 meeting to order the first item is to approve the agenda. Yeah, I would like to add probably under other business some discussion about our local emergency management plan process and the ICS trainings that are going on in town. I would also like to add the, we've gotten some communications from the school in regards to kind of the communication path between the school, the town on events like tomorrow. So I think we could probably put that in there under other business as we're talking about. The agenda as amended. Do you think any? All in favor? Aye. Aye. Do you have a public comment or inquiry? Anybody have anything that's not on the agenda? So we have 10, 15 minutes so we can, if it's okay with you, we can skip on. Open it up. So I just wanted to have the first part of our meeting tonight was mainly just kind of gives us a chance it's a new year and we can kind of go through the roles, our roles as like board members as well as, there's been a few things that myself and others have kind of thought about over the years of, you know, the way in which we conduct our meeting at times of going in and out of executive session or things like if we add to the agenda for the night, what does that mean? Can we take, should we be binding, should we not be binding to give everybody, if not we need to hear the discussion and be here. So the first part I just wanted to kind of touch base was before we go to that was just town meeting itself, any feedback from town meeting that we have or regards to the topics of town meeting and any direction that any of the taxpayers wanted to see or any comments from town meeting. I heard a lot of positive comments about it especially how the budget was presented and the explanation that you and Therese did made it a little more palatable. Nobody was happy with it but at least they have a real good understanding of where it started and how it's progressing down through. So a lot of good comments, positive comments about that. I did hear some comments about the participation as usual and the number of people that were there and could we look at other options, you know, Saturday or some other options to try to get other folks to have the usual conversations that you hear about that. It was a pretty poor turnout. I mean usually... A lot of 69 people, that's pretty... Usually around about 200. It was actually... One of our better... It was one of our better attendance. It just was spread out. We had a lot of bleachers. At first I got thinking, well maybe we could have had it here. It didn't seem like there was a lot of people but I mean I know the school one then. They had all those chairs I think in preparation for the school meeting. It did seem like it was a pretty full room of chairs. I didn't come across anybody that had talked about the town hall versus the school. In prior years that seems to be a topic of discussion but didn't hear it. I mean I think everybody would prefer to have it here but clearly we can't have the numbers or get the accessibility. I heard a lot of positive feedback as well just being people being clearly frustrated but pleased with the authenticity and openness of the board and the staff. What's that? Dave? I don't know if it's going to make a big difference but as of July 1, that school will no longer belong to that whole school system that will become property of the White River Union District which is comprised of that language the building itself will become property of that. I don't know if you want to... Do you have it there? You might want to speak to someone about that? Yeah, probably. Yeah, it would be worth it because it clearly is a town asset right now. Until July 1. So we probably ought to wait until... What was still owned the property? No. I hadn't heard that. The joint board is in effect currently, right? No. Or that's not in effect until July 1. They are working on a budget and they got the budget passed. They're seated but they can't make day-to-day decisions because their district isn't a district yet. It doesn't exist. It's still the Bepple District and the Royalton District and it's not the Union District yet. It's... So does that come into fruition in July for their first meeting? I think we'll probably just have to put that on the agenda for July for one of us to be at the joint meeting. Did you press that first? We always have to ask the staff to get our... We've got voting coming up in November too this year. Yeah. But we'll get on their agenda for maybe their first one or second one to pass permission. Yeah. One thing I was noticed during the meeting and tried to speak to it to some degree but it didn't really dawn on me until afterwards an opportunity... I or someone could have taken it on directly at the time. There's a lot of concern over delinquency and taxes and fees and a lot of disparaging comments are made about the type of person that has delinquency and it's a very divisive tone to have in a meeting when I guarantee you there will be... I think that it would be something I'd like to continue to pay attention to in public meetings is for us to recognize ways to maintain connection and compassion and interaction with each other in the community and we can do that from the board and I think I will try to be remain aware and present enough to actually hit it head on and make it clear that that's what I'm talking about instead of... I think I've tried to explain some of the realities of how municipality plays part of the game in terms of getting people into delinquent situations but as a community we don't need to use shame and guilt as a way to try to better ourselves. It seemed like with Therese that she... it seemed like her tone was that we're... which we are is that we're trying to work with everybody that is on a delinquency of some I mean the last thing we want to do is have a tax sale or rush or... and I think to Carl's point is we just need to continue that message of that, you know, obviously we do want to work with everybody so that everybody knows and you'll see that and maybe there's no drawing towards anybody because you know I know a lot of water or sewer or tax directly. Not for the new municipality but Therese from the public the public comments that were being made and it's understandable, it's frustrating but I think that we all could have learned it was a good opportunity to possibly address the way that we can connect together as a community around an issue that's controversial and frustrating so my point wasn't necessarily about delinquency but about connection and language Anything else from the meeting that came out of that meeting today any sense of direction that either we have thought about over the past week or anything that came out of the meeting talking about it? I'm new to town but what I got from that meeting myself was that townspeople just want honesty they just want us to be direct and forthright and they get it, you know it is what it is at this point as long as we're telling the truth and that's what we've always, you know about delinquency and I think that's something I saw from it is that like you said, people weren't happy about the situation that the town was in but the fact that we were was all out there they got it, they understand that it is what it is It's starting to sink in that they can come and speak with Greg or speak with Therese and get answers and Therese going to see the coffee club there on Tuesday and spread the word that it's all right there and it's starting to take effect Greg? Yes? Just the comments and the confusion between the budget article verse and then the line item articles maybe this fall to give some thought over a more clear way to present that it's a tough question but maybe we could do a little more research on that and to see what might be a better way to present that Right I think it would definitely be interesting to see I do think it has to do with adding some veracity to those additional items and then basically asking people to approve them but then giving them a chance to shoot them down and because otherwise if you approve the baseline budget then those things are truly optional clearly we're giving them the opportunity to make them optional but like the $5500 for the fire hydrants one resident came to our information meeting and asked us why we didn't just put that into the budget because we could have a but I think so I don't know but it would be interesting to see what the legality is anyway so that we can say that there are a couple of ways to go on about it Yes It could be less confusing if you were to reverse the order so that if something got voted down someone could get up and speak at this 194 whatever it's no longer 194 it's 181 I think that's basically what we were talking about trying to figure out what why we're doing it the way we're doing it personally that I mean in our budget in the school if you pass the budget we have that money that's our money to spend you have a little different leeway than what I thought that's what we do with it yes but I would just the legality go on the agenda that you voted to approve and I would assume that what's that it's approved that's your money that's the upward money to spend as they have decided not if the $5,500 got turned down that you would be forced to subtract except that that's I think that's the way it's being presented is that it's a line item it's providing a veto opportunity to but that was my interpretation of what I heard yeah and maybe it didn't get out there correctly but on those items alone so the fire hydrant replacement the extra maintenance to the fire station those separate items that allows taxpayers themselves to do a line item veto that's the only time so if we so let's say if we included the fire hydrants for $5,500 into our base budget let's say even if someone stood up and said I don't like that and I want to decrease it by $5,500 in the budget that doesn't mean that we have to take that out we don't have the $5,500 we can't do a line item veto you came to the school I can tell you to not spend $5,500 while you on fire hydrants itself we can research that but I'm pretty sure it's correct on that $5,500 total I think I can tell you where to take it out it's a little different the town versus school they have a little more control over the actual I didn't think it was that way either from my experience that we would have to take $5,500 out but it doesn't come out from any particular item have it spent we can legitimately take it from there because clearly that's what it was intended for but if we felt that we couldn't live without the fire hydrants and we would spend it on that and take it out of truck tires well yeah we've got some research to do if you look at Randolph over there it's Australian ballots it's a little different setup but each individual for example human services each one of those agencies has an article by itself and they're allowed to vote EA&A so they never really get to the final dollar figure until all the votes are counted so they can't go down to the budget in the south but they vote Australian ballot too