 Good evening, everyone. Would you please come in and take your seats? Welcome to town meeting 2019 We are privileged to have Williston Boy Scout troops 692 from Williston to lead us To present the colors and lead us in the pledge of allegiance. So if you'd all please rise Indivisible You may be seated I'm Terry McCagg the chair of the select board and it's my pleasure to welcome you again tonight You may have noticed as you looked at the annual report that this year is dedicated to two people Ken Wharton and his wife Ginger and then the It in the report it says the invoice in report this year is dedicated to a dynamic duo For their combined 70 years of service to the town of Williston Chief Morton has served the Williston fire department over the past 35 years including serving chief for the past 25 During this time the department has grown from an exclusively on-call fire apartment to what is now a mixture of On-call and full-time firefighters and emergency medical service personnel Under his leadership the department was recognized as the ambulance service of the year by the state of Vermont In addition Ken has served as the town emergency coordinator for almost 30 years and is fire warden for the past seven years Ginger has also served the Williston fire apartment in a variety of capacities including dispatcher over the past 35 years in her spare time. So you serve as a lister Auditor and justice of the peace for the town Finally ginger has worked with the Williston food shelf for the past 10 years and currently serves as president of the board I see ken here and ginger was at the desk checking people in but if you'd please give them a round of applause Also in the town report is an in marmorium page or two that recognizes People who served with the town of Williston with distinction over a number of years and have passed on during the course of the past year So we recognize tonight ralph visna jr Herb goodrich mary babbitt tot hill roger saint hilarious senior barrett peterson in art germain So we appreciate their service over the long period of time that they lived in Williston So at this time i'd like to introduce the select board to you The first person on my right is jolly lodge Next is ted kenney next is vice chair for jeff fares And the final one is terry hoon citrige And if i have thanked them for their hard work during the course of the past year So the next thing on my agenda is to Do article number one on the town report on the town agenda And as to elect a moderator Are there any nominations for the position of moderator shim akella? To me at least for the past hundred years we've had a citizen in this town quietly and not always quietly Serving his community behind the scenes and sometimes annually at the podium that common denominator person is Tony lamb and it's my honor to nominate him as our moderator tonight It was zero seconds second Are there any further nominations for the office of moderator to see and none is there a motion to Close nominations and direct the clerk to plant to cast one unit in this ballot for tony lamb Is there a second And a second all those in favor of the motion say aye All those opposed say nay And you have elected tony lamb. You're a moderator Them would suggest it seems like a hundred years I think it's been Getting up to 30 and and I do appreciate the opportunity to serve as moderator and one plug I would make as we begin the meeting is I noticed that recently there was a school fundraiser Didn't have enough volunteers And if I could do anything I would encourage all of you to find more ways to volunteer as in the community It's a way to get to know your neighbors their kids And to really have some fun in the community. So thank you Article two shall the voters authorized the current taxes to be paid to the town treasurer in three equal installments with two dates of August 15th, November 15th and February 15th As authorized by 32 vsa sections 48 71. Do I have a motion? Is there a second Move moved in second any discussion questions comments concerns All those in favor of article two signify by saying aye Those opposed say nay the ayes have it Article three to hear and act upon the reports of the several town officers. Do I have a motion to accept the report so we'll hear the Presentation can you pick it up the pace folks? Is there a second All right, it's been moved in second direct. Do you have a presentation? Sure. Thank you, mr. Moderator. I have a brief presentation I wanted to kind of give an update on some of the projects and and programs and things that have happened during this past year We've had a number of successes and of course not everything always goes according to plan So I'm going to take this opportunity to talk about both The good and the bad and in case you have any trouble discerning which is which I've had arrows the up ones are the good things and the The down arrows as you might expect are the things that didn't go quite according to plan The town Staff has endeavored to increase the town's presence on the social media formats We have always had a pretty up-to-date and comprehensive website But we've added a bunch of other things to supplement that as a way of getting information out We now have our own tv show. It's a once a month program It deals with a number of different community issues And it's hosted by the assistant to the manager eric wells is sitting right up here in front I encourage you all to check it out. There's a link on the town's website to it And I think you'll find it an interesting program And of course, I encourage you to like us on facebook Tweet us on twitter And of course, we also have a youtube channel now featuring a number of videos And I encourage you to subscribe to our youtube channel. I think we only have 14 or 15 We got to get that number up So that's definitely an up arrow I also want to introduce our new finance director and I think that's deserves an up The Our finance director a new one is surely gadel lackey. She started working with us four days ago So don't give her too much of a hard time. Surely if you could just stand up and wave so we know what your As a candidate for the job, she ended up sitting through Just about all the budget sessions that we held during the months of december and january That isn't necessarily the reason why we gave her the job, but it certainly helped and it helped with her familiarity With the the town budget and our process So the as was mentioned In the introduction the town also received an award the fire department did to be more specific ambulance service of the year The this was selected by the department of health the formal department health for its exemplary service and leadership And in that photo we have on the far left is daniel batsey Who's with the department of health in the middle? Of course is chief morten and on the far right is tony samanskas who is a senior firefighter with our department Now as I said, we've had a series of mishaps And this earned a down arrow This was a private Recycling truck, I think That and I don't know how this happened, but it's lost its load in one of our neighborhoods And made quite a mess in the process On the upside we have deb becket who was selected as treasurer of the year She has served as town clerk for 20 years now since 1999 and also as town treasurer She was selected for her dedication professionalism and leadership In the town and of course with her work In at the state level that helped to enhance improved training for Vermont treasurers Across the state and I would say this is a an award that was well deserved and we're happy Now I wasn't quite sure I didn't want to show this up our this this is actually the view Of the church steeple for the federal church passing in front of the town hall We heard it was coming through so we all jumped outside It was a nice day and we got a nice photograph of that And here it's on its way down towards the the church So I thought that was kind of a neat little Thing now Also on the downside I'll definitely get an arrow for this This happened on old stage road We had a private company that was pumping out a sewer pump station The truck malfunctioned and lost a good part of the slowed on the road Unfortunately, it was a huge mess and potential environmental concern But because of the quick action of our staff and the quick action of the company We were able to minimize the damage and get it cleaned up pretty quickly But it was as you might imagine quite a mess If you haven't seen these he's deserving up arrow There's a number of plaques that are around the community Particularly around Allenbrook if you're walking on the bike path behind the school You might see it or there's a little nature path that veers off the bike path that has several of these And they cover a variety of different topics concerning the environment concerning storm water Here's