 It is Monday, December 4th at 6 p.m. I'll call to order the liquor control board meeting. Please join us in the Pledge of Allegiance, led by Deputy Mayor Thomas Brenner. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Thank you. All right, Jenny, we have three regular items. First up is approval for A&A Asian markets, second-class liquor license renewal, second-class tobacco endorsement renewal, and tobacco license renewal, all marked conditional. So these are pending inspection. Okay. So we're waiting for a certificate of fitness, and then these licenses will be approved such. Okay. Any questions from Council? Any concerns? Okay. Any questions from members of the audience here or on Zoom? As a reminder, if you're on Zoom, you can use the chat or raise hand feature to be acknowledged. Okay. Do I have a motion to approve the A&A Asian market licenses on a conditional basis? So moved. Second. Motion by Charlie, second by Thomas. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Motion carries. Thank you. Up next is McKee's RMJ Enterprises with conditional renewals of first and third class liquor, outside consumption, restaurant license, entertainment permit, and sidewalk use plus winter use. Yes. So this is a straight renewal, also conditional, waiting for the certificate of fitness to be issued. No issues. All right. Did you want to come up and speak? Please join us at the table. You can introduce yourself and then make your comment. Thank you. Ryan Johnston, owner McKee's Pub and Grill, Winooski. Thank you, Councilor, for having me here this evening. The conditional issues with the permit are some minor electrical stuff. They are some painted outlets that have been there for 25 years and snuck through. So there's a few other small electrical needs that need to be done for the conditional permit to be released. And I think one fire extinguisher got missed in a normal certification in the basement. So we'll get that all squared away this week. The only thing I really wanted to talk about tonight while we had everybody here was the insurance issue for the sidewalk permits. So the town or city is currently looking for a $2 million additionally insured clause through our current insurance company. So one, when you have a lease with a landlord, Winooski being the landlord of this piece of sidewalk, we have a fee. That we are paying towards usage of that area. No problem. In the city of Burlington, they currently have a $1 million additionally insured clause which, as we all know, Burlington has some problems. There are shootings and stabbings and robberies and that kind of stuff. And they're only looking for $1 million. The $2 million is an additionally insured package on your insurance portfolio is upwards of $6,200 a year. So the $1 million is completely reasonable and understandable. We come with a $2 million liquor liability insurance policy, which in the event of one of my customers getting injured or let's just say a trip or fall or something of that nature, it is my responsibility and my insurance's responsibility under that policy to cover that accident. So being an additionally insured person on my package, it really doesn't make that much sense. I understand that the city from a city's insurance standpoint is looking for that verbiage in the contract. But the $2 million is kind of unreasonable for what we're using it for. We're paying for a year-round permit because we need it for one day, St. Patrick's Day. And then the rest of the wintertime, it won't be under use. So we're okay with that. We'll eat that. We'll maintain it. We'll take care of it. We'll do everything that we're expected to do. But I would just like to start some discussion because as I've talked to other business owners in Winooski, they're running into the same thing. As you know, this past year was pretty wet and soggy. So we didn't do a lot of business out on that patio. And when the weather wasn't wet and soggy, it wasn't really that nice out. So it's one of those things that I 100% understand the city's need. I'm trying to explain our need as a business owner. It is unbelievable how much money I've had to put into this place in the last year. It's nothing to do with the city, but just personal expenses and upkeep and refitting and, you know, just the growing pains of a new business, an existing business with no ownership. So, you know, I'm just looking to start that conversation and see if we can get to an amicable resolution. Because at $6,500, I don't know if I even want to use it, you know, and be liable for it. Because when it happens, yes, it's very nice to have the outdoor space and it's definitely an attractive thing to get customers in. But what happens is people sit outside and now I got a whole back room that's unused. So, you know, it's kind of one of these like catch 22 things is like, yeah, we'll have a nice day, we'll go outside and it's great. But now I have this other space that's not being used because everyone wants to sit outside. So, just something I'd just like to throw my hat in the ring in. And, you know, like I said, I've had discussions in several other Minnesota's that have been dealing with this. And I know they've expressed some concerns and things as well. I just, if it's an insurance posture that they're saying this is what it has to be. I don't know that I'll use the space. So, I'd like to use the space. You know, I love this city. I love the vibe and I love that, you know, people are enjoying it and having a great time and utilizing our facilities. And I just, it's a lot of money. It's a lot of money for a small guy. One square mile pond. Well, thanks for coming to speak about Ryan. It's something that we'll be back on the agenda in the next month or two. And when it first came up, we did discuss that dollar amount and hearing actually specific business owner's perspective is useful for when we revisit that discussion. I think one thing that needs to be thrown into that discussion as well is that Vermont, not Winooski, is a very difficult place for restaurant bar owners because of the verbiage and work that has been written and kept in place since the 20s, which I know the state legislature is discussing and talking about rewriting some of these policies. But the fact of the matter is insurance companies don't want to ensure us in the state of Vermont because the dram shop laws, which are so outdated, are not congruent with New York, Massachusetts, Maine and New Hampshire, the places around us that have much broader and less liable policies. So that's just something to think about and throw out there too. So that's my two cents. Thank you for listening. Thanks, Ryan. Thank you for coming. Appreciate it. Thanks. Are there any questions, comments from Council? Any other public comments? Okay. Do I have a motion to approve the RMJ Enterprises license renewals conditional? So moved. Second. Motion by Thomas, second by Aurora. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Motion carries. Thank you. And then finally we have Standing Stones, Wine LLC, Tobacco License, new. Yes. So this is a new establishment in Winooski. Glad to have this establishment. Decided to add on tobacco from a religious application which is conveying a second class. All right. We had the owner in here recently. Any comments, questions? Any public comments? Okay. Do I have a motion to approve Standing Stones, Wine LLC, Tobacco License? So moved. Second. Motion by Aurora, second by Charlie. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Motion carries. That is the end of our liquor control board meeting. I have a motion to adjourn. So moved. Second. Motion by Thomas, second by Charlie. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Motion carries. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Jenny. It is 6.10 p.m. I will call to order the Winooski City Council meeting now. First up is agenda review. Any concerns about the order this evening? No. No. Okay. Next up is public comment. So if you're here for one of the items on tonight's agenda, if you're here for public hearing or, or else, if you can hold for that, we take public comment during every agenda item. If you're here for something that's not on tonight's agenda, though, now would be the time to speak. Is anyone here for something now in tonight's agenda? Okay. I do see a hand in the zoom, zoom participants. Very good. Are you ready? Hi, thank you. I, I am here a little bit about tonight's agenda, but I'm not sure if this is going to be discussed. So I just wanted to check in. I know that you're doing the, working on the budget right now. And I'm just curious if you could, since I don't quite understand the process that you use. If you could just tell me, if you're going through the amounts of money that you've allocated for certain line items, or if it's just a general kind of discussion about the budget tonight. General, we get more into the weeds during the department presentation. So like next week is community services and then in January, we'll have public safety, public works. Elaine, do you want to add to that? I do. Yeah. So Terry, if you have a specific question, you are welcome to address it to staff at budget. Obviously you might, you know, want to be making a case publicly. And that's also welcome, of course, but if you wanted something specific explained to you in advance of a meeting, you're welcome to email us there. No, I just really wanted to know, I guess I'm looking at some of the priority, the budget priorities and the recommendations from these guidelines for active transportation. And it sounds like probably when DPW, I guess is being discussed. That would be a good time for me to come and ask questions. Sure. That would work. I am going to cover some of the information there, not a lot of the numbers, but certainly the types investments. And it also might be useful for you to just ask those questions directly of John Rauscher by email first or at budget. I think I'd actually rather do it in a public realm instead of privately like that. Just to make sure that I get an answer. Okay. We would certainly answer regardless, but of course it's up to you if you want to do it in public or by email. Okay. And then I just have one other quick question. And that was also related to public works. And that was that this year it appears that the line striping was not completed. And I'm assuming that's because of the weather. That was what John had said to me a few times that the weather was holding it up. And so I'm curious about how, how that looks for the, for the upcoming year. I understand that the budget you're discussing is 24, 25. So I'm, I'm wondering if there's money in the budget next year for continuing the line striping. And, and also just in terms of what didn't get completed this year, what, what are we looking at for next? Like, have we already contracted with this contractor for next year? Are they finishing up what they didn't complete this year that was in the contract? Like, where are we at with that? Right. So this year it is a fiscal year contract. And so they got started a little bit. And that wasn't for lack of trying the pulver structure was on them almost weekly at some point. Where are you? Where are you? And at some point, yes. But then we were up against weather even after they had it. So that's been a challenge. They're still under contract to finish that after that work for this fiscal year in the next calendar year. There is money in the same budget amount in next year's budget. We have our doubts whether they will be able to actually deliver on that, but it is in the budget. And there's certainly other uses we could put that money to even if that doesn't come through the way we want it to. Would it be possible if, if they're not going to come through, would it be possible just to have city staff do some of that striping, particularly on Mallets Bay Avenue, where cars just don't stop for pedestrians, even though there's signs there? We don't. My understanding is we don't necessarily have that equipment, but John, he is on if you want to respond to that. Yeah, happy to respond. So the expectation is that the light striping contractors going to finish the remainder of all the city work. Next season. We'll be in discussions with them over the winter to make sure that we're on top of, you know, their schedule queue. And, you know, then if we. Think that that's going to slip, then we will definitely, you know, talk with our city staff and see if. You know, it makes more sense to have us do. Some of those crosswalks. With, you know, less resilient water based paint versus, you know, what the contractor was going to use, which is a more durable paint that would hopefully last two or three seasons. So that's really issue. We don't want to do it because. We would use a less durable paint material than the contractor. Right. I understand that completely. However. You know, the crosswalks on Mallets Bay Avenue and by the school, for that matter, haven't been painted in years. And again, the bike lane that I've been coming to council for like three years now asking about that bike lane on center street. It's just non-existent. And I. If we can't get the contractor to do it, can we at least get the con can we at least get the city. We can at least get the city. We can at least get the city to do it. We can at least get the city to do it. We can at least get the city to do it. We can at least get the con can we at least get the city. Staff to do the bike lane on center street, which is like one of two bike lanes in the whole city. And, and also the crosswalks on Mallets Bay Avenue so that. People can cross safely in the mount and the crosswalks by the school. So the kids. Can cross safely like that. Those are the specific things. That I'm asking if we could. When the weather gets better of city staff could just do those, those three things. I mean, I mean, I mean, even if it is with the lesser quality paint so that it gets done. Yeah. I mean, I'm happy to jump in, but I mean, right now, we're painting won't, won't be happening until, you know, June at this point. Right. I understand that. So I'm asking if it could be done. If those, those three things could be a priority in June, whether the contractor does them or city staff does them. Yeah, that's fair. And that we've, we've told the contractor those crosswalks through priority. Yeah. So that's fair. Yeah. Thank you. I appreciate it. All right. Thank you, Terry. Thank you. Is there anyone else on zoom that had public comment? Okay. We'll move on to the consent agenda. So we have our city council and liquor control board minutes from November six. Hey, real warrants from October and November. Council Pable from November. Vermont community foundation equitable and inclusive communities round the city council, city council legislative priorities. We discussed it our