and that's it doesn't until the end so they see which articles were approved and which articles weren't then they can establish a total they do have an information reading they can this is all stuff that needs to be researched in the following they'd be great but a little bit more authenticity I know it's always been a little confusing in the way in which because instead of an addition it's a deduct but that's the formality that we not just toss but the model that has been used I think if you look back a few more years part of the back of a few years you'll see that very rarely was there those additional things it was a budget and the voters would adjust that budget to the floor and only in the last few years that the budget in mind is coming out because the board might want to get a consensus on whether this was important to the tax payers or not some of them but hasn't the human services always been out it's always been separate so we've been following that suit by bringing up because we have been trying to be more accurate about what it actually costs and I think that was more because in a lot of the citizens mind that's more of a donation to these various agencies and we need this much money to operate the town these are extras that go outside, same with the ambulance it's a little it's not really functioning of town business sure it would be good to see what kind of leeway and what kind of regulations there are looking to that the town equipment fund used to be a separate article and I talked to Gelber years ago and the reason it went into the budget because the number was getting so high and they were afraid it was going to be turned down it was 125,000 I mean if you put that out there it was 125,000 I bet you'd have a hard time to pass it it's the same thing with the fire equipment fund we go around it every year and it's been rolled in but it was a lot less years ago too right now I mean off the top did anybody know what happened in Randolph with whatever valley ambulance did that get passed? yes it did everything go past don't make curve all the way okay alright so we'll move on so I just want to get back to give us an opportunity to kind of revisit well one set our meeting time and dates if we want to keep the second and fourth Mondays every month at six so does that seem to be the consensus to stay with or change reports for me? yeah it's a creation I already got my calendar set now if we can only get this clock set for that and then just like I was saying before kind of going through and reading through the open meeting laws I think probably as a board we should probably talk a little bit about adding items to the agenda and what that means or doesn't mean now reading through the open meeting law it's very great so I would just make a comment that caution you that that is not the open meeting law that Vermont League of Cities and Towns frequently ask questions as a compiled interpretation it's much more important and clear to read the actual law and that's what I would prefer to and it doesn't make necessarily change what you were going to say it basically says that we can as a board we can add an item to the agenda and act on that that night so it gives you the authority to do that however it does open the board up to subjection that could be at a legal level or other if we didn't technically warn it to others that was kind of what we had gone through great it kind of gives you the authority to do that I don't think it makes any sense personally I don't like to take action on something that has been providing information I don't think it's good business definitely they're leading it to a judgment call if it's important enough to be acted upon immediately we would but if it's not they just recommend they go on to the next like our meeting after the town meeting I could say that that was an emergency meeting because if we couldn't leave that meeting without a chair so you know because we can call an emergency meeting for issues that we don't feel can be left on dealt with so I guess on my end I just wanted to get a consensus from the board on if we add and we frequently do add items to the agenda and I can't remember if we've acted on any of them or if they've just been more informational talk but as a board going forward if we add to the agenda would that be more for informational and then we would set if we need to take action to set it for the next date to properly warn that I don't think totally because there might be something that somebody was really adamant and they might not have a chance to know that he was going to talk about it I don't know what you're talking about it could be I've said this to Greg too and I've said it ever since this law came out or ever since this law has been updated the law itself does not agree areas that Vermont like a citizen counts illuminate it's clearly meant that the business that we discuss and the action we take is done in public I would hesitate setting a precedent that basically CalTown as a select board to agree area interpretation to a law if some while I agree that we shouldn't set an agenda item we haven't had a chance to review and I agree that it's better for the public to hear our discussion it just wouldn't necessarily I think that it's important that we not be paranoid and recognize that we're working if we're in public and we're working for the best inches of the community it's much different than us behind closed doors and not letting people know who's done so that's just my I'm not going to try to shoot down the action of the board if they feel like this one move forward with that kind of policy around agenda items I just hesitate the way we can do it as a board is one we can make it a board policy to do or not do that in that direction when it comes to adding agenda items or we can do it on a case by case motion where we kind of need to remember why we are here and who we work for and that we give the taxpayers an opportunity to hear the article before taking action on it I mean sometimes it is tough sometimes if you make a policy and you're set in stone with that policy it doesn't give you the flexibility enough to say I mean this has been a wonderful board to work with there's not one person on our board that we have to have to talk with to say just remember who you work for it seems like when we come into this room that everybody here puts their differences aside and they're not pushing their own agenda and we're in the best interest of the people of that role which I like but you know what at some point that could change I mean I know other towns they fight all the time there's other towns that one board member is missing that night they might bring up the topic they've been waiting for for two years to get approved I just want to be honest I personally think it's a good policy to say that if we do not have the information prior to the meeting that we don't take action on it and we can start there and if that means that we want to also extend it to items that might need to take action somebody brings up an issue whether it's a select board member or a public and bring it up at a meeting is going to require action if we're based on the fact that we need more information then before we take action at an appropriate time I think sticking you were saying with the case by case it allows us that if we're in a situation where maybe we didn't have information prior but we need to take action immediately like the tires the other way you've got us information in time but maybe you don't have I can see where there would be instances where we may need to make quick decisions that we don't really have an option not to or if we take the option not to or force ourselves into a situation where we don't have that option we could be hurting the town or the road crew so we don't want to put ourselves in such a position that we can't make those decisions but I think if we're as a board agreeing that in general require information and make a decision we can get information day of we bump it to the next meeting that's pretty much how we've operated the last couple of years I was just reviewing reviewing and you know I think we changed the or add items to the agenda often I was trying to think can we take action on those maybe we have them in the past maybe we have them but it sounds like that we're pretty good moving forward in the direction that we've been in without having to adopt for example tonight we brought it on the issue of the communication with school and it seems like there may be some confusion there and we may need to take action on that to make some kind of a decision and to guide our management and whether or not we can wait or not we can just cycle weekends there there's a difference you know if we have to take action on a communication issue or a let's say a budget issue that's different than all of a sudden pushing through a policy that would have had a lot of laws that's the thing I not that like I said I don't see the issue here but you hear it all the time you know I mean as long as we're all on the same page and the other part was and this was brought up by Greg as well as the the way we enter executive session and just making sure that we're covering ourselves that there's some wording that has been put out there to use to enter executive session based upon the legal issue and it might be better for the board to use the formality of it to protect ourselves for something to come back on and that it's basically a 12 word sentence that we could just have as a template was it different so what VLCC recommends is that we actually state the statute that we're talking about and the statute that allows us to go into executive session instead of just that for legal matters we've got to explain now what the legal matters is we've got to use the statute title 1 310 it's still the detailed of the you tell people what we're going in for and you don't tell of course who or what but be detailed about what and then state the statute that allows for you to go into executive session on that matter it's just a template that we would have fill in the blanks with whatever it would be really easy to do a script it's probably what three sentences long we could have a template here at each meeting and again that's just a recommendation you're really covering your basis because there are certain statutes that allow you to go into executive session statutes mean particular business items or particular things that you have to be talking about where you go into executive session so it gives you that that ability and they just say in there that they recommend that when you make your motion that you're dictating and referencing those statutes it's interesting so I love people that will be able to see their great resource but we also need to realize that they don't have any understanding in the government and they don't have any authority for us and these recommendations are great but make sure we're not at the dock and whack like a tail and prove we don't have anything on the agenda tonight for that so good but yeah we should