 Wednesday, June 8th to order. Thank you all for being here. Do we have any agenda additions or changes for today? None from staff. Trustees, anything? This is for the trustees. We'll get into the rest of it in a moment. So hearing no agenda additions or changes, we will move on to public to be heard. So now is a portion of tonight's meeting where if there is anybody in the audience or in TV land who has a question or comment for the board of trustees, now is the time to let us know. I'll prioritize those here in the room and then those online. Is there anybody in the room who wish to bring something to the board's attention that is not on the agenda? Carl? Yep. If you'd like to just go ahead and so that way the TV can hear you. If you don't mind coming up to the microphone here. Yes. Right here. Yep. A little brown desk. Yep. No, you got a chair right there. I keep walking. I'm stopping and standing. I just want to mention to Andy that you guys did a, you almost duty getting this village town resolved. And we seem to be on our way. So that leads to my question of where does the seniors, where do we stand as an organization? With the senior center? Yeah. The senior center remains as it has been previously. In terms of there's the program fund that's paid for by the people who attend. The staff that is paid for for this year is paid for through the town's budget. Yeah. It was, we paid a dollar a year, but it never got collected. Right. There's that membership fee that's paid. That's within that enterprise fund. Well, our membership dues, that was one of our fundraising. They started out to be a quarter every time you showed up to whatever the event or occasion was. And somebody got smart and said, well, just do a dollar a month. So now it's $12 a year. You can pay it. As long as you don't fall too far behind, you can pay it. So that was a fundraiser. I don't know what the membership is right now, but at one time it was, I don't know, pushing $200. I don't know if the pandemic has whittled that down or not. I know we got a couple more widows. We didn't have three, four years ago. But then the other thing we did was hold these bridge tournaments. And I forgot everybody paid a fee. It was duplicate bridge. And we'd get maybe 20 to 25 tables. So that made us a little bit of money. Then in the fall, I do some kind of a, I don't know what you call it, but anyway, people make up tables and they sell their wares. And we'd sell a few things. And so that was another fundraiser for us. And the way we spent the money was we redid the floor in there. That was membership money raised to redo that floor. And we bought a new set of tables. Well, they're about 80% lighter than the old ones that we had. We get some new chairs. And they worked on the kitchen. They get some changes. So it makes it a little more efficient and everything. So we're going to be able to stay there, right? So we're going to be doing some renovations to this building within the next year. When that happens, there may be disruptions into the space that's right next door here. We'd make sure that the senior center and the senior population is informed of whatever kind of disruptions there may need to be. You're going to go through the whole senior center or just these two rooms on the end here? We don't know the full extent of the plans at this point in time. Some things that we do know, for instance, is the floor or the ceiling of where the senior center is, the ceiling of that portion. There's a support beam that's likely going to need to be reinforced. So if there's going to need to be construction, that would prevent really the access to the senior center at that point in time where those activities take place. We'd make sure that you all know. It's a safety, but it's a safety. If there's a safety risk, we don't want to have anybody in there. So we'd make sure that you all are informed so things can't be unsafe. That probably would go on what, for three, four weeks? I don't know. I don't want to over-promise. I don't want to under-promise. We don't know yet. So at this point in time, we don't even have a schedule. So it's hard for me to give any kind of definitive answers. OK. At some point, I don't think we even have a board anymore. We used to elect our officers. And at one point, we hired a coordinator. And she turned out to be very good. She's there all the time every day that the center was open. And she set up some outside activities. And while we're watching at what was going on inside, that we don't have that right now. So. Right. There should be a coordinator now through Essex Parks and Rec. There should be a coordinator. And we can, I'm looking towards Brad, that I believe that person is still there. She's still be on the payroll, I'm not sure. But from what I hear, and she's, whether she is, she doesn't show up very often. We can make sure that that person is communicated with so that they can be up to date to make sure then that you all are up to date as well. My understanding is that the senior coordinator is a person who has most of your contact information. Whereas I only speaking for myself, I know I don't. And I'm not too sure if Brad or Wendy do. So that's why I think we need to work with the coordinator to make sure that you all are as informed as possible. Well, we'd like to get around that somehow if we could. Right. Right. I mean, that's what some of the sentiment is. I'm not saying it's hard and fast, but some of the sentiment, we kind of lost confidence in some of these people. And when we were doing ourselves, morale was very high and turned out for the various days of the week