 I guess we'll just do what we can. Does that work for you? Yeah. Great. All right, welcome everybody to the Village of Essex Junction trustee meeting for Tuesday, September 24. Please stand and join me for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Do we have any agenda additions or changes for tonight? We just had some handouts for items 5C and 6B. And then we have a agenda addition as well? Like that? We do. Simply, we know it's resigning for the assembly committee. All right, so there's a motion to amend the agenda. So, any further discussion? All those favorably signified by saying aye. Okay, so we will now go on to public to be heard. So now is the moment in time for the meeting where if anybody from the public has something they would like to talk about that is not on the agenda, now is the time for that. Otherwise, there will be time for public comments for agenda items. Does anybody from the public have anything they wish to speak about? I'm Al Bill. This is Ricky from Amtrak. And we're on here as breeding but not on the real agenda. About all the vandalism at the station and bicycle stealing. Is there more than what has already been put in the e-mail that you would? Well, there is some additional pictures that I've taken. When Rick Jones came down, we had him remove the picnic table that was being trashed. Then the two bench seats were moved over and now they're beginning to be trashed. So we thought we and I were thinking maybe shallows removed. Did this just start up again? Is this just like one or two incidents or is it built-in building? Four or five months. Is that right? It started out with just somebody chipping away some of the stones there. And then it got to be more, okay, let's uproot some of these and throw them onto the tracks in pretty big sections. That's one aspect and I believe that's one group that's doing that. But then there's also in the middle of the night sometimes we have people urinating and defecating right there on the platform at the station. That's in the middle of the night. That's different from the stones, but again of course it's not a very good thing to have at the station right there. But yeah, they've been chipping away at that wall there since the beginning of the summer. Have you contacted the police department? Yes, I've had a couple of officers down and we do have the security cameras around the station, but they're only accessible to the New England Central backup dispatches office, which is where the bay window that comes out to the platform. That's the middle section. That's the middle section and we do have the code to get in there. All they changed that? Well, we don't have access anymore, which we should, because all our power switches for our offices in that part. We're not officially Amtrak employees. We're just a contractor to the Amtrak, so we don't have authority to use the railroad building, which is the middle section, and that's where they would have access to security cameras. It is embarrassing for people that come from other countries in the world that we have to see the mess there, you know, and it needs to be addressed. What does Amtrak say about this? Amtrak says contact the owner, which is the New England Central Railroad. What does New England Central Railroad have to say about this? It's a village problem. Village problem. How is that? It's on this property. The wall and everything is all built by the village. It sounds like maybe there's a conversation that should happen between the village and the trackings and the railroads, so many representation to that level, including the caretakers who are contracted to make sure that the property, as I assume, is maintained as it should be. But it's probably more than we would have time for tonight or for an agenda item before a conversation that we haven't information about. So I'd like to see this maybe a first, an initial conversation, and then in the future, agenda item here or have staff take an initiative to figure this out. Thank you. I was just asking if we could somehow ask some help. Just watch over this area. Right after the high school students are getting out and there are dozens of them getting on the bus in the afternoon. That's when a lot of this is happening. It's right in the middle of the day. It's not the middle of the night, it's the middle of the day. And if your people are aware of the railroad, New England Central Railroad, which was the center of Vermont, they own railroad avenue. That's railroad property. At least, I guess, 100 or so years ago, the village has got to be some record of it here. And that's why I think there is a conversation with the village staff and them as well. Change could happen faster than what we could probably just do right now. Is there anybody else who has something that is not on the agenda that you've discussed on it? So we are now talking about this item 5A. First being the interview for the Village Planning Commission with Ned Daly. Ned, would you like to come up and join us here to the table? And Ned, as you make your way up, one of the things that we have done in Zurin, one of the things that we have done in the past is sometimes we've had these interviews or conversations in the executive session. If there's anything you feel that you may share that may have any harm to you, either through employment, contractual, or other needs like that, we can have this conversation in private if you're okay with it. If you're okay with it, we can do it at home. If I say it's okay. Okay. Otherwise, I just thought probably once I had anything. Well, we appreciate you being here. And we have, I know I've had a phone conversation with you. We have what you sent in as well. To start this off, if you will, why is it that you are interested in becoming a village planning commissioner? A couple reasons. We've lived during the village now, going on eight years. Always been interested in development. I happen to have a master's degree in city planning, although I worked in the construction and development industry all my life. I happen to be married to an architect. And I think we both really care about what is done and what is built. I think, you know, I have a strong feeling that it's not just getting a building, but getting something that's a real plus to the town and to the village. And I think, you know, one of the things that's coming up, a very big project that could change, you know, the entire complexion of the five corners area, you know, once it gets built and started. And I think it's going to be very, I think that's an important thing. And I'd like to be involved in that. I also had some local experience, because as some of you know, most of you probably do, on the town of Essex Planning Commission, thinking down the road, you know, whether we become one or we become kind of a joint planning effort. And I think I'd like to be part of it. I have a question. So what trustees or questions do you have? Yeah, just your general take on what's been going on in the Village Center now. You think it's headed in the right direction, some of the decisions that the former Planning Commission has made. And you know, and say whatever you want, whatever comes in your mind. You know, I'm just interested if you think we're heading in the right direction. I guess one of the prime things I look at, and I look at it every day, is right across the street. And you have a, in my opinion, somewhat out of scale building that the ground floor has been 60% empty since it's been built. I think those are the kind of things aren't helping anyone. It's not helping the town. And I think we have to, when we develop one of the things I've found with people living in this area as compared to where I was working, which is in Washington, D.C., is we don't have enough people who really think outside the box when we think of new things. And I think that's important. We're kind of at a crossroads here, I think, and where the town and the village want to go over the next 15 years. I think that's just, that's one of the things. I'm also, I think we need to look at affordable housing, not just for senior housing, but across the board. I think that's an important factor that we need to look at energy. We really need to put the incentives into the planning and zoning code to encourage people to do more for energy saving. Now, if it means looking at density bonuses to the point where it makes it cost acceptable to do that, I think those are the kind of things. And that's some of the background that I would probably bring to the planning for trustees. Thank you. Unless someone sticks their hand up, I'm going to just keep going. So, you know, when, just to go back to this building, when that went up, there was controversy, but at that point, the land development code allowed six-story buildings in the Village Center. And the trustees scaled that back. Now, what I'm hearing, are you saying you'd like to see in order to, what would you, what would you say about that? No, I don't think I'm really saying that. It's not necessarily how tall you make it, but how you make it tall is the bottom line. It's not how big it is. You can be in a beautiful building that's six-stories, or you can have something limited to three-stories that is pretty bland and box-like. Yeah, in terms of, now you're saying affordable housing, but I'm sure you know, having been in the business for a long time, more than I do, that there's always a trade-off for attract, I mean, and I know that we can talk about it all we want, but there ultimately usually is a trade-off between a really attractive building that has a lot of good architectural detail and an affordable build that puts a lot of pressure on the developer and you're aware affordable housing is not probably, the reason we don't see more of it, it's not quite as profitable for developers. And so just sort of throw that around, just throw that out there and see what you think about it. I agree with that, and yet as you drive into Manuski, the new building on the left is a perfect example of someone, a developer who, and I've talked with Mora Collins and people about that who put all the pieces together to mix affordable and market-rate stuff and something that's also in a very attractive building. So it's not impossible. Totally agree with that. I love that. I think that building is, I'd love to get that here. And maybe that building, you know, two blocks down there, city lights building is down the corner, which are real pluses. And if we're trying to develop against semi-urban atmosphere here at Five Corners, we need to look at all those possibilities. No, I appreciate what he's brought forward in his background and everything, but then when we get into the stuff about what, I think we need to, I'll ask you, what do you think about as far as the LBC, the Lane Development Code, as it exists today, and as far as development and its design review board, instead of a planning commission, what are your feelings about that? About a VRB, instead of a planning commission, it's separating the two. Because when you get into the things about what's, you cited that new building then and wanted to go by every day a couple times a day. Everyone's preference is different. One man's trash and another man's art. I think a design review board can be a real plus, as long as it doesn't tie the hands and feet of the people developing it. The city of Burlington has a design review board and it's just terrible to get something built. That's a tough task, but you already need your idea of good design and my idea of good design may be totally divergent too. So part of anything we would have to do was reach agreement and digress a little, but that was basically what my job was working for 45 years. I was representing a design team of either architectural or mechanical or both, and we were building 700-800 million dollar buildings. I was representing the design team. We had owners, we had contractors, we had advisors to all of them, and yet our task was really to somehow work together to come up with an acceptable end product and that was really my role was making sure everybody played nice in the sandbox or most of the time. Any other questions? One other question actually, if you were on the village planning commission at the time that building behind me had come in front of you what would you have liked to see different? Specifically the big piece in the middle up there which does nothing and secondly I think I'm not there I haven't been inside it I think that there's probably some construction defects in there that are going to bite somebody in the butt before long you look at the face that faces Main Street all those panels under the windows and stuff are all moving from the heat and cold all rippling and sooner or later there's no lake I've seen too many of those things happen Any other questions, trustees? No Do you have any questions for us? No I had a pretty clear idea what I was maybe getting into So just so you know there are two openings there are currently four people who have expressed an interest so we're going to continue these interviews if you will for our next meeting and we'll make a decision within a few weeks from that point in time so you may not hear back from us until mid to late October so if you don't mind waiting just keep hanging out and we'll make a decision about that We appreciate you coming up today and we look forward to it Thank you Thank you and so that we can go to item 5B another interview for those planning commission with James Wicks James why don't you join us in the same seat Thank you We appreciate you being here and similar to what I had said to Mr. Daley this conversation we can have out in an open session like this at the same time if you have any concerns about anything that you say possibly having harm on to you either through employment, contractual or what have you we can also do this in an executive session if that's something that you would like So again we have what you wrote and if we can just start it off with why is it that you're interested in Well I've lived in Essex for about 20 days but I've wanted to live in Essex for about 20 years when I was nine I started playing football down Maple Street I've always been associated with Essex and never actually got to live here but after we moved in I went on to the Village website to see what needs or how I could get involved with the community and the first thing I saw was the invitation to apply to the commission and I thought about it seemed like a pretty interesting Canadian beyond so I expressed interest and now I'm here for the first season I don't want to dominate James so you were when you were growing up you used to come around here and I'm guessing it probably hasn't changed a huge amount but it's probably changed quite enough that you can really notice the change so what are your thoughts about it do you like it the way it's changed I'm not looking for a right or wrong answer it's not a multiple choice it's not going to get your sense of how things look different does it seem to be headed in the good direction bad direction just your thoughts about it we're particularly talking around here with the bigger buildings that have gone up and the other things that have been going on around here I like the development that's been going on I think that as part of what attracted us here is to be able to raise we've got three kids and to be able to walk to get gallon milk it's not everyone in Vermont can do so as more comes around we can get a babysitter for an hour and go out to dinner and be back home and I think it's more and more developed I think we're going to have more and more people with young families and with a difficult time getting around whether it's from old age or young age so I think as we have so much accessible by bike and walking it's a plus that is kind of what we've been going for is to have a diverse group of older younger people people who can't necessarily afford a single family all or more but to have that kind of population density that can support a little downtown area like this it is really what we've been going for and it's a great area to say that I'll defer if someone else wants to talk here as far as your time to be spent with meetings you have young children I mean as applications come in there could be a couple of meetings a month and maybe other things come up that's not going to get a problem for you as long as all the meetings are run around bed time it's yours and the children it does span yours and the children right my wife is totally cool with the in your letter you say you're an outside sales person for swish right swish white river can you tell me what that is and what is that? cleaning supplies and food service supplies do you have any background in development or a little bit on construction on a sales and working with engineers I worked in the plumbing industry for a while and working with engineers on what they were going to be speccing out and things of that nature other trustees who haven't had a chance yet James one of the things that besides looking at applications you know while I'm on that just for a moment and we have two former planning commissioners here sitting