 I'd like to call this regularly scheduled meeting of the Chittenden Solid Waste District Board of Commissioners to order. We do have a quorum present. Today is February, Wednesday, February 23rd, 2022. Just for to notify folks who are on this call so far. Kevin Harms has identified himself and he is with, Kevin, did you say the town meeting TV? I believe part of the recording process. Thank you, Kevin. The first item on the agenda is the agenda itself. I point out we have a, do have a long agenda tonight projected to last 820. I'll do my best to keep us to that. We do have a brief five minute break embedded in the agenda just so that folks know that there's hope. There's light at the end of the tunnel or the first part of the tunnel. Are there any changes, corrections, additions to the agenda? All that you need to add a second executive session after the marked sufficiency, ready to sufficient to study and it is for the same reasons for contract negotiations. Thank you. So after item seven and before item eight, there will be executive session number two. When we get to that, I'll point out you do have login information for that already commissioners, but we'll cover that then. Anything else for the agenda? Seeing none, then the agenda will be followed as amended with the addition of a second executive session after item number seven. Are there any members of the public present via Zoom or on the phone who would like to address the board? I am seeing nor hearing anyone, no one. So we will then move on to the consent agenda which begins on page two of the meeting of the board packet. Consent agenda consists of the minutes on the January 26th, 2022 board meeting, program updates, executive director update and financial report. Before I ask any commissioners if they would like to have anything removed from the consent agenda, I want to ask Sarah to provide some updated information on the program updates. Thank you. Nancy had indicated that there was a correction that needed to be made to two of the items. So I will read them into the record with them. We'll provide a correction to that. So her first correction is under solid waste management fee and it should read as of the end of January from a budget perspective, it reads December. The rest of the information is correct. So should read as the end of January as of the end of January from a budget perspective, the first seven months of FY 22 is 2.4% above projected revenues. FY 22 revenue is 6.8% higher for the same seven month period in FY 21. Please refer to accompanying charts. So that is the correction. The second item is number two, solid waste disposed. That item should read trash tonnage through the second quarter of FY 22 was up 13.2% compared to the same period of FY 21. Of the overall tonnage, the municipal solid waste component was up 1.3%. The construction and demolition degree portion was up 5.3% and the alternative daily cover portion fee is 25% of the full rate was up 308.2%. The pounds per capita per day MSW disposed was 2.86 through the second quarter of FY 22 which is up from 2.84 for the same period of FY 21 PC attached charts. We'll include those corrections in the minutes. Thank you for those corrections. Are there any requests from commissioners to have an item from the consent agenda removed for further discussion? I am seeing none and therefore the consent agenda with the corrections as noted by Sarah will stand approved as presented. We'll move on now to item number four on the agenda, resolution of appreciation for Lee Turi who was I believe now completing many decades of service to the district. And I would like to ask our the board secretary, Amy to read off this resolution, please. I would be happy to read this resolution too on behalf of the board. I will begin whereas Lee Turi has served as the drop off center manager for the Chittenden Solid Waste District in an outstanding manner for the past 29 years whereas he has been a dedicated and conscientious public servant working continually for the betterment of Chittenden County whereas he has continually exhibited wisdom, fairness and commitment to the mission of the Chittenden Solid Waste District whereas he has given selflessly all of his time and his expertise leading and working alongside staff at all levels for the Chittenden Solid Waste District whereas he has provided outstanding leadership and guidance to his staff in the community whereas he has built the drop off center program from inception when sites were previously landfill locations whereas he has always exhibited patience, kindness and a good natured approach with his staff and the community whereas his jack of all trades and master of all approach to many CSWD situations provided smooth operations and resulted in decreased expenses whereas his good old ingenuity and carpenter skills has resulted in CSWD staff enjoying and greatly appreciating custom built desks that were repurposed from old doors whereas the work he has completed will continue to be used and appreciated in the future projects of the Chittenden Solid Waste District therefore be it resolved that the Board of Commissioners on behalf of the residents and businesses of 18 communities in Chittenden County hereby convey their sincere appreciation for his exemplary leadership and outstanding service for the past 29 years adopted this 23rd day of February, 2022 by the Chittenden Solid Waste District Board of Commissioners. Well moved, South Burlington. Thank you. Thank you, New Desi. Thank you, Allen. Are there any members of the Board of Commissioners or staff who would like to offer any comments and thanks to Lee at this point? Yeah, I would like to say my deep appreciation to Lee, been on the Board I guess as long as you've been here, Lee, or close to it. And I've always respected the work that you've done. You've guided us through many difficult periods in the drop-off centers and done a great job and you've always been such a pleasure to work with, interact with throughout the year. So I truly appreciate it and I can tell you that I'm assuming you're retiring but I can tell you I love retirement having just done it last year and you're gonna love it. So good choice. Thank you very much, Paul. Any other comments that anyone would like to make? Seconded. Thank you, Allen. And I think it is correct that Lee is heading off into retirement, well-deserved, well-earned and much appreciated for your service. With that then, all those in favor of approving this resolution, please raise your hands and wave them in support. Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi. I declare the vote unanimous and we thank you very much, Lee, for your service. We wish you all the best and you're coming. Thank you, Paul. I just wanna thank you guys because you've always been so supportive of all our staff and it's really been very easy. My first thought is, wow, did I really do all that stuff that Amy just said, but it's been a long time and I'm pretty sure I remember most of it. But what I really do remember is how supportive the board has always been of us employees and it's been our pleasure. So thank you so much. And thank you, Lee. And again, the best of luck to you. And please keep bringing donuts back to the staff when you have a chance. I will also add that in all of our job descriptions, there is a phrase, other duties as required and no one fulfills that more than Lee, which includes emptying mousetraps and all other things that some of us would prefer not to do. Thank you. Really appreciate it. Thank you, Lee. Thank you. We will now move on to item number five on the agenda, which is the first executive session for contract negotiations. Amy, could you read off a motion? Yes, I move that the board of commissioners of the Chittenden Solid Waste District go into executive session to discuss contract negotiations where premature general public knowledge would clearly place the district, its member municipalities and other public bodies or persons involved at a substantial disadvantage and to permit authorized staff, other invited interested parties and the solid waste district attorneys to be present for this session. We have some other moves. Some other stuff, Burlington. Thank you. Here we have a second. Thank you, Alan. Before we have a vote on this, I wanna point out that Sarah has sent out two Zoom invites. This is executive session number one. She sent it out on the 19th. So that's the link to click on, executive session number one. All those in favor of entering executive sessions, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? We will now leave this public session and move over to the executive session number one. Still waiting for Alan. Well, I'm going to trust that Alan will be returning to the fold shortly. Well, I think we can proceed with a motion to exit executive session. Anyone care to make that motion? So moved, South Burlington. Thank you, South Burlington. Again, Burlington. Thank you, Lee from Burlington. All those in favor of exiting executive session, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? We have now left executive session and we'll have a few minutes of discussion about what was covered in the executive session. I'm gonna turn it over to you, Sarah. I think you're best prepared to report on this. Thank you. So a couple of months ago in December, CSWD went out to public bid for mattress recycling services and the sole bidder was one of our current employees who has a mattress recycling business on the side. And a question arose as to whether there would constitute a conflict of interest. So in executive session, that was the question that the board was considering. In addition to considering whether a conflict of interest existed according to CSWD's personnel policy, the board also needed to determine to discuss whether any exceptions to the personal policy could be made. The board of commissioners did determine that there does exist a conflict of interest to award the contract to a current CSWD employee under CSWD's personnel policy. That was the first determination. The second determination was that the board considered the potential exceptions under the personnel policy and further determined that exceptions listed in the policy were not applicable in this case. Thank you, Sarah. That was an excellent summary and very clear. I believe we wanna have a motion then to resolution two parts, first two for the board to determine that a conflict of interest did exist. So if we can have a motion to that effect, Sarah, do you have language that you could then read through us? So I think the last two sentences I read would be considered both of the resolutions. So we can do the first half as the result. The board of commissioners has determined there exists a conflict of interest to award a mattress recycling contract to a current employee under CSWD's personnel policy. Thank you. I'm going to make that move that motion. I'm going to move that motion. Thank you, Allende. We have a second. Seconds up, Burlington. Thank you, Paul. Any discussion on this motion? Well, certainly I'd like to express cast my appreciation to the employee for his creative thinking and his hard work and trying to put this together. And certainly I know I wish that we could accommodate it but I do agree that it is a conflict of interest and at this point is not, we don't have a required need for the public health and safety at this point. Thank you, Paul. I think you expressed that on behalf of the entire board from the comments that I heard made in executive session. This is a great idea. We really would like to help him find a solution for his business to get off the ground and remove this material from the landfill. Any other comments that would like to be made on this first resolution, that there is a conflict of interest? I'm seeing none. Therefore, all those in favor of the resolution identifying this as a conflict of interest, please say aye. Aye. Aye. All those opposed, please say no. The resolution is approved. Tim, I saw your hand up momentarily but unfortunately we've already begun the process of voting on the motion. I was voting aye. Thank you. The second resolution, sorry if you could just read off that language. Sorry. Excuse me, the board, be resolved the board considers the potential, considered the potential exceptions under the personnel policy and determined the exceptions listed were not applicable. We have someone willing to make that motion. Some of those separate links. Thank you. We have a second. Second asset lost. Thank you, Allen got there first. Again, any discussion on this motion? I would say, Paul, you expressed it again in your first comments on the first motion. Covered this as well. I'm seeing no other commissioners ready to talk on this motion. Therefore, we'll take a vote on it. All those in favor of the resolution, please say aye or raise your hand. Any opposed? This resolution too is passed. And again, thank you for bringing this before us. And again, we wish there's a way, we hope there's a way that we can get this material out of the landfill and work with you on that. We're now ready to move on to item number six on the agenda, which begins on page 24 of your meeting packet, the administration building architect selection. I just wanted to make an introductory comment here just to set the frame background for newer board members. As Sarah had pointed out in her cover memo, this had been brought before the board about a year ago. And early on in the discussion, this was not something that I think she mentioned in her memo, was either at the finance committee or at the full board asked staff to go and look at the option of leasing office space in the area, they reported back and that option did not appear to be viable, financially attractive. But the process then began, or then continued. And as she noted in August, there was an engineering study that was authorized and has been reported back. I'd also say that this has been part of the capital plan presentations that the board has been regularly updated on, I think is most recently probably in November, but it has been before the board, essentially for the past year. So I just wanted to give that background to the newer board members. And with that, Sarah, I will turn it over to you. Thank