a couple more that you may see around Here's a couple more and Here's one that deals with living with beavers, which is not always the easiest thing in the world, but because they they have their own way of Changing the environment, shall we say? And the final thing that I wanted to give an up arrow to is we have a new Facility program that's available through our town website. It's a service request portal And this is Up and live running as of this weekend There's the software behind us is very flexible and it will enable staff to respond very quickly to service requests It also will have an informational question and answer type format I think this will help us to Track the various requests we get And not just the total number, but also the type and our response time So we think this will be a useful a very useful tool and we encourage all to use it when you have them Like let's say a pothole or a stop sign down Just click on this button that's on the front page of the town website And the service requests will get automatically routed to the correct person And uh That's it unless there's any other questions on this Just a question about the presentation Any questions comments or concerns about the reports That are set out Should like to report. Yes Well is I think I'm good here the um as you might imagine The pump station was holding sewage and there's possible pathogens that could Get into the water stream of the Allenbrook, which is right nearby, but immediate attempts were Taken to block that from going down into the stream and then there's I think speedy dry may have been used to help so So copped the the waste material and and then that was disposed up in a proper fashion The television that the question was what environmental concerns were with the spill on the old stage row other questions comments or concerns about this report or any reports on the Annual report Extending the I'm going to ask That's Bruce whore who is our director of public works to answer that question Yeah, the next heart of that project is for the Essex Alliance church to build their Their project and the path is going to connect through their property as part of that project over to uh fitting that area Too dramatically missing blocks there that render any attempt to walk from our neighborhood meadow run and those to the north Down either to task corners or the center of the village insanely unsafe Walking along that narrow bridge over the street. I did it once I barely survived I wouldn't I wouldn't suggest doing it Especially with the bridge there now But uh, you're right There's still some along two way that will be looked at as to whether more sidewalk will be put in that would be pedestrian Five-foot sidewalk if it if and when it happens questions comments concerns Seeing none all those in favor of accepting the reports signified by saying aye As opposed say nay The ayes have it the reports are accepted article four Shall the voters authorize the select board to enter into current use supplemental agreements for a period not to exceed 10 years on agricultural Forest and or open space property is authorized by 24 vsa section 2741 do I have a motion to accept the article four? So Do I have a second folk We have a second Susan's second been moved and seconded um Are there any questions comments or concerns about this article? Yes I'm going to be doing a lot of duty here tonight the Courage program or the supplemental program that we have is actually a supplement to a state program courier's program that provides a tax break to Farm land to keep it open space rather than being developed The town's program is just a tiny piece of that and I think it has a value of less than $10,000 a year So the big part of this really the state current use program And this is just a small supplement to that and it requires it's required to be renewed every so many years Pass out a quiz to see if everybody now understands the supplemental use program But it's I would encourage you if you have other additional questions you can approach the town manager or the select board afterwards if you Want to know more about it in greater detail But I don't want to shut off any other questions now Seeing none all those in favor of the article four signify by saying I Those opposed saying a article four is adopted Article five to transact any other business proper to be brought before said meeting Ryan did you want to Who has the microphone? Test Hello, my name is Ryan Allen. I'm a resident of Williston born and raised here Tonight I would like to talk to you for a few minutes about our reliance on single-use poly plastic products To me these include though are not limited to plastic t-shirt bags or shopping bags plastic utensils Plastic cups and straws plastic coffee lids and stirs and plastic and styrofoam take away food containers While vermont has taken progressive steps to combat waste through the universal recycling law Plastic pollution is still visible in our environment We sit in our neighborhoods commercial zones parks and waterways, especially as micro plastics in lakesham plain A large misconception of plastic is that it is easily recyclable While in reality only about 30 to 40 of a product can be reused and about five times before the plastic structure is too brittle to Process CSWD cannot process all types of plastic Leaving it to either be put in our landfill or to be shipped and processed in other states such as new york new jersey in pennsylvania Recycling plastic also faces complications as china has put stricter environmental regulations on recyclable material Imports this is all to say that the plastic recycling trail can be pretty hard to follow While recycling plastic does help reduce waste eliminating the need for production of these products will have a greater impact than simply recycling I believe that the solution to single-use plastics is twofold The first is to address poly plastic use within the town and the second part is that of a state to national effort to change policies around the packaging of products So while it may take a more correlated effort to combat plastic products such as cigarette butts plastic soda bottles pringle cans And plastic wrapped produce at the supermarket I believe williston can begin to look at how to reduce our reliance on the single-use products I propose that williston begins studying the impacts of a poly plastic band and or tax With many potential stakeholders in town there should be a public public meeting at the onset For thoughts and or concerns around this issue The intent is not to harm willison's economy or residents Though introduce consumers to the environmental cost of single-use poly plastics and other materials such as paper shopping bags and cups A tax could help Could potentially help companies recuperate some of the cost of buying and the proper disposal of these single-use items At a state scale a tax could help ensure each county has the proper equipment to process biodegradable and compostable single-use products And what can we all do now to stop plastic pollution when we forget our reusable bags in our car? We can ask to have our grocery items put back in the cart so we do not use store bags We can pack reusable coffee mugs in our own kitchen utensil for our days We can ask waiters to not bring us straws or if you own a restaurant Do not automatically give out plastic straws or utensils unless a customer asks We can unite and reward shoppers for bringing their own bags with punch cart systems to give them freebies across wilson We can pay it forward for reusable bags cups and utensils for those who may not be as fortunate as others I appreciate you all listening to my thoughts on single-use plastics. Thank you I just want to say that that was great excellent And I just want to say that the paper industry is working very hard to offer Alternatives to plastics and that should be something to look at and the other thing I would say is I for one and as a citizen I'm much more happy about incentive programs than tax programs Any other questions comments or concerns about this or other topics? Is there any other business to come before the town? Yes Specific proposals in the morning for tomorrow Yes In particular, I need more clarification as to articles eight and nine which seem to be Oh Either either the electric current we don't like to work I do not understand why we don't first to Appoint and then we go to maybe a point. Oh, I need an explanation Why do we we're not going to spoil that? There's a presentation coming Well, so Articles six through nineteen will be voted on by Australian ballot tomorrow the voters are warned that Beginning at seven a.m. At the armory till seven p.m. You'll have the opportunity to vote on those articles as well as the elected offices Do I have a motion to adjourn this meeting? Been moved and seconded all those in favor