prior meeting. I made three edits that were requested by council, as well as one edit to special education funding, which was a request from our superintendents. Are there any questions, concerns from council on consent agenda? Okay. To have a motion to approve. So moved. Second. Motion by Thomas second by Aurora. All those in favor, please say aye. Motion carries. Okay. Council reports are next bring. Do you want to keep this off? Sure. I don't really have anything to report at this time. We have a joint meeting with the infrastructure commission and finance commission last month. Mayor, you can since that finance commission was hosted. Hosting infrastructure this past meeting. I'll leave that update to you. We don't have any specific agenda items for December. So it's likely that we won't have a meeting this month. Airport commission has its regular meeting at 4pm on Wednesday. The sixth. Regular agenda items will cover the noise exposure map updates, sound insulation, et cetera. That's usually later on in the meeting. So if you want to. Skip the first half hour, 45 minutes and then join later. Online or in person. That's usually where we tackle that and the agenda. And that's it. Certainly. So coming up on our next. City council meeting. We have. Hopefully we'll have two alternates to a point for inclusion and belonging commission, which will then have a fully. It's not staffed, but have a full. Yeah, have a full commission. So that's very exciting. And we do meet in December. So our commission meeting for inclusion and belonging will be December 14th at 6pm. And that's over zoom. Please feel free to come and join that. State healthly connected people did meet in November. It was rescheduled for 1121. The meeting. The commission reviewed a draft for an invasive species management policy for the city parks. The goal of having this policy is not just to have that tangible way to manage invasive species, but that can be used to kind of guide folks looking for volunteer opportunities. Working with local entities like one new ski valley parks district and institutions of higher ed that want to do research. So that's where we're at. The commission was kind of the first stop. And one of the next ones is outreach to abenaki leadership. And that the abenaki land rights and use document was used throughout the policy. The commission also got an update on exploring the Winooski parks district, taking over ownership of the Winooski park. So that's where we're at. So that's where we're at. So that's where we're at. So that's where we're at. The Winooski parks district taking over ownership and management of Memorial Park. The commission was in favor of this option continuing to be investigated and getting more community input. I know that's come up to commission a couple times or to council a couple of times too. And the next sake, healthy connected people meeting will be on 1212 unless there is another reschedule. I have a number of things. I'm following our last meeting where we gave some direction to our housing and planning commissions related to priority housing. I had a meeting with our zoning administrator housing initiative director in the planning commission chair to clarify council guidance and discuss coordinating a joint housing and planning commission meeting, which that's staff recommendation will likely be in February to help them align on those efforts. The planning commission will meet again December 14th. And in January, we'll return to meeting twice a month. Second and fourth Thursdays at 6.30 p.m. The zoom. Actually, you can come in person for that. That's hybrid. I also shared that direction with the housing round table group that I meet with monthly, which includes area housing service providers and school district staff. That group is actually met twice over the past month to coordinate across agencies supporting residents living at 300 Main Street. Whereas I think a year and a half ago, the landlord was planning to redevelop the property, displacing some residents. Those plans have resurfaced. So the group is working to ensure residents know their rights and have support in existing or new housing. I also followed up with the Vermont agency of transportation after our last meeting. They had mentioned that legislation related to the local match. We have to contribute for the bridge project. I'm discussing, I've reached out to some of our state legislators to talk later this week about how to navigate the legislation and find an avenue to reduce our contribution if possible. I also connected with the Burlington mayor's office to once again co-host a breakfast event for our shared state representation. I'll keep you posted as the date and location are set. Elaine and I had our quarterly meeting with the school board president and superintendent where we discussed coordinating community outreach, our city and school budgets, likely to be over January and February after some of the initial discussions and input are done. We'll have more to share and engage folks in for decision making at that time. Oh, thank you, Thomas, for joining me, the superintendent and school board president for our monthly in the world of Winooski show and town meeting TV. We did a short recording to explain the annual budgeting process to residents, which we will be sharing out. And then as Councillor Oakley mentioned, finance and municipal infrastructure commissions held a joint meeting where our public works director presented capital improvement planning and the group gave some input, essentially in support of all of the priorities that staff had put into the plan. The finance commission will not meet in December or January. Thomas. Thank you. Mostly just some thank yous. The mayor, Councillor Oakley and myself kicked off our first council in your community chats. We're still working on that name. But we met with some residents at monkey house. It was a really great way for us to just be in the community. We understand that this room in the zoom isn't always convenient for everyone. We will be hosting another one of those Aurora Charlie and myself. We will be at scout on the 17th at 10 a.m. So looking forward to that, hoping to see as many new faces there as we did at monkey house. And also a big thank you to everyone who came out for downtown. It was really successful of the business owners. We're really appreciative to see so many people coming into their businesses and enjoying not only just the pop up shops, but the items that the businesses that we're hosting were having as well. So it was really great. It was a fun night. That was really nice. And last announcement from downtown. The city of Winnipeg. The city of Winnipeg is happening tomorrow. Last stop sports bar. So if you can't swim by again, this is a fundraiser for downtown. So everything that they do for our city does cost money. And this is one of the ways that they are raising money to do all of the great events that they put on for us. Thanks. All right, Charlie. Mine's also pretty brief. The Winskey has in commission elected to the city of Winnipeg. We had some scheduling conflicts as well as the commission waiting on approval for short term rental language, which is coming up to us soon. Yeah, like I said, we'll be meeting on the 19th at 6 p.m. All right. Thank you. We'll move on next to city updates. So tonight kicks off fiscal year 2025 staff budget presentations. Please stick around for my presentation and ask questions and provide input on how you think your tax dollars are spent or should be spent. You can send that input between meetings to budget at WinnipegVT.gov. For those of you new to the process, each year the city manager of me and staff work together to create a budget that provides the same services currently offered to the community, adjusted for increasing wages, price and growth in the city. And then we discuss other things that we need to be doing. These proposals are use limited funding to provide the greatest benefit related to priorities set by city council. The city council then decides what budget will be voted on by the community. Each year in March on town meeting day, the community votes on the total budget and the taxes. For the full schedule, or just the total budget. For the full schedule of budget meetings and information, please visit WinnipegVT.gov. slash FY 25. Annual winter parking band reminder. That is, those reminders have gone out on all city channels that are electronic. And here, as a reminder, there is no overnight street parking from 2.30 a.m. to 6.00 a.m. in downtown Winnipeg from December 1st to March 31st. For everywhere else in Winnipeg, overnight winter parking bands are during winter storms and for snow removal where street parking is not allowed from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. To sign up for our winter parking band alerts, text the word Winnipeg 8777 or register at nixle.com that's N-I-X-L-E dot com. For full details, please visit WinnipegVT.gov slash parking. Related to that, our team is reminding everyone that overnight parking in the lot at the O'Brien Community Center is not allowed from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. That's true all year long. Also, please help the plowing and sidewalk team by making sure lawn ornaments, sports equipment or other things are not in the city right away as it is the homeowner's responsibility of damage from plowing occurs and we don't want that to happen. And finally, Operation Fire Cuffs. The city of Winnipeg is happy to join 2023 Operation Fire Cuffs their annual toy drive for the UVM Children's Hospital. Every year, this special tradition brings joy to children in need and we encourage residents to donate. Donations can be made at the Winnipeg Fire Department Monday through Thursday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. and at Winnipeg City Hall just behind me there's a box from Monday through Friday 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. until December 21st. All right, thank you. We are finally onto our regular items and so first up for discussion is a public hearing on municipal code Chapter 9. Chief Audie, would you like to give a brief summary for public attendees who maybe have not been following closely? Good evening. Tonight's public hearing is on Chapter 9, the housing. We've spent several months with the Housing Commission coming back to council and obviously staff on updates to this chapter. It included several updates to definitions and the bulk of the work was in garbage or rubbish removal parts of the ordinance. There was nothing taken out of the ordinance. It was just really a lot of clarifications and the definitions trying to make it so people could advocate for themselves through understanding the definitions of different parts and then again we focused on the rubbish and garbage. We hear lots and lots of concerns about that. We think a lot about public buildings in the city of Winooski and it's pretty easy for lack of better words for us to deal with a public building if you will when it's a private home. We lacked in some cases the authority to start to enforce the ordinance and that's why we focused quite a bit in the garbage and rubbish. This will not be quick. These are tools it doesn't change the resources available as far as people but certainly it puts us on the road to improvements and addressing several of the concerns we hear year to year and make us more efficient and more importantly allow people to advocate for themselves and hopefully not get into trouble. Thank you for that. So at this time I'd like to open the public hearing and invite anyone in attendance who would like to speak please come up to the microphone and introduce yourself and you may make comment or ask questions. For those of you who are attending on Zoom I'll go through in person first and then we'll move over there as well. Good evening. My name is Michael Bryan. I'm a resident here. I'll be honest I haven't read this yet. Is it chapter 19? What's that? Chapter 9. Well that's close. I do have a couple of questions John maybe you can answer that I've heard over the course of different meetings I've been at. One is folks who are tenants who want to make complaints about landlords but they don't know the process. Especially new Americans who aren't sure how to go about it and are afraid of getting pushback or evicted by their landlords. Is there some way of doing an anonymous request to look at some one thing came of bed bugs or things like that? Absolutely and it's a great opportunity to bring up so I appreciate it. Property complaint forms historically been available it's part of the education we are doing as a set of housing meeting on Saturday so there's quite a bit of outreach that the teams are trying to do and part of that is assuring that people understand that the property complaint forms are available you don't have to put your name on them it is helpful if there's questions staff we don't go to said landlord or a building owner and say John Audis did this complaint they're available here at city hall to write if you don't have access to internet that sort of thing but having property complaints filled out super important to the city for accountability reasons calling me at 8 at night if it's an emergency absolutely call me whenever but to try to be getting a property complaint when I may be off at a hockey game or whatever so doing a property form puts it into a system comes to our public admin system through our channels and it's logged and I can now tell you how many of those a year I get they're connected to each building so there's a lot of accountability filling those out so I can be either online or here pick up a form here that's correct and if people have difficulties with either of those please reach out to city staff and we will certainly always take a complaint by phone but we may ask you or physically fill out the forms ourselves and get it submitted the other I heard you say a minute ago that it's difficult to enforce some of the things for private residences what's the some of the properties that around the city that are run down that really need some attention where's the boundary between what you can do what folks neighbors or other residents can do to get that on your radar so as we just said really the property complaint right and typically people want to do the right thing whether it's private or publicly owned people want to do the right thing but in some cases we find that there's struggles going on in the property whether it's a bad relationship between said tenant and property owner a property owner may not have the means and what I've been charged with balancing is the city resources we took action on a piece of property recently and it was upwards of $12,000 that we extended we will lean that property but there's no owner to that was that we could