 I think it's going to be better so I'm not too worried about the winter time because there aren't as many walkers and so on. This is a lot of activity at the intersection point. All right. Thank you. Taking 30 years. We had an accessible path in the parking lot for the billion. I credit some lights for that. I was told when I worked on the fire, the barbecue pit last year, I could not touch a brick with a hammer and chisel until I provided proof of a million dollars in liability. And I have all the emails from Nick with that. And my insurance company provided that to the town before I was allowed to walk to that fire. So the barbecue pit. So we again, this is going on for three years now. People are mowing out in Hope, Davey. Here's Mark Stearwald mowing the wetlands. This is a week ago mowed down flat the delineated wetlands. So running power equipment. This is from last fall. Folks with chainsaws taken down trees. There was an issue at the time of whether there was approval for that or not. So I've been directly told by town officials that the town policy is that private equipment power equipment is not allowed on town property. I have not seen anywhere in the town books, what the actual policy is. I also was told to subcontract in any way that you needed to have $1 million in personal liability. So I don't know where that exists. Is there somewhere that that's in the books so people can understand what the policy actually is even trying to clarify that with our insurance company. Well, where is it right now for the past three to five years where is it that people are telling me this. I don't know what the what occurred the past three to five years. There's no handbook of town policy ordinances which would have said this because people said this. Bill Woodruff said this. So the normal policy, I'll use the Rotary as an example. Rotary has its own insurance. The town has an MOU with the Rotary for their work at Rusty Carter. The challenge at Oak Daphy is center chains is not an organization. But we don't know. We're a non-profit for example. So going forward, I mean, going forward the insurance advises that individuals doing work, authorized work in town property volunteers at a minimum need to sign a waiver. We're trying to get some clarity on the issue of do we need to go beyond that if there's things like power tools. If it's things like credit clearing and more minor things probably not. We're trying to get that clarity from the legal system of towns that provides our insurance. Is that policy in our cash management policy? Because I know we have to have that documentation to pay a vendor. No, these are unpaid. Which is a bit of a challenge. And we are going to address ordinances in our next meeting on the 19th. So perhaps we can bring that up to the agenda as well. The next thing is. You only have one minute left by the way. So we've gone through $70,000 roughly on this park study. We have this accessible path to show for it. Steve Lawspeak said this week that everyone on the steering committee is appointed by the select board. So Steve resigned his town position. He's on the steering committee. What's his status? What was the status and the process for him to be on the steering committee when he's no longer a town employee? What was done to have that happen? Well, I believe he was the only town employee on the committee. And I believe his decision was to keep him on because the study is ending. Yeah. But was that a select board process? So he was appointed by the select board. Okay, but he ended his, he terminated his employment. I understand. But he's also, for example, was appointed to the tree committee as a volunteer. He remains on that until his appointment ends. Okay, the second half of that is he's being paid. And I asked for both his contract and his duties under that contract and his rate of pay, which he says is his private business. But he's a public servant as he works for the town. Where is that information available and where is his contract available? So there's no contract. He's a part-time employee. How do you define that? Defined as he was hired to, in essence, finish this project, host the final committee meeting. And that's really it. Okay. Was that it? Was that your, is that a discretionary decision? That's correct. He's paid at his, whatever his, he was salaryed before, but we translated that to an early rate. Okay. Will that information be public information? Sure. While he's being paid, will that be available? Yes, absolutely. Okay. The last point. I think you're out of time. I'm sorry, Tom. Okay. Well, anyway, some of those drivers had drunk going down how it happened. So they were very inebriated on the parking of the day and they drive away from there. And this shows you a typical day. I don't hope they be on a weekend. There's a lot of alcohol. Anyway, so thank you. Yeah, thanks Tom. Appreciate it. Anyone else for the public session? All right. Looking on, we have the appointment of applicants for the library commissioner for one expired seat. And once again, we're in the unenviable position of having three qualified candidates and only one position to apply. So I'd like to start with Pauline Malty. Pauline, can you come up and just talk about your interest in the position? Why I'm interested ever since coming to Waterbury three years ago. I really got active, even though I've retired and retired and retired. After going to the library, getting involved in some of the things and programs and also getting involved with the town's activities, I thought it'd be nice to jump in again and being involved again. Just to let you know, back in California, I was involved with the library all the way from the friends group, the board of the foundation, city library advisory committee, all the way up to even county commissioner on the library commission. So after 21 years, I was reluctant to stop. But it's because I moved away. That's one way of getting out of certain things is moving away. But I think I have enough interest in the Waterbury library that I'd like to jump back in. Thank you. Michelle Baker. Michelle Baker, I've served from the friends of the library public library. I think since 2016, I've been a treasurer. So I served during the period of time when we were finalizing the capital campaign that financed this building. So in that position, I've gotten to know a lot about the library and its programs, its operations. So when I heard this position was available, I thought it was a good one to step into. I am a certified public accountant and I understand that the person that is leaving their term did serve as the treasurer of the commission. So I thought my skills might be helpful there. The library has meant a lot to me throughout my years as a kid. I used to come to the library. It was a great place for me to come after school and be safe. When my kids were really young, I used to bring them to the library for all the story times. And now I really appreciate the library and all the digital resources it's offered. I think it was really important during the pandemic time, all the services it offered. And lastly, the strategic plan just got completed. And I think that says a lot about the future of our library and the opportunities that are there. And then they have to participate in that. Any questions from the board? Thank you. Very quiet. Okay. And the keen. I'm going to mispronounce your last name. We adopted my first name. That's harder. Thank you. Nice to see you all. Thanks for entertaining my application. But having just heard about the past two, I think we've got some good candidates and I'm okay if you appoint one of the other ones. I have experience. I am a professional librarian. And a lawyer, but I do other volunteer work in the community. And I like to have a nice broad array of community volunteers. I have a specific question for you. But I'm not desperate to be on your library commission right now. I can be on it some other time. Again. Or continue quiet. Okay. We have heard from the three candidates. Thank you. I make a motion to appoint Michelle Baker as a library trustee. Second. All right. The motion has been made and seconded. Any further discussion? I just thank everyone for applying. I think it really does speak to the wealth of experience in this community to have folks stepping up. And just appreciate in particular, that Michelle's long-term involvement over many years in the organization. Yes, I made that motion. I think all three candidates have a lot to offer. As a matter of fact, I think it would be great if any of you wanted to be an alternate. That would always be welcome. But I heard from Michelle that the treasure is leaving and with her experience as a CPA. I think that's those skills to me would be very important to the library. That's why I made the motion. And I'll just add that as being noted, we do have other openings or opportunities coming up. So please, if you're interested in serving the town, we have a great batch of volunteers here and we'd love to have you join. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Congratulations to Michelle. Thank you for joining us. All right. Next item on the agenda is revitalizing Waterbury. Karen, are you ready to make a presentation for us? Couple presentations. Mike, Roger, I just want to say I probably need to excuse myself from the conversation, especially on the Stose Street Alley project, because I'm on their fundraising committee for that project. All right. I hope you want me to sit in. No, I appreciate it if you would stay for the discussion, but perhaps recuse yourself if there's a vote. Okay. So starting with the Stose Street Alley project, I had a conversation with Tom, a couple of real at home. Met with Tom about March 3, early March, regarding the Stose Street Alley project, and to sort of bring them up to date and to make a very specific request. And I've detailed it at length. The Alley, we've been doing significant fundraising. It is an expensive and complex project that we've been working on for amazingly two and a half years. And at this point, I felt it was time to ask the town if it would be willing to contribute to the project, particularly through the ARCO funds that you have available. I've asked for a $20,000 contribution that amounts to one-tenth of the total project costs as estimated at this moment. I am not going to pin down the final cost of this project yet. As every time we turn around, something else comes up. But the project is going incredibly well. There is a good number of colleagues from the committees here. We meet monthly and then some. And as Mike explained, I've even got a new fundraising committee and some people outside of the group have started to meet and help work on fundraising. As I explained in my notes, we've sought money from a variety of resources. We look at different revenue streams. And a lot of those, the funding started with grants, donations in memory of Jack Carter when he passed away in 2020. And then we did a fundraiser for BRICS and I just gave Alyssa her mini BRIC. So the BRICS, we made $35,000 on the BRIC fundraiser and we have over 400 engraved BRICS that are going to be installed very soon. I've written grants and we did receive a $15,000 Animating Infrastructure grant for the Gateway, which is a particular piece of artwork that will be at the entrance of the alley from Stowe Street into the alley. This is going to be something that this town will be incredibly proud of and will draw people to the town. Every component of this project is important. One key thing is that this is not a donation to revitalizing Waterbury. This is a donation to a coalition of partners that are all working together. RW's name is on it because we're 501C3 and we have the staff to manage this project. But that doesn't mean the Waterbury Rotary Club, Bakersphere, Waterbury Arts, Property Owners and Local Business Owners, all of which are represented in the room right this minute are part of this project. So I could talk on end on the Stowe Street alley project, trust me, but I'd be happy to answer any of your questions. I will note that when I was reviewing this document there were two additional grants that we were waiting to hear from. We did not get them. One was AARP and the other one was from the Vermont Community Foundation. But that doesn't stop us. Plenty more to go. But I do think a commitment from the town would add you as a significant partner to this project and really be a statement of the importance of taking this alley and transforming it into a place that is going to be incredibly unique for the entire state of Vermont as a place to come and be in Stowe. I will answer questions. Okay. I'll just start by saying that we did deliberate long and hard during our last deliberation on the 2023 budget on ARPA funding. We did a townwide survey and received over 500 responses and used that as a guide for our investment in 2023. And we committed to doing sort of a similar deliberative process in 2024. So I'm not convinced we're going to be able to make a decision tonight, but we may. That's just sort of to start out to tell you where we are with our funding process. With that, I'll open it up to the board for any further questions or comments. Tom, do you have an update on there was $400,000 budgeted for the reappraisal? And I don't know where we are with that. Still planning to move forward the state debated a bill where they would take over the reappraisal process and they eventually decided to do a study. Of course they did. There's still support for it. So the challenge we could have going forward is we can delay reappraisal for a couple years, but we have to use the ARPA funds within that timeframe also. So we have, as of today, about $300,000 in available ARPA funds, but if we do the reappraisal ourselves, we have another $200,000 in ARPA funds. May I add something? This project, remember, is two components. There's placemaking, which is really creating a special place within this community. It's not just the street. It's not the sidewalk. It will really activate it. The other component to this project is about public art. And we're really looking at every single component of this project to impact it with public art. And when a community starts