signify by saying aye Those opposed say nay We stand adjourned You can stay So the school now they're going to take a moment These folks are going to take a seat and the school is going to come up and make their budget presentation Up almost four but we have two percent and let's do Okay, yeah, there's something interesting that go for it Are we good to go? Hello We are going to go ahead and do a presentation for the Chittenden valley school district I'm erin brady one of your school board members. I'm jocelyn adams also a school board member Hi guys kevin mara another school board member and we'd be remiss if we didn't this is this is really really kevin's last stand really He's been a phenomenal resource to our town and our schools for over nine years now helping shepherd consolidation They school the phenomenal Renovation here and we are apprentices here learning from kevin's leadership. So thank you. Thank you kevin. This is me. Sorry So welcome. Thank you So the champlain valley school district we encompass wilson central school allenbrook school heinsberg community school charlotte central school Shelburne community school in champlain valley union high school We have um, we are educating three thousand eight hundred and fifteen students and we employ approximately four hundred and fifteen teachers With twelve School board representatives four of which come from wiliston So this presentation Will include Welcome an introduction. Thank you. Some statistics about our enrollment Our board budget goals the proposed budget for 2019 2020 budget factors articles tax calculations tax rate implications tax tax relief and then at the end there will be time for questions a mission of the champlain valley schools that the Teachers and staff live and breathe every day is to develop students Who learn actively and collaboratively can think creatively and critically live responsibly and respectfully Contribute positively to their community and pursue excellence. In short, we are Tending to the academic and social needs of all kids in our schools And we would like to thank The phenomenal community we have here. We have wonderful parent support community support Tremendous teachers and staff in our buildings administrators And we appreciate the community's ongoing support of our schools and also want to thank the budget buddy that helped develop the budget this season rick debtweiler In wiliston specifically some of the high points over the past year include Both of our schools were exemplar schools and under the pbis positive behavior intervention support system helping to develop Students for skills for lifelong learning and strong relational skills with other students Allen brook has now been awarded this honor for six consecutive years Many teachers in both of the schools here in wiliston continue to be Recognized for their excellence including two teachers this past year who have earned their national board certification Which is a very rigorous process PE teacher linn porter has received another award this time the shape america eastern district honor award We are Really lucky that the central school here has a thriving Connecting youth mentoring program to make sure that our middle school students have strong adult relationships to help guide them We have a very active school safety team the Greg marina has been instrumental in helping run drills and provide leadership across the state in school safety abs and wcs have vibrant co-curricular programming and options featuring Options for athletics as well as drama And the wcs continues to have a strong emphasis on community service through the eighth grade graduation or i'm sorry challenge projects So points of pride for cvu The chemistry teacher sarah melcom was awarded uvm's outstanding teacher of the year Senior mylo crest was featured on npr cnn mbc and morpher's work to reduce the national waste of plastic straws Cvu raised well over $50,000 for the special olympics vermont Cvu girls cross-country won a trip to nationals in oregon Cvu students at s sx technical center were nominated to the presidential scholars award And 76 percent of cvu's 2018 graduates Chose to go on to higher educating higher education choosing To attend a four-year institution and two percent are attending a two-year institution And just a note that's not up there is that 96 percent of our students graduate within the four years of being at cvu in terms of our enrollment the slide isn't Totally accurate because it has been persistently difficult to predict enrollment in williston And the statewide narrative of declining enrollment has not been the case here in williston Generally enrollment across the entire district has been flat And williston though projections have come in low actual kindergarten numbers and then actual ninth grade numbers when students get to cvu have been a bit higher So both in williston and then In the district as a whole If you want to hit the next one Our enrollment Generally has been flat or slight increases when we actually get to Starting day and kids in in the door In terms of our entire district Williston is the largest town within the consolidated district With 969 students in the williston schools And 1300 students at cvu make it i believe the largest it's neck and neck often with esx for the largest high school in the state And as jocelyn said at the beginning overall, we're educating 3,815 students in our district So a large consolidated district here So right, uh, sorry ratios and class size so We as an average for cvsd for kindergarten are keeping a one to 17.2 ratio in the classroom There's a range across the four elementary schools With there being an average between 16.8 and 19 We'll see a little bit later in the the more of the meat and bones of the budget But there is going to be an increase of one kindergarten and one first grade teacher at williston Because of the the higher trend of kindergartners coming in and wanting to make sure that we're keeping Below a one to 20 ratio K through three the average is 18.5 the cvsd range Is 17.8 to 19 and then the 4.4 to 8 Is 20 80 20.86 for the cvsd average with 19.6 to 22.4 for the cvsd range And for the 4 to 8th graders we try to keep under 25 students per classroom In that far column there the education quality standards come from the state and the board is Very careful and attentive to class sizes And to being within or under the education quality standards when we are looking at budget impacts As I said, we're the Staff and teachers here are working to nurture the academic and social well-being of all students And we have continued to outperform the State averages in almost all categories and grade levels on the standardized tests currently the test being used as the Smarter balance or the s back. So this gives us just a quick snapshot of results from the past year Williston there is is the green bar. So we are Out ahead of the statewide averages with some particularly high scores in English language arts And these show the results at cvu where testing is done currently now in the ninth grade And again our testing results are far Outreach the statewide average particularly in English language arts So board budget goals the one of the first slides that we showed that had to do with our mission the I believe it's five standards that we try to hold our entire community and our students into having going out Is what drove the mission and vision? for Past budgets and including this year's budget We want to meet or exceed Education quality standards. We wanted to implement key initiatives We wanted to implement and continue to improve the budget process including the focus on community input And at a cost that the community will support. So What is different than in years past is that before when it was just the Williston school district The the group of us would have been sitting down and really um Figuring out the budget line by line But now we are a policy board across the district meaning that We tell the administration that this is the maximum that we think that the voters can support And it's on the administration is then tasked to figure out how to Educate our students in that in that goal So this slide is just to point out that the budget doesn't happen in like at one point in time It's an ongoing process that we've been developing and we're constantly working from a five-year plan So in the summer we start doing preliminary work Where we look at the fourth quarter fmr review. We look at the prior year audit We the special ed service plan actually has to be in at the beginning of the school year for the following year So that's being worked on And then looking at the equity and autonomy matrix In the fall we look for stakeholder input We do this through community forums surveys And leadership on continuous improvement innovation and equity Then going from the fall into the