 Good evening everyone, I'd like to call the April 4th, 2022 flood board meeting to order. We'll start with public hearing. Public hearing is, or actually I should say, called the public hearing to order. The public hearing is for the name change of Mount Street to Porter Place. Any comments? My name's Pete Kelly, I live at Montstreet and I would like to change the Porter Place through conflicts with the 100 Montstreet and Barry Vermont that has exactly the code and everything that Montstreet has to say. To your knowledge, was there any objections to this beat from any other neighbors? No, in fact the only other neighbor is Tyler, Ladd and he's completely agreeing to live everything. Any other comments? Hearing none, I'll take in, see here, we can close the hearing. No motion? So moved. Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Now I would like to call the April 4th, 2022 drone select board meeting to order. With us is Flo Smith, Dave Sawyer. On my right is Carl Parton and Joe Stov. With us also is Vince Conti and our treasurer Diane Pizzabelle. Additions or changes to the agenda? I do have a couple. The office and garage security system update, I would like to present that. And also cover the fitness court funding letter that we received as well as far as the grant funding and the status of that. And update you and get a decision on whether or not we want to move forward at risk with something that I'll explain that when we get to that point. Those are the only two additions that I have. Okay. Excuse me. Any public comment tonight? I have a request, Town Clerk, to read this letter during the public comment from her to address the residents and the board. Okay. So it says to the residents of the town of Berlin and the Berlin select board dated April 4th, 2022. Thank you for this opportunity to address you, the board, as well as all Berlin residents through this letter. For the last 20 years, I've served as the elected Berlin Town Clerk. I've always taken this office very seriously and done my very best to serve the residents of Berlin first. I love doing this job. Through all of those 20 years, the Town Clerk's office has always been very respected by the residents of Berlin, but not always respected by the various select boards. Some select boards have seemed to treat the Town Clerk and assistant Town Clerk positions as unimportant, not as worthy as other positions within the town. We as select board members even call what we do menial. The fact that the Town Clerk is still in an elected position in Berlin has been an issue with some board members in the past because it and the assistant Town Clerk are the last positions that the select board do not control. If the Town Clerk's position ever becomes a select board appointed position, the residents of Berlin will lose the last employees in town government that work solely for them. Every position in the town will then work for the select board, not the residents. Everyone hoped that it always stays elected if for no other reason that the Town Clerk and assistant Town Clerk always have to be aware of and follow state statutes and current laws in every part of the job and ensure others follow them also. If the Town Clerk and assistant Town Clerk ever answer to the select board only, my fear is that following the statutes and laws could then become less important than keeping their jobs. For the last 15 years, I've continuously asked only that the salary of the Town Clerk go back to being treated equally to that of the treasure earth. As it was for many, many years prior. Even though every other hospital Town Clerk salary is much higher, I was also very appreciative when the assistant Town Clerk's position was increased to full-time, but nothing was done at that time to the salary to get closer to being equal to that of other assistant Town Clerks. I truly thought that some headway had been made last year regarding both positions and going forward it would continue. It became very obvious at the beginning of this year that was not going to happen in either case. The last two years have been the most trying times for everyone. Every Town employee has continued to do their job in spite of serious medical dangers surrounding all of us. While all boards were meeting remotely because of the danger of in-person meetings, every Town employee continued to go to work every day so the Towns would continue operating. In spite of knowing the dangers, a previous select board member even complained because we were not allowing the public into the clerk's office in person. To my knowledge, none of us have gotten even a simple public thank you from the select board for having continued working every day, even when most everything else was shut down. For me personally, trying to continue to do the job of my office, the danger of getting COVID myself, losing my dad to cancer in late 2020 and helping take care of my 90-year-old mother have taken a toll on me these last two years. I no longer need or want to continue trying to get select boards to understand the importance of the Town Clerk's office or to continue to fight for equality with other Town employees. It is for these reasons, with much sadness and a heavy heart, I've come to my conclusion that it's time for someone else to be the Berlin Town Clerk. Maybe a new person going forward will manage to get the present and future select boards to realize that the Town Clerk and Assistant Town Clerk positions are just as important to the Town and the work done in the office is just as deserving as all of the other positions are. This letter is to announce first to the residents of Berlin and then to the Berlin Select Board, my retirement and to officially tender my resignation as the Berlin Town Clerk in fact of June 30th, 2022. It's been my honor and privilege for the last 20 years to serve the residents of Berlin as your Town Clerk. Respectfully, Rosemary Morris, Berlin Town Clerk, 2002, 2022. Any other public comment? Hearing none. Discussion of Public Works position? Rob? Yes. Shall I come up? Sure. They do have a letter in the description that was done with you and Tom or they have a copy of that in their package as well of the job description. Of the job description? Oh, okay. This one, I don't know if they have a copy of that. Okay, great. Thank you. Alright, well thank you for having me here tonight. I'm Rob Allen. I am Chairman of the Berlin Public Works Board. And Public Works here in Berlin is sewer and water. Okay, the water system is a fairly new system. We've got drilled wells and a reservoir up on the hill by the old Dodge Farm up on some of that property. It serves the community here on the hill, basically. Some residents and commercial properties here on the hill. The sewer system is here on the hill, collects the sewer, and there's also a collection system down along Route 302 down on the main road. And the sewer is collected at a main point and then pumped to the Montpelier system and down to the treatment plant down there. So what our board, I'm just kind of giving an overview here. Our board operates and maintains the water and the sewer systems for this area of the town. We are a five-person board, but we currently have four members. And I can't think that we've had five members actually on our