hold accountable so it's not only people resources it's available funds for us to take that because it's illegal action we're taking someone's property or we're enforcing some code that inevitably costs them money so the form is for a neighbor to use for a single family property down the street or someone any property any complaint that form should be we encourage to get filled out and again if people are having problems with that please call and come to the window and city staff will certainly assist with that great thanks John thank you council is anyone else here wish to speak is anyone attending on zoom wanting to make public comments on the chapter 9 housing quality updates please use the chat or raise hand feature okay seeing no additional comments I will now close the public hearing we can move to then item B where we can discuss and consider approving these amendments to chapter 9 are there any frail questions or comments from council we've seen this a few times I'll just thank you you've heard what we said last time I feel like that's all incorporated in the new document so it's great well hearing no concerns would someone like to make a motion to approve the amendments to municipal code chapter 9 housing so moved second motion by Aurora second by Charlie all those in favor please say aye aye all those in favor please thank you very much okay we will move on to item C this is on for discussion the walk bike master plan draft presentation welcome Eric and Jen that's it yes thank you very much so I will just do a quick introduction here and then turn it over to Jen to provide more information on this project so tonight I'm pleased to introduce to you the the city of Winooski's walk bike master plan effort that's been going on for the past calendar year this was funded through the Chittin County Regional Planning Commission's unified planning work program part of the metropolitan planning organization in FY 2023 the bulk of this plan kind of focuses on big picture elements related to walking and biking in the city it really builds off the 2017 transportation master plan which was kind of the high overarching transportation document that referenced some walk bike items this plan really is basically the next step in that master plan process where it really develops a master plan for walking and biking in the city so it is intentionally you'll see not a lot of specific projects included in here because the intent is really to be able to to more specifically analyze and review the corridors and the existing facilities to make sure we can fit what needs to happen in those areas after further study specifically so we did receive a lot of public comments so we have a good idea of what people are asking about and talking about so this is this will kind of set the stage to build on those future planning efforts so with that as I mentioned with Jen Connolly from DHB and I believe Elizabeth Sunberg as well is Drew here okay excellent so yes and Brian Davis from the Chittin County Regional Planning Commission is here as well so with that I'll turn it over to Jen to provide presentation good evening again I'm Jen Connolly from DHB excited I'm going to go through this pretty quickly to allow time for questions but feel free if you do need me to stop at any time I'm happy to very quickly first slide is just the project team again it was between the city the CCRPC and DHB as the consultant the process really started it's been it's a year long process since we first kicked off and as you can tell we're at the end we're presenting the city council and wrapping it up this month I want to stress the amount of community engagement that was involved with this project there's a significant amount of engagement attending in-person events being available for office hours doing interviews and not to mention most significantly to the online survey tool we had a total of about a thousand comments that came in between online and in-person about half and half between online and in-person and in addition to try to get additional input we put out surveys in a number of languages tried shorter surveys if people thought it was daunting to fill out the larger surveys collected a lot of input very very important in this again just kind of giving you broad strokes up our level but what we did is we collected there's been a lot of work that had been done in the city to come up with various plans you know you have your transportation master plan you have a number of studies that have gone on in addition to that generation of projects we also then through the community engagement listen to what folks were saying and I know you obviously had a comment from someone earlier bike ped concerns really paid attention and created projects based on that engagement so it was bringing forth projects that were already discussed or mentioned in other plans and then really what came out through the public engagement and we took those and with the help of the advisory group and the project team developed what that evaluation criteria would be to figure out how to prioritize these projects what is the most important what should we put our focus on and so again this is very small so hard to dig into but if you do have a chance and can look at that draft plan improving equitable access was very important improving safety for all users received points and we were very particular in how we defined what those things were and what points that they got and we tried to do that in an independent way not make it subjective make it based on very clear measurable criteria and once we went and looked through that lens our projects which you can just see unranked on this screen anything that is a dot is a point of a project and anything that is aligned is more of the corridor wide comment I provide just a few overviews here of the GIS analysis this is based on census trap to get at that equity piece this next slide shows with the GIS analysis based on destinations what walking and biking destinations are more important say schools for example in those received higher weighting and we just continue to went through a GIS layer analysis for each of our criteria what that led us to is this prioritization of recommendations and as Eric mentioned this isn't to say that this is necessarily the order will be ticking these through but these are the ones that I think if you had a choice between funding a certain study and another study this gives the city some guidance as to what we heard was the most important based on those criteria and based on that input the great news is the first one is main street so many comments came through on main street so it's wonderful that project is already been studied it's been designed and it's about to go to construction so that one's moving along the process well and happy to answer questions you have questions of what's a piece of any of these projects as we go through but what we did end up seeing and I'll just mention briefly is really a focus on priority quarters there are a number of quarters obviously that are very important to people in the city and received the most comments and like what happened on main street following that process of doing that identification of priority quarter a scoping study to identify what can be done what should be done going into design and then construction following that process is really the roadmap for the city to follow to get the most bang for their buck in infrastructure as they move along however there are a number of other short smaller projects that are illustrated also in the prioritization recommendations so there are a number of shorter connection things crossings etc that also got mentioned and are not as big and maybe daunting as a full corridor study then we have again this just shows if anyone does want to dig into how we waited those based on the GIS results one of the things I wanted to touch on was the initiatives as far as funding because I know that conversation is happening tonight mentioning here that funding the maintenance of walking and biking facilities is very important the continued implementation of these projects whether it's full corridor studies or individual and one of the things we did get a lot of comments about were maintenance now whether it was the striping that came up earlier in making sure to communicate those challenges I think those things but also the snow plowing it seemed like there was a lot of concern about the sidewalk plowing the system exists and here it is on the screen but maybe it's not being communicated as well as it can be so some of our recommendations are more around that communication and what those citywide initiatives should continue to be to get that message out a little more clearly so then we get into implementation and we try to identify here for each of these priorities what comes next and as we know for main street for example the construction is next but for some of these things really we know there's a lot of needs that want to happen on some of these quarters some folks want a sidewalk some folks want a bike lane in some places the right of way can't accommodate both so the first study is that scoping study so the implementation plan really gets into what is the next step what what order of magnitude is the cost going to be and what are the potential funding sources so that you really know what steps you can do to advance any of these different projects this is also important as you do have development projects come in or a repaying project or anything to that effect because you have at least here what you want to happen for that next step and what you can refer to this as potential projects come up that can help you fund them and that's it the next thing will be to get the city council endorsement what's the plan thank you so much for the presentation I appreciate that this is like a roadmap built on existing plans existing community input no surprise to see main street top as that was a top recommendation in previous planning and I like the evaluation criteria that was used I do have some thoughts about the implementation plan and timeline okay but I want to hold off on that and see if there are any questions from council and finally real quick so as we've done with past efforts like this the initial discussion here with city council is to get feedback and the project team will make changes corrections discuss those changes and we'll bring a final plan back to you at a future date for consideration of adoption approval whatever acceptance however you want what is that as we've done with past efforts so there will be another opportunity to look at the document at a future date thank you the question I have is so this is bike and pedestrian but one of the things I thought a lot about is bike and pedestrian getting to our bus stops and accessing those in a safe and easy manner I was wondering how that was kind of incorporated because I noticed there was a lot of information of that and I was just wondering if you could go more detail sure one of the things that we found when we do the mapping for transit is that depending on what right here she put around the transit stops it really ended up including most of the streets so it wasn't really a good evaluation criteria because it didn't really I think it's oh I apologize I think it's probably more important to look at that through the equity lens so that you're hitting that population but we didn't we didn't find that to be as good of an evaluation criteria just because there was you know there are transit stops within a short walking distance to a lot of community okay thank you Brandon I see you again yeah thank you I just want to commend you all on the amount of work you did and put into making this as accessible as possible for public input is rather impressive and I think the yard signs were really noticeable the QR codes were a really smart approach course having translations was really necessary for our community and I'm happy that you put in the effort to do all that as well so thanks so much just want to really reiterate that that it is it does take quite a bit of effort and time of course to go through and sort through all the comments that you do receive so really appreciate that and I do think this is going to be that much stronger for that effort that has gone on gone into it in the front end I had a question to Eric about when the final comments would be due so it looks like this was reviewed by the SAFE Healthy and Connected Commission but was not something that was presented to the infrastructure commission so I'm curious, I know you're eager to wrap this up and I'm just curious what timeline if any there might be for the infrastructure commission to take a look Talk to Brian Davis with the RPC as the project manager basically to see what the timeline is under the contractual obligation for time and money available for that so I don't know Brian if you have anything you want to share with that I think also it's you know if that's something that council wants to do is to have this plan forwarded on to any of the commissions for their review I think that's entirely up to your all's discretion knowing that it may require some additional staff time to do the implementation depending on what we have available in the budget so Mayor I believe when we went through the strategies and priorities there was the overlay of topics that we wanted to have between commissions perhaps you'd have that handy I don't This might take me a second I can't think it's really tiny far That's okay but needless to say while you're kind of looking that up it is perhaps Brian or one of the project team members can articulate if there's any additional time for other than the review from public tonight from any of our other commissions to comment happy to jump in thanks for the opportunity to present tonight it's been great working with the city on this and VHB thanks to everyone including all the Winnieski residents for their input it looks like our contract between the city and RPC is said to expire at the end of the calendar year but to extend that however much longer we think might be necessary is a pretty easy process it does depend on the amount of budget that's left over for the consultant to make any significant changes but I think they're all set to you know make any updates that we recommend and then on our end if we think that it will exceed the monies that are available we can certainly take that on ourselves but more time is fine thank you it's something that we would want municipal infrastructure to weigh in on I would be supportive if it was possible to squeeze in a meeting in December with the caveat that their feedback would be for any like significant change like it's pretty well along already and I'll say to that point just for reference John Rauscher public works director has