winter. We do budget development. We're based on board goals financial eqs Articles finalized by third week of january in the winter We do communication presentation flyers social media town meeting vote on which is where we are right now Vote on town meeting day and then going from the spring to the summer. We talk about goal development in a day long What's it called retreat that we do one of the benefits of consolidation has been a much more streamlined year-round forward-looking budgeting process and able to look system-wide across the schools So our cvsd proposed budget for the following year is 78,901,170 Dollars this is a change of 2.7 percent from the year before With a cost per equalized pupil being 16,071 And so for when we're looking at the cost per equalized pupil Which means it's the amount of money that we believe it costs to educate a single student In our schools. It's actually a 2 percent increase overall for the budget And so for budget factors And I was actually looking at the This flyer that you probably saw in the mail Has some very nice graphics that I wish that we had Included in here, but I will say that the largest if you're looking at a pie chart Almost half of the budget increase is coming from instructional programming that has to do with salary and benefits And then special education and student services operations and maintenance And then all others which really consists of like instructional support technology district administration campus administration athletics and co-curricular So the total increase from last year is 2,063,129 I will say I was part of the budget committee. We have a few different committees And when the administration first came to us, they were actually giving us I believe It was more like 3.8 increase and we worked with them to whittle it down to 2.7 percent feeling like this was Something that again our community can support while Making sure that we're offering all the services that our our schools need that our staff need to be able to do their jobs well um So tax calculations, so The budget expenditures is almost 79 million. Um, which is up from 2.7 from last year We um anticipate revenues of about 12 million. Um, so when that comes off, that means our total net spending Would be um about 66.5 million dollars That equalized pupils. Um, so this Is we have four it changes day to day. So this actually changes slightly So the state says that we have 4,143 equalized pupils Which um, if you remember the chart that was seen before we only have about 3,800 Students in our district and that's because there is a formula that the state does where They equalize everyone then they divide it and certain students like high school students count more than um elementary students And they just pop out a number and then this is what they base what they will give us So they say we have 4,143 students Which I actually know that this has been changing from day to day when gene jensen our coo looks at the numbers Um, so the spending per equalized pupil becomes 60 16,071, which is up from 2 from last year The statewide yield. So what the state says is the minimum amount of money that it takes to educate a student In the state of ramon is 10,666 dollars Um, which means that our district spending adjustment is 151 percent Um, which would make it a dollar 51. I apologize Um, which would make it a dollar 51 One of the incentives of us consolidating is that we get this the step decreases So this year we actually get six cents back. So although it would be a dollar 51 It makes it that the adjusted equalized tax rate is a dollar 45 Before cla Thank you. Greg um, so I'm sure what most people care about is um, willa stent, right Who cares? Oh sure a lot of minds working children st. George right now But so for willa stent our common level of appraisal or cla is 94.7 percent The closer we are to 100 percent the closer we get to stay to the Adjusted rate of a dollar 45 There is an asterisk next to wilson right now because like last year the town is um What is sorry challenging appealing the the cla. So right now as it stands We would be we would be paying a dollar 53 However, we're hopeful that like last year that the appeal will come through and that our rate will actually decrease um But so that's a change of 2.4 percent from last year Do you want to do some sure so the um articles that you will see or have seen on the ballot already include an overall Vote on the budget on the 78 million dollar budget an increase of 2.7 percent an article seven uh article eight Specifically Deals with our use of the fund balance and using $500,000 of the current fund balance and applying that to the operating budget In order to decrease costs and yet keeping a very healthy Fund balance and what we've been advised And I would just like to make a comment about this So our coo gene jensen has a five-year plan of all the facility maintenance that needs to happen across all of our schools And instead of making it so that we have to pay out $12 million in one year. She's divided it up with things that absolutely must happen right now and then has tried to Spread it out across the five years and so by using Um $500,000 from our current fund balance, which means it's money that the taxpayers have already paid in We just haven't used it in other places Being able to use this in our construction fund means that we will not have to ask for a bond this year for Maintenance and construction that needs to happen at our schools So it's you it's utilizing money that is already there Rather than having to come back and ask for us to take out a bond And finally buses The final article We have 62 buses in the fleet and again working on a strategy of being proactive In how we deal with our transportation fleet replace five to six buses per year In order to keep the average vehicles under about eight years So this would authorize the district to buy to purchase five additional five new buses We hope you will support these three articles tomorrow when you vote between seven and seven And depending on your household income you may qualify for an education property tax adjustment So that would be something to investigate if that Applies to your situation as well And we would be happy To try to answer any questions For greg marino may be able to answer Some of the specific educational questions as well Yes It seemed to be a downtrend And yet if I look around willis then if I look around willis then there's a lot of construction Seems a lot of new people are coming into the town How would you you account for more people coming in but fewer students? We asked the same question Uh, especially I think I I think about a month ago or so there was um There was an article in the observer about all these new units that it was like something Like six possibly 600 new units or something Coming into the town of willis then And so we've had the same questions I will say if When we're talking about our Our schools when you look at the trend they may be going down slightly But but really we're not talking about hundreds of students So like our projection of nine hundred and sixty nine for this year in willis then with 978 last last year That's really only nine kids. Um, but we're asking the same thing. We're not we're not quite sure We we were up from 2017 to 2018 we project that we're actually probably going to be above 969 Most likely above 978 Sometimes we've been it's been pointed out that a lot of the houses that are coming up are one bedroom or two bedrooms And so it might be a lot of either single or um couple like professionals who don't have children yet. Um But we're not really sure kindergarten numbers have traditionally been really hard to predict and again one of the benefits of consolidation is that we have A really robust early education program across the district And a specialist who is working to better identify more of the Pre-k students in our district one so that we can meet their needs before they even arrive in kindergarten And two to have much more accurate kindergarten numbers But generally the reality has been higher than the nasdaq predictions And I will say that two years ago I believe it was two years ago willison went from five kindergarten teachers to six to keep that one to 20 ratio And then last year it was thought that we might go down from six to five because the projections from the kindergarten Were inaccurate and then as soon as registration happened We realized that that was an error and kept six teachers and for this year We're all we realize already that we're going to need a seventh kindergarten teacher and add in a sixth Um first grade teacher I think it's six or will it be seven now It's a 12 for us in second grade The first second grade to to help with the the increase that we've already seen with the kindergarten So we are slowly increasing It's just maybe not as