board for about four or five years. It's hard to get people, as you know, to volunteer for boards. And ideally we like to find someone that's got utility or construction experience. It helps with problem solving and such. Dave has been on our board in the past. As we know, the town of Berlin is experiencing some growth. There's a lot of water and sewer projects in the works, and especially with the town center coming on. There's a lot going on there and in other places. And it's getting to a point where it's really more than a volunteer board can handle with some part-time assistance. So we're kind of feeling it's getting to a point where we need a full-time, needs to be a full-time person, to operate and maintain the water and sewer. Right now we have contractors that, we have a contractor for water that does the operation and maintenance and a contractor for sewer that does the operation and maintenance. There would be efficiencies to bring it all together and have one person do that. Our vision would be a town employee, but as a board we don't have hiring authority anyway. We can't hire somebody. It would have to be the select board. And this person would, I think, would answer to the town administrator probably. And something important to note is that public works of water and sewer are self-sustaining. There's no taxpayer dollars that go into maintaining or operating water and sewer. It's all funded by the users of those two utilities. And I expect that would continue on even if a full-time person were hired. Their salary and benefits would come out of water and sewer and not anything from taxpayer dollars. It would need to be a skilled person. I don't know if you had a chance to read this or not, but look through it. They need to have a license to operate a water system. They need to be knowledgeable of sewer lines and sewer pumps and that kind of thing. And of course they're not going to fix all these things, but they'd have to be knowledgeable and call for service when it's needed and that kind of thing. The way our contractors do now. So it's more than just a labor type person. It'd have to be more of a professional position, really, the way we see it. So my objective tonight really is just to bring this topic up, get people thinking about it, and try to move forward. I'll take any questions at this point. How plentiful are people out there with these skill sets? Certainly there's plenty of licensed water operators. So that would be sort of the minimum. And then choose a person that's got some knowledge of sewer as well. That is a licensed water operator. You mentioned part-time assistants. Were you referring to the contractors that are part-time assistants? Our part-time assistant is the zoning administrator. He does a lot of work for us actually, but he only does it part-time. And I think we pay, you know, the two contractors that work for us, their contracts are around $90,000 a year combined. That was my next question, so thank you. Combined, they're about $90,000 a year, kind of as a base contract. And then it's more than that for call-outs, like emergency call-outs and such. So I think we're over like maybe $110,000 or something like that. So $90,000 for the contractors is actual construction and maintenance, not for just organization and planning. Right, it's just for maintaining. I mean, like the sewer contract, the person comes and checks pumps three times a week, does some cleaning. A lot of the cleaning, though, is extra when he does sewer line cleaning, but just general make sure the system is operating properly. So my question is, would that $90,000 be decreased if this position was added? I think there would be some savings, yes. But we haven't had the details to really run the numbers exactly, but we think there would be some savings. If we post this, I take it you would post it as pay-based on experience? For sure, I would think so, yes. Do you have a range in mind of salary? Would salary and benefits should probably think around $80,000 or something like that? I can interrupt here because we have talked about it and I did a lot of the research. Okay, great. So what Tom was telling us is he thought the base pay should be $80,000. And then with benefits, and this would be if they took, they had the highest benefit as far as the healthcare, maybe $127,000. And that would be at the low end as far as if their base rate is $80,000 and if they're going to be doing repairs then it probably would be even greater than that. Okay, all right, thank you for that. But again, this would not come out of taxpayer dollars. This would be funded by the water and sewer users. I guess I have a follow-up question to that. So as of right now, the funds that are collected for water and sewer are going to the general fund winners. No, they have their own account. Yeah, it's a separate fund in titles called the business fund. In an ideal situation, when would you like to fill this position? How soon and do you have a time frame? Well, I don't have a time frame. I think this is a discussion period. If it's favorable with people, we'd like to get on it and put something out in May or June or something like that maybe. So Rob, I had a real quick question. I mean, from serving on that board, there's some knowledge that comes with one of these contractors that may be looking to retire soon? Possibly, yeah. So the sooner you had somebody to get that knowledge... Yeah, it would be... Things could change in a hurry. Things could change in a hurry with our contractors and so... Especially on this side. At this point, I think we're going to keep... There's no word of retirement or changing any contractors or anything, but things could change in a hurry, yeah. So that knowledge needs to get absorbed faster than... Yeah, sooner than later. Sooner than later, yeah. So this position would free up some of Tom's time, too? Yes. I think initially Tom would have to be there to sort of be a transition, help transition a person into just getting up to speed on knowledge of how the systems work and where everything is. But yeah, this would eventually relieve Tom of his work with the board. So these funds have been separate for a while and they've been working on a separate account. You feel, I mean, at $120,000 a year, how's that going to impact the funds that are coming in now? Well, it would just affect the rates. But we're constantly adding people to the sewer and water. So we really are building a group. Some more people, obviously, the more we spread out the money. But all the funds would come out of that business account. And right now, part of Tom's pay is coming out of that account. So if you were to subtract that as well, then you could easily pay for the $120,000. That's a good point. What comes in for the water and sewer annually? Oh boy, that's a good question. I'm trying to think of at least a half a million. Okay. Tom did tell me the collected budget for water and sewer is close to a million dollars. Okay. Probably. I was thinking just sewer only. Yeah. And I would agree with that. That's just off the top of my head. And like I said, we keep growing. So if the expansion, though, if the expansion didn't like over, you know, because I don't expect it to go up overnight, but at the rate that we are now, it would