 I guess we'll get started. I will call the Count of Essex Select Board meeting for Monday, November 22nd, 2021 to order. And I will call the Village of Essex Junction Board of Trustees meeting for Monday, November 22nd to order. Thank you, Andrew. First order of business is any agenda additions or changes from staff? None from staff. Any from board members? Nothing from the select board. Anything from the trustees? Okay, no changes. So we'll move on to public to be heard. Public to be heard is a time for folks who are attending the meeting to address the boards on topics that are not on the agenda. If you'd like to speak, either raise your hand in the Teams app or indicate in the chat that you'd like to speak. If you're on the phone, we will give you an opportunity at the end or if you're in the room, please raise your hand. I don't see any hands in the room. Anybody want to speak? Public to be heard in the room. Okay, no hands there. So I will go to, I see Patty Davis. Your hand is up. Yes. Oh, sorry. I forgot my introduction. I'm sorry. I just, just hold on a second. If you'd like to speak to the either of the boards, please be brief, please be civil, please refrain from using inappropriate language. Please address your remarks either to me as chair of the Essex Town Select Board or to Andrew as president of the Essex Junction Village. Please do not attack other members of the public or town staff. If you are online, please keep yourself muted and your camera off unless you have been recognized to have the floor distraction. And I think that's the usual admonition. Okay. So having said that, Patty, go ahead. Yes. I love our town staff. Darren Scribbler is a gem. I just want to point that out. And I want to also point out our police chief is a gem and I really like him and I know I'm encouraged to make a complaint with the police, but I'd rather come to you first to be open-minded. And I would please like you to know that my husband and I have been moving rocks in front of the area at the end of Saxon Hill to help the police try to control ATVs from going on the Saxon Hill trails that these people from Fellowship of the Wheel do not get paid $25 an hour. They volunteer and they make these beautiful trails that 10 people are coming for Thanksgiving that we want to use. And ATVs on Friday night and on Saturday night, because Sam and I run every morning, move the rocks that we move to block it, to block what they do, and they come at night, Friday nights normally. So I'm not being accusatory. I'm asking, please, we are as a community policing Essex Town ourselves and doing what we can, even picking up garbage, doing what we can, please make this a priority to have a sign. And my husband's actually suggesting another metal gate instead of four more rocks where the ATVs are pushing the rocks aside and then maybe one wheel going over one of the big rocks and still going, my husband says they're taking trailers and they're putting their ATVs on them and they're coming to somewhere near Saxon Hill and coming at night because there are not a lot of houses on Saxon Hill. And this has been slated for a recreation area. You can talk to Darren Scribbler, who I adore as our staff member. And he knows me very well and he knows that after doing a whole study that Saxon Hill has been slated for passive recreation, which means no ATVs. And the police have already put a beautiful sign near the gate that's already up that says no ATVs and move the rocks back, but now perpendicular to that on the right, the ATVs are still going and making their way through there every evening on Friday and Saturday night. I am like the Saxon Hill police woman, that's okay. I don't mind helping out. So please do something because it's very upsetting. Thank you. I thank you, Patty. Thank you for your comments. Okay, anyone else wanna speak during public to be heard? I don't see any other hands up. I don't see anybody participating by phone. So, okay, let's move on to the first item of business, 5A discussion on potential action on tentative agreements about shared services between town of Essex and independent city of Essex Junction. There were four documents included in the packet. We want to proceed as we have in the past on these, going through them. Raj. Hey, good evening. I'm just wondering if folks aren't on the board, if they could turn off their cameras so we can see the board members, please, for those of us that are remote. Thanks. Thanks, Raj for that. So Andrew, should we go through these documents as we have in the past? I think that that would be good, Andy. And I think we can just use the order in which they are within the memo. Before we get through that though, I was hoping Raj, not to put you on the spot, but if you'd be willing to talk a little bit about the intent. Yeah, thanks, Andrew. I had forgotten about that, sorry. I just wanted to speak to the board members that are here, select board and trustees and try to reframe, refocus us on sort of where we started, how far we've come, try to get us to remember we're all approaching this with the best intentions. I sort of feel like we're starting to approach a place where we're starting to question intent and motive. It seems to, that seems to be sort of creeping in a little bit and I want to try to stop that if we can and just I'll try to remember that we're here trying to get to the same place, perhaps for different reasons. But I hope we can, I hope we can set aside questions of motivation and that sort of thing as we try to get through this in the next couple of meetings. Thanks. All right, thanks Raj. Dan, I just got a message you joined the other meeting. Oh, I'm sorry. Because there's one for our calendars. Yeah, there's two meeting notices. Okay, thanks for that Raj. Okay, so going to I guess the memorandum of understanding the version that's in the packet, the first changes on the second page, section two, where the words attempt to reach agreement, the attempt to has been struck through. The select board has been continuously saying that we need all agreements are none. Still in that position, it seems to be a bit of an impasse. I'm not sure how to resolve that. Andy, can I try mid? Sure, go ahead. Oh, sorry. I'm not looking to see if there's hands up. No worries. And this is a little bit off of what Raj had said within this MOU. One of the things I really want to point out is within the sixth, whereas, whereas, whereas the village in the town desire to prepare these tendons, I'm emphasizing the words tentative agreements because as we're going through this, we've really been going through lately with a very fine tooth comb. And I think we've gotten away from the framework and the really the intent of this portion. The intent of this portion, as I recall it, is to really come up with the high level framework for these items. How much for what services by whom, where are they housed, leave it there. Then after the legislature approves of separation, then as a city council, we would move forward with furthering these agreements to actual contracts. That is my understanding as to where we were going. And I think speaking for myself, I believe I got lost in the weeds and got lost in trying to get this as close to final as possible. So if we can keep that methodology in process or in mind of keeping that in mind, and if we can keep these conversations at bullet level, like bullet point level frameworks, I don't have a concern in getting through these items. If we have to go through this entire process of finalizing agreements that are nothing more than tentative agreements anyway, then I have a real hard time in seeing how we're going to possibly get through all of this before we go to the legislature in January. So I think that's how we can resolve this. So one, one point there is I've asked several, our number of times for a timeline explaining what expectations were and your intent to go to the legislature in January. Was not clear to the select board. I believe so. We haven't been working toward that kind of schedule. I'm as one comment. I'm unsure how. I'm unsure how that would be. I'm not sure how that would be. I'm fairly certain we have said quite a few times that we would intend to go to the legislature as soon as they get back into session. So that way we can work through the house as quickly as possible, then get through the Senate as quickly as possible, especially given the government operations committee schedule and workload with regards to apportionments and pensions. So I'm pretty sure we've articulated that quite a few times. And my understanding of the timeline is more so around the specifics with a transition period. Which which departments are within that transition period? What does a transition period mean? What are those dates? That type of thing. Not, not this January portion. Can I jump in there, Andrew? It's fine by me. So further down number three, section three, section three, section three, section three, section three, section three. So the、 the, the last one number three. Section three, the town and village. Intend that the town and city will enter into the above reference, tentative agreements generally consistent with the form of those attached to her to. That has not been changed since the beginning. And I think our understanding again has been. You know, these tier two agreements. Likely have very little, um, That and as far as the January timeline goes, I'd be curious if the entire select board had the general understanding that the village did not intend to go to the legislature in January. It's not my understanding on conversations with other members, but hearing that the select board in general feels that that is a surprise to me. We've said pretty consistently that we will work on a schedule that works for us and that we will be diligent in looking through all of these details irregardless of how long it will take us. No, Andy, I understand that, but you said that the select board is surprised to learn that we're going to the legislature in January and I'm asking, is that the entire select board or are you speaking for yourself? Go ahead, Tracy. I don't think it's a surprise that the village was going to the legislature in January. I think it's compounded with the fact that the legislature will be expecting a full and complete package that there won't be any, we'll figure that out for you. I think that exacerbates that timeline. The other thing that we're contending with is, a loss of 42 percent of our property tax base. One of our major motivations for these agreements was to try to mitigate the potential ramp rate of that tax rate with things that have been on the ground that are changing as we go. Staffing for finance, for example, is going to be completely different than the agreement that we had been previously working on. The IT agreement is reduced to being considered trivial. Raj, I guess to get to your comment last, about the way the select board may have reacted in our last meeting, is the question of we were being asked, we were asked for $97,000, no strings attached, we were asked for $60,000 for a finance director for the village, and we're asked for something on the order of $60,000 for a separation transition manager, and that all hit us at the last meeting. I'm really having a hard time with Andy. I'm sorry because there's nothing sudden about that money for the manager. We've been talking about that in executive session for quite some time. Let's back up a second before that's too long. I don't want to re-argue it again. I'd like to back up a second before we devolve. Why don't we do this? Why don't we get past number two and keep going? We always get stuck on these tier two things. Let's get past tier two tonight. Just put it aside for now. In the rest of these documents, let's get it done. Then we can come back and we can talk about tier two, see if we're just doing a framework, or if we're just going to hash out really quickly, what'll it take to get through EGRP and Indian Brook? We can get back to that tonight, but let's skip tier two and move on. How's that? Not for the whole day, but just for the next 30 minutes, 20 minutes. Put a pin in it maybe, and we'll come back. I'm struggling right here. I spent the last two days in the hospital with my mom, and I'm thinking I'm not in the right frame of mind to run this meeting. I'm very sorry to hear that. A bunch of moments. Andy, if you'd like to take a few moments at this time, I don't see a harm if you want to take a few moment pause from the sounds of it. You've been through enough at this moment, and if you want to pause for the moment, that's okay. Yep. I have any recess. Yeah. I'll be back. All right. Go ahead. Right. Shall we continue, or shall we take a five-minute recess? Andy mentioned having me run the meeting as he exited the room, but if people feel more comfortable, or if we want to proceed, I'm happy either way. I think we should take a recess. That sounds good to me. Trustees, are you okay with that? I think it's important for your board to make the decision whether your board is ready to move on or if you guys need a break. I think that's within your control circle. All right. Fair enough. Let's do a five-minute recess. We will reconvene at my clock says 648, so 653. Sounds good. Trustees will reconvene at 653. Let's go ahead and continue. I heard coming back to number two, and I'm completely fine with that. We can circle around to it just for the sake of moving on for this evening. Continuing as well with the same format that we've been discussing with. Let's move on to number three. Looks like where I next have changes, which actually circles back to number two. Then the next order that I have, and I apologize for those online. We don't have someone to run our computer, so I'm not seeing it up immediately. What I believe is the tax collection agreement. That's what I have next in my printing materials. Great. Continuing on, I'm going to rely on the help of my fellow board members to note the specific changes as we go through them. I can note them, but again, on this printed sheet, I'm only going to have the note of the change, not specifically the color-coding. The fourth whereas. Excellent. Thank you, Sue. Fourth whereas, any property tax payments due or delinquencies incurred for properties located in the city following July 1st of the first fiscal year after the effective date of the city charter will be collected by and payable to the city of Essex Junction. I know that we have certainly talked back and forth on this agreement quite a bit. As far as the specifics of that, we did receive an email earlier today from Sarah Macy. But it was not in time to be included in the packet and the materials for this evening. Effectively, I think, and anyone else who's read the email can clarify if I don't go into enough detail. But I think effectively, Sarah said that what we were trying to do with the agreement as it's mostly printed seems to be opposite of what is actually happening right now and would add quite a bit of confusion around the printing of the bills or excuse me, the tax bills when they go out. Patrick? Yes, Raj. I think that is actually the exact opposite of what she wrote. Sorry. No, I got it. She was doing it around three, so. It's okay. The opposite reference. Basically, this is like the IT conversation where Rob said that he felt that it was eminently doable. The big difference in this process that we're laying out is that instead of making a setting so that the town collects village taxes and taxes for both, they would simply change how they do it to change up the tax bills for the city. It's essentially changing a setting and creating a new template for a new tax bill to be mailed. I don't want to oversimplify, but it was not considered a big change. The other big takeaway from that email, from her feedback was that, and this goes to some of the conversation, I think from the select board's meeting on Monday, the tax payments would still come into the same cash account that they did this year. So the concern about whether the town would see the town would see their tax collection from the village and the concern about when it would show up while one of those is addressed in this, they would still be going into the same cash account just as they are this year. The second concern from last week, and so far as the introduced whereas in this document mentioned the end of the fiscal year, those tax payments get made within 30 days of the due date to the town. So, but again, they're going into the same cash account. So it's not. Yeah, it may. They're staying commingled. Right, exactly. Tracy. Yeah, I think we kind of touched on this last week that defining the scope of what we're trying to achieve, I think is needed to start it as a delinquent tax agreement to only talk about delinquent taxes. It's morphed into the minutia of how taxes get collected. And as I stated last week, it's why are we trying to reinvent the wheel and tell finance how to do their job? I think they do a pretty good job and we should just allow them to keep doing that job. As you said, they go into the same account anyhow, they're accounted for, they're there. It's not like anyone is going to be missing money. So why are we micromanaging finance and how they do their job? Which is my way of saying, let's just rein this back to only be about delinquent taxes. Thank you, Tracy. Thoughts? Patrick, I'll go. Yeah, sorry, I can't, again, apologies. I can't see when you guys have raised hands or not. So please. No worries. I'll do my best to just jump in. I really agree with what Tracy was saying. If we could go back to the original intent and if we can keep this as a framework, then I think this can be a whole lot easier than what, and shorter than what this current agreement is. So if the select board is willing to go back to have this only deal with the tax delinquencies, I think we're good. I'm saying three nods to my right and I will make a fourth. So yes, I agree. And I think Tracy is absolutely right. You know, we have as two boards and I think both sides are acknowledged tonight gotten so stuck in some of these details that we're really not making progress on this. So if we can lessen the scope of these in any way possible, then I'm all for it. The only other comment I had was I don't see a termination date and the ability to amend. I think those are both equally important to ensure that those are included. I have no concerns with that. Yeah, they're in the other agreements as well, so it'll be consistent. Okay, I'm hearing termination date and ability to amend from Tracy and Sue, you mentioned that as we look through the agreements as well to make a note of that. Well, I think that has been in the other agreements. So it would be consistent. Oh, and it's missing. Yeah. Great, thank you. Okay, good. So no other changes after that. And I know apologies, Raj, I heard you for a moment and I want to circle back to you. Since we have often decided this, what's the best way for us to go about lessening the scope since we have already gone into quite a bit of detail if we want to make this about the Lincoln tax collection? Should we, I am hesitant to start taking another pass through this document from the beginning? Yes, John. Wouldn't you just take out wherever it says property taxes and just leave the delinquency part of it? Okay. Is that right? Okay, because you put back in delinquent tax collection agreement at the top and like in the, well, what in the whereas is this? Two, three. Fourth whereas any property where it says property taxes do, it would just say any delinquencies incurred for the properties and you can still leave the same date, right? And the same number one, you would just take out all property taxes do and just leave in delinquencies. And I think that's the only other places that says that the rest of it all say delinquency. So, yes, no. And third whereas I think so, I'm Raj, I'm out of this. I meant to touch back with you first. Go ahead. No, that's all right. I think the third whereas as well. That's all. Very Raj, maybe counted wrong. No, nevermind. Yeah, no, the second line of the whereas tax payments leave in delinquencies. Yep. Okay. All right, then we'd go through and make adjustments and then send it out and readdress, but I agree with that. And I'm happy to move on. What would a termination date be for this? The end of one fiscal year? Am I understanding that correctly? Are we gonna write this one end at the end of fiscal year 23? I think it would end at the end of the transition period. Okay. I'll just leave it to that because it may go, we made. Okay. All right. I would ask a finance director when the termination date may work. Within the scope of delinquencies only. Correct. Yeah. It sounds like we're largely in agreement on that one. We have delinquencies that have been on the books for a couple of years. So I'm not sure it matters. Again, you're doing this amicably. You're gonna do it together. I would assume that if the village, if the town has a delinquency that is still out there, it will communicate that it has a delinquency and how it's going to address it if it's in the city and vice versa. All right. If I can jump in, there is that portion here that's currently on the screen where in number one after the crossed out portion, it says the town may continue collection efforts for both the town and former village, including tax sales on delinquencies beyond the effective date. So I'm not sure if having an end date, if that would then cancel that statement out. I don't know how that portion would work, but I think this is the kind of thing where we can have our professional staff and our attorneys figure that legal process out. And we're just in agreement that we wanna make sure this, what works best for everybody. Right, correct. I think the point is right to make it as smooth as possible for the staff to administer and deal with with as little confusion as possible. Perfect. All right. Shall we move on to IT? Work for me. All right, IT agreement. We do have a few more changes in here. Let's just drop down quickly to the one, two, third, the fourth, whereas the town IT department expects the time required to facilitate the migration on the town's part to be negligible. Where did that removal come from? It was our discussion last week. Right, we didn't know. It didn't seem like, I mean, it's like an opinion at this point. That's enough. Do you have any, the removal? I don't, just the only thing about that is that opinion comes from the town's IT director. So it's not an opinion of either board. It's an opinion of the staff who oversees the current IT infrastructure. So that's a part of the overall understanding as to the current state. And that the town staff just wanted to ensure that the boards knew that that's where that's coming from. I don't feel it needs to be in here just if we can have an understanding. Yeah, thank you, Andrew, for the clarification. Evan. I think there's a lot of things going on. In a staff meeting, if this billet wants the data and IT is just going into the servers, copying it, putting it into a media and giving it to them, that's not a problem, period. In that meeting, the staff of the village said, we talked to them about running the same software department to department. If they do that, copying data back into format, that's not a problem. So we feel that moving data over to the village is not as onerous. There are other things that are involved in IT, but they can be worked on as need be. Agreed. So I'll just say, last time I'll say it, that's assuming that you can separate the data. And that's usually the biggest problem is pulling the data apart. And I know you know what you speak, and the question