you. I'm going to skip on over to Josh, but you're right. When we did the review of potential leasing options, and this was a couple of years ago before pre-pandemic, pre-COVID. So the options are probably more expensive now because everything is more expensive now. It became apparent that, and Josh, you had the most recent, kind of the most likely to be workable fit up of over $200,000 a year. So if you could kind of weave that into your conversation, too, as an update on the cost and maybe the return on a potential investment here. I mean, and we're keeping in mind, we're not asking for a vote on the project itself. This is on the design and the architecture. So, Josh, over to you. Yep, everybody, hopefully you can hear me. As Paul kind of dialed in and Sarah just set up, back in 2020, we took a look at what would take to lease some space for ourselves due to the pandemic. We realized that this is not a very viable space. There's no HVAC or air exchanger ventilation and we're kind of at capacity here in this existing administrative building. We've been here, I think, since 1993. So we got a good run out of her. It's been about 29 years we've been in here. So with that, when we looked at that point in 2020, it was between $170,000 and $220,000 for an annual lease to get kind of all of our employees back in one space. And that also included some fit up costs, but they were estimates. The fit up costs, I would expect now are probably much higher than they were originally estimated. So I just kind of wanted to put that into context as Sarah was saying, the average was about $200,000 to get us into at least space. At that point, we realized, well, hey, what is it gonna cost us to actually build our own? And we do own land. So what we did at that point was we went out to bed to see what the most viable option would be for land on areas that we own. Lamero and Dickinson was selected. They did an assessment, they came back in the packet in attachment one is the area that was selected as the most viable land option for an administrative building on land that we own. Can you put that up on that? Are you able to share the screen so we can see it? Oh, can somebody give me the ability to share? Great. Share. All right, can you guys see that? This is on Redmond Road. For those of you who are watching here, this is heading towards our administrative office. You can see in the upper portion of this, this is where our compost facilities, we're looking at kind of this plot of land here that's to the north of what we call the Velco highway into their lay down space. Our preliminary look into this was kind of see if wetlands were gonna be an issue, if stormwater was gonna be an issue. And we've identified that we can fit this in. We assumed a 10,000 square foot space. We don't expect to use all 10,000 square feet to be totally honest with you. And when we start looking at costs of the project moving forward, I don't think that we're gonna want 10,000 square feet. But with that, we also reached out to Velco because this is within an easement that they have with us. And they have been nothing but gracious partners in this. And they've worked very closely with us. They're interested in kind of where we land tonight, but they have not shown any indication that this will be an issue for them. I'll scroll down to kind of the work we've done to date, which is this right here. Josh, can I ask you a quick question on the picture? So if we were to build a landfill in the future, how would we get the sand, and we had the stockpile sand, how would we get the sand across that area into the other area? What's the spot there? That's a great question. So we have about 26 acres. If you can see where my mouse is kind of circling right here and extends farther down in this direction. And that would be kind of our lay down area. But with that concept, you know, as we'll talk about later tonight, you know, this is a viable area for Murph, which then further reduces that to this, probably 12 acres here. This is what we're talking about for a landfill sand storage space. With that, you know, we're moving along. I don't want to get too much detail. I can address it either here or in the future, but, you know, we're moving along also with the sand pit sand removal. So where we originally purchased land, you know, it's been 12, I think 18 years actually. Anyway, the amount of, I'll have to do an assessment, but we actually looked into it not too long ago. The amount of sand that we had originally anticipated any land for has reduced because it's being removed. It's being actively mined out of the KC pit. But I think that's a good exercise to do to make sure that we can fit it in the event we need to. And isn't there, I don't know, we're sorry. So ancient history, wasn't there a time limit for which we had to, you know, beyond which we didn't have to consider the sand, if you know what I mean? Moving the sand, I can't remember, but, and yeah. I think we've got 12 years left, but don't, it's within that range. I think it was a 25 year. I think it may be a little longer, Josh, but yeah, we have been in conversations with Mr. Casey about that. And, you know, and he knows that, you know, some years he's can move a lot and some years he can't, but he's definitely aware of the timeline and the past two years have been tough, but things are starting to pick up again. But we should double, we should check back in with Mr. Casey and just verify the timeline that he feels that he's on and make sure that it is matching with our agreement. Yeah, I just asked, because, you know, I mean, who knows, we may never build it, but then again, you know, looking at the reports about Coventry and the local opposition and their lack probably won't be able to expand. They have 20 years left. So, you know, anyway, we may end up facing that decision here in the future. So, okay, thank you. And I have that on my early spring task list to reach out to him, because there was some areas that we need to discuss anyway, where we're in the pit. So I will bring this up for sure. So, let's see, you're scrolling down here to continue on. You know, this is kind of the layout that we anticipated. In the event we go forward with building our administrative building that the 10,000 square feet is here, septic goes down to here. These are soils that are appropriate for a septic system. One of the things we're talking about is bringing the water line, the municipal water line down the road. We would anticipate a hookup in this direction, actually the newest, the most recent water line estimates would be the water line would come up to here and then cross. We have parking for 30 spaces and then a stormwater treatment and retention pond. So that's kind of the basic civil site development we've got. We don't encroach on any wetlands, we can meet all our stormwater requirements. So that was kind of the first straight face test, is could we fit it in here? The next step, stop sharing, is to get a true design, and that's working with this architect. We went out to about eight local firms, two got back to us, and we went through our evaluation criteria, both were