support this position. If we stayed stable where we are now, it would more than support this. Okay. Because you're only looking at an actual increase of around $20,000. Because you take the $90,000 you're paying for the two contractors and say if the total with benefits was $110,000, that's a $20,000 increase. Yeah, but they're going to need these contractors for a while after this position is hired. It's not like you're going to get rid of it. Some details are going to be worked out on the transitional period. Yeah. But that, even the transitional period is only going to be a one-shot deal. It's not going to carry over into the next year, next budget cycle. There was talking, you know, and talking with Tom a little bit too early for me on this, a four to six month transition period with the contractors. And then another couple of additional months with the board still in place as well. And there is a surplus in the account now that we could easily cover that going forward. And that's if the system just stayed stable where it is right now without any growth. Absolutely. And I don't know if I mentioned if we, if you were able to hire a full-time person, it would be, it would really become a public works department for the town of Berlin. And it would eliminate the board. We would no longer have a public works board. It would be a public works department. A one-person department. Basically, yeah. Now in the future, you know, maybe you want to work highway in to have a public, you know, a bigger public works, a real public works department. Now the logistical question, this is maybe for Vince, or looking at office space again with added, an added position and wondering where exactly this person would sit. So we have looked at it. There's some options on the table. For example, just one quick chain of thought is a job trailer right outside and open up the Lister's office for an individual to sit in there and be based in the Lister's office. They're here one day a week. That's an easy short-term solution. And all these are, you think you've covered all your bases here with your description? Well, it's draft and I think we'll go over it again, Brad, to make sure. But it looks to be pretty complete. Well, how's the board feel? You think we should take in press forward with this? I personally think it's a direction with the town the way it's growing and from sitting on that board and seeing some of the stuff that goes on it's something that needs to go. Like I said, these guys have been doing this a long time that have information that somebody needs to have. If something was to happen, we'd be in a mess. That's all information that's not written down? Well, it's with contractors. And who knows what happens. You know how things go these days. Okay, Carl. I guess first question is there's some way we could get all the documentation that our contractors have done for us and get it in-house here. We might have a lot of it. Well, I think we do have a lot of it. So that would be good to have a backup just in case. What we have, Carl, though, is we have, for documentation, right, we have the drawings and the mapping of the systems and the things that have been done. We have all of that. I think what David's speaking to is the tribal knowledge. The knowledge that goes through. This guy knows where we've had leaks. He knows that what we don't have are detailed maintenance records. So what do things do to be serviced? When was the last time they were serviced? When did they have a problem? That kind of thing, we don't have. It's that tribal knowledge. And this contractor, you'd probably have one. You'd have him on for a little while to be able to show. You'd have to be able to fix things. Right. Yeah, well, certainly it doesn't sound like we're going to eliminate all contractors, even if we move to the position. I guess I have to defer to people who have knowledge in the system. I guess my only caveat would be that just the three meetings I've been to, we're moving from Berlin town and looking more a lot like Berlin city government. Our structure and our growth direction and our staffing. It's interesting how it's moving that way quickly. Although we're a town, it seems like we're emulating a very city and a peculiar city quickly. Joe? I'm going to say, you know, I'd be in favor. I don't necessarily think you're going to be very long before you're going to have to merge that, maybe with the town highway. You know, I just, I'm looking at this and you're looking at people that are going to be running equipment and such. You're still going to be using the contractors, I'm sure, for a period of time. But I see this position, or the department, let's say, growing some with the highway department, probably in the very near future. Paul? I was going to add that as a liaison, you know, I'm very impressed with the board, everything that you've done, I think it's very forward thinking going with this. I also think that it might be necessary to have an assistant as well as a supervisor, because this position is going to require a lot and there's going to be vacations and time off. Well, that is true. Somebody, there's got to be other knowledge among town staff somewhere, if somebody wants to take a vacation. Exactly. And I'm also thinking that with the growth that's going to come and what Pearl said, we are growing exponentially. And I think, you know, if not now, very soon in the future, we might need to increase the hiring in this capacity, aside from just this one position. That's the way I'm looking at it. But I think it's wonderful that you're bringing it forward. I'm very much a proponent of going forward with the hire. So I guess it's just a matter of finding who's out there. They can get with Vince and work up, go over this job description again. They can get it posted. Half the board agrees. I'll work with them. We'll finalize that between the board and Tom and myself, and we'll get it out into circulation and see what's out there. Okay. I'll throw one more comment down. And anything we could do to really firm up the figures, I guess, as far as what we might be saving, what dollar figure we'd be saving from the zoning administrator's work, from the contractors, and how much it would cost, I think. I think what we can do for that, to say that we can pinpoint it, really nail it down, probably not, but what I can do is work with Diane, and we can come up with obviously the actual costs that we have, and then make a couple of scenarios, right, based on experience, kind of a range that each would fall in, and where we would end up. Yep. We can do that at the same time we're finalizing the job description. Anything else, Rob, or any more, Rob? Nope, that's it. Thank you for having me tonight. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Appreciate you, Rob. Let's see here. Please, Chief, update. Hilltop. James? Yeah, thank you for hearing me tonight. I just thought it was important to bring to the board's attention some issues we've had regarding Hilltop and the sheltering program over there. Over the last few weeks, I've been very vocal of the state about the conditions over there, and just wanted to keep the board in the loop. Just for some context for them, newer members of the board, we have eight positions within the police department, not including myself. We have two open vacant positions, and two officers. One is at the academy, and one is on family leave. So that leaves us with four officers, basically, and all their shifts. Over the last month, we've had 150 calls to the Hilltop, which is extraordinary. Some of those are self-generated, called foot patrols or directed patrols, and I did that with the intent of deterring problems that had been happening there. And at the request of the owners, they thought a more visible presence from law enforcement would be helpful. But a majority of those are calls, someone calling us to the Hilltop. Anywhere from citizen disputes, disability conduct, noise, suspicion, calls of some sort, which are kind of general trespassing, fights, disputes of all kinds, property issues. A couple weeks ago, myself and another officer responded to a fight over there in mid-morning. As soon as we were done, and it required a use of force to get the person under control. Seconds after getting that situation wrapped up, we got a report of another fight while we were still on scene, completely unrelated to what we were doing. Another use of force situation to get that person under control in custody. That morning, I wrote a letter to the commissioner in DCF saying this is an issue, we need to address it. They've kind of been stalling, I guess, for lack of a better word, unable to come up with any kind of resolution to help us there. At its peak, we've got 90-plus residents at the Hilltop with various issues of some sort. Mental health, substance use issues, you name it. So, I specifically requested that they draw down the numbers to something a little more managerial. When the numbers are around the 50s or the 60s, I found that we were able to kind of stay on top of things and it wasn't requiring five or six calls a day to respond to the Hilltop. They responded in kind and said that they're working on removing people who are problematic there, but I don't know that they're going to get the numbers in any neighborhood of where I'm requesting. So, just as a heads-up, it concerns me because to top it all off, they've had 27-plus cases of COVID reported there as well. So, my concern is, as the department and operations, if one of my officers gets hurt, responding to a call there and getting him to a tussle with someone or gets COVID, it's kind of becoming a real problem. We're already at bare bones managing shifts. This is kind of an issue that the state created, putting that many people into our community without any infrastructure in place. And I find it a bit irresponsible on their part. They have private security, but they don't have any law enforcement powers. Really, they're just kind of standing by another set of eyes over there. They have referred to as lifestyle intervention people that they put there recently that are kind of peer-to-peer support, which hopefully may address some of the more minor problems. But there's really no law enforcement presence responding there other than us. So, my concern, well, last Saturday or Saturday before was a good example. We had somebody lost on the trails above the pond. We had officers out trying to deal with that. We got a call that there's a major fight involved in multiple people. Other agencies had to respond to deal with it. It's not their responsibility, it's our responsibility. The issues happening at the hilltop are taken away from services that we provide to our community as a whole. I just wanted to put that out there and let you guys know what's going on and then I'm trying to stay at the top of it. But just so you're aware of these conversations between the end of the state. Is this housing thing? I thought that these certificates were going to be stopping like April 15th. They're going to keep throwing them out there. I've been told that there's some kind of transitioning to a new phase starting in June. But I'm not sure that that's going to address the problems that we're having specifically at the hilltop. The program that provides the funding for this, is that COVID related? There's some federal funding and that was part of why they implemented this program is to keep people separate and not happen in a single complex like the Good Samaritan Haven down in Berry. But it's kind of gone beyond that scope now. From your talk with the state, you didn't get any ideas on how to take it? I don't think that it's my place. I'm out of options. We only can do what we can do. Something in the state, well really the only option is trying to draw that in the numbers there. You can't give the police officers to respond to calls. Part of the other issue is the owner seems reluctant to implement suggestions I've made to making a safer and more secure building. The state is aware that he hasn't implemented these suggestions and really there's no consequences. Can you put a dollar figure on your enforcement for just the hilltop? Is that something we could do? It's a little hard. There's times when we've had to respond there and take somebody in the custody and bring them to a facility that's usually two officers involved just for safety issues to bring them somewhere and have another officer come on duty and actually handle calls. We're talking at an overtime rate of maybe $50 an hour for two officers for a three hour period that's just off the top of my head. Couldn't really put a figure on it other than we respond there six times a day and you say it's 30 minutes of response times whenever we get paid per hour what that is. My concern is not so much the monetary amount because we have discussed the time being compensated to some degree financially. It's being able to do our functions if we were to lose another officer or two we just wouldn't be able to respond to calls anymore. I literally like shutter in our doors until people got better and had to go to other agencies to deal with town's calls, which I don't want to have but we're getting dangerously close to that right now. The guy is working 20 hours overtime a week as it is to cover these shifts and if somebody else goes down we're just not going to be able to do it. I noticed on the monthly budget you put out that we're 30,000 over and that's why I'm certain. For overtime. The part of that is just and this is an issue you need to attend to our department but we can't find people to fill these positions, these vacant positions and that's a problem to stay with. So it seems to me you have absolute justification to request state help and enforcement in this particular situation because the state's policy caused it it seems like the state police presence there would be pretty helpful especially in the situation we're in now. Is that something we could draft a letter as a town to request maybe just enforcement in this one area? Be required. And I've been told flat out the state police aren't responding to calls and they're facing staff issues similar to ours but I wanted the board to know in case things don't improve there and I would be surprised if they do that we may have to be more vocal in order to get some kind of resolution. I don't know about weight to be more vocal I think now's the time to be more vocal. I say the time is now. Yeah because if we wait then we lose an officer up there it gets