dramatic as one would expect with how much housing that has been going up The other thing we've been doing in the last couple of years is um taking a look at Families who are coming into the district for the first time they're new to the district and we're just doing a quick address analysis to see where they're coming from to see if we can Notice any trends Nothing dramatic has appeared so far, but it's just a new level of data that we're collecting there Any other questions? within williston For the classroom size you had the range through in the school district But yep, where does williston fall? These are the cv sd I know I have it in another set of notes, but I don't know greg if you can From memory pull it any what one thing I know that I that we can say is that and I this was brought up to me Was that the cv sd range right there? Is um the average of like the lowest the school with the lowest average in the school with the highest average So williston has to fall between those numbers, but I don't know if greg has more specific information I can say Those numbers are very close to what we have We would have we do have a kindergarten class or two of 20 And remember that the range you see are average range So we do have To a 20 this year We have um The first and second the first and second grade to classrooms of 18 and 19 or maybe 120 And more through eighth grade You'll see 19 through we will see classes here and there especially Especially like a world language class a french classroom kids are selecting what language they want to take There might be 24 or even 25 in a class Um, but that's you know for a particular french class that students had we're able to self select But the are those the ranges are pretty pretty close to that questions Great all right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you all I was going to say that was way out of focus Okay So got a lot of ground to cover here I'm going to talk a little bit about the town budget And it'll stop and give people a chance to ask questions I'm going to talk about the bond resolution And it'll stop and that's Well, a lot of people ask questions and we're going to talk about the various articles that are part of the town charter changes So, um, I'm going to start by talking about the town budget And on this I want to um Start by asking a question If I asked a question about how many services the town provides How many would think maybe 10 services? How about 50? How about 100? How about a well, you've got me now 180 is the total Um, and I I'm Suspected most of you thought that it was uh, I mean these are the Seven services and there's probably more that are basic that everyone comes to mind very quickly There's lots of other services that we provide that you may not be aware of for example Uh, we have a neighborhood watch program We have a reparation services program We have a community outreach services program. Those are all programs that are part of our police department We also have a car seat safety inspection program And we offer cpr and first aid training those are programs are offered in our fire department and Um, the list goes on and on for the types of services that we provide They're far beyond this list of seven that you see on the screen So where does the budget fit in? Well the budget is a plan It's a plan of the services that we plan to provide over the coming year and of course You wouldn't be a budget without numbers and those numbers include the cost of those services And how we're going to fund those services Well this cartoon illustrates the reason why we do a budget It says here we do budget so we can worry before we spend the money And we can worry after we spend the money As we're preparing the budget each year We're looking at a number of different considerations both external and internal externally Inflation is obviously an important piece If the inflation is up high That's going to affect what it costs us to buy the goods and services and supplies we need to provide the services The economy is a factor too If the economy is down, that means people's ability to pay is down That means we're going to have to adjust What our expectations are in Providing the services and it may mean Cutting services in some Circumstances in fact we have done that in the past We've reduced services in response to a downturn in the economy The population is a big factor in Williston We have had an increasing Population for many many years and I have a slide in a moment to show that It demonstrates that That affects the quantity of services that we need to provide to the citizens And then our grand list is another piece. We have to look at that. That's our tax base And if that's going up that makes it a little easier to provide the services that people are demanding in our community Internal considerations We have to look at the resources that are needed to actually provide the various services that people demand The cost of the services obviously is important and what is our past experience? Are we actually meeting? The our expectation on how much we're going to spend to provide those services Are we under spending for those services? And if you'd like to learn a little bit more about the process that I just spoke about we have a video online So that just focuses on the process So if you really are into process you can learn a little bit more about it through that video that we have Through our youtube channel, whichever referenced earlier now on this particular chart it shows our population growth and Uh, I think the point the note is it's been steadily increasing about 100 people per year So over the past 10 years that means a thousand more people in town Now than there were 10 years ago, and I think partial answer to the one question that came up earlier About well, why aren't we seeing more children in the schools? Part of the answer is The age of the population of wilson wilson tends to run much older than other towns in the state of vermont Which by the way tends to run older than other states in new england except for main and new england tends to run older than Most of the rest of the united states, so That's all to say that wilson's population is old and Generally old people don't have as many children, so All right, um, so Let's get into the sum of the numbers The proposed budget is about 11.5 million For next fiscal year. This represents an increase of about 3.4 percent over the current year Um, I did a quick survey of municipal budgets throughout shitton and county And found that this increase was about average There were some that were higher some that were lower But this is about average for municipalities and it's fairly close to the inflation rate for the town for the region Uh So there are some cost factors that I want to do highlight for you In that are part of this budget increase The first is wage and benefits Those are going up about three hundred and thirty six thousand Part of that is a reflection of a The inflation rate Employee salaries right now are keyed into the inflation indexes So when the inflation rates two percent, that's what employees get A couple years ago the inflation rate was zero and that's also what the employees received Um, it also includes several new positions. Uh, we have right now a The position of town clerk slash treasurer that is two different functions in one job This will split those positions out if this budget is approved so that there'll be one town clerk that's full time and one treasurer that's full time and I'll get into some of the reasons why that's necessary a little bit later when we talk about the charter change but Suffice it to say that there is money in the budget to Take that position from part time to full time There's also money in the budget for a new position within the fire department This new position is partially offset by planned increase in revenues Which would come from a new fee that we instituted for inspections of apartment units The concern is that there's an increasing number of apartment units in this community and As we know from experience in other communities They're not always maintained the way they should be and so Providing a safety inspection will help prevent Possible disasters from happening like carbon dioxide poisoning or certain types of fires So that money is in the budget and So we also have A decrease in the budget in open space Last for the current fiscal year We had money in there for the purchase of the catamount property This money is no longer needed since that purchase will happen within the next month or so And no more money is needed for that so that Lion item will be decreased by 185,000 And then we have assorted capital projects and debt service that will Increase the budget by about 121,000 This pie chart which is an expenditure pie chart is if you want to look at it When you're at home, you can see