been involved with this process as well so I realize that's not the commission but we have had municipal infrastructure we've had discussions about the infrastructure piece with John's input along the way from the capital side from what we're expecting for future public works projects as well but depending on if there's a meeting scheduled for municipal infrastructure this month yet it is potentially we could get on that agenda to have that discussion with them should I follow up with you tomorrow William? Okay On the implementation plan table and also thank you for all the work that you've put into this this is extensive and maybe it's too early to have an answer to this question but I appreciate the level of dollar signs to say how much something is likely going to cost but is there any way to get actual dollar amount estimates instead of those signs because we love to do of course all of these things but unfortunately money always plays a part in what we're able to do. Sure we did include the ranges which obviously you know the high cost of four dollar signs is more than a million so that gives you an idea of order of magnitude the low cost is less than 50,000 so that you could get an idea for budgeting I think some of the issue is in this recent environment that we're in estimates are changing constantly and you want this to be a document that we live on so I think it's tough to get too specific. That's fair. In that vein I find this timeline rather challenging Eric I'm curious if staff weighed in like there are six items occurring in the zero to two year term while staff are engaged in the main street project bridge project, O'Brien center and lot 7D it feels like a lot to add that way in the two to five year term when the bridge project really gets going now we have five additional things so to me this these are all things we'd like to do the idea that that could get done in five years I think is not feasible I think for some of the short term projects at least several of them involve other scoping studies so it wouldn't necessarily be a staff effort it would be something that we would seek additional funding either through the UPWP program again to do something similar to this but yeah I think the staff time component could be something that is a challenge and that's why these are our recommendations and not the final document the other short term projects again is to continue implementing what you're doing on East Allen incorporating those recommendations and some of that can be done as a part of a development project coming in there's a number of different things that you've done great work there you can continue to do great work there in the short term so we did try to be cognizant of that and not say you're going to do seven scoping studies in two years because we know the CCRPC probably won't fund that many scoping studies and try to spread things out time-wise but we certainly can revise Charlie, did you have questions? No. Let me open it up to public comment is there anyone in the room that wants to make a comment and ask a question about the presentation? Anyone on Zoom? So there were two more items that I was surprised to see in here one is it sounds like this recommendation brings back the Weaver Street bike lane which to my recollection was very poorly received in the community and the second is realignment of East Spring Street which when East Allen scoping was presented to council council did not approve that recommendation So both of those things still gained significant interest in discussion so on Weaver Street specifically we suggested that it go for scoping to really have someone dig into how much width is available what are the alternatives to those trade-offs and have the whole community be a part of that conversation especially in light of what you tried and didn't work but there is still quite an appetite for something in that quarter so we didn't want to again you know we waited based on the criteria and it did that's where it did fall on the list now I obviously understand that there can be some reasons some of these projects don't move forward certainly. And what about the East Spring Street? I would have to look at that I can tell you that East Spring Street also received a ton of interest that was one of the places that we did get a lot of comments on it and so again instead of recommending something in particular we recommended that for scoping again to identify what those differences I'm sorry I'm talking about in the recommendation to move forward the additional East Allen scoping Oh East Allen I'm sorry when that was presented to council one of the options was to realign East Spring Street with East Allen we declined that and approved the signalization but this document makes reference to the alternative that was not approved I apologize for that I can look into that and see why that got carried forward okay I see another hand oh bring it yeah thank you I'll need you to refresh my memory Eric or John or any of the project team for that matter is this are we expecting a second study accessibility audit report and just curious if they're if that's separate from this you know if there's considerations where there's overlap etc and the timing of when that will be complete you're referring to the ADA accessibility plan is that correct counselor John Rouscher I think can maybe speak to that John if you're on still yep yep so the ADA accessibility plan is a separate document that's sort of it's more of a regulatory document versus this kind of planning effort document so although it does have some sort of planning capital elements to it because it'll basically inventory all of the straight elements that have an ADA component and look to see if they are ADA compliant or not and then you have to provide an inventory and cost when those are done so we do have a draft version of that that I have in hand but it mainly looks at the ADA curb ramps so I'm trying to build in some of the other sidewalk pieces and things like that so that should be on the website draft sometime this winter but I will just so the council is aware we did incorporate though what the CCRPC had identified in the ADA study we did give weighting to expanding ADA accessible infrastructure and services so we did give weighting to the projects that they had identified as part of our criteria for conferring Eric is there any specific feedback that would be useful I mean I think what you've given so far is definitely useful I think it's more a matter of if this is in the vein of the East Allen and East Spring Street component if there's anything you think is inappropriate to include in here or that you might want to see potentially reconsidered for a higher prioritization things of that nature but otherwise I think the feedback we've provided so far is what we're looking for Any qualms with the prioritization Brian I see your hand yeah I just have another question so this document looks at current state I'm curious if there's any aspects of this that is kind of forward thinking about you know how we anticipate the city to change especially as we look at act 47 implementation within the very near future any other infrastructure changes obviously the main streets already captured the bridges already captured but any other elements you know that were anticipating changes down at the O'Brien Center construction of the hotel is there anything about this that's forward thinking I don't know that anything as far as potential future development was incorporated but the way we did do the criteria really looked at you know even if you have a new population of people or you know something new that's changing you know looking us looking at what those key destinations are again schools parks you know and other the community centers got got points as well as those key locations so it didn't really look at any other changes you're anticipating if there's something we should be aware of I suppose that would be good to know to see if it influences any of the recommendations here but still mostly thinking if you have a new employment center or if you have new residents they still probably are going to the O'Brien Center and or the schools and or the part you know still some of the things that we did wait as important would continue to be waited importantly great thank you any final comments? okay thank you so much we'll see you again in a while with the final okay next up is on for discussion the town meeting TV budget presentation welcome Megan and Jordan hi we've lost Elaine but she'll be back right hopefully yeah I would imagine no that's okay should we proceed to base yeah you want to introduce yourself yeah hi for those of you who don't know I'm Megan I'm the co-director at CCTV and I'm here with Jordan Mitchell who is I I'm Jordan Mitchell I co-direct operations for town meeting TV and yeah thank you for having us I'm gonna say you can go ahead and start speaking about your budget because Elaine has seen it alright so thank you for having us we're here to present what is our fiscal year 24 your fiscal year 25 budget and give a little bit of an overview of the last fiscal year so last year town meeting TV produced and supported 1386 programs for our member communities and 362 of these programs was municipal coverage for here in Winooski we produced 39 city council and DRB planning commission meetings some other general programming that we had throughout the year included the Winooski school district ribbon cutting ceremony Winooski's memorial day parade and ceremony the Burlington Winooski bridge project public information meeting and Winooski pride so the contract stipulates production of three meetings a month or 36 a year with at least one other general Winooski program so we covered 108% of the budgeted number of programs during 39 out of 36 expected meetings for the year town meeting TV is funded in large part by the cable subscribers of Comcast and Burlington telecom and manageable contributions help to cover other operating costs this year we are requesting an FY25 Winooski municipal contribution of $11,000 for general operating funds this is a $1,000 increase from last year's contribution and you can see past municipal request history in on the website where the agenda is linked so that's that secondly we have an exciting update from the legislator that we're looking for your support but we have your support on so CCTV is a part of a statewide organization known as the Vermont Access Network or VAN and we've been working for the last several years to find a stable and permanent funding source for community media centers across the state we've been successful in getting one time bridge funding for a few years while we did some research and now we're ready to bring a proposal for a permanent solution to the legislator so with that there is a bill that they are looking to bring to the legislature and so to show support I had emailed Christine asking for support for organizations to sign on and I believe you all have already supported this Christine mentioned she'd be incorporating this recommendation into some legislative priorities that the city council will be sharing with state lawmakers ahead of the next legislative session so thank you for your support with that and then lastly I want to thank Kate Hepner one of our field producers and Matthew Smith who's the time meeting to be trustee for Manuski he couldn't be here tonight but thank you Matthew just you know for your continued dedication and support of community media so thank you for the continued partnership and for having us are there any questions thank you and I'll just point out for those who aren't already aware the thousand dollar contribution we've been in a you've noted here but we've been in agreement for some years with Tummy and TV we were paying less than whatever the requested amount and so for several years we've been increasing at a thousand dollars a year until we catch up to what our other like peer communities are so appreciate that ongoing flexibility do you folks have questions I have a a question with curiosity I recently I had been under the impression that you all kind of the only game in town covering local meetings and whatnot and recently we did a meeting with our friends up at the school and there was somebody else covering them so I wonder what do your outreach efforts look like to try to expand your market let me first explain a little bit of that relationship so and just for folks knowledge and education Mitchell this is her first year starting as co-director at town meeting TV so that's why I'm sitting here to help answer some questions and I have moved from the job the job that Jordan has had up until now I've moved to co-director of CCTV and CCTV is sort of the parent organization that manages a variety of projects including the access management organization town meeting TV and Vermont manages franchise fees which is what provides cable access and each of those cable access centers are referred to as an access management organization and we're lucky enough to have 24 different access management organizations and interestingly enough in Burlington there are two so the media factory manages what used to be called regional education television network and V cam public access so the public and the educational channels are there and they do educational access for all of Chittenden County they also just not to blow your mind and confuse you but they also do some government access for Chittenden County south so they cover meetings in Shelburne and that we are the government access channel for Chittenden County north but we're also a small G government access channel we are required by our certificate of public good to provide some public access as well thus our internships our studio equipment that we're allowed to train other folks in the community to use so when you are at the school board meetings those are being covered by the media factory and it is somewhat confusing in a brand it used to work fine when people were just watching on TV but now in the world of social media and branding it is a little confusing so hope that answers your question but we also do support for the whole organization CCTV has a marketing and outreach person who does some work also for 10 meeting TV so for example we'll excerpt your updates from today and Elaine's update from today and that will be aired separately and also distributed on social media in its own separate so that folks you know I say to people like if you want to learn something about your community just watch 10 minutes just watch City Council for 10 minutes and you're going to learn something that's a way in that your mind's going to be blown about what people are doing I mean I just sat here I was like there were things that you were saying during that update and now I can't remember