 And where you live and try to keep your comments to two minutes or less, that would be excellent. And also if you are with us digitally, if you would change your name if you can to your first and last name so I can address you properly, that would be great. And I think that is all the things I have to say. We'll start with folks in person. Anybody like to make a comment? Go ahead. Steve Whitaker. I just want to point out the impact of kicking the homelessness task force can down the road another week. There's a particular the Christ Church agreement. This is a city funded cooperative venture with good Samaritan to have a shelter at Christ Church. That agreement was contingent upon there being day warming space. I'm told that it wasn't until today that the agreement with the transit green mountain transit has been signed. I still don't have a copy of that. But there's a person particular person staying at Christ Church who has been no trespassed and is left out in the cold and we are safety net cannot tolerate that we have leverage it's our building. We're not negotiating the terms were paying paying city money to clean it and provide toilets we need to lift the no trespass order for the woman I'm watching her deteriorate her spiritual and mental health is deteriorating daily. Okay, so this is not something that can be ignored. Restroom City Hall for y'all to ignore that repeatedly repeatedly be deceived about the cost of securing the main hallway is is it callous indifference and selfish plain out selfish people who are out on the streets need bathrooms. I appreciate and I want to thank you for action in Cameron's offer to set up the recording and the laptop and the audio for the CVPS a meeting last Thursday night. Unfortunately, the doors were locked. You need to take action the door locking of the city hall when public meetings needs to be managed daily. And I think it's too complex or too inconsistent for bird is or VC three to handle. I think it should be handled either by the city manager's office or the city clerk's office and programmed for a specific time after the last scheduled meeting to automatically lock the doors. But the as a failsafe the the automatic pat paddle the handicapped paddle should work and a sign put there saying if it's after hours use the handicapped and then the handicapped paddle gets locked at as of the end of the last meeting. This is all doable. But in effect, there was a violation of open meeting law again by CVPS a to conduct a meeting with those door locked the state legislature would have halted the proceedings. And then what's worse the she refused to avail herself of the city laptop and speakers and then the battery went dead. And then disconnecting the chair from the meeting. So it's just a farce of technical and desire to adhere to the law. I think that's enough. I probably used up with two minutes. Thank you. Thank you. I just wanted to make a comment. You can raise your hand using the raise hand icon, which is under reactions. You could also just wave, or you can unmute yourself and let us know that you want to speak. Anyone with us digitally wish to say anything. Okay, I am not seeing anybody. We are going to move on then. All right. So, on to the consent agenda. Is there a motion. I move the consent agenda as published. Say, okay, so there's a motion and a second. Any further discussion. All in favor, please say aye. And opposed. All right, so we do have an appointment to make. So we've got an appointment to make to the public art commission. And I believe there is just the one person. And I don't see Jesse Jacobs with us digitally. But I could be wrong. I don't think, I don't think he is here. So is there a motion regarding this appointment. We go into executive session to discuss the appointment of a public officer or employee pursuant to one VSA 313 a three. Okay, so there's a motion and a second further discussion. Please say aye. And opposed. Okay, so, all right, we will be back. Please say aye. And opposed. Okay. Jack, go ahead and we appoint Jesse Jacobs to the public art commission. Okay, further discussion. All in favor, please say aye. And opposed. All right. Thank you, Jesse. We are grateful that you're stepping up for that. It's great. So we are onto the bulk of what we're going to be talking about this evening, which is the budget and I, we should have all received the Excel file in which you can enter different things and play with numbers, which I'm very grateful for. Thank you, Kelly for putting that together. So, to start off, I think, well, I can ask staff to start us off at least with what they have. Yeah. So we don't have a lot, you know, obviously we gave you the big overview presentation last meeting. Hopefully you've had a chance to pick up budget book for those of you that wanted the official book. If you don't, we can get it to you. It's also all online and was sent to you electronically. And, you know, it's really our presentation to you. You have all the information we're here to answer any questions, clarify anything that you want and help you through the discussion, but we're not going to. We won't lead you because you've got to get where you want to go. We have some Kelly's here. The department heads are almost all online. You have specific questions about anything. And, you know, we can put the spreadsheet up working spreadsheet up on the screen if necessary we have sheets about the capital plan and the various funding what's in those people want those. So we can provide some of the detail for visual. Other than that, we're here to support you as you discuss and decide and get where you need to go. Do you all want to talk at all about CIP stuff specifically or no. Yes, not. I mean, we'll happy to talk about any portion of the budget. Okay, good to know where the council. Okay, we can assume we will be explaining it at some point tonight. Yeah, I think we should probably start with that if that is. Okay. Yeah, sure. Is that all right team if we start with that I realize that that is, I mean it is a big portion of the budget but it's just a part of the budget. I'm imagining that we'll go from there into I just want to hear from every individual if you are up for it to tell us about like what you how you're reacting to this budget what would you like to see in terms of changes, additions, subtractions, etc. And we'll sort of collect all of our thoughts and then go from there is that does that sound like an okay plan team. Any other suggestions. Open to suggestions. Okay. All right, let's let's start with that if that's yeah, yeah. Kelly, a chance to get right up here. So I'm going to go ahead and just pull up a summary sheet of the capital fund and what sort of in and sort of identified online. The sheet hopefully will help with just some clarity around where the items align within the different buckets of funding. And I think it's worth noting too that I think it's super helpful to understand like what's in the city budget and then with ARPA funds like how the staff is proposing what falls into what bucket so I think that that I appreciate that nothing that that really makes a lot of sense in terms of how we approach this. Yeah. So the sheet I have up here is sort of compilation of all of the items a little bit small so I will try to expand it a little bit. And then in this first column right here, and I'll get into the details but just the way that this is set up. We've got the traditional capital funding, and then so on throughout the sheet. Water sewer bond items water sewer bond items then ARPA, and then our CIP restoration fund money. And so just kind of taking it from a higher level overview. Yes, I hate to interrupt but could you also share that. This, this sheet. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yep. Let me I'm actually going to pause for just a minute. Can you would it be okay to email it to everybody. Oh, share. Oh, okay. Thank you. Sorry. I think people who are watching on zoom also have an easier time reading it that way. Absolutely. Share screen. All right, excellent. Thanks. No problem. And so a lot of this detail can also be found on the CIP section of the budget that's online. And then also within that category there's also a breakdown of, you know, sort of what's in what's out. That's helpful, but this master sheet is really what we use for deliberations internally as a team. Load here. And so just as I'm sort of getting into this list that we've got on the screen, there's also one that is online but just a higher level overview. The debt service. Well, let me back up. Sorry. So the total CIP plan for FY 23 is about 2.149 million. The total annual capital project is just over a million and then equipment we've got slated for traditional capital that is of 359 548. And so that's where the plan comes from. And so just jumping over here into the sheet. This is what has sort of been identified as what's in and what's out. I'm not able to move this mouse. Sorry, everyone. Yeah. So what I want to do here is just jump on down to the bottom. I'm going to add the mouse here. Actually, I'm going to take this out for a minute here. Sorry guys. And stop the share so that I can actually use the mouse on this machine. We spoke a little too soon there. Hold on. Make sure this is the right version. It's actually not the right version of the sheet. So hold on. I downloaded this before I came on. It's the right version. Sorry guys. Let me share my screen again here. Now I'm ready. Okay. Sorry about that. Because I was like, this just doesn't look as pretty as the one that, you know, was the final version. So, let's just back up here a little bit. So, and summary just going over what's in here. I'm going to, if it's okay, I'm just going to go over what's in each of the items and then from there. And if there are questions, we can can get into that. So just starting here. Online seven. We've got some tree care equipment for $3,000. There are tree guards for 5,000. There's some bike path or path money here for 5,000. And this is a combination also, which I should mention of both equipment and project. So in this left hand corner for me, where there's the type and it's indicated with a P or an E. That's, you know, what it is. So it's equipment for me and P is project. So we've got a parks truck for 5,000 we've got some tree greats for 8,000 then large parks for 10,000. Then we've got the Berry Street bike path for 20,000. We've got crack seal for 20,000. And then moving on down here to fire equipment. This includes the lease payments for the new engine ambulance and for the power stretcher so this really actually is about $15,000 worth of equipment for the fire department. The other is really lease payments. Then moving on to the parks and trees truck three you'll notice as I go down the line there's a lot of equipment on this list is we're working towards getting things back up and running. And then on to the route to town line bridge for 27 five. There's a DPW two by four pickup truck for 30,000. Then there's the main street sidewalk improvement project for 50,000. And then there's some money in here for it infrastructure investments for 53,000. Again, in this column these are all traditional capital funds so the summary that I gave at the beginning these are all kind of incorporated into that. And then I'll get on to the other buckets as we get underway here. We've got the F 550 from DPW for 65,000 or so. We've got fog seal for 65,000. There's $75,000 in here for project and engineering support to go along with a lot of the big projects that we've got going right now. We've got a vehicle replacement for the police department for 76 five. And then you'll notice here as we sort of break away this this Marvin Street slope failure. As we get into these other columns here you can see how they've been identified within the bond category rather than just a traditional capital category. So that's going to be happening as well but I'll cover those in summary after I go through the traditional cost. Then there is some money in here for ADA compliance $100,000 which covers projects within City Hall. Then there is funding for year two of the contract for the reappraisal. And we also are working to set a reserve in place about in future years when we have a reappraisal there won't be such a hit and a contract cost so we're trying to pivot there but for this year we're taking it within the capital fund. And then we've got $505,000 for a cold in place for cycling. And so this this along with a fog ceiling and crack ceiling goes towards trying to reach the 70 pavement condition index number that the council is really looking to do. There's also other money within the capital funding and other buckets to reach that goal to and so our intent is that in the future we'll be standing this up. Even further it'll take about three years three to four years to reach that goal but we're working towards it. Then we've got $50,000 here for trail trail building. And so as I'm scrolling down here you can kind of see the number of projects that are on this list some of them are funded with other buckets of money, but there's a lot that, you know, you may not be funded. We tried our best, but some things will have to wait. And so just scrolling down here the total within this traditional capital categories about $1.4 million or so. There is an additional 150,000 here that you see at the bottom which is for the wastewater sewer trucks that we talked about at the CIP meeting. So there are some purchases there and I'll just scroll scroll up so you can see them. $40,000 here and also the vector. I'm scrolling up because I don't want to miss anything. There's also a dump truck and a few other items here to pick up trucks, sort of on tap within sort of this traditional category. And so just taking it back up to the top here so you can see I need to go all the way back to the top because there's not anything else in bonding but what I've done also choose I've color coded the bonds within this bond category, because we discussed at the capital committee meeting, pairing bonding together and certain packages and so I've identified based on the listing and based on committee feedback for different bond items. And so we can get into that but this first is shaded in this color here and it looks kind of peach up there kind of purple over here, but you get the gist. So there's the Marvin Street slope failure. There's $250,000 in here as part of the energy net zero plan, or another alternative to that plan could potentially be using some of the energy returns the methane from the water recovery resource and the energy output so that's an option too. Yes. I'm just noticing that is also that line is combined with ADA compliance. I just don't remember that being combined. It's not I was just trying to keep it. I was trying not to add an additional line. Okay. Sorry about that. Well, you know, as far as I recall, we, the energy upgrade that we were discussing was about 250,000. Yes, thank you for clarifying. And actually, you know, I was, I was like it's just one line, I can, I can amend the sheet pretty easily and I just did do it so sorry about that. Thanks for asking. So then just scrolling down here, we've got $550,000 for the main and Barry Street intersection. Also, I'll take a minute to note that online with the capital improvement items that are listed, you can drill into those and take a look at the components and the notes that staff is submitted on those projects. So, and also locations, there's a mapping component to that too. So then moving on, these are all the same shade by the way. Lighting conversion for 250,000 Confluence Park for 600,000. And that that that is all that we have with that particular shade. Then we've got the recreation center land purchase for 1.5 million. And then in this first blue bar is East State Street. So that's about 7.2 million. There is some grant funding associated with that. So that'll be a little bit less, but we just put the full amount here so you can see what the project costs would be in total. And then moving down here, you can see phase two of the water resource recovery drier project that was discussed at the last meeting. So that's captured in full here. There was some conversation about whether or not we would use some of the bond capacity leftover from phase one. And we're, you know, looking into that a little bit. It may be a good idea to consider just putting this all on the ballot as the 16.5 so that then, you know, we are calling that out as the total cost of the project and then also if there are any overruns then we would have a little bit of breathing room. Just want to make sure that we have enough because it's such a big project. And then lastly on the list here is the CHIF garage repayment that, you know, we'll work on getting squared away in short order so that we can kind of clear that from the general fund since we're no longer moving forward with that. So you can see with the two bond lists we've got the 8.4 almost five for, you know, sort of the non water sewer bonds and then 19.7 for the water sewer related items that includes the East State Street portion and phase two. So then I've also got this split up into sort of other one time monies that are of exception. Getting ARPA funding is is pretty fantastic. You'll note down here at the bottom what I've done is I've just, I've noted what we've received to date. We also have done the loss revenue calculations put out through the league and GFOA, which is the government finance association. Just to make sure that we're in compliance and could claim up to this first allotment of money in loss revenue and that's the most broad category of the ARPA funding. The rest of it is, you know, pretty specific. And so there are guardrails around that funding, although it does support water sewer infrastructure. And so you'll see in our planning what that looks like. As I get into my sheets a little bit more here, but I'm in summary just coming up to the top here for ARPA, just so we can kind of see what's in that phase one bucket. I have another sheet that I'll show you that has phase two ARPA and then also has some of the CIP reserve monies called out. So just scrolling up here we've got a cemetery truck and I'll also note in this first list. These are items that were delayed due to COVID. And so we're restoring funding for projects and equipment that we had already sort of said were a go but then held back because of just the COVID impacts and mitigation plans. So we've got a money in here for large park work. We've got $40,000 in here for fire EMS for truck replacement. We've got $135,000 in here for a couple of cruisers along with the fit ups that go along with that. We've got for Granite Street the storm lining 85,000. We've got $30,000 for parks for the entries for the staff bathroom. That's been on the list and kind of an item ongoing. And then we've got Phelps Street storm replacement for 90,000. We've got a truck for recreation for 70. We've got a street sweeper replacement for 275. This next one is a big one and it's one that we've been trying to figure out how to manage. We've got a grant associated with this. So the total project cost on Grout Road Bridge is $507,000 the amount that would go towards or be spent out of ARPA would be 332,000. And so we would be able to get that project done and off our books. It's been kind of hanging out there for quite some time as I understand it. So the total ARPA column for this phase one funding is almost about $1.1 million, which is our first allotment. The remaining balance that we have for this first amount of money cash on hand would be about $14,000 or so. So we've kind of captured what we could potentially use that money for. We're going to get into the phase two in a minute here, but then moving on to the CIP restoration reserve money. The reason why this money is available is as you will call we heard the deficit mitigation plan ended up cutting $1.5 million. And so we ended up coming up short about a million, which then left this $500,000 figure or so, not figure of cash that actually get transferred over into the capital fund and it just stayed there. And so now what we're aiming to do is just restore the projects that were put on hold so that then we can