investing its money in public art, it's really saying something about how we are... We've matured to a level where we see how people interact with it on the streets and how we communicate with each other really is a statement of what kind of community we are and how we want to interact and be present with our guests, our visitors, our residents, our businesses, our business owners. And I'll keep talking. Well, I think it's clear that it's a really important project to the town. And I agree that the town having monetary investment is more than just a monetary investment. It's also showing the figurative investment as well. And so making the town the best it can be. Like Roger said, we are still not fully decided on the process of making decisions. So I wouldn't feel necessarily really comfortable taking a vote tonight. But I would like to, and this was later in the meeting before we plan our next agenda, maybe add that another conversation about what our next steps are because we got kind of far ahead and then now it's been a few months and we haven't had the conversation again. So that would be my inclination. I'm not sure if there are other input on that. I guess my only other thought is that the intention of the ARBA funding really was to part of the recovery. And I'm just wondering if you had some thoughts on the impact of the alley on the economic vitality of the town. Oh, absolutely. This is all about recovery. First of all, if you take a look at what we've done on Main Street and there's this beautiful, I mean, this was a three year, 30 year long process to create a streetscape with sidewalks and lampposts in this design and just really make it, the telephone poles were about to come down. I mean, we could not be more excited about that. So we, this town and the state and the federal government invested to make Main Street in Waterbury a really beautiful place. And the missed one little piece and there's this alley and it is a really decrepit kind of piece of property and it's right in the middle of town. It's next to a couple of very, very important businesses in our town including Stowe Street and Portia and then Kathy Murphy is present here today. It's across the street from the Waterbury Senior Center. It's across from the street from the American Legion. The other neighbor is the Masons who is also represented here today. Tom Nesbitt is here from the Masons. This property is an ISOR and as our community has come back from COVID and recovering itself we continue to try to draw people into our community to come and spend their money and to spend time. We don't want them just to come in, pop in, go to the restaurant and leave. We want them to spend time. We want them to walk down the street and if they walk down the street and all of a sudden come across this interesting sort of gateway and go, oh, what's that? And they walk in and then they sit down and sit down with their friend and have a little talk and then they can pop into the store and go get a cookie across the street and it becomes a place and then next time they want to come into town that's where they'll start before they go to the restaurant. They'll come down an hour early and spend some time. This is all about revitalizing, that's my word, sorry about that. It's all about recovering and making our businesses strong and it takes time and we're very fortunate that people are coming back and have come back to Waterbury but there's brand new businesses on that street. Stones throw pizza just opened up and that flows during the pandemic. That restaurant flows during the pandemic. Access moved across the street and a new business is moving in. They're looking to make sure we want to be able to drive and bring people here. So I think this ties beautifully into ARPA and this project certainly started in fact in the middle of COVID and we've been working on it ever since. Also, I'm not expecting you to make a decision tonight. This project is at least two more years down the road. But the day you call me and say, Karen, we're sending you a check for $20,000, it's a great day and we will celebrate. I will also encourage you, doesn't just have to be funny, you can always be more. But we have some real significant fundraising projects and plans and you are only one of many that we are speaking to. Great. Well thank you for bringing this to our attention I have two questions, hopefully one quick, one very specific. I know you're in budgets, Karen. Can we talk about the cost of ventures? Is that how much they cost now? It depends. Some of these costs are bumped up because of grants. Okay. So we applied for $10,000 grant from AARP because part of the grant budget included special AARP signage that had to be included. And then there's also, you can't just build it, a bench is about 1,000 to 1,500 but we've been talking about making a bench not just a standard square bench but a bench that has an enhancement through an artistic look or something that ties it. That's not, nothing here is going to be, I'm going to say that differently. When you buy public art and you make something public, you want it to last for 20 years. I don't want to have to replace this in five. So we're going to invest the money to make it a really important piece. So there's also the installation that's putting in the pads and designing the whole thing. So 10,000, yeah, that's definitely a little ramped up. But that was a, you know, we'll see. And then my other is this, you have MOU developed with property owners. And I met with the sector before, I was on the board, but I guess I would just say, is there other types of support you need in terms of maintenance or support or logistics outside of just kind of cash contribution? Yes. So in terms of lists here that we established a site control of MOU signed January 21st, 2021. A new one was signed in the middle of May. So it is absolutely up to date and current with both property owners that we can move forward with the construction of the project. There will be a second piece, which is in a sense, your MOU being developed with property owners for ongoing maintenance plans. And I've briefly spoken to Tom about some things that we would really like the town to be involved with. Like, can you pick up the trash? You know, we have trash cans, trash, and then also talking a little bit about liability insurance. That's sort of the biggest kicker. In my meeting with Tom, Woody was there, and I said, and I was plowing it, and Woody looked at me and said, that can't be done. So, but you know what, I know it today instead of in six months. And so now we come up with a different strategy or solution for that. So there may be other bits and pieces, but we have a, and we'll probably be working, not probably, we will be working on that MOU for moving forward of this summer. Awesome. Thank you so much. And yes, I guess I would just echo the same up in terms of process has been all over the place back and forth in public project. Okay. Done with that one? Yeah, I mean, we're not done with it. We will keep it all the agenda and revisit it as soon as we can. Okay. Thank you guys. Thank you. Santa, I love you. Thanks. Number two now. You should have, I don't know if we need to have any major discussion. You should have received my special event permit application for the Lottery Arts Fest. I think it's approved. Has it been approved? Good. I need the signature page because I can't. No, I need to make a motion to approve this special event as its own. And then my other question was in light of that, do we also need to repass the consent agenda, which lists July 16th, which is the date of the consent agenda? So, I'm guessing the consent agenda. That is the alcohol permit. Is that correct? Right. Right. But July 16th would be Sunday. That is the wrong date. You're right. Okay. So I'll make a motion for both just so that we can be extra special share. If that works for folks. So I would move to approve the special event permit application for Waterway Arts Fest and Friday night block party as presented. And also, the black flannel distilling company special events permit for July 14th. Is it? 2023. Noting that it's being fenced. Thanks, Doug. I will second the motion. All right. I have a motion moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none. All in favor say aye. Aye. All right. Although any opposed? Any abstentions? All right. And it looks like you just signed it. I just, I have to have your signed version. I would like to sign one so I can scan it, please. Can I give it to you and pick it up tomorrow? Yes, please. I need to get my permit to the state with before 30 days, which is like seven days. You know what? Thank you. Okay. So last but not least, and just because it's fun. Tom. I have a present for you. Tom. Ask me. You really took us away. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You really took us away. We all have to put my, come on, come on, team. We rearrange the table for this read. Cannot see. You can't see a thing. That's true. I'm sorry. So I'm also going to hand out a couple of pieces of paper. This is going to be really short because I talked to Tom. I actually think we need to have a major conversation about this topic. The town of Waterbury will experience a total solar eclipse at the sun on April 8th, 2024 for two minutes and 30 seconds, starting at 3.30 p.m. And I attended a conference, actually, let's do this, I think once again. I attended a conference, it's the Main Street America Conference for downtown organizations in May, in March, and there was a town, Sweetwater, Tennessee, doing a presentation on their experience of doing, having a total eclipse of the sun in their community in 2017. And everyone goes went in thinking, so excited, and I left scared to death. This sounds like it's going to be fun, it has great potential to impact our community significantly. And here's a couple of statistics, it's estimated between 50,000 to 200,000 people will travel to Vermont to view the eclipse. People have already started booking their Airbnb's next year. I know that for a fact, my board chair says, oh Karen, someone booked my Airbnb for April 2024 for some light thing, I'm like, oh, did you raise your prices, she goes, no, I suppose. So this map shows you two things, this is Vermont, this is the path of totality, and you can see where Waterbury is, two minutes and 30 seconds, okay? Plenty of places north of us, but I think the really important thing to look at is where is Waterbury when it comes to the interstate? Exit 10. Right, and you know what, other than Montpelier where you can get less than two minutes for viewing, we are the first town, if you look on the other side, if you get in the car in Boston and drive to Vermont, you can either go up 91 to St. John's where you're going to come to us, okay? They're not going to go to Stowe because they have to go through Waterbury to go to Stowe. They're coming to us, and I really, truly believe that we're going to see an incredible impact of people coming to the town of Waterbury, and if you look at it, I mean yes, Northern New Hampshire, but who, there's no interstate to go to Northern New Hampshire, why would you do that? You know, Montreal and Canada, they're not coming south, they're right in the middle of it, but really truly, New York City, Boston, Connecticut, Massachusetts, getting in the car, going north, they're going to go up 89 or 91, they're going to come to us. So, there are things to really be worried about, traffic, public safety. By the way, I've already spoken to the state of Vermont, and we have tried to start them, getting them to be aware that this is going to be something to be concerned about. Woody said the Department of Public, State, Buildings and General Services put out an announcement, hey, this is happening, but didn't really think it through. If 50,000, 10,000 people come to Waterbury, it's going to be a major impact. People will get out of their cars and sit in the middle of the road, because guess what? The middle of the road is where there's no trees, and you can see the, see the eclipse. These are all experiences from Sweetwater, Tennessee. They're going to stop, they'll stop on the interstate. Public safety is not just our promise. The Vermont State public, you know, public safety, you have to really think about these things. Emergency responders, if all the roads are closed or filled and clogged with people and cars, we got to make sure our ambulances and our firetrucks can get to where they need to go. They had experience with communications. All the cell towers were overwhelmed. The street lights are on sensors. Lights go up, the sun goes down, the lights go up. So can we turn the street lights off for the day? Porta Potties, we have no public bathrooms in this town. When it comes to Porta Potties, toilet paper. She said there was a run on toilet paper in Sweetwater, Tennessee. So it's really an incredible amount of things to think about. Glasses, glasses, glasses. I bought 100 pairs for $75. I just got them so that I had some. I know that revitalizing water spray is not interested in going into the glasses business, okay? But I know that there are some small businesses, and Katya is here from, and Kathy are thinking about buying bulk. And she said maybe we'll buy 500, and I'm like, or 10,000. But they can't afford 10,000. So the trick is how do we support our businesses and think about these? There'll be trash and recycling. Did Sweetwater give you an idea of how much people would be willing to pay for two minutes for $2? I think it was. And they made $90,000 on the things they sold. But they sold everything, including parking spots. The problem with Sweetwater, Tennessee's eclipse was it was in August. Ours was on April 8th. We can plan until the ends of the earth, and it could be snowing. Right. But if we don't plan, we're kind of... It'll be a bright sunny day. It'll be a bright sunny day. But there's also things. What happens at our schools at 3.30 in the afternoon? The schools get out. Do you want your children getting on buses when there's a full total eclipse at the sun, and they could ruin their eyes forever if they go outside and look at the sun? So should the schools be close that day? I think the schools should be close that day. I can't get them to be close for an election. No, no, no. I'm telling you. Beyond our experience. The other problem is the Sweetwater, Tennessee experience took three days for all those people to arrive. It took 12 to 15 hours for people to leave. The roads were packed and they couldn't get out. Our school buses will not be able to drive through town. It's a Monday. Yes. Sorry, and Sweetwater is about the same size. Yes, the Sweetwater, Tennessee, was 5,500 people, and the infinity thousand people show up. So Mike's got a question. Yes. Karen, we've had an experience like this not that many years ago in Coventry, Vermont, when the fish concert happened. And granted that was over a long period of time, but there's going to be a swarm of people coming here and there's going to be a possible bottleneck. So I think you've brought up some very applicable questions. So here's the other thing. We can say 10, what was it? What was my number? 