next to you and they can tell you that sometimes when an application comes in not everyone's happy sometimes an application comes in that people particularly in the immediate neighborhood they don't like it, they don't want to see the new building go up so I'm not going to try to put you on the spot but I do want to tell you that sometimes planning commissioners can be really put on the spot where you can have a room full of people who don't want a project to happen and then maybe a bunch of people do want a project to happen and the planning commissioners have to sometimes make a tough decision I don't know planning commissioners are not in their heads but I just wanted to point that out to you, it's just to think about that and one of the other things that happens is we have a, as you probably know we have a big book of rules about, they're basically it's the code, it's called the land development code for the village of Essex Junction and we, it gets revised quite a bit and so a lot of the time planning commission meetings aren't about reviewing a building application it's about reviewing the details of the land development code and do they need to be revised and that sort of thing again, not trying to ask, there's not really a question there but I just want to give you a sense of what some of the things that happen on planning commissioners I don't know if that is an eye-opener for you are you aware of any of that or not I've been, when I was talking to Robin we went over to him you talked to, okay, so Robin okay, so Robin filled you in with some of this stuff do you have any questions from trustees do you have any concerns or any questions for us or concerns no, not at all seeing as there aren't any other questions I would just say the same thing that I just said to Mr. Taylor about how there are four people who are trying to get four two open seats on the planning commission and so we will continue these questions again for two other individuals at our next meeting so we likely will not make a decision until mid-late October or so at that point in time we will reach back out with either a yes or a no but regardless we appreciate you coming here and submitting of an application thank you very much, thank you good to see you so we can now go on to item 5C a discussion about open container ordinance and please Chief Gary if you will be so kind to join us thank you good to see you this evening thank you for being here, we appreciate that absolutely I know if you would like to start off with introducing this, if you would like me to Evan would like to talk about bringing this up I guess I'm here because this is not something the PD brought up I'm hearing that the trustees are interested so I guess I'm here to I've heard a little bit about it I got a draft that was sent out, I think you may have gotten the email that if we were going to do something like that I guess my first question is why are we talking about it, is there a problem what research can I do what information can I provide to understand why we're headed down this path so I will say I'm the one who brought it to Evan a while ago and this has come from in particular a few residents who have come to the trustees over the past four, five, six or so years mostly talking about what is now the multi-use path over by the railroad tracks on the back end of Rove Street and that's so we've put in this nice multi-use path took a fair amount of money to put it there to try to help one key people safe but also to help prevent people from doing things they shouldn't be doing back there it has come a few different times that while there is now a safe path for people to go down there is not the appropriate behaviors that have not always followed suit and from time to time there are people who do have an open container are publicly intoxicated those types of things that happened back there and the feedback that the residents have gotten is while there isn't an open container loss there isn't much we can do about it so in some instances from my personal standpoint if we're hearing that there isn't an ordinance so there's nothing we can do about it that's actually something we can fix so it's been a few years let's try and do something about it so that was my impetus for having the time to come here so yes we have no ordinance to deal with it's something the police took action for in reference to the open container intoxication if we get and all this starts with if there's a problem someone's going to call a PD if we don't know we can't deal with it if we have someone that's intoxicated that it's the point where they're a safety concern for themselves or for the public we can actually take action on those we can actually bring someone to detox to a family member so we can solve some of that without an open container loss again we have to be intoxication at a level where there's safety concerns or safety concerns of themselves or somebody else I would tell you we don't have a lot of issues with open container we have it historically do we typically deal with them and we kind of you know move the people on but yes we don't have that as an option having that an option would allow us to deal with it and if that's the direction you would like to head I've provided you with a copy just a rough start of where what we would recommend to you folks as a draft just for your review and I can come back and talk about it later on our ordinances we deal with on a civil level I think some of the feedback I got from the unified manager was potentially dealing with this issue possibly through the CJC if that was an opportunity we certainly can request that and see if the CJC has staffing for that then we have a civil fine structure that would be an option for people that either refuse to go through I will tell you that the one issue with that is their civil tickets and neither the village or the town we typically don't go down to the courthouse and pay the village or the town attorney to hear these tickets so the problem is if we get someone that refuses to pay the ticket refuses to go to the CJC we'll write the ticket there's not a lot of backbone behind that unless we want to start investing money into attorneys to graph to those folks your other option is what you saw I believe Mr. Brown that you had passed out was to criminalize the ordinance but that kind of is heading the opposite direction where you're telling you want to be with the CJC so yes we can do it as a civil ordinance you're going to have you may have some non-compliance with that we'll issue the ticket and the people will keep doing it so there's all the all the flavors and we'll go in whatever direction you want to go it's actually another tool in our toolbox that if we're dealing with someone that's inappropriate we can actually use that to attempt to comply it so we have no issue with it I would tell you we don't have a huge issue right now but whatever you and the citizens wish we will so I provided you a draft to take a look at and certainly if you want to chew that and then get back to us if there are other questions or I just wanted to provide you if there's other research that we needed to do if you'd let me know we'd be happy to do that for you I think for tonight's purposes to make sure that we're on the same page I think that what we should do for processes if we have questions definitely address those now but to not get into the nitty gritty of either of these documents for one we just saw them today and so we probably haven't had a chance to read them but then also just from a time perspective to make sure that we have the chance to digest and get the answers we need so if there are specific questions I'll let the board go first but when they're done I'd like to ask a couple Dan just a comment from my experience is that like the Chief was saying the call needs to be made and then in ordinance it's another tool in the toolbox to address something at the moment what happens down the road as far as I understand what the Chief said about the backbone to it being able to enforce it and prosecuting a court if we go down that route but as far as I'm concerned the law enforcement was going to deal with the matter at the time the issue was occurring preventing any further incidents happening and then what happens down the road kind of was out of my hands and at least you dealt with the issue at that point and maybe prevented somebody from doing some foolish thing they would regret down the road so I agree with him adding the thing to the toolbox as far as worrying about what happens down the road I'm less concerned about that whether you know so I think there's it'd be a good deterrent I would say if you had said unenforceable ordinance versus tool in the toolbox those two it's like I like it I don't like it and you said the thing that sort of says to me it's not necessarily going to stop the problem but it's not going to be a negative or a problem for the police so that changes it in my mind just a couple quick questions is there a bandwidth issue that you see with this you know if we do you have is there a manpower issue with this like do you see just putting this in there you're going to respond if someone calls anyway whether you have an ordinance to enforce or not is that true? we have to know that there's a problem I can tell you we're short on staff so us walking that path typically what we are is reactive not proactive we're responding to calls getting the calls we got other places where we got speed issues so yes we've got a resource issue but if someone calls us and we now have the ordinance that we can deal with it we'll respond to it it's balanced with what else is going on that time so it's kind of like a barking dog it's important but it's got to be measured with but if we're dealing with intoxication and drinking we will deal with it we're just going to stack it in the order that we have to handle the call second question may be a little dumb on my part so all on that does the town have an open container ordinance? no I would think that if it did it would have encompassed us so I just figured I'd just ask that if I may we prefer as we had at our retreat discussion we'd like to have ordinances that match in the village and the town so we're treating everybody equally and that I have consistent enforcement with my officers I live across the street from Pearl Street Park which I'm in the village and Pearl Street Park is becoming quite the party scene with just a couple neighbors that have moved in and so it's just interesting the difference is again having an ordinance in the village would expect that when I call EPD about the park across the street that they'd be able to do something about it you can do something but you don't have any teeth behind it if the town doesn't also have an ordinance just coming up we're getting this maybe we talked about this they pushed the problem you know walk over there a little we may if there's an ordinance in the village and they catch on they may go drink in the town so it's best to have consistent policies and rules that we can enforce equally and fairly next slide any other questions the ones I have so you and I have had a couple of conversations about this first you know we appreciate when people call call the police you'll sort it out it's 36 square miles that you guys cover and generally on any given night we don't like to advertise how many police officers we have we have a limit to how many are on shift assuming it's at night do you see any seasonality issues is it do we have things that happen maybe we'll run that path or in the summer that don't happen in the winter etc we're going to see more because there's more people out walking during that time that are sitting out there because it's nice versus the middle middle of the winter so yeah we're going to see more during this weather any potential role for Howard's center it depends on what it is so if we have someone that may have maybe for the people in the audience and stuff how we use Howard's center Howard's center is actually embedded within the police department so we have Howard's center staff that help with calls that may deal with mental health or substance abuse or sometimes just general questions or problems in reference to services or needs so if it's something related to a mental health issue Howard if they feel safe to do it can actually go out instead of setting an officer they'll go out and sometimes meet with the folks and deal with those issues if we were dealing with open container intoxication we probably wouldn't be sending Howard Health out there initially they may go with an officer but because of the potential for intoxication we wouldn't send them on the wrong initially thank you personally I like the potential involvement with the CJC just in the terms of generally these types of things from previous work experience are not a financial deterrent it is not necessarily in the work and that there may be underlying issues there where the involvement of the CJC may be able to help expose some of those underlying issues so personally I like the potential involvement in having them get involved in these situations so it has a way in terms of this ordinance process and the CJC of course they're going to have to say yes we can handle an increased workload so that would be my next thing in between when you get back to me I'll follow up with the CJC and run the central environment is that something that we need to take I think the answer is going to be yes but I don't want to speak for Joe right of course and then also is this something you want the town to also look into so that we town and village so that we are able to enforce it uniformly I think that would be a good question for the town select board for the town chair to weigh in on that but it can't hurt it can or can't see them right so I think that's all we have on this any questions? no great thank you G for coming up so we can now move on to item 5d discussion about security cameras at maple street park where this is another one of those items where it came up some people had talked about security cameras at maple street so now's the time it's an issue that came up back if you don't mind the topic itself when I was on the reconvisory council it came up about six to eight years ago about eight years ago about putting security cameras there and it was batted around a little bit but kind of pushed aside I expressed my concerns as far as our pool and the fact that it's utilized by so many people and even the fields back there and everything else and there's only one basically one route to get to those fields into that pool right by the main office building and just worry about something happening to some little kid or something like that and express concern about if something were to happen and you need something to follow up on so it was things that I'm just very passionate about if we look at an elementary school or a school where there's a lot of kids or a soft target there's tons of security and yet I walk by maple street park every day it's a soft target and you do, I look at it what's the security we have there so I did want to just kind of mention that I had a couple of mothers say to me they were asked me they were under the impression that there were lots of cameras around and I said I'm not sure there are and so I brought it up in a meeting and that was one of the catalysts that got the conversation started sorry Rick I'm going to give you a couple of different pitches I'm going to talk about the business end I'm going to talk about the security end it would be great to have cameras everywhere yeah but the problem is we've got expectations of privacy all those issues that we deal with every day to put cameras in maple street park and to do it right you're talking over $100,000 to put cameras in that park you're probably talking closer $150,000 because and you've got a on a proactive stance we don't have staff that can watch all of those cameras we've got cameras that we've got now that we can't keep an eye on so it's basically you'd have to do it with a DVR or a recorder that's recording it and you'd be responding after the fact to that so those cameras basically all have certain fields of view so in order to be able to cover the park completely you'd have to have a ton of cameras out so I can tell you probably very accurate is going to be over $100,000 to cover that the issue then becomes A, how are you going to pay for it B, when you have to replace the equipment and you're talking about storage of the video how are you going to do that long term C, what about the people that now you're in a public area but you're going to have people that are going to complain about their expectation of privacy in that area right, how is it going to be used and I would tell you when I first heard this from the manager I ran the stats we do not have a significant increase in criminal activity that's happening in that park for the last five years the amount of fights thefts of bikes we're not seeing a huge increase so now I've got my business hide on and I start thinking about return on investment what are we trying to solve and the money that we're throwing at it is