when different programs are going, that was pretty good. We had a bus that served, I guess, all the village and I guess it got extended to Athenianland. So if you could give that some thought about, when we hired a person, the more mature adult person of our age, she got along better with us. But she was there all the time and doing things and checking things out. Right. Then another thing that keeps popping up is over the years, there was some seniors before my time, and I've been there, I know it does in our 15 years, who had a very enjoyable experience as a senior. So in their wills, they wrote in a certain amount of money that they wanted to leave to the senior center. And when I got there, the treasurer, give the treasurer the opportunity to say that we have a CD with so much money and whatever it was at that time. They weren't huge sums, I don't think. Somebody else had a CD and might be a little more, a little less and the treasurer would always take care of that. And then there's a larger one, but no one seems to know where or why that those CDs disappeared. So our interim co-managers, Brad Luck and Wendy Hisco, who are on our virtual land, are definitely hearing what you're saying and can look into it further from a staff perspective. They can look into the books, they can do those kinds of things and have some better access and get some of that back to us. I can't give you even a guess of how much money was, or how many of those CDs exist or did exist, but if we could somehow iron that out. Yep, yeah, for sure. I guess I can't think of any, but long as we're gonna be there, except for when this renovation takes place and that date hasn't been determined as of now. Right. Yeah, okay, understandable. Just keep us advised kind of a heads up when things start to happen. Definitely, absolutely. I don't know if we can make plans to relocate somewhere else. Right. Right. The library's not being used, so maybe we can go over there. Okay, thank you very much, gentlemen. Thank you, Carl. Thank you, Carl. Appreciate it. Was there anybody else in the room who wanted to raise any concerns or questions to the board that's not on the agenda? Not seeing anybody? Anybody on Zoom World? If you have questions, comments, concerns for the trustees, please go ahead and raise your hand. I'm not seeing any hands up. So then going back to the agenda. Andrew, would you mind if I just, I can address that question tonight just so we don't have to circle back and mainly so I don't forget. Please go ahead. Thanks. Just in 2016, there was an Essex Area Senior Center Incorporated 501C3 non-profit who had monies. They dissolved and the municipality, the municipalities assumed responsibility for operations of the senior center. So things kind of shifted. And so any money that was previously donated or given to or raised by that 501C3 is now sitting in an enterprise fund with the village. There's 20 or 25,000 in there. I don't have the exact number, but it is there and accessible for senior needs. And as you mentioned, Andrew, the Essex Parks and Recreation, the town of Essex employs the senior program director. And that will relationship will is planned to continue through 1231 23, at which time the village will take over management of the center. And Brad, just to make sure I heard you write that enterprise account is within the village and city of Essex Junction. Yes, that's correct. Great. Thank you, Brad. So our first or next agenda item is public to be heard. Oh, sorry, I did that one. The public hearing. We did that one. Sorry about that. It's the public hearing on the FY23 water, wastewater and sanitation rates. Hello, everyone. Going to share my screen. Let's see. Not that one. Can you all see my PowerPoint? No, we see a blue screen. Nope. We can see a PowerPoint before. How about now? Now we do. Now we don't. Okay, perfect. All right, so this is our first of two public hearings on water, wastewater and sanitation rate setting. For anyone out there in viewer land, we have the village has a policy that we hold two public hearings on rate settings each year. And just to kind of give some background on this, I am using the same calculation methods and presentation that Sarah has used in the past. So everything should look very familiar with the data being updated, of course, for FY23. So in summary, the combined village rate for all utility rates is increasing 7.7% over FY22. You'll notice there are some red percentages here on this slide. I realized after I sent it that Sarah, I was not using the final version of last year's PowerPoint deck. So I updated it with some information that Sarah had updated in last year's presentation. And then obviously that also fed over into the FY23 budget as well. So we have also in here in the packet, this information is all the same. Those two corrections I just stated are the only ones that I had to make. So in this history slide, we have five year averages, kind of showing that FY23 is mostly in line with increases in prior years. And the total overall increase translates to about $41.78 per residential property per year, an increase for FY23. And this is assuming, again, the same assumption we've always used of 120 gallons per day. So we'll look at each of the rates individually, and I'll kind of go over what the increases represent here. On the water side of things, the water fund is seeing the highest rate of increase of about 5.7% over last year. Due primarily to operating budget increases for benefits costs and increasing a part-time shared position to full-time. And the water budget also includes a 3.5% rate increase that Champlain