have that if you guys want to follow that if you look at the frequently asked questions it says page 5 executive session number 21 executive session first state municipality oh the logistics of entering into executive session and again these are recommendations the LCT and so we just have a template and it will break down the subsection so it's for legal reasons specifically we have one legal reasons where we have a personnel that's on it so we could have Chris could have a copy of those motions and you can first read it through so there's those 313 and it's basically just referencing the title and then providing much information as you can without giving away the details which is this one area of dismissal action you say one BSA 13 subsection A4 so here's where it gets a little more number 26 talks about making two motions I don't know first motion to find so they're talking about finding premature general public knowledge replacing all of the substantial disadvantage so this is say we were negotiating a contract we don't want to negotiate a contract in the public if it's with Dave any possibly and he doesn't want to know we don't want him to know how much we have in our budget to do this or how much we're thinking that we want to spend so because of that reason and that's the section that we're quoting is that that would be the first motion so it gives you an example down there I moved to find premature general public knowledge regarding the contract and you can see the company would clearly place the town and substantial disadvantage because of blah blah blah that would be kind of your first motion and then the second motion would be okay we're going to do a section to discuss this and here's the statute that's the idea I don't necessarily know if you really have to have two motions I think that's what they're asking us to clear with the rest of the board that we all agree that there is premature general public knowledge that we want to discuss if everybody on the board agrees with that then we we go into exactly the session we can use common language or we can use this language and of course the owners would have us for us but I know that there have been some towns that people didn't understand that what just happened was that the board made a motion to go into the executive section for legitimate reasons well I mean just another example would be you know with the DRV face you know through their hearings there with you know having sworn in versus not sworn in where that can be used and not used I mean a lot of times what we do talk about in the executive session is you know legal yeah but you also have you know we're being videoed too so it could be observed by other people well I think the opportunity for and not just to put this statute to it but it's more giving a little bit more information on what that topic is without getting into the details because if we just say going into executive session talk about personal matters personal matters could be very broad across the whole town where we might be able to give just a smidgen born detail without you think that's the point I think the point is also just to be clear with the public that we're actually that we have standing and that we're going to be talking about something that we do because I mean yeah they say company but in my preference I wouldn't even recognize the company that we're talking about important is just to state the statute because if you look through the statutes there are sporadically there are places where it says everything is in public except this and this is why this is the statute and the title and this is the section that says you are not required to be in a public meeting so that's what we're deciding that's the word we are deciding is that that statute so that when everybody out there knows that there is a legal reason why we're doing what we're doing and we're allowed to by law and not just because we feel like it's not public we should work on it something that's comfortable for us to say I just think that this example isn't necessarily that good because if we were contracting considering a contract with a local person I don't think that it does that individual any good for us to mention that we're considering a contract and then everybody knows that they didn't exercise that contract I mean or whatever it is we have the authority to discuss these issues related to something that could put someone at disadvantage whether it's legal or personal or business and we should just figure out how to say that clearly so that nobody has any question or agree that's something that the board would like to do we could definitely have it aligned with you I think at the end of the day we'd have a simple template that we could use that you can read off for our reader we could call that telephone that we can have to go in we can hang a banner across back up there just to cover up so we still haven't seen our appointment yet so it's not like coming so let's continue on we need to designate the newspaper record that's the herald where the valley uses a backup should we change that I got her attention her fingers going faster do you need emotion yeah emotionally we keep herald as the primary and valley news as the secondary all in favor so we'll keep the herald as our primary and valley news and also we need to designate the official which I believe the randolph animal hospital is it's country country animal it had been randolph a few years make a motion to leave it as is for the country animal hospital second one more favor so that would be the country animal hospital here when did we change that last year before I think that we changed we changed in the middle of a year because something was dull maybe we changed it when we changed our policy next order of business is the letter of resignation and letter of interest Brad Andrews is resigning his position with the planning commission but he also has a letter of interest to the DRB Rick is this to fill Bob's position received a letter of resignation from Bob so it's not in addition no fill that slot can you make a motion to appoint Brad Andrews to first of all accept his resignation planning commission if he needed that but appoint him to the development review board all in favor so Brad Andrews moved to the DRB I didn't see anything from the planning commission was there anything in the planning commission with filling his seat and you need to accept the resignation of Robert Weister also I make a motion to accept Bob Weister's resignation thanking for many years of full amazing commitment to the counter battle all in favor just anyone that can send out a letter of thank you for that yeah please do that are you going to contact Brad or do you want me to I can do that be a little more official and the next item is to appoint Mr. which this was the position that was being filled with Deborah Leahy and Louise isn't here tonight but Louise and Jim Bray had interviewed a couple of candidates and they'd like to move forward with offering the position to Kristen Jettkins so it seems like she's more than qualified for the position and would fill our need at the Lister position yeah I agree I make a motion to appoint Kristen Jettkins to fill the balance of Deborah Leahy's term on the Board of Listers all in favor I think what we ought to do to throw in information on that is when we get to the when we get to some of these other appointments here if they're not not here or if we haven't reached out to them yet we may want to skip the ones that we have question marks and give them time to answer back to the town you can get some information out to them for next time so I would you know moving forward through these and the board to weigh in on each one of these but do you feel that we can move forward with through the constable position just constable and fountain keepers and fountain keepers now I know as a constable I know we had talked about this a few months ago that Mark was looking for a multiple year commitment if I remember right I know typically this is an annual renewal of appointment to the board so I don't know so if you want to if you wanted to get to two years we'd have to go in front of the people for a boat and we just didn't kind of consensus I got from some of the other discussions we had which is kind of Mark has so he's very interested in having a two year term but I think that's something that helps just a bit more about the warning for the next county I think that my feeling we've gotten some really good feedback about some of the work that Mark is doing about we're clearly spending more money on law enforcement and I just feel at this point it gives the community a little more um say even though it's an appointment but clearly we can consider it for next county meeting to see whether or not it makes sense to bring more for a two year term but I make the motion that we appoint Mark Vellale as our first constable and family keeper we've extended Mark's constable and family keeper duties for another year the next one on here was the appointing to which which we have two vacancies regarding with the Mr. Chair, I would like to resend my resignation and I will serve on that again if you so so desire Mr. Chair, I would like to resend my resignation and I will serve again if you so so desire because I don't feel that I'm down there as a second ward member I'm down there as a member of the public I agree though I think that my feeling is that Mo would provide us with some continuity moving into the into this transition that we're hopefully able to pull off so I would make a motion if we appoint Mo, re-appoint Mo Brigham as a select board representative to the Bethel Royal and Solid Ways Board second all second aye yeah and so but we do need a public we still have a vacancy there's no reason there isn't actually anything in that agreement that says that we even need to have a select ward member on the board but there's nothing to say that we couldn't appoint to your select board and I think the I think looking back the intent was to have one person from Royalton, one person from Bethel to be on the board I think more or less to keep a watchful eye on to be a direct liaison and then be able to report back to the board and it sounded like that the direction at least what Mo had talked about a couple of meetings ago the direction that maybe should be there is more of a townspeople and no select board members which is a great possibly in the agreement that we're working on that would be spelled out in the language so that we could have some more continuity and less susceptibility I think it's an interesting juxtaposition really because Bethel with our manager system we're clearly used to having the select board be designating our responsibility to a manager whereas the Royalton board doesn't operate that way they have an administrator and so it tends to be that they're much more hands on which is which is fine but I think in this situation we're clearly looking to try to create a facility where there's a primary executive director that's in charge of the