is, again, do you know it until you get into it? And we will try to do so in a timely manner. Yeah, but getting into it, I think getting into, apologies, I didn't want to interrupt anyone, I think getting into the details of that, really just something for IT further down the road. Raj, I see your hand up on the screen, and then I'm going to go to... Select. I'm good, I'm good, you handled it, thank you. All right, Gracie? I was just going to point out that that sort of detail should be included in the plan, the project plan that's going to be created by the IT director and the IT consultants. So I think that those details will come, but just not in this specific agreement. Agreed. Agreed. Thank you. All right, we'll move on to bullet point number three. We're a number of changes here. Thoughts on the changes as they are. Thought about going through, like I have been talking through it all, but really need to read out half of a page of the words themselves. And they were good enough with number three. Thoughts on any of the changes? Raj, I see your hand up and down again. Because I can't operate our computer. Yeah, I did, just to mess you up. I'm curious how our village attorney will respond to the hold harmless if Claudine is present, which I think she is. I'd like to hear her thoughts on that. Hello, I'm here. Thank you. You know, Raj, generally my answer is that we advise not to include indemnity in any agreements of a municipality. And I think I mentioned this last time, the reason that we make this recommendation is because a pledge of indemnity is a commitment to financial expenditure in the future without voter approval. So our opinion is that any pledge of indemnity in a contract is not permissible for that reason. That being said, it's not an issue where there's been a decision that's come down out of the Supreme Court on this issue yet. This is our opinion, it's an opinion that's shared by many municipal attorneys. But it's been a topic of conversation because there isn't a specific decision that's out there on this issue. How do we resolve this? Because municipalities are constantly being asked to pledge indemnity. And so I think what Bill has done here is essentially the best possible work around that exists to try to sort of soften this type of indemnity pledge which effectively kicks the can down the road. It inserts this language to the fullest extent permitted by law. The idea here is that that clause when inserted into this request for indemnity leaves open the opportunity for one of the municipalities that municipality which is being asked to pledge indemnity to then go to the courts when indemnity is sought and say it's not permissible. And it's not permissible because it's a pledge of financial expenditure without voter approval. Therefore it just was never, it was void ab initio and was not permissible to begin with. Therefore we're asking the court to strike this language. And so that's kind of what's going on here. That's, I don't want to speak for Ternielis but my suspicion is that that's why he added this language just to try to bridge this gap between my recommendation of no indemnity, just don't do it. And his request to have indemnity, this is kind of the only possible way to bridge that gap which is just to the fullest extent permitted by law. And it's sort of, I guess kicks this idea down to hopefully indemnity will never become an issue but to the extent it does it leaves open the opportunity to say, we're not going to do it anyway. So that's what's going on there. Does that answer your question? I think it does, yeah. And I appreciate the fact that Bill tried to do what you're explaining. I guess my other question or comment would be, you know, any agreement we enter into with a consultant, you know, a full on corporation to do this work, you know, our contract with them is going to have some pretty strong stipulations in it in terms of their responsibilities and their liability. So I'm wondering about the necessity of this, that coupled with the fact that until this process is complete, our data just as much as the town's data is at risk. And, you know, we are going to be just as beholden to the community to keep this safe and keep things, keep our contractor, well, first of all, start with a good selection, ensure the contract has protections and make sure the work is done responsibly. So I see the desire for the clause. If it is inevitably going to result in litigation once it's attempted, you know, once enforcement is attempted, it's just going to cost both communities in some way. So I'm wondering if the logic of having it there based on all of that, curious what the select board thinks. Raj, may I add one more thing? Sure. Not with respect to that particular indemnity provision, but just the language that precedes it. And maybe I'm just being a little nitpicky here about language, but it just kind of, it says the city shall be responsible for any damage to town infrastructure caused by their access. And I would submit that the, that any potential damage is not caused by access. It's caused by someone's misuse of the system or it's caused by some type of negligent act or it's not caused by the access itself. So I just think that language is imprecise and should be, you know, I would suggest an edit there to try to better achieve what the intent of the goal is with respect to that language. If I may, I mean, the select board's hanging on this and you're right, it came from Mr. Ellis but I do agree with it that we did want some language in there because I think many of us who are on this select board and this is obviously picking from a very niche kind of pool of tech people, we've certainly seen the damage that can be done when access to specific data breaches that contain very specific information about our residents, our staff, billing practices, whatever. I feel like Bill, you know, tried to close the gap a bit and I'm not sure if he is on or not but I thought I saw him enter. Bill, are you there? I'm here. Great, thank you. I wasn't here. Did you caught the earlier conversation around this language or not? Honestly, I would really like to move on without spending 45 minutes on section three. But your thoughts, I think that this was in here, it was requested to come out. I think some language changes were made but I'd like to hear your thoughts before we bring it back to the two boards to decide if we're gonna try to keep this one on. I think Claudine summarized it pretty nicely. I understand the objection to municipalities and demifying parties through contract. I'm not wearing a black robe and I don't think Claudine is yet. But the question is open and so I inserted that language to the fullest extent permitted by law which has been acceptable to other municipalities that I represent. I think it should be fine here. The concept is that it's the village that's separating from the rest of the town. And so if that separation causes costs, the city should be responsible for it. That's all I'm trying to protect a certain percentage or a portion of the municipality at this point. The trustees have the benefit of only having to represent a distinct portion of the town at this point. Select Board on the other hand has an obligation to protect all of the town including those outside the village. So that's where that language came from, I think it's stay in. Thank you, Bill. Tracy, you had your hand up and then Andrew, since I wanna hear what Tracy mentioned, you had a hand up earlier and we'll come back to you and I. Yeah, this may be a question for Bill but I was kind of noodling this around this weekend and thought that if the city is doing its due diligence, which it should, and I don't doubt that they will, they would include an indemnification clause in their contract with their IT consultants. So I'm wondering if Bill and the Select Board would be amenable to including language around, the city shall include indemnification, yada, yada, yada in their contract with the IT consultant and then including any claims, penalties, or other costs incurred and not covered under the IT services contract, your IT consultant contract shall be the responsibility of the city and that doesn't leave it to one party having to litigate in order to sort of close the gap if it's not legally doable. Does that make sense? If that's directed towards me, yes, I think conceptually, again, that makes sense. The town outside the village will not be a party to the contract between the village and the IT consultant. Requiring the city or the village to have that clause in its contract with its IT consultants may protect the village but and it could protect the town as well. But I need to see the details that the bonus should be on the city to cover the costs. It's again, back to the concept and what you suggest, Tracy, may be workable. But again, we're at a pretty high level still. Right, okay. Andrew, you had started to speak before and I see Raj also has his hands up. So... We do too, we do too. Okay, George and Dan. I think in terms of the indemnify, I hear our attorney, I hear your attorney, I think that what is provided is a reasonable middle road and I think it's getting into a level of detail that's within our attorney's purview. If on the village side, if we can get an indemnification in our IT contract, great, that would probably fix all this to begin with. I hope we have today, I think that the proposals as good as it's gonna get. Okay, Raj, take his hand down, George. Okay, I'm sorry, I'm gonna say I agree with Andrew what Andrew just said, but I'm gonna go back to the issue that Claudine raised, which also caught my eye, which is that having access is just too nebulous a term and I think it's a little strange. I would suggest for a language correction that we take out strike access to same and substitute from their acquisition efforts. That gets more to the specifics of what's going on. I mean, simply walking into the building is access and we could cause damage that way, but so we're trying to get specific, we're trying to say to the town infrastructure caused by their data acquisition efforts. I'm not saying we should stick that in there now, but that's maybe a suggested phrase that we could substitute in there that addresses Claudine's concern. Go ahead, Dan. Well, I just, I agree with what's been said so far. I just think that we can get into the minutia on the issue and it comes down to semantics a lot of times on how the verbiage used, as far as defining, specifying what consists of damage and it would require an investigation, obviously, and a forensic investigation that exceeds my knowledge of this whole thing. And as far as the verbiage used, if the attorney's in agreement, and I, as you said, Andrew, I find this as a nice, happy medium between what we presented and what your Bill Ellis had presented initially. So I think just for the sake of moving forward quickly, I should just agree with that. Great, thank you, Dan. Okay, if there's nothing else, I think we can move on. I've taken a note about that acquisition efforts, George. Number four, concerns, issues. It looks like there was the addition of just some language at the end. Looks good. Okay, number five. Good to me. Great, six is just a date change. I do see that our attorney has her hand up. Yeah, Claudine. For six, I would just recommend one small addition, which would be language that says, if this contract needs an extension, the town shall not unreasonably refuse that extension. My reason for suggesting that language is because you never should know when you start down this road of transferring data, it might be an easy thing. What if something gets sort of snagged up and at some point, you may need a little bit longer to accomplish this goal. So just when they're in the event that there was just some small extension that was needed in order to accomplish one last little thing, might be useful to have that language instead of that hard and fast June 30th, 2023 termination date. Specifically, because you also don't know when this is gonna get approved by the legislature, so you might have that kind of pushing things out a little bit, so you might be bumping up against that date pretty quickly, it's possible. So it's just that suggestion. I'm completely happy with it. So like board members. Yeah, it seems reasonable. It seems reasonable. We also do have under number 13, we can amend and modify. I can't see any reasonable person saying no, we're not gonna help you get your data. So perhaps 13 could be moved up right under termination, just to make it clear termination amend, boom. Yeah, that's fine. Have some notes to maybe move 13 up, which incidentally was also the last change on this MOU. So are we happy moving 13 up to number seven to mitigate Claudine's concerns? It seems like that language is already in here, but if we wanna be more specific about it, I'm completely happy. That sounds good. Okay, I can't see anyone on the screen. Raj, Andrew, you guys okay? We're good. And select board. All right, and let's move on. We services, slight changes down in number one. Looks like just language verbiage concerns. Okay. Not for me. And we will move on to number four. Looks like in the last paragraph, there are some more changes here. Concerns, thoughts, issues. The concern from the trustees is likely that if I'm remembering what this statement was about, is that should the town after separation not approve of a budget, and then there's a required reduction in police services, this strikes out that the city would then be refunded for any of those services that we would not be receiving. I'm wondering if the reason why this would be struck out is because if the budget is cut, then if we're paying half of it, then our portion is cut. So I'm wondering, Claudine, I see that you're still here. Is my understanding correct and that that in and of itself would solve this issue? Or is there some other perspective I'm not gathering? So we didn't talk with council about this, but that was our assumption as to why this was changed and maybe Bill can chime in if he had a different intent here, but that's why we figured that was probably fine. And there's also these opportunities for a true up. So I think that should be okay. I might add after the word budget and before the word necessitates, add just and the failure necessitates a reduction in police services. I just think that's a little bit clearer that it's the failure to pass or prove the budget that creates the necessitates the reduction in services. I just think that makes it a little clearer. Otherwise the language didn't really work, but yes, Andrew to answer your question, that was my understanding of probably why maybe Bill did that. Is that right? That's correct, Claudine. We were, this is forward-looking. The budget will be set, the services will be established and there won't be any need for a refund or a credit because you're only gonna pay 50% of the budget going forward. And so that's, and I don't have a problem with adding in that one word that Claudine just suggested, but you were both correct Andrew and Claudine on what the intent of that was. Thank you both. I don't have a concern then. Great, thank you Andrew. And I've made a note for a budget failure to be added for language specificities, select board members, thoughts, concerns. No. Okay. Kind of off of the police agreement. Can we now consider this one done? I believe so. There was one word that was crossed out in number 11 automatically, but other than that, I believe we have a finished agreement. Of course, as I say that Amber sticks her hand up. No, I don't, I speak too soon Amber. It's such a minor comment, so minor that I agree with you. I think it's done, but we need to be consistent. Can we change the notice provision section? As I'd ask with all of the agreements to have the select board and the city council be the notice person, not the manager. That is how all of the other agreements are drafted. Yeah, I'm happy with that Amber to be consistent with all of the agreements. Evan, not a problem is it? What number? 1414. And we have mentioned that before. It should be consistent. I just wanted to make sure there was no weird lingering issue with the police needing to have someone's specific reference to it, so. Okay, great. Then yes, that, all right, so now you can cheer, Raj. There we go. It's awesome, thanks everybody. All right, great, yes, thank you everybody. That one in particular has been quite a bit of work, but also incredibly important, so appreciate all the efforts that's taken to get us to this point. Pat, do we need to ask? Yes, Sue, public to be heard. Well, not public to be heard, but public input. Yes, absolutely. Before we do that, Patrick. Yes, Andrew. If I may, so one thing I want to point out is again in the timeline that we're working towards the legislature, we are hoping to have them take this up as soon as they come back into session. I've already been told by Karen and Lori, our two representatives here in the village, that as soon as the legislature reconvenes, they're looking to have the bill drafted and submitted on the first day from there. We don't know how long it will take until it is in the committee. And then when the hearings happen, we hope it will be as soon as possible. If that's the case, I want to point out, we have one more joint meeting after today before that happens. So if we look back to that MOU, there are other items that it appears as if our boards should discuss and come to some level of agreement on before we get to that point. And I say that in terms of we can keep going and we can talk about some of these other items now to try and get this list to be a little bit shorter, or we're going to find ourselves where we're going to be looking to add other meetings, which currently would be during a holiday season. I don't think anybody wants to do that. I'm here at your proposal, Andrew. I'm hesitant, not because we haven't made some great progress, but with our board chair having to relieve himself from the evening so early tonight. I mean, I'm happy to go back for anything in the MOU that we said we'd circle around on. But if we want to get into any specifics beyond that, I would not feel comfortable without Andy here. Can I get some clarity on what exactly you were looking to discuss? What I'm looking to do is to go back to that MOU, look through those portions that previously we have identified as a tier one, but if the board really isn't willing to or is requiring that all agreements be a part of this overall package, then I really don't see much of a tier one, tier two anymore. Everything just becomes a tier one at that point. And so if that's the case, we go back through and develop those bullet points of what are the services that we're looking for, who provides them and for how much. Then we have our attorneys go forth and do their good work along with our staff. And I hear the concern about the chair not being there. I have been in that very similar place not too long ago. And if we can't be there, our boards continue on. Our community does not elect one person to represent the entire community or to represent the entire board. There's five of us to do the good work. And if one can't be there, we keep going. Can I just jump in and add one little possible procedural thing that we might accomplish? You know, if we can do these, if we can come to some sort of higher level agreement on some of these things, tentative agreement, right? That's what we're doing. We can get them drafted up and reviewed between now and was the 15th, is our next meeting. And I'm talking, not to the level that we're in right now with these four. We're not writing the agreements. We're saying, I'm looking at this sentence here. While right of first refusal for 81 Main Street, my understanding that in stormwater we're largely done. We don't have them in front of us. So we can probably move on from those for now. But we've seen in our list for months, Indian Brook Access, EGRP Access, we can have a good discussion on the high level concepts that our boards are interested in in terms of how would that look? Because if we wait, we'll just be starting that conversation that the next meeting is Andrew pointed out, which is right now our last scheduled meeting of the year. So it might be a good idea to start having some of those conversations and figure out, okay, well, where can we come to some kind of agreement? You know, we've been looking at this list and I think waiting, expecting the other board to make an offer and we keep saying that to each other. In fact, okay, what are you looking for? And we don't get there. So maybe this is a good time to start doing some of that. And see where it goes. George, can I, I just wanna jump in here. I'm looking, I'm kind of a little bit with Raj and Raj, you're looking at the back of my head right now, but I'm hearing what you're saying. I'm seeing a little bit of a difference though. And I think that I can be, I'm very sympathetic to you wanting to have Andy here because I think there is some, obviously some discussion that you folks need to have. Particularly with me, as I understand it with the senior center, because that's a pretty big, you know, I think the tree farm building is a technical issue. It's just, we both have liability and ownership of it and we have to agree that we basically agree that we do and acknowledge that we do that. I don't think that's hard. EJRP program and Indian bro program access, that's something that you have to figure out but the senior center, where we last left off is maybe you've progressed since then, but you had kind of throughout the idea that maybe you would start your own senior center. And I don't, that's a big change from everything. And obviously we don't have control over that. And if that's a decision that you folks are making but we're kind of held, we can't enact any of these other decisions. And none of this goes into legal force until you make that decision that kind of puts us in a bind. On the other hand, if that's what you're thinking that is a big project. So that might be really helpful if not to discuss tonight that's something I guess that you would want to have Andy here and have that worked out. But I think if the other trustees don't mind me saying I think our position just isn't not to try to force any kind of decision but our position is very clear on the senior center. We're going to continue it as it is. We would love to have you join us. I think we would love the senior bus the whole operation to continue. If you don't then, and don't, this is not meant in any way to be provocative but if you don't then we will do those things. We will figure out how to get a bus and continue the senior center. But that's pretty much what our intention is there but I'm not clear that you know what your intention is for the senior center. So that might be something that would be helpful if we could clear up. Okay. Thanks. That's all I wanted to say. No, it's great. Thank you. I appreciate it. I'll go back forward. Yeah, please don't. Well, given I would normally agree with Raj that we should continue but given the factor of 30 plus people in an audience full of people waiting to deal with the tree farm issue and that we don't have any facts and figures on the rest of the list or information as to what we've decided I would urge that we go on to the next item. Okay. Sue, Tracy. Thoughts? Yeah, I mean, I do feel that we as a select board need to have some discussion on some of these items. I don't know that we have you know, talk through what our position is on all of these because they have been put into this second tier up to this point. I mean, the memorandum of understanding was warned that tier