it really worth what we're doing and I think Brad Luxe had an email and said we'd be better off handing out bike locks over there to reduce the bike thefts than putting cameras up there my next concern is now you've done Maple Street Park what is the expectation for the rest of the parks in that community and how are we going to do that because if we do Maple Street Park how can you not do the other ones that the other citizens use in our parks it's supposed to be a natural place where if we start giving the impression that being in nature in our parks is so unsafe that we need monitoring by video I just don't know what we're admitting to the kind of community we're living in for that kind of money I give everybody a bike lock a bike helmet, put some crossing guards out get some training for children I mean there's so many other things more children die drowning in public parks and get abducted I mean these problems they're just not, they're fears which are justified but I just don't see it bearing you know we did have an incident many years ago with a murder back there that was with the park and so I think some people with long histories know about that and certainly that is a concern and a fear I can tell you that in talking with Brad about the stats and we ran our stats to see whether we got called over there of course the question is if they're not calling us our stats aren't going to be accurate and Brad said no that's consistent we're seeing about the same stuff what Brad did tell me is they made a little change the troll person that I believe after school hours goes out in a golf cart and actually is wandering the park so a lot of times what we're seeing is fights, smoke and dope and sometimes drinking and that person Brad in his response to me said has made a significant impact in the inappropriate behavior that's happening out there is it going to solve everything? does it mean we not have crimes? no, it's not going to solve that that if we had video it could help us so it is this balance between what are we trying to solve how much are we willing to invest in I think it's not just that once you do that part you're going to have the community come back and say now do Cascade, now do Pearl Street now start in the town yeah I hear what everyone is saying to this issue the difference being and I won't say main but when I was on the wreck advisory council and brought this issue and spoke to it the comment from one of the members of that board was well I feel at risk when I cross the street anywhere in the village the difference being across the street a million spots in the village, in the town, wherever there's only one spot where a kid can go in and out of that pool and that's right by that front entrance to the building where I'm talking about it and I said to the board members there anybody else I'll tell them right now I'm for it, I'm not saying keep the video forever rewrite over it just as much as any store as George said in the school they have cameras, they monitor the entrances to the place that's where people are coming and going so if some mother just by accident you know goes to the bathroom and some perp goes and grabs that child says oh your mother asked me to come get you and walks out when it's after the fact and we go back and find out oh if we just done this I'm just saying it won't be because I didn't suggest it and I'm not trying to protect everything I'm just saying when you know for a fact there's only one place where people go in and out of that room sure people can hop the fence and go in the back it's not so much that issue the expectation of privacy anyone for me as I spoke Raj and I spoke about this before I explained if I want to I can stand down here at the five corners with my video camera and there's nothing in a view as a state trooper when I was working or the police department can do about me videotaking everybody coming and going that's the fact that you was the right to do that so the expectation of privacy is when you're in your own property and the curtailage of your property but as far as public spaces I don't know it's a matter for discussion but I'm just giving my point of view I'd like to just not debate public privacy no it was brought up but just in terms of what's legal I don't know one quick thing there are cameras currently you don't need to tell us where they're pointing to but can you, for anybody who doesn't know that there are some cameras on Maple Street correct? I see more I think we would rather not discuss where cameras are if we're not going to discuss where cameras are and we're talking about putting more in that's a hard enough for me I'm happy to say it looks like a camera on Maple Street Park so I feel that there is a camera there and whether it's we need to go into details but this presents the problem we're in right because there's a lot of ways to get in on Maple Street Park a lot, you can go around the back of the pool you can run down the path there's so many ways to go inside of Maple Street Park there's one way to get in the pool we're not talking about the pool we're talking about the whole park so you go on the tennis courts you can go through the woods it runs in and out of the woods it comes in from IBM the privacy thing I was a photographer for Newspaper I know all about what I can and can't do in private and what people have for expectation it's not so much about whether they get to have that expectation it's whether they're comfortable enough to be in their community and expect that they're not going to be surveilled I mean I just what's next? are we going to say well we'd sure do a lot better if we were able to use spatial recognition on that perk we took the kit we already keep license plate stuff why do we keep it? we don't need that for 6 months I don't understand that at all if you didn't ding on it dump it, why do you need to keep it so if we were to do this I would say yeah we can keep the video for a week but it's got to be destroyed and a week should give enough people enough time to realize their kids missing which is tragic and the police enough time to kind of say let's go back and look at this source I would think, I mean I've deferred to the experts but I certainly don't think that the long term storage is an issue because we really shouldn't be storing it so if the boards are okay I'm trying to be cognizant of the fact that we have a joint meeting that we're running into it sounds like there are some questions about one shouldn't we do we philosophically as a board feel that there should be more of what there is as well as questions related to storage questions related to this that we aren't really going to have time to delve into the details of right now that maybe we have Chief come back at a future meeting with some guidance, some answers some law around what is allowed what's not allowed so that way we can have a less reactionary, more informed conversation and if there are other specific questions I agree with you, except I would only say one thing my thought is is that I have questions about this that I don't think I would like the Chief to come back when we have some specific questions for the Chief I'm listening to our conversations I think I'm hearing a couple of different conversations I'm trying to just understand not any of the security privacy stuff I'm saying if we're running daycare after school programs and school-like programs all day long in a building in the village how is that different than a school you see what I'm saying the Chief to answer that's a question for us to answer that's my only thought I totally agree with you I can just honestly see this going for 45 minutes to an hour before we can really get anywhere else that's where I was going if I may, scope is the huge start I'm not sure whether you're asking me about and what I told you was security cameras around the whole park if we're talking about the pool areas then that's a whole different number and that's a restricted area but again you have other areas that you could have a problem which then leads into the issue of you had cameras here, why didn't you have the cameras in the back so it's a huge discussion but we have to understand what scope you're talking about before I can give you good answers about cost would it be possible to I don't know if this is you this is Brad or somebody else what other communities are doing in this topic so there's also a frame that could either be replicated or not for parks, certainly Brad and I could ask those questions if that's what you want us to do I think that may also be helpful in terms of the scope of realism versus practicality trustee do you have any concerns I think that's great and I'd love to see if you I've looked at a couple studies meta-analysis from England which is plastered with cameras and the research suggests that at zero impact on reducing crime we're not talking about crime per se right now we're talking about child reduction and stuff like that which is different but strictly speaking video surveillance does not at least they are and they're a very similar society I'd love to see what you find with other communities doing parks are they seeing seeing an impact from that just the stuff I've looked into which is I remember we're going to try to pass that out to the director I would also encourage independent research from board members if it's of interest just passing along so are we good with this item of 5D okay chief thank you for being here really thank you David look forward to seeing you in the future we cannot move on to 5E we can make three parks a waving of the no alcoholic beverage policy park as soon as it's from Brad he is not here somebody doesn't want to bring this up or should we say yes I will take it so on October 12th from 12 to 2 EJRP is hosting the second I guess you can call annual now battle of the barbecue and they're requesting the same as last year that they know alcoholic beverages and parks be waived for that two hour period of parks and container was appropriate I don't have any questions any trustees I'll just say the same thing as the last time this came up with personally I'm against having alcohol at a park personally it's just not something I believe we should do and I'm happy to be the lone voice in that well I for the sake of moving it forward I will move that we wave the no alcoholic beverage policy chapter 3 section 303 at Maple Street Park the battle for the battle of the barbecue event on October 12th from 12 to 2pm is there a second is there any further discussion on the motion I'd like to hear your thoughts Andrew why should we not personal philosophy I don't believe parks and playgrounds are places where people should be drinking okay I'm curious what Brad's going to do to separate where this is going to be in the parking lot do we know where we can call them I'm just I mean I was going to be next to the little thing where are we drinking I think that my best guess would be that it's going to be in the parking lot because there are multiple food trucks coming in for this and that's probably the best place for them oh it takes place in the parking lot look at that thank you Brad it was a success last year they have certificates of insurance from all the vendors which the league of cities and towns our insurer said and that they're already working with the vendors would work with the vendors to ensure that the Vermont Department of Food and Control laws are being followed South Bronson, Bronson and Colchester are other local departments that host these types of events I feel comfortable the idea that it's sequestered in the parking lot and I pretty I do be a confidence that Brad understands the concerns about people just roaming around the park and I know I don't think that's what's going to happen so I'm comfortable with it so most of them table there's rest of yous for comments those in favor please signify by saying aye aye all those opposed nay alright so three to two that passed who's the other descendant though Rajan going on to item 5F cap of program review committee report on local option tax Sarah and another one of us talked about how to introduce this so cap of committee we spent a fair amount of time looking into ways to fund our cap of projects given that we have millions of dollars in the village of outstanding projects that will need to be completed and we do not have millions of dollars in funding revenue coming in not to mention when we think about capitol the report from John Alden the other day about our buildings so we as a capitol committee we came to the trustees and asked could we do some research on this and exploring local option tax the trustees said yes and so we did some research what you see is our final report where I'm not going to read the report one of the things that we learned in doing this is that's I think it's important to say the village in the town as communities when a business is in either town or the village and they report to the department of taxes their sales they identify where they live we all town and village have the 05452 zip code we all say s-exjunction for a mailing address so the overwhelming majority of the money that goes in is says is in s-exjunction well we look at the rooms and meals tax or the rooms portion of the rooms and meals tax the overwhelming majority of the rooms say they're in s-exjunction when I think we can say that's not true we're splitting out a rooms and meals or local options tax by the town and the village just is not practical the tax department doesn't have the ability to do this to put that onto staff to do doesn't make much sense nor do I know if the tax department would give us that level of data so we really came at this with a local option tax we believe from the capital committee that this is something that the town and the village should do as a way to one hell pay for the infrastructure since when we think about a business like a Lowe's or a planet fitness or an s-ex rental or other businesses or rooms and restaurants that exist in our community the people who drive on the roads are not just s-ex residents the people who patron those businesses are not just s-ex residents we have people from surrounding communities who come in and utilize those businesses who take the wear and tear on our roads which then can wear and tear on our water lines and our sewer lines and they're not paying for it so this is a way to one help us pay for the infrastructure that non-residents are utilizing plus when we think about anytime that someone goes in flush the toilet that goes somewhere that has to get processed in some facility it's time that people who don't live here also pay their fair share and so this is a proposal from the from the capital committee to one ask the trustees to engage in a conversation with the town select board around a local option tax and so that is where I will start or that's where I will end for now if I'm not getting quite dry thank you if anybody has any specific questions Mary-Lynne Sayer from this not really a question but just a comment from the one that you know when you look at Burlington's South Burlington they already have a local option tax so we're really not breaking any new ground it's pretty much accepted in the community my feeling is that I'm going to be since the select board is here and I think this is sort of projects into kind of a controversial area but the need for a local option tax in my view when looking at this is significantly greater in the village than it is in the town outside the village and I won't go into great details but I think we have a lot more heavily used and older infrastructure and so I think this has perennially put a problem on us it doesn't mean that the town can't use it wouldn't be able to use the money if we generated a half a million dollars and splitting it equitably but I do wonder an alternative solution would be if we're going to have a discussion if the select board feels that they don't this might be controversial is that we may be considered doing something not unlike what we've done with the highway budgets where we start have a more equitable sharing sort of a town village wide redistribution of capital expenditure funds for capital improvement instead of the village funding a significant portion of the town's capital expenditures and also funding all of our capital expenditures I think that's really if we're going to really get to the hard nugget of the thing I think that's really the crux of the problem my feelings I'm glad and I totally agree with you but I don't think a TIF TIF is a great idea but it's got nothing to do with this issue at all but either way I'm on board with having a discussion with the select board on this and having staff look into it more trustee do you have any other questions on this okay would I be happy to we can talk about a point in time to engage the select board through other joint meetings and how to proceed excellent great and so we can move on from the business items and we can go into the consent agenda just wanted to one quick note the item that has removal of parking spaces there's actually a procedural item if you are amenable to the removal of those spaces we have to amend the