very qualified firms, one was just less than the other, is what it came down to. And that's that freeman, French freeman, and you can see it in our scoring on our evaluation process. So that's kind of the basics of what we're bringing to you tonight is to approve us getting into the design phase of our building so that we can bring all our employees back to one building. This does have in its concept, a board meeting room for us to come in and have board full board meetings. This is an approval to build the building, this is approval to design the building and come back to you. And part of our process with the architect we select is to get a full-blown construction bid out so that we can come back to you with a real-time estimate before we go to build. So this isn't, again, this is just the next step in moving forward to developing this site. So that's the bulk of my discussion. Sarah, did you have any other, anything you wanted to add at this moment? I want to point out to the board, we're on page 24 of the board packet. I think what I would, unless, Sarah, you wanted to add anything right now, I'd ask that we move the resolution and then open it up for discussion and questions by board members. There is language on page 25. Sarah, would you care to read that out? Sure. Be it resolved that the board of commissioners authorizes the executive director to enter into a contractual agreement with Freeman French Freeman of Burlington, Vermont for design services of a new CSWD administrative building for an amount not to exceed $152,800. Thank you. Do we have anyone willing to make this motion? So moved, South Burlington. Thank you. Do we have a second? Second, Richmond. Thank you, Logan. We'll now open it up for discussion and questions by board members on what's been presented both verbally by Josh and what's in the memo that was prepared and submitted by Josh. Wait. Thanks, Paul. Josh, I don't know if I missed it but are we gonna have pricing on two alternatives for the water? I see there's a possible drilled well location and then the waterline brought down Redmond Road and is that waterline being brought down dependent on the MRF as well? Because I know where it was talked for bringing that down for the MRF. That's a great question. So we are working with Du Bois and King on the development of the waterline and we've gotten to a point where we can actually get true costs. I think we're about a month away from that. We've been through the DRB process. We have brought to the board the waterline is gonna cost about double what we anticipated it costing. We had budgeted roughly $400,420 I think is what it was. It's looking to be about $800,000 to be honest with you. But we also asked Du Bois and King to do an assessment. In the event we didn't bring the waterline down to the compost facility, what would it take for us to drill three production wells? And their assessment was based on our storage requirement and the storage requirement would be to provide fire safety at all of our facilities. They assessed it at about 1.5 million for three drilled wells. It was pretty pricey. And the cost of everything has gone up, but in reality it was for us to have the proper storage for fire. And we've also spoke with the Wilson fire department. And that's one thing that they had said is that if you're gonna build a mirf or an admin building or even where you're moving forward with your compost facility we need fire protection there. So that waterline discussion will be brought to the board most likely next board meeting or the board meeting after just depending on working through a couple more cost estimates on that. But that will also go hand in hand with an ODF expansion, our phase three expansion. So when I get true costs for that I wanna bring that to the board for discussion. So all of that, oh sorry, I was just saying. So we have in there the potential for a drilled well and we've decided to spot for it in the event that the board doesn't choose to go forward with a waterline. But our anticipation is that based on our cost assessment to date the waterline still is the most viable option and we have that coming in. So we would just scratch the drilled well portion of that project. We just kind of covered both sides. Thank you. Thank you. Paul, then Bryn. Yeah, I just wanna speak in favor of this. If anyone has spent very much time with staff in the admin offices they'll know how very cramped they are. And over the years I've been amazed that the creativity you've been able to do to cram even more folks in there. So wonderful, but it's time to get something that's a little more spacious and definitely like having a board room so that we can meet there. So I support this fully. Thank you Paul Bryn. I feel comfortable moving forward with Freeman French Freeman. They are, I believe they were awarded the contract to do the building and renovation of the Waterbury complex after Irene. And if you ever have a chance to visit that space it really is very nice inside. They did an excellent job with that. And I think they may also have had some assistance with the fit up for the national life space but definitely the Waterbury complex. And one of the things that we really appreciated about actually both respondents packages was their focus on what they call future proofing. So to make sure that we are designing for future needs of future employees, anyone else would use that building. So that was critically important to us as well as being environmentally sound and healthy as possible. So it's one of the reasons that we had asked for kind of three alternatives, right? So that we could make sure that we were understanding what the best use of environmentally sound practices and building materials would be and what that would cost to be able to bring that to you. And then also having a sense of what was affordable and hoping that we are going to be landing somewhere in between but definitely the future proofing so that this is, again, viable for decades to come. And the idea is to get another 30 years as in this next building, you know, it's gonna be a, we're gonna move in and maybe 50, who knows, it's new. Kalen. Hi, so I've been a little out of the loop and I'm guessing this has been gone through at length but just thinking, you know, with the big shift to working remote and a lot less time in physical office space, just how that's factored in to the need for more space and just, yeah, it's looking forward. The greenest building is the building that's never built. So just wanna put that question out there. Yeah, no, excellent point. And we've done several big conversations with our staff. Pre-COVID and then kind of in the midst. And one of the big things that we've learned throughout this experience is how much better we work when we're together. And for our group at this time, it's really critical that we be able to share space and to do so in a healthy way. However, your point is very well taken, which is we don't know what future generations of employees are going to prefer and to need. So to be able to build in that flexibility is really, really important. But we know that for the way that