Water District is budgeting and projecting. That rate normally is around 3% per year. So it's a little bit higher this year. On the wastewater side, we have about a 5.6% increase over last year. And again, some of that is due to the part-time shared position increasing to full-time. So this is the admin position that we are filling for FY23. And there are other various cost increases associated within this budget due to changing state regulations, which essentially are unfunded mandates. And it's both, I guess there are also federal mandates as well. Along on the sanitation side of things, we have about a 1.5% rate increase. And about $7,750 is an increase for planned debt repayment. And then other slight increases in the admin fee as well as various pump station costs. The other two rates that the village sets each year are the large water user rate. This is basically the rate charged to global foundries right now. And again, using the established methods that the village has used to calculate and these are based on actual and projected usage data. We are projecting an increase of 1.8 cents per thousand gallons over the current rate. So next year's rate would be 11 cents per thousand gallons. And lastly, we have the wastewater fund, sorry, wastewater wholesale rate. And this is the rate paid by both the town of Essex and town of Williston for the treatment that goes through our wastewater treatment facility. We have about a 9.7% increase over FY22 here. And this increases a result of the wastewater operating budget of 10.6% increase. Most of that is related to cost increases for biosolids, land application, chemicals and electricity for the plant itself. And there's also in this fund, there's also a planned annual increase of $20,000 for the capital. So that is what I have for a presentation. I'm happy to answer any questions that anyone might have. Thank you, Jess, do appreciate that. And thank you for the consistency as well with the presentation made it nice and easy to remember from previous years. So seeing that this is a public hearing, I would first prioritize questions from the public. If there's any members here in the audience who have any questions of what you've just heard, not seeing any, for those in Zoom land, if you have any questions about what you've just heard, please go ahead, raise your hand. And I'm not seeing any hands being raised. Trustees, any questions? All right. Well, Jess, thank you. That was very thorough, appreciate it. We have no questions, so thank you. Great, thank you. I'll see you again in a couple of weeks. Yes, take care. Thanks. So then we'll go ahead and close the public hearing and move on to business item 6A, which is a discussion on upcoming initiatives with the Chittinsawed Waste District. Hello. Hello, how are you? Good, how are you? Some room for Alan here. So thank you for inviting me back again and for being interested in these two particular items. So my name is Sarah Reeves. I'm the Executive Director for CSWD. And we do have a very busy couple of, or three years coming up on the Capital Front. So I would be happy to kind of do a quick overview of what we're talking about and then would welcome any questions from any of the trustees or members of the public. So the big news is that our Board of Commissioners did approve us to come to the voters with a bond request for a new materials recovery facility. Our current MRF is about 30 years old and it is in desperate need of replacement. It is currently processing double what it was designed to process. So we have no room to move up out or do anything within the building and we simply can't even hope to take any more material in. So we really need flexibility for the future to be able to have a hope of being able to extract more material out of the waste stream and into the recycling stream. We just can't do it where we are now. And a big factor too is that facility is mostly sorted by hand. And pretty much we and the Rutland MRF are the only ones that I'm aware of who are sorting materials by hand. Every container, every bit of cardboard, every paper that comes through is sorted by people. So it's a tough job. What we wanna do is construct a new facility on property that the district owns in Williston. We're looking at about a 22 to $24 million project. The board has approved us to ask the voters for no more than $22 million in a bond. It would be a general obligation bond. And the key for our members is that we will not be sending you a bill. We are very proud of the fact that we do not bill our members for any of the services that we provide nor do we intend to bill you for any of the long-term debt that we are seeking to incur. We do need to get your approval that is in our charter that we ask for a voter's approval. And it will go to individual voters not to the select board's councils or the trustees. So it is different from the budget. We do need to get everybody to vote for it. And so what I'm working on now is getting that not to exceed number down. So we're talking to the folks who have lots of grant money available this year. There's lots of money at the federal level. There are zero interest municipal loans that we have access to. There's other nonprofit grants that we have access to. And so in talking with all of those folks, they are looking at this on this project very, very favorably. So that's super exciting. So what we're looking to do again is to build flexibility for the future. And this current MRF has served us very well for 30 years. We're looking to build, you know, getting into the future of a 30, 40 year facility. So very long-term