stand ourselves back up. And I will note that it's not the total 505 that we've got left in reserve because in FY 20, we did have a deficit in the fund of about $70,000. So that's the remaining balance that's available to be spent or $435,000. So in this bucket that we've identified there's $125,000 for a sidewalk plow. There's $180,000 for cold in place recycling for the streets and so this would work towards the 70 PCI statement condition index goal that we have, and we'd be able to pivot rather nicely into future years that we could keep investing the same amount of money year to make that happen. And that's along with the 505 that's in the traditional capital plan and the other money for fog seal and crack seal. And then we've got 47,000 for snowblower and then a pickup truck for 34,000. And so this really would set our sort of equipment back up to where we need to be and sort of put us in a good position. That being said, we still have some ground to cover. This is just kind of sort of the path back, if you will. And then there is $15,000 here for part of the vector replacement you saw that in Water Sewer that was that portion of this installment so it just starts to build that back up so we can purchase a new vector when it's time. We're trying to take an eye towards, you know, installments and doing what we can when we can. And then there is $34,000 in here for dam removal. We'll be looking for grants for this as well. It's a total cost of about $120,000 to do this study should clarify study, not the actual dam removal because that's a bargain. We should definitely do that. So then you can see that comes to 435. So that is currently what we have on the list. And then what I do want to show you is the ARPA 2 list, which then has some of the other items that we're proposing to move forward with when we get that money and we should get that probably in September of next year. So we have that on tap to use. And so folks are okay with that I'll move towards that sheet or I can stay here if there are questions. Just going to refresh on where we are with the rec center. So yeah, it's just a land purchase and no money is envisioned to come into that. Okay. We've got some more charts. I mean, do you want to wait for infrastructure? I mean, they're they're on this point, but I don't know if you feel like you're mid presentation. Sorry. Yeah, so I mean it's okay. So just just a couple and really like the frame I'm wondering about is with the federal infrastructure bill and knowing that roads bridges, dam removal. What are the specific examples I see we're funding here. Like, are we, I guess I just want to make sure that we're like preparing to take full advantage of any opportunities there like if we commit to doing it now might we build, you know, Grout road bridge for example and then like oh if we'd waited a year we could have had it federally funded or a bigger portion of it. I guess I'm just like curious what, what analysis you're using to set the priorities with that or like if we get it going are we going to be in a better position to take advantage of that and the timeline will work out great. So, I'll take a stab at that. We obviously are aware that this is coming. We don't know how it's going to work on exactly what it's going to fund. So we decided to prepare just what we need. So the good part is this budget doesn't take effect till July one. So there's a lot of time you know seven months in between six seven months to learn more. You know we can always shift projects out of this to those that funding if we're successful in obtaining it we don't know how much is going to come directly to cities and towns, how much is going to come to the state, how it's going to be dispersed. So there's a lot of money but how much is directly related, you know, we just a lot of unknowns. So we could conceivably, you know, say half of this got shifted into those monies we could come back to the council so I could now this is this money's freed up. You know, here's the next backlog of projects that's coming so you know, that's the beauty of these you know you're basically approving the dollar sums, and we're showing you what's in them and making sure that the buckets contain what you want them to contain. But until we actually do something. And is there a chance we'll do a project before we could have had it funded. Yes. But I think, overall, our goal would be to get as much out of the other funds and I think actually, you and I had this conversation, you know, we had, we're trying to build in the full 120 for this. You know, the dam removal. And then after our conversation understanding that there was going to be a lot of dam removal money we thought well, maybe this will match a grant to do the study so we only put the 34. But you know, in others we just, we know there's going to be a lot. We don't know how much, you know, I don't know how much the state will keep. I feel like I don't think there's a direct appropriation to cities and towns and counties so. I think that's really helpful. I guess just in that vein, is there. I mean, so we don't know some details, but this one's a lot more descriptive than ARPA was in some ways in terms of, you know, it's like, there's fridges. And it tells you more, there's more guidance I think, just in because it was of the way the bill was enacted. I guess I'm just wondering like, how much are we knowing that likely we would get some money or there are certain pots of like the types of projects that are going to be more likely to be funded is there a shifting of priorities that we're doing to front load so that we're ready like doing engineering like the dams I think is a great example we've been wanting to do that like we know there's federal money coming or is that I assume that's like part of the calculus or how much is that being considered for the dams, for example, the funds are here is to do the engineering we don't have any work done on dam so far so we would need to, we would need to start with that and figure out what we needed and then seek the funding for removal. Many of our street projects are, you know, various traits of design paving is not a particularly heavy design. And whether we move these projects are just, you know, we have no end of those types of projects that we can do. Obviously, each state streets a big project if we get more money for that and we don't have to bond as much money the same with the wastewater plant and others those are you know the big ticket items so yeah we're definitely planning to pursue whatever we can but in the meantime we're planning, you know, not knowing what we'll get. Thank you. Last one on this. I was just curious how do we calculate that it came up last meeting when we were talking about the difference in trucks and equipment and when we're looking at electric vehicles compared to fossil fuel vehicles and you know, often the upfront cost is more but then the lifetime cost can be lower. I don't know that that's necessarily always true but I know it's sometimes true so are we taking that into account when we're budgeting for these where maybe our upfront cost might be higher but we're both meeting our net zero goal and long term saving the community money. So we did talk to the staff about that after the conversation last week and asked them to start doing that we don't have any real revised numbers and then it came up again at the capital projects meeting on Monday so where we're at now is one of our our plan immediate plan is that one of the water sewer trucks that's on this list will be an electric truck and we'll we thought that was a good way to test it and get it to see how it works through the winter with the charging and you know really give it you know because there's the cost and then as can it do the job that we need it to do. And we had talked about trying to build in the cost of a fast as high speed charger because before we invest in the fleet we need to be able to charge it and we even had we went so far as to talk about whether that should be you know sort of open to the public and we talked about well should you know our emergency vehicles have to wait an hour or two for some so I think the thought was to install. Try to find the funds in here and we haven't we just met Monday so we haven't tweaked this all yeah but the takeaway from the recommendation from the capital community to try to put I think $50,000 in here to build a you know build the charging capacity so knowing that at some point in the future we're going to be moving to that so. Well so just to follow up on that anything further just just to follow up on that, I think the, the estimation of $50,000 it was, I just want to make sure that you know it's an estimate. Yeah, we will be for you. Okay, cool. Yeah, Jack. I wrote all this on my paper book and so I have all my things by page on the paper book but one of the things one of the questions I have is right here on the screen now line 56 on the street lighting conversion. And I wonder if we have similar to what. So what Lawrence question was do we have a calculation of the payback time for for that conversion for the reduced energy costs. That's an excellent question. I don't have one handy. I know that there was a lot of work done around this proposal. And so we can certainly get that for sure. So one of the benefits to this particular project is that there would be a payback. It's a great question I don't have that answer at the ready though. Any questions about that we've seen so far. We have a question about the center stuff and we'll come back to that but anything. Okay. So, just to sort of highlight, based on the bonds that are noted up here and I'm sure we'll circle back to have a conversation about them but we've got them sort of lumped into four categories here. And the structure includes the things that are like the street lighting conversion components part of those items. And then we get East State Street direct center and then phase two of the wastewater treatment facility. So that's how we've got it currently put together we can change it in any way that you want. But just for discussion purposes I just wanted to note that before I stopped my share and just bring up the loss revenue. I wanted to answer Connor's question so the proposal here is strictly a land purchase at this point. So that's an estimate of the value of the land we have reformed the land owner that we've put this number in the budget we the committee that's working on it knows that this is what we're going so there is an appraisal being done and obviously that could affect between this and the reserve for the in the rec department we believe we've got sufficient funds to purchase the property and given the unique sort of opportunity in time. We think there's an advantage to us owning that land and then we can have, you know, map out where we go from there. We're not touching the car building now. So we'd be we own it, but this this isn't for that. Okay. So then just continuing sort of the theme here I'm going to stop my share and then pull up another sheet. Try not to give everybody whiplash with us. What we're pulling up right now is just sort of the ARPA funding phase two portion. I can just share my screen here. So this is just a quick kind of proposal to sort of identify what we would do with the other million or so that we're going to be receiving but we haven't yet. We're not really looking for a conversation around this but we've also, you know, heard you and what you've said in previous conversations around ARPA and what you'd like it to go towards. And so this first item is the community survey for about $25,000 or so. So this survey would really kind of identify what the community priorities are and a sort of scientific sort of it would be scientific and more robust way so that then we could really get at, you know, what those items are I know we've done this survey in the past and it was pretty impressive in terms of really being able to identify areas of vulnerability, words are heard. And, you know, so that's what we'd be able to do with this survey and really trying to identify and capture, you know, what the community is wanting meeting, trying to drive it some of those equity issues as well. And then the next item is community outreach. So it has been brought to our attention that, you know, we really need to focus on transparency and making sure that we can engage the community through leveraging technology and so this is about $50,000 or so to work with maybe something and what I've got listed here it's a granicus product. It's called being the table, kind of catchy. And there's an example of engage Missoula and essentially what it is is it just provides the platform for you to see what's really going on within the city at any given moment and based on projects and things of that nature. And it's pretty neat. It would be really neat for us to have and I think with a clear gove budget book that we've put up there's also a transparency component to that as well. That's not as robust as this, but is at least sort of part of the way there. And so this would maybe bring us a little bit further in that effort and really trying to leverage technology to get the work at the city out there and then also to engage the community so we can get needs met. And then this next one is the public restrooms and housing services hub item for $425,000. So, a portion of this is a placeholder value for a public restroom facility, and we would need to get into planning on that so this is preliminary. And then the other sort of portion whatever that's determined to be would be for some of those hub support services for vulnerable populations. And so that's based on categorical eligibility within the ARPA funding to help those impacted by COVID and really in need. And then this last piece is an investment in water sewer infrastructure, the two infrastructure pieces that are allowed under ARPA are water sewer and broadband. We did look for those charging stations to see, you know, maybe possibly, but I don't think that's would be sort of a lot as part of ARPA so we would just have to figure out how to fit that in another way and we can do that we haven't identified exactly where yet but we can get into that as well. So this is just a quick list of, you know, what that second pot of ARPA money would look like. And I can go back to the CIP summary sheet if there's more discussion that you want to have around the items on that list. And then I've also got a few other sheets here but they're mostly just for summary purposes to kind of touch up conversation. I can also bring up any of the budget materials if you want to go through that. Totally up to you. Questions. Go ahead, Donna. Well, I can't read it without my glasses and I can't put my glasses on without fogging up sorry. So it's my handicap here, but the item under the housing and service hub and public bathrooms were separate items. But none of it was I felt priced out well, as well as they could be interrelated. So that was one change after the discussion with the CIP on Monday that the group agreed would be okay to combine them. And, and that's good to know we have that much resource to apply to this huge problem. And then we can define it as we move along. So I hope you'll feel comfortable with that. If I can have questions about if I can add on to that one of the things that I had said in that meeting to was that originally we had had like $100,000 dedicated to the housing and services hub. And I felt like that needed more clarity or conversation and you know if we're going to spend $100,000 on something I want to be able to say like this is what it is. To be fair, an alternative could be maybe maybe we don't know quite what it is, but we have a process that we believe we're going to go through to to figure that out. And that, you know, I wanted to hear from other folks to about like, you know, if I mean, in this case, silence is like, yeah, this is fine. But at some point either probably not tonight but at a future meeting, if that stays in there I think we should have a conversation about either what does that look like or what process do we want to get to a place where we understand what that looks like. I'm seeing a lot of nods so I'm hoping that that makes sense but yeah go ahead Jay. Well, I'll just add to that and I appreciate that thought but the other thing that's unique about this part of this piece that we're looking at is it's, you know, you know, three months into a fiscal year. It isn't with all of these things. It's an infusion of capital but it's, but there isn't necessarily an associated plan to manage the human capital needed to implement. And so I think that that's also important like we can say like hey this is great we can figure it out next September, but it would not be unrealistic for Bill and staff to say like, yeah, but we don't we don't have the the capacity from a from a you know, to from a from, you know, just from our staff to be able to implement these things so I think that that's another piece of this that you know I do love the idea of saying like hey we can, we can defer a few of these things. Yes, we'd love to, you know, implement the, you know, a new website that engages the engages the community and or deals with with public restrooms and housing services but if there's not the staff capacity to be able to implement them I think that that's part of what we need to be talking about here. So I could just we'll run on this couple, couple thoughts one is as far as the actual amount of money we did have. We had 325,000 and for the bathroom, because that was I think we had some kind of ballpark price I can't go about that and then 100,000 was really just an estimate. Obviously, I mean we do need to invest in our water sewer infrastructure as well but you know the money can be shifted between there if you felt there needed to be more put into this area. So, to Jay's point, presumably part of the planning would be to see if there was an agency we partnered with for these kind of services. And I would say from the staff's perspective, the notion of a housing services hub scored really highly on your priorities. But we weren't 100% clear on what collectively people meant by that and I know that question did come up in the capital capital fund so you know, to the extent that you all meant the same thing or different. You know, it would be good for us to a settle on what the vision is who might partners be and then what the process might be to move that forward but we also felt because it squirts Ohio we needed to put some significant money in here to allow something to happen because clearly housing is an important issue and providing services. And yes, maybe it's a new building with a public restrooms and you know I don't know so I think there's a lot to be talking about. Jennifer go ahead. So I'm just going to weigh in as I'm going to put my social worker hat on for a second. You know, I, you all know I've been working with homeless people, communities, families, children for 20 years and the infrastructure and the staffing is like such a huge piece and I, and I really hope that when it comes to moving forward with any kind of housing services hub that the staffing gets centered, because you need to have staff that are going to be compassionate staying in their positions long term because a lot of these people are seeing new service providers over and over and over again it's really exhausting. Yeah, I just I want to make sure that that piece, having a building is important yes but also making sure that there that there's going to be a staff and buy in from the community, long term, because this is, it's a hard, it's a hard thing to get started you know you can have the building and you can have all these great ideas but there's a lot of moving pieces, and I just want to make sure that it's included. Neither thoughts, Donna go ahead. I just wanted to share I believe it was Cameron who mentioned also we're getting a study done we've put out $25,000 for a study is being done so that may give us a lot of information of what's needed and suggestions so we're not trying to act in a vacuum. We're reaching out for more information constantly. I just say this is a similar conversation that goes on in