we are today and with the kind of the where our staff is in their career mode that we anticipate all being together for the foreseeable future that being together is very, very important. Thanks. Thank you. I saw an intriguing headline the other day probably in the Wall Street Journal that why are big tech companies buying up lots of office space? What is it that they know that perhaps the rest of us don't? Just an interesting observation that they may know something or maybe they don't, but nobody knows the future, but we need to be prepared. The other incredibly interesting thing is that least space for large offices is not going down, but you think it would with everybody kind of moving out. It's just not. We did a reassessment in 21 just to see like, hey, are these things dropping out? And the consensus, it wasn't an official reassessment. It was just kind of calling out and seeing if there was anything available. It's just not. So I don't understand it, but for leasing space and trying to go that route, it hasn't softened for the cost. Other questions or comments on the motion? I'm seeing nor hearing any. So again, the motion before us is to enter into a contractual agreement with Freeman French Freeman for design services of a new administrative building for an amount, not to exceed $152,800. Just when we now we're ready for that question, all those in favor of the motion, please say aye. Aye. If you are opposed, please say no. The ayes have it and the motion is passed and your next step on exploration of our new office building can proceed. Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you. At this point, we had built in a five minute break. I was anticipating that we might be going a little bit longer by this point in time. We're into the meeting for just an hour right now. My recommendation is that we plow ahead, if that's all right, and move into the item number seven, the Murph Revenue Sufficiency Study and seeing how, just keep it in mind, if this takes a long time and there's an opportunity we can put in that five minute break in a little while down the road, I'm seeing some heads nodding, but that's fine. So some thumbs up. So let's proceed then moving on now to item number seven, the Murph Revenue Sufficiency Study. I'll turn it over to you again, Sarah. Thank you. And we do have a couple of things to join. We have folks from SCS Engineers to be able to do presentation. And actually, let me see. Thanks, Vita and Kellen are here. And they're going to, Vita, if you let me know or Kellen, if you're able to share the screen, they do a presentation. So this is part two in the economics portion of the discussion over the, we did the cost benefit analysis last month. This is a revenue sufficiency analysis and kind of wrapping up the conversation on the Murph, the intent, unless the board decides otherwise, but my intent is to kind of bring back to you a formal wrap up of the question, should we proceed with constructing a new Murph next month so that we can kind of pull all the pieces together, have it in one place, and then have any other discussions as you may see necessary. So for now, for this moment, I do want to have SCS go through their analysis and then we'll open it up for conversations. I do want to be clear to make note that at some points in the conversation, maybe some of the questions that the board may have, may fall under Murph contract negotiations. And as the board is aware, we are in the midst of contract negotiations with our operator, Kasella, for the current facility. So I do want to just kind of plant that seed in your mind that some of the conversation questions may relate to that. And I will try to indicate as best as I can, that is a question for the executive session. That is one of the items we will be discussing in executive session and update on those negotiations. So I'm not trying to stifle conversation. I just want to be, make you aware that it may be better suited for the executive discussion. So I will, I'm not sure I'm turning it over to Rita or to Callan. It's me. Okay. That's Rita. Thank you very much. Okay, so I won't bore you all, I guess, with the long introductions because you pretty much heard most of that last time. So when we spoke a few weeks ago, though, we had done the cost benefit analysis, which was just the high level of what potential facility alternatives really even had or potentially financially feasible over the longterm. So we narrowed that down and you all had expressed that you wanted to see a few different scenarios. So I'll go over how we define those scenarios and then I'll show you what the longterm outlook looks like as we try to realistically project the revenues and expenses associated with those over time. So we looked into status quo. When we spoke last time, we had really talked about status quo a little differently more in terms of maxing out the current facility. We were asked to look at it, though, just in terms of if you continued your current operations in your current facility, just doing the investment that would be necessary to keep that operation up and running, what would that look like? And something similar then for retrofit. You still have someone else operating the facility, but you're putting in all new equipment and you're trying to maximize what that space can do. And then in the third scenario, looking at a new facility that could accept 50,000 tons per year, but that would allow you to really expand the types of recyclables that you accept in the equipment that you have available. There's a few assumptions, though, that I think it's important to note that are true through these scenarios. We don't have a lot of control or a lot of foresight as to what tipping fees might be over time or what your material sales rates would exactly be over time, but we do know you're kind of in an extraordinary revenue stream right now in terms of those sales rates. So the assumptions that we made is as revenues continue to increase, you don't like to keep your tipping fees quite at the level they are so that they would decrease over time, but we did assume that those tipping fees will get down to but not fall below $45 a ton that the material sales rates would return to a more normal level about $85 a ton. And then depending on this scenario would either continue to decrease slightly over time, remain somewhat constant or increase slightly over time. We did a pretty in-depth analysis of how those prices have increased or decreased over the last about 20 years. And honestly, it seems like they decreased just slightly and there could be a number of factors at play there. We have discussed about how your recyclables are not necessarily maximizing their market price. And so that's why the status quo does assume that over time those revenues continue to decrease very slightly. Whereas if you improve the material slightly with the retrofit that sales rate would no longer decrease but it was not likely increased necessarily either because again, you're not maybe maximizing those revenue streams, but with the new facility you do have the potential to increase those. But again, those are plus or