investment. We, if we get the approval of the voters in November, then we will be able to get those RFPs out for construction, hopefully be constructing within about a year, you know, maybe a year from now, probably into the summer, or the equipment and then hopefully be up and running within about no longer than three years. So we're looking at late 2024, early 2025 to be able to move the material from the current MRF to the new MRF. So again, you know, bringing in technology, sorting technology and making it a larger area, essentially doubling the physical size of the building to be able to accept more material and be able to store more material and then be able to process kind of in a more linear fashion right now. It's kind of like the Game Most trap where things are built on top of each other. And then just to make those jobs much for lack of a better term, better. They're very, very hard jobs that you can imagine sorting every container one by one. So the bulk of the sorting we've done by by technology and then our employees will be quality control. So they're gonna be looking after the material that maybe the machines may have missed. So again, that we are very, very excited about this possibility. It will be able to ensure that the materials we process continue to be sorted at a very, very high level and to actually increase that quality. Many other facilities are putting in equipment now. And so we are really behind the times. We need to be able to improve the amount that we extract out of the waste stream, improve the quality so we can ensure our place in the marketplace. And that's really what we're talking about is making sure that we don't lose footing there, particularly in our paper products. Paper is about 75% of what we process through our MRF and those markets are very competitive and they're getting tighter as they should be for quality purposes. We are sending still sending all of our material domestically and we wanna keep things as close as possible. And there is one last mill in Vermont down in Putney and our paper products are not sorted to the quality that they can accept. We wanna be able to send our material and keep it in Vermont as much as possible. So that's really one of our goals for the fiber products. We wanna be able to keep the rest of the material as local and when I say local, maybe Quebec, certainly in the eastern part of the country. And again, continue to try to be flexible to be able to pull more materials out. So that is the MRF project. So I would love to actually take some questions on that and then I can highlight some of the other capital projects we have kind of ongoing at the same time, but this is kind of a big one. So I would love to hear anything you may have on that one. So with the new MRF, what is it that we as consumers, customers would see difference or what we'd be able to do differently, act differently or would we even notice anything? So good news is you won't notice anything different from what you're doing now and you should be able to do more. And that's why we need to build in that flexibility because right now packaging has changed dramatically over just the past five years, never mind the past decade. So we've been in that business for 30 years and we're still only able to take essentially the same things we took 20 years ago. So we need to be able to improve with the times. So some of the things that we're looking at are things like polypropylene for sure, and we can take these now, but they kind of go into just a generalized plastics bail. We wanna be able to take those out separately because they are very highly sought after, they are very versatile and very flexible and the demand is really high. So things like yogurt cups, coulip tubs, things like that, we'll be able to sort those specifically and be able to get a better price for that plastic. We're looking at, and I get this question a lot and we are very strongly looking at can we take some black plastics? So that has been one that every time I talk to folks about recycling, why can't we take the black plastic it's everywhere. The short answer is that it could be made of many different types of plastic and it's hard for people to know what kind of plastic it is. You really have to pick it up and then be able to identify the code. And we don't have time to do that but the material flowing through, people are picking very fast. Machines will have a better chance of identifying that resin type. So that's one thing that we're talking to our potential equipment providers about can you scan for black plastic? Because I get that question a lot. Things such as pouches, will we be able to eventually take the Capri Suns and the baby food that comes in pouches? We might be able to take those at some point with this newer technology. So some of the changes that we'll be be able to have in the Murph, we'll be able to add on later day. We may be, we'll be able to adjust for the future. The equipment is so smart that we can run something underneath a scanner. It will read not only the resin but it will read the package type and will remember it. And then we can then put that into a database and we can tell that the computer's the next time, this is how you sort that. I mean, it's amazing what can be done now. So really it could be somewhat limitless, right? So as far as the system being able to learn as we go and that's really what we wanna do. We wanna build in that amount of flexibility so that we're not having to constantly swap out equipment because of new packaging, we can just change the brains and continue to have that learn as packaging changes. So