one, tier two is on the agenda. It's in the packet. So I don't have an issue discussing it. And I was actually gonna suggest instead of getting so involved in the details I think it's helpful to step back and talk about what our individual overarching goals are what we want to achieve what our aspirations are before we put words on a page because when we see words on a page we want to edit them we want to wordsmith them we want to focus right on the details. And I don't think that's helpful in drafting an agreement because you first have to have that goal you have to have that vision you need to state what you want to get out of the agreement before you dive down to that level. So I firmly believe that needs to happen as it's been stated we only have one more joint meeting before the end of the year. We do have members in the audience we have members at home that are here for a specific item. And I'm curious as far as whether we can table this discussion until after the next agenda item just to be conscious and respectful of people's time. Okay, that sounds like a good middle ground to me if the trustees are amenable to table this so that we can talk to the folks who are here for the tree farm discussion and then I'm happy to circle back around to that point and talk about some of the maybe large brushstrokes on some of these others if I'm using the words properly. So if you're talking about tabling the rest of the tabling the rest of that conversation to go on to tree farm, I'm okay with that. Let's just keep in mind that we're going to be coming back to this. Yes, absolutely, Andrew. Great. And Raj, I saw that your hand was up. Okay. Yes. Thank you, Evan for reminding me of the proper rules. Motion to table. I'll make the motion that we table this discussion until after the tree farm presentation. Second. Don, thank you, Tracy. Select board, all in favor of tabling. Aye. Opposed? Same motion on behalf of the trustees. Second. Thank you, George. Thank you, Dan. Trustees, any further discussion on that motion? Hearing none, all in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Anybody opposed? That's unanimously. Thank you. Okay, great. And we will come back around for public discussion. Apologies if you add something very relevant to say we will come back to that though. All right, our next agenda item is not in my packet of information. So if I could have it on screen, that would be great. This is the discussion on the tree farm lease. Okay. We have Brad, Locke, and Allie, Vile. Thank you, Evan. So, Brad, Allie, would you like to start us off? Everyone, can you hear me all right? Yes, we can. Thank you. Thanks. Brad and I have submitted memos to each of our boards regarding our proposal with how to extend the August meeting but is, you know, bit more in the transitional scope of the lease ending for the tree farm management group and the two municipalities since the lease is set to end in July of 2022. There's one general extension for it to not end in July and to continue but then with a proposed plan of how the transition will occur with the 2023 season and then going into the 2024 season with more oversight from the two recreation departments. Okay, great. Thank you, Allie. Brad, do you have anything to add to that? If you're speaking, Brad, we can't hear you. No? Okay. And I'm giving an understanding. We also have representatives from the tree farm group here this evening. Great. If you'd like to come up to the chairs. And if you could identify yourself just for everyone at home. Giles, Willie. I'm Sven Knackloff. Giles, Sven. Thank you for coming tonight. So the proposal that we've heard is for the town of Essex and the ERPs departments to jointly take over the management of the tree farm group after a, I believe a two year lease renewal. I know that you've sent emails requesting a 10 year lease renewal. Yeah, we obviously want to give you after our last meeting, you know, have you present your side before the two boards make a decision? So if you'd like to have some time to speak now, please feel free. Sure. So I'm coming at this, we're in three hats. I have been a village resident for about fifth generation of seven willies and that have lived in the village and continue to live in the village. So as a taxpayer, my first question is, what problem are we trying to solve? And for 20 years, the tree farm management group has managed that facility in a spectacular way. It's a gem, it doesn't exist anywhere in Vermont, Northern New England, even into Massachusetts in some cases. So it's a gem that we've created over this 20 year period. And we all understand that ultimately it probably should go back to the town and the village to control. We have zero control of that. I mean, obviously that's why we're here. And I just want to point out some of the things that maybe as when I throw on my other two hats, one is president of Vermont soccer. So we are a member of the Tree Farm Management Board. There are designated positions based on the original setup, the original agreement that went through 20 years ago. And I apologize for this mask that keeps blocking. But in that 20 year period, the Nordic soccer, Essex United, Vermont soccer, the rugby folks, they were the four integral parts of the equation that went into the creation of the tree farm and the state passed the land to the town and the village. So it was a sweet deal for everybody involved. It was a way for the state, actually for the town and the village to save that from going into a development of some sort. And so it's 100 acres of really good property for any kind of soccer, rugby, ultimate frisbee, walking around out on the trails. It's a fantastic asset. So as a resident of the town or of the village, I'm sorry, what are we trying to solve here? I don't understand what we're trying to solve. For 20 years, there was never any interest and now suddenly we were hit in August, I'm sorry, in April, we were at our April board meeting and Evan and Brad came over and said, well, we're interested in having the conversation of doing this and then in August, it goes to a joint meeting and we found out about it the Friday before the Monday meeting. So, and then it happened again today. We found out about the changes in the proposal. It got sent out Friday at 4.58 p.m. That to me and tonight it's Monday. So we had over the weekend to digest all of this and come up with talking points. And so I'm a proponent of handing this back at some point. So I don't want anyone to misunderstand my intentions here, it's just the timing of this, it feels like it's not a conversation. And we've had a partnership for 20 years went along really well. We've never used a taxpayer dollar. It's all money that has been generated through the fees that we charge for the fields and from the contributions made by the founding members and additional infusion of cash some years later. So the town and village have a great asset at no cost and the proposal says that this will transition at no cost. As a taxpayer, I'm not sure I agree with that assessment. I know what it costs, I'm the treasurer of the tree farm. So I've been in that position for one year, but being a member of Vermont soccer for about 15 years, I indirectly had access to all of the tree farm information. We've always had a seat on the board that's a designated position. So as treasurer, for a year, I've been able to see a whole period, a whole fiscal year of revenue and expense. And at every one of our board meetings, the tiniest expense is scrutinized. We look at everything, what's its benefit? What are we getting for it? And how much does it cost? And so we spent a great deal of time and energy trying to make sure that that asset stays as pristine as it is and we reinvest. So as you would do with the capital project, we also do capital projects. So we're always working at trying to make those fields better and whatever it takes. As we've gone through this process of talking through the financials and we've heard from the village as to how much they think it's gonna cost for them to manage this operation, it doesn't jive with what we have experienced in the real world. So what we've been told to expect and what actually has happened, there's a pretty good delta there. And so I wanna caution the boards that before they say yes or no, that we have a real conversation. I would think putting a two-year window on this given what I just heard prior to us being here, it sounds like this shouldn't be a blip on the radar until after everyone's operations are in order and we can proceed in a conversational manner as to how to transition. Cause we definitely would love to transition just looking at, we're thinking that two-year period is not how to get there. And so we're asking to go with the 10 like we've had two times before and just be consistent with having us manage the facility, understanding that at some point it will go back to the town of the village when it's appropriate. Great, thank you. Yes, my name is Sven Ackloff. I'm a resident of the town 14 years, not as long as Giles. I'm also sit on the board of the tree farm management group and I represent Essex United Soccer. You mentioned 20-year history, there's actually a 25-year history from the very beginning of raising money, lots of money to build these fields in the facility that we have today. That's something we can't forget, right? The initial programs raised all this and built the fields and I've managed it ever since. I would say we have a pretty good track record and reputation for running this facility, again, at no taxpayer money whatsoever. We're a self-enterprise fund, so that means what we make, what we can spend. I would say if the parks and rec, this is my personal opinion as a taxpayer of Essex, you want the rec departments to manage it, that is now a paid service, managing it for something where money is already tight to begin with. And I don't know if the town or junction are good at raising money, they're not a business, they're a government setup. A few things, I will like to mention that the parks and rec for both divisions have a seat on the board of the tree farm management group. I don't know if the public is aware of that, but they're making decisions with us and we try our best to work together. I guess my personal opinion, given the situation with the village and the town and all the stuff you guys are currently dealing with, I don't know how you're doing it, but do you really want to have another problem on your hand when the tree farms are already being managed well now? I mean, think about that. You guys are voting on this. And then more importantly, the two rec departments I don't think are seeing eye to eye and you expect them to coexist and manage a facility like this. It's a beautiful spot, brings a lot of business to this town and the village and why change something if it's already working well. It's my last comment. I have one follow up I failed to mention and it's a pretty important one. So we got, as part of your package, you got a memo from Brad and one from Ali. Is that, and so I'm looking at the one from Ali and in the discussion portion, third paragraph, there's a line in the middle that says at this time the financial and physical assets would transfer to the municipality. That would not take place. So these are tree farm management group assets. So the cash that we have in the bank, all of the goals, all of the flags, all of the paraphernalia that we've purchased over the 20 plus years would remain in the possession of the tree farm management group and we would dispose of those as we saw. I'd also like to say that we are a volunteer organization. We're not getting paid for this work. We're passionate about this work and we want the best for the tree farm. I think that's my last comment. So I think there's a lot of people. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, we will address the public. If you could hold a second. I think I want to give the select board and trustees a chance to ask you any questions if they have them before you get back into the audience, Sue. Yeah, so I had the same question of what problem I'm trying to solve. Kind of where my head first went. But one of the things I just wanted to follow up on, you referenced an April meeting and that Brad and Evan came, Allie was... Oh, Allie, I'm sorry. Allie's part of the board. So she comes to the meeting anyway. So I was negligent in giving that piece of advice. I didn't imply, I wasn't trying to imply that Allie wasn't there. I just, I would make some assumptions. That's fair. Thank you for clarifying. And all of the information that I'm going to give in and all the notes, if anyone wants it, they, I am on an open book. We are an open book. Trustees, I apologize. I can't see all the hands online. I don't see any questions there though. George. Yeah, Giles. Could I actually address this to both of you? You said you don't have a problem in seeing, you do see that eventually the municipalities have to take it over, but you're lobbying for 10 years. Yeah, I'm lobbying for more than two. But in two, it's not enough. Tight window. I just want to just explore that a second though, because you do, you do see the need. I mean, you understand that it's, you know, I've used the analogy before. It's like if a completely independent group was running Essex High School hockey rink and the high school board had no say, wasn't, you know, maybe they have a C. It is a giant piece of property. There is money changing hands. I hate to use the big word fiduciary, but there it is. We got to wheel it out and put it out here. We have a fiduciary responsibility. I think that that's what some of us have said here. There's a lot of money changing hands. There's a lot, there's ordinances being written that never came by us. Things happening that we didn't see yet. It's public property. The public has, it's supposed to have access. And so I think I just want to make the case to you. You understand we're not, this is not about us questioning your competence and your goodwill and all your good work. It's about us exercising what we believe to be is our fiduciary responsibility for this. Yes, I agree with that. I would agree with that too. I just don't think the timing is the timing. It's just the timing. So you're thinking that if, so if you extend, if it was three, if we say 10 years is too much, like we've gotten pretty good at negotiating. So 10 years maybe too much, two years not enough. I mean, so what's a happy medium in there perhaps? Well, I mean, if you look at the MOU, I think we're, there's talks to start talking about this together with four years ago in advance. I mean, correct me if I'm wrong. I'm kind of new to the board, but we have not been part of those conversations. And if they, we have been, it's been, we know very little. Yeah. And some of it was COVID. I mean, we would have loved to blame COVID, right? So the redhead step child, but there was that issue of COVID. And I'm going to give everyone the benefit of the doubt on that, but you're right. It's supposed to start the conversation four years in advance of the expiration of the current MOU. So since we didn't have that opportunity to really ever have the conversation. I mean, Evan came out to the meeting, but he had to run because it was the night of the merger vote. And so it just seemed like there was, we were piling on on this thing. So I don't know what the right number is, four or five years. You know, that seems like a reasonable number to me. And handing over additional responsibilities. So that, like I said, in my notes to myself, I said, it should happen such that on that last day, nobody even knows it happened. It just didn't. We all feel good about it. Yeah. One point. So whatever it takes to, I'll give you a really good example of what we were thinking as a board, the tree farm management. We actually had this conversation on how to transition. And one of the suggestions was, we had this thing this past season where a set of individuals did the opening and closing, the lining of fields, the picking up the trash in the morning and that kind of stuff. So oddball jobs that just were at odd times too. So you couldn't just pay somebody three hours. It was odd times. And so we had this J crew and they will not be doing that duty this next year. And so we're thinking, well, okay, that's a great thing for the municipality to, let's start the transition. Let's see how you do on that. And if that goes well, well, then we go to the next step. And like I said, eventually you get to a point where it's all on. Yeah. I mean, I'm just concerned for the taxpayers. We all, that's an ugly word for a lot of people in this area, increase taxes. There's been zero tax money into this facility and how we run it. And I feel like taxes in some way will be increased to run it. We're not, we don't make a lot of money at the tree farm, right? We spend just as much more or less what we make for you while you're in this year. It's actually been our best year ever in terms of revenue. But it's just, you know, you have a lot of big plans for the tree farm and you don't want to use taxpayer money. So, and then now you have to pay for some of the services we're doing with by volunteering. I'm just wondering where the money is going to come from. I do think that actually our rec programs are pretty phenomenal at running their programs on user fees alone. We get nearly a two to one return on investment for what we put into EJRP and our parks and rec. I'm not saying that it obviously wouldn't be difficult, but certainly within the capability of those two departments to make that work if they were able to set their minds to it. Well, the costs on those, so I'll just provide a little reference. If I offer a program that can have, say 10 participants at $50 a piece, that's $500 in revenue and it may only cost me a hundred for an instructor to run that program. What we're talking about are the maintenance of facilities. That cost, there's not an economy of scale that you would have in a rec program. So something where I'm registering for something like swim lessons or daycare. Lawn mowers. Totally different than the park side of the house. Okay, thank you. Patrick, if I'm gonna jump in here. Lily, Andrew, I see you, Raj and I think Brad as well. So I'm gonna go in that order. That's just the way I saw them. Yep, thank you both for being here. My question is I've heard a few times both of you talk about how two years is just not enough time. I haven't really heard why. I'm hearing concerns about, this might cost taxpayer money. What about things that are happening currently with the separation? But what do you feel the harm would be to the participants and to the programs by turning this over in two years? I'm worried about quality. We have a little tidbit of information. The tree farm itself had 19 different preservatives in the current season. So that's not a lot of customers for a lot of revenue. Of those 19, three provided 80% of the revenue. So one of those walk and find a new home and I'm not making any threats. I'm just saying this is what clubs like Nordic and Essex United and even Vermont Soccer. We have to have that conversation internally. Like I have to go before an AGM in January and I have to discuss what we're talking about right here because it has a dramatic impact on our member clubs. And so clubs like Essex United and Nordic who use the tree farm as their home facility, if that's not gonna be a long-term solution, they're probably looking for another option. So that's why it has to be a conversation and it has to involve Essex United and Nordic and Vermont Soccer and Rugby and all these all the different players in the two rec departments. There are a lot of conversations that have not been had yet and to have a fair assessment as to whether it's the right time to do it or not. Well, first you gotta have a conversation to know that and so far that has not happened. Yeah, I think my response is quality too. We both will be retired from business. They sold and I run a business and numbers. I look at numbers for a living. I just don't, again, I can't tell you how many times we're at the tree farm ourselves volunteering our time. It's unbelievable how much time we have and now that's gonna be a paid service at the end of the day. You're gonna have to hire people to do this work that we're doing regardless. The lawn has to be mowed twice a week. I mean, you get the lawn tractors to buy all types of stuff you have to do that you're not fact-figuring in. The last meeting when I was here last, I couldn't believe that both rec departments had no idea our revenue, our costs, anything. That to me is alarming. You wanna take over or something, you should know what's involved and how to do it. So two years in my opinion, that's probably in the short end. I'm probably looking, again, I still think 10 and maybe we find somewhere in the middle, but. I don't know. Okay, thank you. Raj. Raj. So thanks for coming in. I appreciate your concerns. For sure, my kids grew up playing soccer there too. So we spent the last discussion on this topic hearing about how there wasn't anywhere else to go. We had people coming from Southern Vermont, from out of state. We had new Americans coming. We had, everybody came and I'm sure they're here tonight, which is awesome. Telling us how there is no other facility like this and that's in fact how you opened. So I'm hearing that the businesses that are using the public land are gonna probably walk. I guess I just don't know where they would go if I'm to believe the input that we got and we're probably going to get tonight. And I'm saying that not wanting them to go anywhere. I think that our rec department. You're muted. It grows, grows. The whole internet. The video's gone, but no volume. No, the video's not going on here. All right, Tracey, you had your hand up while we wait for the internet to recover. Did you? He's still talking on that one though. Yeah. Oh, that's weird. He's on, he's still. Oh, he thinks he's still talking. Raj, if you can hear us, we can no longer hear you. We're having some technical difficulties on our end. Andrew as well. Yeah, I can't hear Andrew either. Andrew, can you nod if you can hear us? Everything about that. Yeah, I'm not. He's not being here, but he's not thinking I should. Yeah. All right, let's take a minute or so to leave and come back in, see if it's on my end. That's good. Well, it didn't even shut this one down. Yes, this is. So this, the screen is frozen because it didn't even. Oh yeah, that's true. It didn't even, it didn't even shut it down. Andrew, can you say something? I can see you, can't hear you. We got the video. God, can you try leaving and coming back in? Yeah. He texted me. Here we are. No, it's not, it's on my personal computer. That's true. No, it's on the system. That's really loud, Dan. Yeah, it's not. I put it next to the speaker. We are working on it, guys. God, if you can't join, I might try to swap over. So I'm giving the feed to the TVs, try to get the volume there. And then. Well, while they're doing that, why don't you tell us what happens in the winter? Like what's going on right now? What do you sort of shut down? You sort of incubate for a few months and how does that all work? So we would, back just a few seconds ago. So November one is our closed date. And so, as Sven said, the board goes over and moves all the goals. So they're compressed against the access road. And then did some minor repairs have stopped, but essentially it gets shut down. Capital improvements, yeah. Do you have a problem? Can I just want to see? Oh yeah. With the new tech stuff. Andrew, Raj, can you hear us? No, can you use, can you say something? I can't