minus 1, 1.5%. There was no drastic assumption may because you really just haven't seen that at your facility. What a revenue efficiency analysis is because it's fancy financial words really. It's just if you kind of look at those words it's just the sufficiency of your revenues. Do you have enough money to be able to pay your bills over time? It's a long-term cash flow projection but it's specifically on cash flows. So while we do a lot of things in the budget process and when dealing with finance that will make adjustments for depreciation or other non-cash items. This is really just saying how much money do you have available to you in each year? What are, is your realistic cash in your realistic cash out? And we look at the actual timing of expenditures to say in every year, what will it take for you to be able to maintain a minimum working capital reserve target? When I say that, I mean that you just have to have some money in the bank and generally everyone has some sort of financial policy across most utilities or enterprise funds, things like that. We usually aim for about three to six months of operations and maintenance expenses just knowing that we need to have a certain level of funds in the bank to continue to weather the cyclical nature of revenues or any sort of unexpected events that might occur mid-year. So we put all of those assumptions into our financial model along with each scenario and then we can compare them side by side and see which one looks the most financially feasible for you. So as I said, it is just a cash flow model which simply means when we look at the graphs we're about to see if the cash in is greater than the cash out, meaning you're making more than you spend, you'll be running a surplus and your fund balance will increase over time. Conversely, if your cash out is greater than your cash in, you're spending more than you make, which is fine as long as you have a savings. But once you meet that minimum working capital reserve, it starts to get a little dangerous for you and eventually you can run out of fund balance which obviously really isn't even an option. So the first scenario, the status quo. So again, status quo means nothing changes at all. We do know that you need some immediate investment. We have Kisela still continuing as the operator of the facility. What you're seeing here are some of the tables that you saw in the memorandum. As I mentioned, you're seeing that your material sales prices decrease somewhat over time after they normalize back down to that $85. There is a necessary capital investment because you need some roof repairs and tipping floor repairs. And periodically throughout the rejection period we do assume the same thing. That every seven to 10 years there would be a need for some facilities or equipment, replacements or repairs that would just be required routine capital outlays, but that's sort of the spikes and valleys you see here. Those would be years where you're drawing down fund balance because you need to replace some facilities or equipment. With that though, over time, you can see where your fund balance is okay for a while, but then eventually pretty dramatically go negative by about 2042. And that's just really a factor of what we've talked about. You cannot continue to grow as your potential system grows. You're pretty much at the maximum tonnage that you can accept at your facility. So you would have to forego any growth in the system, but that doesn't stop your expenses from continuing to increase. Can I ask a quick question? Sure. So in this particular histogram, it appears then the yellow and the green bars are one and the same, is that true? Yes, so that's what's gonna change in the next scenarios is that the yellow bars will remain the same and you will see that the labels will reflect that and the green bars will change so you can compare the scenarios to the status quo to see which one will be most feasible. And so on this one, you see that the green bars are the retrofits and the yellow bars are the status quo. Can I ask a quick question? Yes. Could you go back to the scenario one? The capital assumption here is 3.08 million, but when we looked at the capital assumption in the CBA model last month, it was about a million dollars. Well, the assumptions are going to be different in the revenue efficiency model because that's the reason we went to this extra level of detail. It was that rather than assuming, so we do the cost-benefit analysis, you're sort of just assuming a constant rate over time. You're saying we need to input or we need to transfer this much into a capital reserve to be able to afford these equipment replacements, whereas when we're really doing a detailed financial projection, including in line item detail, we can say, okay, in what year do we think we realistically need to make an investment? And then how far apart will it be until we need to make the next investment? So we're really plotting those in more detail over time so that you can see what we think is a more realistic cash flow. I must have missed it, but why does the tipping fee go down? When we did the analysis of what your, well, oh, sorry, the tipping fee, it's just that right now it's at about $80 a ton, which we understand is fairly high and that often fluctuates depending on the sales rates of your recyclables. But that's, again, both are rather high right now. So the assumption was, let's see if we can in a conservative scenario where we're not necessarily charging at a very high tipping fee and where our material sales rates aren't really as high as they have in the last few years. Can we still have a plan that's financially feasible? The other thing that factored into this is someone had brought up at the last meeting they can turn about having competition. So if you are at an $80 tipping fee and there ends up being competition over time, then you end up having sort of that race to the bottom where people are lowering fees. So let's see what you think is a fee that you really wouldn't go below that price and see if it's still a financially feasible plan. But I'd like you to continue on to scenario too, but just off of the observation, the tipping fee assumption remains the same in all of the scenarios I believe. It does. But for the benefit of the full board, if you can continue the presentation and then we'll open it up to the more granular questions I think would be helpful. So in this scenario, as I said, we have to sell us still operating the facility. And again, the tipping fee assumption is the same. But in this case, we're assuming that you have a better quality of your recyclables so that the material sales rate while it doesn't increase doesn't continue to decrease that you can maintain that rate. There is a $12.5 million retrofit for the facility. The annual debt service on which is about $725,000. In this case, you can see that the green and yellow bars really aren't all that different. In the near term, I mean, you can see where the revenues are slightly higher, but by the end they run out of fund balance in about the same amount of time. And it's simply because the increase in your