50 to 200,000 people come to Vermont. What about all those people who live in southern Vermont? They're going to come up. So that's another, it's just something to really be worried about. Other things, accommodations for diversity, accessibility, and languages. Sweetwater, Tennessee had every member, people from every state in the country and 35, yeah, every state and 35 countries present in their place. Now, they also branded themselves as the only place to watch the eclipse in the state of Tennessee and promoted it to the ends of the earth. Revitalizing water rate does not want to be in charge of this. I'm just panicked about it. And so I have met with my downtown organizations. We started planning and I'm actually working with Montpeliers, my colleague in Montpeliers to do some co-planning. There are some towns, St. Albans just doesn't think they're going to have a band on the, and they're not going to worry, there's not going to be too many people there. I just don't think that's going to be the case for us. And then, so the other thing is our marketing and tourism committee at Revitalizing Water Worry wants, our goal is to make it a good experience for everybody in some fashion. I don't want to be in charge, but I don't want us to ignore it. And I need you to know this. I don't know about, I mean, I don't have the money to buy for all these things. It's not in your budget. Oh, by the way, this is eight days after the beginning of the new fiscal year for the town. Isn't the fiscal year start on April 1st? Or are you going back? So it'll be after a luncheon. But you see what I'm saying. So I'm just sharing. If you're interested and curious, we're doing a, I'm doing a Zoom presentation on this tomorrow at 11 o'clock to the hospitality and tourism industry people in our town. And anyone who might be interested to just get on and listen, or I can do this presentation to you directly or in a bigger way. There's just a lot to think about. And it's not, the deal is they are going to come. Granted, if they wake up on April 8th and it's cloudy, they will get in the car and drive away. But they will start here. Can we get them to buy these in advance? Yes. I wasn't in pre-order. Do you know how much they cost if you have like, you know, discover Waterbury or something? Well, you could do that, but you know, it's kind of fun. Do you guys figure out how much it costs? I think for upwards of 1,000, it was 60 cents a piece. These are 75 cents a piece. Yeah. So I think zero is 500, it's 75, and 500 is 70. It's not worth branding them. It's really not worth branding them. We'll get stickers, we'll stick them. I don't have an answer. I have, we have encouraged the state to perhaps buy like 30,000 glasses and front the cost and then let the town's communities buy them from them. But the state seems to be moving at a significantly slower pace for this level of concern than we are. And I will tell you, the Department of Marketing and Tourism was part of my first presentation. We did it at the state level. So they know. So yeah, I've got a little level of anxiety, and I want you to be anxious with me. I don't have an answer as to what we can do, but I just think it's important you know about this. It just seems that in addition to a problem, it could be an opportunity, right? Well, it is an opportunity, but the only way it's going to be a good opportunity is if we consider and solve the problems. That's the important part. If we build big signs that point you to Grand Isle. Exit 10 closed. Well, they get an extra minute. They do get an extra minute. Two minutes and 30 seconds. Sweetwater, Tennessee was like two minutes and 46 seconds. They were just a little bit more than that. Also just because it starts 2.14. So it starts an hour and 15 minutes before it's total. And then it takes another hour. So I mean it's really a two to two and a half hour process. It's in the afternoon. The other thing with Sweetwater is half the people camped and people sold their front yards to campers. But we're not. This is April. If anyone walked around our town on April 8th, it's really pretty filthy. The snow, no, it is, trust me. Green update is in May, but I suggest an early Waterbury Green Update where we go and pull up the branches and clean up the garbage and things like that. So Waterbury's revitalizing Waterbury's willing to be involved and help do the communication and do some of this work. I don't know if we'll do that, but the town may need to seek some assistance from you guys. And you need to be aware of his public works. I shared this with Woody. His eyes slowly went like this. But he also understood. They had stuff on TV two months ago when it was a year away. And I don't know if it was tourism, but they were saying a lot of places were already closed for this. This is something that's kind of, you know, it's almost like if you don't have reservations already, you're going to not be able to take it. Well, I've told my son and his family living in Boston to take the weekend off and come to my house. I said, I won't see you that day, but you can hang out in the yard and watch this, watch it. So it will be a lot of people. They're already, yes, already planning, but there will be more. There will be a day trip for some folks. Rent a space at Dack Row. Well, honestly, there's some great places for viewing, which would be the state office complex, a farce field, Pilgrim Park, Dack Row, Hope Davy. All of these would be great viewing locations. And if we wanted to plan to direct people to viewing, it would be a smart idea. And I still think somehow or other if you cancel that day. Well, I'm pretty bored. Yeah, thank you. Maybe early release. Yeah, that's a lot of things. All right, Karen, thank you very much. Any other questions for the boy? No, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And, you know, call me back if you want to talk about it. We could. It's in April. We could make a killing off of Waterbury Grant. It's no shoes. Or snow shoes. Yeah, okay. Anyone want actual glasses? So people who drove to Waterbury can't do something. Okay. We're stuck. I'm going to be on about 18 hours. I'm going to do more than I do. I want a thousand people right about there on three minutes, 20 seconds. They're stressed out. Yeah. I suppose to be here. All right. Next on the agenda, we have the planning condition. Welcome. Thank you. You're very welcome. Yeah. Thank you. Okay. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. I just want to say thank you very much. I'm so happy to be back. Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, So, I'm not really good at public speaking, so I have a few prepared things, and then I do a lot better answering questions. So I'll try not to read it, but we wanna, first of all, thank the select board for inviting us, and thank you for your service to the town, all of you. We also wanna thank Tom for his new leadership and his thoughtfulness. I think we're all very fortunate to have Tom. With me is Mary Cohen. She's the longest standing member on the planning commission right now. She's a downtown resident, and she's very passionate about the Waterbury community. Mary's background is in working and public education at several locations around the state and at the state level, and I believe this is very helpful in appreciating what it is we have here in Waterbury, and therefore contributing to the work of the planning commission. Thanks, Mary. Personally, my background is I've worked on, I served on the town zoning board of adjustments since around 2008. I will say writing this up made me feel very old. Transitioning to the DRB in 2011, and then looked to serve from a different viewpoint and joined the, I was appointed to the planning commission in 2019. Next year will be my 25th year of living in Waterbury, which I really enjoy, and personally I work for a Vermont Renewable Energy Company and install solar and wind generation across projects in Northern New England and Massachusetts. I stepped into the role as chair after Alyssa, moved up to the select board, and so this is my second year in the role as chair. And as many of you know, the bylaw rewrite has been an ongoing task of the planning commission since around 2018. And so this process for the zoning rewrite is now under its third planning commission chair, working to bring it to fruition. Anything else you wanna add? Yeah, I wanna, since I am, have been at this for a while, I wanna highlight the accomplishments during 2018, 2019 and into early 2020. The date on the draft that the consultant presented is with is May 2018. But during 2018, not only were we working with her and providing input for the planning director and the kind of direction we wanted the rewrite to take. We also updated the municipal plan, reflecting changes in our local government, state legislation that was passed in that year regarding forest fragmentation and local energy plan requirements. And that had to be done. We were five years out at the time the municipal plans were renewed every five years now it's every eight years. So we had to get that done before the end of 2018. And our municipal plan is dated December 2018. So we accomplished that, but it, it meant when this draft was presented by the consultant that we basically had to then just turn around and abandon it because we had to focus on the municipal plan to meet state law. And requirements for the town. During that time, we also worked with around the expansion of the village's historic districts and developed historic overlay district regulations. And I'll say something more about that in a minute. I went through a lot of minutes and some of these I remembered and some of these is like, oh wow. Winooski River tactical basin plan. We had a presentation from the CBPRC, whatever it is, Regional Planning Commission. And river corridor regulations. So there were, we had state folks who kind of, we were involved with the way finding grant that was responsible for all the signage in town and also the interim signage bylaws during main street reconstruction when it started at that time. We spent a lot of time with the zoning administrator contract. Excuse me. We knew all and changes to job description and performance review process. We spent a lot of time sort of our own professional development, if you will, around Vermont Green Streets Guide, Complete Streets guidance that was coming from the state zoning guide for Vermont neighborhoods, also known as Building Better Places. And this gave us a lot of input around the whole land use planning and helped us make decisions that I think will eventually be really beneficial for the town. So as I was looking through all this for 2018, 2019, and during this time, we had public input. We made a decision that in hindsight, maybe we could have done something a little bit differently, but to put this full rewrite, and Martha's going to talk a little more about it, up on the website. So we had a lot of people who found it and would come and ask questions, and what are we doing? And it really was something that we had never seen. Oh, fuck. It was something we'd never seen. So it really is, we're going through page by page. Recording progress. Thank you. But this turn that we took and spent time on during the summer and fall of 2019, around the historic district regulations came from requests from select board members at the time, from DRB member and from the planning director, that this was something the town needed, this was something the town wanted. There had been some historic buildings demolished that because there were no regulations that even guided what would need to happen if someone wanted to demolish a historic building. So we kind of again took a side road and we had a public hearing on February 10th, 2020. And it became very clear that no, this was not a direction that there was any public support for us to do. And so we scratched that we had spent, I think we did start it in the summer of 2019 at a 2024 meeting and then March of 2020 was shut down. Everything stops. So I felt it was important for especially those of you who are new to the planning, I mean to the select board to kind of see, I mean this period of time that was kind of crucial that maybe looks like we weren't doing anything that seems important to know that we were doing a lot and responding to a lot of things that come to us or come to the town staff and then to us. So it's hard to stay on track and we've had a lot of new members and changes in leadership. So we just kind of keep working. Yeah, so to pick up from there, we are a five board member. We have our vice chair is Katie Gallagher and Dana Allen who joined us both last year, 2022. And recently you appointed Billy Victor. So we have new energy. We have new staffing. I think we're turning a corner. We have, we framed a path to getting the unified, phase one unified bylaws out for public hearing in the winter of 23, 24. Now that has slipped a little bit because we have the staffing opening still, but we have a planning professional, the planning professional assistance from Neil who has been, that's giving us some good momentum and he's been extremely helpful. We recognize he's carrying a couple of hats here right now, but he's really been helpful to the planning commission with guidance and assistance recommendations