ordinance and then we'll have to go through that process we'll be able to if you do want us to go forward then you can come back on the agenda for start the amendment process of that ordinance so do we need to remove this item from the consent agenda basically what we're saying is you'll see it back on the agenda with the language which one are you talking about? the parking spaces we're trying to figure out where they are which ones they are you can remove if you want to basically they're in the corner they're on the east is it east or is it north they're in the corner they're the first three spaces after the intersection when you are coming down prospect you're facing Lincoln they are the first three spaces on your left when you are sitting there there's a right hand turn there's a left hand turn if there are cars parked there you really cannot see oncoming traffic and by the time you inch out past it but those are legal spaces and we would have to amend the ordinance to show those as no parking so this will have to come back to us but as you say if you just approve it it'll come back as an ordinance great any questions, comments on the consent agenda anybody want to make a motion? I'll make a motion that we approve the consent agenda second any further discussion? all those in favor please signify by saying aye anybody opposed? great, thank you once again I really appreciate that with Jones and Hamlin Engineering jumped on this that we've had some reports of close calls pedestrians and we believe that this is the right answer for that and it also require that one of the signs will get moved a little bit further up on Lincoln Street which is also one of the things that is making visual a problem over here so we can go on to the reading file any further comments? okay any comments? okay we don't have an executive session so at this moment we can just take a brief recess as the trustees portion of the meeting will come to an end or we'll take a break and then we'll have this work come up and join us we'll have her join me shortly give us a few moments as we go you're going at that right? from swimming get their attention I'm going to drive but I don't know what to do so welcome back everybody I'll call the village trustees back to order I will call the Essex Select Board meeting to order any agenda issues or changes? no any issues or changes? thank you we will not approve the agenda changes so we can go on to public to be heard so now is a portion of the meeting in which if there is something that I would like to speak to that is not on the agenda now is the point of time to do so is there anybody else? just so I can get an idea of how many people would like to tonight okay so we have two can you raise your hand first? can you put your hand up? I'll bring it over so I want to speak to the merger to date I've tried to get separated and shared to be studied and represented and taken as a viable option to date I've pointed out some of the inadvertent use of presumptuous terms that Mike was leading public today I want to talk about sacrifice current merger scenarios ask the town outside the village residents to sacrifice their hard-earned dollars to cover more than half of the taxes and services elected by village residents only now this alone is not necessarily a problem unless let me quote Mr. Tyler here at a governance subcommittee meeting just two months ago and they quote our assumption has always been at least on the trustees that service levels will be staying as they are at the ground level whether you live in the town or the village what you're going to see municipal services isn't going to change now that's been our assumption unquote now this is the position of the joint boards you're asking one party to make a sacrifice while the other seems to offer nothing in return you might say well wait a minute the village is offering something with this sacrifice all the great village services will now be available to town outside the village residents and so make that case so far I haven't seen it if the village was to come to the table with say a 42% tax of taxes or services it could be seen as a serious partner at the 916 select board meeting I ran into a villager who told me that he favored merger but not for the reason that I thought it was his hope that town outside the village influence would impact some fiscal constraint on the village spending so clearly there are some village residents that are aware of that problem the assumption that all village only services will remain the same without even giving town outside the village an opportunity to weigh in is simply not fair and untenable to a town outside the village resident and prudent village resident as well if you want to sacrifice you have to if you want to sacrifice you need to be prepared for that I'm still waiting to hear what the village is willing to give up in exchange for a hoped tax decrease thank you before we, Irene before you speak thank you Ken if there is anything that is related to one of these agenda items one of them being an update from the subcommittee on possible merger that could also be a good time to talk about things related to a possible merger thank you after 14 years of studying and promoting merger I've concluded that merger is inadequate in addressing five goals of good government therefore I welcome staff board members and voters to join me in thinking outside the merger box because merger has ever and only seriously addressed one of those goals fair taxation but even that I did unfairly the other four goals appropriate representation access identity and transparency have been collateral damage every time a proposal to merge has been published since 1958 please move with me now to the 21st century with a plan that doesn't smush together four departments that have so far resisted consolidation however planning, fire, recreation and libraries could remain as they are or partially cooperate under the newly minted separate and share model that Kent has devised at the same time the already consolidated departments could continue on their married combined way same thing for committees and commissions the last thing I would do is split up say the energy committee which does fabulous work at a recent meeting the government subcommittee dismissed the separated share idea because separation was considered last year as a governance option and rejected that's not fair to the author of separate and share only a complete separation of the town and village was ever mentioned at the governance subcommittee a separate and share never optioned was never considered I know because I was there I served on the governance subcommittee that Frank scored and then narrowed the options to two finalists merger and special districts or status quo the benefits of separate and share closely mimic the special district model and until last week that model was under discussion now that it's been deemed unlawful and the special district model is off the table I would encourage you to make separate and share your new companion model and give it to consideration the public was told last spring that surveys and focus groups would determine if the staff and elected officials had missed anything now that we've received a great idea like separate and share from a public member I look forward to hearing you vet that option against merger at first glance I see no tax shift and an inherent incentive toward fiscal responsibility in the separate and share model it may also make for better neighbors as estranged partners won't be forced to go habitat as they would be to merger knowing how busy all of you are yet things started can instead of a matrix that compares these two options side by side this could certainly be expanded upon when might we get together to chat about the SAS model to objectively see how it can meet our needs my schedule is very flexible thank you I'm glad we waited on stuff that doesn't have anything to do with the agenda so we can go on anybody else from the public have a comment on something that's not on the agenda okay so we can go on to item 5a discussion of joint budget initiatives thank you so welcome everybody to the beginning of budget season I know it feels like it just ended but it's starting again in in the packet of the last meeting in the reading file was this same memo I think I fixed a few typos this time with outlining some of the goals that the management team has identified for the upcoming budget cycle to help spur you into thinking about what your goals are and this evening this is one of our spotlight topics so that we can take your ideas and your initiatives your priorities and your goals into consideration as we get started with the budget process internally so that's really all I have to say if you'd like me to hit the high points of the goals I can but I believe you've all read this at least once and so I would look for the joint board select board to start talking about what are your big ticket items for the upcoming budget cycle haven't maybe not alright welcome to the ceremony Seisha friends from the select board would you like to pick this off I would be curious to hear what select board members have in mind based on the list that Sarah provided stuff that may not be on that list and then whether any of the things on the list rise to the top in terms of priority I did have one question about one of the goals that's listed here no new full-time positions will be approved correctly if I'm wrong but I do think that we are still under where our recommended levels should be as far as policing services go is that correct or not correct we have vacant positions in the police department once those get filled will that bring us to a level where we feel comfortable with that or not I don't want to just immediately discount no new full-time positions if we feel as a town we need something like more police officers we'll be spending most of this next year filling those positions but we have the general just is for no positions is because of budgetary reasons and other priorities we would give direction to staff not to propose that we could look at hard-time positions and other things that didn't carry full benefits but in the way full-time positions affect the budget both of the town and the village that was important anybody else from the select board have questions or comments or prioritizing that you'd like to share can you just explain the one line that talks about the funding of the town budget to village budget for WREC absolutely so one of the things that we want to discuss in this year's budget is how do we fund these co-located recreation programs so that we can give equal access without harming one party benefiting the other how do we also equalize the funding for these two programs if that's something we want to do now that they're co-located from a staff perspective that has always been one of the goals of this co-location project is how do we make this community recreation and we're starting to take steps toward that with co-locating but still being separate we've already done a small monetary sharing initiative in the FY20 budget with the town WREC department no longer using sunset studio but being able to share aspire we've also had some conversations about this with the being charged to town outside the village folks and so we want to continue to go down this road in a similar fashion to the way we've done I guess the highway budgets where I guess that's sort of this is still just in its idea form here so if you have other suggestions this is when I would like to hear them in a way in which the village would be the village of the budget for EJRP and then over time that dollar amount would get shifted to the budget that's funded by the larger by the bigger bucket remember and so this is a step in that direction so are you saying that in comparison to when these shifted public works from the village into the town budget this is a similar thing but done in smaller increments that's correct but I believe when you did that you also removed portions of the highway tax at that time that made the offset this does not have an offset yeah is this new money or is this transferring money from the town budget that would have normally been budgeted for spending in the town to another is it new money or is it existing I don't have a new revenue I don't have a new revenue source it would be part of the budget of taxation so if the village if the town budget was 3.5% that would be part of the 3.5% increase so I'm not sure I've got I understand the answer is this an increase or is this take the town budget and take $165,000 of it and put it into the village because we're not spending that money in the town budget or is it a whole new $165,000 it's going to be added to the overall amount that's spent on for both communities I did not understand your question is there new revenue to support but you were asking is this a new line item in the town expense budget and yes it would be and then it would go to offset the total cost of the recreation budget and the village general fund so then the intent is this gets counted as revenue in the village budget correct so that there would be X dollars less of village tax dollars going to fund the EJRP budget it would not be going directly to recreation it would be going to the village for services at the village or anywhere it's actually money going to the village the village can decide where it goes but in general they're trying to say that that access is town wide so how do we explain what we get for that money and I'm just trying to figure that can I follow up on Andy's question so please remind me when we took a transfer of $3,000 to cover the cost differential was there I can't believe I don't remember this but I don't was there commensurate town outside the village residents didn't have to wait they had the same sign update and they had the same pricing for everything except for pool and child care so if we are looking to increase tax revenue to transfer that over to village rec to cover the joint administration of the co-location is that going to change our village or town outside the village residents going to be able to enroll in Camp Namble Street and scrimming lessons in day care the idea is to over time equalize the cost and equalize access so this is this would still need to be vetted and explored by the two recreation directors into what does it mean, what does it look like what is the multi-year plan but we would like to get started on this in this budget cycle now that they're co-located so expecting more information okay yeah generally in support of moving in that direction we will continue to research it and come back and say not research but really fully vet what the idea is what it's for what are the concrete steps that are going to be taken to equalize access what's going to be done what is this dollar amount represent and what does that look like over the next few years this is like a heads up I just want to put in a vote for $165,000 is going to be raised to move over to that department that town outside the village residents don't wait that's a big investment and it should be immediate if the benefit is to be paid for then the benefit should be received right away so I'm not sure how we'll work that out but I suspect that other board members would also feel that that's deserved if the payment is made I guess I said this before I want to understand what this means we're looking at a November 2020 vote on merger and that's still one of the pieces that has to be discussed so I just sort of again I just sort of feel like that's going full steam ahead in a sense despite everything I just feel like it gets confusing the benefits of the reasons we're merging getting muddied I feel like this is ill time and I haven't changed my opinion from the last time we talked about the $3,000 before but I just I guess I would love for this to sort of stop so we could get a handle on what we're trying to merge and decide whether we're going to do it or not if that's what we're going to do let the community vote on it finishing up all of the leftover departments that haven't been consolidated I don't understand why I'm arguing with getting $165,000 I don't know why you're arguing however I do feel like that's going to be the expectation as Elaine articulated I don't know that I mean I'd leave it up to Brad now to figure out I'm sure they would figure out an awesome way to make those accommodations they probably will but still my point is let's just do this in a sense to get the merger right if it's going to happen and I believe what I heard Sarah say before if I may is to one what Elaine was just saying about having the equal access with the number one decision should be made through the lens of is this beneficial regardless of the outcome of a November 2020 vote that equal access for town outside the village residents the local location recreation department would be beneficial to everybody regardless of what would happen in a merger vote so to get that process started I think is what they're saying I'll just go to Dan can I just take that one comment I'm also trying to understand this this change would also is an attempt