the homelessness task force where you know everybody sort of has a different idea of what this thing looks like so the thought with that study is, you know, get all the information to try to put an intelligent proposal on the table, and that there is a lot of conversation about staffing because it's you right if you don't have a partner. It's just just a building. A lot of those agencies are strapped right now, as it is so. It seems like a, well actually do we have an issue that that study yet right like that hasn't gone out. I mean it might make some sense to thinking out loud here but to wait until we get the results back from that before we assign. I think the I think the task force is very receptive to the Council helping set the parameters of what that study looks like. I think they welcome it actually. Okay, worth conversation. Okay. Good to know. All right, well, further further thoughts on this. Yeah, Lauren, go ahead. Thank you for all that. That's really good context. Just, I guess, I'm just a little confused. So are we putting out this survey together community input, but like we've already decided where the money's going so that's to inform future budgets and getting back to the process of doing community surveys like that's not intended to inform the ARPA dollars. It's just a community survey. One of the really more informed community needs, you know, one of the nice things about the survey we did in 2020. Sorry. One of the one of the good things about the survey, you know, we did in 2009 and would like to repeat is that it gives us a lot of cross tabs on income, race, neighborhood, age, gender, all those sorts of things. I can see, you know, as we think about our social justice goals, the chance to see how, you know, in a sort of scientific anonymous survey way, our services split out based on those cross tabs and then we can better inform not only the investments we make in infrastructure, but our, you know, our direct services as well, based on those that feedback. Those results were really interesting then. Then it'll be interesting to see if they've changed over time. That's great. I mean, I think, I think doing that again makes a lot of sense and obviously things have changed a lot since the last time we did this with a pandemic and everything so just one thought on this. I mean, I've definitely heard from some constituents asking to have some kind of public process around the ARPA funding that is not the like replacing what we had already committed to do as a community so essentially which is this batch. So, I'm just, you know, curious I don't know if others have heard that too, but if there's value. I mean, does this need to be tied timeline to the rest of the budget or could we is there opportunity to potentially solicit some input I mean I like it could be a really like how often do we are we able to like go to the community and be like, we've got a million dollars like what do we want to see out of it together like it could be a good engagement I know that was one of our goals. You know, I mean, we have to obviously set really clear like you can only do certain things with it and you know all of that like you can't just do anything with it. So, you know, it is not does not have to be tied to the budget. We don't actually receive the money till September. And then I think we have two years to spend it so there's no rush on it. We wanted to outline this. Basically, because we're trying to address the needs we had on the table and that you had identified as priorities and given what we had for funding. Where else this was, you know, for example, the social services hub in the bathroom, this was an appropriate place to put that this was a good place to put some of the community engagement piece. And really, you know, we have a huge amount of water and sewer infrastructure so we just left the left, you know, we sort of balance it out. Okay, half a million and water and sewer. So, you know, we could do that, or we could put half a million dollars out say we're going to spend this half a million this way and we can discuss the you know, there's any number of ways the council could do it. We just wanted to allow you to see the whole package, how they all work together before you proceed it, or how they could all work together. Any other thoughts on this section. Yeah. So, I mean, obviously we've been talking about the public rest room so like I think that needs to be in the budget somewhere does if we are putting it in this line item does that mean it would not even be able to begin until the second slug of money comes in next fall so we couldn't even begin construction if it's put here in the budget. I think we'd want to look at that I think I don't know I mean I think we can probably probably borrow for it and pay it back with the ARPA funds I don't know how. Yeah, I think I think it's possible it could start ahead of time you know, we know, you know that bills and law we've received our first payment our confidence is a lot higher that we're going to get the money when scheduled and all that stuff so I think we could start that earlier. I don't want to be sure but I think, I think that's right. I mean I would rather have the money in hand. But, you know, we do have more assurances now that we'll get the money. You know, we've already seen the first infusion and we do have the guidance that will be getting it, you know, next fall. And so, that's also not that far into fiscal 23. I don't think it's going to be a quarter so it's still, you know, a little bit down the road but you know then also I mean thinking about developing plans for for public facilities, I mean they will take time and deliberations to sort of get all that off the ground. So, you know, I think we could figure something out. I don't think we're tied to waiting till September to actually start constructing if we're ready to go earlier. Or as Kelly said we could be ready to go as soon as the money comes in. Yeah, check. This whole list I really think the public bathroom is probably my number one priority beyond anything else and I know we can always spend money on water and sewer infrastructure the rest. I think I'm interested in seeing it fleshed out more before we're actually writing the check and buying stuff. Yeah, fair enough. So just to be clear Jack that that doesn't mean you want to take it out. No I'm not saying take it out and but you know as you suggested at some upcoming meeting, having more of a discussion about what the housing services hub means. Because I don't really know what it means. So I hope I'm not someone who put one of my dots on that because they don't really know what it means but I was, I was just at a meeting. There was a big mental health meeting. And people mentioned staffing across the state right now in the community mental health centers. There are about 900 vacancies. So, staffing is a huge, huge issue. Neither thoughts on this section. Okay. So the next thing to do here is I would probably pull up the budget options worksheet so you can kind of see in summary, you know what the budget generally looks like and then there are some items that have come in from groups that we might, you know, mention to use that there's sort of out there on the table if you were some kind to add them in, then, you know, we can do that in real time. So let me just see if I can. So while you're pulling that up because I think this is a good point or a good place to transition back to a sort of a full discussion and maybe we can turn the lights back on. Awesome. Thank you. Hopefully we can still see this somewhat, or we can turn the back off if we need to but. Yeah, so I wasn't sure that I was going to wait and see. Sorry about that. Yeah, so I'm hoping that we can go around. Now, I did have the thought of, you know, if if we do go around, it's possible that someone might have a lot of questions and we just dig into that and we don't end up getting all the way around so I guess I would ask if you have a lot of questions maybe just tell us like the big topics. And we can see if there's some shared concern about things I do want to get to all of them I also just want to make sure that everybody gets a chance to share. Just recognizing that we're at like 730 right now so with that in mind. I'll just say for myself like I have questions about the budget in general that I want to ask there are some things that I might suggest. I don't have, I'll just be for myself, I don't have anything I want to take away but I also wanted to make sure everybody, like I said has a chance to share so. Yes. I will start by saying I have nothing. Fair enough. Well, we still want your opinion about all the things. Fair enough, right like, I have nothing to compare it to so. Well, I think that hopefully also speaks to that. You know, it. What we've been presented with is at least mostly like reflective of of our goals as a council and that's I think a great place to start. It's very encouraging and very grateful for the work that you all have done so far along with the staff so also please pass that along to to the rest of the staff for us. Before you start talking about this if you could blow this up a little bit that would be helpful to me at least. So who would like to start. Jennifer, that's true Jennifer did start. You know, so actually before maybe before we get rolling too much further I do want to point out just a couple of things that I saw from this budget survey that you all filled out thank you for doing that. Of this group, three of us said that we thought the budget should increase by either cola or CPI that somewhere between 4.4 and 5.9% and this what we are starting with here is in that range. Two folks said we need to catch up from previous cuts. Therefore, we need a percent increase over that, and some folks said are to two folks said some services should be expanded while others should be cut it just depends. So just wanted to make sure we have that kind of in mind because any suggestions that we make obviously if we are going to add them they'll impact the bottom line I just wanted folks to know sort of where we where we were at to start with. Other thoughts yes Jack go ahead. I have one very tiny thing if it's not if this isn't the place to do it tell me but in the budget book there's a page 12. There's a listing of restoring $110,000 for the housing task force should be housing trust fund. We've got all these things that have the same initials housing task force housing trust fund homelessness task force so. Thank you for doing that I can make that change. There are questions or suggestions people have. Yeah go ahead Jack. Again working from my notes from the budget book on page. In the revenue summary. We're listing 56.3% increase in the state payment and move taxes is that a temporary coven. Add on. Is it. Are we getting in the future years. We know, well actually it's a. Last year we had a temperate we estimated a significant reduction in that because of coven and it didn't happen we actually got full amount so we're back to budgeting what we actually received last year. Great. So it's it's more a return to normal as opposed and last year's was a low, an estimated low that didn't turn out to. So it was a windfall for us this past year. Oh, that's good. So we don't need to be thinking well, if we spend this money next year we're going to have a hang around next thing and receive this amount. Okay, thanks. Great Connor go ahead. Yeah, just a couple of quick ones. My recollection economic development we're sending the $50,000 aside could spend it on a project I know there's some creative ideas kicking in the community. But the thought is we'll probably spend it and we'll have a discussion later time for the 50. So specifically had two things in mind. Although we could reshape that. And we had a lot so let me just take a little step back we had a lot of you know obviously MDC one away. We didn't have any money in this budget so give us some time to think about it we talked you know should we propose a position you know what should we do. And one of the things that Mike Miller, I think aptly pointed out was that the economic development strategic plan which was the basis for formation for MDC and sort of laid out our goals and aspirations. We're two years old now. And, you know, one of its key initiatives, you know was sort of a hotel and parking structure in the center town there's one of the things that drove that that project, and, you know, and lots change So we thought we should have funding in the budget to update that plan to sort of reflect today's reality and today's priorities and that involves meeting with a lot of stakeholders in the community and getting a sense of where those economic development priorities are. And it was that last plan that recommended creating a nonprofit corporation and so hopefully this plan would recommend some way of moving forward, be it staffing or whatever. We think that might be about 25,000. The remaining 25,000 is I would like us to keep that because what that really means is that then we will be doing economic I will be mostly doing it but with Cameron's help and our staffs help. And there are times when I need technical assistance like Whitenberg or people particular for using tiff but even other development consultants. So the idea would be that would be for us to tap into one and as needed basis as opportunities come up as we're working with savings pasture development I've been using them and, you know, they're not free. I would just like, you know, I know, like Dan Jones for example he's never like 80 people in town and kind of had this concept of a economic round table, you know, and not totally dissimilar than the first one I think. I, you know, I would like to give them a day in court they actually like pitch this and if it's a good idea, you know, maybe go with some of the ideas there. I don't know if it's the book getting caboodle but I just like that. Personally, I would like to have that in the mixer for future conversation. Now I don't know if that's part of the money or if I should propose a bit more on top of that. I don't know what the idea is so I don't know how much money it is. We can pass you as emails. Good. Likewise, I was thinking that maybe part of that money would it be applied to whatever we want to do with, I'm going to call the Elks Club plan that we actually look at it in a more holistic way than just a little presentation we had from the hub group. Do you mean like for other uses or I mean no it's using this 50,000 economic development. Again, you might pull in expertise from people but you that could be part of our economic development plan is including that land purchase and what we do with it and how we appropriate partners and a regional mindset. Sorry, I have more questions. Are you thinking of like economic development because we've had this long conversation previously about outdoor recreation as being economic development. Is that sort of where you're going with that thought? Yes. As well as more rec services. Right. And I think for so from our perspective pursuing the purchase of the land was to try to further that goal of more rec services and and the outdoor recreation as economic development. I mean, we, we will at some point need planning money. And depending on the cost of the land we there is some money, as I said, rec has some set aside for planning for facilities. Obviously, if we build things there, we're going to have to come back and get money for that. So, I mean, honestly, this really wasn't intended to be used for planning for rec some part. This was really meant to be sort of for business expansion and to update our, you know, and maybe we'll be part of that plan that that's that's important. And then to assist us on actual economic development projects where we need professional help. So I would not have envisioned this to be used for sort of a wreck and parks planning. Yeah, I understand it's undefined. I guess I just want to slip that idea in there. Yeah. I feel like it's really great being part of the CIP anytime you should join that discussion just to hear all this information more than once. And I really appreciate how much the staff has responded to the input we've given them, including that $425,000 the housing service hub and restrooms. And one thing that I think you might want to consider adding because the public center for months public safety authority board voted to potentially put $30,000 on the berry month to your ballot for month to your that would be a share of 14100 max share the budget for the public safety authority this like this one is going through lots of changes we have a meeting this coming Monday. We have our final one hopefully it'll be the January 13, but I'll keep you posted but I'll just give you a heads up on that. Otherwise, I really, I, I like where we're at and may make some changes but I feel it's a good, good first pass through. So just so I'm clear, you see you all voted to do this right so I'm guessing, I guess what I'm saying is we don't, because we don't have a say in that right like that's like the library. It's coming okay. So, and I'm just trying to think of like historically have we included that in our estimation of what our budget is. We haven't other than included it because it is part of the total I mean we you know to the extent that we want to know what taxpayers are facing we've certainly included as our planning we like like with the library and others we've said you know here's proposing here's what others are proposing but at the end of the day, it's still part of the bottom line. Got you. Okay. And the funds he put in the budget were the FY 20 the 23 five. Because it's already listed in there oh right I see, because right CVC CV PSA ballot is listed under as 23 five. So we could put it in as 1410 100 because we know. Yeah, okay. That's where it's just for a point of clarity that's like a carry over from prior years it's not actually in the budget for this year. I mean you can see that it was dashed. Yeah, I just was trying to explain where the prior year number came from, but we didn't get the last year either. Okay. Thank you. It's good to know that we can fill that in. I have other thoughts but yeah go ahead, Lauren. Yeah thanks. I have a couple thoughts. I mean, overall I also think this is a really good budget. I think it was really responsive to the strategic plan. I am really excited to see fully staffed departments and that, you know, getting back to the types of quality of service that you know the community needs and expects and all that. Thoughts. One there was a request that was in everyone's inbox today from the social and economic justice advisory committee to consider a line item for stipends for service on city committees. This is a big equity issue who can actually participate and because we are so reliant on volunteers to do so much amazing work for our community. It's a line item. The request was for 42,000. There is an expectation that probably that full amount would not be spent. You want to be able to make it available to everyone, but from experience with other committees. Not everybody takes it just because it's available so I think you know obviously we would need to budget the full amount and but there would be an expectation. So, I, that was one of the things in our equity assessment from creative discourse that was a recommendation so I wanted to put that out there for consideration. Another was from Kate Stevenson from the energy advisory committee had urged us to consider funding and energy and sustainability position. We've had some great experience in other communities like Hartford, Vermont, where they hired an energy coordinator and that person was able to make up their salary in seven months on the job by identifying efficiencies that they are able to secure. I think even just watching, you know, knowing we've got our net zero plan to implement things like district heat where we've seen both challenges and opportunities where if somebody was able to focus. Somebody was able to focus on it more fully and try to bring more customers on and there were efficiency projects identified that people were able to install addressing some of the concerns and I think if somebody was more proactively