it on page 22 of your annual report The one takeaway on this is that The if you look at fire Uh police and highway those are all public safety related functions that represents More than 50 percent of this budget. So 50 percent more than 50 percent of this budget is for public safety related functions On the revenue side, this is also on page 22 of your annual report We see almost half the revenue not quite half is from property tax In most communities, you'll see a much higher percentage Going from property tax for municipal services often it'll it's in the range of 75 percent Most and we have local option tax which helps make up a huge part of that difference The that's the good news. The bad news is that it's also a highly volatile tax So when the economy goes down, so does that revenue source and they swing in in numbers can be hundreds of thousands of dollars as we saw in Was a 2008 or so when the economy took a turn for the worse The local option tax also went down considerably, but it has recovered dramatically since then of course So the big question is what's going to cost me? So this chart shows the What's going to cost based on a property valued at a hundred thousand dollars so you can do the math for yourself But and this is just an estimate at this point in time We can't finalize the actual tax rate until we get the grand list numbers in and So that's what we've got to go on at this point in time But for a hundred thousand dollar property your municipal taxes are going to go up a total of four dollars for the year It's going to be interesting to take a multi-year look at the Taxes over a four-year period including the projection that I just shared with you Now these numbers are based on property valued at four hundred thousand dollars four times the number. I just talked about and over the four-year period Including next fiscal year assuming the budget is approved as presented Your taxes over that four-year period would have gone up a total of 20 dollars for four hundred thousand dollar home And I would be remiss if I didn't share this slide with you This is the municipal tax rate comparison of Various municipalities throughout chitinon county. Williston is next to the lowest on this list Sherlock is a little bit lower They offer a different range of services and quality of services than Williston offers And finally Before we get to questions I wanted to share this This is a post that was recently Showed up on front porch forum And it was one of our residents talking about the various reasons why she loves living in Williston And I don't know if she's here this ginger isham I'll see her Here tonight, but anyway, she's the one to post this and I wanted to thank her personally for that I'll have to wait and do that at a later time So with that, I'll be happy to answer any questions that you might have Yes, sir Thank you. We know that an employment is getting at a lowest level. It's been a long long time Are you finding it's putting a stress on keeping employees from the city or recruiting? Yes, it is in fact It's been a huge problem Our police department for many years has suffered from this and in fact We've had some budget surpluses partly because of that because we haven't been able to fill some of the positions I'm happy to report. We're close to fully staffed. We're down one right now We've been understaffed in our public works department recently. We've been struggling this winter Not just with being understaffed but also having an inexperienced staff I'm happy to report. We're at 100 staffing in the public works department I think we're still down one person in our water sewer department another department Let's see Oh our fire department We've been understaffed in that as well, but I'm happy to report. We now are 100 staffed in that Those are the various positions and departments where we've experienced the greatest struggle with finding Top quality people and we're not obviously in this alone, but yes Any other questions? Yes It seems to me on this budget that we're developing a reliance on on reserves To tune of about a million dollars Is that a concern for you because the reserves run out and then what well, that's a good point I would say at this point. It is not a concern Much of what we're using in reserves we're using for one time expenses We have boosted up a little bit what we're planning to use on a regular basis to reduce taxes out of the reserves Partly because we think that is sustainable and partly because our fund balance we feel is too high so You know, we've got to find ways to bring it down and of course one of the reasons it's too high is we've had High or higher than anticipated revenues through the local option tax, which as I said is Very volatile It gives you more money than almost you need when times are good and when times are bad It gives you less money than you need but also because of the shortages of in the various departments That's caused some problems and In a way, maybe it's we're able to not able to spend as much money And provide the same service levels that we normally would provide if we're fully staffed But we've been making progress in that end and we're working towards bringing the fund balance down This woman right behind you You talked about the apartment Revenue that you're now charging a fee For apartments. Is that an annual fee or is it when they build? This well, first of all, this is a proposed fee. It's not something that's been implemented yet If we are going to implement it, we'll have to go through a process of developing Most likely an ordinance which will require a series of public hearings before the select board and ultimately the select board We'll have to decide whether or not to do that the fees We're talking about there are annual fees that will be paid and we're looking at what was it $50 a year Or less That 50 would be the highest amount at this point. I think That's not been approved and we only have budgeted Half a year of that Trying to hedge our bets because we don't know if it's going to be approved and the position that will help Support that service is also budgeted for only half a year Well, we're planning we're hoping to add this new position Which is in the budget and if it's approved then we'll also be looking at instituting the fee schedule But there's no certainty that that would be adopted. It's really up to the select board to decide Some of it not 100 of it. Yes I think there was another question down here Thanks Just curious if the local option tax revenue has any Restrictions on how can we spend or earmark to it? I'm not aware of any restrictions other than Any restriction might be on any other municipal expense or revenue source. We can't use it for example for education Just as we couldn't use any other municipal taxes to support education other questions If not, we'll move on to the next item Which is a bond vote. So before I get into some of the numbers. I wanted to share a story with you This is a picture of the old brick church The year was 2007 the month june nice warm early summer afternoon The people you see in front of the church there were attending a wedding. They're just coming out of the church Shortly after this picture was taken a strong thunderstorm rolled through the town of wilson And lightning hit that steeple and this was the result of that lightning Now the result could have been far worse and See a few people in the community the group here that may remember this but if you i'm dating myself now I admit that but You may remember paul harvey the radio newscaster Well, anyway, this is my share or my version of the rest of the story So after this was hit by lightning obviously it caught fire and It just happened that the first person that was one of the first persons that was driving by this building Was our fire chief? He was on his way to a call It was a uh mutual a call which means a call in another community And so he noticed the Thank you for your observance noticed that there was smoke and He noticed that our ladder truck was actually The ladder truck was stored In the armory because the fire new fire station was under construction at that point And the ladder truck was starting to leave the armory because it was going to that mutual a call And the chief radioed in and said hey guys Turn right instead of left And they did of course and they were able to get water on that fire very quickly And quite likely saved that building so we were very thankful for that So with that um That ladder truck that I just referenced Is now let's see 18 years old. It was 12 years old at the time of this fire and uh That's the truck that we're proposing to replace at this point in time The process for Going through a replacement of a major piece of equipment like this is a rather lengthy process It takes two to three years To go through that process And we're not talking just about