hear you. No. I can't hear my microphone. That's my bad. Oh yeah, you might get strong feedback. Yeah, completely lost. Can you say something again? Yes, I can. Can you hear me? I got getting a little feedback. Okay, we're good. Then can you then lower your volume? No, who hit the mute button? It was you. It wasn't me. So you can hear me. Yeah, we can hear you guys again. This is Raj, Bill and I. We all said nice little barbershop tri-cat thing going on. It's all in dad jokes. Oh, I'm just saying. Well, where are you froze? Was Raj was saying something about? Where would we go? Where would they go? Yeah. Raj, can you pick it up from there? Was it right at the beginning? I guess. It was about. I guess my only question is, the feedback we've had so far is that there aren't enough places to play. And that feedback has been taken apart. Nobody wants anyone to go anywhere. But when we hear we're hearing, I think, mixed messages, then we don't want an Essex United or a far post to walk. But we've also heard over and over. And I'm sure with it tonight, there's nowhere else to play. So we're trying to find a meeting where the community has some responsibilities to translate up for its parks. So I just want to just reassure that we're not trying to make anyone go anywhere or make it a certain environment where they feel they need to. I appreciate that. And because we could both go back and forth and no one's winning. The idea is that everybody wins. So I think if a conversation were started, it would morph into a solution that's acceptable to everybody. And honestly, quite frankly, we have no leg to stand on. You guys own the property. You can do what you want when you want. I would just like to be part of a conversation, a bigger conversation, because I'm invested personally. I'm invested at the tree farm. I'm invested through Vermont soccer to make fun for kids. That's what it's all about. And our best we can get to that conclusion. I think everybody's open to that. We just feel like we've been left out of a conversation. Thank you. We also have Brad online. I said I was going to go to him first, and then I will come back to Tracy. Brad, are you there? Yeah, can you hear me? We can. Great, thanks. Sorry, I missed the whole thing. I was having some technical difficulties. I just wanted to address a few things. Some of these are highlighted in the memo that is provided in the packet. I think in terms of the problem after solving, we need to be careful that it's not a problem. It's just the situation where we're at. And I recognize the work of the tree farm management group has done for the last 20 years. They took on something for the community when the community wasn't ready to take it on. But we have to have the lens moving forward of what's best for the community. And that is providing access to a municipally owned property with government checks and balances, with openness, with transparency, with participation, representation, oversight, audits, municipal employee oversight, appointed citizen advisory committees. These are all things that we are all familiar with. That's how we manage to treat all municipal banks. We do so to make sure that the interests of the people, the assets of the people are being managed appropriately and there are checks and balances on them. And the best way to do that is through municipal oversight. I recognize this feels short in terms of this lease ending. Everybody signed this lease 10 years ago and knew this lease was ending on July 31, 2022. And so we're talking about extending it two years from today. That is plenty of time for the recreation department to work with the tree farm management group to figure out what needs to be figured out to move forward, to have that seamless transition that Giles has talked about. So that on that first day that it's seamlessly operated, that people will continue to drive into the facility, use the facility, leave the facility, and all will still look and feel the same. Where you call, where you email, and who you pay will look different. But the user experience will be the same. We did not. I recognize that the boards asked for a business plan and some other information for tonight. And after having several conversations, we felt that instead presenting a united front between the municipal recreation departments and management team of transferring this to municipal oversight was the best process forward. We didn't really want to get into the minutiae of the nuts and bolts. If that's something that the board desires, the board's desire, we can bring that to you. I can tell you we've run numbers on a budget. We can operate the facility based on the revenues that they've been receiving. So we can do that without taxpayer money and without being in the general fund and running this as an enterprise fund. I think that we have the opportunity to have a two-year conversation. And I hope that the three-part management group will reevaluate their position on the asset transfer. I think for the last 20 years, they have dutifully operated this facility and purchased assets, physical assets for the facility and generated financial assets based on operating a municipally owned property. And I hope that at the conclusion of their lease, whenever it is, they would transfer both those assets, financial and physical resources over to the municipality to have the ability to continue to provide the same services that have been provided so that their own groups can continue to access and utilize these fields in the same manner and that the holes won't be removed and field hoses and financial assets won't be given to some other entity other than the very place that the revenues have actually been generated. I think that's all I have. I'm happy to answer other questions as they go on. Thank you, Brad. Tracy, you had your hand up. Yeah, I, just out of curiosity, how many members currently sit on the management board? Six. Six, and two of those are municipals. Correct. So there is municipals, right now Allie represents the town and Harlan represents the village. Great. So I guess I'm curious, when this was presented back in April, you said that there hasn't been any conversation. So when that was presented, was there no sort of response? We got a document in the morning or an evening meeting. Okay, I thought you said it was presented at a meeting. It was, so we met at the tree farm. So our April meeting was at the tree farm because we walk around the facility to see what needs to be addressed for the coming season. And so our meetings start at six o'clock. We were meeting, I'm sitting on the grass and feel nine, Evan and Brad come to the meeting. Allie's already there. And the topic, the first topic of discussion was something we had just learned about that morning. And as I said, Evan unfortunately had to run to, I think the polls closed, I think that was the reason. So it was, to say the least, it was like, what did we just listen to? Reasonably, I would have thought we would have had something coming to us so that we would have been at least prepared to what's this all about, why are we doing this? And like I said, COVID caused a dark period, literally. And so even though we were supposed to do this for four years, we got shortened to two. And so I think if I'm not gonna speak for Sven, but I'm pretty sure if we could get back to four, I think everyone would be happy. And I think you would find that we would be much more willing to participate in a really, really smooth transition. And again, I'm not trying to be threatening or anything of that nature, but we also have to do our due diligence. And what Raj said earlier, there are other fields, it's just they're not as good. So, but if you're an organization and you have to prepare for a coming season and you're not sure what's gonna happen, what's gonna happen to the tree farm? We've been told all would be stupid to change it from soccer or centric. But we don't know that, we don't have control of it. So we're just concerned that if it were to change, the strategy were to change, that we would be looking for another home and we as a general term, I mean, each club's gonna have to make their own determination, but certainly it would take away the convenience that our customers have of going to the tree farm and their seventh grader and their sixth grader are all quite the same place, as opposed to having somebody at Maple Street, somebody at the tree farm, somebody at Dorset Park or something. So it's just, I think everybody gains if we have a conversation and I disagree with what Brad is saying in terms of just changing it over to the municipality, that's going to solve something. I don't know that it's gonna solve anything. I don't know that. I'd like to see. And to use a phrase that you just use due diligence, I hope you understand that this is us doing our due diligence as well. Exactly, I'm all for it. And in that same line of thinking, Raj, you brought up the fiduciary point earlier and I was curious since Ali is on the call, I don't believe Harlan is, but Ali as the town municipal board member, do you have a full picture of what the finances are currently? I'm not off the top of my head and I say that just because it's something I have to reference when I'm speaking about it more so because as a member on the pre-farm management board, I'm also the secretary, so there's so many things I can do at once. So I'm documenting and I'm the minute-taker of those, but everything is really well thought out. It's full discussion. It's working within our means as a tree farm management group. The audio is a little funky, so I don't know if I have fully answered your question from maybe what you said versus what I've heard. I believe you have, but I know in the lease and the management agreement, it does say that the finances will be essentially given to the village and the town for review. I don't think I've ever seen those. Yeah, I was never on the board. You were 100% right. It was never asked for. I don't know whose responsibility is whose and I'm not gonna get my new shift, but it's never been asked for and it was never given until, well, I guess it was mid-summer before we actually got it. It's all right here. I'm happy to share it with anybody that wants to see it. So it's really, it was not done for any nefarious purpose other than, well, I didn't even know we were supposed to do it. So that when a board turns over, there are certain things in people's heads that don't always get transferred to the next person. And I think this is one of those details that nobody made an issue of it. So nobody thought to even look at it, but you're right, we're supposed to have that sharing of information. I'm happy to give it to anybody that wants to see it. Thank you. Select board, any other questions? Trustees, Andrew. Just one quick thing, this might be more so for town meeting TV. It sounds like the audio is coming through possibly on like one central microphone. I'm not sure if I'm the only one having this experience, but sometimes not everyone is coming in very clearly. Tracy, your question about finances, I only heard the second half of it and the response I missed the first few words. And somebody else who spoke, I'm not sure if they were at the back end of the room, but I could barely hear anything that was said. So from this end, the sound was not as good as it was. Yeah, Andrew, the problem is that channel 17 lost its internet connection. They're trying to get it back. So the workaround is that we're just going through the municipal computer, which does just have that single microphone that's attached to the webcam. Okay, I got you. So sorry for the difficulties. That's where we're at. All right, so we'll project up at the webcam. Don. So since the last time you came to this board, how many meetings have you had with Wreck? With Wreck? To discuss EGRP and that, to discuss this. Only through their membership on the board. So we just discussed our normal operational stuff. And then we'd also talk about, in fact in the last meeting. At the end of the meeting, we had a 10, 15 minute conversation. But these two recent proposals are brand new as of Friday, the 4.43. So you had no knowledge that they were going to present that to the board because you have not, even with your reps, talked about it. Correct, correct. And back to it. It's hard to work together when you don't have the information. Thank you. And I'm not sure if that's a legal issue. I'm not smart enough to know the answer to that. I know Allie's in a difficult position. She's on this side of it, but she's also on that side of it. And I don't envy her position at all. It's a difficult position to be in. So I will say that publicly because she's been enormously helpful in making this all of these makes some sense. I'm just, my concern is we had all these questions come up before that initial discussion. And we still don't have the answers to those questions tonight. This might, that would be my response as well. Thank you. Okay. I have one or two questions that I might need to borrow. Evan, you're speaking about institutional memory. I certainly experienced that here on this board. I have received a number of emails over the years from residents or people walking that said that the management group has not been kind to them or has demanded that they get off land that belongs to the public. There have been a few over the years and I'm seeking Evan's assistance because I believe that we've had some difficulty in the past trying to get resolution on those. We brought them to, I'm not sure, it was probably two years ago, maybe a year and a half since as you might, you know, COVID was in there. And I think that that's important for us because I understand and recognize the extremely valuable service that you do certainly for the entire Northeast soccer community. But we are not here to help the Northeast soccer community. Necessarily we're here to make sure that those fields and that that property is put to good taxpayer use and that's gonna be there to be used for our citizens, your kids, my kids, you know, so it's not that we are unrecognizing of all of the work that tree farm management has done but there have been some problems in the past as well and we've had difficulty getting resolution to those. Evan, can you speak a little bit to previous instances of that? I would say the incidents that come to mind are mainly dogs being on the fields versus on the paved surfaces. Number of garbage cans are available to the facility. People getting their cars locked into the facility from the parking lot. And then a general comment about field usage and priority which we have not get involved in, they do all the scheduling. That's roughly the four things that I tend to remember about the facility and other than that, I think the facility gets, I guess one thing is, one last thing is when people get approached about being on the fields or using the fields or having dogs on the field, they have complained about how they got addressed. Not so much the fact that they were already in violation of having a dog on a field where people are playing sports. Dogs defecating on fields is not good for field sports. I think, can I talk? Yes, please. I think that's kind of a perfect translation what we're dealing with. Dogs are the big problem with the tree farm. Let's just get that out in the room. If you go there at 7.30 in the morning, the dog part, to be honest, it is, and dog waste on the fields and all the sticks they bring. I was gonna mention sticks. I forgot sticks. Every time the lawnmower, the people who mow our lawns have to get up and move a stick, it costs money every time they get off. And it's hard to, I guess, police the dogs when we don't have, I'll leave it at that. We're not there 25 hours a day watching dog. If we do ask someone to leave or remove their dog, I think that's happened a few times. We're out and yelled at as volunteers. We try to be as nice as we can, but dog waste on field is a problem. I am just saying those are the complaints I've heard. I didn't say they were warranted or unwarranted. And the waste can thing is there's some irony to that one. You have to have some levity here. So this is two years ago, and the Valley will remember this and it's so will our family. We did our normal spring cleanup and we had, I'm gonna say 20 of those 55 gallon drums situated all around the pre-farm because we were trying to help with people who were doing their cross-cutting skiing or walking, whatever they were doing during the winter. Well, every single one of them was full of those doggie bags. And can you imagine, and we were trying to lift these things into trash, the trash disposal. And so lifting 20 of those things in the middle of April is not a pleasant day. So we then went the other direction and said, we're not putting any trash barrels out there. That was this year. Well, then it was COVID. Yeah, and one was out there and what do you think happened? That one got full of dog bags and I had to go get it with my tractor because it was buried in snow. So I get both sides of it and I'm trying to make light of something that's not really fun, but it's the dogs and the trash or they're kind of tied, tied together. Patrick, back to your question. Harlan sits on our board and he oversees the Meeple Street Park area. He gets complaints every single day for the same things we get a few complaints of. I would argue in that only I have seen the emails that have come and I have not seen emails from people complaining about Harlan, but I have seen it. No, I'm not saying Harlan, I'm saying residents are complaining about dogs and so forth the other part, right? Fair enough. George. I heard you back a while ago in the conversation just skipped right over four years. You said if you had something more like four years. Yeah. Why would four years be better than two years? I don't know. Honestly, George, I don't know what the right number is. I'm just going with what my gut tells me and having sat through that first hour, I'm even more committed to not doing two years. I just, I'm trying to envision, now I'm just a village resident. I have nothing to do with soccer. I'm just trying to envision how this whole city town thing is gonna take place and I'm not a cynic, but I'm gonna say play devil's advocate. There's probably gonna be a few things that hit the fan and skip over us for a minute or two or a year or two and then we continue to have this conversation so that we do it in a smart way. And if the finances are the issue, we give you the finances every month. If you wanna review the finances every month, I'll give you the finances every month. Whatever you need to feel like you're doing your due diligence, I'm happy to oblige as far as I can oblige. And I think Sven would, I mean, we've talked offline multiple times and are in complete agreement with how our way of thinking is really get a conclusion that's good for everybody. I see Raj's hand is back up again. I wanna get to the public. If we can, after Raj, if we can open it up then so we can move on in the agenda. Yeah, Pat, so two points now that you brought that up. First point up is a question. And that's the feeling on for the two of you as to changing up the representation or wreck on the board. Right now, I think it's Allie and Brad. It's two people, maybe it's not Brad. Harlan. Harlan, excuse me, thank you. What's your feeling on a change in the structure of the board? And Pat, to your point about public comment, I'm seeing it's 830, almost like 30 or 40 people are here, it'd be great if we could do a hard stop at maybe 40 or 50 minutes of comments tops. We've got a lot to get through tonight and maybe people when they comment can simply say that I agree with what's been said. I don't agree with what's been said. I have something else to add to help us move along and we can still get a count on the sentiments and have a, we still have a lot of work to do tonight. So thanks. Yes, I didn't understand the question. I think the first part was for us, but I can't remember what he. Right. Can you check here? Oh, oh, sure. Hey, more hands make easier works. Perhaps more representation from the municipalities on your board. I'm happy with that. I don't think more representation would be good. I think the board is originally created. I think there's eight or nine total groups all in. If I had my opinion, I think Audubon should have a seat at the table. They're a close neighbor and maybe more help. Yeah, definitely something to consider. Yeah. Happy. All right, great. Thank you so much. So we'll go with the members of the public online first because I'm saying you were of them. Matt, before you move on to the public. Yeah, absolutely, Brad. Thank you. I appreciate it. I just wanted to comment on a few things that have been said that, you know, there's been talk about community concerns and that goes back exactly to the openness and transparency participation representation that comes with municipal oversight. And then something is, is municipally run. There's an avenue for community concerns to be addressed and appropriately dealt with. And there's not in different situations with a private organization managing publicly owned facilities. I also want to say that, you know, with recreation departments taken over oversight management, there are no planned anticipated changes in the future use of the facility. No group of the 19 users who have currently using the facility should anticipate any change in their ability to utilize the facility in the same way. It would be foolish on our part to change that. This should be an enterprise fund operation and it needs to generate revenue in order to pay for itself. And so we would continue to operate it to make sure that those groups have access and get to continue to use the fields and pay for those fields. You know, in terms of if there are questions that the board needs to be answered to move forward, the direct departments would be happy to answer those. We intentionally did not answer the budget questions and management plans for tonight's meeting to focus this conversation on a higher level concept of should this facility be municipally run or not. We can assure you we have run the numbers we have budgets that we can operate the facility with the average revenue that they've been receiving for the last five years of about $125,000. We can do that with no additional general fund revenue. I lastly, you know, I kind of wear two hats, you know, obviously the recreation director, but obviously a long-term public administrator. And I have to say that having a private operation run municipally owned property that generates revenue is somewhat irresponsible of government. And I'm not accusing any of the individuals on the 10 people on the board of being irresponsible. I don't think the tree farm management has approved has done anything irresponsible. I'm just looking at this on principle. And I'm telling you that having a private organization that the municipality has no control over, they have two seats on the board. It's not a majority, a group that sets their own rates that decides who gets to use the fields when they want to use the fields that then decides to fill those groups for using the fields. That those groups who sit on the board then pay the board for use of those fields that then the board receives those checks and processes them. Again, I don't think anybody's done anything wrong for 20 years. I have no reason to believe it. I just know that from a government perspective, this is not the appropriate way we do things. We don't have the folks who are in accounts receivable also in accounts payable. There are checks and balances in municipal government and that's how it