to offset potential increases should we decide to merge and bring it a little sooner then it is a it would have that effect that is not the intent you know that's not the only intent but that would be an effect sorry Dan thank you to that end the 165,000 dollars Sarah are those funds those tax funds generated only by residents outside of the village no it would be all intact I just wanted that clear to everybody here it's not just coming from the residents outside the village so this is sort of partial consolidation then of the wreck department would it be viewed as such when we talk about consolidation when you guys talk about consolidation I think about policies and procedures and staffing in the five personnel manuals and the different budgets I don't think about the money so when I think about the money it's not so much in the effect of sharing the funds or equalizing the source of having one source of funds the way we have in highways to meet doesn't necessarily lead to more consolidation it just leads to more equitable funding source for programs that the entire community is benefiting from which we would have to couple with changes to the registration and fee structure as well I guess I'd like to see what the details are because I'm sort of feeling the same way Raj is we got this vote coming up people will tell us if they want to put everything together but if this is to help with equal access sooner I'd certainly be interested to see what your thoughts are and while we're still I expect we'll probably continue with the wreck piece but it would be really helpful please tell me if I'm out of line to get sort of a straw-pull sense of does the majority of the group feel like time out on the sharing funds or keep pursuing these goals because that really changes the way we approach this budget season so if that's appropriate I would appreciate that sort of feedback I think we're going to keep talking and maybe we'll get there today but maybe not we'll do our best that would be helpful otherwise there would be two different budgets that emerge so 81 Main Street where Allys town and wreck department offices were located 75 Maple Street as you all know is 0.8 miles away from each other frequently the staff from Maple Street goes for a walk in the neighborhood and then sometimes I'd see Allie and integrate so I'd also go for a walk and I would think to myself as they all walk past my house boy that's odd right so to me while I hear you Raj absolutely to me the co-location the wreck departments is sensible either way it's sensible whether we wherever the vote goes the co-location of the wreck departments is only making all of Essex recreation stronger and smarter there's nothing about it that's not a good idea it's absurd to have 0.8 miles difference between the offices right now they're functioning I don't know I haven't been in there but my assumption is they're functioning in a far more effective fashion they're able to communicate about recreation to one another on a daily basis in the same building have genuine and authentic conversations about our public recreation and what they can do for our community and so while you were talking Raj I was like yeah that's true but when I really put my head in the right place about it we can't really go wrong to serve our community with our recreation because in the heart and soul situation that I think was just you last night right? last night seemed like a long time ago all of a sudden but you know this is so valuable and so important to our community that I that yes I really when you were talking I was like yeah but then I really feel that no matter which way we dice the whole thing and slice it up we're still going to come out wanting to serve our community wisely like this and there's still some pieces of recreation that like when you go to school that's going to be where childcare is those pieces have to do what they are and the rest should be equalized so that people can all just get into their recreation in the town and the village thanks Annie I mean I agree completely with you Annie you know I was for the previous votes about merging the two rec departments into a district but one thing that I really have to do is that if there is a vote taken that we have to respect the results of it and I mean not too long ago the towns did vote not to combine those two departments and it does seem like this is you know sort of you know where I've said it it's kind of going ahead and I just my personal preference would be to merge them but I just I don't feel like I would be at all comfortable just discounting a vote that happened two years ago where unfortunately that was just not what passed you know this is I realize it's not combining two directors but this seems kind of like an end around something that the public already voted down if I may of course my only pushback on that would be that what was voted down was a union municipal district in which it created a whole new governmental entity not put to voters is do you want the town of the village recreation departments to be one department within one community so I think that there is a slight difference there where one created a new government and one is don't create a new sorry don't create a new government but pay for things differently so those are two separate questions yeah absolutely Sarah can I ask you up until everything we've been going through all of this potential murder talk and all of the consolidation we've done today I personally can say I don't feel like ever been led astray by the staff and you've always given us exactly the data we need and any recommendation that has come from you guys has been with great reason and a lot of thought ahead of time so can you give us in a nutshell the staffs thinking about your thinking Ali, Brad what is the thinking behind this increase and why now as opposed to waiting until next year if we have a positive merger vote to answer your question I can't do that in a nutshell tonight without Ali and Brad here to also talk about it this is something that we started last year when we started talking about the co-location the natural progression of that initiative that we put in place last year this feels organic and like it flows out of last year's budget into this year and down the road how do we do things better and smarter to benefit the whole community if there's curiosity at least about this item then Ali and Brad will be put to task by yours truly to really flesh it out and come and talk about it sooner rather than later and I'd be happy to assign them that task when they get back from their national conference all rested and re-infigurated and full of new ideas that we may or may not be able to afford okay I'm sorry Raj you had your hand up I just want to make it clear I don't mean this just for wreck I want all consolidation to stop until this merger conversation is over it's a great idea I mean we should have done this years ago I was on the board that wanted the U.N.D we wanted some way to get them together so it's not about whether I think Brad and Ali can make this the best record department in the country absolutely they can I don't want everything to stop so we can have a baseline conversation about where we're at if we keep doing this then it's going to be harder and harder for us to explain how everything works if we keep consolidating things while we're trying to merge that's just my I feel like it complicates and it's one year and as Dan pointed out I'm going to have a tax increase from $165,000 to a wreck program that I already have as a village resident so I'm trying to understand, want to understand more about what as a village resident how my experience is going to be 42% better so your village taxes are going to go if the only thing that the let's imagine that the only thing the village paid for was $165,000 for each ARP and nothing else to simplify this and the town paid for nothing you in that $165,000 was taken out of the picture and poured into the empty bucket you would still be paying for the debt but not as much as you were previously so your town tax rate would go up some but your village tax rate would come down more this is not, hey EGRP we found you another $165,000 it's for placing village tax money with town tax and not increasing their budget by $165,000 but the sentiment of not continuing to do consolidations as the money transfers aside I hear that too thanks for referring to me Danon I was just getting to the point that we were talking about the program's accessibility to the programs at the same time at the same rate as village residents but before I agree with Raj with Raj just said it was kind of like putting the cart for the horse and almost to the point where sometimes I think I do like what we've done so far but it does make it very difficult to explain to the people outside of this room right now or the people that aren't paying attention to the video what's going on and then can I just ask a slightly different question for me I'm a little concerned we say do no harm and I understand what you're saying here but do we know and I think I saw somewhere information about health insurance Evan but I don't think we have a solid clear understanding of where health insurance is going I'm concerned and again I think 2.5% overall increase is admirable but do no harm in my mind I think we nevertheless have to say do we want to have a level service budget is that what we're aiming for or a level funding budget what are we doing here and in my mind in the village at least we generally try to go for within reason we try to go for a level service budget maybe that's going to change I don't know but right now I would hate to see one department have to cut back or get something that it doesn't want i.e. decreased service in order to pay for some other departments health insurance increase and we all know that one or two people changing their health policy in our little departments can profoundly change their budgets so I just wanted to throw that out there I'm not having I don't have a question so much as a comment that I think 2.5% get it do no harm and let's try not to exacerbate the balance between the town and the village I get it but also I'd like to throw in there I would like to I'm in favor of maintaining current service levels throughout the community village and town so I think we have to have some flexibility there and that departmental that's a directive to department heads when you come back with your operating so non-personnel budget that's your goal for that you're going to have a great reason I mean to cut you off Sarah but I guess I wanted to just sort of say that I read down here building maintenance program incorporate results of the space needs study I didn't see anything in the space needs study that didn't have a gigantic price tag associated with it so I'm not really clear how that integrates or corresponds to the rest of the team of this whole thing I would say if anything you maybe want to hold off on the space needs study for a while if you're going to try to keep the rest of this going that is likely more of a comp that's likely more of a point for the capital budget which is the breadth of this village so I certainly appreciate the part of do no harm if you can understand that the gap between the village and the town is the village is 3.5 each million etc the village goes up by say 4% and the town goes up by say 3.5% that gap gets wider so we're trying to be cognizant that the things that the village does and the things that the town do do affect each other and do affect that gap we want to be mindful that's where this comes from our decisions, your decisions in the budget should have that lens of do not try not to do that unless there's something that just comes up that happens health insurance one of the largest departments one of the largest departments in the town is the police department we don't control how people do their health insurance you can be single you can be two person and you can be family and you can run the gamut every month, every year changing that status one really sucks the budget one really helps the budget and then everything in between for the departments we're trying to say try to keep your department at this level services being equal let's get through this year let's do no harm if you don't give them that thing they wouldn't do this one in three that was okay I'd like to get this and I'd like to get that we want to get them really sharpened down the pencil with the goal of staying in that realm and if they have something that's going on that we're not aware of make your case but it's got to go against everything that we're trying to do that's with that as for the space needs study we'd like to be able to look at is at some point we're going to have to start putting some money towards some of the items in that study what they are, what they're prioritized really doesn't matter at this point you have zero, you're starting at near zero you have to start putting some money away or for some for some planning and for some patches what we're really thinking is some of the buildings are going to end up getting patched but targeted and wherever that starts it starts with a few dollars being put into funds trying to fit it into this framework and then usually what Sarah does with her magic spreadsheet I was going to say one but that's more of a spreadsheet we find where those balances come, again maybe the one 65 becomes something else and the money gets moved to make sure that the numbers come out to something acceptable to the community it's the beginning but you got to have some framework for it I just again, and I agree not disputing anything, not disagreeing with you but again just a little bit of advocacy for the smaller departments in particular I mean recreations half a percent increase in the rec budget is a big chunk of change a half a percent increase in the fire department budget is not a lot of money and so it's not equal it's a lot of money still but not as much and same thing for like community development library is still pretty big but some of our smaller departments we don't want to, if they have been waiting and they really need something I would hate to say maybe we need to ask Rec or one of the big ones to actually put down their budget a little bit what if the big budgets of rec, library police or whatever, I'll go village in down the village, you know the big budgets are library and recreation and capital, et cetera if they rise higher than say two and a half percent they do affect every other budget that's why we're trying to get people to focus in on really thinking about two and a half percent would that equate to two and a half percent total budget not exactly because again there are certain things that are outside village there are things outside of budget of a department that affect the entire budget health insurance wage increases in general for our contract these are just things that are we have to keep and then there's capital and our capital expense and debt so these are all, they all go into the pot I can't do Sarah's thing from last week but they go into a pot and then we look at it and see how do they top out what's absolutely necessary we can wait a little bit and try to keep it but with wages and health insurance this year we will try but it is I sent out an email I don't think anybody in the state should be shocked that Blue Cross and Blue Shield rates are going up anywhere from 10 to 14 percent ours is looking at 12 and a half and we are looking seriously at other vendors there's MVP and others and as I mentioned in one of my emails Blue Cross and Blue Shield is shedding members, they call them members of lives and my joke was maybe it's because of their rates I don't know why they're saying they're not doing as well but we are not likely to be able to absorb a 12 to 14 percent health insurance increase without making some changes and then stay in a budget that the residents can afford but it's like ding so if you're looking for big picture kind of ideas here for the budget from just my perspective I'd like to see the budget not be the whole budget be no more than say 3 percent this is kind of a special year that I'd like to really not do additional cost sharing beyond where we have today because we're really taking it to that next level if that's what the residents want and I know we have contracts that require certain raises and that's going to take a big chunk of that say 3 percent or whatever so I don't really see this recreation thing shifting being appropriate for this budget in my opinion though I think the reasons are good of why it's coming forward but because of the year that we're anticipating with this vote I think it's best to stay status quo in my view but if we can do the overall budget to be less than 3 that would be cool but I think to do that you're not going to be able to shift that rack that's a big chunk of change again even though I know it's for really good reasons but this is kind of a special budget year in my view because of what we're proposing in November 2020 so if it were different you know we didn't have that vote then I think that's the right the right way