facility and has a board of directors that can be a resource for them and the select board will get their information either through talking to the members or by reading them in I think the whole idea behind it is to have a third party board I think it's a non-buys board kind of read between the lines of the original agreement which hasn't been that way but do we have any other candidates that are interested Carl who did do that we could have two select board members I didn't know if either one of you felt like you wanted to I thought about it but I wasn't sure how that would you know will it pass its mouth to us well look at all the people that are banging down the door because then does it become is there any perception are you going to be a troublemaker? no I'm just saying is there a perception perception I believe it would be better would it be best if we give it give it another two let's see if we can get some public we need to put something in the paper we haven't done a lot of advertising we haven't done a lot of advertising because we've kind of just been seeing our hands a little bit on it to see how things shook out here but we can advertise for it there hasn't been a whole lot of outreach on it so maybe there might be somebody out there I don't know if anybody knows anybody here would like to come out here I mean I think we probably ought to give it we should do our diligence when's your next meeting? Wednesday so so we'll have two members there and so I'm not sure if it's that one Walton's only going to have two members there so we're going to have two well two more board meetings prior to the next meeting that you'll have right so if I get a mad at you tomorrow I'm going to give it a try yes so we need to post it so so obviously we're going to miss your next joint board meeting but that gives us two meetings of hours to find an appointment prior to the next meeting we meet the second Wednesday so do we want to give it that'll give us a full two weeks to three and a half weeks to explore options that are out there and then we can we can put this back on the agenda item for the 12 Walton's Valentine's Day so the night it's all people night's meeting we'll put that back back on there with a good decision at that point hopefully we'll hopefully we'll drum up some excitement from because if one wasn't going to re-up then I would consider going on the board but I think just having two slide board people just might that we've got a lot happening and any member's going to take a few meetings to get up to speed on what's really happening down there and that's nice you've been at all of the other meetings wow I agree I think that one could feel like this was I mean it's not like a slide board member's going to hold any more authority right in there you're just informed if you would be an informed member who can contribute substantially to moving forward and I think if we can't drum up another public member then we can consider it I think it's entirely legitimate but we need to have three that's the basic so we will advertise this weekend next week and come back to Canada's sounds good we have other appointments defense viewers I guess what I would I guess at this point my recommendation is that we that we would reach out to the defense viewers tree warden tree warden is deceased and I would wear cold wood and give an opportunity for Harvey can't see anymore so I don't there'll be trash he's not even telling that right now so do you think we could probably give that the same look at as the solid waste portion will give it up a couple weeks in the paper I throw my name in for tree warden it's been something I wanted to participate in for a long time there's statutory requirements and authority for the tree warden and I think it would be a job that I could fulfill well the board felt like it was appropriate otherwise I'm willing to see somebody in the public and step up do you know anything about trees? I could study do you know anything about wardens? I actually have tree wardens I've actually I've studied tree warden I've got training as a tree warden okay I got to ask though what exactly is the defense viewer I hate to demonstrate ignorance boundary differences between neighbors okay and where are cold wood since the town by some yup and if you bought a quart of wood you could report it to the layer of coal and wood and clearly the state agency commerce that stuff now and we have certified surveyors deal with property aligns and the listers have a lot but these are arcade positions that have never been eliminated from the legislation okay so would we do we want to wait until at night to appoint these or if we gave it one board meeting cycle of two weeks do you think we could appoint these at our next meeting? I don't think that we're down too heavily by time but yes sometime in the next month but reach out to all of those who are on here that are still in town did you say Elbert's he sold his house there so I don't believe he's in town anymore to make it easier on advertising and giving us enough time when we look at the appointments for these positions on the ninth as well as a solid waste board and I would recommend that whoever wants to put their name in that to be present at the meeting I think a lot of times it's no different than that town meeting you know law something but there was there was some confusion at town meeting in regards to one position that was held last year and then another person that wasn't there got nominated and appointed when the other person was there and you know so so we've got two positions that we are confident are vacant do I hit the tree warden in the way of Cole Wood do I hit the fence viewer well I have to contact but we know those two are vacant do we need to advertise for those in the newspaper we do okay and that's what I was saying might be easiest because you can put it all out one advertisement of what we're looking for also gives you the opportunity to reach out to those people what's wrinkled in that is that if you contact these guys tomorrow you may find that there's a fence viewer that doesn't want to participate and you could advertise for that and also might find well I think you can contact Bob Dean and Elbert and the three rights viewers before you have made the advertisement you would know whether they were vacant right soon Bob will actually yeah I'm sure too it's better to contact otherwise you've got so we'll advertise those and we'll stipulate that we'd like them to be here or a letter of interest or yeah you don't want to hear that and if not Bob probably Dave I'll be getting that it's just good to know that the person is interested in the position and that's kind of one thing that I've never really liked at town meeting days anyone can stand up and appoint somebody and second hand away we go and they might want to do that so yeah I guess like with the Lister's appointment we can assume that she has interest because she submitted her resume right, right, right, yeah for consideration alright we'll be looking at the Montestate developing fund this is the initial step in the water matching fund this is a plan of loan, it's called it's a renewable loan so the way this works is that if we if we go forward with the state revolving fund or get funding through some mechanism whether it's the state or or other this loan will either be removed and forgotten about which we'll then have to go in front of the voters for the regular this gets us off the ground this gets us off the ground, yeah this is for the planning also this is the loan agreement with the revolving fund for $12,900 all the engineering costs and planning costs for the water matching plan so if the other stipulations, if we do not move forward with the project that's funded we will have to pay it back but it's a 0% and there's an amortization schedule in there to 5-year payback at 0% but of course we will move forward and do some project and this will just get rolled into that or forgiven so I'm just asking for your approval and some signatures just one signature so I would make a motion that we authorize our chair to approve this loan agreement all in favor? and what was the time frame on this again? I was thinking I mean we talk in 6 months a year you know I thought it was going to take almost a year but we had a kickoff meeting with the engineer they were talking like probably less than 6 months and then it goes to the state of course they have their names and everything so they'll have to look at it we should see a finished product 90% probably at least within 6 months they're already working on it thanks to they talking like 3 or 4 words we've already done a lot of the footwork we've already done the hydrogen flow test a lot of mapping and things like that with our asset inventory that they had done previous to this so a lot of the on the ground kind of work is done the state obviously knows that we're doing this so I'm assuming that they're probably waiting for receipt of the document so that they can approve it in a timely manner I guess is what I was getting to with the state so if we get that back in 6 months then it's going to go to the state for approval is there any time frame on the state with their I mean the state can be anything from 2 weeks to it took them over 4 months to get back the proposal the agreement that we had to do this it took them over 4 months they had one little comment on it which is with them knowing where we're at with this waiting anticipating receipt of this and then there'll be a prompt I would hope that they would be motivated because they know the condition of the needs that we have I know I've heard that the state can be really prompt sometimes and sometimes they can like buy so I'll have to go now but to get as far as our and their being basically 90% complete which is ready for review by people they think within the next 3-4 months so I get it 6 months to be safe so maybe in him and then we're looking at probably you know 3-4 months maybe for review worst case so 6 months puts us yeah probably if you know the lesson first so are we ready for something to start the draft and start the spring yeah and we can actually start, we can probably start the engineering part of it before it needs approved if we choose that you know we say we want to do the tank or whatever we can start that process but you still have to go through the construction loan process before it really started to do it anyway right so cool? yeah so here's Johnny item number 6 there is an exhibit C that's required by everybody in the majority of the guys are you going to pass that stuff around and see if it is why can't they just make it simple yeah there's the rest of it this is just the beginning this is just the beginning next one do we have to do this only 3 lines on them so you guys signed this you're going to get it are signing we have a little fun exhibits on here that are further understood and block us into it item number 6 is the the v-tran certificate of compliance so it's our annual renewal of the v-tran standards check how do we that is