seeking out those kinds of opportunities. And just knowing we've got the climate action plan the state just adopted a huge slew of state programs coming online. You know, state arpa dollars, state infrastructure dollars for like EV charging stations is there's 21 million for Vermont for that like being able to make sure that we're taking full advantage I think like it's a time where we would be able to reap rewards from having someone focused on this for the community. So I wanted to put that on the table. One other. This is more of a question. So the peer outreach workers that the police review committee had recommended the budget so the budget reflects more social worker. So there's a total of 1.5 for peer and social and we've increased 1.5 for the social worker portion. So there's another point 1.0. I guess half for social worker and point five first peer that is not yet funded. So peer social worker that's essentially what the, so what we currently have is what's funded with the homelessness task force we're paying for that service. And that was really just trying to stay within, you know, trying to expand some get all the positions back and stay within our line. Yeah, I mean, thanks. Yeah, I mean, I guess, you know, we had identified it and that committee is a priority and, you know, to the conversation earlier about staffing and addressing these issues. You know, I think just looking at that. Yeah. Yeah. And we did, you know, just to be clear, we also did include the body worn cameras and most of us virtually all of the recommendations are funded within the department operating budget. So that's the one thing that we probably, we thought, well, maybe we can get that one next year. Yeah. It wasn't that we ignored the committee. It was just that was. Yeah, appreciate. Appreciate that. Yeah, yeah. We're assuming I guess the legislature is probably not going to fund our half position again for the social worker. We don't know so. So our budget. I mean, but our budget assumed that the, so right now we split half position with Barry, and we pay a third, the state pays a third and Barry pays a third. So we assume that would stay in place. And that we would then fund a full half other half of another position, whether it was the same person or not. With no state funding. I also have a follow up question on that. Sorry, if that's okay. And actually, this is a question for Chief Pete who I see is on. I just wanted to check in about the, the shared social worker. I see it posted in the weekly notes every week that this person is available and I am just curious. I mean, I hope that residents folks in Montpelier are accessing this person. I just wanted to confirm, you know, before, I do know it was a part of the recommendation of the police review committee, but I just wanted to confirm that, you know, this person is being well used by Montpelier residents. Yes, ma'am, the shorter answer to that one is a definite yes. I can, and continuing on with that Susan is, I think so too. Is she, there's a lot of overlap. I'm sorry, ma'am, there's a lot of overlap between the folks that are in need of hold on a second word. Hopefully going to be able to hear you soon. Chief, can you try saying a couple of things. Yes ma'am, are you able to hear me. Okay, we still can't hear you. I don't know. Yeah, I feel like I hear coming out of. We can hear him fine. Sure. When Lauren mentioned the energy position, I thought we approved one that just hadn't been filled, because we reduced our budget. We had approved one a couple of years ago and filled it. We didn't fill it as that we use the funds differently and attempted to get out the situation differently. And it's been with mixed success. So it's not considered an unfilled position. It's just gone. So we have to reinstate it. You have to put funding in for it. How are we doing. Still working on it. Yeah, go ahead. Chief. Good, good evening, ma'am. Yes. Oh, we can hear you. That's wonderful. Okay. Right on. Good evening, Madam Mayor, members of the city council, city manager Frazier city manager, Nina Meyer. The short answer to that question is a definite yes. Susan has been extraordinarily. She's been a foundation in Iraq and to what we're trying to do regarding 21st century policing and service to the community and bridging that access to resources within the Washington County area with folks who are most need of them. So yes, Susan has been a phenomenal part of that. She's been a phenomenal partner with Washington County mental health services. In addition to that, even though Susan is spending is sharing her time between Montpelier and Barry, a lot of the folks who are in need of these services often do visit both twin cities. So it's just been nothing but great cooperation. So the answer to that question is a definite yes ma'am. That is fantastic. Thank you so much. Appreciate that. Okay, sorry, and I think we had interrupted you learn on. If you have more I want to turn it back over to you. Thank you. Yeah, I mean the only other thing I think gets more to the capital discussion we were having just just thinking about how our budget can be responsive to opportunities that might come up as we learn about like state dollars or federal dollars that are flowing to the state, like for example that you know there's a line item about PFAS contamination at wastewater treatment facilities, like if we realize where we could put filtration in and we could get that federally funded. I just like how I don't know what we need in our budget now to make sure that we could be responsive to opportunities. I don't know if there's a portion, either if it's that 500,000 of the ARPA funds or you know something that would give us matching ability, for example. I know there's a bill that's going in this year about municipal energy efficiency projects and how they want to make a really generous state match to help cities do a lot of efficiency projects for example so if that moves and becomes available for the next fiscal year just so just would you know welcome any thinking on how to actually structure that but I would love to be ready to take as much advantage of those kinds of things that I think could be online by the fiscal year budget that we're talking about. The answer to that is really any of those funds that we've identified could be reallocated. If we had you know if we have reprioritized an opportunity at any time we could say hey you know we're not going to buy this truck or pave this road or do whatever I mean that you know we'd have to have a conversation about what that means but we could clearly if we're going to leverage a higher priority project like PFAS or something then I would say sure let's reallocate. Again, the council really appropriates the money and the general purposes the voters just allocate the money and then we manage it over the course of the year with in conjunction with you so we can you know I think we can be as responsive as we need to be. Great. Now go ahead Donna. Lauren. I just recently I get some emails from the Vermont Regional Planning Commission when they know a grants coming up. You seem to be in that groove. Do you notify PDW. Hey I heard about this is she a conduit for us because the staff is good when on jumping on opportunity when they know. So maybe you could be our point person. Yeah I mean really just great great you're in the know. Well she does and VLCT does and CVRPC does and our own staff tracks these things as well so but yeah Lauren has always been very helpful pointing these out. I just want to point out I know Vicki has had her hand up and I just want to acknowledge that this is a workshop time. So Vicki I just wanted to let you know that we're prioritizing the council discussion at this point and we'll have a public hearing on this. I think it's our next meeting. It's either actually. Public hearings aren't until January. Okay. But anyways we're going to prioritize our discussion for now but we'll check in again at the at the end if you're if you're still here. Anyway I just wanted to make sure you are aware of that I'm sorry. And all right so other. Yes go ahead Connor perennial proposal for me but I you know I think we have a good legislative agenda. There's a ton of opportunities to draw down federal money. I think there's a bunch of things to track whether it be rivers or PFAS or public restrooms and institutions, public safety stuff like the social worker. I really think $15,000 would be well spent contracting with a lobbying firm in town here would have a point person. We're setting in the appropriations committee institution committees, monitoring the appropriations bills the capital bills, any opportunities for grants that come down that we just miss you know, like we, we don't know what we need because we, we just don't know, you know. So I think $15,000 would pay for itself I'd even be willing to take $2,000 from the legislative welcome reception for it but. I think we have enough cooking up at the dome and enough potential for federal funds being drawn down. There could be some huge potential there we just can't cover it we don't have the staff, we're volunteers you know. I'd like to propose $15,000 for a lobbyist yeah. I so in my mind right now what we're just sort of collecting all the ideas and then we can sort of hash them out further is that okay. Okay, okay. Any other thoughts, Jack. Are you interested in just sort of high level thoughts of the budget as a whole at this point because that's fine I. I agree with with I guess Lauren and and Donna that you know I'm not ready right now to say yes I vote to put this out to the voters, the way it is but I, I think it's very encouraging. Look like we can prove up to propose a very responsible budget with that addresses. Most of the really important things that we've been talking about doing and looking at some of the big items we have on here and very pleased that we're finally going to get to fixing the elevator at City Hall which is has been a looming time and threat for a long time. The main barrier intersection again is something that we've needed to do for years, the putting really healthy amount of money into road maintenance and improvement because that is. I think for all of us it's probably the number number one complaint we hear from constituents. So I think there's a lot of really good things here. There are some things that I about the future that I either think about or worry about that I think it's. I'd like to see if we can explore a little bit one of them is where the state is on on bringing workers back, because that's going to have a tremendous impact on. The parking fund and on the rooms and meals tax, although. I have noticed that lately as I'm driving through downtown. Most of the parking spaces are full. It's it's obvious that there are more people working or coming downtown parking. Then there were back when things were back when we thought things were really bad when they weren't actually not nearly as bad as they are now. But. But so that's a real, real question for for the city for the future. Another thing that I is more of a worry than anything else is the, is the upcoming reappraisal. And the biggest question to me, and I know, having been on the board of civil authority and board of abatement for many, many years, I know how it all works. And that people are always afraid that if their appraisal goes up the assessment goes up that means their taxes are going to go up and that's not necessarily true. But. I think the pattern is also has also been for some time that each time we do townwide reassessment. There's a shift from in the tax burden from the commercial to the residential sector. And so that's something that is going to have an impact on on residents and so as we think about what the burden is on our taxpayers that's something to always keep in mind. I have a couple, there are a couple of tiny things that one is a is a big thumbs up and the other is a question, the big big yes is, it's great to see money in the budget this year for independent stay celebration. Obviously, that's going to depend on how things go in next year. But I think people will be very, very happy if we can have a parade and have the celebration on on the State House lawn next year. Another even tinier thing but it was the last year or two years ago this got the much bigger and more heated debate than we might have expected and that's the line 34 the $1000 for the USS Montpelier. And when the last time we had this debate where some people were saying take it out because it saves us $1000. And other people really wanted to keep it in. It's only $1000 and a very big budget, but it is one of those things that to me embodies kind of kind of a cultural divide in the city. And so, so I think it, if someone knows something about how that happened I think it's worth having that discussion because it's likely to come up and be be a discussion again. Oh, and I had one other thing. Chief Pete if you're still here on page 20122 of the book or the appropriation for 126 the appropriation for body cameras, which I strongly support. Am I right in thinking that there's no personnel cost associated with that, or we're planning on having to hire anyone or you're just absorbing that. I'm sorry sir which my my son is going in and out which which line item is that one sir. The body cams. Is it going to cost us. Are we going to be paying someone to be reviewing the video responding to public records request and is that going to be a cost that that we're not seeing reflected in the proposed budget. We did take that into account sir and I think what we'd like to do is we're still trying to draw numbers and making sure that we collect accurate numbers regarding public records requests. And so I think for now, and then based on what the software platform can do regarding redactions. I think right now would be be more important to take a wait and see approach. Or we could come close to entertaining hiring an administrative person to help us in dealing with those types of public record request. I'm anticipating they will add to the public records request we already get, but I don't know how much at this point. Thanks. Also chief, big thumbs up on chipping away at the vacancies in your department. I think it's, it's great that that we're getting those down hiring people to replace the vacant fill the vacancies that we had. Thank you sir it's all up to it's all the officers there they're going out there and looking for folks that they'd like. That's great. Anything else jack. That is it for now. Thank you. Okay. Well I may share some of my thoughts. I realize we talked about this already but just in terms of potential charging station and electric truck that we talked about at the capital improvements committee that is now. The thought is that that will be in the water budget is that correct the truck will definitely be truck so we already have the trucks in the water budget so we'll just adjust the price of one of those. Or maybe just wait and see and the charging station the charging station we got to figure out where to put it okay so that will either be an ad or shift right and just to be clear we we vote on the water budget at a different time. So the charging station may not be in the water budget because it will probably would be used by not just that right. So, yeah, that would make sense. Yep. Okay. Great. I so Lauren thank you for bringing up the stipends for other city committees. That's something that I'm interested in. And also the energy coordinator position I think we need to see like well so how much would that cost and I think there's some really interesting potential there. And at least in terms of the stipends for city appointees going back a topic. So the proposal that we got from the social and economic justice committee was recommending a process where people could apply for so everyone wouldn't necessarily just get funding. But people could apply for $50 and I asked where that had come from that was the recommendation from creative discourse that that was the amount to start with because I was curious where that amount came from. And that, that, you know, I think is fine particularly that it came from creative discourse. If there's some kind of application process I think we probably would need to flush that out. What does that look like. What would be the basis for somebody getting in or not getting it. I don't know. Yes, go ahead. The way we've talked about it is it basically the reason the line item is what it is is because if we're going to make it available it should be available to everyone. But then it would be essentially an opt in thing so not everybody would opt in and take it. What we're hoping to do is the city of Essex in Vermont is implementing this starting in January. So by the time this would come online here. We're hoping to look at the program they've built and take lessons learned and have, you know, the details of like, how do we make this work because, you know, there's considerations of like, you want to make it. Feel like something people don't want to take or, you know, you want it truly to be accessible and so just the way you structure how it's provided and how people are made aware of it and is it is it working and look at the amount that they offer and stuff so I think we could refine the implementation plan over the coming months. This was like the baseline of, you know, getting the amount and the budget so that we could then figure out the structure of how exactly to offer it in a way that is going to, you know, make these committees more accessible. And they had suggested to start this as a pilot with a handful of committees, and I would like to talk about if we do go forward with this, are those the right committees, I would have prioritized providing stipends to committees that the city has to have. For example, the DRB and the planning commission I know the planning commission was already on their list but the DRB wasn't. We have to have those groups. So that's where, where I would start, and then, you know, go out from there, potentially also the design review committee, you know, these sort of ones that are where we sort of are expected to have them and we don't really have flexibility and as to like the number of seats that that are on these boards. Anyway, we can have further conversation about that. And I think that is it for me for now. So I'm a lot of a lot of repeats there. Yeah, Donna, go ahead. And I would hope the stipend would really help someone pay for a babysitter. And if they're only getting $50. So, is it not equitable just to say there has to be an express need. Otherwise, to me $50 won't allow a parent with young kids to come. It's almost not useful. Yeah. Let me understand why it has to be available. Not on need, but to everybody. I don't see how we can afford it and help people meet the real need to pay their sitter so they can come. So just to make sure I'm understanding the question right like potentially we could make a larger amount available to fewer people to make sure that you're actually making it like if someone had to hire babysitter, and it costs more than $50. For example, I guess I just want to make sure I understand much babysitting for $50. Yeah. So, I mean, essentially, this will be based on need and that people will say, like, essentially sign up for it saying yes, this is something that I plan to take advantage of so that so that it allows me to serve on the committee. And what we've seen in other examples that were brought to the social and economic justice committee are, you know, there's state committees are starting to do this more where they're giving some more generous stipends and climate council just offered similar stipends and very few people actually ended up taking them but it was it was available and it did allow some people to participate that would have found it a burden otherwise. So, you know, because this is kind of a standard amount is what we found I think by doing it as a pilot the idea was we could learn some of this is it actually bringing in new people that are able to participate is is it the right amount is it being offered in a way that people can take advantage of it is it, you know, are people who have served for years, taking it that