that's why we're so excited. Because technology is just grown by leaves and bounds and we're at a great point to be able to implement some of the newest technology. That's great. Go ahead, Dan. Will this relieve some of the pressure at the drop-off centers? I mean, or is there, I go to Williston, sometimes I go over to Essex just because I'm right near the Williston line. It's quicker sometimes we're there. Obviously on weekends, it's very busy. They have those containers that separate different materials. I assume those, what's brought there is what you're talking about going to Murph. Yes. And the quicker you can move the product out of there, the quicker things. Is that gonna increase the number of drop centers or you're gonna keep the drop centers the same amount or what? I mean, I gotta imagine there's some kind of benefit for being able to process more stuff out. Yeah, so what it allows us to do is to be able to take a look at the size of the containers that are at our drop-off centers. And we happen to actually swapping them out for larger containers to be able to hold more at one time so they don't feel too fast because that obviously on a Saturdays will sometimes happen, right? They'll feel very quickly. And if we haven't done the pole dance properly, then it can get tricky. But we will be able to certainly accept more for the Williston facility, it'll be on the same road. So we'll be able to swap that out really frequently. The neat thing too though that will have available to us is we're most likely still going to keep the old, the current facility. So that will give us, we'll still have that asset and we may be able to take additional materials that maybe we will want to have people drop off at the drop-off center, consolidate them in the new mirf like film, maybe styrofoam. There's a whole host of things that are annoying, bulky. We don't want in the mirf but have recyclable qualities that we still want to collect at the drop-off center and then consolidate and sell when we have a load. So we may not need to add more drop-off centers but we are also talking about that this year, this coming fiscal year, is our entire drop-off center system? Is, do we have locations in the right spots for where people are? Are we collecting the materials that need to be collected? Do we have the right number of days, combination of days and hours? So we're always looking at that efficiency as well. And yes, they all kind of, it's all a puzzle that fits built together but really the big opportunity could be that to right size those recycling containers and make sure that there's enough access at the drop-off center. Thanks. Great. So you had mentioned how you're expecting this to be about $24 million or so and that the request of voters will be to approve of a $24 million bond. How is it that if I vote yes for that bond, am I then not paying for it? I think it's one of the things that you had mentioned. Yes, exactly. So the way that we will be paying down our, paying the debt service is we receive revenue in three main ways through user fees or TIP fees. So the fees of the haulers pay us when they come to the MRF and literally tip out the material on the floor. That's called a TIP fee. That is one of the primary sources of income. The other is from the revenue from the sale of the recycling. So those are the two main streams that are generated by the MRF itself. We also have a solo waste management fee, which is a fee that is charged again to haulers when they bring trash to be disposed at the landfill and coventry. So we have those three main sources of revenue. And again, to make sure that I am not going to the voters with 22 or 24 million, I am seeking those grants and the zero just loans. So if I'm guessing, well, I know it won't be more than 22. I don't think it's going to be more than 20. I'd like to get it in the teens. So really what I want to come to you with is no more than something in the teens. But again, those are the three sources of revenue. And so those sources will pay for operational costs, some capital costs, and then the debt service. And the very unlikely realm that in one particular year we're not able to pay the debt service, that would be the only time that we would seek an assessment in a single year from one of our member communities. We would not be transferring the obligation over to the communities. We would still retain the general obligation of that debt. But if there's, I don't know, it would have to be, you know, really something pretty devastating if we're not able to pay our debt service because we can raise the tip fee, you know, right now to $80 a ton. If we need to raise that, we can to meet the market rate. We could raise the solid waste management fee if we needed to. We haven't raised that fee in nine years. We could do that. We also have reserves. We have a capital reserve. We have an operating reserve. We'll be also creating a sinking fund. So, you know, we have multiple sources of both cash on hand and revenue that we are comfortable will satisfy those obligations. The board really keeps it tight control on Sarah with respect to the finances of the thing. I mean, our bond is hopefully going to be just like this Champlain Water District bond, you know, where the users are paying, you know, for it, but it isn't a bill to the municipality. Okay, Alan, you brought it up, I'll brought it up. Yeah, it's indirectly paid through user fees. And then what you said about the worst case scenario where something came up, you might go to one of the member communities for something. Do you mean, how do you mean to address it with