an error because it didn't get unchecked no it came through that way is this one for maybe we have some so do overrides do not I tried to uncheck you can check do not but you can't check do it's the state I don't know what state I'll still do not but maybe there's maybe a hinting maybe you want to cover your problem do we have to certify that we do not have enough so this is basically saying that we would adhere to their standards to do it every year we have to do this so that we can get funding through the structure of the v-tran just need a motion make a motion that the board adopt the certificate of compliance for town road and bridge standards all in favor all right and I need you to sign it it says at the bottom do we authorize if you guys want to sign it it's got four blocks four by blocks who is signing them all we just want to show them who are really serious yeah fully unanimous yes was they going to drift with that we did sign that just for the record they're at the copy of those standards review review review the signatures so it looks like on the agenda we moved up the console report town managers report what's that saying I have a new truck and I don't want to get it both the signs the speed signs he got a fixing in the day today I showed the one outside the town I have a lot of the LEDs in the shot yes one little shot and the one over on sand hill wasn't working at all when he got to them are we receiving the reports that are supposed to be generated from these two there's a he told me the other day he downloaded a bunch of stuff out of speed reports he said pages and pages it's all blue to the paper yes pages and pages and reports how many cars are alive is there any I'll just look at it at least once in a while is there any movement on the new signs there was some talk about so the idea was that he had some grandmoney coming that we're still looking to hear about and that grandmoney can be used for things like that the thought was retro 50s with solar panels because batteries were just there's been a cold weather they don't last a very long time but we retro what we have with solar panels when we look at something new because I've used them in the past that I actually already have with solar panels and they have a little more two of them they're pretty reasonable are those portable they're not portable I mean they guess it could be but they're removable it's a box about that new like that and then the solar panels they're removable but they're not as portable as the ones we use now but these if you retro these with solar panels that's going to take away a lot of the ability to move them because that's a large deal to mount them and more chance for vanillism yeah there's more expensive vanillism well they're not as high enough to use they're trying to keep them out of the way it's only seven foot to the bottom of the sign and the sign is how big and you've got the panel that sits up on the top so it's usually up out of the way but anything can stabilize your right yeah so we're waiting to hear back from his grant to see how much he's going to get and if he's going to get that so we can look into possibly getting these lines well we have a couple of locations that tend to be more of a fixed location than a portable maybe we could look at places that we use it the most to have a fixed and then we could use the portable ones to just move around I'll bring you the cut sheets or whatever the sign that I used in the past and it's pretty slick you can actually program words into it to say things it's got three settings on it it's got three colors it's got an amber color for caution it's got a red for you going too fast any one you can program words like we got to say if you're doing a speed manual you can say thank you or slow down or welcome but it probably wouldn't be a good thing for town town it's got a little flash good because it's LEDs and it flashes when you're speeding eventually you're out by the school but out by the schools is the location the fixed location so once we get there we'll get more information thank you yes does it have an importance on flashing signs I don't know it does for signs for for businesses for businesses we would school as a business well it wouldn't be as slow apart from having a sign there it's not a flashing sign like an LED flashing sign it's a flashing sign like a crosswalk sign yeah he's talking about the fact that the flashing is worse we got a word yeah he's talking about there was controversy when the school put up their neon sign their information sign out there because it didn't conform to the DRV however our previous town manager had basically let the ball get started and going in the right direction because he said that it shouldn't matter but then when it turned out that the sign was there it was basically in conflict with the bylaws and so nobody else has a lot to put up a flashing sign so theoretically the argument is that our highway safety signs fall into the same concerned way when I brought them to you we would love to see if they had any requirements they don't need the zoning in the town that's what we would check he's saying that what we already have well you said it wasn't the words that were the issue it's the flashing sign it's the neon flashing sign yeah so we just exercise eminent domain that's when we tried to put a fire downtown because I couldn't have my neon flashing sign okay I think that the voters approved the town meeting several years ago the use of these signs not so much that they approved the use of the signs but they approved the expenditure for signs like this so what's that I'm sorry if you're interrupting I don't think that the signs were a possibility when the mine was approved improved to do something to mitigate speed maybe look at the wording of the art I'm not yeah no you're right I'm just bringing up the fact that we got a lot of hot water we had to change our sign do things differently and I just don't think it's a very good precedent to come down on the school and the town turned around and does something to yeah well for the record I didn't come down on the school I thought it was I thought it was a menial exploration for sure but yeah it's interesting that we should find some way to reconcile so that we can explain to people but for public safety what my point was is that during that article there was a lot of conversation about the use of speed signs as one of the options for things to spend money on so we all know that speeding downtown there have been many recommendations for the use of these signs so we should explore how we can explain that the use of them in terms of our bylaws so we have the town college school to explore see a lot of tickets this time around busy guys it's been taking it easy on people it's a rather smart thing to do maybe the signs are working but you know we've had we have a lot more better presence back there I think during the weekend we have a fair amount of town traffic and I would say the majority of that traffic doesn't really know if the constable is here on Mondays or Wednesdays but it seems like with his presence the tickets kind of peaked last year at one point we had six, seven, eight tickets in a board meeting had four days or something and now they've come down a little bit so hopefully that's a result of speed decreasing in the town I haven't personally had any comments negatively towards that which I haven't received quite a bit especially on the corner of San Hill Street area there was a lot of activity there months ago with speed I haven't heard anything from those folks anymore so I don't reach out to see what they say but it seems like I see them out and about a lot which is good we also had a lot of activity with new poles being put in and a lot of road maintenance and things going on too so we'll slow it down a little bit of course the nicer days are coming too so the speed will be picking right back up again so we'll talk about the town management report so my report is in your packet a couple little quick highlights the Champlain Farms I reached out to the elder and given him our proposal for the revision of the reviews we need to hear back I talked to him a little bit and I think it's positive I think it's going to be fine I'm just waiting for him to get back with me on an official read guess or not just an FYI this last document you guys just signed will allow me to submit the 2019 structures grant to do the actual construction part where we're currently working on engineering it's about 60 percent deleted for that bridge and we're hoping that in the summer or fall we'll be able to get that bridge completed I'll submit the application and talking with Chris it shouldn't be an issue at all but it's going to be the funds from them so we'll just move forward with that and we'll have to close the road for a period of time the road will have to be closed for up to three weeks we'll do detours and all that to get around but without that it's going to be significant and more expensive to have traffic control the whole time and it's already it's already loose almost all the budget so that will push it way over budget because it's a few miles it's not unreasonable it's not great but it's not there's alternative ways in there if you would have up there you know how to get there to avoid but hopefully if we keep the road shut down it won't take that long the hope is that if it's shut down they can get in and get out and we don't and lastly I talked with our attorney about the depot that counter proposal has been sent to them we're awaiting a response is there any questions? no other action other than what you described the town meeting on the Painter arrangement just waiting to get his insurance and waiting to get his dossier I guess his qualifications so that I can send that over to the state for their review especially if it involves pain, torque, whatever you need it's some crazy angles yeah what he's done was like he's got the liability insurance he's just got a semi already done out there supposedly this company has done some work on historiabilities of the colleges the local colleges I'm just waiting to get all that information so I can send it over so they can review it he's got a tentatively scheduled for I think he said the month like a week in July so hopefully we'll get done good? yeah it's pretty aggressive and the signs are all posted for month season now signs are all posted for month season yeah we got all those up actually the day that the next day after we talked about the meeting you guys heard of it and then also behind my report is Teresa's report for financial support if you try to answer some of the questions I'll have some of the answers here but she marked 67% that's 67% to her budget just to kind of get you out of it what's the point? yeah for the comments are pretty good now yeah there's a lot of moving things around kind of where it should be there's been security issues in the past we're trying to get all that squared but a little bit of that was just a morning curve I think with having the supervisor