revenues from this newer facility isn't enough to offset that debt service payment. And so 25 year debt service, so over time it just begins to draw down that fund balance in the same way the status quo did. So then the third scenario is a new facility. Again, the tipping fee assumptions are the same. In this case though, the material sales price is expected to increase slightly over time because again, as we mentioned, you not only have a higher quality of the recyclables, but you might begin to accept other materials. There's a little bit more that could be done with the facility. What I wanna mention here that is true for the retrofit as well. In both cases, we do understand that facility improvements and new equipment last for a time, but would require replacements. In this case, a larger facility while it is 50,000 tons would max out at some point and you would need to do an expansion. So what you're seeing here is a decrease in the out years is an assumed expansion of that facility so that you would be able to continue to accept more tonnage. The initial debt service on the $22 million is about 1.3 million a year. And while that is larger because you're able to maximize your revenues and because in this scenario, have you operating the facility, you're actually much more financially sustainable over time and over a 30 year projection, it looks like you still have fund balance well in excess of the minimum requirements. So with that, just to summarize what we're seeing in the numbers as that the status quo is hampered by the fact that you really can't accommodate growth in your system nor can you maximize your material sales rates. The retrofit just simply can't get enough additional revenue to be able to offset those costs on the debt service payments on those improvements but that a new facility can not only pay for those improvements but has the potential to expand. So over time, you don't have a facility that hits its maximum so early and you can really continue that financial sustainability. So that's it. If anyone wants to go back and discuss any of those scenarios. Well, before we do that, thank you, Vita. I just wanted to ask Sarah, if you wanted to offer any additional context here before we open it up for discussion. I think it's a, it was certainly an eye opening when we were looking at, I thought that there would be a bigger spread frankly between status quo and retrofit. I was surprised that it was barely close in the analysis. And I do wanna, we'll wanna probably touch a bit on the 50,000 being filled factors as far as when Vita was talking about that presumes that the district would operate the facility. I don't know if you want to kind of talk a little bit more about the rationale behind that. One of the things is that we simply again, where this is where I mentioned we were talking a little bit about contract negotiations in the next executive session. So I don't wanna necessarily get too deep into those possibilities, but it was a factor, but Vita, there was additional information kind of behind that assumption if you want to. Yeah, I didn't know how much I, you wanted me to talk about the assumption if you operate your own facility, is when we ran the numbers, it's surprising really the base part of the contract cost that you have for Cassella is fairly similar to the amount that you would need to pay in staffing and operating costs for that facility. The difference is you have a revenue share with them right now. So you only get 50% of the revenue generated, but in the new facility, if you're operating it, you get to keep 100% of that revenue. And that's really a driver for that financial projection. It does make a significant difference. While the material sales rates are, like I said, plus or minus here or there, that's not really the major factor. I think it's really just that you get to not only maximize your revenue, but capture all of it in that new facility scenario. Sorry, anything else at this moment? No, I have a few questions or comments. Thank you. If we can return back to full screen so that we can see all the participants in the call and then open it up for questions and discussion. Who would like the first crack? I'm seeing that. I'll ask them a question. A scenario two, what's the volume assumption? I know that in the green field, it's 50,000 tons per year, but if you could just refresh me actually on both the status quo and on option or scenario one, what are the volume assumptions? Your current facility is about 48,000 tons. And while the 50,000 sounds like that's not much more, it has the ability because you have a yard where you can put in some additional facilities to, Josh can articulate this better, but then you can actually accept more tonnages before you would need to expand. So we assume that you go up to about 70,000 tons before you would need to then do another expansion on that facility. Thank you. And the retrofit, which is scenario number one, what's the volume assumption there? That's the same, it's the 48,000 as well because your space just really can't grow to accommodate additional waste. So in both of those, it assumes that within the first few years, you're really already hitting 48,000 or above. And I think we capped it at 50,000 and said anything beyond that, you just wouldn't be able to accept any additional waste. So to my mind then that would explain why the financial performance of scenario two, the retrofit pales in comparison to what you've presented for the green field. Yeah, it's a combination of that. And like I said, that revenue maximization, when you put both of those together, it just isn't as desirable. Thank you. Other commissioners? Dan. I appreciate the financial analysis that's given and the comparisons. I just like to offer a little bit of historical context. I was on the board when the current Murph went online. And I remember the excitement, Tom Murrow waving his arms like he often did in talking about it. And Tony Barba-Gallow wanting to quickly move us into the Murph so that he could show us the technical variables. And this is perhaps addressing the retrofit. That was a good Murph at the time. Consider though the world and what shape it was in. I don't remember the technology and what we may not have gotten state of the art but it was pretty good. But it didn't need to be that good because China, if you remember, was buying everything and they didn't care about so much about contamination. So we were able to turn a profit quite easily with that unit and it was good. Times have changed. There's no longer an ability to offload recyclables that have a great deal of contamination or even little bits of contamination. The optical sorting seems to be an essential item in this industry at this point so that it can be refined and productive. So that said, and maybe I'm ahead of myself because I know the discussion is going to continue next month but at this point looking at the financial analysis and having attended the retreat and other events around the Murph that we've had, I would do what I could do to influence Underhill's vote to be on board with it. Thank you, Dan. Other questions and