to go but I think the circumstances in my view are different this year and I'd like to just express that we appreciate the input it's just my view the last thing you have on the list here is community justice center funding is that a proposal for a change to it or is it just a matter of no right that isn't very that's not very but I also do want to say I would like to they've sort of been off in the the shadows and grant funded and not really shown as part of the town budget and I would really like to sort of even though they are almost completely grant funded we added some funds in the police department budget this year to help offset some of the costs I so would like to bring them in and show them like the division of the public safety budget that they are so that we can get some more attention as we move forward with their granting of funded year term thank you you're welcome so would the Howard center people be included in that Howard center is in the contracted services line in the police department budget but not horribly dissimilar so let me touch on both of those thank you so for those the community justice center is a grant that we have I think it's from two different state agencies that believe it's from corrections and judiciary okay we get a $200,000 grant we administer the grant with Milton and Colchester if you don't give us a certain amount of funds you are supposed to give us it like kind contribution we do get a little bit of money from Colchester we are currently not getting anything from Milton long story but the grant is all three communities in one grant we cannot unbundle long until the grant is done which is this next year the community justice center does not want or operate very well inside the police department building a lot of the people that they do don't feel comfortable going there so we have rented space outside of that their grant is kept but they are town employees so they are subject to our personal rules therefore they get pay increases but there is kept so we want to look at how we are going to continue to fund CJC community justice center going out further understanding that their grant is talked and the money that we are spending is not and the work that they do in our community is not so they are occasionally a budget request and other things that take from the police department budget so we are kind of trying to figure out what happens to them and our program as their grant is kept and our costs go up so we need to start budgeting and always talk about state and grants and where that goes and then do you end up one day the state says we are not doing that program anymore or we are cutting it in whatever percentage they do and now we have this great program that does things in the community and what is its impact back to Howard center Howard center is a contract we have an impact with grants we have a grant and we have a benefactor from the University of Vermont hospital gives us a grant as well and then multiple communities are sharing a service I go through a bunch of names and I will end up missing somebody but Shelburne, Colchester Essex, Essex Junction Charleston and South Portland too we all work together we have a contract they provide services they are embedded in the department again grant funded and funded through a grant with the hospital we are very concerned long term where that funding is going to be and what is our contribution what is our call volume how much of a service can we do and therefore we want to make sure that there is something in our budgets to cover wage increases etc etc so that should some of our other grant funding be lowered we are not lowering the service but we have that safety net and we have looked at some of that funding in the health and human services grant but again if you take it from there you are taking it away from others and that is about 140 143, 143,000 so it is kind of a dance that we are doing we want to be forward thinking because who hasn't heard in the news that the state grant funding in the states doesn't have that kind of money they come up with great ideas of how they can shed their costs they are currently doing a fantastic job of shedding state costs to the local level quietly, slowly but they are doing it or the threat of it sorry longings but they are great services in our community and very much needed Robby ask something completely different what is included in the IT and security upgrade line what are you guys thinking about well there was definitely some access controls for this building and some phone system stuff we were looking at the timeline of that we have been able to move that up a little bit given some recent phone system failures at buildings that we didn't realize had actual phone systems now we do those are the big ones they are that door access control type stuff right so you thought about aligning actual IT services the stuff offered to the staff seems to be different between village and town at least this for us I thought we were getting into talking about main libraries we would love to standardize the IT for the select board and the village board into one device that we instead of two different devices not even device, I was thinking more we can have some sort of just the whole back end of this is odd Google got all the good Dropbox got all the good half installation of Office 365 but it's on-prem so I just didn't know if that was going to get specialized a little bit that is part of the discussion we continued to have we started last year about what pocket we provide and how we provide it instead of having Dropbox and Google Drive would like to do one is that how it is for the two staffs or are you all in the same system is it different for us just trying to figure out not everything is completely the same across the entire town and village we are going in that direction I think wastewater just got connected to our network not too long ago that was one of the last big ones blanking on the others it is coming together one of the last differences is that it is the same staff that is doing it we have the same administrative and IT staff uploading to your different packets so it would be helpful for us too to get on to one system but wastewater got connected in I believe GRP is now on the combined network wastewater phone went down all the time non-target phone systems I think that was what company oh that was me that is how I know it I really appreciate you stepping up and saying that it was not IT we just had to call so yes we are trying to do some of those things we are trying to standardize servers and services and make sure but also giving people some freedom to do what their operations need as well and the Bernal Library and the Essex Library are really I would say they are different than most of our operations in the fact that if you came in to do Lincoln there is not a computer for the public to use there is no computer for you you come in you get a building permit you pay your water taxes it is not like here sit down and use a laptop from one of our computers that doesn't happen it doesn't happen at 81 main it doesn't happen at 75 maple but in our libraries people go there and use town or village computers to go on the internet to do research and so that animal such as it is poses some interesting obstacles there are still practices around that and so we are working through some of that is that overseen by RIT our municipal IT staff or are they on their own? RIT staff basically runs all buildings except for Bernal currently they don't touch anything the IT really isn't doing much of anything over at Bernal they have some staff that I prefer they have some highly qualified staff taking care of that but we do want to help out where we can and get them some things that we still would like to do to help with some other staffing issues but it is not a big focus it is not a big money item but cemeteries just make sure they are treating them all the same and being fair to them Greg that is your valoic she is Mr. Cemetery we would love to start to align we will probably see an increase a request for an increase in the maintenance budget for the town cemeteries this year probably about three years ago the town started giving us extension cemetery association $5,000 a year that is with the understanding of municipal ownership the town is the overarching municipality so it is going to take over yes extension cemeteries so it started giving some funding for when that happens the town cemeteries mountain view cemeteries and the common burial grounds they get like $2,500 a year combined for maintenance and about half of that goes towards the memorial day flags there is a lot of maintenance in their mowing of the lawns but they can use some more help in terms of seating lawns just general maintenance so we will probably see an increase there and one of the things we take staff take very seriously the fact that we own and operate cemeteries and what it means to the families who have their loved ones buried there we do not want them to get into disrepair that is disrespectful from our standpoint and therefore we are putting policies and procedures in place to address the maintenance of those we are not necessarily in charge of headstones those are the people that did the maintenance in and around them and any disrepair we own them we maintain them and um I don't really know how the best way to touch on this is some meander a little bit incorporate the results of the space needs study and capital we talked about it very briefly earlier we got the results and the recommendation for maybe what should get tackled first are we thinking that we should put off everything this year or like specifically we were talking about the exhaust the fire station and I've been up there when I was doing the tour Dennis brought me to the fire station and I mean the exhaust from the trucks literally kicked back into our volunteer fire department's equipment I mean it's really pretty horrific like that was what three firefighters who were on duty said independently from one another as an issue but because of this year and the merger we don't want to look at any of that stuff or if we're thinking about prioritizing maybe one project should we discuss which project can I interrupt there I didn't mean to interrupt that, let me just add on to this I don't when Dennis brought that up or when John Alder brought that up I didn't even understand why that specific issue was included in the space needs study that's just a dire need thing it's like the roof is collapsing or the the pipes are backed up just fix it for goodness sake don't put it in a study, just get it done I would just put it in the town fire department budget and get it done I don't know what's where it belongs I mean if we're sitting here talking about priorities I mean I would love to see that as a priority totally agree how much that costs $30,000 you did, you brought a $30,000 meeting but okay what we'd have to look and see what the village spent in this particular building I'd have to find out I wouldn't even say it has to wait for this new budget I mean I don't know if there's funds from somewhere it seems like it's an important piece to at least see if there are funds to be able to address that sooner than waiting for this budget this next budget is there anything we missed in our list can I ask another question my last one don't wash yourself in like that that's what I thought that could be a problem we have a two cent capital tax but then we also have and sprinkled with various other accounts transfers of operating funds into capital and I'm just wondering whether it would be appropriate to consider increasing the capital tax to make things more transparent rather than having operating funds this is a town statement the village capital is handled whether it's been brought up before should we need to increase the capital tax and take those dollars out of the operating budgets so that we're not so it's more obvious that what's being raised for capital just make them more transparent I think Dennis addressed that and said that's being looked at right that's what I recall I think we can take that and look at it I think one of the big topics that we're going to need to talk about regardless of certainly if a November 2020 vote says yes, go ahead and merge is how do we do capital together and regardless of the result of the vote do we want to do capital together and does the local option tax play into that there's a reevaluation of the capital tax I'm not done I won't say that word again I don't want to but I think that this is one component or one idea of a much larger and more in-depth conversation that we'll need to have sooner rather than later do you have one clarifying question on review policies that have monetary impact you talked about fee structure discussions what about does that include fines too the fine structure sure because I don't think they've been updated for a long time our fines are very small we really don't like doing it in village or in the town we prefer compliance it is really more like impact fees and think about this things that cost us more money to actually issue them and take in dog licenses we charge I think three dollars whatever it is twelve we don't get those twelve dollars we can we get I think two dollars of whatever that is the state gets the rest but we only get two dollars we can actually charge more but we get two dollars for all of the work and sending it to the state so we need to look at it I have no idea when that will last but you come to find out after ten years it's still twelve it's still twelve dollars we just want to look at some of these things what's appropriate how much staff time and other things do we do to that permit or that activity and is it appropriate thank you for clarifying that are we doing an impact fee study was that discussed we talked about looking at them we don't have anything but a full-blown study yet it's huge what do you want to look at but we talked about a sidewalk impact fee, direct impact fees we're still collecting them but the study they were based on expired in like 2013 or 2014 so they're due for an update we have talked about it it's on the radar we have not started based on our town capital there's impact fees that feed that fund so I mean it's all intertwined if any of the select board members before we wrap this conversation up I'm feeling like we might have gotten to the point where we're all set Sarah had asked for a consensus or a sense of the boards about the direct transfer so can I ask select board members to just give a should we look into it or should we ask staff to explore it more deeply and come back to us or not bother or that's a choice ask staff to look into it or no can I hear from select board members about that I said my piece earlier because I think if we want to prevent the budget from going say above three that's just my idea for a cap I think that 165 is going to end up being sacrificed I hate to have you do a lot of work on it and then say no we don't want to do it so I would say again because of this budget and the vote coming up I think it's kind of a special case this year to say let's let's not do that even though I know there's really good reasons for it but I don't know if this current budget we're going to be working on is the right place for that Pat? I actually agree with Max I would I recognize that there would be a lot that sort of we go into it as far as finding fee structures and access and everything but I just I just don't think that now is the right time okay and my understanding is that this component of the co-location can carry on regardless of the merger vote and I feel that this just helps the red department serve our community better and I feel great about it I'm open to hearing more about the particulars but I feel alright I thought that Sarah's comment was about transfers in general or was it specific to it was specific to this one there really are no other new ones that have risen to this level I mean I do know just as an example of how intertwined things already are that EGRP is coming onto the overarching Microsoft 365 license which means the cost of that is not going to be in the EGRP budget next year it's going to be in the IT budget so that's a shift but it's a small one it's not like that's just like more of a housekeeping but that's an example of just but with that my comment was very specific to that simplifies the answer then I guess I'd like to see what the intent I'm interested to see what the such a change would accomplish or what it would provide but then now that I've said that though I do have the concern about if the if the vote goes the other way how do you undo that so I'm on the fence about it I would like more info Sarah mainly because when you guys make a recommendation it's usually warranted so I want to understand it fully thank you all for your answer same question to the trustees I'll speak because I'd like to just I would like to just as long as Sarah understands where it's going that we may say no that thanks for the work but no one's not going to do this you don't mind doing that the last comment here if the vote goes the other way I'm