and stuff like that. So following, and then following you guys signing the bylaw modernization grant for outreach, Neil and Dana and I have had a encouraging kickoff meeting with SE Group. The original grant schedule was for proposed meetings this fall, but as I said, I think that's going to slide a bit into the winter. We, I just, I think it's important to recognize both Tom and Neil's help in getting us organized, getting us on the path that it's just really appreciated from my perspective as chair having to come ready for these meetings. So I think it's important to understand, Mary talked about the sort of interruptions I would call, it's not interruptions, that's part of our job and we recognize that, but it is a deterrent, it makes the path a little bit more wiggly than straight and narrow. And the document that we are working with is extremely challenging and it's up on the website, you can take a look at it and when you take a look at that and you look at what we currently have as regulations and try to compare, you'll see some of the challenges that we're faced with and when people ask us what's changed here, what's changed there. So between the document that was to be a rewrite, it's completely a different format, it's a different structure, it's difficult to take that and then consider new legislation and the compliance to that, we wanna be current on our societal goals and challenges and as I said, comparing what's changed and it's just taken a while. The phase, so we broke it into phases, the phase one addresses everything to the Southwest of I-89 to the river and then from Bolton to Middlesex. So that's what the focus is right now, we wanna be really clear that what's gonna happen in the winter is not the whole town, it's just the districts on this side of the interstate. We're very, I'll say very welcoming of SE Group's help and like I said, the kickoff meeting went really well, they're reviewing, they're not only gonna be helping us with the outreach which is the contract, the grant but there is a small part of like getting themselves up to speed on the document itself and comparing what the changes are. So we told them that it would be helpful if they have input, we certainly don't want them to not speak up. So I think that's sort of a summary of where we are and what we see the road ahead for the rest of this year and into the beginning of 24. I don't know if you have any questions for us. Well, I think we wanna help you be successful. So, any thing that we can do and open up for questions for the board? I wanna respond to that. I do wanna thank the board for actually taking one step in having Alyssa be the liaison to us, she's come to our meetings and I think that is a nice way to open up a door of communication. So thank you for that. I guess it's, oh, sorry, go ahead, I can't. First, thank you both for your service. That's the first and foremost, public service is sometimes a thankless job and you're doing a good job. Secondly, I just wondering how you feel the possible changes to Act 250 will affect our possible zoning rates. I don't know if you have any. No idea. Yeah, I think that's a little bit of an unknown still. It is unknown. It's really a negotiation that's gonna happen at the State House. It's kind of happening all right. Well, it is, but it's not moving forward. Right, exactly. I don't wanna, again, that's a really, actually that's a really good example where we need to keep our eye on the prize and the bylaws while having a meal and he's already done this, bring the current state of legislation that's happening that we have to address now and to let us know about other legislation, but it hasn't gone anywhere at the State House. So we know it's there and sort of like back here. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. It's a general question that Roger just kind of opened the door to, but if there are other ways that we can be of help, I'd be curious to know or just actively saying, you know, our email inbox is open because what you do is invaluable to the town and you're a small group and you also have an entire life outside of what you do and the time it takes to do it is, it feels insurmountable sometimes. So if you have ideas now, great, or, you know, we might not always be able to, but I would like to know like if there are ways, you know, that we can help or be supportive. Can I jump in? Yep. I think that's, I appreciate the question, Danny. And I think that the phase one document, so there's, there are two documents on the website. One is this massive UDB draft. And a lot of that, there was not any discussion with the planning commission. It was kind of a boilerplate from the consultant. And to be honest, so in one of the things, it's going to be a huge challenge that we're not going to tackle now. And so I'm sort of saying this, that it's going to come later is a lot of administrative changes and how the structure is going to work. So I don't know if Tom or any of you have thoughts about any aspect of the administrative section for future. So that would be number one, because it's really, it's very different. It's just a whole different approach to the regulations, to the bylaws. The other thing is, I don't know if there's a way to color code, Martha never actually talking about this. Earlier that part of the phase one draft that's up, we have reviewed the whole use and dimensional table. We spent a lot of time making sure that those use definitions were things that we really felt were reflective of the town and what we wanted in the public input we had. We have looked at and carefully, edited the three of the zoning districts that are in phase one. The downtown, a couple little changes to the intro, but downtown mixed use and neighborhood. So if those two sections, you know, the dimension of the use table and the definitions, we've really spent a lot of time on it. So if there's anything there that's like, ooh, we're not going to support that, it would be good to do now. And then the three zoning districts that we have reviewed. And I don't know, I'm thinking it would be most helpful for the things that we've worked a lot on before we go to a public hearing. That's just my, yeah, that's just my, yeah, I think, I just want to cut it off. Yeah. I'm just flossing. It's your time. Tyler and me. It is. Well, your question was, you know, what can you guys do? And I think the answer is look at what we've done. And to her point, the hard part of looking at what we've done is what have they done and what haven't they done? Okay, because we're still moving through the document. So use tables and districts. Definitions. And definitions. You know, that's sort of the key. The other thing is that, and you know, this is part of the grant process is to work with you folks. We don't want to go out to a public hearing without knowing where you guys are. So we're going to need to meet again or work together or we need to hear from you as to what is good. You know, we have looked at very specific densities and lot sizes and things like that. And we're talking about the downtown. And so we're going to have a conversation. And we really, we have no intention of having a public hearing that you guys aren't on board for. All right. I mean, so that's really a primary key that we need your input for. And I think the, I don't know what the next, we're in, right now we're working on special use, that's what they call it, special use regulations. Development standards, yes. And which includes some special use standards. So we're in the process of working on that. And then we're going to go back to the zoning districts and we have tourism, business, institution and industrial that are also in phase one. So we're going to have to, and one of the things that I think is important to understand, and this was a decision made a while ago that when we would do the phase one, like if we're changing something with regard to a particular zoning district, it's only going to be applicable in that geographic area that Martha, phase one, that Martha applied. So whatever the density or whatever the use allowed, so it's going to be an interesting kind of laboratory that people like it for the whole rest of the town. I mean, that's just something, Alyssa knows well, we decided we got to tackle this somehow. Yeah. Okay, okay. Oh man, I forgot that I was just going to ask exactly what Danny has to sell. I think we got a long form answer. Okay, great. Just wondering, would it be helpful to try to set up sort of the calendar for good? I think the interim bylaws sunset in April. Is that right? Yeah. So that's our backstop. Right, yeah. And then we got to think, do a little backwards buildup here as to when would we need to have the final regs in place for us to approve? Right. And then when do we want the public process and then what are we going to need for that public process to happen, so. So I think that's going to address that specifically. That is in the thinking of SE Group and the schedule that I've mentioned. We're going to have to slide what was in the grant application. We hope to have it really in the fall. But, and they know that we are, we're still working on the document while they're preparing the storyboards. So, and doing a survey. So, good to make sure that's the backstop and we all recognize that's the end goal if you will and work backwards. And I think that's a great suggestion to get that timeline. That is one of the things that we're expecting. Right now they're looking at the document. So they hadn't really gotten their head around what we have and where we are. The new, the April, I think it's April 18th, 23 version of the phase one document, which Mary and Neil spent quite a bit of time getting all the accepted changes that we had already done. We hadn't even gotten the changes implemented that we had been working on for the last year. So that's all up on the website as of today, actually. So we have the most current version on the website. And then when we have our next call with SE Group, I think we'll have a schedule or we'll get that working and communicate that to you folks. And there are also state regulations that dictate how many public hearings and when we do it and then when you do it. So we'll definitely figure that out as well. When you get into the voting process on issues. When what? When you get into voting processes on issues in your commission, do you go with the ultimate majority or just like, do you have unanimous vote and then you move forward? Or do you just majority vote? But we do try to reach consensus. But if we can't, we vote in its majority itself. I watched the clock, just kidding, just kidding. I mean, I will just echo my thanks. I know it's less well attended than these meetings. So if you all want other things to do with it, please go join us in our convention work. And really, I just know how thoughtful the group is and really thinking about, and just to like pull everyone if your eyes have glazed over from UPB 12 times. Like I live on South Main Street. Can we put a pizza place next to my apartment? And if so, how big can it be? And can I smell the pizza from my porch? Like really that's what zoning means for our communities and a lot of other things. We have housing on our agenda later. And I just want to say like, again, this is a piece of it. Where are we putting housing in our community? We know we need more of it and how do we actually make that happen on the ground? So thanks for being part of that. I'm thinking more nuts and bolts. I think this piece of coordination that I feel like we have both sides touching on. We as a select board want to make sure we're on the same page as you as a planning commission and that we get a document that works for everyone. And I'm just thinking about, we as a select board don't all need to become zoning experts. That's why we have staff. But I think there is this, maybe sometimes challenging disconnect. It is like totally different language and meaning and just wondering about, is it us as a board doing professional development or working with someone just so that when we, are hearing pushback on lot frontage and coverage, we have the tools to respond to that. Is that something you think Asi Group is going to help with or should we look at how to do, part of the story board. This is why I've worked with Asi Group just on my own professional career. So I'm very well aware of what they're capable of doing and they're going to do it. I'm excited about that. And there are ways of telling the story of, with pictures more than just words. So showing, you know, if you have this scenario, it's going to look like this. And we'll use, we've already talked about using actual Waterbury Street examples. So it's a real live, you can walk down and go look at it and go, oh yeah, I saw that. And now it's going to have this capability. So there is that education piece that is part of the public engagement process anyway. And how can the select board engage in that earlier? You know, I'll keep that in mind as we're talking to them and ask them if they have some suggestions. It's a good question. I think it would be helpful, because when we have our public hearing that you will attend. Oh yeah. So that's a way to do it. But I wanted to, the industrial district is a place where we've had some preliminary discussions, I guess, about whether to allow housing in the industrial district. I mean, you know, there's the strip there and I for one thing we should in the industry that we have is not heavy industry. So that's something if you can sort of look at and think about, you know, look at the map and what do you think? I think that's gonna be kind of a controversial section. We haven't gotten there on the board though. No, no, no, no, but I just did. If they didn't think, you know, what you're talking about, you know, sort of the big issues are coming together and you have thoughts about it before we spend a lot of time, we've got to know. We did, to your comment on housing and I just wanna make sure we're all on the same page is we're following your lead that is not addressed. Short-term housing is not gonna be addressed in this phase one bylaw. It's just too, well, we need to follow you. So we're appreciative of the task force being set up and that sort of being the lead, if you will. We are definitely engaged in that with Katie and Mary. So we're watching and listening, but we're not addressing housing specifically in this read right now, phase one. Other than where we zone housing. Well, yeah, zone, but not a lot of the minor issues. Right, okay. You get the political hot potatoes. Yeah, I think, yeah. Just curiosity, how often are you meeting in person or on Zoom with SAE? We just had our kickoff, we just signed the contract. What was the plan on, you know, how are you gonna meet with them? Well, it's gonna be by Zoom they're looking at the documents right now and then we're gonna be following up with them and set the schedule going forward. Okay, thank you. Well, thank you. I'm just wondering if it would be helpful for us to work with Neil on just setting up a tentative agenda with that to able to backstop and then working backwards as to when conceivably we would be having a meeting with you and with us in the public meetings. And then also you gave us some homework to look over the work that you've already done. So I appreciate that. He'll have the schedule and you're gonna keep coming. Yeah. So we'll be able to get that too, for sure. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it. I also have to say I just run into Billy last weekend just literally out counting trees on the sidewalk. So the word is really hit the ground running. We do a lot of on the ground research. Martha and I did one time and read the list. I was like, welcome in my breakfast. I had a lot of good density examples. It is a really good exercise to just literally walk down and look at what's going on house by house structure by structure. It's eye-opening. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks a lot. Okay, next up we have a request for ARPA funding from the senior center. You know, on track to these. So you want me just to go through what we've requested? Is that how you can kind of explain what we're requesting or why? Yeah, maybe just a quick overview as to why the Q&A is operating. Okay, so the most important part is our snow ventilation system that is for the fire market. As far as I know, it ventilates out to the side and it's supposed to go out and up. So that's a big piece of it. The hood is not wide enough to cover the stove. And there's also no fire suppression system in this thing, so that's huge, obviously. The other three are old appliances. So we've been in our current space since the mid-90s. The biggest concern right now is our commercial dishwasher. We have been piecing it together in the band-aids for several years and you keep thinking this is the last band-aid that's, you know, right now it's not working, we're waiting for the pie to get on the farm. Keep putting money into it, we gotta stop. The other appliances are just, they're very old. They're like 25, 30 years old. So we really need to do an upgrade. Most of our money is just, the donations everything we get is for operating budget. Just to use what we do, this is kind of outside of that. So it's basically good in a nutshell. Okay, great. Maybe if we could go through the idea of the very little six or five different pieces on the level. So the first is a company called NevTech. They would actually put in the hood in the gap. You had the party? Hearing you. Oh, someone's a little closer. So they did ask you to move. And she got to go through that, sorry. NevTech, the first one is the stove hood and the ventilation system. That's the biggest piece. They would have to redo the whole ventilation system, like I said, going out and up. And Justin also told me that it requires a one inch air gap on the back. Well, I have no idea what that means, but that requires a general contractor. Something that you need to get into code. Yeah, you need to be able to service it. So you need that gap to get your hand in. So that's the biggest piece of it. They would have to take out all the existing ventilation, put the stove hood in. The fire suppression system, I don't know exactly what that means, but is what they put in it. So now if there's a fire that goes up, it just goes up. And of course, we have housing above us too. So that's, as I said, our dishwasher, right now, it's not even working. It's probably at least 20 years old, if not more. The other two appliances, they're working, they're fine, but they're just old, you know. So the biggest piece, obviously, is the stove hood and the fire suppression. It's the safety issue there. Have you gotten multiple bins from different contracts, like different restaurants and supply places? For the appliances, no, we have, we would, we'd have if we need to. There aren't very many companies that would install the stove hood. Neftech is one of the ones that doesn't go on. The senior center in, I think Northville just had the same work done and used Neftech. And so there's not been any places that do things like that. But I don't know about the fire suppression years, but we would, you know, if we need to get more bins, of course we will. I don't know how many there are in the market, we do those things. There are a bunch of them in the Burlington. I know it's my old roommate used to be in kitchen supply kind of stuff. And, you know, it's like everything. There's probably been a contraction in a number of years, but there are, I know there are several and I think I'll be off the top of my head. And, you know, we may reach out to, you know, risk factors in town. We don't know. We, you know, we're just feeding seniors. We don't know about commercial kitchens or anything like that. So we obviously need help to, you know, get the different bins and reach out. So there's a few people around here that come by us. My other question is, how does this all affect with your landlord? Do they? They're the ones who brought it to us in the first place. They brought it to our attention about the hood, but obviously we would need their approval to do all this work. We haven't gone that far because we don't have, right now we don't have the money to do this. So, you know, we didn't want to get ahead of ourselves and ask permission, but we asked the landlord. So they wouldn't provide any assistance with fit up and stuff like that? I don't know, but it's down street housing. It's down street, it's here. Yeah. Never heard of that. I know who would definitely go to them and make sure everything is, you know, not perpnessed or anything to do. Yeah. We just haven't started any of that because it's been on my mind. How did it? I'm curious, I know right now donations are just covering operating costs, and I'm curious if there is a plan for special fundraising efforts for this or if you have the human resources to keep it in. We haven't thought about that. Well, I've been thinking about it. We would definitely do a capital campaign. My concern with a capital campaign is people donate to that. They don't always donate to your operating, your manual campaign. Our operating budget is what we need to. So that would be a difficult, you know, way to go. I mean, of course, we would try if we have to. We do what we need to do, but you know, our fundraising now is just to keep us going. Have folks who are able to or experienced or are hooked into either foundational grants or state grants, that would help. Well, we thought about state grants. Tom came over to see us when we first got here and suggested the mockery or something like that. We were going to apply and we missed the first deadline, and I asked him, second time, is it now it's over $250,000 or something. So we're way below that. The challenge you can apply, the challenge is the administrative it's very difficult. So it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to apply and we should work pretty much with them. And we do need to look into more grants and different opportunities. We still don't have a director. We're starting up again. We're going to do this again. Has something dedicated to looking to grants. The board does what we can, but we all kind of come separate ways and you know, all the caregivers are. But we absolutely. I think with the appliances, we definitely need to replace those. The top two are a safety issue. Yes, but we can still operate what we have now. We have been for 25 years. Okay. I wanted to answer your questions. Because I can work in restaurants my entire life. Neftech systems are the best in the business. Oh, I know they're a good company. And the fire suppression system will be Ansel. It doesn't matter who installs it, it will still cost the same amount. It is just the one company that makes the fire suppression systems for hoods. I can't speak on the Blodgett and the Balkan systems because you can get convection ovens any brand. But yeah, Neftech and the Ansel system, the fire suppression are probably, regardless of who you go to, you're going to cost that exact same amount or more. Thanks, Kane. Thank you. But the Blodgett is like top line. With top line convection ovens, yeah. We use them a lot. I'm always very hesitant to take more on. But I don't have an, oh I do have your email here. I'll send you an email. So professionally I'm a fundraiser and I do a lot of grant writing. And I know that there's money for this in the world. So I will, yeah. So I'll send you an email. I mean, we can just have a phone call and I'll see what I can do to, at least identify some and then maybe some folks where we can do the writing, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Any other comments from the board? I think so. You know, Justin did a great presentation here. Again, it was six months ago or what. But you're doing a tremendous service for those odd residents, not only in Waterbury, but through the broader community. And I think we probably want to help you. As we said earlier, when Karen was up here, we haven't really decided how we're gonna just, what the process is gonna be for distributing the ARPA funds this year. I think we do need to figure that out. So I appreciate your patience with us if we don't decide to move the money tonight. But I'm certainly sympathetic to your needs and understand that's a priority for you. Oh yeah. I would like to just speak one last time, probably lobbying for the senior center and the ARPA funds at this point. But as I understand ARPA funds, I think on our, on the Alley project, it felt questionable because it wasn't directly impacting people right then, but I feel like making sure that the senior center's kitchen works is a direct impact on people, like right when that project is finished. And I feel like at the heart of the American Rescue Plan, like sits like the need to help people and seniors need to eat. I feel like funding or partially funding this project is exactly what that money is meant for. Do you care about the motion? I move to approve the request for ARPA funds from the Waterbury Senior Center. I would suggest if you're going to move that, putting a dollar amount in the motion and rounding it to something. Like a 60 dollar figure? Yeah. Can you round up, that's great. Can you round up? And then we could just reimburse them for invoices up to that amount. And if it goes over, they'd have to fundraise or come back to you again. Okay, I will remake my motion. I move to approve the ARPA request from the senior center for the amount of $60,000. Up to? Up to $60,000. Got it? Two or a second? Two or a second. I'll second the motion. Okay, we have a motion moved and seconded. Any further discussion? Like, as much as I'm very supportive of the senior center, we provide a lot of support to them. I do think maybe a portion of this request should be coming from them in some sort of fundraising. You know, and should we be looking at a full $60,000? Just my thought. Yeah. I think, Maureen makes a good point, though, that the way in which we've been supporting them has been through operational funding. This is more of a capital campaign. If there are other ways to raise capital quickly. That's not quick. That's sort of the point that I think Kate was making, is that whatever it is, is not going to be quick. The meals do have to be prepared on a daily basis. I'm personally a little bit torn, just because we do have this process issue on our hand. I'm fine with you. If you guys want to vote tonight, I'm just thrilled that you're here. Another thought is that, you know, the things that are out of code and direct safety issues are those top two items that could be considered emergent, where the other items might be able to wait for things like, you know, sourcing outside funding. So it might, you know, be a some but not all solution to solve some really important problems. Sorry. I love that. I just have to say, I would, with no reservation vote. I mean, when I support all of it, with no, again, for Roger, it's really a technicality around that. I feel challenging over the note, RW along the grounds of process, and then to vote or something tonight does give me pause. But I think that ventilation and fire suppression, I do feel emergent in a different way. Both of those quotes we received in March, and they expire 30 days. So they are not current quotes on, you know, if we can get somebody back out and look at that. And then the other thing to think about is like, it's, you're, they're just sitting really bad as a show without a director. They just don't have the human resources to be self-sustaining in this moment. And the hope, of course, is that, that's solved. You know, that there is- And just so you know, last year, we actually looked all year with two different candidates that we went through the whole process and both turned us down for very different reasons. You know, one wanted to come to Waterbury from the Massachusetts, they couldn't find housing. So we tried. Yeah, we just lived with us as a town, continually trying to hire. So we are trying very hard to- That was more just not a criticism, but an understanding that like, you know, there are times when you're not self-sustaining because you just don't have the resources that you need, but that might not be indicative of what it's gonna look like in a year or two or three down the line. Mike. I agree with Melissa's comments. I have no problem with the first two items approving those. The others are, you know, kitchen equipment. And I do think if you kind of shopped up those around, you might have some savings. And that's why I was a little hesitant to go to that. Right. And those aren't emergency needs. Dishwasher is, we don't have it right now. Right. But the dishwasher, that is, we did get several quotes on dishwashers from many different, and so that was kind of the middle of the road one that we just put on here just to put the number down. So we definitely will look at, you know, what is the break dishwasher to get? And, you know, just to make sure that, you know, we will look around and shop around. So based on the discussion that I've heard, would anyone want to make a friendly amendment to the motion and cut the figure down to $30,000? Mike. I'd be glad to make a friendly amendment to, well, it's $26,000 now and they could come back with, you know, if they have some additional things on the, you know, more of the kitchen equipment, not the fire suppression and ventilation stuff. And we very much entertain, you know, if you have some bids, that amount. But for right now, that's those are immediate needs. And I think, you know, we should approve those. Okay, we have a motion to amend the motion. Do I have a second on that? Second. Okay, that's seconded. Any further discussion on that? We're voting on the amendment. All in favor say aye. Change of time. Aye. Yes, aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Okay. The motion is now amended to prove up to $26,000 for the request from the senior center. Any further discussion? You're none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Congratulations. So what do I need to do to give you a new did it? I wanna say, maybe follow up with Tom. Yeah. I hope to follow up with Tom. Just bring the invoices. Yeah, get some invoices. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you. You appreciate it. Okay. Update on the Charter. Do you speak on that one? I don't know. We have a e-mail or I couldn't find it. I'm not e-mailing it. Okay. Do you e-mail me something about the Charter? Uh-oh. Local Office Tax Adminager for a e-mail? Yeah. Where's that? It was in our e-mail. Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't think about it. I don't see this. I'm sorry. I definitely read it in my e-mail. If that's the worst thing not to say right now. Can you provide a brief synopsis, Tom? If I can steal this is real quick. Oh, that's hard. So the brief synopsis on the local option tax is that I researched all the communities that handle it and was surprised to learn that they seem to fall into three buckets. Roughly about a third of each community falling into each one. Some communities have no policy. Stowe and Essex City, City of Essex Junction just had theirs passed and adopted. And their logic was to reduce the burden of property tax payers, but they didn't have any policy at the select board level or a town meeting day approved by the voters about how exactly those funds are spent, general revenue. A number of towns have select board policies, which means they can be amended by the select board anytime and allocate them into fairly distinct buckets. Some towns went so far as to have charter language as specifically says how the funds are spent. So you have the array of choices. There's, I mentioned when we started the charter research process, there's no model town and it's the same way with the local option tax. So I looked at some of the examples and came up with some thoughts about some buckets because I do think a policy is, a select board level policy is generally advisable. And in terms of the budget and what, if LOT funds would be allocated towards the budget, I'd recommend allocating them towards recurring expenses to reduce them. So debt service and capital expenses, which in effect can reduce the tax rate. Then based on some select board input, the other big bucket I came up with was economic development and community of vitality. So that can be funding to revitalizing water barrier, concerts in the park, public art, various town events, and affordable housing, which I think is both economic development and community of vitality combined. Yeah, so wrote a book about streamlizing and modernizing municipal operations, including any one-time costs. Now that might be an investment to get a longer term efficiency. So sitting in my seat that oftentimes means a technology investment. That could also mean an investment related to municipal consolidation. Then there's one area where I recommended actually some specificity in a policy. So we have, I don't have 2022 numbers yet, but I should in any table in 2021, the town had fund balance of about 2.7 million. Fund balance can be thought of as retained earnings. But that falls into different buckets, some of which are clearly defined about how we can spend those. But the undesignated fund balance is in a negative position. So my recommendation is if you have a local option tax to put a portion of that towards the undesignated fund balance. So it's money that in essence is cash that just stays with the town towards its bottom line. So you would budget it as a revenue, budget it as an expense, front pocket to back pocket if you will, or in essence not budget it, which would have the same net effect. But curing that deficit without going back to the voters of town meeting day would be pretty useful. Then the other piece is, and this also pertains to the fund balance, if you don't have a policy that says what happens to unallocated local option taxes, they automatically just fall into that undesignated bucket. But if you have a policy that is clear, those funds could be, according to your policy, tracked and reserved in a separate bucket, if you will. And so your finances would show that as a separate category. And that could be useful when making long-term investment decisions. Otherwise it just becomes part of the whole. And I, that's the most transparent way to track it also. So that's a recommendation of mine when it comes to the LLT funds. The other question I was tasked with was the manager appointing, hiring all town employees. And there's, again, there's a ray of options in various towns and how they choose things. But the themes I found is that, and the practice we have now is the manager, and I think the past practice, with the exception of those positions in state law, the manager hires, fires, gives raises, all those things. And the manager checks in with the select board that gives her discretion. And I think that generally works. What I suggest you consider, what I think is reasonable for department head positions in a lot of drivers, there's a, there's an essence of check-in provision with the select board where the manager gives a name to the select board, the select board either formally approves it or in some cases tells the manager to go back and bring a different name. In no instance that I found that if the select board isn't happy with the person nominated for the position that they get to pick their own. But I think having some sort of check-in for the most important positions is pretty reasonable. Department heads. Department heads. And the example I gave is Stowe, which Stowe has, the Stowe manager when hiring department head, brings a position before the select board. The select board has seven days to object, which is pretty reasonable. And if there's no objection, the manager can hire. That's probably especially critical given that in theory, a public works director could be jointly employed. So having a check-in here with the other board would also be handy. So that's the sum of the major issues. Well, just to state explicitly, I think this was implied in your point of, there are obviously some positions like Clark got us elected here, but others that are currently specified in state statute, but is it, I guess, putting my cards on the table, I think things like the planning and zoning, director and zoning, the goal is to put those under the manager, which we have the ability to do through this. But no, it's not currently, just mostly stating that with the record. Is there a reason for seven days? I know we're typically not gonna object any of your appointments, but especially when we meet, if there was some sort of thing, it would probably require some sort of short notice, special meeting of the select board, because I assume we can't do that in any other way. Seven days was just an example. Okay. And so like an objection wouldn't necessarily be a full board objection, it would just be somebody emailing you back or what have you saying? I have questions or concerns. The process isn't outlined in the charters, but in theory, I would forward you a name that's still a private process. Right, so there's objections and it wouldn't even mean a majority vote necessarily if one select board, if the select board chair, for example, strongly objects of that person being hired for some reason. It's unlikely it would move forward, even if the rest of the select board, I would strive for unanimous consent in that situation. Can you just clarify the difference between a quote, select board policy and the town policy, the select board adopts? I'm just trying to come to an logic. I know the town has a cash management policy we had to adopt. Is this, I'm just thinking about like, in theory that could vary with each new board, is that correct? But the goal, I guess the thought or intent would be it's set by a select board, but the thought that it would be maintained for a good reason. And I think that's advisable over a policy adopted by the voters because circumstances change. Go back in the last 15 years we had a financial crisis, we've implemented, people weren't talking about affordable housing, same magnitude just a few years ago. So I think priorities can shift pretty quickly. And I think we want to shift with that. Yeah, I was just gonna say my only hesitation, my only hold up about explicitly select board language is that a future select board in 20 years. For example, it was like, well let's pull all this money out of reducing the tax rate and put it all in parades, it's just an example. But my concern would be that a select board at a future date might take what the money that we've been using through the local auction tax to invest in our community and use it for something else. So using the charter language, I would support a measure more that use charter language to explicitly say like this is either going to the general fund or this is going to this economic development fund. Because then it can't be changed at the drop or you know, a vote one night where we really want to increase our fireworks budget, you know, like, it's just my concern. Yeah, I'll just answer what I've been saying. The select board is responsive to the voters of the town and whatever he has a tradition of being a deliberative body. And I'm not sure we want to hand ourselves in to the conditions of today when it could be a problem down the road that we don't consider. Not for nothing, it would also involve engaging with the legislature again if we want to change our charter, which is a not quick process among others. I guess I would say I hear you, I think I would echo Roger's point and also say that like we talked about like new boards. I mean, we have three seats open in a year for election. We have three, three year standard terms. So I would say to the extent that there's some modicum of continuity. I'm not disputing that. You could have a scenario as you're, you know, deciding but I think my goal would be that we create a policy. A future board would want to upholds because it's working well and gives them both clear parameters in the ability to be flexible. The other piece I'd add is from a practical perspective what most towns wind up doing with their roll of auction tax and a good chunk of it is they go to the voters and they say, we want to, we want to buy this for $4 million. We're going to service the debt with roll of auction tax. And then a portion of it is essentially locked in for that use for the period of the tax, which is usually, you know, if it's a road or bridge project, we're going to say, you know, $200,000 a year for 20 years. So in effect, you're binding future boards that way. Sure, okay. So if we have a motion to direct the town manager to grant a charter based on the recommendations presented tonight. I would move that. My only question being, are we doing a proposal for a breakdown of spending or an outline? I guess I self-question around is the mechanism percent of hypothetical local option tax we're sending to buckets? And if so, what are those percentages? I guess that I would love to have a little more discussion about. I agree with the general proposal to have a select board policy in the general categories presented herein. But I guess would just, that would be my one question. Well, I think we need to have more discussion now about what those amounts are. Well, I'm just wondering, do we need to, if the percentages are not going to go into the charter itself, and it's going to be part of the select board policy, could we then debate the policy once we get that charter approved of us? Good clarification, I was fully off. Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. So I won't move to instruct the manager to research, draft, develop a draft charter language that would allow for a select board policy for spending of local option tax and the authority of manager to appoint to send and terminate employees as I wanted to know. So sorry, so sorry. I would say it again, looking up and not moving towards that character. Take two on the motion. So sorry. Okay, so. Not important. I'm moving that we instruct the municipal manager to draft potential charter language based on the June 2nd memo about local option tax and manager authority. And specifically that the draft charter language would allow for a select board policy to be finalized and debated and discussed on a later date about how the local option tax for everything was spent. It's just really sped up there. Okay, thanks. And the stuff about manager's hiring and all the other stuff. I'm trying. I'm trying to take it extrapolated from the memo. Was that part of all of this before another statement? You can cut it out based on the June 2nd memo. As outline. As outline. June 2nd. As outline. As outline. I second that this is eloquent motion. Do you want to ask? All right, any further discussion? Oh wait, was this actually? Seconded? Yes, Mike seconded. He also said it was eloquent. I'm sorry. He said it was eloquent. The eloquent. The eloquent in the room. Any further discussion? Hearing none, all the members say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Tom, do you know what your order is after that? Yes, there will be a whole call on the eloquent's direction as I was presenting. All right, thank you for that. We have the housing task force update. Oh, you start and I will follow up. Okay. Well, I asked in part because Kane attended so good group met. We have settled on a regular meeting date, which will be the third Thursday of the month, six to eight PM. Was great to get everyone back together. I also would say the high level takeaways for this group. We did actually have actual copies because I have all my materials here. Discuss kind of the initial potential action items the group had developed at the first meeting and what potential next steps were from moving forward. Take aways for this group, I would say in general the group supported having a very encompassing view of housing. So candidly on the agenda, we had everything from what we heard with this group here around short-term rentals to homelessness. And just recognizing that we don't have groups necessarily leading on those right now. So given that we had this group, it made sense to have them be a group thinking about those issues. The conclusion of the group is that we needed more information to do that work. So at our next meeting, we're looking at creating a version of what's called a housing needs assessment which looks at what housing currently exists in Waterbury conversations we've had around is there rentals? How many rentals? What type of rentals? How much did they cost? Essentially before creating an intervention we wanna know like what is the need? Do we need a lot more one bedroom apartments? Do we need a lot more single-family houses? Do we need both? And so there was support for the group in doing some surveying around that and needs and desires of the community. So we are working on that and working on drafting questions for the next meeting. Great. I think that was all good. I will just shamelessly, because we obviously would say potentially there was discussion of how that would be distributed and potentially a minor cost around if it was something again we wanted to mail. So obviously we didn't have a budget for that up front but I do in fairness wanna say that to all of us board members to me if there's a way to do it, it could be worthwhile. I'll say just personally there's the balance between some suggested like having a UVM student do it as their topstone project and having it done really quickly. One is the healthy balance there. But I'll say Kim was there and who was there. No, I definitely, some of the ideas that were thrown on like mailers to every resident of Waterbury to ask them what they'd been rent. I was in support of, and then there were some really healthy discussions surrounding homelessness and inconvenient enough. The homeless, the talk of homelessness now hadn't started when we had the meeting. So it's a whole new venue that's opened up. And then we talked about, we spent a good long time talking about short term rentals and the things that the folks task force think are important when it comes to rental housing and property ownership. Well, one of the other things I think capture, I'm just one reviewer minutes, which are posted on the website and we do have a page just so that you all know, was around to capturing folks who like might not live in Waterbury currently, but want to live in Waterbury. So a piece of the survey was also potentially around employees in Waterbury just recognizing what we as a select board obviously have the constituency of folks living here, but particularly with housing again, as we heard tonight, and we know there's folks who are trying to move to our community, but can't. And so how are we capturing their thoughts and inputs in any sort of survey or data work we do? Are you, may I ask a question? Are you doing, do you have a hybrid option available for your meetings? Are you having it? Yeah, yeah, with the owl. I'll check with the agenda. But, I know Cain mentioned this very briefly, you know, talking about homelessness, but we've just passed the time that the hotel voucher system has happened. Have you discussed how the impacts of that will affect our community? I know it's really early now to know that, but I know you've discussed that pending problem. Unless I can speak on that. You'd like, or? Yeah, go ahead. When we were talking about it, we were talking about the independent doom as the news networks have been putting it. And we actually discussed it at great length and kind of came to the conclusion that cities like Barry, Montpelier, Burlington are all going to be impacted disproportionately, whereas we don't offer the same service, as a town, we don't offer the same services, we don't have a hospital here, we don't have a homeless shelter. So we might. Social services. Or social services that would, yep, that would deal with homelessness. So even if or when or now that we have houseless individuals, the general consensus was they would just be passing through on their way to a place that has services that can't help them. But nobody can see the future. So we'll see. And just two minor points that stuck out for me, I agree completely with that overall assessment of like we felt like it again, is more likely to be concentrated elsewhere, was that those relationships are important. So they talked about a lot of the service providers really being at capacity, but in other communities they're really helping to lead response and be a network. And I know Danny has shared some potential resources, but just like we are where we are today, but in terms of future thinking, like how do we have or establish those relationships so that when situations like this happened, we as a municipality have relationships with those folks to say like, are you seeing needs? Do we need support? So just noting that like, again, kind of no fault of everyone, but just some communities already have really strong, existing relationships with those folks. Certainly they provide services in water barrier. We know of them, but I would just say we haven't historically don't think had them. And then also just talking about like ultimately housing supply is really important. So doing work about what we're doing of, it's not what we call tomorrow, but that that is a really important long-term solution around creating systemic change. It's a really tough issue because like right now, both the affordable housing coalition and the homeless, you know, they don't kind of get talking about possibly merging those two organizations together. And, you know, you've seen some people leave and stuff like that. And they were a real voice for, you know, both the housing population and the homeless population. And it's gonna be, I think a real challenge. I know we are a lot of good, strong statewide organizations, but those advocacy organization that bring together coalitions, I think are gonna be missed in this really tough time. And my second point that I forgot is I just want to say also acknowledging that, I would say library employees and particularly we did just talk about our folks that are already municipal employees that are serving and interacting with folks experiencing homelessness. So to the extent, obviously we just appointed someone to the library commission, but we're supporting and making sure they have the resources they need. They were the ones who had the most to contribute in terms of that like current status question, kind of in the community. Just a question. I mean, it seems as though you've got a fairly broad perspective. I'm just wondering if you have the direction and the means to set goals and accomplishment, accomplish them or are you there at that stage yet? It's a good question. I mean, I would say casually, again, we just heard from a volunteer board receiving some staff report support and it's still challenging. So I don't want to be misrepresentative of, it is an all volunteer committee doing our best. And I would say, so to the extent like help and support would be welcomed and it could be more formalized. It was our second meeting. So to the extent it felt like gathering this data was an important, I will say that maybe is kind of part of why the group landed on this data of just saying before we're creating a punch list prioritization project things, folks felt like, we provided a constellation of updates on everything from 51 Southamine Street to Stanley Wasen but kind of how to engage and where to support or the zoning rewrite. People felt like they kind of wanted a little more grounding in like, what are the biggest barriers right now in Waterbury? But I would say, but also like we welcome support. I mean, I'll say like on the homelessness issue, I was like, if anyone has ideas, let me know. Yeah, but this brand new task force solves housing and homelessness in Waterbury, I, you know, fantastic work. I guess one thought that came to my mind is the state has been working on this issue for a long time. Forever. Yeah, but they should have a certain amount of data with which they're working for one. So we may have some statewide data that would inform the situation in Waterbury to a certain extent. And then also, I would have to expect that the legislature has got some intent moving forward down the main aisle, I agree. But we may want to ask our representatives if they could help us address some of these issues to understand where they see the state coming, where the state's dropping the ball frankly and any recommendations coming from them about where the town's position needs to be given the situation with state policy. We give a healthy yes and to data, which is just say the state absolutely has it. HousingData.org is a Vermont website run by Vermont Housing Finance Agency. And it's reliant on census data, American Community Survey estimates, which I think are listing like $900 as the average rent in Waterbury. You've been on front porch for them. That may sound a little off. And actually we did also talk about what data we might have locally just through like how we chatted with the listers, how we chatted with Karen about like, do you have a list of what properties have apartments before? So I completely agree. We should look at what we have before spending more time on something we have. And I will say even the state in kind of best practices for housing task forces encourages collecting local data just because they know there are limitations. And also we mentioned representatives today. And you know, I think we did a survey last year on how to spend the aqua funding, which I thought was largely successful. So I think that we will get a fairly good response if we do a survey. I think that this is important. Be willing to support the costs of that, which are not terrible amount of money. And of note, in that survey, a large amount of people expressed housing as one of their main areas of wanting aqua funds to go through. And so perhaps there's a budget that we create from our funds for the first year or first two years of the housing task force because we know there will be funding needs. So just a thought of like how to actively and immediately use, it would be, I assume, a relatively small amount of our funding directly in the way that the surveys respond. And so just something to put on the back burner. Can I ask two questions? Yeah, shoot. I recall vaguely the process that you went through this to choose the members of the housing committee. Do you know if any of them are landlords? I don't know. Okay, I was just curious. And I also just want to remind you that when we did the survey last year, we did it to households. So it was, which would not be as relevant for the survey. So you would want to, if you're going to do it to the voter checklist, it would double the budget. And you probably want to have either myself or another staff member that had some time to pare it down. So you're not mailing a survey to me and my husband. But, but, you know. Thank you. And that's a great. Oh, look, someone who's been in the housing world for eight believes, to me, the biggest impact that our dollars, I don't know how much of a particular project or something, but to me, the most critical thing is the zoning issue. You know, if we don't tackle zoning where we can create additional zoning units, create the means to renovate existing units, we're not going to do what, you know, because again, it's so expensive to, you know, you look at 51 Main Street, the cost. I don't know if we could do major projects within our community. I think if you get the development community where there was sufficient support to create housing, I think there is the means to do something. So to me, that's, at least my opinion, would be the way to create housing in this community. I think it's greatly needed. That has the rewrites on the critical zoning are being completed. Is that a mistake that could be reviewed by the board? That's what we're working on, PSC. Right, okay. But I think also, if what we heard today, most of it's going to be like on this side of the interstate, not saying that's not something that's workable, but on the other side of the interstate, there's a lot of, a little bit more open land, which might potentially be available to create some, you know, housing projects. And I don't know, it's just, you know, there's something that we need to create the ability with some town support. I think it's good that we would support any housing development, because I know sometimes if you have a developer and they're looking at some sort of key resource that we could be a part, I think that's where our money is best spent. But I don't think, you know, the town's going to want to be ourselves a developer, but maybe I'm misguided. No, and I think that was a point actually, someone on the committee made