 So we called the meeting to order. And it is time for public comment. And I actually have a public comment. If you would entertain my. Reading a statement. I would appreciate it. Is that okay with everybody? That sounds good, Denise. Okay. All right. So to start. I'd like to sincerely apologize to anyone. I'm sorry. I don't want to offend anyone. I may have caused any offense to through my actions over the past few weeks. I strive to be respectful and kind. To everyone. And I would never intentionally offend anyone. I know people have questions about how and why I was involved in the rena's answer permit process. And while I can't redo what's been done, I can clearly. And be certainly be transparent and explaining and sharing what I've learned. I've been doing that for a long time. I've been doing that for a long time. I've been doing that for a long time. I've been doing that for a long time. On July 9th at six AM. And everybody that knows me knows, I'm not up at six o'clock looking at email. I received an email from the DRB chair asking me to serve on the Ansel Rain is hearing that evening. I assume because of concerns that there wouldn't be a quorum. I could have said no, I'm too busy, but I didn't. I had a chance to serve at the last minute is sometimes just what happens. When I joined the meeting that eat that night, there wasn't in fact a quorum and I could have stepped away, but I was already there and it's been a long time since I had a chance to serve on a DRB hearing. So I stayed. It frankly didn't even occur to me. Not to follow through and serve as requested. From that point forward, I continued to participate in the process because again, it simply didn't occur to me not to. I finished what I start as a general matter. However, in the same timeframe, I also participated in the select board's discussions. About requiring a training of the DRB regarding process. That discussion arose from the concerns I had after participating. In the proceeding. But in retrospect, I realized I should have brought my concerns to the board as a DRB alternate. And then stepped away from the board's discussions about the matter and decisions about the next step. Again, it didn't occur to me and it wasn't raised by anyone else on the select board at the time. Looking back, I can see how the timing and overlap. Of the DRB process on this permit and the select board discussions about the DR process. Generally created an appearance of a conflict. I didn't feel I had a conflict and I did my very best in both cases to be impartial and objective. I did my very best in both cases to be impartial and objective. Those who know me know that I help out whenever I can. And most of you also know that personal integrity is really important to me. Conflict of interest is often about the appearance of conflict. And I feel it's my responsibility to do my best at all times without any conflict. And to avoid any appearance of conflict. Again, now having had an opportunity to look back. I didn't meet that responsibility in this instance. I have, in fact, recused myself from any further select board work on this issue. And I will continue to do so for as long as the select board is called upon to respond to questions from people who have questions on this hearing and the permit. I pride myself in being a dedicated and responsible member of the select board and a dedicated and responsible member of the DRB in my role as an alternate. Again, I am reliable and a committed volunteer and almost always am willing to volunteer and make myself available to help the town. So again, my sincere apologies. Thanks for listening. John. I want to thank you, Denise, for stepping up and providing us your thoughts. It was wonderful. I too would ask to have a moment. Just to speak actually to an email exchange brief, though it might have been, I was, I didn't email exchange with Walt Amesis. And quite frankly, it's not an excuse, but it's pretty burned out from everything going on. And I was Kurt and said a few words that weren't the best. I told him to get a life. And that was totally inappropriate. And I apologize to Walt publicly. Please put that in the minutes, Katie. And also to, you know, the callous public for having to see that. I just wanted to put that out there. But in addition, I also want to say I'm hoping that we can move beyond this. Just for the select boards benefit and the attending public's benefit. I met with Janet Ancel today and I saw Steve later. And we had a talk and I got to see. You know, all that went on through her. From her viewpoint through her lens. And it was, it was instructive to me. I could see how exactly how she got to where she was in her understanding of what went on and her frustrations and her inability to. Communicate those frustrations due to not wanting to. Go so far as possibly. Causing an appearance of a conflict or. Expert a. Conversations possibly with. She's, which she felt might have been a case if he reached out to select board members. But so it was a good