not clear what you mean if you went and let's say we had some brilliant formula where everybody saved money and yet you continue to consolidate recreation departments and let's say we had a vote for consolidation next November and it was defeated why would that unnecessarily undo what's been done in the recreation departments necessarily a correlation between the two unless someone I'm not getting it I don't anticipate that a negative vote next November is going to undo anything that's already been done is that am I alone in that or is that does someone have something to understand the vote itself George would codify the thing basically anything we've done right now is just on a handshake there's nothing really there's no right a lot of things can be undone I mean it's just the whole idea of a vote is really getting the whole community rather than these MLUs that are established based on discussions and working with staff and everything that's the big difference you also have annual meeting votes right so George did you say you were I think I'm in favor of looking into it I want to see the more details before I approve it but I'd like to see more details I'm sure I think I made myself I'm not crazy about the idea again I just keep the consolidating stopped but if I'm hearing from leadership that it's okay to kind of if people want to see the work and the work can be produced sure I'll take a look if George and I are saying it's okay with me that staff do the work even if we don't do it I don't mean it that way we're not slave drivers it's certainly not what I meant I would like to see the consolidation in the old period on all departments going forward I am always curious to see what Ally and Brad come up with that's right so there's a mixed message it's a mixed message Amber I agree with George I'd like to see what you guys can show us I'm in agreement with George I hear what Roger is saying but I'd like to see what they're thinking I would agree to see what they think great so I really appreciate that that's very helpful I just want you guys to know that's like super clear, direct I can now count up and I can see that enough people are curious about what this would look like to ask Ally and Brad to put together something more detailed it's not going to be completely what it would be if we were like rah rah let's do it but I'll have them work on that and then we'll come back and start talking about that early in the budget process and then you'll know before we get too deep so thank you very much for all your input budgets are due back to me no later than October 28th from department heads, capital and operating they don't know that yet but they will come around and so if you think of something like oh I forgot to say that just please email in those ideas if you've missed something before October 28th well I don't think the trustees have really had a chance to go around if there's anything else that was desired I know one of the things I want to echo George's sentiment about the do no harm and not to read services about the flat service budget making sure that we don't shoot ourselves in the foot I have a question about the question on how do we approach capital together and I don't really think that that's something we can answer given the various I don't think we understand each other in what we currently do what's together would even look like so I think that some research could be helpful in terms of what the options are and I think really that's kind of also kind of dependent on next falls out right but is there a specific thing you're looking for us with this question oh did I put it in there? yeah in here it says capital how do we approach capital together are you looking for us to answer that tonight we're looking for the the future discussion of how do you think we're interested in how we would do capital together if you guys say now let's wait for 2020 but we think there's we think there's opportunity and synergy of how to do capital together I think we can't not have that conversation in conjunction with the modeling that you already started Sarah I think it has a huge impact on those models I think it needs to be discussed separately it's its own topic Christie do you have any other comments, questions on the budget? Amber? the only thing I'd add is to Patrick's comment about the fire station I think there are a couple of other pieces in that report I can't remember off the top of my head what they were obviously that was the biggest one that stood out but even with the village fire department are there other things that need to be incorporated now and just be done so everybody is safe and most important piece okay thank you all very much I am yes that was very helpful no operation for me okay so item 5b is the discussion of the FY 2020 budget schedule where we envy trustees for having a single meeting I would be so open to making that change if more than 50% of the select board members really did envy that on the trustees that was wishful thinking on my part I think we've had this conversation before I think you have it's difficult for some members to take time off work for a full day budget day on the tennis court as much as I would be gave you hey if anybody wants to do it tell me now I think you said FY 21 I'm an FY 21 just for record people it gets confusing just for sort of a lead into this I walked into a very heated difficult discussion between Greg and Sarah about the calendar of the it's really good if you're talking about this calendar props in case there were any questions there are a lot of rules there's a lot of rules on when budgets have to be done warned meetings etc these two genius people really factated it and we have a village and a town budget to do together and separately you really have to know your needs so this is I believe what Sarah and Greg put together that's true Greg was very helpful because I had interpreted this first day and so the village does a budget day 830-330 here in this room the village board stays and come in and out we feed them lunch the select board has had nights where they try to fit it in where we attended once there's a few there special for budget discussions and then some of the shorter ones we try to do before the actual select board meetings we used to I believe we used to have 5 of these meetings we are down to 4 love to get it to 3 but I don't want to push the envelope too far get us the budget early and it doesn't change dramatically between issues we've had some departments come in late with changes that suddenly all things different not with Sarah I can't make any progress and that's a lot of content that's good to know so one of the things we may look to do is we'll take a look and see if all things being equal we'll keep this schedule and look to if we can get it done by the 8th we could possibly cut the last possibly really the Monday the 6th at 6 p.m. is only going to give us 1 hour before the regular select board meeting and so one of the one of the challenges is that we had Christmas and New Years and all those holidays and that also the trustees have to accept their budget prior to putting the highway budget into the town budget we should put an earmark in but there are just some structural challenges that over time we hopefully won't have to deal with anymore about and we might figure out other ways around all these meetings and we'll do budgets anyhow but this is these are the key takeaways of the budget calendar there's a list attached with notes so however you look at however you like to look at it and are there any looking for other comments or if I could just ask the January 6th I have three like the budget meeting a select board meeting and a joint meeting that's going to be rough on all of us I'm wondering if we did if we could squeeze it to three meetings drop the six to keep the 13th or something we can choose for that we're going to try to do the we're going to try to use the admin budgets in that short hour in an attempt to keep the other one short but we can aim we can aim for it the 13th is kind of the final cut day when you've gone through everything we can try to take some of the shorter administrative stuff on the 6th and put it either on the 2nd or the 8th and make those meetings longer we could look at we don't know what's going to be on the agenda but we could look at canceling the joint portion of the meeting and just doing one meeting in January that was my personal preference but understanding the pressure we're under for time and the volume of department work that we have to do let's leave it there but if we could avoid that we'll do our best or see if the select work portion after the budget meeting can be kept short it's hard to predict what's going to be on there but because especially plans that's good direction and these are not new dates these are dates that we've already been given alright because they're on the calendar good team from the trustee's perspective I know in our last meeting I brought up the concept of this is how we have historically done it and do we want to keep doing it that way as there are certainly pros and cons to both ways given that yes it is a day out of work for those of us on the board it's a day in work during work hours for those of you not on the board so there are certainly pros and cons to both and I think that we as trustees may want to I think on our next agenda for the trustee's we want to revisit this and have a formal decision at that point of whether we're going to continue with the way we've done it or make a change and do something different different how well do we want to do it in a way that's less convenient for staff but more convenient for those I know you're afraid of that way all like it is but we can wait for our next meeting for that I don't think we need to do that right now I'm good with this right here but I'm very flexible during the day so that's just me I know we have others who don't have to say that I mean would it be worth putting out on the agenda for next meeting to see if we could fit it all on the day and be happy to discuss it yeah just do a whole reversal in practice you guys see what trustee's what's that you've seen the thickness of that book but yeah I will say that his budget yeah I mean I'm dealing with an 81 million during the school so it's worth discussing show us what you came here hoping for Sarcasm what you're one for Sarcasm thank you yeah so if we're good they're going to 5C the update from the government subcommittee in excess of a possible merger is this George Mapp well I think for that George yeah I'm happy to lead off but I think Greg did you want to lead it off a little bit did you actually authored the beginning of the memo and I just contributed to it did you want to share some of the government I didn't mean to cut you off George I didn't mean to cut you off no I'm good yes the government subcommittee had their last meeting earlier this month September 12 they finalized the second survey the quantitative survey that is out now looking at the different merger to the merger options getting some feedback from residents on that that launched September 18th as of this afternoon we had about 370 responses I think so far so pretty good response rate it's more of a quantitative survey so the results should be kind of easier to just grab and say here's percentages here's the numbers versus the interpretive from what do you think type of comments that came in the first survey the survey we'll be wrapping up I think it's October 14th or 17th is the last day and KSV will take a couple weeks to process all the data they should have it ready by late October rather than having a government subcommittee meeting and then having a government subcommittee present the boards it was best to just have KSV come to the joint meeting on October 29th present the results there so everybody can see it and hear it once before October 29th meeting there's kind of a question of what is next for the government subcommittee we talked about a little bit at the committee staff was talking about it earlier today there's a ton of work to do around actually putting together a merger plan and a charter proposal a lot of that's going to be based on the results of the October 20th or the results of the survey to figure out how to craft that but some questions as you can see in the memo the boards want the government subcommittee to sort of work as the primary group putting together proposals the plan the charter proposal at what point should the boards get involved should they be just be putting at the board table should be the government subcommittee should there be some other process to consider that stuff but it's coming up fast we talked about being able to present draft plans that annual meeting in March and April with pledges even coming up holidays happening that's going to come up fast so you start to think about who do you want taking the lead on that I'll just add that I think that we have to keep in mind that the surveys are not just a box we check off on the way to creating a merger plan and a charter of our own device I think the idea was that the surveys and the focus groups were going to inform what we do and so I think and I know that I mean Dave Tristan will come in here and give us a very good professional analysis of the results but the results are just half the battle you know maybe everything will be very clear distinct message that we get the likelihood of that is pretty low it's probably going to be equivocal so I think the interpretation of the results are coming to the conclusions and it's really going to critical next step and how do you want to do that again we don't have to decide tonight but do you want the subcommittee members to continue doing it do we want the joint boards to do it the subcommittee could take the lead on it and come in and then the joint boards you give us your feedback we could split up into other groups I mean there's nothing special at this point that the subcommittee is doing other than it's just easier to schedule four people instead of ten and I also would I'm going to add just my own little personal comment here but I think we've heard from some members of the public that you know are we going to open up a space at some point and listen to members of the public who have other ideas or questions at this point that would be an opportune time when we're going into this kind of an analysis so I have all these ideas out there so that a month from now when Dave comes here and we say what are we going to do next we have a pretty good idea I would recommend that we don't come up with something that involves a lot of cross talk and communication and emailing of surveys and editing stuff I think we want to come up with something that's fairly simple but effective and also as Greg mentioned we're we're going to meet with Ann and Evan just to talk about compiling all the information the subcommittee reports the legal information that we've received from Dan Richardson the finance information we've gotten from Sarah and just try to catalog it and organize it in a way that we can all see and we can kind of use that as a handbook for helping us interpret their survey results that's Dan I'm done thank you Trustees would you like to I would say my gut reaction would be that I appreciate the significance undertaking the subcommittee has done to date and that I'm personally looking forward to the October when I've joined to meet him and we can look at the results of it of the survey and what I think would be beneficial is when we have that presentation we as two boards have a better understanding of what we will then need to do with the information should it say should the results say that yes the community is in favor of a merged community so what does that look like we want to find ourselves where we say okay governance subcommittee or whatever it shall be go do some work of what does a merger plan look like personally I'd love it if the subcommittee were able to look into what does a merger plan need to have in a so that way again we can hit the ground running should the results from the survey indicate that that's the direction the community wants to go in so that's where I would like to see that happen is to do some of that researching light work which that's something you guys can do in the meantime while you're while the survey is in the field and you're waiting for the results to come in I'm wondering if we have reached a new plateau in our process here and once the results are presented to us I do think both boards need to have a conversation saying what do these mean to us is there some overwhelming message and what if the message is stop you know we need to have that conversation we have agreed that we're going to get to a point where we're going to make a decision are we going to do a plan and we have to make that decision should the decision be made that yes we're going to keep going we're going to prompt a merger plan we would need a list of topics like what are the things that would be in the plan and then I would like to suggest that we constitute a charter committee and disband the governance subcommittee because it isn't ad hoc and because