just about kind of this larger idea about coordination and how does conservation and land use planning and all of these things tie together. So I think, yes, absolutely. It needs to be holistic. I would say if you see particular barriers around a specific zoning, I'm sure that's something the planning commission would love to hear about while recognizing we just heard pretty strongly about the current scope of working capacity, but. Any further action needed at this point? A little plan. Maybe, should we, in July, first meeting in July, come back after that next meeting or on-survey stuff, hopefully. You're good on the timelines. I appreciate your, when's the next deliverable? So we can have an update on what survey looks like first meeting in July? Yeah, if we could figure out how much it would cost, we can move forward from there. You should have reasonable estimate because of the last one we did. But the list is going to be considerably larger. Yeah, I can definitely pull some information off the voter checklist. I'll need you to give me some directions. Well, that's a great number. No, I think the next step is someone to have a conversation with you about Karen. What would this look like? Yeah, we can pull the invoice that Roger received. Yeah, with the group and Barry, which they did a very... Yeah, they did an old job with them, which was... They mailed their life, then it all went too far. And then it also might want to consider something online that the... Yeah, yeah. Supplements the mailing. All right, any other further discussion on this topic? Here none. We can move on to next agenda, next meeting agenda. And Karen provided us with this on the draft agenda already. So we would have the consent agenda, the minutes, and then ordnance review, vendor entertainment and parade. So on this topic, that's... These are the ones that we had discussed and that Tom and I worked a little bit on together. So I didn't have notes on any other ordinances that we were thinking about reviewing, but one came up earlier that I can't recall if that was parking and noise or in the parking lot. There are no parking or noise or that's in the term. Those have been on the parking lot for two entire years. Are you referring to earlier tonight? Yeah, earlier tonight, but unfortunately, the note that I wrote down was simply other ordinances. So I can't recall when it came up. Well, do you remember that? It might have been regarding Hope Davies. It was Tom's written as... But I can't remember what it was. Oh, Ordinance Insurance. Oh, yes. And liability. Liability. So that's something that we... It's not an ordinance issue. Right, okay. It could be in a policy. Charm suggestion. Yeah. So that one, you're playing the last. Is that true already? Do you need help and support? I can get to have them done. And then as it pertains to lots of tonight's conversation, whether it's next meeting or not, thinking about our next discussion for ARPA processes. Yeah, I think we should get that one. And then in that vein is there anything that we should do independently to come prepared for that conversation next meeting? Maybe we could review the survey results on the direction from the households. I can resend that. Okay. And maybe we're... And the budget... Go ahead. Yeah, I think they end the budget spreadsheet that we last updated. And the term meeting report that had the breakdown of what we did in line just in terms of textualizing from last year. Sorry. I don't know if this has to be on the next agenda, but I've noticed the sheriff's been patrolling Stowe Street. Is there a plan for how they're gonna be deployed? We heard someone talk about Howard Street. Howard Avenue. So they're responsive. So if there's community complaints, I can get them, I can get it to them and they can change how they self-deploy if they will. So they were on a kind of an ad-need basis? Yes, I don't have the direct authority to say go here, but I can say when time permits, try to focus your energies in these areas and they're very responsive. Are we talking about... You said sheriff and you're sticking out the Vermont State Police. The sheriff. Oh, the sheriff has been doing it. That's the sheriff on it. The Lamoyle Sheriff. I saw one day, I think last week, the same day he was giving a ticket on Stowe Street and then when I went home on Neyland Flats, he was sitting on Neyland Flats. The Lamoyle County Sheriff. I could swear, the Lamoyle. I don't know why. Well, you know, this is a real tip. Well, no, because for the end of your station, we have used Lamoyle County Sheriff because I think there's some issue with the Washington County Sheriff. That would be a specific contract. Right. And that's why I was just, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it wasn't Lamoyle. Is there any patrolling? I don't know. It makes no sense. We were too sure. I saw that morning. I saw them both on my way. Were they Lamoyle? Do you remember how we should have killed them in Washington, Lamoyle? Curious. Yeah, they could have been down here for a special detail. Uh-huh. That's why we're just one county. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I guess the question is, do we want Tom to call the sheriff and say, hey, what are you doing? Or do we have a question about our contract with Vermont State Police? I'm not just using the question. We want to tell the state police to get the sheriff's action. Well, I know the state police as all but said, they don't have the time to do a lot of speed enforcement. We have heard that multiple times. But and we've talked about a number of times should we enter into a contract with the sheriff's department. And maybe I was off. I thought I saw it said a little more, you know, granted I'm driving, you know, driving down the road. I thought it said a little more of a county, which just surprised me. Let me ask my friend who got a ticket. Oh. Who was it? Let's find out. Not the tickets, I'm sure. Maybe we don't have to pay them. They'll just come down. I was going to say, take their free service in Rome. Yeah, if they're strapped for cash. Yeah, they want to create some additional income to come down to some of our hotspots. Well, they don't even have to come down the street. They can stay up on Howard. They don't even have to come all the way down. Right. These parts are going to be in July versus next week. That's what I mentioned at the meeting last week. July 17 was the proposed presentation Washington. You don't forget them when they're ready to take it. You said it was July 17 to a parks update. Yeah. And that's very targeted. Just an FYI on the next day of the next meeting. That weekend I have one of my few paid gigs. Then I kind of have a responsibility. I should be able to get, here I am. I'm a wait station captain at the LCI derby. We closed down. I'm usually here. I have to drop the stuff off at the headquarters. I might want to zoom while my wife drives here. So I might be late, but I might. Exactly the reverse. Right. She doesn't have one. He drives. I'll be on zoom and let her drive. Zoom in while driving. No, I don't do that. I don't want to make friends with the Washington county. Sure. All right. So we added. So we added our process of policy on liability. Right. For Hope Davey. Hope Davey and parks. I'm sorry. It's now appropriate time to ask about the first meeting in July. Yes. Because I'm bringing it up now for myself, but there's other staff that are going to be out and the tax rate is not meeting. So July 4th is on Tuesday. So the offices here will be closed on Tuesday. Are we meeting on Monday? I don't care. I will be here. So it doesn't matter to me. Are there any of your statuses for the first week of July? The third is not a holiday. The third is not a holiday. We don't want to be out of town. Yeah, but we would already get our efforts. Really. I would have a recommendation. I would be virtual. So I can attend, but I will not be in one of them. I can also attend on the third. I'll be here. I recommend they do the fifth. That's mine. Wednesday the fifth? There are going to be some people that might have a long weekend. They're standing here. Unless they cancel it. Smartness isn't it? Yeah. Oh, are you zoom in? Who? Does CRB still work name or no? No, they come. Then they'll be that Wednesday? Well, I don't know. I think when they cancel it, they don't come. OK, we'll do the third. I don't want the fifth. It's worth the third. I'll cancel it. And I guess I'll go on the sixth. They could cancel. That would be a good question. Yeah, maybe, I mean, I don't know. Whether you're going to cancel something or not. That's my question. We could just go to the 10th the next Monday. We can go to our website. See if anyone does. especially before you're going to be here meaning for the inclusion training. Right, we've got us going to mention that as well. Just to confirm that, everyone's got that on the calendar. 28, 20, 27, 28, 27, yeah, 27, I thought it was 28, 29. Any minute, I just emailed Mary to confirm it this morning. She said July, June. So the inclusion training is the end of June 28. Yeah. It's on the calendar, but it's on June 29. Okay, good. All right, how about the following Monday then? The 10th. The 10th. If we do the following Monday, we're kicking the thing that I mentioned now. Okay, I'm going to have a TBD. Probably 68, I think. I will just say it's all there. Wait, you're not here on the third? Who's not here on the third? I can't remember. You could just say no. Oh, we could do the third, I suppose. I'm just, I'm sure why we're working to move it if everyone's available. Okay. If there's a problem, then I'm fine with adjusting, but if there's not a problem, then there's nothing at all. Or we could do the fifth. I don't want that. I mean, it's just my recurring monthly on the first Wednesday. Oh, okay. Or we could do fireworks and all. I guess, do people have a problem with the third? I don't know if there's more. Third? To the third? I'll take one for the team. My wife's going to aid me. Well, if it doesn't work, then say it. That was my question. If it doesn't work for you, I was asking who it wasn't, who, who. And if it was nobody, then we might as well have it, but if people can't make it, then let's change it. So that's okay. Does it, does it inconvenient or like next to a possible? It's more, it's not a given, you know, just, it's been a historical thing. We've always gone with friends to, on the early to fireworks, right? It's sub-op. Right. Okay, so you like it, huh? It's sub-optimal for me, too. Okay. I never know. Okay, then let's find another one. Fireworks plans. So is the fifth workable? Is the fifth workable? Is the fifth workable for me? Fifth workable, it was something about. I may or may not be able to. I signed up to volunteer. First work is on the fifth and sixth. So I might be able to finagle, so don't worry. It's like, why would I be here, I won't. Yeah, but if you could be here. Fifth work better for you? I have a proposal. What about cancelling the meeting that week? Meeting on the 17th and starting early. You can't, can you? You're gonna set a tax rate on June 17th? July? True. You can't set a July 17th, right? Yeah. You can't make that one. When do we need the tax rate? You need to tax rate that week. I don't care if it's Monday, June, Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday. So it can't be the time that we need it the first week. Like before the special inclusion thing. So let's check with Dan tomorrow and see how close he is. Do you want to set the tax rate next meeting? Yeah. I don't want to pressure him. He's got to get the grand list on, but when it's done, it's a one agenda, it could be a one agenda item meeting. Can we not do it before the inclusion meeting? If it's a one agenda item? That's all right, let's do it. When do those start at six? Oh yeah, that's fine. Well, they're booked all day on the calendar because I don't have a big time. Yeah, but six to eight, I'd like that due in an hour. Let's do other things. Yeah, just an hour, yeah, an hour. I guess we really want to do all the other discussion. So I'm not pushing all the ordinances to the 17th along with. No, that's the 19th. No, no, that's the 19th. Oh, sorry, sorry. Sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, thanks. We're thinking a month from next week, that's what we're talking about. I thought, who knows what, anyone's right on right now, but I thought it was proposed that we would have a special meeting before the trail. Yeah, the inclusion meeting on the 28th. And then cancel to life. And cancel the first meeting down. I think that's reasonable. Great. Does that sound good to everyone? All right, thanks. All right. Perfect, I'm the one saying that. Banking, even we get a banking. All right. One. Two. I think we need a vote on that. I think we've achieved consensus. Now I need a motion to consider any executive session. Who's got the... Personnel or legal? Personnel. Both. Oh. And potentially real estate. Oh, so do you want me to do findings for personnel or... Finding for personnel. Is low or important? Appointment or evaluation of the public officer or employee. Appointment or employment or evaluation of the public as an employee. Negotiating or securing real estate purchase or lease options. And pending or probable civil litigation. Okay. So do I need to find that premature public knowledge of pending civil litigation and clearly place the term at a substantial disadvantage? Do you need me to say that? Mm-hmm. Sure, then. All right. I move to find that premature knowledge of pending civil litigation involving the town of Waterbury would clearly place the town at a substantial disadvantage. We have to find them just that. So someone needs to second that. Thank you. And they don't need to vote. Okay. I have a motion and a second. To all in favor, say hi. Can you pose the abstentions? All right. So then, go ahead. Okay, so I move to enter executive session for the purposes of discussion personnel. Negotiating contracts and discussion pending legal legislation and inviting the school manager to join us. Seconded. And then discussion. Hearing none, all the members say aye. Aye. Can you pose the abstentions? All right. Thank you all. And I move no baby votes coming out of this. No.