injured and it's too late. And I'm concerned too about liability any potential use of force that we have is a potential liability. Most definitely. I don't like exposing yourself to additional sources of liability. So I looked at some numbers or had somebody pull some numbers for me they're for calls going to the hill top and over the last 12 months there were 1435 calls that's to include Berlin Fire, Berry City Ambulance, Berry Town Ambulance and the Berlin Fast Squad to also PD. So we take everything out and leave just PD that's over 1200 calls just in the last 12 months. I mean it's crazy. And to say the man hours you could go there for a half hour or two hours plus afterwards for follow-up I'm sure. Something like paper work and transport if that's the case. At the very beginning didn't the state have their county sheriff set there for some period of time? At times they've contracted the state's contracted more county sheriffs to provide the staffing but they're in a visible mode anyway. They don't have any or won't get themselves involved in a law enforcement capacity. They're not going to go out and arrest anybody. I can't say that I've ever seen them there in the year that I've been here so I don't know what their patrols look like what their shifts look like when they're over there when they're supposed to be over there I know that they're facing staffing issues as well and have significantly cut down on their presence and when they weren't there they were very constructive they're kind of one notch above private security. So if the state police aren't going to act and we're down if we fall down a man what will we do? I mean the only thing we could do is just get really vocal and make it so the state police has to step in I guess. Or you know I don't know that they give you some extra manpower from the state side or something. I'm not sure that that's even if they were inclined to do that I don't know that there's bodies out there too. To do it. I think really the only viable answer is for them to draw down numbers there so that it's something more manageable. But if we draw down numbers there just I'm just thinking out of the box we draw down numbers there and we put them somewhere where is it going to be all night in my backyard situation you know what I mean? Because we've got Barry I mean because crime's on their eyes Montpere, Barry, here, everywhere it's not like we can send them to Burlington because crime's on their eyes in Burlington too. I mean I think If we had four more officers here I think we'd be alright but we'd probably be in a better position and just we were at a real thin ice right now. And there's really no place for you to get four officers now anyways. And I don't like sending officers by themselves over there because you never know what the situation's going to evolve to. And fortunately for us Barry Montpere have been very helpful in responding here when they when we call them. For back as? They don't have to do that but they're responsive. That's great. How do your radios work inside the building? Our radios are not operational. Most of the time. So when you send someone in there alone they are alone? Yeah. Okay. You know if the dispatchers are on their game and they haven't heard from the officer in the minute or two and they check in with them or try to check in with them they haven't heard from them that will sometimes send another unit but state police dispatch and stretch them and sometimes we don't get those radio checks. I guess and what we need to do is figure a way to get vocal and who we get vocal with and how. Well I just want to make sure we're on the same level because the state's attorney has been very supportive at the issues over there so he is definitely in our corner. Who is that? I've already teed all the state's attorney to do that. And he's keeping in close contact with you? Yes. Good. The program that's housing these people is that in human services or Department of Children and Family Services DCF. Emergency housing and stuff DCF. And I recognize the need for sheltering people I really do but I also have a responsibility to the department the community it's a little like making sure we can take care of everybody. Now have you sent any letters to these people to the commissioners? Well that's what prompted this conversation we had with the commissioners office last Thursday where I was told that they're going to be removing some of the more problematic gas but I don't know if that means we'll remove them and then replace them with ten more people that potentially might cause even more problems or we're just going to remove people and see what we're at with those numbers. Well why don't you and Vince get together and draft a letter to the commissioner and to the governor and bring it back to us and we'll see if we can sign it. Send it on. I think we're going to have much more luck to get to it. No but I think it's important that we be vocal because something does happen on the record. Most definitely. You brought it to some attention. Anything else chief? No. That's it. Thank you. Thank you chief and to your staff as well. Thank you. Any other questions for the chief? Well he's here. If not thank you very much. Thank you. Okay there's such and on highway police radio system. So you have a the original quote in your package from Burlington communication systems. I don't have the revised quote that reflects the numbers for the police department yet. The idea behind this is again we have a lot of dead spots in town for both the police and for the highway on the communication systems the old radio system that they both have. I've talked to Burlington communications for a digital system they can get us up on the tower at a reduced rate because they have equipment up there now that they can put us in a rack that they can put us in of theirs at a reduced rate so we don't have to go directly through the tower. He said probably at least a 50% reduction so it would be somewhere in the range of maybe between $200 and $300 a month for that to get us up there with the new digital radios to outfit the highway. The highway doesn't need 100% new because they already have some digital radios. That quote's pretty accurate for the highway of what they would need. On top of that we do have some funds already to cover a portion of that on the highway side for the radios. I think it's 11,000? Well all in all it would be like 17,000. I have 11,000 just in the highway equipment but we do have highway materials which I have another and again this is also something that ARPA funds could be considered for as well. The police they need a few more radios than what they have to bring them up to the digital level and obviously still have the ability to communicate with the surrounding towns of the state police. So that's the quote that I can't even estimate right now because they haven't got back to me on that they were still working on it as of last week. And also on the highway department their radios will also be set up in a way where they'll still have ability to talk surrounding towns as well if need be. So that's the intent of it again is to just upgrade the system so that there's no dead spots on the other side of the mountain or over in spots and then in the Junction Road and