coding their own stuff but I think we'll get to that and I know we're in the transition phases of the new administration you know newer managed public works and I just want to make sure that and trying to get our budgets to where I think they should be an accurate budget and I was talking to Teresa a little bit on just the importance of transparency with the combination of I still think there's probably going to be one or two budget cycles of I don't want to use the word deficit but there's going to be a period of time where we're still trying to figure out with that where that efficiency is and how combination on in the field and at the budgeting and the things and I just want to make sure that there's transparent as possible when it comes to showing that to the voters next year and I guess what I mean behind that right now is let's say our budget runs $20,000 over when July comes we collected $100,000 and back fees and property taxes what I'd like to do this is my opinion but I think what we ought to do as a board is we ought to present that to the voters next year of we have $100,000 in the undesignated fund however we have $20,000 and we need to retire as a deficit you know I mean to make that transparent rather than say we came out ahead $80,000 and put ourselves over the back I think we have these transparent as possible that gives one of the gentlemen that had talked at the town meeting gives us the opportunity to take that money and put it towards our long term obligations that we're retiring currently if that makes sense it also gives us that opportunity to look at what that costs if in fact we do overrun then you have that opportunity to really look and see where that expenditures were in terms of how we adjust them forward whether or not we feel that we can like one good day without sending might save us some money but then it's like can you get away with it and that's some of the challenge that we have right now is you know we have like we talked about we've had a history of budgets that weren't necessarily accurate however we never had line items that were documented correctly so we don't really know what the true cost is on a certain line item because they just kind of lump things together it was not a great record keeping when it came down to so it's going to take a couple of like Carl was saying hopefully this year we can really see exactly what those line items cost us so that we can make a better estimated budget for going forward and that means that we're over then we're over we're going to show that and we'll show it in our new budget we're retiring a deficit however we did bring in we did collect because it kind of seems like right now I haven't talked to you since you put this together but it looks like going through the numbers that overall we're going to come out with money in the checkbook but I still have a question my guess is we're probably going to have some sort of a little bit of a negative balance in the budget but we're going to come out ahead because we're going to collect we're ahead on collecting fees and these taxes that are due to us and I think even with the consistency of our board in the 12 years I've been here I've ever been to a town meeting where one we've retired a deficit and two that we've had extra money to in the undesignated fund to point toward something else and I think that would really be a great opportunity to bring to the voters saying hey as you can see we are retiring a small deficit from last year we've acknowledged that while working on that and oh by the way we have this in our undesignated balance that we can use towards a warning on town meeting that could reduce the tax rate could pay down the long term debt it could be towards the water tower to get built or whatever that is but I think it's a great opportunity to bring towards the town's folks because I've never had the opportunity to say I think that's a great idea every year it says we're on to the next budget so we're constant in monitoring the budget I sit down with the department heads and the supervisors we really want some of that but we don't always get there especially certain departments you know wintertime of course the low departments using highway departments and stuff they're in and they're spending money like crazy so we're not you know Theresa and myself and all the the supervisors are all aware of this we're trying to stay within that budget the best we can so we won't just forget about anything else I would just say do it any differently right now because I've seen you guys in action and you know it's nice to see but you know I would just say just be very very strict on what we buy between now and in June there to come as close as we can right anything exactly that's what we're trying to do just make everybody aware of it it's not my budget and I don't know if it's completely realistic but we're doing everything that we can but again you know but once we get you know I gotta think that line item by line item when we're sitting down here in October looking at this budget for next year you know I think we're gonna have a a lot better information on line item than just saying alright the last five years it's been $5,000 and it doesn't mean that anything ever should have hit that line item it should maybe been zero it should have been ten down but I think we'll have a really good good handle on it but it looks like it looks like looking through what I spent some time through it looks like we're we're gonna be pretty close you know we might need a little over but we're gonna be pretty close but we will have some undesircated money that's coming in yeah Trace is really good to explain in this re-fame collection chart that you did won't you explain it to me it makes no sense on that $32,000 or whatever yeah you know she's making great headway no I think I mean we're clearly heading in the right direction in the reports the thorough notes just to handle those reports the coding of accounts and things you remember I think the only thing I saw did that didn't give me a little bit of concern was not so much the town's budget but just a little bit of water and the sewer and the things was the position that those are in you know I've talked with Tim about and he basically has told me that everything the things that he's needed to buy to get these stocked shelves because we want to have it on the shelf whenever something goes bad he's already been done the only things that are really left are those fixed costings like chemicals and testing getting rid of the solid waste type things that we know we have to spend that money on or what so I think we're okay there and I think you know looking at it will be good as long as as long as we are reflecting at the same sure great we're getting better at the collection but it's not you know you're seeing you know right now we're at 71% cost it should be at 67% but we've only collected 50% you know so we're the revenues aren't still equaling to the in granted they're not always going to be the same yeah it's not just on time it could happen the next day it seems like my comment on back up to it's not that we're going to be running over deficit-wide cost-wise it's hopefully that the collection is equal to cost towards the budget which will be 100% right so based on based on the any other conversation in regards to the no it's great I just have we have the slept board meeting minutes from the 26 other than the capitalization of my name I think everything else was fun I make a motion we accept the minutes as written for the 26th second and we have to we have to adopt these meeting minutes what are they just for us to do that we have to adopt them I don't know I just knew that they were here just information we have our committee minutes you also have a list for an individual for the planning commission we only have three people on that board I think that there's only three people around I think we're good to have a couple they said that they have done some advertising on their own and they put the word out there but they're interested but we'll do an actual interview statement two weeks we should definitely they're in the process of updating the town plan if we regret that more than three more maybe three more I don't we still need somebody for the Red Cross shelter too we advertise that I know a lot better so if you know anybody if you know anybody going into a good situation that's something I know we talked about tonight it's going to affect the Red Cross shelter it's going to affect the conversation and I think we have that conversation with the new board in July you know the Red Cross shelter as well as the our meeting there's got to be somebody who wants to do the project I think it would be okay I mean Natalie's got some training you're stepping into it she's got everything is that the one you need certifications for or is that the other one you will need them you're good at that she's like how come nobody ever told me about ICS before this is awesome so keep your eyes and ears open for anybody that might be interested in that position it's a great position and it's a it is necessary it is necessary it's very important well let us help you make your decision Carl's already there he's going to make a decision for me we can teach you well let me chat with Greg about it do some research what it involves don't research just say yes we even talked with Carla yeah check with Kelly first and other business we added two items there yeah so I've been in the capacity of the chair I've been sitting on the emergency planning committee we've been working through a pilot program to rewrite the local emergency what they're calling now management plan as opposed to operations and it's one it's a statutory requirement in the past all we've had is a checklist with a bunch of names who would fill in different places and so forth and this is a much more dynamic and engaging process and we're in the process of playing with all of the quote unquote stakeholders in the town who will be on that list as people who either require certain services or could provide certain services or would potentially be the site of a potential emergency we just held an ICS 100 training on Saturday which is required for many of us in town government but we held it as an opportunity for people from the community to also take it because we feel that the more people in the community who understand incident command will be able to support the efforts of the municipality and the first responders in any kind of emergency so on Saturday we'll have another training which is for municipal managers but it's also a basic overview of the ICS system and Wednesday we will have a stakeholder meeting at the town office or here Greg is here and we're going to be inviting as many of our stakeholders as we possibly can I think we'll suggest we had four of us in the room the other day and we go through scenarios within the training program and you can take all of these trainings online and some trainings better than none but it's really valuable to be in the group face to