productive discussion. And I'm hoping we all move forward from here and. Unite our community and not let this. All saw down any further. Thank you. Rose. I too just want to make a couple of comments. I want to thank you, Denise and thank you, John, both publicly for your kind words. You know, I. I reflected and I actually went to the select board handbook and I was like, okay, let's try to. Start back at square one and figure out where we could go and. You know, gather my thoughts. And so, you know, I just want to read a couple of things, you know, as town leaders, it is incumbent upon the select board to take the lead. We should try to develop tools and strategies. And we should be able to, you know, to address conflicts of interest. And just like you said, Denise, it's not necessarily conflict of interest, but it's a perception of a conflict of interest. And, you know, I'm just. As in as much an error as anybody else, because when it was all happening, I wasn't even thinking like that. But of course hindsight is always 2020. And so it's just really important that we address. And so, you know, it's important that we address conflicts or potential conflicts appropriately when they arise, not only for our own protection, but to uphold the public's faith in their local government. And we do have a small town. There are a lot of people that really care. We all are neighbors. And certainly we don't want to violate the public trust. And so we going forward, we're going to try to be as transparent as we can. And we're going to try to be as transparent as we can. And we're going to try to address conflicts. So again, I just want to publicly acknowledge your public statements. Denise and John. I appreciate very much serving with you. And hopefully we'll be able to move on in a much more positive way in the days and weeks and months ahead. Okay. Thank you, Rose. Anybody else. I would like to echo Rose's statements and. Thank you, Denise. Thank you, John. I know it's been difficult for all involved. But what I would like to add is that. Some a good friend of mine told me a long time ago, he said, you know, you learn something new every day. And if you don't, you're not doing it right. So this has been a learning experience for us all. And I definitely want to continue to work together. And I just want to make sure that. I just want to make sure that we have a better mentor to the community. And hope we can. Quickly put this behind us and continue to serve to everyone's satisfaction. Thank you. I want to, I want to. That's four of us. So I'm going to, I want to say something, but make sure that if folks from the public actually want to say anything, they have, they have a chance to do that. Anybody, anybody else want to say something? I don't need to go at last. No, I, Denise, thank you. Thank you. It can be. We get very in the weeds and we lose sight and you're absolutely right when you said that none of us, none of us. None of us suggested that, that you step away. And, and that's something that, that personally I, I feel like, okay, I. I feel like I'm not going to be able to get to the end of the day. That's part of my job as a public official is to. You know, do the good work of the town. But sometimes that can be really hard. And so we have to remember that too, that it's our job to remind each other. So. So I failed in that. And. I'm, that's one of, one of the things that I am going to. You know, do. Going forward is, is. Yeah. But we're not going to forget for it'll be a while. So thank you. That's all I have to say. Okay. Thank you, everyone. All right. Anybody else. Last call. For those quarantinies. All right. Yes, I'm sorry, John. We have a public public comment period at the beginning of our meeting. On non-agenda items. And so if you just have a comment about anything, it could be as extraneous. It could be about your neighbor's dog fighting with your cat. And maybe we can help you with that. Now's the time. And then comment. After this point in time, it needs to be. You know, directed at what's on the agenda. So I just, I just want to encourage a public to kind of, if you have anything on your chest, do it now. That's if it's not related to an agenda item. That's all. All right. Okay. Are there any additions or changes to the agenda? We already had a change. Regarding the. Regarding the curb cut. For North Cal's Memorial hall on God road, we're going to defer that to the next meeting. There really, there is nothing for the treasurer or delinquent tax collector to report on it. This meeting. The treasurer will give us a report. On the next meeting. And the next meeting. If there's anything else that wants to participate. On the last Monday. That we meet in every month. So she'll be providing us with a treasurer's update and a delinquent tax collection report. Um, Toby. What. Have you heard back from the trans at all. I did fill out an application and I'm working with the R. O. I do. In the report. You're gonna get a review from that. Well, I'm looking forward