I feel like we're moving into a new stage and the governance subcommittee has provided an enormous service to us in terms of doing all that legwork and all that interaction but this is a new stage and so we should be thinking about who should be on that committee how often it should be I think it's the other towns when they start getting ready to do this process they form a charter committee so I think that might want to be considered as our next step but I just one though I think that Greg and Anne have done a lot of the technical work for us and they've certainly been a big benefit in getting this information we ask a question and they go and they find the answer and so they really helped us with that stuff would it be valuable to check in with Dan Richardson as a group or that question has come up it's almost kind of like having Chief Gary here tonight I'm not really sure yes but on the other hand I'm not really sure that we have a specific question for him yet I have no doubt that we will have lots of questions for him but I'm not but I think that we have a lot of Dan has supplied a lot of stuff about charters and if you talk about a charter committee and we know probably on the subcommittee more than the rest we know lots of stuff about charters now and what the process is and what you can and can't do so I think that there's already a wealth of information I mean happy to have Dan a great guy always great to see him but I don't know that we have a specific question for Dan just yet so that's my only thought I don't know Raj, Andy what do you think I think they handle the idea UMACS and that's great and that's going to really kind of you know if that includes an outline of what's in a charter as an appendix then or as a primary section that would get us or whoever off and running at least in terms of thanks a great idea, thanks a great yep I agree I was already having a thought that it feels like it's time to so I'm just supporting your change here Evan and Greg if you are thinking of some type of committee you should be thinking how many people on each side what are the parameters and you also need to start thinking about what's their charge and what is not their charge scope and again maybe some guidance because again I'll risk of repeating myself we have used the services do not try to break new ground in law for the structure in which they work in under the day but it's going to need to be a quick turnaround to get appointed and get working so if that is the case I suggest you may want to keep it small because you are going to try to get every every person you add on the other side is going to make getting a meeting exponentially harder to schedule agreed we know that from having ten election officials Greg did out everything Evan just said and then in terms of putting that committee together my thoughts to run by you now are put something on the agenda for next joint meeting on October 7th I think it is put the advertisements out there we can bring it to both boards separately on the 7th and 8th and look for authorization to get some feedback and have staff finalize that and start advertising probably on October 9th if that is the case probably bring something back to you potentially by October 29th maybe people who are interested can come to that meeting hear the results from KSV and then look to get appointed by the boards that night just thinking a lot partially can I interrupt I am interrupting you but I am going to say I think you are and I think you are right the process is right you can get a result on the 29th that says put the brakes on this whole thing I mean then you have a room full of people that you have gathered together to be on a committee that is not going to go forward and I am not hoping that happens and I am guessing that is not what is going to happen but can any of us say that is absolutely not going to happen that is a good point and I was thinking more towards that annual meeting deadline of putting something together and trying to get people up to speed that is a good point so maybe you are talking early November if that is the case to make that decision and I just want to quick aside you just mentioned that Ann and I have been doing a lot of work on this I have been doing some work Ann has been tremendous she is really getting into the technical stuff she deserves most of the credit and just like maybe between now and whatever date that is think about the size and composition of said committee it really does not take a lot of people to do this when you start doing George you are a writer you start doing collaborative writing we see a lot of collaborative writing from the board here the fewer writers the better I think in hybrid committee I am thinking so let's see what the result is what the board's consensus is as to what we are hearing from message maybe we come up with some template with some options I am worried with the timeline we have that if we look for and I am all for getting public involved especially now but if we look to start from zero knowing how complex this issue is and writing this thing is considered before our next meeting is do we make this a hybrid does this joint charter committee come up with the template with some options that we want to get back from because if we have to do the whole thing from scratch by committee and get people up to speed I don't know how that would work out the opinions the community's input would still be relevant very relevant but it would be sort of from a starting place it's a little further down the road from scratch and get just from some of the conversations we've had in the governance of committee it's a lot and that's not to discount bringing in community volunteers I think fleshing out a committee what we want to do with the committee your idea is good Raj and yours is too great in terms of specifically inviting new people on we might want to hold on to that but have the idea of what you want to do the only thing I'd say is that I hear what you're saying Raj you're saying that the subcommittee would bring some members of the public on with us like Elaine was saying I love the idea maybe changing it up it starts out as a charter committee of members of this board and they get a little bit down the road of saying here's the things that would happen there are sections of the merger plan there's really no option get that done and leave some of the more difficult more difficult more complex discussions around specific issues that's where we really bring committee members in then we're part of the way down the road we've got a framework and we can focus the discussion on the things that still are optional maybe that doesn't need a lot of time maybe staff can just produce the the beginnings that I'm talking about that have to be in it and that's the point where I'm just thinking starting from zero we're going to get you educated now on all this stuff here's the handbook I'm thinking back to the UMD it took a long time to get people up to speed before we even got to and that wasn't even nearly as complex I'm wondering if the boards would be willing to allow Andrew and me and George and Max as chairs and vice-chairs to sit together and try to come up with a couple scenarios for the make up of the committee to bring back to the board boards for their I just volunteered us for a meeting but you're used to it yeah sorry yeah used to it because yeah there's some really great possibilities so perhaps we come up with a couple in depth anybody that looks skeptical yeah I'm just thinking about what Braj said I mean I don't think that we should be drafting members of the public to be on a charter committee like that's why they elected us to be leaders you know to do these things the federal government isn't sitting there deciding I want to change the constitution let's grab some red joes off the street or even people who might be what I'm saying is that this is a big process and our outreach to the public has already been this summer it's been focus groups it's been another survey the public has had their input and if all we're doing every step of the way is getting opinions coming in it seems like at some point we've gotten all the information we've gotten what generally people have said our previous survey say 70% of people are in favor of some form of merger like I think we have this information that it is it's a lot to bring people up to speed I think that this committee should just be the people who were elected to do these jobs okay Andy we have in our subcommittee meetings said over and over again that there will be many more opportunities for public input so I think if we I don't think we can back away from that without getting ourselves in trouble Andy I don't know that public input needs to be sitting on a committee meeting I think public input has so many things I think it gets murky and complicated and challenging to do something that's already challenging I think there's a really nuanced way to bring in public input through any way I can help have it come to a meeting or let you do a meeting whatever but I think that there are so many ways to bring in public input that doesn't necessarily mean forming a committee I don't know it's just yeah Andy said it I mean it's not it's stymie the process I think I think I hear what Andy is saying and there are like Andy said there are so many other ways they can have input but ultimately decisions are going to be made not by the community outside of the boards they elect us to make those decisions perhaps that's what it is I would like to make a recommendation I hear what you're saying and I'm struggling with it because I totally get I don't want to slow down the process we have had a lot of public feedback about wanting to have more input we have as Andy said told the public they will have opportunities at every stage of the game now that we're getting to the real where the rubber hits the road and this is the really intense hard work and I get that bringing in a volunteer from the community or more than one volunteer is a challenge could there be a compromise and perhaps inviting a state representative from 8 2 and 8 from the village and the town outside the village to sit on the committee sit on the charter committee and that way we have elected representatives they're not elected to select one of the trustees but they are elected by the community and they represent their community specifically by GI that goes counter to the whole process that was brought up expressed that why former board members able to get on these committees and now here saying we're going to introduce at least one of those members was on one of these boards I think we should talk about one one I can see where they can come back to bite us I understand what you're saying I'm suggesting one state representative from the village and one state representative from the town as a consideration of this charter committee just a thought we're not voting on anything my state representative lives in Westford right I think another difficulty to bring a member or multiple members of the public on board is that there's always going to be people that say you chose these people you wanted to get who you wanted on this committee at least if we're choosing amongst us all of us have been elected so the public has already had their say in who's sitting at this table I would just be more comfortable with the committee being made up amongst the current board members that we have now I was at someone's home gathering the other day and somebody came with a lot of misinformation asking a lot of questions about some recent communications they had heard we sat for a very long time and I had a great opportunity to explain how meetings had gone and how and that interaction alone I think the people I was speaking to felt really heard and I think that if we were to have listening sessions or I really think or even the other night when we stayed after and listened I think last night again I just feel like it's so valuable to get heard that's all I ever wanted to get hurt and you all do that for me very nicely and I feel that I feel that if we just offer a lot of that kind of opportunity and then we bring what we heard as we always do into the board of the meeting or the committee I think that has so much more value than isolated people with independent opinions I think Dan had one just real quick echoing again like I said before but anything totally when the police station just bring back you know police station that we have now in the facility for a bond on that we went out, gave the people the information what we're looking at is there are a lot of people in these senior housing places they're not able to attend a lot of these meetings maybe they're not watching who knows but go to the people as opposed to have the people come to us and if we can get the message you know strategic locations maybe we went to the high school I know Max was there with myself and others and we did go to the senior housing in the town and the village and there are a lot of unheard people out there voters and taxpayers so what I'm hearing is just among the conversations so far is that there's some mix of yes have some some private citizens on the committee don't have some private citizens on the committee but that we do need to get some community input on various specific components regardless of what happens we need to get public input on how on so many aspects of this charter where should the vote go or should the survey go that we want on this process of having a merger plan then I think if we have those points from a subcommittee to say these are the points that are there we don't debate these there's some charter components that by law just need to be there so what are the ones that are really going to be debatable where those of us on the board we could then talk about how to get how to get input from the community on those specific topics and or have KSB ask them do they have some thoughts in terms of if they were in our shoes what would they do to get some input from the community with regards to some of these very specific points so that way we don't have to have a we can try to find some hybrid way of everybody getting what they need while still being able to get the work done so that we don't find ourselves making decisions until the last last minute I don't know who got first you two fight the vote what about a mechanism like the state reps have done where this charter community gets together they write and then at points in the process they open up an hour at the nest an hour at sweet alchemy where the public can come and then we can get a lot of feedback they can take that and add that to the process seems like that way the actual components of writing it are still done by the elected board with respect to Andy's excellent point you know we're still allowing the public opportunity to provide feedback okay so we create that new charter committee Dan and I bring General Seventeen with us and we go I'm just kidding I'm being funny I'm being funny but sorry Dan, I was totally kidding I would go and even if I'm here at night and go out for outreach go visit senior housing go talk to people at specific locations I'm happy to go and listen to places that people don't normally go to and then also have the opportunity to suggest where to come to us at locations why don't we do all of that so I think we've gone very far afield we never go back in so we've talked about creating it sounds like there's a general consensus that we should switch gears after the survey results are presented and shift to a charter committee we have time to talk about who will be on that committee so I think that's the end of this topic and I love the ideas that have come out let's put them in the parking lot for now and revisit them in subsequent meetings in the interest of time and just to let us get our thoughts organized on the possibilities because we're shifting gears into a new stage plus we still need to hear the results so okay was there anything else governor? can you hear Raj? did you hear anything? no okay all that remains on the agenda is a consent item which I believe is for the trustees because did not we approved it last night right so is there a motion to approve the consent agenda? I'll make that motion is there any further discussion? all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye everybody opposed? great thank you now to the reading file do not bet any money there are sharks I never bet on anything that I'm playing I might not be over you're clonking words I've never been seated before I thought I was going to make the cart with evidence do not do not put Joyce Joyce would like to be known as the ambassador of people at all so I don't think there's any other trustee comments blackboard numbers so Dan moved the leader second watch second to that any further discussion on the journey for the trustees all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye everybody opposed? thank you second all in favor of adjourning say aye aye thank you everyone there's a nice card here from the Mayville family thanking us if you have a few moments for the trustees those who need to sign things