you had another dead spot I think somewhere else as well. And the police basically have the same dead spots when they're out on the highway. Chief, the mobile radios there's five is that for your cruisers? I'm not sure. Most of the notes are for the highway department. The highway? Yeah. How many cruisers? Four cruisers at any time. Okay. And you're going to be upgrading the four? Some of those are digital already probably communications checking out the models that they have that they provided the information on to see which ones would need to be replaced which ones could still assist them. And then going back to the hilltop and having a problem transmitting outside that building do any of your cruisers have repeaters in them? No. Have you thought about that? I don't know historically if we have enough that hasn't been part of the discussion between men so on. And so that would assist you on communicating outside from inside the building to your cruiser which would then pump it out of higher if they had repeaters in the cruiser. And the other thing going digital and a little bit higher output may also again I'm waiting to hear of what pointing communication says we got to the police on that as well. What's the total on this upgrade? On one you have there I think it's second page. Nineteen, five, twenty-five, seven. Right around 20 grand on that one right there. That's just I only got one page. It's right on the back. Yeah it's on the back. There we go. Saved some paper on that one. And how much do you see within the budgets? In the reserve I have like seventeen thousand for the highway. I do have some for police but we're not talking about police right now. Right. We will be shortly once I get that obviously I'll bring that. So this is just on the highway? That's just the highway as it stands right now. And there's seventeen but then you said the other qualifies are the ARPA funds. Yeah. Jim did I miss anything? Do you want to add anything to that? I think pretty much covered. It's just some of the radios are old and some of them are some of the newer trucks have been upgraded over the recent years with newer radios but they still have a few that the greater sales are the old radio, the loader I think they asked me they were just kind of passed on through not so much as the trucks the trucks usually get a new one every if it's needed they get a new one. Saturday I was trying to talk to Mike I'm on Jonesbrook he's on Bylet Hill we couldn't even talk to each other. So it's about two thousand more than what we have in the budget. In reserves. In reserves. In your what's your budget percentage on the highway department now? Okay so it looks like right now we still okay we have like the budget was like one million one hundred eleven thousand and we have spent seven hundred and twenty thousand to date so we still have an additional three hundred ninety thousand potentially expected and we are in the ninth month so we still have three months to go after this. Unfortunately spring months too. Right where we'll be doing other construction work. Are there any savings if we take in and do we wouldn't know yet because you don't know the police if we do it all at once. Right that's what I'm hoping to find out we can couple them and I've asked them that question right what can we look at for savings from a labor standpoint if we do everything at once you know what's that look like for us. Well you'll be buying a few more radios to boot. Yep a little bit more of a volume discount as well so. I don't want to speak at a turn here but we're also applying for grants federal grants for a variety of technical assistance radios included but that's going to roll in the dice whether or not that's going to come to fruition and it could be months and months before we hear an answer so we are seeking alternative sources and if it's possible we may be able to be compensated for whatever expense we have. Well how does the board feel about this? Probably should wait until we get the total estimate. Yeah well that's what I'm going to recommend right the board meeting as an update and then at that point maybe we can make the decision the board can make the decision with that information do we want to move forward or not at that point in time or do a hybrid of some type. Well I think probably I don't think there's much choice other than to upgrade if they're not able to talk to each other. Just from an efficiency standpoint exactly. Well safety as well. Absolutely. And I think I would probably ask them about the repeaters and how that might benefit the police department do you have an idea did they give you an idea of turnaround time on this I think you've got a long time before you might get a radio. No actually they thought they could do that before the end of the summer we do that but again it's subject to change if somebody comes in tomorrow and cleans them out so obviously they'll be a long way but they were pretty confident that they could get this done tightly for us. Good Well I would take and say and put this on Nick's agenda. Yep Well little Thank you Anything else on this? Chief anything to add Oh Oh I'm good Thank you Tim I'm good Well okay thank you very much Chief Thank you Tim Yep And Nick's is Thank you for the grading as well Finally I think Nick's is discussion on highway pickup I don't know they do have the police in their back okay I'll hurry Thanks Chief Thank you Thank you again Come on So as you guys know well excuse me we're here we budgeted last year for the sub coming here for to replace the 2015 pickup truck along with the the other temporary so after town meeting there they talk events and I went I went got some quotes from the three dealerships right here in the area they told me capital and maybe we waited there 30 days past town meeting as comparable as comparable committee with them the three dealerships About 20,000 cheaper on Chevy why is that It's a Chevy these are regular regular bed trucks their crew cab chassis or no they're one but they're the same as what we have now to pick up single wheel crew cab we have a three quarter time but we pulled the chipper that's a little much okay so single wheel would you have to order this thing? yes so it wouldn't be you're to like everybody says so capital and Cody's both said that they figured around eight weeks McGee said 24 to 6 miles how soon did Cody say they could get it? eight weeks eight weeks what's the mile mileage on the trade roughly about 55,000 right now and that's a diesel diesel as well yeah they're all diesels so Cody Chevrolet is $3,000 under the rest of them sizeable difference the other two are right around there they're $700 different student tools and Cody's listen 28 on the base truck 64 Cody's also offering a municipal discount too yeah I'm not sure why the other two didn't they went and sat down with them and talked it all through and told them that's everything else no is this anything tied into the state bid for trucks I don't know it's the same it's it's the municipal pricing is the it's government pricing is what they all put in for government pricing in there I'm pretty sure I saw it in all of them I see one for government fees I don't see anything like that all have been for a good fountain but yeah phones didn't well they didn't