it seems like is this changing the, you know, who's able to participate so I think that's the kind of lessons that we would hope to learn. But this is a pretty standard from the research we did in terms of amount and the kind of approach and structure and I don't know. And I think it's $50 per meeting. It's not just $50 flat to be on the committee it's $50 per meeting. So you could probably get a babysitter for one meeting for $50. And then every I didn't. I'm, I'm not finding the auditory working. Sorry, it's $50 per meeting. Thank you. Thank you. That's what I just read it. I'm going to get when I feel like what we get. And maybe we have to do that and say do I really need this. But I'm really wanting to focus what little funds we have to get that diversity we're not getting because of financial difficulties, and not necessarily everybody getting it. So that's where I'm at and maybe that's not legal. I don't know that's what I was trying to ask you. My preference is that it really goes where it's needed to get our diversity that we need. This is clearly a policy question and however you want to handle this is fine. I guess I would say from an administrator perspective. If we get into means testing and need based, then someone has to make a determination of that. And that means someone has to review. So I don't, we don't have the ability to do that nor what I want to get into having people have to submit their financial standing to us to, I think it would just have to be, I think it would work most efficiently if you just put it out there and people could choose to take it or not. You're right, some people who don't need it might take it but that's the way it goes. Jack, go ahead. I would be surprised if if these are the boards that we use or something like that I would be surprised if we spend half of this money, which is not an argument for not doing it necessarily. But I, I suspect that most people, for instance, we don't have 15 people on the housing task force. I don't not sure how many we do have but I think that most people would not take the money. And I wouldn't want to put someone who needs the money in the position of having to justify it. So, that's, that's my thinking. Other thoughts. Yeah, Connor, are we waiting? Sure. Yeah, sure. Yeah, I don't know what form it looks like. I don't know how much money pretty much the social justice committee we hired this consultant they came in they give us all this data. And it looks like this is like the only thing they're asking for and it's substantial of course but I think you know, if we do these things, like have a report come out, it's got to be more than just sort of admiring it for a couple hours. We've got to follow through with some action steps, whether it's a linear or not because you know, social and economic justice, I think goes beyond that so I would I think we have a week to like maybe flesh it out kicks my ideas around what committees are relevant how much money is it. But I'd like, I'd love to see it in some form. Right, other thoughts. Yeah, Jay. General. Yeah, okay. Perfect. I would say that I certainly appreciate everybody's thoughts I've had lots of notes and I was happy to cross most of them off because you folks have covered them and I appreciate that but just there's two things that I want to come back to and I'm not. It's just more about thinking about how we approach this not necessarily making a specific proposal, but first. It's really important that we acknowledge the opportunity and responsibility around the potential of asking for a one and a half million dollar bond item to purchase the golf course land. I think it's incredible opportunity we live in a river valley there is not much open space, certainly very very little flat space not that that's totally flat but it's like kind of getting there right, but it's it's manageable that space that can be used for a lot of different purposes. So I think the opportunity to be able to buy that property is the timing is is, dare I say generational it doesn't just doesn't come up very often and I think that that's something that we should really take seriously and engage with the community about how important this opera, you know how unique this opportunity is at the same time I also want to acknowledge that owning that land comes with it. It's a really big responsibility in terms of how it could potentially be developed or not and there are lots of organizations and folks that would love to take advantage of what we could do there, whether it's the folks from the hub, whether it's, you know, outdoor groups, it's tennis players soccer players, I mean you know cross country skiers I go on and on and on and on. So I think that acknowledging that that if we're to do that if you know where to move forward with that that I think we need to be diligent and smart about at least allocating resources to develop a plan to make it so that it could benefit the community as best as possible I don't want to be in a situation where if we if we bond and buy the land and it's just sort of like well whoever shows up can just do with it that they want. I just don't. I don't think that that would be fair, but at the same time it really is an incredible opportunity. And this ties back a little bit to what Don was talking about is around economic development. And again I don't necessarily have a specific proposal here but I do think that we need to invest some money to update the plan that was done a few years ago. A lot has changed the world is very different based on what the recommendations they gave us were, and I think that if we were to try to implement those recommendations now they wouldn't get very far. For a lot of reasons, and so I think investing in that does make a lot of sense but at the same time I'm worried that I just want to acknowledge that I think it would. You know, if there was money available, like Bill like you said that like hey yeah I could do, you know, something comes to me then I could, you know be able to hire Whitenberg or a consultant or somebody to help see it through. I think that's all well and good but at the same time I feel like there's an opportunity. That's not a proactive stance that's very much a passive stance and and Lord knows you haven't you haven't you have enough to do chairman the staff everybody has enough to do so I wonder if we should give some more thought to could could could the city be in a position where we could take a more proactive stance around economic development financially or what that would look like and what sort of investment that would take. Like I said I don't actually have a specific proposal right now, but I do think that it would move us and I think that this, you know, this is where you get into a lot of gray area but talking about outdoor recreation and recreational opportunities and parks department and the property, you know that we could potentially bond for and then also looking at the other side of that looking at downtown and being proactive around economic development. I think that you know we're in a place where that could be the return on investment could be significant if we were to take a more proactive stance on that. Well, I mean, that's where I'd like us to be, especially if they could do energy work. We've already tried to combine that with something else. And I just I think we would be more at the 100,000 that we were at before when you start talking about a staff person benefits, some operating funds. I think that's really where we'd be and that's where we started with the budget was to try to put that in and you know, as we tried to weigh the various priorities and get everything in and stay where where we ended up with the level. Some, you know, some things just didn't make it and that was when we said well, let's do this that's that keeps us moving forward but it doesn't, you know, we didn't want to zero it either. But I think, I think, regardless of how it looks, I think we're going to be at that $100,000 level really do it right. And, you know, I'd be happy to do it faster. I think that's something that we could talk about, you know, increasing that amount potentially. Sorry, I don't want to cut you off. There's more. All right, well, Jack, before you go, I just want to acknowledge that it is just about 830. That was the first thing I was going to say. Oh, really? It seems like most folks have had an opportunity to at least weigh in initially, which is great. I do want to take a break and then we'll sort of pick up the conversation from here and see where we where we want to go with it. And maybe we can get back to. Well, actually, let's talk about it after where we go after this. So for now, let's take a 10 minute break. We're going to reconvene at 840. And we are going to reconvene here. Jack, you're going to kick us off. If you're ready. I'm ready. Thank you. And I'm actually following up on what, what Jay was just talking about. Because as we haven't really talked much about the bonding thing yet, and I think it's probably a bigger discussion. I would have to say that of, of all the proposals for bonding, the land acquisition for the recreation center is probably the one that gives me the most pause. Part of it is that we don't really have a fully developed plan for the new recreation center itself, if that's what we're going to do. And part of it is because I would like to think through some more the, the degree to which the success of our placing the recreation center on that location is dependent on the success of the private development of the hub that we had the presentation on. And I don't really know whether, you know, what their financials look like and whether they're, whether the business is going to make it or not. But I certainly hope that it does. One of the things that was in my head is after we had that presentation as I was going home was that I wish that some of the people making that presentation were younger than me. So that we can have a really think more that this is the thing that is going to attract people that are younger than me and are is going to be going. Not just as long as people my age are still able to go out and play tennis, but with is going to be used and useful by younger families by people who I suspect are not most mostly not using that kind of facility. Just thinking of the young families I know in town people in their 30s 40s I think they're not, they're mostly not going to facilities like that although it's this is not a scientific study at all. But that's something that that kind of worries me about about going down that road and I think we, I would want to be more confident before we do that. Does it hinge on the successful. That's my question. Yeah, I look at the alternatives right. I don't think you can polish that building on Berry Street up enough to ever make it viable, and I'd rather put house in there frankly the more I think about it. And it doesn't seem like there's enough space down at the direct fields there. If it was standalone. I think I'd be inclined to go in that direction, you know, if or nothing else and lack of other options. And Jack, it's just to follow up I totally appreciate your point and if I wasn't as clear as I could have been I apologize but I'm with you 100% I that being that how we utilize and that space and that land is crucial. And what what would the plan be and that we would have to go into it not saying oh we're doing this so that the hub or, you know, X or Y organization is just going to decide what to do with it but I do feel like the opportunity to for the city to take ownership of that land if this is and if this is the time to happen is not one that we should take lightly and not one that we would even if it takes us. Not that one that we let would want to let pass and even if it takes us a couple years to figure out a plan and and do a significant community outreach and find partner or a partner or partners in the community to help develop it as best we could. It would be the opportunity to be able to be able to control the fate of that land I think is is significant and and and unique in its timeliness. Donna and then Lauren. Yeah, I would just add to that it's a great question Jack. I prefer we own the land and that we also don't exclude housing. We could do a really good collective housing there that's multi units, really smartly done. And I just give kudos to Steve Rubiani, who really is willing to think about having the city own it I mean he's really such a civic minded person I just an opportunity I would hate for us to miss. And if we're in charge fine we can reach out to hub group and lots of groups to make lots of things work out there, and that would be part of the study and looking at it. Good. Yeah, I was wondering the same thing about how how tight and so thanks for raising that question and appreciate the responses. What am I constituents had what I thought was a great idea of creating a youth advisory committee to work with the city to help inform and think about what the opportunities. So I'll be connecting her with Cameron probably she's very plugged into the parents group and stuff so I think could. But I thought that idea of getting some different perspectives and, you know, being able to have this as an opportunity take advantage of this moment of the land being available seems to make a lot of sense to me and then look at what we are and work with the community on, you know what is going to be a resource for, for people for years to come. But just to circle back, particularly to the bonds in general, you know, like one possibility is that we move forward with the bonds, sort of as proposed, we could also reshuffle them we could also say we want to pull them off of the list for now and there and it will will actually officially vote on this later but where I'm thinking about going to see knows I would love to let's just talk about the bonds are we okay with them do we want to redo any of them and then I would like to come back to the budget in general and as proposed, I heard four different things maybe I'm wrong maybe there are five, and I'd like to just to get like a straw poll, you know, like our people interested in pursuing the things that were talked about. So that's kind of one of us an idea of sort of where we're landing. And see whether that is palatable to us in terms of what that implies for the increase or the percentage or whatever. I'm anticipating this conversation going if that's okay your team, but coming back to just the bonds in general. I want to come back to you jack. Are you proposing that we that we pull that one off of the list where you don't. You also don't have to have a definitive answer to that. I don't have a definitive yet. I think it's an important question to raise but but I'm not saying not to do we shouldn't do it at this point. Okay. Any other proposed changes we have to the bonds. I'm seeing some, some nose here, maybe. Okay. If you do keep us posted otherwise sounds like we'll move forward with at least the consensus anyway sounds like we're moving forward with the bonds as proposed yes. I would appreciate it maybe if Kelly could put together a slide similar to the one we saw where the grouping of the bond is like in its own little spreadsheet figure so we can read it and see we can group the bonds like this maybe two or three alternatives of the bonds. That's, you know, big print. Thanks. Yeah, I'm picturing because there's really four column. Yeah, there's was there four bonds there's four bonds. So, you know, what's in each of those bonds, maybe just by column. Does that make sense. To make it fairly easy. So one is the state street bond. So that's the state street and that's water sewer storm drains sidewalks paving all of that that's 7.2 million. One is the wastewater plant which you heard about last week and that's really a self contained project. One is the purchase of the Elks Club land. So those three are pretty straightforward, but it's the it's the last one though the infrastructure that includes the Berry Street intersection that includes the street lighting that includes Confluence Park and includes the Marvin Street storm retaining wall what else is in that bridge. No, the bridge is not DPW heating which is part of that zero. I haven't read the DVW. Marvin Street and then confluence it. It totals about 1.8. Right. There you go. So, so that's the only one that's got a lot in it. The rest are single items. I understand, but I also think not only because you had some different presentations in your chart when you. I have split out initially the Confluence Park from that so there were five items and the committee said group those together and I think the only other consideration was whether to lump East State Street in with the wastewater plant. I was just talking about the one you have like a screen presentation instead of a spreadsheet on those key bond groupings. Yep. And maybe I wasn't I wasn't needing to see what all the individual items was just like a brief naming for not only a clear picture but also for the public. I think it's great to have this detail but if you see a slide screen that says this bond is the wastewater treatment. This one is the land this one is the infrastructure and then you have this for backup I just think it helps people to communicate themselves. Oh yeah and certainly we would want to do that. I can't share my screen on this can I. I can we also have the. And you did the same thing for the garage to you did a screenshot saying this is the ARPA restored. This is the ARPA. Whatever it was the next phase, and that that wasn't as clear here. Somehow supplement the spreadsheet. It was really clear screen to share. Yep, I'm not currently. This actually is just up there. I was able to. Okay, I'm trying. Probably only show up in the zoom. Kelly's screen. You just in a minimized view. So you're not sure. I hit shares. Oh, I have to share yours. So this is what you're talking about Donna. So this was the slide I showed last week. And and since then we've put the Confluence Park in with the infrastructure projects. So there is one less. Yeah. I mean, that's not going on in the ballot. That's already passed. That's just a new debt that's going into that we're paying in our budget. So. But I think so. Yeah, we can recreate the summary very easily. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We can recreate the summary very easily. But I hear you too, Donna, about the, is there are other columns like ARPA one, ARPA two. Right. CIP reserve. Yeah. We can, we can recreate all of that. Great. Very easily. Jack. One thing that. That I had not been thinking of as a potential bond. Until I heard Donna talking about this. You know, Donna mentioned that there's a real, real possibility to acquire the Elks Club, Club land and develop housing there. And, you know, wherever we want to go to put housing at the housing task force, we've been talking about. You know, the place that we've identified for many years as a, as a key potential place for housing development is savings pasture. And. If something like that. If something like that. If something like that. If something like that. If something like that. If something like that. If something like that. Which is some system for the city to acquire real estate. Which we would then. Make available to. To developers to, to put housing on. And. If something like that is potentially on the table for bonding. I think that that's maybe worth thinking about. And I don't know if that was. I know that there's an owner of savings pasture and that there's. Efforts been. Made to move forward on some kind of development. And we've done some. Zoning changes to facilitate that. But. I think that. Might be worth looking at. I was. Is another overall. Point about the bond. Is that I was, I found it very encouraging to. See the presentation that the two tables about. The level of our indebtedness. Compared to. Our policy. Because for the last few years. The level of debts been going up and getting closer and closer to the. To the policy. Now we can see the curve. Going in the other direction. Which, as I say, is. Encouraging for our. Capacity to. Take on some projects. Yeah. I need a thoughts on the. Okay. I'm going to move on then, if that's all right. So moving on to talk about. The. Budget. What, go ahead. If I may, just before you. I think I know where you're headed. Just so that everything's on the table. There were a couple more items that we got submitted. To just. That are not in the budget that other groups put into us. I'll make sure that you had a chance to at least. You can do what you want with them. Okay. One was the request for $30,000 from ARPA funds from down street. For part of. Alcohol treatment. Facility. One was $10,000 from. The. Conservation commission. And. So, yes, there, there were funds from the conservation commission to replenish some of their. I know I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money for grants. Because there was a large, well, about half of their 40,000 ended up going out to the hub or Park. Expansion project. And so they were. You know, wanting to request that they. Maybe get an infusion back. Of 10,000. And then there was the parks commission. Who also put forward. specifically around the city's parks. And then I've got the social economic justice committee stipends, which was already mentioned down through which Bill mentioned. And then there's the municipal planning grant we had put in to get it and we haven't gotten it. It was a pretty competitive pool from what Mike Miller has reported out it's sort of over $850,000 for an available $443,000 and so it just didn't come our way. And so that's also $10,000 that's out there that really should be. Although we might be able to find that in this grant. Yeah, we can probably, if you can just ask us to find it we can do that. But I just wanted to highlight some of the things that have kind of come to pass. You know that you probably need a little consideration that weren't in this budget. So at least the three that you hadn't mentioned were the 30,000 for Down Street, the 10,000 for Conservation Commission and 5,000 for Parks. Okay. And the 10,000 we knew about when we did our budget I don't know that we knew about the five or the 30. We knew about the 10 and the five but not the 30. So we opted not to include those just so you know that those were. Okay, and so we don't need to worry about the municipal planning grant. The planning grant we got that. Okay, all right. Okay, whoo. All right, so one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. I've got seven potential additions to the list here. Starting with the highest possible amount. If we did 42,000 for paying committee members, energy coordinator at like 100,000, lobbying firm at 15,000. We talked about more money for economic development but I don't know if we had a dollar amount for that. I would suggest that if we're gonna do it it would be another 50,000. Okay, and 30 for the Down Street Alcohol Treatment. Is that a facility? It's housing. It's housing for recovering mother and children. Oh, I did see that. Yeah, it's not treatment, it's housing. Thank you, yes, that's right. Okay, transitional housing, yeah. Okay, and then 10,000 for Conservation Commission and five for Parks Commission. Kelly, this might, I don't know if this is an opportunity to project the Excel spreadsheet. If we did all of those things then the increased value I'm looking at here I'm looking at here is like 7.6% up from 5.2. I'm less interested in going up that high but that means not doing something. So I wanna just take a straw poll on some of these things here. Well, actually what I might propose with the committee, paying committee members, I don't know how you feel about this, Laura, and being on that committee. If we narrowed the scope to just the committees that we have to have and that we know how many people there are, they're gonna be. I don't know, what do you think about that? The committee, when we were talking about this concept this morning, there were a few options and Cameron, please jump in, I mean understanding. So this was calculated as if everyone's taking it for every single meeting and reaching these five particular committees as a starting place. I mean, again, I think the expectation is that a small portion of this money would be spent. So I think it could be scalable. Like we could put in less money and just figure out a way to roll it out. So it's fully accessible to certain committees and then if uptake isn't that high we could expand the committees or something. So I think we could be a little adaptive with it. So I think. There's some flexibility there, but getting it in and starting it would be I think really important. Other thoughts, is there general interest in having at least some level of paying committee members or is anybody, would anybody prefer to not do that one? Yeah, go ahead Dawn. I guess I'm a little hesitant and that's because we've done other things that was in that report. And hence I thought, well, what if we just delay this one? I'm still nervous about our own recovery. I don't think as we all know, we're not done with this virus and its mutations. And I felt that the body cameras were important and I felt the social worker increase was important and we put those in. And so I would just maybe want to stagger it a lot more or wait till next year. I just, I'm a minority. Okay. Other. Yeah. The body cams and the other thing you mentioned from the police review committee, this was from the equity report. No, it's okay. Yeah. No, it's fine. She was on both. Yeah, that's true. That's true. Keep it in order. Anyone else sort of feeling like we shouldn't have some level of funding for that? Okay. All right, so we're in, oh yes, go ahead, Jack. I'm just not sure how I feel. I know years ago, I used to come to the council every year and say the council needs to raise how much the council gets paid because it's otherwise an economic impediment to serving. We have a lot of committees. So I'm not sure, I'm just kind of on the fence about this. I'm not entirely sure. If we were going to do it, I'd almost be tempted to say, well, we'll just appropriate a dollar amount and anyone who's on any city committee who could apply until the appropriation runs out. I'm not sure. I'm not sure if it makes sense to me to say, how do we pick out, pick certain committees and not others? Yeah, I would almost propose like, let's start with $30,000. How many committees could that cover? And to be fair, like I said, I would start with the statutory ones. And then see, like if we can crunch some numbers between now and the next meeting, see how that plays out, but start with something like $30,000, which is not the whole 42, but it's, I mean, talk about like an impediment to serving that you're getting nothing now. So, it'd be better than nothing. So I guess, and I start with that just as a place to like have a place to start. And like we can continue to tweak that number or change it or grow back or whatever I support. I support that. But just as a, yeah, go ahead, Jay. No, I think that that makes sense and sort of called a pilot project to see how it plays out. But I think ultimately the goal is to make the committees more accessible to our community. And so it's, I would, you know, as we approach it, it would be to, you know, the reason we would do that is so that we could have a broader pool and a more diverse pool of folks who would participate. So that would be our benchmark as to whether it's successful or not, not did we figure out how to dole it out to the people who are already doing it. If you know, because that clearly is a, you know, that administratively that's a challenge to how do we maintain equity and fairness and how we can distribute those funds. But at the same time, if it's successful, it's successful if we have a broader pool of folks who are willing participants, not just figuring out exactly how we distribute that money to folks who are already doing it. So that would be my perspective on how, and I'm fine with that 30K number to sort of, and with the statutory committees, I think that that makes sense. But I just want that to be our mindset, not just how, you know, how it's distributed. Okay. Moving on, the, another one that I heard was the lobbying firm, hiring some lobbying, $15,000 you proposed, what are your thoughts, general thumbs up, thumbs down? Where are we at? Yes, Lauren, go ahead. I mean, I might be the other person who supported this previously, but I think I just, I think this one will pay for itself, like just being someone who spends a lot of time at the state house, like you don't know what you don't know if you don't have someone in the room, they whip through the budget so fast, they talk about opportunities and having someone who's there with Montpelier's interest in mind, and it's just monitoring it. I think with so much money flowing around right now, like there's, I don't see it almost anyway, we don't get that money back. And then some other thoughts. Yeah, Jack. As a lobbyist myself, I think that lobbying is of great value and the last time we had it on, I think the reason it didn't make it eventually is that money was very tight and we decided, rightly or wrongly, that this was a place not to go, but I don't have the sense that money is quite as tight this year, and I'd be inclined to probably do it. Donna. We're looking at the seven things that all have substantial need, whether it's the stipend of any amount, the downtown housing for recovery moms and their kids, those particularly, and then the conservation and the parks. So I find, I'm not sure we have money for those. I find it very hard to put 15 for a lobbyist because 15, I don't think is enough to keep them in the room. You're gonna get a lobbyist, you're sharing with a lot of other groups. And if there's a conflict, which place do they go? Every organization I've worked with that's shared a lobbyist at this level doesn't always have a person in the room. And I think we have a lot of ears there already. So I would not fund the lobbyists over these other things. Go ahead, Connor. To address that concern, a lot of the firms would have 10 lobbyists in the building, right? So somebody might be in the budget committee, somebody might be like in judiciary. It's not just one lobbyist stretch then, it's multiple lobbyists looking there. And if they saw something, okay, this looks like something Chief Pete needs to get down for. They could give us a ring, we could do the work. But it's not somebody running from committee room to committee room there. They're in there already and they're in many committee rooms looking at this. So yeah, I just want to address that concern. Other thoughts. This is something that I have in the past anyway not been in favor of because, probably because I feel very separate from that world and I don't fully understand it, but for $15,000 part of me is open to it in that, like let's try it and see, I can't believe I'm saying that, but we could try it and see if it does manifest. I have, I'm not trying to argue for or against I have a question. It sounds like a lot of what we're talking about is for the session that's coming up in a month and a half. Because this is not gonna take effect next year. So one of the questions would be, if we want to try it, should we see if we can scrape? I mean, and I can't promise that we can, we'd have to look, but is this more of an immediate need than waiting till 2023? And then. Just a question. Interesting question. I mean, I'd be of the opinion, we'll definitely need it next year too, but like you're saying, Bill, it's like, now is when the federal money's coming down, it would be better to have them in the room starting in January. Well, especially given that circumstance, is that something that folks are interested in, at least seeing if we can find $15,000? Sure. Okay, it's worth a look. It's not the same question as, is it worth putting in the budget? No, but I was just, it was the frame of reference, is all this stuff happening in Bubble Blah? I was like, well, this isn't gonna happen for a year from now. Jay or Jennifer, any thoughts on that particular point? If not, that's fine. No, just agree that it, find it. I mean, what does that mean? Take it away from somebody else. Try to prioritize, but this is a unique time and opportunity with the amount of federal dollars that are coming down. So I think. How about for? I think it's worthwhile. And I think it's also worthwhile looking ahead. Yeah, absolutely. For that amount, and I agree with Lauren that it's the type of thing that could fairly quickly recoup itself, come back to us. So. And I'll just say this again, it's up to you whether at the end of the day, once you see the whole bottom line, you keep it, but if you did, and we tried it this year and we weren't happy, we can just use either if it's, if we decide by the end of January, we don't want it, we could take it out of the budget or we could have it in there and use it for some other purpose. So. Match one of those grant funds. You know, I'm gonna move on from that one. I hope that's okay. I probably should have started with the requests that we got. So. Let's talk about the request from Down Street for $30,000 from potentially ARPA funds. Where are people at with that? I support it. I don't know if there's any way to make any kind of partnership with the housing trust fund to reduce our share coming out of it or not, but. Interesting question. Jennifer. I support it. Directly affect the communities that I work in. So. Yeah. Other thoughts? I support it. Do you support it? I, yep, Jack does. Lauren does. I do. Okay, so $30,000. But yeah. And that would be from ARPA two. Presumably that would reduce the water sewer amount at least for now to 470. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Cool. Okay. So, so it's not, we're not adding it on. Thank you for that clarification. I appreciate that. That's not. Okay. Woo. Okay. And then the conservation commission's request to replenish some of their funds so they can have more available for grants. I have, if I haven't captured that correctly, let me know, but thoughts on that one. Jack. Is the proposal here, not that it's for to be used for a specific project or program at this time, but that they want to be able to respond to something that arises when it without delay. Without delay. They had a long history to this. A number of years ago now, they had a conservation fund of one cent for conservation. It was on about one time and then they get raised now $60 or $70,000 at the time. And they've slowly dwindled that down and they want to put some more money back into that fund. And obviously it's up to you. I will tell you that that was on the table for our budget deliberations and didn't make it into our recommendation. And because they're a commission, they asked to come directly, whereas other departments and things don't get to do that. So. But so the plan would be for them to not just use that small amount they're asking for to spend on stuff, but to use it to leverage for other bigger projects. To go into their fund to use as they see strategically as it goes forward. Yeah. Thanks. Lauren. First of all, well, we're on this Alec amazing work. Congrats on fundraising for the Hubbard Park expansion. That is amazing. Yay. Great job. One idea that had come up a while ago around the ARPA two funds was going out to all of our commissions and committees and what is not included in the budget and what would request and needs be and have that be part of a public process. And, you know, I could see this as the kind of thing that could come up in that format, perhaps, the parks and how it would be eligible. It's for grants. For grants for, okay. So, so maybe it's only for water, sewer, you know, certain income issues, broadband. Star. It's pretty. Sorry, can you remind me how they get, how they're funded already? So, typically they're in the budget. There's a small amount, I don't know how, what is it, four or $5,000? If that $3,500 in the annual budget that they have and they, if they don't use it, they lose it, right? That goes to the general fund. They don't accumulate that. And so that's really all they have other than this one-time infusion of a conservation fund that they got a number of years ago now and have slowly whittled it down. And I think they were looking to build that back up. I mean, it's not a bad idea, but there's a, you know, there's a lot of ideas. So, yeah, it's up to you. If we gave them this money, does it go into a separate fund that does roll over? Right, so what do folks want to do? Do you want to put in? I've got another question. Yeah, go ahead, Jack. Are they in the budget this year for $3,500? And if they have not been spending it in recent years, and I don't know if they have been, but could we change that appropriation so that it does carry forward so that if they don't use the money, they build it back up again? Then Kelly, maybe you know if they've been spending it year by year. Yeah, I mean, so we could certainly make sure it goes into the reserve. It's something that would just need to be set up that way. And I can definitely look into it for sure. And then, you know, write a recommendation and take action to make sure that happens if that's what you'd like to do. Thanks. It would also be good to know if they are, in fact, not consistently not spending the $3,500. If they are, you know, and they're using it on valuable things, I hate to take that away, but I like where you're going with that. If they're not using it, yeah, let's... Would you cap it? If it's a rollover, would you cap the rollover to a certain amount? Or ask them to talk about what they're going to use it for if it gets over a certain amount, something like that, because, you know, there are certain kinds of things that you may need to accumulate money over a few years before you're ready to do it. But I don't know enough about what they're doing to really know how to answer that. Go ahead, Lauren. Oh, I'm just noticing that Alec has his hand up. Oh, okay, yeah, Alec, go ahead. Thank you. I'm the staff liaison to the Conservation Committee. Give a little insight just for information. So the request is actually from the Conservation Fund Advisory Board, which is different than the Conservation Commission. The commission is a appointed group and they have $3,500 to discretionary money. And the Conservation Fund Advisory Board is I believe three members of the Conservation Commission and two members of the public at large. And they have this pot of money that Bill's talking about to give out in grants. And so the advisory board is asking for the $10,000 and the commission gets the $3,500. So that's just the informational overview on those two entities. Thank you for that clarification. Yeah, go ahead, Donna. Can you tell us what they've spent it on? What the 10,000 or what they've had in the past? Is that a question for me or Kelly or Bill? Well, I thought maybe you would know, but she probably, she can echo you. So I think the original bond was for $40,000, $45,000 maybe. And they just gave $20,000 toward this project, the Hubbard Park expansion project is seed money. I don't know what else they've given it to that. I think they might have paid for the city's natural resources inventory from 2007, but that also might have been out of the Conservation Commission that was before my time. Thank you. I don't suppose it's logical to have the Conservation Commission's unspent funds roll over into this fund. That's what I was kind of answering. So I was like, well, why can't we? We could. Okay. If that is the case, then do we want to change the amount? I mean, if there, or are we saying like, you can, or should we just give them anything or wait until money rolls over? What do you want to do team? I mean, I'd be inclined to leave it off for now, you know, until we go through the list. And maybe like, you know, a lot can change in a week. Maybe we'll get more information. Maybe there'll be some other mechanism to shift it around, but... Okay, so leave it off for now. Yeah, especially, yeah, the other thoughts. Okay, I'm happy to leave it off for now and revisit it another time, especially if we can look into rolling some funds over for them. Parks Commission Outreach, $5,000. This, yeah, go ahead, Jay. Well, I just, I think that for all the work that Alec and the Parks Commission have been doing, especially in collaboration, leveraging a significant