanted on that? I don't think so. Members item, other business. Any other members items or other business? I wasn't... Well, hang on a second, Jeff. Still on other business here, folks. I was just gonna say, I wasn't gonna say much because I'm still gonna be in Andy's position, but I wanna echo Jim and thank the staff and members of the commission for the last couple of years while I've served as chair for the support and it's a great group. Things run really well, even doing these remote meetings. After we got over the first couple of meetings, I think we had a couple of hiccups, but since then it's gone very well. So thank you, everybody, and thank you, Charlie and everyone on the staff. And, Catherine, you're gonna do a heck of a job, so we're not concerned about that at all. Oh, he was very kind of you. When Catherine's done... You can't go any place but up, Catherine. ...the first chair. What's that, Jeff? When Catherine's done, I am certainly gonna propose a second immediate first chair. That's true. All right, so now I'll take... Jeff made a motion to adjourn and, Garrett, I think seconded. All in favor. All right. Anyone wanna stick around? I guess not, okay. Thank you, everyone. Thank you, Mike. Thank you.