needs to operate. So this is not a reflection of where we've been for 20 years. It's not a reflection of these boards of the efforts of anybody individually. This is a reflection of what's the correct thing to do when we operate publicly owned assets. And that's to manage them publicly so that there's accountability and checks and balances. Thanks, Patrick, I appreciate it. Thank you, Brad. So as I said, I'm gonna go online first. I would like to actually, in fact, I will, I'm going to keep a hard three minute stop on public comment since we have had a large amount. Apologies if that, if anyone was looking to speak longer than that, but just for the sake of time the number of individuals I anticipate are going to want to speak. I would like to kind of keep us moving this evening. I can really see the names online. So I'm gonna have Tracy help me out. Great. Melinda, if you would like to turn the camera on and unmute. Full name, please. Oh, yes. And if you could share your full name, please. Johnson, we've got a whole bunch of kids, three. I consider that small herd. And we love the tree farm. I'm a huge soccer fanatic. I've coached two out of the three years. I've, or actually I've coached every year my son has been there. And my concern that I don't think has been addressed is everyone says we want to turn over to a municipality. But which municipality? Is it gonna be the village or is it gonna be the town? And I think that's kind of my overarching concern is that we don't, we're splitting two separate municipalities. And there's so much that goes into that. And I'm concerned the kids and the true meaning of what the tree farm brings is gonna be lost in that. And also, once again, this doesn't feel so possibility. Totally understand their way to keep that without throwing it's recreational opportunities into the mix. And I think we can all and the village have a long history to work as a community. I don't want my kids. Steven, use this. Hi there. I was involved with this whole thing started 28 plus years ago as a member of the board of the trustees. There was questions on why are we dealing with this now? I think there's been limited access to the public the last couple of years. I've tried to go to the tree farm during normal park hours, which I consider, you know, the daytime if I want to go for a run in the morning and the gates been locked. And this is a public park, should not be locked. There needs to be someone there to do that. The trails have not been mowed and with kicks and everything else, it's not safe to be on trails that have tall grass. And it's in the rules, the original understandings of the trails of the mode. So those are some of the things on why are we here? I know everyone's talking about the soccer fields, but there's a hundred acres here and soccer fields are not hundred acres. But to look at the entire community and entire set of uses. I'm in support of the recreation department proposals and people say, you know, feels rush, why are we doing this? We need 10 years. Two year transition is to work out all the questions and work out all the kinks. You know, maybe it needs to be three or four but 10 years seems like forever. When the non-field uses are not being met and they're not at a standard that the community is used to and the public is being locked out or locked in as Mr. Teach mentioned earlier to the facility. And that's all I wanted to say in the interest of time. Thank you very much. How do you have your hand up, but it just went down? Okay. And take Annie Cooper. Thanks, Matt. Can you hear me? We can, yes. Sounds great. I think our community, talking tonight and Giles and Sven for being there. I have been a player at the tree farm and out there that for any tram management would be an approved business plan. I think it would be extremely irresponsible if there were hand and review before this happens. A verbal agreement of the decision to transfer is not enough to ensure the success moving forward. So again, they own the land and as Giles said, whatever, they have the right to manage it but it would be a disservice to everybody if there is not an approved business plan well in advance of any transition of management. Thank you. Thank you very much. This is like a business plan. I would like to see nuts and bolts as we talk about transparency that to me is part of transparency and making these decisions. So one of the things that we asked about was quantification of labor, which I didn't really hear addressed because certainly staffing is a huge cost to running anything. There was also a question about whether there was gonna be building on that because I believe that was discussed last time and it sounds like Brad is saying tonight that there will be no change and no buildings added. I also thought to Steve Eustace's point that in the agreement that it was the high school or whoever was using cross-country trails that were to maintain the trails so that if the trails would be maintained now would that be an added cost? And also with the parking about the parking was addressed because not that you can't park there that you can park outside of that and still use the trails but that was related to the dog waste. So I would love to hear at least one of those that with the labor quantification, if that was addressed. Staff, Allie or Brad? Oversight too. My understanding of the way that the system was constructed was that Allie and Harlan were there as oversight. So if there was numbers needed, I'm not sure why those wouldn't have been directed through them and given to whoever was looking for them. So maybe it's more about who was appointed to the board for our municipal oversight that might be a problem. Patrick, I see all of them. I think we can come back for our responses. Thank you, Brad. That's actually a good point. Let's grab the questions and then get through this first before we or before I start interjecting whenever I feel necessary, which we would be here all night. Patty Davis. Thank you. I agree with Carolyn and Lorraine that just spoke about business plan. I too am a runner, but I feel that moving here five years ago like Caroline, that I believe either municipalities totally organized with a labor plan or business plan on how to handle dog waste, community involvement in all parks, rules, ordinances. I think that both municipalities have to get their act together from the tree farm, what they've been doing so successfully. And like Lorraine said, with the school being responsible for the trail, for the trails on the tree farm, all of this needs to be worked out. Municipalities should take charge, both municipalities should take charge and get their act together and put garbage cans up for the dog waste because of the larger population in both municipalities that demand green space. Thank you. Thank you, Patty. Betsy Hofmeister. Betsy Hofmeister. Hi, I'm Betsy Hofmeister. I am a village resident. I coach for Essex United. Both disclosure, I work for the rec department and EJRP and I run the rec soccer. And I don't think it's the right time for rec to take over. Thank you, Betsy. I believe that is everyone online. Okay, if you are online, it would like to speak. I'm about to go to the room, raise your hand now or forever, hold your peace. Very good. Okay, in the room, if anyone would like to speak, please come up to the microphone, identify yourself and we will hear what you have to say. My name is Paul Austin. I've lived in the community since 1969. And a few observations, I don't know the details of everything that is said. But I think a key question was asked earlier by what is the intent to the farm, the tree farm, and to what degree have we accomplished that? And there have been enough conversation of people saying it's a world-class operation that those that aren't familiar with it, there's hundreds of cars and thousands of people that go there. It's a jewel. The casual suggestion that one can just simply take it over or the casual suggestion that, gee, we have a fiduciary responsibility, audits, checks and balances, it's kind of unfortunate to suggest that who's been managing it, there may be. But what we're not accusing you, but you know, we had representatives on that board whose responsibility was to bring back information, to the town and to the village if they felt anything was a few. So I do hope, and that seems to be the only reason that the village wants to take it over. There was one other thought, I'm losing track. Yes, now I may be incorrect, but I have heard on more than one occasion from different sources that there's an interest in trying to make more money off of Tree Farm by making it a year-round facility for teams. Don't know if that's true or not, but if so, the village hasn't even gotten to be a village or town yet, and we're now talking about more expenses. That's a million dollar, multi-million dollar effort to start putting buildings in the Tree Farm, the architecture, the construction, heating in the winter, cooling in the summer. Now, I'm a little concerned as to why the drive, it's a winner, why the drive to change it? And without a detailed plan, which has already been talked up, I think it's falling. And we can go with this. And in addition to that, the Tree Farm management needs enough time. They're not gonna stick around for a year and a year and a half, and maybe we'll tell them what we would like. They need to have an upfront understanding, are we serious or are we not? Or are we playing games with the Tree Farm for other reasons? Thank you. Thank you very much. Other members of public in the room, please come on up. Chris Lyon, and I'm gonna have trouble following that. I think that was a lot of wisdom that just came from that gentleman that's been here since 1969, right? And probably seen a lot of things. Like Mr. Willy, I've worn a lot of hats in the town. My roots go back to a lifer in the town. My wife is a lifer in the town. Three kids coming up through the town. Ten nieces and nephews through the town. And excited to say now have a great niece and great nephew in the village. That are gonna come up through all of which have used a Tree Farm at all different levels, from players, some kids even coaching. I've worn many hats as well as being a participant on the sidelines. I've coached for many years. My wife has put countless hours of volunteer time. And I had the pleasure of being the president on the board for three years. Thank you for what you guys do. And honestly, this meeting really should not be about Brad Luck wanting to take over that facility. It should be about celebrating what the Tree Farm has done for 20 years, 20 years. We've got 20 Super Bowl rings, 20. And now we have someone who's put forth a proposal with absolutely no detail whatsoever, zero. I read that memo for about 30 seconds. And the one thing it did tell me was, both the town, rec, the village rec, loved the way these guys are running this facility. They're killing it. Let's get these guys another 10 years of Super Bowl rings rather than taking it away with no plan whatsoever. You wanna talk about being irresponsible, putting a proposal in front of you folks? With nothing, I don't see a plan. I don't see a budget. I don't see a strategy. I see less than a one-page memo that dismantled a 20-year success story. It's embarrassing. It's embarrassing. So I think we ought to just step back, think about that and just celebrate the Tree Farm. They're killing it, what an awesome facility. I now want my great niece and great nephew to play there. The way it's being used today. Not for some vision that one guy has that he's not willing to share with anyone. 20 Super Bowl rings. I don't know if, I don't know how this works. I don't know if I can make a motion. No, I will. I would make a motion that you sign on the 10-year lease. Get 10-year, 10 more Super Bowl rings under your belt. They're killing it, you guys. We can nitpick little things, right, that don't work perfect. No one was gonna have that. But again, step back. Look at the success story. This is a shout-out. Not a conversation of changing who runs a facility. Sir, if you want to wrap up your thought. Yeah, I'm gonna take my wife's three minutes because you couldn't make it to the end of life. I don't know if you can set time when it's like that randomly. Yes, we can. Sir? Yeah. So just, let me wrap it up. I don't want to interrupt you. Please finish your thought. Yeah, you kind of took me off my track for it, but just step back and think about the proposal put forth in front of you guys. How it makes sense in the success of the fields and the history. Let's not forget a couple of folks on the phone said it. Okay, sir. 20 years has been a rep in the village. Thank you, sir. And 20 years has been a rep from the town. Sir. So the transparency. Sir, bad there. That's enough, right? So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Ken, great job. Appreciate it. Members of the public in the room who would like to say something. Anyone else? Irene Renner. Thank you. It's really hard to see this take place as a. Can I interrupt? This is Roger. I'm sorry. I'm wondering if Ms. Renner is appearing as a member of the public or as a member as a reporter for the retorder. I'm here as a member of the public as I always am when I step to the mic. Thank you. Ken's got the hat on tonight. If I were reporting, I'd have the hat on. As Steve used to said earlier, and I hope that you will not deduct that dialogue from my three minutes. Thank you. Steve used to said earlier that 10 years feels like forever. I wish it did. 10 years happened in a blink of an eye. I was chair of the select board when people gathered at Essex High School in the cafeteria to vote on purchasing the tree farm. It passed by 95%. People were thrilled to have the opportunity to do what the state encouraged us to do, which was share this. It's one of the few things we've successfully done together as a town and village and we've made it work. Probably because the town and village are at arm's length and everything that goes on there. We have this fabulous organization that's a nonprofit and I believe, running this at very low cost to all of us and no cost to taxpayers. It breaks my heart to look back at the old notes and the old MOU that we had, that the trustees and staff, the morning of the last select board meeting before the vote, change things. They cut out the voters from voting on whether there'd ever be a subdivision, for example. Same kind of stuff that deja vu. The select board is seeing now. Last minute changes, tricky little changes. Word changes back from the original and back and forth and back and forth every week. Something new being changed. It's really frustrating because it tells me nothing's really changed. What I wish hadn't changed was the principles that we agreed to in the memorandum of understanding between the town and the village back in 2010 that the joint purchase and management meets the mutually held goals of preserving open space for recreational use and natural resource protection in a way that is also of significant benefit to the economy. We start monkeying with this. The tree farm won't be the economic driver that it's always been. Secondly, the town and village are named as tenants and comm and in the deed of the facility to further ensure a full commitment to this cooperative relationship. I wish I saw cooperation between the village rec department and the town rec department, but I haven't seen a lot of that lately and yet we are being led to believe that somehow they can get over the huge riff that developed when Brad Luck wrote an email to Ali when she was on vacation in July, kicking her out of his building. That doesn't say to me that either rec department can work cooperatively in running anything much less our gem of a tree farm facility. Third, the continued efficient and orderly operation of the facility in a manner similar to the current operational framework is strongly desired and a shared goal. That means once again we have somebody like the tree farm management group running it, not one rec department or the other or two that are fighting with each other. And finally that the facility continues to be managed as a single public 100 acre parcel until such time as this MOU expires or is terminated and it has let expire that is on our elected officials. This should have been renegotiated three years ago and I'm really disappointed that we're now we're down to the last minute. And here we are being told there's a plan in the works and we just haven't seen it yet but it's there, none of which I believe. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Renner. Any other members of the public in the audience that would like to speak? Okay. I'll bring the discussion back up to the two boards then. So staff, the recommendation was for two years for approval. Are we asking on that vote tonight? I apologize because I have the memos from the two rec department directors but I do not have... There are proposed language for motions. It is up to the boards to decide whether you're ready tonight to take that vote or if you need more information. Yes, that's what I'm looking for. This printed packet, I don't have the motions but yeah. Okay. Oh, thank you. Go through the boards and see whether people are ready to make that decision tonight. Absolutely. Hi, Andrew. I'd like to start off with a piece you'd like. Please. Yeah, I'm ready to move forward with the presented recommendation. One piece of clarification just in looking at the MOU back in 2012. It refers to the facility being a 100 land consisting of 100 acres more or less and that's the non motorized trail use refers to the following uses of any existing or newly established trails with the exception of the existing vast snowmobile trail, walking, hiking, cross country skiing, snowshoeing, running or other use being appropriate by the town and village and in reference with any management agreement. So this in terms of who manages what that is in terms of the management agreements that the school is not referenced anywhere in managing these trails. So just want to put that other trustees are you in for your thoughts? George, I think I saw your hand. Yeah, thank you. Andrew. I want to first of all clarify something. Brad Luck was directed by the boards by the trustees and Ali was directed by the select board because we have reached a hiatus in the contract and we needed to make a decision and he was directed the recreation directors were directed to come up with the plan. It was not there. They're not driving this. Anyone is driving it. It's the boards and it's because we're faced with this decision and I just want to clarify that. This is not something that Brad Luck is trying to achieve. He is just doing what his duty as a member of the staff. And I have no doubt that if the recreation departments took it over, if something happened to the tree farm management group, I think that rec departments could take it over next week and do a fantastic job and everything would continue as it is. However, I would say, I would just like to throw it out there that I'm hearing a lot of public anxiety. I would also like to say I have a lot of, I think we owe a lot of a debt of gratitude to the tree farm management for everything they've done and achieved. I would also like to continue taking advantage of Giles and Sven and their volunteerism. And so I'd like to throw out the idea that if adding another year or two to extend this and not have it two years, but have it be three or four years, if that would buy us a partnership with the tree farm management group and make it feel less like a hostile takeover and with the understanding that we are working towards a complete transition, that's absolutely what's going to happen. But if a little bit more time makes everyone happier, it shows respect to them, but it also shows that we're coming into our responsibility for TAFE for managing this facility, then I would like the boards to consider adding a year or two to the contract instead of having it be two years, have it go out to 2024, 2025. But with the caveat that perhaps immediately the tree farm management group would start addressing some of our concerns that they've heard here tonight about public access and about a little bit more oversight over their budgets. I don't know exactly how that would work. I'm not even gonna get into that, those levels of details. But I'd like to throw those, that general plan out there for the boards to consider. Thank you. Dan, Andrew, Dan hasn't signed up. No, I just, I agree with George. I mean, Raj brought it up earlier. We talked about this with Harlan and Ali being on representatives on the board, expanding it at board to have more representation by the municipalities on the board. So, and only during this, like George said, extending it, I don't see a big issue with extending it maybe a couple of years, but as long as that is part of the extension that we have greater representation. I guess I'll go. I'm comfortable moving forward as proposed. I guess if we're gonna extend it a year, I'd have to, yeah, I think I'm comfortable going as proposed right now. I guess I could go another year if the board's really, we're out of it about it. But I have confidence that over the next two years, the strong transition can be achieved. Thank you, Raj. Amber, anything else? Well, I'm comfortable with moving ahead tonight as proposed. I have a significant amount of confidence in both of the parks teams. And I know that they can pull this off. They've already adjusted the original proposal back from the August meeting to give additional time. So I think they've already taken that into consideration. Thank you, Amber. So Patrick, what I'm hearing is that the overall for that the majority of our board is certainly happy to move forward tonight with making the decision. There's some potential for an extended period of time beyond what was just proposed, but there's some reservations that are there. Thank you, Andrew. Select board, final thoughts, Dawn. I'm gonna read mine because I wrote it as everyone was speaking. Given that we do not know how long separation will take and we have no guarantee that the current clubs using the tree farm will stay if we allow the recreation departments to take it over, I would propose that we extend this contract for four years, asking that they give quarterly financial reports that we appoint one representative of each from the new city and one from the town on top of what we already have. And they're turning over the money that they have currently earned is not part of the deal. Yeah, I don't think that that would have been necessarily part of it anyway, the separate non-profits status. I just think we have so much on our plate and this feels very rushed to me and I just... Thank you, Dawn. Sue. Yeah, I agree with what Dawn said. I think she said it very well. I think the last piece was the assets, right? That was, that have come up about, there was, but I think we heard from Brad kind of hoping that those would come over but I saw the gentleman here shaking their head. So I don't think we can count on that and I think that we would need to make sure that that's part of the business plan, right? So, but I could not support in with just two years. I think if we can talk about another two years beyond that for four years, I think that's what you had said as well and to have open collaborative discussions which I think is really all that anybody's asking to take place to have the opportunity to do this right. Thank you, Sue. Tracy. Back in August, I had asked for basically a cost out of revenues, expenses, what it would take for staff resources for contract, things of that sort. I have not received that. Therefore, I