what it was but it was something I was writing notes like oh the election forums that are coming up and how we're going to like because you're going to have what is this your second or third year doing non-resident voting so did that sort of answer the question? Yeah it's been what I asked since I witnessed that so thank you Thank you for asking Are there other questions? Any questions for members of the public or folks attending via Zoom? Brynn? Yeah I I know that we have a breakdown of what how many meetings we get aired a month Is there a summary of that in terms of like what what months we've not used the allocated allotment of you know three meetings does it sugar out into like January where we have four council meetings you know how does that kind of move around throughout the year? Okay so in my experience of working with you all and it's Paul Sarn right who works really well to make sure you all are using your allocation and so it does sugar out like if you only have if there are only two meetings in one month then there'll be four meetings likely used in the next month I think you said 109% so we Winooski has three baseline meetings so all of the all of the communities that we cover save Colchester where we really only are covering a couple hundred homes and we partner with yet another access center in Colchester and access television to do that meeting coverage so the baseline coverage is three meetings per month that's 36 meetings in the year I think we covered 39 a few years back we also decided to make an effort because we have a big pocket of general programming and so we made an effort to make sure that we're covering at least or trying to cover at least one general non-meeting in the city as well and so that's some of the programs that Jordan mentioned that aren't included in that 39 municipal meetings so hopefully I'm answering your question and if you ever want to see it your municipal rep Matthew has access to those documents and we detail we keep a contract dashboard going on a month-to-month basis all of that coverage for the whole for all the community so you can see that if you want through Matthew or you can ask us to send it to you and Paul will direct that very carefully and he responded to my text asking about it that it's very rare that we missed an R for allocation in the month or any of the three sorry Brent can you hear me okay Councillor Oakley Elaine was just reiterating that we very rarely miss a meeting we almost always meet that which is great thank you Paul any other questions or comments well thank you for coming in presenting this is built into the budget that is being presented to us as well so we will take a future vote thank you everybody and feel free always to reach out and come in and make some TV too that's all we're here for I host in the world of Wendyski once a month and I don't have to if you all have a guest or a topic you want to feature I'm flexible and we can come out to Wendyski and do that with you too that's true yeah in person on site so before we move into the next item which is the fiscal year 2025 budget presentation I'm compelled to call a little break here I've got 7.17pm let's reconvene at 7.23pm it is 7.23pm I will reconvene the meeting we are on item E for discussion the fiscal year 2025 budget presentation just for some table setting this is our first introduction to this year's fiscal budget proposal from the city manager you know we will deep dive into different sections of the next 6 meetings before actual decision making so I would encourage you to focus on your questions or thoughts or concerns you want to see addressed as we move forward in this process since we're not necessarily the decision making stage yet alright take it away so yes today I am presenting the fiscal year 2024-2025 proposed budget I'll provide an overview of all the funds and go into some detail about the general government departments note that I will be presenting three budget scenarios the council directed budget my recommended budget and an alternative budget thank you to council members who have already started asking your questions by email please feel free to ask any questions tonight also as we go we might not answer them all today for detailed questions related to community services police public works and capital improvement I might have those departments department heads to answer those during their presentations in later weeks to warn you my presentation does take almost an hour to deliver without questions that's not to discourage questions just want you to be prepared so the agenda for my presentation in a bit more detail I'll remind everyone about the strategic vision context for the city and for this budget review the budget process review the general fund budget scenarios including my proposed budget review all the funds and review what's next in the budget process I'll review the general administration budget in detail two of the funds that are managed by the city manager and uncertainties that could impact the city's financial picture a reminder that everything your city team has done and continues to do is guided by the strategic vision set by the community in 2015 these themes continue to be relevant today municipal infrastructure housing economic vitality and safe healthy connected people a reminder on the budget process in September council approve the budget timeline in October council provided direction on your priorities in bold as where we are tonight and the next four council meetings as the mayor was just saying including January 16th you'll hear from the bigger operational areas that's community services public works public safety and the capital improvement plan the capital improvement plan was presented on the same night as public works but because there's a lot of information to absorb on both with council agreement we separated those presentations this year that means on January 16th you'll be hearing that and having your overall discussion on the budget so that makes it extra important that you ask your questions as we go please send them to budget at that email address can be used by the public as well not just council members by state law we need to mourn the budget vote 30 to 40 days in advance of the vote which will be held on town meeting day town meeting day this year is on this coming cycle is March 5th so staff need to have polished notices of what's on the ballot known as the warning between January 25th and February 4th your scheduled meetings around this time are January 22nd and February 5th so your schedule has you approving the budget and setting the warning during the second meeting I'm telling you all that because if you find you need more time before setting the budget you do have the option to schedule another meeting as long as the budget and warning are set in enough time for staff to have the warning published before February 4th do also keep in mind that by state statute early ballots can be available as early as 30 days before town meeting day so setting the budget closer to 30 days before the vote will likely reduce the amount of time early that's available because we of course have to still get the final ballot printed in February there will be community presentations on the council approved budget going to voters including during a community dinner hosted by Wunewski partnership for prevention that's on February 19th by city charter there's a last presentation the day before the vote so that's March 4th this year and that's held jointly with the school district and at the school and finally of course today is March 5th when people can vote in person by ballot for the school and city budgets local offices and other local matters this year that will include two city bond votes only one of which has a financial impact into the future a reminder that during your October 2nd 2023 meeting council directed staff to develop a catch up budget that updates costs for existing services and includes some increases to catch up on some deficiencies with an emphasis on infrastructure first some context for who the budget pays for to provide what services as a local government we provide services to the general public that are basically too expensive for them to get on their own for the most part it takes people to deliver those services this is an organizational chart showing how those people are organized by department or office everyone in the organization is accountable to Wunewski residents and the council our community's role primarily is to set that vision for the for us council's role is to adopt plans strategy and policies to achieve that vision the black box on the right is for advisory bodies their members are all appointed by city council to formally advise you on plans strategy and policies the green box at the bottom shows municipal service areas and starting with the second one we raise money to pay for the services we provide the public is mostly through property taxes the tax bill for property is based on the value of that property and it's the professional contracted assessor who determines the value of each property community services support the vitality of our community providing green spaces safe spaces learning spaces and programs fire and code enforcement protect our safety and health related to buildings and road hazards housing support a built environment that our community needs and wants police and dispatch support the safety of our community members this department also enforces city parking regulations which is about safety in most of Wunewski and in the downtown supports our economic vitality by ensuring parking spaces turnover for business customers public works manages our streets sidewalks water and wastewater services and finally back to the top of the green box administration that department makes all the other functions more effective in the middle just above that last green box is the city manager that's me I support city council in your efforts to guide the city and provide leadership coordination and support to all city departments as city manager I am accountable for all activities of all staff because most of Wunewski's government services are provided by people most of the budget is for salaries that's in lighter blue on the left it's for benefits in orange at the top note that most of our employees are covered by multi year union contracts which set wage increases and dictate benefits for those employees not covered by union contracts it's better for retention to have wage increases and benefits that are similar to those in the union contracts now we'll go into the budget scenarios for the general fund which is the fund that affects the tax rate the general fund pays for general administration, fire and code public works administration and staff community services and some capital costs related to the buildings for those people so first let me review the challenges and assumptions in each of the budget scenarios recall the portion of the budget that is wages and benefits was quite a bit we used a 3.2 cost of living adjustment in fiscal year 2025 for all staff our two union contracts are based on the October to October consumer price index change so that was 3.2% we used the same figure for non union employees as I mentioned earlier it's not higher for fairness and not lower so as not to create pay compression issues in the case of leadership team members the new statewide tax that will fund childcare initiatives is also have to be reflected the employer share will need to be included in budgets going forward health insurance the city receives health insurance through vermont health connect health insurance quotes for calendar year 2024 should increase of 13.75% for blue cross blue shield premiums that makes up 81% of the city's health care costs we projected 13% increase for calendar year 2024 based on experience the grand list is the total value of taxable property in the city all things being equal if there's more development the grand list will increase note existing buildings can also go down due to a fire if they're not being maintained so what matters for the grand list total is the net value across all taxable properties in the city so an introduction if you need one why we talk about the grand list the value of the grand list affects the tax rate like this we start with the amount of money we need to provide municipal services then we divide that by the grand list value to arrive at the tax rate so if the grand list goes up it offsets that much of the increase in the tax rate by the budget the grand list is growing but projected to grow more slowly so we're projecting a modest increase of 0.5% growth in the grand list based on zoning and building permits issued offset by expected value of reductions the net change to the grand list translates to approximately $38,239 to the good a new property tax revenue for the general fund grand list growth that will determine the actual tax base for the city won't be calculated until April 1st 2024 and so could vary from this next some long term residents may have even been expecting a decrease in their tax bill this year because the tax increment finance district is expiring May meaning the tax revenues from the downtown pre-development are freed up from the infrastructure improvement debt the city will have paid off and will now go to the general fund however most of that has been allocated by city councils in years past to meet priorities along the way these are main street revitalization community development funding and community services staff this past year for this fiscal year other expenses from the revitalization are also continuing like maintenance of downtown infrastructure and legal fees and finally for the purposes of this slide we are projecting some reduction in revenues due to factors outside of our control especially in recording related to property sales is down high barring costs and the plans review revenue we were attempting to make the case for what the state has been put on hold by the state still trying but can't count on that that's right yeah plans review so it's a service that is currently provided by the state and by us locally so there's other communities that actually receive some of that revenue that comes from reviewing plans for new development and the city of Winooski doesn't get any of that revenue now so we've asked the state to share in some of that revenue so this bar graph summarizes what's driving 5.44% of the tax rate change in any of our scenarios that is the portion that is for level services salaries is in blue again benefits is also in orange again and revenues are in yellow on the right there in gray that little sliver is the net total of changes related to inflation or contractual increases so with that context as a starting point for all the budget scenarios the budget that staff