face with people who you may likely be involved in the incident and to work through scenarios and see where people are when they start and what we understand when we get done so I would highly recommend that we all do what we can to be here on Saturday at noon for the ICS 402 where is it located here from noon to four and Rich does a great job working through the training program and we'll try to we'll make the record I will suggest we make the recommendation on Wednesday to try to arm twist our as many of our stakeholders as possible to participate are you looking for a role you said it's required of us in town government but I don't know if people can take it too yeah we're looking for as many people the idea is that the street that actually begins to understand what incident command actually is and what the purposes are will be an asset to us so if people are interested they should call the town office BU BU class they can do either one they can call the town office but they can also sign up on for BU it's a Saturday class it's titled ICS 402 okay and there's a there's a description there that it's a general overview of incident command and the idea of having anybody involved when the the town administrators are taking the training is that then they understand what administrators need to know in an incident and how we respond and who's in charge and how we create the response system I think that was all you have any thoughts on what was there I had come up and this was from the BU side you had submitted the proposal and when we were doing the data entry into our system for registering it there was a question of because I didn't know what ICS was you know should we have changed the name in the BU registration to be something a little more explicit because your description was great but you could easily just scan over it and it's probably not for me and not read the description and at the time we'd had a whole debate do we adjust his title to maybe be a little more explicit to you know get the outside public input we ended up not because we sort of were thinking maybe maybe it was really meant to be only for the people who needed it like the municipality so just curious if for the future would you want something would you want a title that kind of grabs people a little more I got that email and I responded and said sure I understand go ahead change the title but then I explained that you because the option was Incident Command 101 and I was like no you can't because it's Incident Command 100 it's a certified educational being an education program so you can't change the number that's all I said but then they're like oh fine okay so I agree with you some other title that said we're looking for people in the community come out and learn what we're learning we've been fine but we can't change the title and I wanted to make sure that that makes sense because truthfully anybody there are firefighters in town maybe you know they're this is all general level so most people probably coming into this wouldn't know but there are people in our community who are certified in these programs and the title and the level is critical to them in terms of whether they take it so that was my point and anyway we'll recover we can get rich back here and have another training and another time if we want but this Saturday is a great opportunity for us I just wanted to this is 402 and it's Incident Command system ICS you know I got the ICS I was thinking the same thing what am I going to write in the paper so people know what this is alright well maybe because I think it's a great thing to do if we keep it if you go to the BU and there's a good description of the secondary portion of the description and it explains why we're at the floor higher and having it did the same thing again next year we're doing it as a BU class I wonder if there's a way that the town could sort of push that in a way that BU has to list it as the exact this is that number of the classes but then have it sort of advertised via the town as well that there's this free class for everybody and we encourage you for the benefit of all this kind of thing you know there's a way to sort of work in tandem on our way through it but the timeline is pretty rapid and has immediate cancellations and stuff so we haven't been as on-front it's a challenge to try to convince people that they're actually stakeholders and that they should be responding to us because in the past all we've done is gone down through to check it off painting put people's telephone numbers in places and then during an event we just make a phone call and get somebody there and so this is an opportunity to build the connection first in the process so it's all known we're getting a lot of blanks we've had some good we've had a few stakeholders that showed up in the spring but it takes a lot of time Kelly's been our primary she's our something information officer PIO public information officer she's been but she's got a lot of other things going on so she's been trying to reach out and follow up PIO is holding the class on Saturday and then Wednesday night is our stakeholder meeting for the LEMP three o'clock here just so you know I'm not going to lose that you don't want random people showing up to you not for the stakeholder meeting it wouldn't hurt to have it in there the stakeholders know who they are the stakeholder meeting on Wednesday at 3 p.m. and this is a we're the test town this is the absolute first time that this new platform is being run up the flag fall state emergency management has chosen Bethlehem to be the beginning so it's nice so we're pushing all the we're pushing all of the brands so the last item that we had was it kind of seems like we've got some communications everybody got the email that came from the school it seems like at this time that you know between the town and the school that the communication that we have is maybe non-par for what it should be for the weather events and I don't really think that we can point the finger in one direction or the other for looking through it but I know there's time where the school has reached out to the town but sometimes it's difficult when it's 6 o'clock in the morning somebody that's in a truck plowing with no cell servers we have those things but on the other end should the town be in a position where we should be telling the school when they should be cancelling the school so I think they're asking to be told they're actually looking for an update on where the road crew is in terms of and clearly if you're out on Sandy Road and you know that school buses are concerned about the quality of the road there's plenty of places to find cell servers to respond to a text and I feel like I don't know who the particular the right-minded command is whether they should be getting in touch with you or what but there's hundreds of kids in town that are relying on the school buses and we only have one road crew well that was my thought is bringing a little more of a formal system to it what is happening what is happening that was my question the issue I have with this the liability my job as town manager is to protect this town from my ability that's one of the parts of my job and when somebody texts somebody and says is it safe to drive on the roads I'm not going to open any of my employees up to making that decision because what happens if they say it's completely safe that must rescue a lot of kids I don't think you can answer that question that's what the problem is but you don't have to not answer you get back and you say we've had the road queers out we've plowed the roads at 4 o'clock this morning and sanded them that's all they're looking for is an update where are the road because we plan to go back out we aren't going to be back on the road until 10.30 in the morning and then the school can make the decision so are you saying that we need to designate a time and place for every storm that this person needs to find a cell service and call the school no, I think that if they're contacted they can respond I don't know if this person ever got to this person by 5 o'clock if you're out plowing at 2 o'clock in the morning you know that the school buses are going to be wondering whether or not they should be on the road there's absolutely no reason why you can't be looking for a text and I guess my whole thing was just kind of you know backing up from you know if we know that the first school buses leave the yard at what, 6 o'clock or 6.15 and we need to back up there needs to be a time where we can take action the phone calls come at 5 o'clock in the morning about delay right so that's what they're looking for is a report on where the road crew is in terms of road maintenance but I'm just wondering if and I don't want to speak for Greg or anybody else but maybe maybe instead of the school reaching out to the road performance maybe it should be to Greg just if we put it in concrete and said on potential weather days there will be a check-in at 4.30 in the morning what are the time is that in this case if the liaison from the school is Andra that Andra knows exactly who to contact at what time and at that point I don't think what we're looking for is for Greg to necessarily say hey you're all set to go you know that's safe but you could say our update currently is this is the maintenance that we've done to the roads over this period of time and you know absolutely he's trying to but I think what the school is looking at is they didn't get any information back they've reached out on some occasions and they didn't get any information back and that might be various reasons that could be no cell service of the mountain road or something like that but if there's a maybe if there's a point at a certain time with the same individuals that they know or a weather day at this time I'm going to call this person and then they can talk that's kind of what I got from them I feel like there's a there's just a restriction on communication and there's no need for it there's absolutely no need if Alan can't get in touch with him then he can have you get in touch with him but clearly there's you know I had a neighbor drive down road the other day and he pulled a 360 out in the middle of a flat section of road because it was the sand the snow had gotten packed down and turned to glare ice and there was a little skip of the snow on top of it and he said we need sand out here my text to do and I told you we need to get sand on the back roads that's no different than the school bus wanting to know whether or not the roads have been sanded and I don't I think we have to respond to them as just like any other and I don't have I agree with you that you shouldn't be making the decision about whether or not the roads have been plowed or sanded but clearly we're we've got a different schedule now than we have in the past we're plowing based on the we're plowing and sanding probably less used to be the trucks were on the road at 4 o'clock and the road was plowed and sanded by 7 o'clock absolutely every single day and you can look at our