cannot say without a doubt that there will be no cost to taxpayers. I do trust and value our staff but I think that those details do need to be more fleshed out. As Giles said, you know, you don't believe that this was a if but a when this moment would come and where I'm landing on this is that because we do need more information, I think it makes sense in the interests of transparency and the interests of management that there is a transition and or management plan, business plan, call it what you will. There needs to be some sort of an agreement. So with that said, I'm in favor of drafting an agreement and subsequent business plan management agreement. It takes what it takes. I wouldn't put a set end date on it at this point with the terms as generally outlined in the memo. I think this is a path we need to go down but it's clear to me that there does need to be more information brought back to the select board before making a final decision. Thank you, Tracy. If you don't mind my thoughts or excuse me, your thoughts on length of time, two, three, four, we've heard all. I think without having those details, I'm not sure I would assume that this could take place in three years but given that we don't know what the legislature is going to do around separation. I mean, it takes what it takes. I would rather it take longer and be done right and be done seamlessly rather than give a specific date right now. Thank you. So an answer but not really an answer. Fair enough. I think obviously tonight we are being asked for that answer. So it sounds like the select board is more comfortable with four, the trustees forgive me for assuming sounds like more comfortable with two. Would we be okay as two boards settling on three years and then including transition plan and in the language of the motion itself to satisfy? Yes. I would be comfortable with three years but I also think that this needs to be that the management group needs to be included in that transition plan and the business plan because they are the board that has the knowledge of how this has been done. Thank you. Trustees, thoughts about three. So to your question about the years and that's similar to what we just heard from our staff about how originally there was a tenure proposal from the tree farm management group. Our initial proposal was no extension whatsoever. Going now to from a two to a three year, I think seems like a place in the middle. Personally, I can live with that. I would be okay with that. So your hand is up. Yeah, I guess I would be fine with that. I'd like to get the financial transactions as I think in this current two year plan those would come over at the beginning of year two if I'm reading it correctly. So I'd like to have the financial transactions that are done regarding any business that's handled there happen sooner than the end of the contract. Also, this property is gonna be continued to be managed and owned by both communities regardless of what happens with separation. So I'm not too concerned with the timeline of separation. This carries on. The assets are there. We just keep on, keep on chiming with this property. So I can be fine with three years. I'd like to see the timeline outlined by RAC for transferring the registration and finance to stick to what they've proposed. All right. Trustee, is there any other concerns? Yes. George? Yeah, I do wanna concur with what Tracy said. I would like to see the tree farm management group have some degree of involvement in the transition plan. I don't know exactly what that is. I'm not certain, I'm not gonna try to formulate it tonight but I agree, I think that would be a good idea. And I also would like to say going forward since this is going to be a jointly owned property going forward regardless of separation I think we need to set the precedent that we try to find common ground at least on the tree over at the tree farm. So I think it's a good thing for us to agree on an extension of the contract. Okay, can I just jump in with the detail you mentioned? Everybody wants to have the tree farm remain. Me too involved in the transfer. I think in one of these recommendations, recommendation one, one of the bullets here is that they will be. So I think that that was part of the proposal that was before us tonight that they remain active and involved in the transition. So I'm just saying that to folks at ease that that was the intention and is at least as presented. Okay, at this point, I will be willing to entertain a motion if anyone is. I just have a process. Sure. Great question. If staff and legal counsel do develop a new MOU, transition plan, business plan. At the end of the day, that's still gonna come back to both of these boards for final approval for tweaking, for public input, someone and so forth, correct? Yes, correct. When you say tweaking. Well, I mean, if the dates just don't work for some reason. If we have taken the business and doesn't support it. If the finances are wonky. Always thinking of the if, you know me, Evan. Yes, that's why I asked you about your definition of the term tweaking. I think what our job today is to take what we've just heard from all of this, last pieces from the board, speak with the prefront management group, put together that type of framework and then come back for approval. That's what I'm hearing. I have, we'd like to see a transition plan, business plan, the financial transactions, timelines outlined by REC, tree farm management group, part of the overall structure, like we've said and to remain an active and involved party in the group. I think I've also, I can go through all my other notes. Gentlemen, trying to get other entities involved in the tree farm board as well and fleshing out certain details. Certain things have been said that I don't know if they are accurate, but we'll get around. We'd also, and I know I spoke with Allie and Brad, we would love to have a school district representative as well into that because of many other reasons that are used in parcel. So I think what we'd like to do is take your input. If you're a reminder to go with a three year extension or four, whichever one you guys decide, we would then circle back with the management group, put it together into an extension document and bring it back to the board. That satisfy your question, Theresa? It does. And I think I'll take a stab at a motion. Can I just ask a question? Sorry. Yeah, please. So can we separate in the motion the extension of the current tree farm agreement from the Essex Parks and Rec and Essex Junction, Recs and Park taking over? Does that need to be in, do those both need to be in the motion or can we just do one or the other? Well, I think we want to keep the motion as closely to this as possible. I see two different motions. Brad had different motions on Allie. Yeah. Why is that? That's problem. That's probably not a relationship problem. That's probably reasonable. So the issue is two different boards, which I don't really think is an issue. The structure and the substance of both of these are effectively identical. It's just language for a bitch. So yes, Tracy, please take crack at it. I move that staff and legal counsel in consultation with the management, with the tree farm management group, draft an MOU, transition plan and business plan with the terms outlined in the tree farm memo. Is that specific enough? I think we need the timeframe. Yeah, I think we need the date, so. Right, I think we need the extension of the current. Three, do you want to go three years or four? I heard three and four. Three settled on three. With three year extension. I didn't settle on three, sorry about all of these. Excuse me. The consensus seemed to be three, you're not in for three, if I heard correctly. Tracy, a friendly amendment, because we probably need to vote on the same motion, correct? I know I'm jumping, but I want to, because we're going to need to vote on the same one. Let's collaborate, Ron. I'm wondering if I can, with trying to find the language above in the recommendations here, with the municipalities, see the thing I'm having a hard time with, it's hard to bear with me. It's the recommendation and the recommended notion. So we've changed the recommendations. How are they supposed to be reflected in the motion? So that they're, because we would need to adjust this memo and then vote on this memo. So, you follow me because we've made a change to the final transition not happening for an extra year, but I'm asking that the municipality become the fiscal agent in the same timeline as outlined here. So it seems that we need to either have a very long motion, give staff notes if that's sufficient that we've changed the recommendations in both memos. Follow me. Or do we break the motions up into multiple motions? That's where I was kind of going. So if I can, Brad, Allie, can we take today's discussion, recraft it, sit down with Tree Farm and come back at their next meeting in December? Suggested in terms of a motion moving forward. I guess I would need some clarity, but yes, I'm happy to do it. I just want to make sure that we're getting all. Okay. Well, let me ask a different question. Sue, are you ready? Are you looking, can you make a clarifying statement to what you say breaking up the motions would be? Well, I just, I mean, I was on board with what Tracy had already indicated, but then there was pressure to provide a specific date and then Raj wants to add something else to it. And, you know, it's quickly becoming a motion that I can't support. Just want to clarify, I'm not trying to pressure anyone. We've, we're making motions on, it looks like if I'm looking at Brad's memo correctly and maybe even Allie's, on approving something that's on a memo and we're changing the content of the memo, but not mentioning it specifically in the motion. So I'm asking how that works. We seem to be moving towards a three-year timeframe and I'm asking for a friendly amendment to what Tracy started that transferred fiduciary responsibility to municipalities. I'm only asking that because we have to, apparently we have to vote on the same motion. So I'm just trying to figure out how we handle this memo with the motions that are recommended for us and get everything done we seem to want to do. We're supposed to. Raj clarifying question, if I may. Please. As of what date would fiduciary responsibility transfer to the municipalities? 1123. 1123. Raj, could I, 1123, the current contract and lease agreement would not be up at that point. I'm not sure that we can move it back to something within the current contract. It expires in July of 22. Right. And you said 11, oh, 23. Yeah, I'm sorry. No, no, no. January 1st, 23, so a year, a little over a year now. I just want to make sure I have that right. If I'm taking notes. Which is a year earlier than the motion that was in the memo was. That's item three in the recommendation as it stands now. Item three in Alley's memo. 1123, municipality shall serve as the fiscal agent. Raj is asking to keep that part the same even if we increase the lease of the tree agreement. That's correct. Well, I guess will that be able to happen without first seeing and identifying a business plan? Exactly. Kind of a chicken in the egg. Would this be, would it be wise to not vote on anything and just have staff go back and, and recraft a motion for us to present at our next meeting? I'm starting to feel more comfortable with that, George. Yeah. I don't, I mean, I believe we've gotten the large chunk of the discussion and a general agreement, if not explicit. But if staff can come back to us with a clean motion, then they're at our next meeting. I would be more than happy to do that and vote on it then just to make sure that we're on the same page. I would rather it be clear than have all together. No. We've already had a couple of them. I'm making a point of order. You're not a member of the meeting. Good. The Tracy, Miss Don, we agree to this. I'm not a mega-boy to work for the best, he's not in our meeting too bad. And if you, if you have not, you've agreed to this, you cannot change, it's just, can someone mute Miss Connolly? I'm not sure if that's exactly how it's been. So we mute her, you know? Thank you. We mute her. So Patrick, if I can, if I can jump in real quick, Patrick? Yes, please, Andrew. Would I think it would be most beneficial For our staff and staff, if I'm wrong, please tell me I'm wrong. It's not the first time I've heard this. It would be beneficial for our boards to at least make a motion on to what it is we're looking for it. What we're looking for is a three year transition from the department to the municipalities. I believe they would like to have that documented as a form of motion from us. If there are other portions that we need to have them iron out for the final MOU and the final motion. I think that that's something that's they heard they can take the input and bring back to us, but there's that unfortunately, I think you have enough agreement on between our boards to see that far go forward that would help them in their. So, point of clarification, does that mean that we're agreeing to what's in the memo? Because. I mean, the specifics that are on the memo or what we're discussing that we have a need to make some modifications, right? So, in the motion, we would need to clarify. That there are specific changes that we would want to see would be my how I would interpret that and then the request to motion if people are comfortable with it, then we can put the motion up and below. And if not, then we move on. But we have spent a lot of time on this. So, if we are going to see a motion tonight, I would prefer to hear it. I do see that rest hand is up and I'm wondering if he would like to correct my statement or if there's other portions that they need that's that need at this point for us to make a motion on. No, I don't think Alice hands up to. It was, and then it wasn't. If the both are going to create a motion to extend the lease by 3 years. And get us moving on to then having a timeline documented with totally financials and all reported. From the tree farm board, then that 3 year extension motion could be made tonight with more presented next month. And that motion tonight is helpful to provide direction for us. I think they again, the intent tonight was to provide a higher level. Decision making process should this be municipally run and operated or should this be run by a private organization. And so, I think the only piece I would add is I would agree with you, Raj, through the 2022 year where the current lease ends July 31, 2022. But I would rise that effective 1, 1, 23, it is the most responsible decision of municipalities to take over the fiduciary responsibilities from that point forward. And then if there's a 2 year transition for 2023 and 2024, that's fine with the municipalities managing the branches. So, if I can restate that as my brain is needing to at this time of night, the motions that we have in front of us those in Brad's memo, the 2 of them and Ali's memo, the 1 motion. Those are the high level decision that get at the 3 year time period and the rest would then be ironed out in the MOU as there be that they would then come back to us. I'm still concerned because I keep hearing about this 1, 1, 23 fiduciary responsibility transition and I'm not really sure I understand why that's being pushed in earlier and I don't, if we're going to make a motion as is written in here, I'm not supporting those specifics. And I think what Andrew just said is that those specific would be ironed out in an MOU, which but I just want to make sure there's not a catch 22 here. No, no, I agree. I mean, I think we had a motion Raj offered a friendly amendment. That's where we are now. It is up to Tracy if she chooses to accept it or not the fiduciary responsibility could go with the 3 years. And we just include it and wrap it up in that motion or break it out. But as things stand, there was a Tracy was making a motion and we'll pick it up from there. Yeah. And Raj brings up an excellent point that the motion included references to the memo, which are different, which is how we came back here. Right. So it's just terms out. So I am going to withdraw my motion. Okay. Thank you, Tracy. And then I believe I am going to make another motion that the select board offer a lease agreement to the tree farm management group for four years and that Essex Parks and Recreation and Essex Junction Recreation and Parks assume management of the tree farm facility thereafter. And that with the understanding that the lease agreement would need to be developed with that transition plan and business plan. Can I can I ask, are you making that motion or is that a that's something we're we're that a concept we were working on? That seemed to be what folks were saying, so I'm just trying to alter the motion so that it meets all of the points that folks have raised, give staff direction. Are we going with a four year or three? I'm kind of losing this. Yes, I thought that's a great effort. Tracy, thank you. I guess I was understanding what we're doing three. Is it four years is three years? I don't care, but I'm fine with three years because at the end of the day, that agreement is going to come back to these boards. Okay. And if we decide on four years, we can do four years. If the business plan indicates that three years would be fine, then we can go with three years. I don't think that either one is going to be detrimental right now. Thank you, Tracy. So I apologize. You mentioned four years. You're okay with three. Your motion was for though. So that's what I'm going to. That's what I'm going to take. Do I hear a second on the select board? Four years stays. I'll second it. Okay. That's, we have a select board. All those in favor. I pose. None. Trust these, you have heard our motion. Apologies. I know there was a lot of back and forth. But we have a motion. We have that motion for four years. We can choose to go along with that. So even though we had originally said three. If that is the will, I entertain such a motion. I'll second. You're going to move that. Could you read your motion one more time? Listen, guys, it's the first time I'm running one of these. You're doing a fine job. You're doing a great job. But yeah. We can just, why don't you just say you would move Tracy. Motion, but replace select board with trustees. Yeah. Okay. That's fine. I'll second that. Okay. So George, you've made the motion. Dan, you've seconded. Is there any further discussion? The only thing that I want to point out is that it feels. Just, I realized three to four years may not seem like much to some. It's just one of those things where we're forgiving and feels like a little bit of an arm twist here. Without, without having that conversation. Seems you're fully. So if it doesn't feel right, ultimately I will go for it, but just not a fan of how that part broke out. So with that. Brother. Yeah, I just thought we had agreed on three. So I'm feeling a little bit like we go second and we either agree or we blow it up. So I guess I'll have to. Go on with it. Yeah. It's unfortunate. So trustee. All those in favor of that motion, please signify by saying. Okay. Thank you. Thank you everyone. And we will take one breath. Before moving on to our next agenda item. Are we backtracking? Or are we going forward? Motion. Let's go back. It's a separate agenda item. So trustee. All those in favor of that motion. Please signify by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. So we are going to circle back. We had tabled initially to move on to the tree farm agenda item. So we're going to go back to the discussion and potential action on tentative agreements about shared services between the town of Essex and the independent city of Essex Junctions. Specifically to just reset or recent ourselves, I think we are looking at specifically item number two, the tiers of services that are listed and some discussion around how we want to move forward with these. I think I'm open for discussion. I think initially Andrew and Raj made some, you talked about coming back here first. I just want to get kind of a bigger, more clarification into exactly what we're going to be talking about and what you want to have us address as a select board. So we'd love to have our two boards address. If we look back at that list of tentative agreements, those items that we have not yet talked about, if we could develop a bulleted framework, if you will, about what it is we could come to agreement on and what it is we are looking for. So if we were to think of Indianbrook Access or EJRP Program Access, what is the desire here? What is this wanted? What level of agreement can we come to? Is there money that's going to be asked to change hands? And then we leave it at that. Once we have those agreed upon bullets, that can then go to our staff attorneys. They can then draft that into something further beyond that. Just keeping that framework in mind that what we're talking about here are tentative agreements. And so we could spend hours and hours, hours and hours on the horse-mit thing. But by doing that, all of this could change anyway. That's why, again, these are tentative agreements until we get, until separation passes the legislature and then we can become a city council. So that's the ask. Thank you, Andrew. I express reservation about not discussing this without Andy here, but Andrew, I do think you've raised a good point, which is that it is an agenda item. It is on here. And the loss of one member of the body does not. Should not rather prevent us from moving on with the business of the municipalities. So I am absolutely for it. Andrew, did you want to start with anyone in specific and then we can go from there? I'd be happy if we just take it on in the... Well, why don't we go to Senior Center if we could then do Indian Brook, EJRP and work our way through that way. I think from the Senior Center and bus conversation, the first and foremost, it would be fantastic to know whether the select board is looking to do that in collaboration or whether the select board was looking to do that on your own. That could just be a quick one. So I wasn't here when those discussions took place, but I've heard Andy talk about that there was reference to what was proposed being each municipality paying 50% for the facility that's in the village in order for the Senior Center to continue there. But I feel like the reservation was that then the village would use that building for other purposes as well, right? Yes, Sue, thank you. I think that pretty well sums up the reservation of paying a certain amount into it to have a facility that the trustees owned obviously and then could potentially use for whatever afterwards. I believe and certainly select board correct me if I'm wrong, but I think we may have at least had some talk that the Senior Center is obviously incredibly important and that we are willing to make these sessions to make sure that it remains in one place. I don't believe that we necessarily wanna split it up. I think that the desire and the goal is to continue with excellent Senior Center programming, however that happens. Just, yeah. If I could, discussing about the facility itself, the police department, which we're working in that agreement now, the facility, the brand new facility that's there that exists is a town property owned by the town when we become a city, well, they have a meeting room there. I assume that meeting room can be, it's been utilized by our boards. Do we have access to that equally? I mean, not to compare the same, same, same, same, but I'm just saying Village residents have paid or we're still gonna be on the bond debt, be on the date, hopefully