grant with Montpelier Live to develop the branding around building a recreation-based economy. I think, you know, there's been some really good work done there. I don't know that this is specifically what they're looking for that $5,000 to help promote, but given the work that they've done and that's been done and the equity that's built up and ready to go, I think it's a pretty small drop in the bucket to be able to leverage a lot of really good existing work. So it seems to me like it's small enough that it makes a lot of sense to include. Donna gives Vanessa a thumbs up, Conor. Thumbs up. You know, something that I like about this, so it feels specific. Yeah. I got you. That helps. So I'm getting a sense that we're leaving that one in for now. Couple others, so I'm kind of leaving the bigger ticket things to the end here. Energy coordinator, which could be on the scale of $100,000 if it was a whole position. Actually, just for context, let me just see where we're at right. Oh, you've got it up there already. So 30, 15 parks. So we're at 5.7 right now. And if we added in 100,000 for energy coordinator, what would that put us at? 6.7, okay. Thoughts team. So they're general interest. Can I just ask, so this would be an ongoing, it's 100,000 every year, right? Where I think that's the idea, yeah. Jack. I like the idea. And I like the idea of we're saving that this could very well paper itself. We also know though that the, I think the next item on the list is add another full-time social worker. Am I right? I thought that was already in, or no, am I wrong? So it's half in, half out. So the, let's get to, let's finish this one first. We can always get the full list up there and see. Yeah, maybe I'd misunderstood something. So the police review committee, we have a half-time social worker now. The police review committee recommended and we have a half-time peer worker. So they recommend adding 1.0 full-time social worker and another half-time peer worker. Yeah. So that would be a total of 1.5 FT. This budget only has a 0.5 FT. Oh, okay. For some reason I- So we're expanding the half-time social worker at a full-time. We presume I'll believe the half-time's still shared. Well, I mean, we presumably would have the half of it shared with Barry and then we'd have our own half-time or however that would work. So there is still 1.0 recommended from the police review committee that it's not funded in this budget. Okay. For a social worker. Well, half for a social worker, half for a peer worker. Okay, okay. So half for social worker, half for a peer outreach, is that what we're calling? Go ahead. So that's what I'm saying. Okay. That's what I'm saying, that we've got that and we might do a correct answer now. Okay. I also wanted to remind all of y'all that you have approved and there is funding for the homelessness task force and one of their projects that you recently approved for this year is to continue hiring additional peer support workers through our partnership with Good Sam. And I anticipate but cannot confirm that that will probably continue to be part of their funding allocation that they use their 45,000, which was included in this budget to continue that for fiscal year 23. So I want that also to be part of this conversation. So thank you. So you're anticipating that that may go towards either the half peer outreach person or the half social worker. And I understood the committee to recommend an additional half beyond the half we already have. Is that right? Right. Or just a half? So many halves. We can check. Yeah, go ahead Lauren. They're actually the most recent conversation of the police review committee and Jack jump in if I'm misremembering, but there actually was an ongoing conversation of among the kind of service providers of like what is the right balance between you know, what the city is currently funding, what the needs are that they're seeing in terms of like how to allocate this. So they were actually going to come back with recommendations. So if we had, you know, funding, if we've done in the homelessness task force line item, some increased funding plus the half FTE, I mean, I think it's all like positive steps towards it. And it wasn't definitive. Like it must be one full FTE peer support in this. It was a little squishier than that. And but they were doing some work to get some definition. And chief Pete might be able to provide some more context because he's the one who's part of that conversation. And so yeah. And some of us did get an email from Dan towel who was one of the members of the police review commission. But it looks like it was me, maybe not Lauren, Bill, but a few people suggesting, I hope we can be creative and resourceful to collaborate to find funding for the 1.0 FTE portion of the 1.5. So at least there's some movement to still put in the one point, the full 1.5 that the police commission review, police commission asked for. So I'm just, when I talked about the energy coordinator, I'm just thinking, well, it could welcome down to where do we want to put our 100,000 column A or column B? Yeah, yeah. Sort of in economic development, you get the column C. There you go. Yup. No. No. Come on. Yeah. Well, and, you know, I guess we could think about this almost in 50,000 increments because, you know. Oh, go ahead. Well, I did have an idea. I was actually thinking about it with both the energy coordinator and the economic development. You know, we talked about this in a few years ago, but we could leave the $50,000 in for the economic development and instead of using it the way we planned is basically say we're gonna assume we're gonna bring on a person but we wouldn't do it till halfway through the fiscal year. So we'd be knowing that the following year we're on the hook for the whole thing, but we get it started. We could do the same thing, presumably the energy coordinator is to say, look, yeah, we want one yesterday, but a year from now we'll be hiring someone and it's half in and then we'll be full-time here before if money got tight. That's a way to open the door to the commitment without just delay the hiring. So. Or do we just hire a half-time? Well, that's also a person to do that. Also. That could be the other option. Right. One or the other. Donna, go ahead. Do we have a staff member now that's doing some partial time with building maintenance? So our assessor was, we were hiring, he was doing maintenance coordination, an extra day a week, but he's cut that back and he's actually hoping to cut it all back. He wants to retire, but we need to find an assessor. I mean, at one time we thought about connecting the two. Yeah. We talked about a sustainability facilities coordinator and we went a different direction and so now we don't have that. And we probably do need to get back to that. So. Yeah. I think especially if we're serious about our net zero 2050 goal for the whole community, and we've had a lot of conversation about the 2030 goal and we've got a roadmap, we've got good progress. This is within our domain, but there are even so there are still things that need to be done as Lauren pointed out, but it's almost like we haven't even touched the 2050 goal. And so, you know, we've got to, I think if nobody is dedicated to doing that, it won't happen because it's, it can't rely on a group of volunteers to make that happen. But, and I will just say like, I'm open to any of the options that include it somehow. Yeah. So go ahead. Yeah. I mean, I'd like the idea of this being a, Jack mentioned a placeholder and then we can flush out the energy coordinator might be combined with some mother, at least the first year and then keep moving in that direction. Yeah. I mean, so what I've got in my spreadsheet right now is 50,000 for energy energy coordinator, 50,000 for economic development and 50,000. I knew 50,000 in addition to the 50 we already have. Well, I guess we can talk about that. That's sort of up for discussion. And then 50 for the half social worker. If we did, if it was an additional 50 for each of those things that I think puts us at 7.1%, which is starting to get a little bit out of the palatable, like I would like to keep it below seven. Does anybody else have ballpark percentages that they would like to keep it within or not? I mean, if it's a separate comment, go ahead. I mean, I guess just answering that question, I agree seven starts feeling uncomfortable. Yeah. Lee, hi. I mean, one thing, and I know that we absolutely cannot count on this, but I was having a conversation with some appropriations committee members in the house who expressed interest in funding peer outreach work. And we're looking at Montpelier as an exciting model and said, we should be helping fund the work that you all are doing. So I think our newly hired lobbyists that we're gonna scrape for the money for this year. I do think there's an interest in that. I have not heard a similar thing around the energy coordinator. Like I know there's staff they're hiring at the RPCs, for example, to help connect communities to some of these energy dollars that are out there. But it's not the same thing as having your own community doing it. So even though I strongly support the peer support outreach, I feel like we're moving in that direction and should make a pitch for the state to be supporting that. So are you suggesting that we keep it in and then are able to take it out once we get money for it? Or are you suggesting something else or? I guess I might suggest, although I'm not at all wedded to this of in that particular instance, sticking with the staff budget pieces that's growing that program. We're growing it in two ways already with the homelessness task force allocation and increasing the social work line item and then looking for opportunities to grow it further in the coming year with state funding. So you would not add an additional half here because we're already expanding it. And if we can, because we have the money, then we would. That's what you're suggesting. Okay. All right, so that takes that out for me. So without that, that's 6.7%. 50,000 for energy. Yeah. At least that's what I have for now. Can we talk about the economic development part of this? I know I sort of was like, oh yeah, 50,000, an additional 50,000, is that the right number? How are you feeling about that? I'm not wedded to any particular number there. A total baffles me when we didn't support the group that we had with even 5075, I would oppose it. I think 50,000 is a good placeholder. And if indeed we gain some momentum, but we're doing a lot of things with housing, with the parks, to bring people in. And that's the driver that I think we really need because people are needed for the businesses we have now. And that will make our economy stronger than I think, searching out new businesses. So I just want to comment on that. And what you want to do is what you want to do. Just to the part that we didn't even support the group we had, we did support them to the tune of $375,000, I think was what it was. It was at least three or four full years at $100,000 each. And then the last year we reduced it a little bit. And then in the current budget, we put zero, but that's because we knew they were going away or that they had this full sum of money. So, and I think one of the reasons we didn't support them was we had provided a pretty sizable sum of money to them. They had a big reserve and we hadn't seen the return that we were necessarily hoping for. So I think one of the questions is if we were to refund at that level, would we do it differently? We would bring it in-house and have our own person or contract, do it with someone like my pillar alive that's more established. So I'm not saying we should or shouldn't, but it would be a different model. But I'm not sure it's to say we didn't fund them because we weren't interested in economic development. I'm not sure that's the equation there. But they finally changed their model because they had terrible success with their, lack of success with their executive directors. And they went the model that we're now thinking about instituting, hiring people to help us do jobs. Only on an era basis. I would stick with the 50,000s. Well, because there's already 30,000 in for economic- The 50s in the budget now. 50s in the budget. So an additional 50, We get to hire somebody. We'd get to hire somebody full-time. So that's what we're saying. Or we could keep it, well, yeah, okay. Right. Is that what we want to do? Yeah, go ahead. I'm still not convinced an in-house economic development position is the way to go. And once you hire somebody for that, it's harder to eliminate the position once you bring them on board. So I'd still like to talk about other options, maybe in the $50,000 range. Like keeping the 50,000 that we have. Yeah. Okay. I'm seeing some nods. Should we keep the 50,000 or, I'm sorry. Do we want to add anything more toward the 50,000 that is in the budget already? Donna's saying no. Seeing I'm seeing some shaking heads. Oh, okay. I mean, I'm inclined to leave it at not add another 50. Okay. I mean, well, not yet. I think that meaning by that, I mean we, I think as a city we need to invest in economic development. I think that allocating $50,000 that Bill and staff could use to pursue opportunities is great. One thought would be, like Bill said, would be to, if we took that 50 and hired somebody part-time or hired somebody to say, to start on January 1st, 2023, part-time maybe, but you know, if we hired somebody to, if we wanted the right person for the job we would have to hire them to hire them. Not, hey, you've got, we've got six months and then we'll decide again later. You know, that's just not gonna work. And so, and I think that that was one of the challenges that my Peter Development Corp was up against. They had this sort of set budget anyways, but that's a whole nother conversation. So I do like having that money and then investing it in updating the economic development report and then using it on an as needed basis and then having further conversations around how do we make it more permanent within city structure. I personally am an advocate for having somebody on staff to be able to take on that work and have the autonomy to do it. But if it's, we're up against the limits of adding funds to this budget, I feel like we're not necessarily at a point that we can do that just yet. So it would not be an additional 50. Yeah, I, you know, considering that we're coming up from nothing from last year, that does feel like a substantial change, good progress. And I think we could reevaluate whether we wanted to add an additional 50 from the following year. So all right, we're at 6.2 right now. I might make the pitch that we've put the energy coordinator in at a hundred now. But willing to sit. What else was on the block? Yeah, I think that's it. Oh, that's, did we talk through everything that's on your, I mean, we talked through all the things that I had on my list. We're looking at how it's found in this charging station. Oh, charging station. But we're gonna try to do that in capital, no? We're trying to do that in capital, but it might mean something's gotta go so we have to figure out what it was. Lauren. I mean, that is one where Vermont's getting $21 million for EV charging stations. I have no idea how that money will flow and how quickly that'll come or if we would definitely get one, but it, I mean, I know we wanna get the infrastructure in place so that we, like for buying the equipment at the same time. But, so, but I don't know, just to note that that was like one of the specific line items in the infrastructure bill that recently passed. Yeah, Jack. How much does charging station cost? Well, see, that's a question I had heard. Anne said. Right, so it must be true. Anne said $50,000. I said $50,000, but I- So it's not the fastest charges, right? Well, it is, right? Cause the thing is like, if we just needed to charge you know, once a day, then you'd probably get away with level two, and those are much, they're slower, but they're much cheaper, like significantly cheaper, but a level three charging station, I had heard that it was anywhere between $50,000 and $100,000. It's a lot of money. It's a lot of money. What are they called? Level three, fast chargers. Everyone's on their Google machines looking for the price. Yeah, right. So yeah, $50,000 plus average cost. And does that assume that we would get some participation in the cost from Green Mountain Power? I don't know if we would, but- This is one that I think we probably need a little bit more research on. So maybe this is- Yeah, we can keep looking at it. I just, that was the only other thing that was on- Oh, that was on your radar. Okay. Well, so it looks, I'm glad to hear that we kind of have a cap. It sounds like of at least somewhere around 7%, which to be fair, I mean, one of the reasons that that's a cap for me is thinking about it in terms of, you know, we had nearly flat budget last year, and so 3% is a digestible number. And so thinking about it in terms of, like, it's effectively 3% last year and 3% this year. But that number, you're right. It's just about right at inflation too. Oh yeah, well. So here it is. Yeah. That's also pretty sellable. Right. Okay. Actually, before you go, I just want to note, I do want to just check in with folks that see if people are up for an energy coordinator position at 50,000. But pause on that. Go ahead, Connor. I used to kind of ask where the schools at, but... I don't know. Not sure. I think they're talking about it. Well, I shouldn't speculate. I don't know. But thoughts on energy coordinator at 50,000. Lauren, go ahead. Just curious. Does the school employ any sustainability person or is it just their facilities? I just have a facilities manager. I would prefer that we put it in at 100, the energy coordinator. I think it'll be a great investment. If we end up really stuck, I'm just thinking like between the schools, there are examples where multiple communities have partnered on one of these positions. Like, so I think we could get creative if we need to. I think somebody full-time would be awesome. Do what I would love to strive for and just throwing that out there that I would hate to wait and do it. So we're talking January 2024 that someone's starting and we've missed all these opportunities coming up soon. So I hate to put it off if we do like the 50,000 and wait for half of the year to go by. Jennifer, did I see your hands? Yes. Wow. Could somebody explain to me what the energy coordinator would do? Yes. Do you want to take a stab at Lauren or should I? Okay. Yeah, so there are a number of things that they could potentially do. So we have a district heat plant that provides, you know, the wood chip powered heat to municipal buildings. It needs a business plan and ideally more customers, but it hasn't really fallen to anybody to manage that. So that's one big piece of it. Another is, and this is typical for energy coordinators that work in other places, thinking about particularly projects that are within the scope of the city of like efficiency or fuel switching that they could help be basically like managing those projects and make sure that they go forward. It could be because right now, like just as an example, the police building was at one point, it needed a new air conditioning system and it was a huge energy hog, but there was no person that was sort of in charge of looking at, okay, well, so if we need a new air conditioning, what should it be? What's the most efficient thing? And also nobody was looking necessarily at the time except for the energy committee at, oh my gosh, this is a huge energy suck right now. And so how do we bring that down? Do we need more insulation? Do we need, you know, oh gosh, this button is stuck on, you know, things like that. So having somebody whose job it is to be vigilant about that for the city, there are, we have a green revolving loan fund for the city where basically we're borrowing from ourselves to do these projects. And we know that there are more projects out there, but to have someone who could suggest, okay, this is the next best use of this money, that would be, you know, that would be valuable. And then thinking of, so there's the within the city, sort of, when I say the city, within city operations, so then like municipal operations, there's, but then, you know, looking beyond that to the commitment that we've made to reach net zero energy for the community by 2050. Yeah, right. So gosh, that means a lot of different things. And so how do we start moving that direction? So that person could also potentially be looking at what's working in other cities and say, you know what this would be a policy that we could potentially implement here. I can think of like a number off the top of my head, but I'm sorry, I have a lot to say about this. Is that, there's all these potentials. You know, we've had this conversation about the home energy information ordinance, you know, someone could be sort of managing that. I'll stop. No, no. I appreciate that. Thank you very much. That was very specific. And you answered all the things that were going on in my brain as far as keeping us green and removing us into a greener space. So thank you. Sure enough. Yeah, Lauren, go ahead. I mean, to me, one of the things that seems most exciting, like given the moment we're in about having this position, it's, you know, so we can look at the city operations. I think there's tons of opportunity, but there's also like rolling out all of this money for community members. So for example, low income weatherization programs, which for years have been underfunded and there's been long wait lists. Now, I mean, they put 25 million into weatherization last year. So the wait lists, the last I heard from someone recently, don't quote me on it, but that the wait lists are going away right now because there's finally enough money. So, you know, if we could be educating community members about what's available, I mean, this is something that could just be saving people money on their monthly energy bills, which is a huge burden for a lot of families. So I think there's, you know, there's gonna be a lot of opportunities and somebody just being able to stay on top of it and then do that outreach. Even they give the home energy ordinance, like somebody who could have, could be in charge of implementing that, helping people. I mean, it's been, you know, tough with our current staffing structure to make that work seamlessly. But I would be really excited for how we could also be benefiting the community with a position. Other thoughts? Jack, go ahead. I like the idea. I would like to, I would put it in for now and I have it for more discussion. We might not stay in at this level, but if we were to go $50,000, I would be inclined to start as a full-time position halfway through the year, rather than ask someone to try to do it as a half-time job, because I think there's probably enough work there to have someone be doing it full-time and probably save their salary. Yeah. So just so I'm clear, you're okay with that at $100,000 for now, we can revisit it. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Oh, Donna, your thumbs up. Other thoughts, thumbs up. You don't have to weigh in if you don't want to. I love the idea. I'm just trying to balance it against everything else. I mean, yeah. I mean, there's more than a full-time job. Of all the things I just heard that could be done, that's a staff, right? That's a new department, you know? So, you know, and I don't really mean to be facetious, but at the same time, it's, if we approach this as like, hey, we just, if we throw $100,000 at this, we want one person to do all these things, is that realistic? You know, who's that person and what are they good at doing? And how are we getting the best return on that investment? So I'm just, I'm more than happy to keep it in. And I, you know, conceptually, I love the idea. But again, I'm just trying to understand how it, like how we can get the best return on that investment and how are we putting up, putting it, you know, relative to other things that we're funding or not, that's all. So, happy to have more conversation about it. Go ahead, Jack. On another topic. So I'll wait until we're done with the energy coordinator. I think we may be done with that particular topic and which, I just want to note before you go that as we're at 6.7 right now, that was, as far as I know, the whole list. And so we're, I think we're approaching done with this conversation, which is very exciting. Go ahead. You know, I think I'll wait and I'll talk to Donna before our next meeting and maybe talk about something else there. Okay. We might want to put the CVPSA on the bottom of there too, just to realize that that's, would you say that was, oh, you've already added it in? It's already added in. Oh, it's a, no, it isn't. It's not? No, it is. 14, I put it in mine. Oh, what percentage are you at now? 6.7, okay, that's what I had too. Isn't that 14,100 from CVPSA basically what's left over from the pandemic relief from this year? I'm not saying, I don't know that we can use that leftover money for that, so. It's like a magic trick. It's going to pay for the lobbyists. Oh, dear, okay, well, knowing that we will have more conversation about this feels like we have a good start, a good foundation. Well, to be fair, I think we started with a good foundation and I think we're closer to a final number, which is excellent. Yeah, Jack, go ahead. I know that you stated earlier that we're mainly having tonight for council members, but if Vicki Lane had her hand up for a long time, if she's still there and I'm not seeing her anymore. No, she's still there. I would like to give her a chance to be there. I agree. Vicki, would you like, Vicki Lane, would you like to share your thoughts? Yes, I just want to bring a little reality to you all. Pertaining to those of us that are low-income and effective low-income decreasing homeowners. Next month, my mortgage payment goes up $100, due entirely to the taxes. That's absolutely nothing to do with my interest rates. I'm in the 28th year of a 30-year mortgage and it's going up entirely because of property taxes. I don't know where all this money is that you guys seem to think is flowing freely, but it sure as hell isn't flowing freely to people like me. You're talking about another increase in property taxes. And I'm not sure how much more I can afford. $100 and more a month going to my mortgage company for property taxes is a major deal to me, considering the fact that the cost of absolutely everything has gone up significantly. Every item of food, gas, heating oil, everything. And you guys were sitting there for the last two and a half hours, three and a half hours talking about everything you can add into this thing. And I just, I don't know what you guys expect of us, but I can't afford it. And I'm sure I'm not the only person in the city of Montpelier that's not sitting here, looking at those figures and looking at that percentage go up, knowing you're doing a reappraisal and God only knows what you're going to do to my taxes after that. And looking at this and saying, well, you know, $100,000 for a person is a hell of a lot of money for somebody like me who lives on less than $30,000 a year and as a homeowner with the medical bills and everything else that are not covered, then I just think you guys are missing the boat here. There isn't a single one of you, it seems, a single one of you on that council that has any idea what it's like to be a low income, fixed income, effective fixed income declining, what it's like to be somebody like that. And there's tons of us around. And we're the ones that work hard to pay our taxes and get everything done. And I just don't understand. I mean, I've been sitting here doing a slow boil, especially when you all started to laugh and say, oh yeah, well, let's up this up. Oh, I can handle 6.7% but God forbid it shouldn't go to seven. Well, that's 0.3% underneath 7%. And I know that the city of Montpelier voters always vote absolutely everything in. But there's an awful lot of us have nots out there that are really struggling to stay in Montpelier and survive. That's just what I wanted to say. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that, Vicki. I think that's an important reminder. A couple of thoughts here. Lauren, go ahead. We were just hoping to get your district for the record, Vicki. District three. Okay. Thanks. And Jennifer. I'm getting confused because I'm seeing the mute thing on here, but I know I'm not muted. Vicki, I live in district three and I'm a renter and I struggle as well and I hear you. And I can't afford to buy a home in Montpelier because of the taxes. So I hear you. And I am... There is no way... Oh, hey, Vicki, let's let Jennifer finish your thought. Go ahead. I just wanted to let you know that, you know, I am a struggling mother of two and living on a fixed income myself. And, you know, it's part of the reason why I wanted to be on the commission is because I'm not a homeowner and I don't make a lot of money. And I struggle. And so if you would like to have a conversation with me, I would love to chat with you. Great. Thank you. All right. And anyone, since I've given an opportunity for people online to speak, anyone in person want to share? Go ahead. In the interest of the hour, I will save some of mine for a future. But what I want to do is encourage you to not postpone your public hearing till January. I know there's a state law that Senator Polina got passed. The finance management department is required by statute to engage a meaningful process with the public in the formation of the budget. And I feel like that if you wait till January, y'all's decisions are all baked in and it's an insurmountable hurdle for the public to try to change them at that late date. So I would encourage you to open this up meaningfully at this stage, because all I heard was a lot of ads. I didn't hear any opportunity to talk about a lot of cuts or where money is being squandered or wasted. And I relate to Vicki's comments that we need to... I mean, I know we need a new radio system. I'll argue that we need much more money in the CVPSA planning budget, but we also don't need unplanned police radios in the tens and tens of thousands when we don't even know whether they're gonna repeat both the fire and police frequencies. So there's so much that's not well considered here that I have several pages of notes, but at this late hour and with this limited opportunity, I would ask you to sooner open this up for specific areas where they could be cut and invite the public in on that discussion, as well as, I mean, this is a good year to do a level fund to not add five, you know, or seven, thank you. Thank you. So just to review the schedule, so I'm looking at our next meeting is 12, 22. Next Wednesday. It's a regular meeting, but we will have budget on the agenda. And then depending on where you're at, we have a workshop like this scheduled for the fifth, which again, would be budget only. It's up to you all what degree you want to engage others. And then we are into the next two meetings are the January 12th and the 20th. And the 20th is the deadline that we have to be done. And so those the public hearings are usually on the 12th and the 20th. And we have traditionally, you have traditionally changed budgets right up until the 20th, so after public hearing. My anticipation for next week. So when I see workshop in the description of what we're doing, that's why I'm like, okay, so we're going to prioritize council discussion, but I'm glad that we did get to hear from the public to even those after. But next week being the budget review, I'm anticipating that, you know, if folks have comments on the budget that we might start with that and then go into a conversation about basically the review of the budget. And then I'll leave it up to you all, but as to whether or not you want to do another budget workshop, but you would have public. That could be a workshop or a review, however, or, you know, if you reach a preliminary decision next week then you don't need it straight to the public hearings. Exactly, then we go straight to the public hearings. Does that process sound okay? Team, any thoughts? Okay, so we will have opportunity for public comment at the next meeting. At least that's my anticipation. There's other things on the agenda as well. I think we're still inviting our legislative delegation and we have an audit report next time. So anyway, there's other things that won't be just dedicated to this. Oh, sorry. Unfortunately, just to update on the audit, we still have not received your draft statements yet and not from the lack of trying and we're working on that. So it's likely you'll get them before you vote it out officially, but it probably will be tomorrow. Okay, yes, Jack. Sorry. How much notice do we have to give for public hearing? We're just required to hold them. It's not like zoning, so we just warned them as public hearings. You have to conduct it in it. Actually, it's not even clear that you need to hold official public hearings for the budget. We just have traditionally done that. We do have to have a bond public hearing prior more than a certain number of days and then another one within so many days. Because I just think, thank you, that's helpful. I think that I understand and support the value of getting a lot of public input realistically making it happen before our meeting on January 5th means trying to get people to come to a meeting in the week between Christmas and New Year's, which I don't think is calculated to get very much public input. So I still support the schedule that we established about this all ago. Well, and I, just for some context too, I think other councils work very differently than our council does. My understanding is that other bodies, if it doesn't say public hearing, then they don't have to take public comment on it necessarily, except potentially during general business and appearances. And so I think the fact that we're required to do that is maybe like a reflection of that, even though we treat most things with this body as effectively public hearings because we welcome public comment. Anyway, that's neither here nor there. And it's 10-10, we should be done, yes. I'm sorry that the public felt left out, but this kind of workshop is really important for me as a council member. It's the only way we get a perspective of one another and to think about another person's point of view on the council. So, and here it is after 10 with just us talking. And we do get a little silly, but it's stressful. And so, but we're also just understanding one another. So these workshops are very valuable and the next meeting we can share. That's great, but we needed this meeting to have something for the public to talk about. And we, and as Bill said, we can and do change things up until the last minute. All right, so we're gonna move on then because I think we're in a good spot with that so we can wrap that up. So on to council reports. Are you okay to go there, Donna? I just want to, one thing is for my housekeeping, I've had two calls this last week about me being on the homeless pass force and they said they found on the website. I've never knowingly been appointed to that committee. I know ACE, but I'm just, I don't know what you're talking about. Water, ACE, et cetera, et cetera. I've been here for years. Yeah. I don't know this guy. Oh, my name was Peter, just lucky. But so I, what I've looked at, but I also, maybe all of us, the list I saw was in 2021, but I know we did another appointment. And so there's an email that has all that on there and I've just listed, I listed a couple of meetings for years in employment and I apologize. But we didn't put you on the homelessness task force. Jennifer, are you on? I'm on it, but I still am not sending any emails and I didn't get any. Okay. I'm not fill your address because that's not coming through. I didn't get anything for this meeting. Something okay. It's okay. But, and thank you for adding my debate speaking Gmail. It helps me get stuff. I really, really appreciate it, Ellie. Thank you, thank you. And I would like you to know that it has been very frustrating to have in-person or both meetings here for the public safety authority. And generally speaking, it's just been myself and Steven it's been very hard to contain using city equipment. I'm focusing on the remote. I share my laptop. No one else on the public safety authority board wants to be alive. And it's also been an issue for our secretary who has decided not to come, both for health reasons and for the fact that Steven's rather interrupted and it's hard. And I apologize. Any level of rudeness, I love you, Steven, but it's hard when someone keeps talking to you on the background when you're trying to deal with the need. So I would just like to say that we've opted not to try to use the city equipment. It's generous of you to offer it, but I don't have anybody willing to come in and manage it. And I'm sitting over there on a computer. I can't deal with somebody over here touching the equipment. I can't find somebody to control any of the other in-person people. So thank you, but we are just gonna stay with the required audio for now. Thank you, city staff, for all your hard work, but not always fast. Okay, Jennifer. I'm good to say. All right. Okay, and I just want to acknowledge that I've gotten a lot of emails about shaws with the mask compliance. And if I understand correctly, we may be taking up some amendments to the mask policy potentially at our next meeting. So just to anticipate that. Anything else that we want to say about that? Well, I'll do that. Okay. Yeah, that's it for now for me. Actually, it's John on here. I don't think so. I don't see him. Okay, so he- We told them I'd do notes for him. Okay, great. So, Bill, go ahead. So a couple of things as the mayor mentioned. So we have had a lot of comments about shaws and we are following up with them. One of the challenges that we've not observed is anyone that works for shaws being without their mask, but certainly many customers are and they're not turning them away at the door as it was last time. That's a difficult position to put them in. We can talk, you can talk if you want next week, whether to add monetary fines that is allowed in the statute, we opted not to in the proposal to try to see how that worked. And that could be for the violating individual and or the business. Specifically, there was an article in the paper that highlighted, in fact, at the last meeting we passed a mandate that took out the part about someone being alone. And at the same time we passed a city policy that said if you're working alone at your desk and all this stuff, it's okay. So we had contradictory things. So we're gonna try to, and it goes beyond just city employees if you think about it, if you're a store owner and you've got a back office technically under our mandate, you're supposed to be, because your business is open to the public, you're supposed to be masked even if you're alone in your own office. So we're gonna try to make that more realistic and more in line with the, so we'll have a draft amendment on that. And then if you wish to do anything else with enforcement, we're certainly happy to talk about that. So there's that. We do have the legislators next week in our legislative agenda. Let's try and think what else we had. Just queue up. I mentioned this to the mayor, but I'll just say it, this is early, but because the mayor will be out a bit in January, just remind people that this, I do have my review comes up in February, and this is a year that my contract expires. So we wanna talk about that. So that's all. You're thinking about that. Normally we don't talk about that till we kind of finish this process and we're into January and the mayor coordinates all that, but she may be out. So we should connect about that. There's that. All right, I'll have an evaluation on a Christmas card. There you go. With a lump of coal. That's fine. What's that? Wood pellets. Wood pellets. That can use those. I just bought a pellet, though. Here you go, here you go. That's all. Okay, all right, so. Is there anything else? Anything else I'm supposed to tell them? No. No, you're good. Okay, great. Well, all right, well, thank you, everybody. And so without objection, we are gonna adjourn at 10, 18. Thank you very much.