comments right now? Okay. A question on your scenario one and also scenario two. What is the assumption on staff and... That's operated by Kisela. At current levels. At current levels. I think it was the current, I believe Josh has correct, there's the current expenses. The current staffing level. Right, and that was that was that, we took that feedback from our last meeting to not assume that we had to run it at full capacity but run it at the staffing level it is now. Okay. Tim. We were told that there was going to be a sensitivity analysis was going to be a component of the revenue sufficiency model. I haven't seen any data on that. We did test another, a number of scenarios. Did you have a specific sensitivity or questioning? Well, I mean, typically when I look at a model, I'm always, I'm interested knowing what has to change, what has to change by how much that could break it. And I'm just wondering, you know, what you found out in that analysis. That was a big part of why we looked at the tipping fees and the material sales rates the way we did. Because initially you can feed it off of this year and it was just irrational in every scenario. You're rich forever. But the fact is that you have a high tipping fee, you have a high material sales rate and they fluctuate significantly over time. I mean, if there's anything we learn from looking at that analysis over the last 20 years, it's how widely these things fluctuate. So all we could do is really just look at trends but try to stay on the conservative side because when you have these status quo scenarios and we know that we can't grow with the system, then it becomes very important that if the worst case scenario happens, that we feel like we can accommodate it. So we thought that the $45 tipping fee and the $85 dollar material sales rate were realistic and we're not, if you will, a doom and gloom scenario, but that they did accommodate that there would be fluctuations also, you know, as you have good or bad years, it just sort of brings you to the middle. Without knowing anything predictively, it was better to just kind of set us a common assumption among those scenarios and then just test really their sensitivity against one another. But we did start out, like I said, projecting off of this year and then we just had to quickly sort of course correct and realize that that was not a realistic projection. The other thing is that we do, but that really are not necessarily big factors in this analysis is that we look at cost escalation over time and we look at how to escalate capital improvement project costs. We generally though, try to go with indices that we know and trust and look at what their 30 year average would be and use that for our projection purposes to the extent that we feel like we're being overly aggressive or conservative. We tweak those numbers as well. Those weren't really large drivers here. I would say the biggest thing as far as the sensitivity would be those assumptions about tipping fees and the material sales. Paul Stabler. I just wanted to echo Dan's thoughts. I do believe it's time we move forward with a new facility. I don't foresee packaging decreasing over time. I think it'll just continue to increase. And I think it's important that we deal with it better than we are, just for the environment and for our citizens. So yeah, I fully support moving forward with a new facility. I got just to remind all the board members that this is obviously a very big investment. It's been under study for several years, but we want to give ample time for the board members to digest what's been presented tonight and the intent would be to bring this to next month's meeting for action. Other questions or comments at this point, I wanted to thank you, Vita, for a very clear presentation. I was able to follow it as a layperson. It made sense to me and I think I got a good handle on the key concepts. Thank you very much. Well, that made my day. Thank you. With that then I believe we're ready to move on to the executive session portion of this part of our meeting. We're at 7.38, thank you, Vita. I just had one question, Paul. I don't know if you saw my hand. Is that presentation going to be available to view after this meeting? Any of those slides, like with the assumptions? Yep, we will add that to the packet and it will be online, yes. Okay, thank you. Yeah, the minutes of the meeting are posted. How soon after this meeting, Sarah? You know, we have five business days. Five business days. And if you go to the CSWD website, I think it's the Board of Commissioners page, drill down, you will find the materials. We can add the presentation at any time. We've got it late, but we'll add it this week. So we'll be there. Thank you. So again, I was saying, looking at the time at 7.40, we did build in a five-minute break, take a sense of nods up or down. If we need that break or we can continue on, my senses were pretty good. When it gets to be 8.15 or 8.30, that's when it really starts to groan. But I would recommend that we move on. And Sarah, the next piece of this is Executive Session. Number two, that's right. And Amy, it's the same language it's contract negotiations, if you could meet that please. I move that the Board of Commissioners of the Chittenden Solid Waste District go into Executive Session to discuss contract negotiations where premature general public knowledge would clearly place the district, its member municipalities and other public bodies where persons involved at a substantial disadvantage and to permit authorized staff, other invited interested parties and the Solid Waste District Attorneys to be present for this session. So moving staff forward. Thank you. I believe it was Alan who seconded it or Amy, you picked up on that. All those in favor of moving into Executive Session number two, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Are there any opposed? We'll now move into Executive Session number two it's clearly identified in Sarah's email to you. So please use that link. See you over there. Amy, do we have a quorum, has a quorum returned? Yes. And all back in public session, entertain a motion to exit Executive Session. Recording in progress. We are now back into public session, entertain a motion to exit Executive Session. So moved. Thank you, Bryn. Thank you, Ken. I don't think we'll have any discussion on this. All those in favor of exiting Executive Session, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? We have officially exited as Exited Session. The next item on the agenda, item eight, other business. Is there any other business to bring before the board tonight? Just another thank you and farewell to Lee. Sure, thank you for Lee. Yes, Lee Turry. Lee Perry, you're stuck with us. Yeah, you're stuck with me for a while, I guess. Come on, Lee. I'm seeing no other business to be presented tonight. So is there a motion to adjourn? We adjourn. Thank you, Allen. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Thank you all very much for this extended evening and we'll see you all again soon. Have a good night. Thank you. Good night. Thanks for your time, staff. Recording stuff.