a truck body. We're talking about tons and tons of equipment that goes with that and So that that's the the process I've outlined right on that slide there I also want to point out that We currently have five pieces of equipment That serve the fire department It includes three engines slash pumpers one ladder truck and one oversized pickup I think is maybe the way to describe it The proposal is to gradually reduce that Down to four So if this Proposal that we have before us is approved We will be reducing our total number of vehicles down to four Which we think is about the minimum required in order to provide service to this community And so with that I'm going to ask invite our police our fire chief I can invite the police chief up too, but he won't know anything about this I'm going to invite the fire chief up to give you some details about what is being proposed on the truck's chief for you Good evening first of all When the town rolls out the service request portal Please don't use it to report a fire or a call for an ambulance It'll be really responsive, but not quite that responsive. We'll still want to dial 9-1-1 Just a quick note I've lived in Williston now for 37 years And during that time One thing that occurs every year is that the town report is dedicated to someone And I was I was really really excited happy thrilled Honored et cetera et cetera that both myself and ginger Were named this year and for that I thank all the support of the communities in many years But also thank the board and the administration from the town for thinking to recognize ginger and I Because it truly is a great honor. I was I was actually pretty emotional when it occurred and it was a great surprise So it was very fun and and greatly appreciate it. Thank you So on to the fun stuff Way back when those of you who were here 20 years ago saw a photograph of a Ladder truck we currently owned at that time Which didn't reach some of the new properties in town and the proposed length of a ladder truck that would And it's one of those photographs that'll live I guess in the minds of folks who were here 20 years ago forever I don't have it tonight, but um hard to believe it's 20 years later. We're talking about replacing that truck It's expensive and and as the slide showed prior to this one We used to have seven first line trucks in williston And that included the ladder four engines A hazmat truck and a brush truck We sent away the hazmat truck and turned that asset or that that um that service over to the state hazmat team Then later we turned away a tanker truck a tanker pumper and we replaced that resource with a regional tanker task force which brings the mutual aid tankers when needed And we've done that because we transitioned from heavier fire load and fire response More to focusing on a lot of the medical needs we have and We're able to do that by still maintaining the pumping capacity And the truck capacity and the ladder capacity that we had in the past So again, like rick said this now takes us down to having Four total trucks, which will be two engines one ladder and a brush truck Which will be now be a larger size brush truck still have pumping capacity But not the same as the brush truck we currently have more than the one we currently have The trucks we're talking about are again The upper right is the the pickup that had a skid tank with with brush equipment And it will now be you'll see in a minute a a larger truck with more pumping capacity And the engine in the lower right hand corner Is the one which is currently 16 years old and the one in the lower left hand corner Is a ladder truck that we were here 20 years about which is currently 18 years old As rick stated the process is two to three years So the pickup truck would be 23 the ladder truck 21 and the engine 19 years old at replacement time I'll just make note that the brush truck has failed this inspection is parked behind the firehouse out of service permanently And we are looking at a replacement program in williston of 20 years per truck And when these trucks end up being brought into williston these three trucks average age will be over 20 years old Rick what button do I push to go to the next slide? Oh, thank you so much So what we're talking about doing is is is being more efficient While still providing the same service when we bought the taro ladder truck that you saw on the picture in the lower left hand corner We were a all volunteer department And we purchased a truck that had a bucket on the end that people could stand in Because it wasn't the comfort level. There wasn't the usual or the regular use that we have now There wasn't a training opportunity we have now And we felt as though we had to have a truck that Firefighters felt if you will safer in more comfortable in when they had a fire And that truck comes with a much larger Structure that supports the bucket on the end a much larger steel Mechanism that's that's the so-called ladder part. It's a bigger truck with with two rear axles It's just overall a much larger truck and the replacement for that truck would be Just under 1.4 million dollars for that one truck The engine which was the lower right hand picture would be about 800 thousand and the pickup truck is like 51 thousand dollars So all told we were talking about coming before the community For 2.251 million dollars worth of trucks What we said was let's be more efficient while still providing the same service So lower left hand corner now is what's called a quint fire truck And that has the capability of both a ladder and an engine rolled into one It will still have the same ladder length we have now It will still have a pumping capacity we have now It will however carry more hose and more ground ladders And it will allow us to still meet things like our iso rating for insurance But have this one less truck to maintain because We'll downsize the engine and we'll upsize the pickup truck to be a mid-sized pumper That's a four wheel drive truck. We have lots of developments in town now that would be south of 89 They are on roads that are more difficult when it first snowed in winter time We had a fire just a fire call about a week and a half ago in meadow ridge And I literally literally looked at our engine trying to come out of a driveway Slalomming down the road And we don't want to have that situation. That's why we're looking at a four wheel drive truck Which can navigate some of these more rural and snow covered driveways when needed So all in all all told we've pretty much Crafted in in what we call our strategic plan. We do one every year We give it to the board each year and over the last two three years We've proposed doing something with consolidation And this bond proposal in fact is that consolidation Instead of that 2.251 million dollars. We're talking about 1.4 million dollars Instead of having three vehicles replaced as would have happened per schedule We're now looking at replacing with two trucks Still the same total capacity Still the same protection for the community just less trucks to train on and maintain And have to replace again in 20 years at another additional cost So that's just a quick overview and if you have questions, I'm happy to answer them Any questions Please I came here someone Well, thank you very much Thank you chief So the last piece is the charter changes that are being proposed and there are six separate articles And I'm going to go through them pretty quickly here The first one is the Well, I'll talk a little bit about the process first Wilson's charter was first adopted in 2003 and has been modified twice since then 2007 and 2009 And it so provides a way for towns that have charters to vary somewhat slightly from state law Whether it's our processes or procedures or what have you The state of remand is actually falls under something called Dylan's rule And which is a judicial interpretation And what it means is that basically the state has all the control and they only allow towns What little control that they're willing to give up So we're pretty much creatures of the state And the town charter allows us a little bit of variance from that That said, there are many many towns throughout the state of vermont that do not have charters and they What they have to go away is state law pretty exclusively When the town goes through a process of changing a charter It has to have the series of public hearings which we did we have two public hearings It requires a vote by the select board It requires a vote by the townspeople and then it requires a vote by the state legislature Typically the state legislature will approve it as proposed But not always sometimes they make changes. Sometimes they won't approve it at all Most of the time they do approve it though as proposed So the first article that I want to talk about is article eight This involves the position of town