to that for that. And there's paperwork. Lots of paperwork and forums and site visits. I'm waiting to get those completed. Okay. Great. Thanks for the updates. Um. Roadside mowing and trimming Alfred, you're up. Oh wait, you skipped over the annual, uh, Yeah, you're right. You're right. So it's the time of the year that we need to file sign off and file our annual report on the mileage of roads in Calais. It's the annual financial plan. Toby you want to just explain to everybody what that is. It's just a form that the state actually Shawna does it and she just takes our budget number and adjusts it to a form that the state requires and she's done that and sent it to me and you just need to sign it because it actually matches the budgeted highway department. So does that make it so that we can then get reimbursed for grants is that part of the reason to do this. It's just part of our annual what we have to do for the state I think it's it's it relates to our 159,000 monies that we get from the state every year. Okay. All right, so somebody like to take motion. Hang on. I can make a motion but I have a question. I can make a motion that we approve the letter that Toby presented for the slick board signatures. Okay, did you, I thought you said you wanted to say something else first. Or you had a question. Well that we can second the motion and then I can be part of further discussion. Okay rose were you second. I'll second it but I also have a question. Okay. I think that would be just for people playing along at home. Shawna is. She's our representative with the Vermont transportation department. Shawna Clifford. Correct. So she's our district coordinator. Is that what we would call her. Toby. That's correct. Okay. Rose, you had a question. Okay. I think that's correct. I added up the total miles listed for callous. 85. Zero three miles. And I always thought we had 79 miles. So. Do you ever. Do you ever double check that mileage? I know we don't have any class one roads, but two, three and four. I think that number includes the state highway mileage, which is not part of what our town highway is. But isn't, isn't the 79 the number of. Miles we have a dirt road. And we do have some paved road, county road, the road by the school. No, the, um, I believe the total on the state annual map is 73 miles. And that includes all of our roads that are town highways. I believe the 85 also includes the state highways that go through our town, which would be root 14. Okay. Well, but if you, I mean, I just, with my calculator, just added up. The mileage posted 18.45. 54.6 to 11.96. And that's class two, class three, class four. So that's not state. Class two state. Excuse me, Alfred. What did you say? I think class two is the state highway. Okay. 18.45. 18.45. Okay. Yeah. Class one is interstate. Class two are the secondary roads. So root 14. Is that, um, and county road. And the county road. And, uh, Isn't there a short piece going from the elementary school? Yeah. Alfred. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, we have 85.03 miles of road for the record. Wow. I didn't think we had that much. Um, but just remember the state takes care of a good portion of that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, I'm very appreciative. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was always in my mind that I had 79 miles. And then when I added it just for ha ha's and came to 85, I just wanted to know the difference. So thank you. It's still, it's still a lot of work, but regardless for four guys, I just put that in there. Good point. Point. Well taken. Okay. Are you ready to vote? Yep. Oh, wait a minute. I have a question, possibly a motion. Or I should say a possible friendly amendment. Do we want to, does the board want to authorize Denise to sign this on behalf of the board? Well, that's a good idea. I would, I would. You know, I would see that as a friendly. It's actually not my job to see it as a friendly amendment. Who is the second? Who is the maker of Sharon? Who's the second? Sharon was first. Who's seconded it? I think I did. Rose did. But if I can interject, I think we, going forward, we need to make sure all documents issued by the select board have all names. And if we have Denise signed for it, that's fine. So it doesn't have to be walked around town, but I would just ask that we. Consider that on all important decisions. Yeah, and have it reflected in the minutes. If I'm the one who is. Signing and the board is authorized me to do so, which Katie. Does a really good job of that. So. Okay. So that's my friendly amendment proposal. Anyone second. Anyone support. Well, let me make sure I understand. So, so we're going to have everyone's name, but then Denise is going to sign on behalf of the gang. That's how you're saying, okay. That's fine. Yep. Rose, are you okay? Yes. All right, you're ready to vote. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Cliff. Aye. Sharon. Aye. John. Aye. Rose. Aye. And I'm an eye. And we're just, we just, people know because we're doing it on zoom, we have to do a roll call vote. All right. Toby, did you have anything else to update us on while you're here? Nope. All right, Alfred, you're up. Okay. I just put roadside mowing on there just to make sure we keep caught up. Yeah. Well, we've been doing roadside mowing a little at a time. Slowed way down on it. So I've been working on some of the smaller roads, less traveled and it seems to have quieted down some of the complaints. I don't know if anybody else is getting any, but I have not. But we've been trying to mix that in with other projects. Such as ditching, hauling gravel and whatnot. So I've been working on some of the smaller roads, less traveled, and it seems to have quieted down some of the complaints. So I've been working on some of the smaller roads, and it seems to have quieted down some of the mowing and whatnot. So I've, I've relaxed the mowing a little bit, but when I get a full crew and feel necessary, I've been, that's been my priorities to keep, keep going on the mowing. Well, hopefully pretty soon just mowing the regular grass will be something that has to get done either. Right. Right. Yeah. Well, we're kind of trying to mix both cutting, and mowing the second round. Yeah. And so, but we've, you know, we've had some guys out vacation days, whatnot. So it's, you take one guy off the crew, it limits you as to what projects you can do and whatnot. So I've been trying to manage that and keep it, keep things flowing. So does anybody else, does anybody have questions about mowing or anybody getting their complaints or roads that specific roads they want me to work on or. I haven't received anything recently out. Okay. Okay. Alfred, do you guys keep records of which roads you've been on? Yes. I have whoever who don't generally keep track of the date. I could do that. But whoever is driving the machine that day, I usually have them right down the roads. So we do keep track of what we've done. I think that would be a good, that would be a good process improvement just so that you have data, right? Not just information, but data. And I do have a question that I will just email to you on that regard. Okay. Do you want to, do you want to ask them that here? No. Okay. No, it's not a big deal. Yeah. Okay. Next up, I had put the ROW application for this. Use this cable, which I never knew use this cable was Tom. Comcast. They're looking to bury a cable on Lightning Ridge road near the school. And this is, I think these, this kind of a request is similar. Rose and John will remember when Cy Lambertin was on the board. We often got and haven't recently gotten. Request from WEC to work in the town's right of way, either to move a poll or. Do some work on the, in the towns, right of way with regards to the power. This to me is very similar to that. Um, so they're asking to bury this cable on the light, Lightning Ridge road in the town's right of way. Yeah, it's part of part of gray road. And then you turn left onto Lightning Ridge road. Uh, it's around that little, that corner and then it follows Lightning Ridge road up to, um, Thompson's house. Um, and there's, there's already underground power there. Um, because I think when Doug Lilly sold the property. Uh, that field where the new house is, uh, he required that it would be underground and not polls. So I think that's why they're being forced to do underground. Um, the issues, one major issue that I have with it is just as you pull out of gray road and go up the hill on the Lightning Ridge, that road is very narrow right there. And I don't know how they're going to be able to get a cable in the ground without being right in our travel portion of the road. You mean what, you mean while they're doing the work Alfred? Well, no, just the cable will be right in our road. It'll be just, it'll be, you know, underground, but it's, they only usually dig that, you know, two and a half, three feet deep. And so that brings a concern to me anytime I want to put a cable in or clean our ditches, I, I worry about hitting that, that cable. And it sort of limits us to do what we need to do for erosion control and, and taming water. So a suggestion I have and I would like to talk to, I don't have that guy's name, but the guy that applied for the permit. Corey. Corey. Yes. Yeah. So the question is, why can't they go underground across that field? Cause the poll, the poll that they want to start from is in that field. And really there's no reason they couldn't go right across that field and up to the next poll where they want to go. And it would be a whole lot shorter. It'd be a lot, a lot shorter wire. It'd be less impact to the road. And our future work. I think that's a good question. I think that's a good question. I would like to make that suggestion to, to Corey and see what his response. And now maybe he's got a good reason why that won't work. Okay. But I would like to explore that before we approve this. This. Right away permit. Well, we can put this, we can put this off