developed according to council direction of some catch up with an emphasis on municipal infrastructure would result in a tax rate increase projected to be 8.7% the budget I'm proposing would also add some to the safe healthy connected people master plan goal area and would result in a projected tax rate increase of 12.76% the reason I went further than council direction is because of the context of a very unusual year which is that the was new ski school district superintendent has proposed to the school board to keep the same tax rate for them for this year as last year or for FY 25 is this current year more on that later I do realize 12.76% on the municipal side is unprecedented in recent memory and that we are a relatively low income community with affordability concerns I propose it because there may not be a better opportunity to catch up on municipal under investment when it will be felt less by taxpayers but staff did also prepare an alternative budget that's a bit lower of an increase at 10.5 4% and this is a little bit different from the figure I gave in advance to council and I'll explain why in a bit this alternative has a more limited catch up on safe healthy connected people now I'll talk a bit more detail about these three general fund budget scenarios first starting with the council directed budget what is included in it is shown in this and then the three following slides those aspects that are for level services are supplies increased in line with increased cost for supplies that's been level funded in the past folks duct taping chairs together technology services increased based on the recommended computer replacement schedule increase in telephone bills for the same services unfortunately contracted groundskeeping services to make up for staff vacancies increased portal at service needs at two parks that we experienced this year expect to continue increase in newsletter expense continue paying for high for enough seasonal pool coverage continued incremental increase as we have heard with the town meeting TV presentation and as well to Winooski Valley parks district more on that later I guess that's all so note that the community O'Brien community center is not included in this budget because we anticipate transferring ownership to the Champlain housing trust by July 1 2024 we will have the same expenses though to lease the library and office spaces we needed that we use in the building now we're not able to get into the library just set the way that that expenses catarise will be a little bit different okay and that's missing a little bit of that top there so it at the top it says what is included in the council directed budget so the practices the practice for many years has been to increase the capital improvement fund by 5% per year this has not been enough to keep up with capital needs this year in particular it would be chewed up by a couple of high dollar needs such as the public service budget or our fleet replacement plan so the increase in the council directed budget to the capital improvement fund contribution is 22.67% this year that would pay for necessary boiler replacement a public works facility that's a level service of course it's a boiler we currently have Burlington Winooski bridge replacement match for fiscal year 2025 work that's level service two traffic calming studies which you might think of as a catch up enterprise password manager to enhance cyber security that's also a catch up item two plan vehicle replacements as was scheduled that's level services again that's current vehicles that we have the typical street research facing budget that's bolded in a minute that's also level service Riverwalk capital needs assessment that's a catch up and is the necessary first step so we can plan on when to replace components of that walkway along the river and snow and ice control brine maker equipment this is an investment this isn't something we're doing now or necessarily even catch up but it will limit salt runoff save money protect water quality and comply with upcoming water quality regulations and enhance driving safety and it's actually expected to pay for itself in shorter so that's why it's on this list and note that we will need even more of an increase in future years to meet more capital needs John Rousher will review that in more detail during your January 16th meeting so our capital plan for oh I had a nice picture there that's no wonder there oh well our capital plan for FY 25 also includes investments that use capital reserves and so actually have that as part of how we are strategically and cost effectively advancing council goals for municipal infrastructure so those include a more replacement sidewalk and curb work for fiscal year 23 paving with unused bond proceeds requiring a bond vote we'll review that in a minute the pre wet brine tanking controls associated with that brine making equipment I mentioned in the last slide traffic calming construction reserve funds so that once we have potentially we'll have enough money to actually do the traffic calming main and we restrict structural evaluations police department architectural renovation conceptual plan and estimate so you can tell that some of these are going to require more money later but you got to do the first step of the studies first was included in a council direction budget is not catch up on all municipal infrastructure needs a budget that truly caught up on historical under investment in streets and sidewalks alone would require an estimated 5 to 6 million to catch up 5 to 6 not 56 to catch up and an estimated $350,000 in annual maintenance thereafter and there again as I mentioned there's other types of under funded municipal infrastructure needs but streets and sidewalks is probably the one that we hear about most often so bring this to your attention so whereas a 22.67 percent increase in contribution to the capital improvement fund over fiscal year 2024 might seem like a big increase compared to the typical 5 percent a smaller increase just kicks the can down the road meaning that what we need to pay for doesn't change but it will cost though will likely increase not really to do with the general fund except as other financial context for the general fund budget vote we will be asking voters for the local match on the Bridges project the bond would be needed in fiscal year 2026 the amount of the bond will likely be 5 percent of the total project cost the most recent state estimate of that total project cost is $60,518,000 5 percent of that would be $3,025,900 we are still working on making the case that we are going to have 1.5 percent as the mayor alluded to with of course the mayor's advocacy we also need that authorization to use excess bond proceeds that was from the completed Hickok Street project from a few years ago to reallocate that for sidewalk and curb work elsewhere it's a procedural thing we have to check off according to the bond bank in order to be able to use that money which is allocated for that we can't really use it for anything else but for sidewalk work it would be fine as long as it was voted on does anyone want to ask any questions about what I presented so far about the council directed budget before I go into my proposed I'm assuming like things like the newsletter cost you said we're going up have we pursued looking at different printers for that and of that nature to try to reduce those costs I don't know if Paul I'm going to ask you to respond to the different printers question but the one thing we have done is we proposed to reduce the page count which we're actually going to try to do this year that's part of it it's grown over the years and maybe it's actually harder to read now because it's longer so we have talked about that but this is actually based on the reduced page count and then including what their cost increase estimate is for fiscal year 2025 Paul can you speak to other printers they are Winooski based so sometimes it's going to be cheaper than someone else yeah that's really it Elaine thanks for the question council runner we you know there used to be two printers in Winooski which is actually amazing so repro is sort of the the only game of town to the current printer that we're using we have not looked into other local printers my my limited experience I would say the costs are likely going to be pretty similar but yeah it's certainly something we can look into this is something that we have a little bit of limited control over as this is actually the schools vendor we can work with the school but our cost is a reimbursement to the school district thank you Elaine perhaps now is not the time to get into it but I just have to say that it's very surprising to me that the council directed budget catching up in municipal infrastructure does not actually increase annual paving in sidewalk maintenance that is the thing that we hear we saw that in the presentation earlier today so I hope in a future discussion to hear more about the rationale for what was selected sure now I'm realizing I can't take notes when I'm sharing my presentation Angela can you make sure that you've got you take some notes about what's being raised here anything else so what is included in my proposed budget which again that adds some to safe healthy connected people for level services or catch up so it would be all items for council directed budget from the council director budget an increase in professional services budget for equity related work which I'd call catch up staff including restoring a 16th police officer which would be level service because the police department was at 16 officers for 20 years there was a year at 15 during the recession of 2008 and 2009 and then just in the last couple years because of the spike in inflation last year so we've had now a couple years of data to show that 15 positions means that we're often actually at 11 to 12 officers between required and best practice training time sick leave and vacation and say a vacancy that requires either overtime or just one officer working meanwhile community oriented and trauma informed policing takes time meeting the community with supporting by supporting block parties hosting coffee with a cop taking the time to be with a victim or source of a call to understand their situation make them feel heard and explain the broader context that all takes time proactive policing for crime deterrence such as patrols of crime related hotspots track and traffic enforcement community officer collaboration like with neighborhood watches and overall police officer visibility that all takes time writing reports takes time when we're often at 11 or 12 officers on in a week they are doing a lot of overtime we're a busy city for police calls so these are hard shifts are uniformed officers are professionals and care about this community but you can imagine it is hard to bring the patients in compassion to every minute of every call when you're overworked note too that a vacancy is often a two-year problem that is in the current environment it's hard it can take us two years to find an officer that is the right fit for Winooski then get them trained up at the police academy on their twice a year academy schedule and then field trained that's why I'm proposing to restore funding for a 16 police officer as council and then fire captain for evening coverage at full time that's a level service in this context so as council has heard over the years we have a harder and harder time recruiting for and training part-time firefighters who live with an acceptable response time distance and will respond between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m. we have good coverage during the day because we have full-time code enforcement staff who are also certified firefighters and help lead the fire department now you might be thinking what about mutual aid for those late hours where neighboring fire departments respond to each other's calls Winooski does benefit from mutual aid like all small communities who can't afford firefighters paid 24 hours a day in seven days a week but it's really only used for major events we did trial automatic 24-7 aid from st. Michael's fire and rescue for all calls but it was found not to be sustainable or doable for a hundred percent of the calls also our community is unique in its demographics and buildings and it's better if we have a Winooski trained firefighter as part of or even leading every fire call and we are at the point we are not able to do that 100 percent of the time obviously one evening fire captain does not guarantee coverage for the whole 12 hours we don't currently have full-time staff especially given that we'd want them to have some overlap with our current full-timers although provide coverage for some of those hours and with overlap with current full-time staff it improves operational continuity into the evening meaning knowing events and concerns from earlier in the day that often bleed over there is a multiplier effect of this position as well it will focus on training a task that currently falls on either the full-time code team reducing their time for proactive fire prevention and housing quality enforcement and education or that duty falls on part-time officers who don't necessarily have the bandwidth to devote to training given their paid full-time job outside of the firehouse having a full-time position devoted to training means we will have the ability to better support our important on-call staff another one would be the second part-time library circulation assistant it's in because without it we had to close the library sometimes this year or pull community services staff to do coverage more details on this will be in the community for a long time I'm calling a catch-up here because it was as refunded before so it hasn't been in the in the budget before but we are also seeing an increase in usage of the library the senior center director the senior center director to full-time is to provide more programming not just for seniors but also adults in audience we don't serve much now when you see is the only member of the Wenuski Valley Parks District to make a full amount several years ago the justification for paying less was because we were the only community that they didn't maintain a park in as we've previewed before staff would like them to take over management of Memorial Park to improve access and for other goals and councilor heard mention that earlier my proposed budget includes the full amount of the contribution they would like Wenuski to make by their formula ideally you would make this decision about this transfer in time for the budget to match it so if you have questions about this proposed transfer please let us know today or by email after today and we'll discuss the topic more during the community services presentation next week Wenuski