treasurer And I'd hope that Deb Beckett would have been able to stay here to talk about this because this really comes from her But she was unable to stay here tonight She has held this position as I said earlier since 1999 And she's I think it's not a secret planning Probably to retire at the end of her term I hope I'm not giving out a secret But anyway, that's my understanding and She recognizes a couple things first of all the duties of that position Combined town clerk treasurer Are have grown over the years and she believes that they should be split into two different positions And secondly, she believes that the treasurer piece has grown Very complex over the years And therefore if she believes that it'd be better to have that position as an appointed position Rather than as an elected position When she first started in 1999 the town had a budget of about three million As you heard earlier the budget proposed for next year is 11.5 million She Right now has 29 separate money market accounts that she manages There's an increasingly large amount of automatic payment accounts that she handles As a convenience to our citizens She has 4 000 tax and utility payments that they process So there's a lot going on and the financial management That's part of the treasurer's office really is an integral part of the financial management of the town And for all those reasons she believes that the this particular charter change Should be approved by the townspeople to make this an appointed position rather than elect it Article 9 is the town clerk's position And this position and in several of these other changes are Pretty basic. It doesn't really if this is approved nothing really change The position of town clerk will remain as an elected position The the only difference here is if it's approved in the future The state legislature will be taken out of the process In other words if the town at some point in the future wants to change this from elected to appointed They can vote on it But they won't have to go through the state legislature to get it approved And by the way non charter towns now have this authority. They were granted to this authority several years ago Charter towns don't have that authority. They have to go through the state legislature So this is just taking the state legislature out of the process Pound keeper and town service officer. It's a little bit different both of these positions are pretty much obsolete in fact The pound keeper's position I've been here 21 years or so I don't think we've ever had an appointed pound keeper What we've done is we've contracted that service out at one point we contracted with a Business in Shelburne right now we're contracting with a business in Colchester And that seems to work quite well. We've had in the past an animal service officer On and off But we don't have one of those now either and the police department's handling those responsibilities so really To have this required in the charter doesn't make a whole lot of sense The town service officer is a position that used to be required by state law State law has been changed. It's no longer required and quite honestly We do have a town service officer. We use them rarely And in addition we now have community outreach workers Those have taken over some of the responsibilities that used to be within the town service officer So it really no longer makes sense to have this required in part of the town charter Article 11 relates to the board of listers I will say quickly that we have a wonderful board of listers in town and they're providing valuable service This is similar to the situation with the town clerk A vote to change this just means that it takes the state legislature out of the process if the town wants to make this change In the future There are some towns that have already made this change Because of whatever situation they had in our community Right now we have a really good board of listers. And so we're not recommending changing that We're just recommending taking the state legislature out of this process And letting the town voters decide Town constable is another position that has become somewhat obsolete. It still has some responsibilities, but they're pretty minor All the law enforcement responsibilities that this position used to have were taken away long ago by a vote of the townspeople in williston And so this would just change it from being an elected position to appointed by the select board And then finally, uh, there's some technical corrections The most important of which is the start time of town meeting. The charter says that it shall be at 7 30 p.m I bet you all wonder what time we started tonight. Well, it wasn't 7 30 it was 7 and we've been starting at 7 for a number of years So we want to make This change so that the select board has the flexibility to Determine what time it is and and most likely to be continued to be 7 But anyway right now the charter says 7 30 and there's a few other minor technical corrections that are embedded in in that piece of Proposal for the charter change And so with that I will be happy to answer any questions that you might have on the charter Yes You basically explained my confusion about how one position seemed to be doing two different things It's because it will be two positions, right? And I have no philosophical problem with electing the treasurer clearly it needs the financial qualification I suppose I also don't mind that the town would have the theoretical authority To appoint the clerk, but I would deeply hope we did not do that as towns in vermont have gone more and more to the australian ballot They have given up more and more of their ability to To impact the town at town meeting we can no longer amend budgets It is practically impossible to put new items on the agenda The flexibility of the citizens of the town to actually govern the town at the town meeting has become in truth largely symbolic And I would hate to see the few remaining positions that were actually elected Sees to be that unless like the town service officer They essentially no longer had any meaningful function that said however since this is only to permit that it might happen I suppose I'll probably vote for it But again, I put that on the table. Why do we bother to come to a meeting if we have no authority at that meeting? Other than to elect a moderator it becomes increasingly An exercise in history rather than the dynamic governance of our town No, you're absolutely correct That was the feeling of the slip word that that position should remain elected And I I agree with that position myself personally and I'm sure that most of the community probably does too Are the other questions? I don't see any if I have one more thing I want to talk about We have an upcoming event scheduled on april 10th And it's a forum on substance use This is in my mind an extremely important issue facing our community We've all heard about opioids and the abuse of opioids That's not what this is necessarily about This forum is intended to Include everyone in the community whether it's a your a parent a grandparent a brother sister a friend Doesn't matter Everyone is part of this community and everyone can be part of the solution to this problem The we're even throwing in dinner had no charge to entice people to attend The we have a really good program planned for this evening And the idea is that we will explore Various ways that we might as a community work towards preventing Substance use amongst our young people The young people are the most vulnerable to the effects of these substances It can affect them later on in life and the substance that i'm talking about are tobacco alcohol Cannabis those are the three main ones and of course opioids too But those are the three most important ones that are getting Used by young people and it's definitely affecting their brains and if we can Come up with several ideas or a bunch of ideas That we can actually change that dynamic and prevent Young people from using these substances will have accomplished a great great service to our community And so we encourage everyone. Please please come. This is an extremely important issue We are asking that if you aren't interested in coming, please register. There's no charge to come or register The address to register is on the screen there. It's wilson's substance use forum or one word dot event bright dot com and Like I said, please come we have Postcards are out in the table out in the lobby That they're kind of save the day cards So please feel free to take one of those with you and I believe it does have that registration address on it so If there's any questions out, I'll be happy to entertain them other than that Thank you all for coming and have a great evening. Is there any questions though before I On that A quiet group this evening, but thank you all for your attention