until the next meeting to give you an opportunity to chat with him and get more information. Okay. Can I, just a couple of questions that maybe. You know, or maybe it's just more to find out from Corey. Is there, I take it there's cable on gray road now. And they're just extending. Well, there's, there's above ground. I don't know if there's cable there, but there's polls there that comes from the school. Or from the direction of the school. So whether there's cable there or not, I'm not sure, but they have to go from that poll underground to get up to. The last house that they want to serve. Well, and so it looks like I'm looking at the, the sketch we got from Corey. And one thing is, I don't know if this is important, but I don't think use this cable. From what I'm seeing here and doing zero research. I wonder if use this cable as private. And not actually Comcast. They use this. They're a private contractor. Right. So that is hired by hired by Comcast. Right. So liability, bonding, all that kind of stuff becomes a question. And then. And then also just to note that it's going running up the. It's running up to the newer house, but then it's going across the road. To run this house as well. Right. And is that going actually under the road or across over the road? Well, they would go under the road there, but they're proposing to bore it. But what they call boring Jack. They won't open dig it. They won't dig an open trench across it. They'll just, they got a machine that drills a hole under the ground. And they pull up, pull the cable through it. So what do they do? Put, they put a pipe in there or something. They put like a conduit in, and then they can pull their wire through that. Which that, that doesn't affect us at all. It's still in our roadway, but it doesn't, you know what I mean? It's, it's. It won't be an open ditch that we have to worry about compaction and all that stuff. So they're actually, so the other one. The one that runs up Lightning Ridge there. They are going to do something similar, but not as deep. Is that the issue? Well, I mean, it's, it's right. It's hard to say how deep they're going to bore in jacket. They, they're, they're obligated to do that. They're not going to do that. They're not going to do that. They're not going to do that. It's hard to say how deep they're going to bore in jacket. They, they're, they're obligated to go, you know, minimum of three feet with, with power wires. I'm not sure what the, what it is for communications, but for power wire, it needs to be at least three feet. And that typically is not enough for what I have to do to maintain our roads, you know, and people are going to say, I'm not digging a ditch three feet deep. I'm not. I'm not digging a ditch three feet deep deep. I'm not digging a ditch three feet deep deep deep deep. I'm not digging a ditch three feet deep. You don't have to put a culvert in or, you know what I mean, if they don't quite get three feet when they, when they install their wire, it's vulnerable for, for us to, to hit. And it limits, not just that it's vulnerable. It's, it limits us because we're going to call dig safe. They're going to say, yeah, there's a wire in there. Now we're going to be afraid to do what we need to do for the water runoff, right? 90% of my job has to do with water. That's how I refer to it that way. I mean, it's, you know, it's ditching, it's culverts, it's, you know, so I just want, would like to have them come off of that pole on Gray Road and go straight across the field up to the other, to the pole where they proposed to, to bore. And it cuts out a whole lot of footage for their wire. And I think it would be a whole lot easier to dig across that field than it would be alongside of the road. And if they're digging across that field, it's not in the town's right of way, though, right? That's correct. So they'd have to get permission from the landowners to do that. The landowner is asking for service. Right, right. There's one landowner that owns both of those properties. They are the, they are the landowner. Okay. That's right. Well, then let's, let's put this on hold. Katie's minutes will reflect the questions that the, the board has. And as we discussed, so that should help you when you talk to Corey Charles. And I'm looking. Yeah, there's a phone number, Alfred, on the right of way application. Oh yeah. Yeah, I see it now. Yeah. All right. So I will on for next time. Okay. I just had a quick comment. Go ahead, Rose. So when I agreed with what Alfred is saying, and I certainly would be more in favor of making this above ground instead of below ground. But when Alfred talked about them boring under the road, and then pulling the cable through some conduit, you know, what happens if they hit ledge, you know, and then their whole plan goes down the tubes. But the other thing, and this might just be selfish on my part or a philosophical question is, you know, we kind of got excited when we saw some little flags on the road and we thought maybe they're going