Valley Parks District will also be in attendance and presenting to you at that meeting so if we get your question before December 11th it will that should allow us to address your questions then and finally historically the rental registry has been maintained and operated as a special fund that is not part of the general fund any budget shortfall is then paid for by a general fund reserve balance transfer this has two consequences first the troop cost of the program is an obvious and we can't always count on having a fund balance to subsidize it with second staff can feel pressure to generate enough in fees to cover the rental registry and public building programs expenses by a hundred this can lead staff to feel the pressure to develop a quantity of versus quality of annual inspections but many factors each year affect the ability of staff to meet revenue targets and many of these factors are outside of their control whereas as we've all heard the rental registry services are essential to the health and safety of renters and users of public buildings generally and have contributed reducing our structure of fire calls including this budget in the general fund reflects that criticality of services which is why I'm including it here now with this whole list hopefully it's obvious but if not note that each of these items have equity benefits if you have questions about these recommendations please let us know sooner rather than later so that we can address them during the departmental presentations please hold on to them just for now until I present the alternative budget as some of your questions might be answered in that one before I go on to the alternative budget I do realize I'm proposing a very large tax rate increase however keep in mind that people's property tax bills include both their share of the education as well as municipal taxes in years past I'd argue that city councils were too aware of the combined impact with the result that city operations have been underfunded encourage future councils to more strategically maintain city services but for this year let's look one more time at the combined impact because again the school superintendent has proposed a level tax rate to the school board the school board will be deciding on the budget they will propose to voters before the city council does so you will know what the combined projected impact will be before you have to decide on your budget so in the meantime please keep an open mind with that in mind one way to think about what we're proposing taxpayers take on in fiscal year 2025 is what their tax rate might have been if recent trends had continued so this graph shows in solid lines what the trend has been in the tax rate increases over the last four years for taxpayers who live in their Winooski home the orange line in the middle is the education tax rate for taxpayers living in their Winooski home known as the homestead rate the blue line on the bottom is the city's tax rate and the gray line at the top is the total tax rate four years is the period over which it was ramping up their tax rate in preparation for debt service for the school construction to catch up on decades of underfunding that facility the dotted lines continue those trends into the future not that they would have but I'm arguing to continue this trend of catching up on underfunding this time on the city's side the chart on the right shows the corresponding numbers for those lines if the trend in the education tax rates continued the combined total tax rate increase would have been about 15 cents per thousand dollars of property value if the whole of that increase went to the city then our tax rate increase would already be 11.63% and I'm proposing 12.76% now the reason the school district can consider a level tax rate for fiscal year 2025 is because the state changed the education funding formula to finally catch up on the higher school budget when you ski school children compared to many other communities that funding is supposed to be ongoing but of course that amount of change is not so this is a very unusual year which I'd argue presents an unusual opportunity for the municipal budget therefore I recommend city council and this community take this opportunity to catch up on the municipal budget also at least to fund level services this opportunity is why I went further than council's direction from October to October to October and I'm not going to go further than the municipal budget since that council meeting where the expenses I'm proposing especially the most expensive which are full-time staff if we don't do it this year it might be harder to do it in future years especially given the news on Friday about the projected statewide average increase to education and tax rates there is likely to be pressure that was hopefully going to continue so to look at the numbers of my proposed budget from the roll-up perspective at the highest level my budget constitutes an increase of over $2 million over last year although the budget is increasing by over $2 million remember this includes expenses formally shown in the tax increment financing district fund or grantless growth so the tax rate change again is 12.76% about $1,030,521 of that expense increase which is about 51.1% of the overall expense increase about that much is being covered by the revenue from the expiring TIF district returning members of council will recall that an additional $409,000 in TIF revenues is covering expenses approved for inclusion in this year's budget that were covered by one time funds in anticipation of the TIF revenue coming into the general fund in fiscal year 2025 the change in the average quarterly tax bill that's at the bottom that is on a home assessed at $225,000 would be $89.85 or $359.39 for the year so you're seeing this detail to see the most impact pack full of the three scenarios we do have this detail available for the other scenarios if you'd like to see them so again I do realize 12.76% is still a high increase compared to last year's 5.22% increase and the 2.17 average increase in the 10 years before that so staff have prepared an alternative budget for council consideration with more limited funding and safe healthy connected people compared to my proposed budget that comes in at a 10.54% increase I want to emphasize that I don't actually recommend this budget scenario but if council decides that 12.76 it's just too much compared to what might have been an 11.63% tax rate increase this is where staff would would suggest reducing so there sort of track changes in there but I will highlight them as we go so there is a source known as a COPS grant that could subsidize the 16th police officer position however it's very competitive more competitive than I realize when I first put these numbers together so we might not get it and therefore we wouldn't get the 16th officer obviously the reason we're suggesting it though is that if we did get it it would allow the expense to be phased in over 3 years which is always beneficial the next change this is what's changed the number from what I provided in advance to what you're seeing right now is there isn't really a suitable fallback position from a full time fire captain managing a part-time staff is actually potentially going to cost the full-time staff more so I don't see a good alternative to this and then weighing the two full-time positions I've had to weigh those two public safety positions as full-time compared to this the senior center director full-time position I'd have to rank the other two as higher and so that would be a reduction as to keep the senior center director as part-time and the last changes from proposed would be to keep the Wenuski Valley parks district at an incremental increase so if we did transfer stewardship of Morale Park to them this is the most justifiable year to go to full payment and again it will be the year that CHUMP is least felt by taxpayers note that the finance director has again prepared the budget scenario tool so that you can see these and their impact on these options and their impact on the tax rate in real time in a future meeting or you can play yourself off out of means and again although my proposed and even alternative budgets go further than council's direction I do strongly recommend that council consider my proposed budget so as to fund for level services or catch up in an unusual year where the school district tax rate changes anticipated to be small or even none so before I move on to the review of all funds and presenting the general government budgets I'll pause for questions again if you have detailed questions about financial scenarios we might not answer them today but we'll incorporate the answers into the departmental presentations and if you think of any more questions at any time feel free to ask for a meeting with Angel Army the finance director or send them to budget. Do you have questions at this point? I'll just say that similar to my question about the infrastructure rationale I'll be looking for rationale for each of these additional recommendations in the budget coming forward later Brianna I see your hand so I think at point 25 we're anticipating the school resource officer to be discontinued so how is that being reflected in the budget consultation with the actually we've asked the Winooski school district what their plans are they're not planning on changing the amount of money that they compensate the city for that service. The service will change from the school resource officer title which is expected to be on site pretty much all the time to a based off site district liaison officer model but provide a lot of the same services just not on the school on unplanned time so there would be planned activities such as you know doing a specific classroom presentation or spending time with the safety committee helping train up the new what do they call it CCS community community safety officer something like that somebody that's based at the school that's not you know law enforcement person so those services would continue so they are not changing the amount of money that they're going to pay the city for that those services they just wouldn't be based there on unstructured time okay thank you kind of time can I have something tied onto that does that in a way bring another officer into or more officer time into the police force so instead of adding a position will there be more time from the school resource officer because they will not be fully based on campus. We're not expecting that because of the things that they're still expected to do especially in fiscal year 2025 and they'll be having to figure out what the new school based position will be doing but it's an open discussion for future years. So I guess that's on a concern with this potential grant if that then commits us to having a full-time officer further down the line but then we might have this freed up from the school I'll tell you that by some of the math that I've shown you in years past which will show up again in the police budget presentation the number that we would ideally have is between 16 and 17 officers so I would not consider that to be excess capacity it would be about what we need based on the coverage that we need and the SRO position is currently counted as one of our 16 officers. That almost and maybe this is just to ask when the chief is here but would adding that 16th officer kind of pay for itself by offsetting the overtime that has been that we're using currently to cover that position or would there still be a significant amount of overtime? Currently we're not expected to exceed the overall police department budget due to overtime so I'm not sure if I could answer that question though. Angela do you have that? The 16th officer would not offset the overtime because the overtime is currently being offset by the savings and vacancy and benefits. Can I think just to echo what the mayor said and you know just re-reading this you know I think you know it says council direction was not to catch up on all municipal infrastructure needs and that's for sure we know we don't have close to the money to do that we can't tax people that much ever probably but I do think at least I left that meeting really feeling that our main desire was to catch up on the four to five million estimate that we need for roads and sidewalks so I think to see you know propose double digit tax increases that aren't actually playing into that I'm not opposed to talking about catching up other areas as well but it doesn't seem that the catch up that we actually wanted is reflected in the three budget options maybe I'm seeing that incorrectly but I do think that's what we were talking about One thing I will say I was the one vote for Safe Healthy Connected instead of municipal infrastructure and I will say the items I was most concerned about was our fire coverage and our library coverage so I do appreciate those being included in what the city manager is proposing because those are just such high areas of need that I see in our community that I just it's hard to continue to fully I think give the services that's why I see them I agree that they would be catch up for level service because they're so needed right now Other questions from attendees perhaps comments Anyone on Zoom? Now while biggest, the general fund is just one of six funds the following slides review the bigger picture of all the funds The overall budget for fiscal year 2025 as proposed is actually down because we'll be done with the TIF debt service and this slide shows the expenses across all the city's service areas under my proposed budget Notice that as appropriate public works and capital together are the biggest share That's because municipal infrastructure that includes buildings, water lines sewer lines and sewer treatment roads, sidewalks and equipment for all that is expensive The good news in terms of overall impact on residents, the water fund and wastewater fund rate increases needed to cover expenses are much lower than last year's increases those were 18.6% for water and 10.5% for wastewater Thanks to staff planning and council foresight we have been able to catch up on our previously unfunded liabilities enough so that we are proposing a bit more than needed to cover expenses so we can build more capacity including for main street revitalization debt coming online in 2027 So we are proposing a 5% increase to both rates that would increase the typical family household water cost by $22.88 and waste water cost by $27.88 compared to this fiscal year As noted previously staff recommend the rental registry budget be moved into the general fund so I'm not reviewing those details here As for what's next we'll go into various departments Tonight will be the general administration department next week is community services Keep in mind