the member community as opposed to the whole county because it's chit and solid waste? Why does that burden fall on a particular community? So, each of our members, every community that is in Chinden County happens to be a member of CSWD. So we just happen to be all of the 18 cities and towns. So what would happen is if for some reason we couldn't make that debt service, that year's debt service would then come to each of our town cities as a per capita assessment. So it would be, so say in year 13, something happens and we can't pay the debt service for that year, whatever that would be, we would be seeking to recover that. Okay, when you said it, you said a member community, I thought singling out a particular community, say Essex or Wilson, but it'd be- Everybody. And again, per capita. Kind of clarify that. Yeah, it's population-based. No worries. There hasn't been an assessment, Dan, since like year three. Right. Yeah, I could add, I haven't exactly, and I haven't seen you guys drop the ball once. I have a lot of confidence and I also just want to commend you, Sarah. I think this is very progressive. I think it's very forward thinking. Chittenden County is growing. The need for this is not going to go away. It's only going to increase. And this is very typical of the kind of forward thinking that we've come to expect from you. So I really do commend you and appreciate it. And I'm very supportive of this project. Thank you. Can I get you to write a letter to the editor per student supporting that? So yeah, so that is our Murph. And there will be opportunity for additional public information. We'll be having a series of public forums over the next several months. We'll be having, again, betters to the editor, lots of information coming out to voters ahead of the vote to make sure people know about it. And that we will request their vote. And that is not to say that that's the only capital project we have going on. So we are just finishing up the build out of our compost facility that will finish up in the first quarter of this coming year. And so, luckily, all of that investment will then be in the past. And then they will be set for, oh gosh, at least another 10 years as far as the build out. We are looking to make some improvements at the Milton Drop-off Center that's in the budget, but the town may have some other projects they need to do first. So that may actually get moved to a next fiscal year. Essex Drop-off Center is up for some minor improvements in fiscal 24 and 25, but if Milton needs to get pushed up, we might bring Essex in. So it's a little bit flexible there. We are also looking at building a new administrative building. And if anyone has been to our offices, we are busting at the seams out of a raised ranch that we've been in for a long time. And it has given us every bit of everything that it can. And the time has come, long past time, for us to have a professional office setting. But the dollars estimates are coming in pretty high. So we are actively working with an architect and a design firm to kind of rein that in and just make sure that it is affordable. And if not, then we will save that for another day. But that is a big ticket item that is in this current year's budget. And again, it just keeps climbing. So I am concerned that that may not actually go. It's a good thing because then that doesn't get spent out of the capital, but it's not great for my employees. So we shall see. A little bit of minor work to the latex paint and hazardous waste facility. We are going to also purchase a new screener for the compost facility to help us pre-screen out some of the plastics that are coming in with the food scraps so that when it gets to the cooking phase, we're not also cooking plastics. And we have to screen that out further down the road. So we want to get as much out upfront as we can, cook it, make sure it bakes, screen it again. And then by that time, it's nice and being beautiful and you don't have to worry about plastics in your compost. So we are also working on making sure that the plastics don't get in the first place, but it happens. Plastics and metals. I think I found sometimes little pieces of metal. I don't know. Obviously, there's some that are non-ferrous that don't pick up with magnets. Right, exactly. And these screeners do have magnets on them to help pull something up. But exactly if it's non-ferrous, it's. So to those who might be listening to this meeting, are there recommendations or asks that you would have of them as they're composting? Yeah, the biggest recommendation and really the request is to make sure that... So for example, on a bunch of broccoli, they may have a rubber band on that. Don't put that in your compost bin, put that, save it, I actually use them, they're pretty good. But take that off and use that somewhere else. The twist ties that may come on bags, they sometimes slip in or they come on bunches of leaves. Anything that is not, that you wouldn't eat, don't put it in your compost file. That's pretty much the bottom line. If you can't eat it, it doesn't belong in your bucket. As home composting has become more commonly accepted, I know we do this as well, but we purchase some, would we see our compostable bags to put into our bin? Are they compostable? Are you finding that that actually happens or are we contributing to that problem? Thank you for asking that question and oh boy, I wish you didn't ask that question. So it's, we understand that really in order to make composting widely accepted by everyone, we do take what's called liner bags, so the compost bucket liner bags. And if you can get