really break it down but this is all they sent me do you have a preference of recommendation of the three my recommendation would be to go with Cody's a little cheaper and they seem to be more of the thing that they'll get it faster not the that means and that's a Duramax with the Allison transmission versus the Ford had Allison 10 speed automatic what do you currently have I do see that currently have I have a service on it we really haven't done a whole lot to it seven years old seven years old showing its age showing its age pretty rusty well it certainly gave me enough for it yeah I was very surprised that was that was a treated value I didn't really think that it was going to do that back in November it would have been more probably MMR was crazy in November on him it was crazy starting to come down now so do we have the money for this value? not until Fy 23 it's not in Fy 22 money so July 1st and it won't be ready till then anyway yeah and they all know that they all knew that it's Ford after July 1st are there any options under the Cody Chevrolet recommendation ICB total options comes to 14,870 are there any options that you could live without or that would bring that price down to bring the bottom even lower that's really much kind of not much just steps and stuff like that we normally use but that's just an LT work truck it's not an LT 2 just a regular because they all did say that they're not building work trucks yeah well that's LT's now the that's the new work your emotion on this if you're looking for the Chevy I would make the motion to move forward with the purchase of the Chevy truck for the price of is that going to change anything is that should we even put the price in there not the number where I'm not sure that's the quote from the game from Cody's how about the purchase from Cody's for the price on the estimate second second the motion any further discussion now exactly the personal truck is one thing but changing over the radios and everything else is additional yeah that I can cover that out of my maintenance budget I would assume it's kind of where I was because if the timing's right I'm just going to if the timing's right the new radios could be installed we could have discussed that as well we'll save that fee whether that was going to be there or not and I didn't price in the changing of the plow depending on who gets it they all do different things because we're going to keep the plow so like sometimes they do them in-house and sometimes they ship them over to McGee because they're a Fisher dealer for Central Vermont are the mounts the same? they will not be the same you'll need new push-bars push plates and probably a wiring harness for the headlights the rest of it the rest of it will all switch over the power the power cords the module and the fish stick and you just need a headlight wiring harness and a new push plate because it brings it to different on the newer trucks yep okay and the lights right yeah Dave yeah what's the estimate the estimate for that truck is total sales price is $26,907 that's what that's what the trade that's what the trade okay cool thank you anything else on this is this I suspect and it's a $3,500 it has a heavier wiring package in this truck right the lights and stuff yeah they're all on the $3,500 all three of them are in the file prep package okay oh yeah now I see it we all have well now two alternate there's a 250 or a 220 and they come with engine block heaters and everything so yeah okay any other discussion hearing none all those in favor aye motion carries thank you thank you thank you okay we need to unpower right away work yeah they want to install a power pole at the subdivision up here on Scott Hill next to the cemetery just be on the cemetery where that little development's going in and run run a line from there over to the the power pole on the L&B property where the subdivision's going to be aerial over the road how many locks are going in there I see four locks four locks three I believe it's four I'm in total I make a motion to approve payment number 22-010 dated February 25th 2022 for the GMP right away permit for the Moody subdivision let's second that any other discussion hearing none those in favor aye motion carries okay approval of licenses permit sub to applications I make the motion to approve payroll warrant 22-19 for payroll 13-2022 to March 26 2022 paid on March 30 in the amount of $48,599.30 also payable warrant 22-D19 with checks 21-900 to 21-936 in the amount of $95,148.94 and the February trial balance report February budget status report March delinquent tax report March reconcile payroll fund and sewer water checking accounts let's second that any discussion on this all those in favor aye motion carries your additions to the agenda yes security system update so the last time we talked was asked to go back and look at what we could do in reducing the amount of tax for the key fob entries had him come in did another visit we brought it down to two exterior doors for the key fob entries everything else would remain with a key lock believe it or not that reduced the reduced it by about 10 grand so you should have I sent the new page as well for the quote the 15 grand was reduced to a little more clarity from him on the others one of the questions was what was happening at the police with the cameras and things they're all new cameras for now to upgrade those to a better camera as well as the additional cameras they would upgrade all of those so that was they would have a fully functional system visual all four corners in the building now they'd have 360 view around here the window security on the police side of things and over at the garage he would have 360 view around the outside of the garage a one camera inside the garage as well with these quotes and again he's holding the price increase that he gave us back in September October that's great and again these are also qualified for the ARPA funds ARPA funds does that have to be paid is the bill is paid by us and we get reimbursed or is that paid directly through the I can take it right we have money in the ARPA funds right now in a separate account so I can just take it out of there and how long is this quote good for it's 30 days and it's already been 60 plus or minus but he's holding it again you know we went back he had a lot of nice things to say about working with the town working with the police and what he's already done and he's happy to have the work from us okay hear a motion on this I didn't get all the numbers but I got I didn't have it in front of me either I can give you a yeah I make a motion to move forward with this it's a security system this one has been reduced to that amount and these others stand as they are security system that is reduced from by 570950 is that what that's that one and then each of those other sheets are also part do we have a total of all of them what was the I didn't total them up this time 570950 give me a second hand 6,731 $6,700 $6,700 $1 $3,000 okay yep $9,58 $2,990 $525 and it's this back page on this $5,70950 okay that'd be $19,913.50 so I'd make a motion to go with round hill offensive security not to exceed the $19,913 for the security system for the on-place as described within the quote second second okay any