highway department budget and you can understand what happened we're not operating that way now so we have to share the information with the schools so that they understand the school bus is operated by the school ok so isn't that up to whoever owns the school bus to be finding out whether the road is safe or not that we're not I don't think we need to tell them whether the road is safe no but I'm just saying isn't that more up to the people that own the buses to find out whether they want to travel or not there's another layer in there as far as I know Dave at least from my conversation with him he's been in contact with that one to find out the information about the roads himself but the school also needs to get the information does the supervisor have anything to say about this whether the schools are closed do you have anything to weigh in on yes I do it's great to have this conversation you're missing people to make a decision I don't think the school can make a decision I don't think you guys can sit here and make a decision I don't think the SU can make a decision I don't think the bus drivers can make a decision I think it would be great if we would all get together and talk about what would work and go into that meeting but we'll do whatever we can if there's a liability issue we can't do this the school might say well we don't need you to say the road is safe we need you to say that you went in the cloud and it's 7.30 or 7 o'clock on the bus's leave we know that the road is a bit better than the cloud than the scene it's our decision to make whether we make it safer and as far as the bus the bus owner is Butler's Bus and to be honest with you I don't know that he knows anything about that they're just leaving it up to the coordinator Dave works for them Dave Bagley works for them in the past in the past Dave Bagley was at 4 o'clock in the morning we were over the road contacted the road foreman the road foreman said I think it would be good to go at 7.30 or whatever they can't get around at that time you need and they need to the school needs to know by I'm not sure at the time like at 6 o'clock at the latest to be able to whether they call that then the school is delayed they've been sending them out at 5 o'clock just because people need to know that their kids are going to school and as far as the liability too so that's why not knowing I believe Andrea this last time in my opinion made the right decision and she did not know she's been designated that person to make the decision for Bethel so she closed school they don't have to close school just because the buses don't run either they don't they don't have very many kids at school but that's the truth the matter is that they don't have any requirement to bus kids to school they don't have bus to walk so what you're suggesting Dave is that Greg and Alan and Owen and Andrew together have a sit down and have a sit down discuss and try to come up with a solution what they all can live with what do you think Greg what do you think I mean I think there's a lot of things just from my observation it seems like finding the correct touch points from the school to the town formalizing some sort of schedule on when that call will come that way they can get their information in an appropriate time I still have my doubt to the school because I was a bus kid for 8 years of the 12 years I went to school but we used to put chains on buses and how many times do we get called for buses being stuck on roads this year and then they don't use the chains and they have auto chains now and use those I went to school here 12 years they closed school 3 days in those 12 years different drivers different drivers the folks they got behind the wheel now some of them they can drive in the summer just one but again like what Carl said I mean I'm the youngest second youngest person here and you know they didn't close school they just never run the buses today either mom or dad brought you to school but you stayed home the walkers and everybody else were in the school I don't know unfortunately we're at the end I think that needs to be open communication that's all I can I don't think we can stand on some principle that I shouldn't be making the decisions that I'm not going to communicate with I don't see that as being the solution I think that clearly when someone knows that another individual is getting in touch with when they're a municipal employee that they have every responsibility to contact that person and be engaging and informative and if you can't make a decision if you can't make their decision for them that's not a hard conversation to have so I would suggest that the board the administrators get together and make sure I'm a little confused as to why it wasn't there some kind of a ranger we met with them at the end here and we talked about how this was going to work and how it was going to this situation here I don't know what the story is with the text if they got through if they got ignored I don't know but I can tell you that we did meet with the school the principal and Andrea and I and I all met so I haven't talked about how this was going to fall how this was going to happen and I said the same thing to them we can't make the call about closing in or anything like that but we've done it basically but unfortunately the first text that came out said the town says we need to close for two we have a two hour delay so I asked her we don't want to have that responsibility I don't want to put that on anybody in my realization so they stopped doing that but we did meet with them at the end of the year but again this is something that sounds like there's with the school combining now there's going to have to be this conversation all over again we need to do something about it and I'll check in on this again I don't know what happened to the text I don't know if they went through they look like they went through they usually didn't say that it didn't go through or something but they prepared for it all morning what kind of work were we going to do for them if the school is looking to figure out what the conditions are a wild call but the person out I have the number so they call like I said she's over at the five making the decision by six o'clock she has to get a message out to the families of the students to know whether or not so it's just a matter of saying it's just a matter of saying the guys started at five there are only two thirds of the way through their roads through their books we're not going to have these roads cleaned by seven o'clock then you can say you can make your call but they will be done by nine right so all they also have to figure out is you know let this Alan or whoever know that they have to be in a spot where they can receive self-service around five o'clock personally I'd like to see the following change of command here I'd like to see the school contact you and then Alan can at his convenience can get a hold of you if he's in good cell range I'm going to call Greg you know there's a point about having a plan yeah and I think it's with the whole idea and knowing the time is for either canceling school or through our delay because I think that's what was the frustration on Andrew's part was on this particular one was that at first the school went out with the blast of a two hour delay was the first thing we did and then they had to cancel because from what I gathered from not having enough information the decision now canceling was probably great you know as far as I've been canceling right before right is it is it I mean I know when we have our next meeting there probably won't be anything such as snow anymore this year but you never know I mean do you wishful thinking I don't know how this would be I know these things I don't know when you had one game it was like an hour later or something well that 8.06 is on her phone she printed them off there was a time that says yesterday 5.06 a.m I don't know what the second one or it says two hour delay I thought it was like an hour later so I don't know what the situation was I don't know if he was somebody with weight they didn't get the thing until after 8 or it was received and ignored I don't know you don't have more than 5 minutes in this town without him self-service there's a hundred different locations in this town where you can get at least two bars to send out a text message you want to take my phone around well I have then get somebody with a service that can actually get service well you want to pay for it no I'm just saying I got my privileges on the hill but down here by the way I don't get nothing so I'm supposed to spend money to go out and get something that's effective I would be surprised if you don't get the reception up on top of Christian Hill and then you probably can get it up here on top of Christian Hill and you can get it out there by 107 so you just need to stop you know that and I know that I think the underlying issue is that we need to get together come up with a plan so that the people that need to make the calls are in the designated areas they need to be able to make those calls exactly there's probably not a whole lot more than you know now is this going to work next year when we've got two different school systems well we've got a different owner my question is correct you're going to have the same administration in this building she will apply the owner of the building will be different but the people that you'll be talking to will be the same so would it be fair Greg if we had you circle back up with the board at the next meeting that kind of lets us know how your talk went or what the formalities of the decision is going forward as far as meeting up with the other I don't know if we'll be able to turn around that quickly or not maybe we can jump over there with a couple you and Alan if we can get it turned around within the next two weeks I'll definitely give you an update on that is that a fair time I'll circle the wagons and kind of put a deal with that hey we're going to meet every weather day at this time to talk about it and give it the impression and that will be it yeah that's what high school the people over there but you know what I mean at the end of the day at the end of the day if I can get you something in two weeks I'm sure we can find the time but it's just that this is where we can get on the same page it's just that it needs to be available and conversant this is just our annual financial plan so again this is part of our paperwork to the state to certify our rules this shows what we will receive for revenue for our roads from the state and what we stand in way of winter and non-winter maintenance and we are certifying or you are certifying that that the funds raised by municipal taxes are equivalent to or greater than the sum of 300 dollars per mile for each class one, two and three highway we are way more than that of course but it's just an annual certification that I have to do so I can get your signature on that any other business I'm happy to work with you today I'm excited about your new journey