that there will be a few final votes required of council including the general fund budget and approval of the warning for town meeting day that will include two bond votes as I mentioned earlier the Berlin-Humanuski bridge match the authorization to use unspent bond proceeds from the completed Hickok Street project for sidewalk and curb work elsewhere to improve the individual enterprise and special revenue funds for fiscal year 2025 and then approve the fee and rate resolutions That was the end of my budget overview presentation Before I go on to general administration budget would you like to take a break to power through? If I could make one comment before you get into that So what is being proposed is for the average tax bill $360 for the year increase plus another $50 on the utility side So just as a frame of reference my home is assessed below the average value in Manuski and the city side has increased $424 in the last five years The whole bill has gone up 1720 I would be interested in saying like an actual average bill history tax history in Manuski so we can like as a point of reference is what this bump will feel like to somebody compared to what they've been experiencing What do you mean by an actual average? I don't know if you can acquire this but we know what the average is for the municipal side do we know what the average is on the education side the average Manuski household average house assessment average income whatever I started to assume we're going to say school district and then realized I'd stopped I did, that's what I was That is what I meant I think the school district prepares that Angel I think you're trying to get in I can tell you the amount that we bill each person but the impact on the household is a little more difficult because of the state payment that could come in based on income and the amount people are paying compared to that income that's a little harder to pinpoint because the average income may not be reflected by the person who owns the same like average home value I think seeing what's average bill is still a useful exercise That's easy enough, I can absolutely do that Great Oh, Bryn's got her hand up Sorry, Bryn's hand is up I just wanted to make know that the majority of workers are not part of our union and do not get the benefits of COLA and just to really keep that in mind as we the city's expenses continue to increase but people's salaries don't necessarily continue to increase in line with what we are seeing at the city level so we see those other expenses that are uncontrollables negotiated salaries and benefits it's not we see these proposed estimates of 9 up closer to 13% and people's salaries just are not increasing with inflation and increasing with COLA just to kind of keep that in check as we continue to consider what's reasonable for our tax base now we'll spend a few slides reviewing the general government budgets as they appear in my proposed budget so these are the staff considered part of general government departments on the left under administration department we have the city clerk's office which maintains official records holds elections, takes payments and permits on the right the other parts of the administration department provide support to all city departments including financial management that makes sense sorry I'm still on the left including financial management staff recruitment and retention and communications with the community other departments that fall under the heading of general government on the right are planning a zoning which plans for growth and development of the city through long range planning and regulatory review to ensure land development is consistent with adopted goals and objectives there are no proposed changes to that budget the purpose of the housing office is to develop and implement initiatives that support a mix of quality housing that maintains and enhances Winooski's unique sense of place and supports the needs of the entire community the parking office supports the supply of publicly parking for economic vitality while managing for safety although the staff are situated although the parking fund is situated with the public works department for budgetary oversight parking is jointly managed by a cross departmental team because it touches several areas the co-enforcement officer positions that mostly enforce parking are supervised by the police department there's three parking positions one full time and two part time that are unfilled general administration is mostly services so the budget is largely related to people either in staff or professional services as in contracted services this is the roll-up view of the general fund administration budget last fiscal year oops do you see the bottom yes current fiscal year and the recommended next fiscal year on the right and the fiscal year 2025 general administration city managers proposed budget includes these items actually mention most of these not that long ago now so I'll just adhere that most of the increase in the professional services line is due to increasing computer replacement costs also the legal fees increase isn't really extra since it was previously in the tax increment finance district fund and both the expenses and revenues from that fund will be part of the general fund starting in 2025 are there any questions about the general administration items so that was the end of the general government presentation I'll take a quick march through the couple funds that I manage the other funds the community development fund pays for parts of several staff and staff training who advance community development has a it has a healthy balance my proposed general fund budget was proposed by the community development fund so that we have dedicated ongoing funding for community development efforts it's a continuation because the source of that contribution used to be the tax increment finance district budget now under the parking I'm sorry I didn't track that wait are we just we're retaining the 200,000 or are you saying that we're adding more into that it's it was previously contributed by the council thank you parking okay so on now on to the parking fund we did used to have two parking departments one for on street parking and one for the Cascades garage going forward with the Abenaki garage now underway will be combining them all into one fund so that they can subsidize each other so we're projecting that the on street parking fund portion will continue to recover from the pandemic this year so that we can reduce the deficit next year we're expecting to contribute much less to reducing this deficit but still contribute the Abenaki garage is anticipated to begin operation during fiscal year 2025 however it's not likely to be able to fund its own operations until a future year and is anticipated to be subsidized by that Cascades garage or on street operations for several years and this is something that we are looking for the existing garage has been managed well and had the advantage of using a TIF district to fund to finance its construction so it has a strong fund balance so that's what's helping us with the Abenaki garage almost at the end so there are a couple items that have the potential to impact the city's financial picture at least a couple the two I want to review here are the city plans to sell and as you all know what our rent will be for our library and community services offices actually will depend on how much upfront money the partners are able to raise so we'll see how that goes for regional dispatch with the passage of Vermont house bill 494 in the last legislative session the funding and momentum for regional dispatch has paused which pauses the chinan county public safety authority or ccpsa for regional dispatch in this county ccpsa has not yet decided what they will do in fiscal year 2025 staff and I are discussing adjustments this year to help issues that regional dispatch is supposed to address it's a bit early to talk about these just yet which is why I have not changed that allocation for fiscal year 2025 in my proposed budget can I ask probably cover it later but just to flag we put I guess money that didn't go into funding we also put aside that police position the administrative police position what are we doing with that money that I'm thinking of it all is together so when I have something more concrete I can say about that I will definitely update council okay because I think what's important to me is in some cases we've already paid money so there's money that we have like a sunk cost and there's money that we haven't paid into that pot and it feels important to kind of separate those two things what do you mean by sunk cost there's money being held there that we could get back if it fails all together or it just decides to dissolve so that's helpful to know too like what is being I guess that's what I mean what is currently being held already and what is money that we set aside for say this position that maybe we could put towards funding other positions we already budgeted for this position right so regional dispatch was supposed to help with some specific issues that are ongoing yes so that's what we're what I'm looking to that money to do is it's serving the same function as we're trying to get close to the same function that that regional dispatch was supposed to address okay we're still working on them yeah I just feel like this at least for me it was a very important thing last year was we were seeing it kind of fail and now it's paused so I want to yeah I know I know there are issues there are issues for both our fire and police so yeah I just want to make sure we are putting money in a way that most actually really helps and not as just some future thing yes absolutely trying so this is basically my last slide we're at the end of my presentation on the budget thank you for putting so much time to review so much material and to the leadership team for preparing so much material and managing resources responsibly and serving our community and serving our community and I'm sure we're missing the last line there but thanks again as always to Angela without whom all of us would have a much harder time managing the city are there any more questions for tonight and remember to send any between meetings to budget that goes for the public at large and for council I guess one question that I have and this relates to your budget Elaine do you have any ideas of what those professional service budget for equity related work what that would kind of look like or is that something that yes so it's very tricky to be proposing money for money that I haven't spent yet this year I am anticipating spending it but we don't have a dedicated language access so that's always a possibility that we could be paying for so only other consulting services but I'm anticipating having more to say about that in the next few months any final questions thank you Elaine thank you for your attention thank you Angela and the rest of the team Brydon yeah I have a comment I know we've been talking I know the staff they have been talking about the transfer of property to Winooski Valley Parks District and gone over some various reasons as to why that may be beneficial I am reluctant I continue to be reluctant on that one it locks us into into an agreement that Winooski Valley Parks District that we don't have any control over their increasing request for cost cost coverage whereas right now we have more ability it's our property with more ability to say what investments we want to make at this time and year over year over time so I I'm just really reluctant to agree to making that at this time and looking at the other opportunities we have their higher priority so I just wanted to make note of that early on thanks Brydon I'm gonna email all of us to you anyway but related when we do get a presentation from them I would want to know how the we're paying less because they don't manage any land here but even if they do manage Memorial Park how does that compare to acreage managed services provided etcetera across communities are we just paying a random flat fee that everyone pays I definitely appreciate the partners that we have that really take Winooski's unique situation into account like town meeting TV so I hope partners other partners do the same yeah I just think I'd like to see exactly what we're going to be getting out of that and what benefit there will be and hopefully an added benefit perfect example is town meeting TV covering more Winooski events that they have to I'd like to see something like that something we're going to do noted well let's move on to item I then the strategic vision goal area updates okay given that you've been listening to me a lot today actually didn't prepare any remarks but I'm happy to answer any questions about the goal updates for all the associated equity update and economic vitality the staffing audit is that something that is going to be present in the budget presentations or is that work not at that place yet we've just drafted a request for proposals for a firm to do that so it just depends on how quickly that can move there go ahead um related to the sidewalk use you know given we had some additional comments earlier um and the agenda you know obviously it's a little too soon to be asking staff to respond but I feel like council was told not that long ago that two million was fairly standard and now we're hearing at least from one business person that it's not so it it is difficult to I don't know make sense of those two juxtaposed positions the two million for I can't think of anywhere in Burlington that's really comparable to our roundabout so I don't know if two million is standard generally I don't know that but what I can say is that the city's insurer which insures most cities and towns in Vermont looked at our situation and that was the number that they recommended given the current situation current configurations so what the business owner was saying about the issues in Burlington those are not what are driving that recommendation it's really the traffic that's driving that recommendation can I tap kind of tied to that are there things that came up in the bike head master plan that might inform any of this because I know what was it they got number six at least for our scoping study Eric any thoughts I would say not specifically it may come up through something like a scoping study but not there was no specific comments that I can recall okay I was just interested if that's another resource we could pull from no other comments on this last item I didn't see anything surprising in there so good news okay how does the end of this evening's agenda shockingly do I have a motion to adjourn second motion by Thomas second by Charlie all those in favor please say aye motion carries thank you all thank you