that this charter change occurs and still paying for that, but that's gonna be own possession of the town. So are we gonna have the same access? I hear what you're saying, Sue, with the facility that where the Senior Center is or by Lincoln Hall, but I guess it could be, you can make comparison, similar properties of the town. Can I, I just, if you don't mind, Dan, I just wanna jump in. I think that there's a, it's a misunderstanding because I think there's a, the concept is that we have this room and we sometimes use it as a Senior Center, but then it's used for lots of other things. That's, that's absolutely not the case. It's always a Senior Center. And occasionally when, you know, when there's no programs around a weekend or a Senior's not there or in an evening, there might be a group that meets in there or from, and that happens very, very rarely. And I think the concern was that if you were helping share the cost of operating this, you are helping your funding other organizations that are not Senior Center related, that are working in there. And the amount of time, and I think Evan can attest to this, the amount of time that that would happen is really, I can't even think of the last time that happened. I know it has happened, but it happens very, very rarely. And it's never like, we don't get money out of it. Some, you know, they'll just, we'll just let some group go in there and use it for a few hours. So it's not, I don't think it was kind of a little bit of a red herring. Yeah, I think that that was honestly the only, like remaining reservation that, at least as far as the specifics of the Senior Center, obviously we have the Senior Band to talk about, but at least as far as the space goes, I don't believe that there was any large objection. Okay. Don, you- I thought Evan brought out something about it, being a drop off, take care problem. Evan, I- So I wanna go back to high level. Do you wanna try to do the Senior Center together? The issues, you can work out. The rules of the Senior Center need to be discussed about how it functions, but do you wanna do it together? And do you wanna then do a Senior Band program together? Everything else can get worked out based upon, that's right, just get worked out. Yes, we have concerns, let me, we have concerns that it not become a Senior Daycare Center. We do not have the functionality to do that. As long as the groups agree, that how it operates, who operates it, we can have that discussion, but you wanna do it together. That's what I'm hearing. Tracy, you had your hand up? Yeah, it's an asset to both communities. It is a worthwhile service. No one is gonna argue with that. It's another one of those questions that I have about why would we want to reinvent the wheel? I don't think it makes sense to reinvent the wheel. And I think that we can find a workable solution. Okay, and Dan? Yeah, no, I agree with Tracy saying, and just as much as if the town were to pursue developing their own Senior Center for whatever, reasons of growth in the area, somewhere around the town center, they wanted to put something in their own. That's just as we would, if we were to create our own police department, we could have it in the MOU or the tenant agreement, how much notice in advance before you move on with that. I mean, I think that that verbiage in that language could be incorporated into an agreement. Okay. I agree. Apologies, because online, I wasn't able to see faces. Raj, I see every hand up. I think I've installed my thunder. I'm sorry, I've put my hand down just for trying to keep it to, do we want to do this? Yes. Maybe we can do a pass through on these lists and then come back and continue to get more layered with each one, perhaps, and just kind of keep going. So I'm excited that we want to continue with the Senior Center. All right, sorry. Sounds good. Senior Center, Indian Brook Access? Well, we didn't talk about the bus. Oh, the bus. Bus. Evan, how does the bus structure currently work? Who's paying for it? Who's seeking the driver? It's just, again, large overview. So the bus is operated by the town. We have a lease with... Green Mountain Transit. Was it Green Mountain Transit? Thanks, I was blanking. Green Mountain Transit, we have a lease. The town hires the bus drivers. We carry all the insurance, et cetera. And the question would be, does the village want to share in that expense with the town? I believe we would still be the leasee. We would still be the employer. We would still carry it. You guys would pick up a proportionate share of the cost. The senior van goes currently to the senior center. It goes to the supermarket. It goes to some local medical facilities, et cetera. Evan, quick clarification on the senior bus. Is it true that the senior bus serves those seniors who do not live within a certain distance of a Green Mountain Transit bus stop? I can't, I cannot answer that. I don't know those rules. Allie does, but I think she's gone. I do know that they're, I thought I knew this, their ridership counts as a discount against the other program that Green Mountain runs. George, you're shaking your head. Does that sound correct? So it's not like we are double, double paying, but we are providing a service in and above what the transit provides. And so the only reason why I say that is my understanding, and that's why I'm checking for clarification because I've been wrong before, as I've said already today, my understanding is that when SSTA and not pick somebody up, that's when the senior center bus operates for those individuals. And if that's the case, frankly, I really see this as being more of a townhouse at the village service because those of us in the village are very close to bus stops throughout. I know that not everybody is within a short distance to a bus stop, so that not would not be serviced by SSTA. But that's what I think my understanding is. Right, but the bus, the senior bus is still picking those people up. I'm not clear. So at the risk of contradicting you, no, the senior van picks people up at their property, drops them off at their destination, picks them up and returns them. Green Mountain Transit is a fixed route. SSTA is something different. You call up, very similar to ours, but they have a lot more restrictions of where they're going and what they're doing. You've got it right, Evan. I think Brett's info he wants to share on that. I was just gonna say that I'm pretty sure Brad might be able to answer that. Okay, great, because I'm not that involved in it. Go ahead, Brad. The Essex senior van, senior van, run everywhere in the village and the town. There is no other requirements other than age and filling out the end forms in order to be eligible. And then those rides are provided free based on your request and our ability to serve you. The SSTA senior services are based on two things. They're based on whether or not you're within a certain radius of bus stops and whether or not you need certain conditions or criteria to qualify for those services. The charge to the individual for those services is $3 per way. And then there is a charge that's charged back to the municipality that the municipality is responsible for that the customer doesn't see. So those are kinds of differences. SSTA provides that in a much bigger way than just beyond Essex. They have a fleet of vehicles, a fleet of drivers or whatever. We have two vehicles. We struggle to provide, to find drivers. And that's part of our limited service sometimes. So it's tricky, you know, we're one of the only municipalities that offers the Essex senior van service, which is unique and great. And but also, you know, SSTA provides for other municipalities. And that's how those seniors access those kinds of services. Most senior buildings are providing those services also in their buildings. So this is a tricky topic. It's not real black and white. But I hope that gave you some clarity on any of your questions. It helped me. Thank you, Brad. I was clearly confusing the two. So back to the original intent of should be, would I be interested as a resty tune that continually sharing this? Certainly I would. I would not want to reinvent the wheel. Tracy, Tracy had her hand up if you want. And I apologize before I thought we were talking about senior and busing in conjunction with one another. And at work, I like to use this. There are three ways you can look at things. From the forest level, the tree level and the leaf level. I think that talking about eligibility and fees and routes is very much a leaf level. And I think due to the time that we have and the expectations at the outset, we should really be at the forest level. Could I, could I, I don't know who could get to my hand in? Please. Okay. And keeping it at the forest level, I would also go, I wouldn't, I think you're right. And we just heard a dissertation about the bus and we want to continue the bus. I think there's agreement, generally agreeing about that. But I also want to point out, so we don't miss an important piece here. And then we have to come back to the staffing of the senior center right now is provided by Essex ERP. And is that going to continue or are we going, are we, how, how would Essex Junction share that cost? So that's an, I'm not saying I have a solution. I'm just saying, that's a question. You're going to have, we're going to have to have addressed. Yeah, there's a lot of questions we're going to need to. Okay. But I want to make that just for the record, I just want to make sure we insert that. That's fair. Okay. Thank you, George. Okay, so it sounds like there is a general agreement, senior center and bus. We would both boards like to continue doing those services in unison with one another. Since I, Andrew got the first crack, I'm going to select Indian Brook Access to talk about. I know as a villager that it is important to me, I certainly would not like to lose it should the municipality separate. There obviously are, you know, there are difficulties that we have with, you know, there's simply the size of the park, the amount of staff who can get out there and use. So there was some change to the usage fees earlier this year. But I don't think that any of us are opposed to some sort of agreement that would continue to allow the whole of Essex to use that. As long as we knew that, you know, not trying to make a profit, we just want to make sure that we have the ability to tend the trails properly, to, you know, deal with dog waste, to deal with the, you know, potential of having, you know, the cyanobacteria that pops up mitigation efforts. You know, we just want to make sure that if there's going to be 20,000 people using it, then rather than 10,000 that we just aren't left with a huge cleanup at some point. But I would say that I'm one person, but select board, I personally would love to see us come to some sort of agreement. Yeah, so I would like to see us come to some sort of agreement as well, but I also want to go back to a comment I made at I believe our first session was around packaging and whether Indianbrook, EJRP, Senior Center and bus, if any of these secondary items can be packaged in a way, as long as they come close to cost neutral crossways. So it's, you know, roughly the same amount of money that each municipality would be expending. Does it make sense to just say, hey, this is our agreement on X, Y and Z. Maybe there's a flat fee associated with it, just to, you know, ameliorate some concerns and then have those agreements be revisited every so often, every three years, every four years, just to make sure that it still makes sense that that arrangement is still good with both parties. Can I jump in real quick? Yes, please. Gracie, I like that approach. I like the staggered review. I think, I don't know that we want to get into trying to craft that package, you know, it's based on your metaphor from earlier or if there are a couple of staffers that we can, you know, we can direct staff to kind of say, ask staff, excuse me, to, you know, look at that framework and say, you know, this is where we think you can land on those four things. We can give them some direction tonight, you know, if, for instance, and this is only a for instance example, if you wanted to move senior center management and staffing to the village as an example. So we give them that frame, that element, say, okay, based on that, how would you then look at the other things you mentioned and then have them come back to us either the next meeting or maybe they can send that proposal to board leadership to review and trying to figure out how we can get this done in one more meeting, right? It's difficult. That's just building up what you were saying. I'm just not sure, you know, do we try to get into that or do we ask staff if they have the time to look at the numbers and see where they can make it as neutral as possible? Well, and just to make it even more simpler, I would look at current state and say, you know, what are the revenues? What are the expenditures? What's the maintenance? What is the management? And is there some, you know, package that can be put together that essentially comes out roughly even? You know, I mean, I wouldn't give any specifics as far as look at this, this and this, but just, you know, look at these secondary agreements and see where the rough costs fall. I think that can be done. I mean, in a, when you're talking at the forest level, yeah, but when you start getting into programs, EGRP, there's such a nebulous thing, but I mean, there's so much to it. And the fees associated in staff and everything else, when you say access to EGRP, I wonder, as opposed to the Indian brook, is it's a piece of property. It's not a bunch of programs. It's not a bunch of, it's property that people with trails and people access, and it's fixed. It's not as dynamic of a partner, but an asset, I guess, I guess would be. But there's still maintenance involved. Yeah, but you can see that. You know, you've got X amount of area, you've got X amount of trails, you got this, this, and this, and it's utilized primarily during the summer months. I mean, you know, brave souls go up in the winter months, but EGRP is accessed and utilized year round, and it's, you know, what I'm saying. Can I ask you? Yeah, can I ask you, are you saying we should try to attach a number figure to, for example, what would it cost if town residents had the same access to, or some better access to village, to S-exjunction programs, then people from outside the community, if we put a number on that versus what's the number we would put for S-exjunction people if it continued to have the same access that town people have to Indian Brook, can we monetize that somehow and do they come out roughly the same? Is that what you're saying, something like that? Rough estimates. Okay, yeah. And then also the same logic applying that to the senior center and senior services. Is that, in senior bus, is that correct? Right. Okay, I mean, does that sound remotely doable, Steph? Is that a question? Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, over a period of time, and if not, look, if you don't, you've heard me say this, don't go down to the penny. Yeah. Please don't do that stuff. If it's generalized, yeah, I can't tell you what data our people are collecting. But I, in general, we probably know where our seniors who are members of the senior center are and where we're picking them up from. So yeah, we have that data. Do I know anything about how, well, I guess we do have Indian Brook passes and the data. Yeah, we can do certain things like that. You could, I mean, you could also look at, I don't know. Capital and so. I think one of the key points that Tracy made, that I really liked was, you know, we get something working and we review them after a fairly brief amount of time and we don't review them all at once. You know, one, perhaps, let's say, the senior center agreement, that's three years from now. EGRP is for, you know, that kind of thing so that we're not overwhelming ourselves. And then we allow this to move forward and we give the communities enough time to land on their feet once this separation has occurred and revisit, you know, so, good, sorry. So I do like where this is going, Tracy, I like that concept. The only thing I wanna say is I've had some of these conversations privately and what I would say is the concern that was raised earlier about how to mitigate 42% of the tax-based reduction, when that keeps coming up, that's what tends to throw a monkey wrench into this. That's when the whole indirect thing comes into play and where one side is being asked to pay $100,000 for this, $58,000 for that, so on and so forth. And that's where things start to go awry. It's kind of what happened with the, how long did we talk about the police agreement and how much indirect to have on that or the financial services agreement? So yes, in theory, that sounds great. I mean, if we could stay out of these concepts of how we get as much money as possible, frankly, from each entity, I think that would allow us to get through this process a lot faster and honestly in a more collaborative way. Sue. Yeah, I think I'm almost feeling like, you know, it's almost like a barter opportunity, right? Like you want this, we want this and are they roughly the same and, you know, or are they not roughly the same and therefore there's something else that needs to go with that arrangement or, you know. So I think that, and I was almost thinking like, I was thinking like agile story points, like that this thing is worth, you know, five and this thing is worth 10 and how do you, you know, reconcile that? I agree with you, Sue. I don't, I think we're talking about barter points. I don't, and to your point, Andrew, I don't think we're talking about big dollars here. I think we're talking about small dollars here and the general scheme of things and no, this won't compensate. Nothing we do here on these remaining items is gonna unfortunately mitigate the impact of separation. I think that's a different issue for the select board is gonna have to deal with and the answer isn't gonna be found in here. But I think it's worthwhile to explore to see if the numbers roughly line up for some of these things. And if they do, can we come up with some kind of a package agreement? Is, if I could ask the question, if we identify the items that we have remaining here that wanna get put into a package agreement, could staff get that set for our next meeting, three weeks? Or is that too much? Like, I know it's a lot. I know I'm just, I'm trying to be understanding that the trustees are gonna be going down the Montpelier. You know, I- It's really more like week and a half between the holidays and the time the packets do. We will- I can interrupt that timeframe. We don't need it to be in that timeframe. So I'm sorry to interrupt you all, but for these things that we're currently talking about, Indian Brook, EJRP, Senior Center, Tree Farm, Shared Force Committees, these things we don't need for January. So if those wait until later, we stay at this high level, fantastic. The things that we need for January are the leave services, re-appraisal of the assessor. I believe the share of financial services. Taxes. The IT and the link with tax. I think those are the ones that we need to finalize for January. Okay. So if those other ones, those take a couple months, great, cool. Yeah, and I was just gonna sort of offer this, again, high level that there may be some value in taking some of these just based on timeline, such as Indian Brook, EJRP program access, Senior Center, plus, and essentially just saying, these programs will continue to exist and serve the populations they currently do until such a time as a subsequent agreement within a certain number of years, stagger the timeframes, and then handle it then. It's we don't have to eat the elephant all at once. You would make. It sounds like there's some consensus on that. I think we, so I'll jump, I do think we need to see like, are we talking about similar sized apples or are we talking about, you know, completely different, but sort of that, I think that I agree with, you know, what's been said. We, I think, I think from a staff perspective, we could sit down and parse some of this out and kind of put together some ideas, what, what we could probably agree on and what needs more discussion after the holiday. Including Hanukkah and Christmas. Hanukkah's next week, so. All right, I want to keep us on track. We still got local options to get through. Based on the Hebrew calendar, so it's all over the place. Did you make up, did you just make a point too? I couldn't quite understand that. No, I'm sorry, we were, we're having a side conversation. I apologize. Okay, so it sounds to me like we're in general agreement that we want to treat Indian Brook access, senior center and bus, you know, we want to look at those together and we're going to do, we're going to allow staff the time to do it. Would it be a leap too far to say we're going to try to do that after the new year or based on what Evan said, and we're going to take these out as a, as a, as a have to and replace the language with what Tracy, something like what Tracy suggested, which was we expect these services to continue to serve the community and details for the, you know, will be worked something like that. Is that what you were trying to get at? I mean, I wouldn't edit the MOU at all because we can come to an agreement that basically says just what we said and still say that we met the MOU because we came to an agreement. Oh, I get you. Okay, so, great, thank you. So what's left here can be generally agreed that the way we treat our shared boards, commissions and committees can stay. We would jointly approve numbers of the housing commission, for instance. Yeah, I agree with that. So now these tree farm building use in Mason's, what do people feel about that? What do people feel about that? I'm not even, I'm not clear what the issue is. I think we, we, I think we acknowledge that we have shared control and responsibility of the tree farm and if there's something happens to that fabulous historic building on that happens to be in the towns. And if it just accidentally collapsed, we would all have to pay for the dumpster or something. I don't know what I think would have to kick in. I don't know exactly. I'm not trying to make a light of it, but I don't, I'm not sure that it was a, I'm not sure there's a big philosophical issue here. Yeah, I'm not even honestly necessarily sure how much this has to do with separation. Because separation or no separation, it's still going to be there. We as joint boards are still going to have to deal with it. The buildings that tree farmer under the domain of the tree farm agreement, they're not under the domain of what we're doing here. So I'm not sure. I'm not so sure about that. Okay. I mean, the MOU and all the agreements identify them as 10 assets. So they actually, we do need to probably address them because the, while we, while I hear what Nevin and you were explaining to us a couple of meetings ago, intent or not they're identified in the town, in the documents as town assets. For some reason the tree farm management group hasn't been responsible for, whoever's been using the land hasn't treated it like we would treat an enterprise fund and taken care of the facility to that extent, probably because they weren't using them. But I'm not, you know, so I don't know where that leaves us. That is a tough one. And this is one of those also where again, we don't need anything in the short term. I don't believe this is a legislative issue about who was responsible for this building. Honestly, what I would prefer if we don't mind that