the ones that are compostable rate, biodegradable, great, our process is so fast that we actually, it doesn't sit long enough for them to really break down. So in the testing, they'll break down in about 18 months. Our process is about four to six. So, but we understand, and that's one of the reasons that we need another pre-screener, is to pull those bags out and so that they don't get into the system. But if you're composting at home, then, and you're not using it each season, over two years, that material will break down. But in our facility, we're just too quick. But we do accept them because, you know, the ick factor is a real thing, so we wanna make sure people are participating. We'd rather have that and deal with that on our end and get more of the food scraps. Great, thank you. Yeah. Any other questions? All right. Wonderful, thank you for having me back. I appreciate that. I appreciate that. Thank you. Look forward to it. All right, so our next business item is a discussion for real estate purchase or lease options, which we will be having that discussion in executive session. We would not be coming out after that meeting or after that executive session with a decision or any kind of vote or anything like that. We would just be adjourning afterwards. And that will then bring us into the consent agenda. I will move that we approve the consent agenda. Second. Thank you, George. Thank you, Dan. Any further or any questions? No, I just wanna say I appreciate that already the property across the street is looking better and there's some money in there now to make sure that what needs to be done gets done. I think it's great that space is packed all the time, particularly on the weekends. And I think it's a really good thing. And I appreciate everyone who's been involved and certainly public works staff for all the labor that they put into it. Yeah, since you opened that, I was gonna save it for trustee comments, but do appreciate Brigitte, do appreciate our public work staff, appreciate Rick Hamlin taking the time out of their days to help improve that. You as well, George. Thank you. So the motion was made seconded. No further discussion. All those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Those opposed, please say nay. Pass unanimously. Thank you. And into the reading file and board member comments. The only other thing that I wanted to quickly mention for those who have not seen it yet, the Crescent Connector phase one of the project is happening this upcoming week. What that means is that the railroad crossings will slowly but surely be replaced throughout our community. So that includes the crossings at Central Street. That includes Main Street, Maple Street, the two crossings at Park Street and South Summit Street. There will be road closures. We are not in control of when these happen. So I ask for your patience. I also ask for your understanding because some roads are gonna be closed and you may not be well informed. And that is outside of our control. But we do appreciate this is finally happening. And this will continue through, I believe until August 16th, 15th, 17th, somewhere in that range or longer depending on delays and construction season. Well, the best part of it, if anyone just go down to West Street Extension and travel across the railroad crossing there and you don't feel that bumping and jostling you do when you're going through these other crossings. So it would be really nice. It's worth the wait. In terms of what the crossings will look like, if you go to the intersection of, I believe that's North Street near the high school where it's nice and smooth. You don't feel any vigorous or rigorous bumps as you're going over the railroad crossing. That's what all of these crossings are going to be like. And as somebody who, when I have to go to work and I go through 2A or go down and have to hit those railroad crossings, yes, it hurts me and it hurts the car. And they're gonna be signal signals that are gonna change too. So it's gonna be really nice. It's gonna be much safer, smoother, everything about it's gonna be better. Absolutely. A long time coming. Andrew, I do have one comment if you're good. Please. I just wanted to update the trustees and community on the city manager hiring process. We are accepting applications through this Sunday, the 12th and then we'll begin the review process. To date, we've received 18 applications, seven of which have come in in the last six days. So it doesn't appear that some were watching the deadline but we'll continue to see hopefully a few more trickle in based on a very cursory review. I think I feel very confident that at least the trustees will be pleased with their top three interviews whoever those folks end up being. I think there's a qualified slate of candidates here and just on qualifications and cover letters and responses to essay questions. I think we're off to a good start. So more to come. Good to hear it. That's great. All right. So if there are no other trustee comments then we are ready for the executives. And so I will go ahead and I will make the motion that the trustees go into executive session to discuss negotiating or securing real estate purchase or lease options under the provisions of title one, section 313A2 of the Vermont statutes and to include the interim co-managers. I'll second that. Thank you, George. Any further discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed, please say nay. Great. Pass unanimously. Thank you all. So again, we will be adjourning right after that. So no need to stick around. Have a good night. Thank you all for coming out.