further discussion on this hearing none those in favor aye aye motion carries what was your I'll give another one you have a letter in your package as well this is in regards to the national fitness campaign and the outdoor fitness center we talked about some time ago to go over in the new town center the issue comes down to the timing and the funding the risk that we're being asked to consider is that the hospital hasn't approved the budget yet and they're not going to approve it after the deadline has passed so the the risk is basically we're being asked to front about $130,000 for this the hospital is going to contribute but they may or they may not it hasn't passed their budget screening process yet and it won't for some time so they they were looking for us to provide this letter basically saying that we're willing to take that risk and put that money up front commit it from the town I'm not willing to commit to that under those circumstances myself feels the same way exactly I was asked to bring it I've brought it it's for the for the debate and vote on but well since the debate is over it's a money item we'd have to put on the next agenda but I guess we can skip it I will I will let everyone dead at this point and I'd like to update you on the the other thing I would ask was the assistant town treasurer position I'd like to update the board on the progress that we've made on that so I spoke with body monitor at the Regional Planning Commission about the hiring environment one of the rates look like how's that going and she kind of chuckled at me and said are you crazy this is not the time for municipalities to be hiring basically it's tough there's a lot of municipalities out there looking for a lot of people the wages are extremely difficult to meet some of the expectations that are out there now as well even for new college grads because a lot of the accounting firms are snapping them up at some pretty premium rates as well but that doesn't mean it's all that bad because after talking with her getting that lovely information I spoke with Norwich University on their intern program they were very upbeat about that they have a program that links theirs to basically hundreds of universities and colleges in the northeast and around the country and locally here as well and they advertise it not only in-house but on a platform called Handshake that goes to the other universities with the job description the expectations and all those things it's out there now I took advantage of that program and it's out there again it just went out last week so we don't have any interest yet coming in no applications and so on but it's out there he was pretty excited to get us on board to start working with him from an intern perspective he asked if we would consider you know a junior not necessarily a senior maybe even part-time we talked a little bit and if it's if it's the right candidate that meets expectations and passes Diane's approval I said yes we'd be willing to consider that as well so again when we start talking about the budget what it's going to cost we don't know until we know what type of candidate we're going to go with whether it's full-time right out of the gate or a part-time intern this could lead us to either one it just depends on going through the interview process and the candidate that we decide to move forward with and then one other person that I spoke to was a lady by the name of Zoe Cartwright out of the creative workforce solutions that's tied with the state she's got an office in Berry she said that she has that she can look at as well and resources so she also has the information and is soliciting for candidates for us as well there so it's moving forward it's we're in a lot better position than we were a couple of weeks ago I believe on this and we just have to you know keep beating the brush until we get some candidates to start speaking to the state on that and the last one that I have for now Mr. Town is the again there's a letter I was asked by Heidenberg properties to provide the select board that they mailed me they're coming in front of the BRB tomorrow night I believe with the fist and it's all with regards to the Newtown Center their position on the road to be built and the financing of that road to decide on this this is information for you our attorney has not reviewed this yet he was on vacation last week when I got this so he'll have that on his desk tomorrow and I'll be talking with him with regards to how we want to formulate a response and start a discussion with them all with regards to that and again at some point the mall will want to come in and talk to the board directly about it as well the DRB board meeting held right here what time is that I believe they're starting at double check it's on the calendar I think they're starting at 6 and that's tomorrow evening tomorrow evening yeah check make sure it could be 7 7 7 p.m. tomorrow night right here okay thank you meeting else ma'ams they're going to save anything around the table no I'm done thank you very much okay round table Dave I don't have anything well no that's tonight thank you Carl we'll be interested in an update about projected road opening since you had something I was going to ask that anybody interested in roads so it's been interesting here for roads do we have a projected opening for across town before it gets better okay for a short period of time if if I had to guess maybe two weeks at the end of the second week maybe you probably got some calls on some of the other roads I can tell you Tim's approach right now he actually asked me to go out and look at some roads today so I did a bit of a tour kind of agree with his assessment he's he's tackling them from worse to not so bad with regards to the calls as they're coming in I think he did he did some work on Crosstown today and Vine Street I think he got he was planning on maybe even a little Vine Street tomorrow but he finished that today I believe tomorrow he's going down to Dog River and then over on Jones Brook and then over to Bylet Hill while he's there so that'll be starting tomorrow based on how much he can get done each day and before the rain makes it soup again again I think what a lot of the maybe the newer stand is if it's raining and the frost is coming out he's not going to put trucks on the road on that because it's just going to make it worse it's just a waste of time so I'm asking people as they call it to be patient we're tackling them by priority you know from the worse to and then work backwards to get them done so but I expect Crosstown it's going to be another couple of weeks unfortunately I personally behind whatever Tim feels is the way to do it that's just I mean he's a professional we hired him you know he takes care of our roads so I support him we've had knock on blood we've had some pretty good luck with the roads this year compared to some of the surrounding channels Joe I guess I I would just like to say thank you very much to Rosemary for years of service and for all the years I've been here in Berlin and services she has provided neighbors any other any others any else that way not I have nothing no executive session no I have a nip and was and then adjourned second all in favor aye aye motion carries we're adjourned