shared financial services agreement. In that agreement, what we had talked about or what we had tentatively agreed to, was that everything hinged on Sarah and Sarah has resigned or it is resigning. And so we're gonna need to go back to that agreement as we're no longer looking to share that leadership, but rather our two entities are looking to have our own finance department. And so I'm wondering if at a high level, can we agree to an MOU where the two entities finance staff will work side by side to separate the financials. As there will need to be a period of time where village and or potentially city staff will be in the town offices and in the town buildings to do this work until to Lincoln can be retrofitted to accommodate those staff. Yes, we can make that, staff can make that work. Okay. So like for thoughts. I'm trying to follow the bouncing ball. We can. Yeah. You're going off what we were going to discuss here. I can't hear too. I'm not sure what it is, but when Sue talks, I'm sorry, I just can't hear what you're saying. I think I'm the furthest from the mic. So this isn't working anymore, right? Oh, it is working now. Are you back on Scott? I thought they weren't working. I'm sorry. Can you hear me now? No. That's weird. We're still picking you up on the webcam mic. That's what I thought. Right. So this isn't doing anything. Sorry. I'm on the furthest from the mic. That's why you can't hear me. I don't know what was said, other than you're the furthest from the mic. I'm not bouncing ball. I think you've been talking before. It's fine. I'm boring just. Yes, Dawn. This wasn't part of the ones we were going to discuss, the financial thing. I think that needs to be put on another agenda so that we can move on because we still have lots of other stuff to do today. And it is 10, 20, 30. Thank you, Dawn. Andrew, did you catch that? Dawn has expressed, and I honestly, I kind of agree. We probably shouldn't jump back into that. Financial services is a big one. And a lot of it has changed. I don't really know that we can hash that out tonight. Do we agree that we want to make sure that there's responsible fiscal oversight and budget maintenance? Yes, absolutely for both municipalities. We want that. I'm not sure how detailed you were thinking of getting, but I think we would rather avoid trying to reshape the agreement. I thought my only question that I think Tracy used the phrase forest level. So at that forest level, my question is would the select board agree to having village finance staff working side by side town finance staff in town buildings using the town system to help with the separation process. That's forest level. And I think that's in keeping with what we were discussing to happen in the financial services agreement before. We heard about Sarah, so no issue from my end. Did you hear that, Andrew? I did, yes. Tracy, I can hear Dawn, I can mostly hear Sue. I'm really sorry, but I just don't hear what the support was saying. It's fine, I don't know what else I can do. Okay, so sounds like we're moving on. So before we do, I just want to make sure we're all and staff are all aware of what we're agreeing on for item two here. And we're basically saying that we agree on the big picture and we're going to work on the details as far as this MOU is concerned. And my understanding is Indian Brook, EGRP access, senior center and bus, boards and commissions, shared boards, commissions and committees, excuse me. And we can talk about hopefully at the next meeting, right of first refusal at 81 Main, stormwater agreement to try to get those finalized much like we did with the others tonight. Does that sound like where we're at? Yes. You left out tree farms, so I don't know. No, he incorporated that. Well, I didn't actually put that in yet because I didn't know where we were so that was going to be the next question. And we don't have to be anywhere right now. We can save that for next time. I'm just checking in. Yep, sounds good, Raj. Thank you so much, that's really great. That's really, really just great. We've made a lot of progress tonight, thank you all. You've earned your cookies. Yeah, I haven't seen them yet. I know. All right. Let's move on at long last to our next agenda item. What's the last? Staff, I'm not sure who is presenting for local option. Local option tax, something that the boards have discussed and taken a look at. Next opportunity to put it on a ballot because it has to get approved by the voters would be March of this coming March, March, 2022. The state has available some projections and estimates of what the local option tax would generate for the community. If the community were to adopt all the local option taxes available to it, it'd be about 1.5, 1.6 million dollars. That includes the sales tax, which is the bulk of it at 1.2 million. There's also the males and rooms tax, which includes alcohol sale. That's another just under $300,000 combined between the two. Cannabis, I know that's been a topic of discussion as well that would fall into the sales tax. So that'd be the only way to connect financially from cannabis is to have it under the sales tax for local option tax. Staff's getting ready to put out a survey in the next week or so. If not before Thanksgiving, it'll be right after the holiday to try to gauge some input from the community or residents or business owners about how they feel about summer, all of the taxes, concerns they might have, questions they might have. Try to get the boards, the information that you will need to decide whether or not to put it on the ballot in this coming March. Originally, we were thinking that there was no way to differentiate geographically between the village and the rest of the town. So if that remains the case, perhaps a per capita split between the two municipalities and it's talking to the state and this needs more information and research, but it sounds like they can probably differentiate geographically if that's something that the boards want to continue pursuing. Other considerations, most of the other big towns around us and cities around us have local option tax in all the categories that are available to them. Part of the survey that'll go out to the community is how residents would like to use any revenue that comes in, whether that's to go all towards capital costs to reduce property tax revenue, which could go hand in hand by eliminating transfers or reducing transfers from the operating fund to capital, could also be used for special projects to help economic development, could go into the human services allocations that go out to the different nonprofits that serve the community. So all types of options there. At this point, kind of just an overview and giving you a heads up, but certainly happy to take any feedback or thoughts now. Otherwise, hope to have some more information for all of you in the near future. See you, Hans. Done. We have to wait for you. I thought it was overwhelmingly defeated before. What makes staff think it's gonna receive a different reception? Well, you know what, I'll tell you, I'll tell you my perspective. I watched that meeting that it was done on the floor of the community. It was about 170 people there. There are 21,000 residents. They were not given. I'm sorry, I thought it was on the ballot. No, ma'am. It was a floor vote. It was a floor vote. Two people were concerned with how it would affect IBM slash IBM at the time. Am I concerned with global? Yes, they are our largest employer. They're a good employer, et cetera. We'd be talking about the community and what the community would wanna do with the resource. I would make an argument that the village of Essex Junction and the town of Essex are net exporters of sales tax to our neighbors, of which Williston generates over $3 million in a local options tax. I would venture to say a good chunk of that is from us and we're sending it over there and not getting any of it back for our roads, our parks, our dams, our needs. So I would think with a better discussion with the citizens with a survey of how they would want to see these funds used, we can do a better job of explaining why the local options tax is something that they should support. Crazy. I guess we've long been told that this can't be split on anything other than zip code and given separation and the potential for splitting along geographic lines. Has any thought been given around splitting it simply based on the business's location that brought in that additional revenue? And I'm not speaking to local option tax up down sideways, just asking the question about whether this has been on the table, so to speak. My conversation with the tax department was that they can plug in the business locations. The other piece of it, this is point of sale. So it's not just business at this point. It's every time any one of us orders something online, it comes to our house, it's gonna get charged a local option tax. I don't know if that answers your question. One of the things I think they're going to do is ask the municipalities for more data to help them specifically delineate where things are. So hopefully there aren't two different, we don't have the same addresses, so maybe we can provide them with address strings that identify to the town and address strings that identified to the village so that they could put it in their data so that when something is sold at 81 Main, even though 81 Main is in the village, if something was bought in this building, it would be taxed and the money would go to the village because this address is designated inside the village. They need to know that that address itself, where the tax is supposed to go. And this was part of a 15 minute conversation that we were fitting in between lunch breaks. It's wanna see what the boards felt like, the direct one, and I can get into more details about how it can be done, how to do it, how it would be set up. I'll just see you out of hand, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Just a follow up about the cannabis. So you had referenced that that would need to go under the local option sales tax and not be able to be pulled out into its own, like alcoholists, did we get confirmation on that? Cause, okay. Yeah, that's the tax department said that that's how cannabis will be local option taxed. Just in the generic sales tax. Thank you. George and I see Andrew and Raj also have their hands up. Yeah, I'll lead off by saying, back a while ago when I was looking at village and town finances, I looked at other Chittenden County finances to do a comparative analysis. You look at municipal spending per capita and you look at what taxes are raised and everywhere there is a big gap. It's pretty much always, with a few exceptions, it's almost completely accounted for by the, that community has a sale, has a local option tax. The Chittenden County average tax rate is around 6.6, 8 or 7.7. Williston's property tax rate is 0.2. And that's because they have a gold mine because of the Taft Corners. It's, as Evan said, they get so much free cash. In Chittenden County, because everybody else has it, but we don't, we are nuts if we don't do it and I'll go on record as saying that. We are sending our cap, we're helping, as Evan said, we're helping other communities fund their, hey, their streets and fix their bridges, Grottis. And we should be trying to get some of that money back. Thanks, George. Andrew. Grottis is the first. Raj. Okay. I guess with the survey, yes, please move forward on learning everything you can. My only concern to surveys when there's a, a very clear and market level of lack of knowledge in a community about how a local option tax works and what it covers and how it's implemented is that surveying people without that prior knowledge will, I can predict what you're going to find out. So it's going to be a little use potentially. Also, the other component to that is, you know, when Andrew gave his capital spending, capital needs talk at town meeting, I think my first year, three years ago, almost two town meetings ago, it was overwhelmingly welcomed by the audience because they saw very clearly what they were up against in terms of future costs. So I worry, and this isn't a criticism of the idea, I just worried that without, without that kind of information as to why it's important, just really hard to do in a survey. I think we're going to get predictable results from the survey. So take that as a, take that for what you will. I am very appreciative that staff is finding a time to focus on this. I think that's awesome. I'm just wondering how much, how much it's going to do if we can't spend a lot of time with the education first. That was a big component. And I haven't watched that meeting. I was in that meeting. I remember very well the select board sitting quiet with their sitting on their hands and not answering questions they didn't answer. And when they did, they were wrong about what the local option tax covered on one or two points. So it's no surprise it went down. So I'm just saying it's going to take a lot of education and that's going to take time between now and March and April. Andrew. I echo the overwhelming majority of what Roch just said. Remember that presentation? I think it was that village meeting and around 75 to 80 or so percent of those in that meeting have said that they were in favor of a local options tax compared to bonding and compared to raising of property taxes as those are the options we have. When it came to our infrastructure needs, I've been advocating for this for years. I'm thrilled to see this momentum. Staff, thank you so much for seeing this for bringing this to our attention. I look forward to the next steps. And honestly, I'm ready to put this out for both today. So sooner or the better. Evan. I would also suggest that over the eight or nine, 10 years since this was brought up, all the other surrounding communities around us have instituted the local option stacks. Winooski, Burlington, South Burlington, Colchester and Williston. I mean, maybe the only one who doesn't have it is Richmond and us. So I think that education is necessary. I think one of the things that I and I will talk with staff about this is we put together a list of our current capital plans and the current funding gap that we have to the completion of those plans. And that's the, and part of the education. And then I just think that when and if it gets there, we have to explain, you know? I mean, I get it. If one particular business gets hurt by this, we don't want anybody to get hurt, but what's the greater good of the community for what's needed? I can tell you, anybody ask Williston, that's how they're funding their capital. So I don't want to beat this to death. It's late. We think we have, yeah, you're in. Tracy, and then we'll move on. Sorry. Raj, yes. I think you all know me well enough that I won't shy away from hearing from how the public feels about things. Education is important, but I also feel that we shouldn't only be thinking about businesses, 50 cents on a $50 bill may not seem like a big deal to you and me, but if you're in a lower income household, if you're living on a fixed income, if you're suffering job losses due to COVID or other reasons, it can add up if you're talking about sales tax on every single thing you buy. So I just want to make sure that that isn't lost and that we take that into consideration as well. It's been absolutely a sales tax and they are by their nature what they are. So I wholeheartedly agree with you. I just want to make sure that people in the past when those conversations come up, they want to know the things that impact them. They understand that when they go to Home Depot, they're paying it, right? And they go to those here, they have the dishwasher delivered here, so they'll pay it. What they also want to know is, is it on their cable bill? Is it on their cell phone bill? Is it on their gas bill? Is it on their electric bill? And things like that, the basics. What groceries, what if the grocery store is and isn't covered? Or my medications, all that stuff. They want to know the nuts and bolts of, and you're absolutely right, it is what it is. And I think we just have to be ready to answer that because you can ask six people that think they know a local option to get six answers. The staff sounds like you have a direction. You need to go and the specificity with which the boards are looking. Yes. Okay, awesome. I will open it up to the public. They do see we have hands here. Let's do the room this time first. Sarah, please come up. I stayed here this long because of the option tax. I have a different view as to what's happening. A lot of business is coming into the community because we don't have that 1%. Concept that we're losing a lot of money outside, I think needs to be looked at a little more carefully. Now I may be wrong, this is my feeling. We have to be concerned for business. Now, we have a planned IBM that at one time had 8,500 people. And the general feeling was they can pay anything. But their competition is South Korea, Taiwan, China, companies that got support from their country. IBM didn't. And other companies don't. So you've got to be careful about, well, we're going to pick up another $600,000 from global foundries. Gee, come on guys. They're the one that give us employment. They're the ones that pay a lot of taxes. We can't be glib about that. So I don't even think it ought to go on the ballot because I think the average person will misunderstand that they say, gee, 1% more, that's not much. It's 16.5% more in sales and use tax. Everybody pays it. And companies get hit pretty hard. Now, it's interesting, the previous speaker mentioned about appliances. Believe it or not, God be my witness, I shifted from tax corners and bought appliances that were over $1,000 from Lowe's because Lowe's was in the community because Essex is business-friendly. And it so happened that he asked me, he mentioned, the gentleman mentioned before me, another parent did the same thing. They were in Shelburne. They were going to buy it either in Shelburne or tax corners. They went to Essex. So I think that we have, though it may seem minor to others, a sales pitch where users were business-friendly. We're not trying to eke every last nickel and dime out of you. So I would think carefully about putting this on the ballot where a lot of people will only think about, gee, I heard my taxes will go down $19.50 if I have the sales tax. They don't understand the problem. And no, they'll be paying the tax too. That's my spiel. Thank you, sir. Your name, sir? Paul Austin. Thank you for the record. Irene. Thank you, Irene Renner. I'm still here as a member of the public and not a reporter tonight. Three things caught my attention. One is a survey. There's an extensive survey done about merger in the summer of 2019, and the results were almost completely ignored by the boards when they put together the merger plans. So I'm very concerned that we're going to waste people's time once again, people who are discouraged, people who are fed up, people who come to meetings and stay all night, waiting to make comments, and then see their tree from handed over to the rec departments. It's extremely frustrating to weigh in as the public. Remember that August meeting where so many people came and spoke, and it's as if those answers and those please were never heard. Instead, we had people repeating stuff tonight about a couple of emails that were sent, even though there have been thousands of people praising the tree farm for the last 25 years. Ms. Renner, if this is in regard to the tree farm or is in regard to the local option. It's about the general picture of asking for input from the public and ostensibly listening, but not listening when it comes to it. You can keep it related just to the local options. Thanks, okay. So I'm very skeptical of a survey being put out to people because time and again, the survey results get ignored. Second of all, the town voted at town meeting in 2009 against the local option tax. The village voted in 2010. I didn't hear anyone reference that. And I believe that was on a ballot. So both municipalities have rejected the local option tax. Please go back and look at the reasons. I've gone over this with Evan in the past when I was on the select board. All the reasons it didn't pass. Please revisit the history so we don't repeat it because we keep wasting time as boards repeating things instead of moving forward. Thirdly, I hear about an information campaign. We just experienced that with merger. All kinds of misinformation coming from the highest levels of staff and elected officials. And you know who I'm talking to. This was again, a misinformation campaign coming from this building and village hall. I don't wanna see it happen again with local option tax. Please get people from both sides of this issue in the room, put together a website. No, I'm not. And show both sides of it. And give a perspective that's objective. Thank you. The person to end their conversation and we move on to the next topic. I've moved on. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Next we have, I believe that we're all set with local options. Yes. Yes. Are there anybody online? You know? Not online. I didn't see any hands. I didn't see any hands. I can't tell. Yes. Can I just quickly respond for the record? I know you all are aware. Staff is not putting out misinformation. We are putting out accurate information as best we can into the best of our ability. Thank you. Good. Thank you very much, Greg. Thank you. Next, we do have a motion for executive session in regard to employee. So yes, does someone want to give the motion from the select board? Tracy. I moved at the select board. Do you have consent? Oh. Oh. Yep. Sorry. My bad. That's not us. Consent agenda. Yes. I moved it. We will approve the consent agenda. Okay. I hear a motion and a second. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. The motion for the consent agenda. So moved. Thank you, Jeremy. Thank you for the discussion. Hearing none, all in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Anybody opposed? Great. Reading file. Dawn. I would like to thank the town, I believe it was the town public works. They have spent two days cleaning leaves out of the old cemetery in the town. The historical, the old one. The young man, and I think it was the same man both days, has just worked and worked and worked to clean that all out with leaves and debris from that last storm. And I would just like to thank them because it looks wonderful in there. Good job. Thank you, Dawn. Okay. Now, executive session. Quick question. Yes. Does the select board want to make a motion to go past 11 o'clock while you're thinking about it? That it's rhetorical. I think you better do something past 11 o'clock. Tracy. In anticipation of needing more time, I move that the select board meet Pat. I move that the select board extend their meeting time until 11 30 this evening. I can't. I hear a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Okay. Now, executive session motion. I move that the select board enter into executive session to discuss the employment of public employees in accordance with one VSA, section 313, A3, to include the trustees, village attorney, town attorney. Don't you say the two of us in my agree and we can. Unified manager, HR director, deputy manager and assistant manager. Second. Thank you, Tracy. Thank you, Sue. Select board. All in favor? Aye. Aye. I'll make the motion, say motion on behalf of the trustees. Second. The amendment of changing the select board of trustees. Yes. With the change of the select board of the trustees. I'll make the motion. Please say aye. Aye. We're at the point.