to bring cable up Lightning Ridge because we've really sucky internet service that isn't reliable. And so it's just a philosophical question, like if they're bringing it to two more houses, why can't they just bring it up the road? So I just wanted to publicly make that comment because, like I said, we got excited thinking maybe they are going to run cable, but okay, so stay on. Right, Sharon? But it would still, I mean, it would still be there if it comes across the field, it would still be to the same location, right, they're proposing ending now. Yeah, I do. Yeah. So, so stepping back and looking at the at the bigger picture. So, you know, we're all, or most of us are stuck at home with as Rose very, very astutely articulated with sucky internet. Thanks, Rose. Yeah. But we should anticipate that we're going to hear more of these requests, particularly so it starts, you know, if Ron and Maggie put it in, then it's that much further up and then there's houses above them. So as we're doing, as we're doing this project, Alfred, I'm going to ask you to think not just in terms of this house, but but the issues you're raising, and you're starting to articulate a standard, what are you looking for? So because if as this as over the next five or 10 years, we're going to continue to have these kinds of requests, as people try to upgrade their home situation. So, so let's be thinking not about this as a one off, but what are the standards? What are the expectations? How do we capture that so that we can be consistent and prepared each time we have a request? Right, right. Well, I think, I think a certain depth we should probably figure on setting. Yep. You know, that would certainly clear us if we are ditching or putting a culvert in. Yep. And, you know, we can talk about that, think about that, but that's I mean, that's my main concern is in the future, if we're out there cleaning culverts or cleaning ditches out, we are going to be restricted by having these wires in our road system. Yeah, well, yeah, so so that's, and as you talk with Corey and other people, and as you just drive around reflecting, you're going to think of other things. So let's just, you know, we can upgrade the right-of-way application to include some of these concerns and check the box. Did they meet this? Did they meet that? To make it more, I forget what I'm looking for the right word, more standardized, I guess, so that we know exactly what we're asking and they know exactly what we're looking for. Right, right. Judy has a hand up. I just noticed that the application says that it's within the utility right-of-way. Does that always overlap with the town right-of-way? Well, that's what I was talking about with regard to WEC. WEC always used to ask us, but I think that they could do it regardless because there's a utility right-of-way. John has his hand up. Maybe he knows the answer. Well, utility right-of-ways can be in the town of right-of-way. They can also cross. Some right-of-ways have been acquired long time ago through across fields and over, you know, the mountains and on private property. It's case by case, Judy. But a utility right-of-way in the terms of it, they actually vary depending on when they were put in place and it doesn't necessarily mean that the utility can do, it doesn't mean they can do whatever they want. It doesn't mean that they can impede those towns right to maintain a road. I mean, it's good to be aware because it does, but it's also good to say good to know. Even so, the town has its standards and, you know, if push came to shove, we might end up researching what is that right-of-way. Yeah. Okay, so it sounds like you got some work cut out for you, Alfred. And we'll wait for you to get back to us next on the 28th. Okay. Very good. Yep. All right. So the 28th we're doing this one again? Yeah. All right. How's that woodchipper doing? I knew that question was coming. I actually have not good news. At quarter of four this afternoon, I got a call from Milton Kat and they have given me their diagnosis. They're saying that now this motor has four cylinders. One of them had really decent compression, 370 psi. Two of them had 50 psi and one of them had 100 psi. So the three cylinders are not doing their job. That's the reason why it wouldn't start good. They're going to send me a full diagnosis and what they have done, what the tests that they have done, and so we can verify that. But they're telling me that needs the motor is junk. They're telling me that they don't usually, because of the nature of that motor, they don't usually rebuild them. I don't know if it's because of the size of it or difficulty putting them together, but the motor is not good. He's going to give me estimates to, he's going to look around for a different motor just so we can have that price. So that's, that's what I know. I just barely learned it tonight at quarter of four, just before I was leaving work. And you said that was Milton? Record? Milton Kat. It's a caterpillar dealer. Yeah. John? And so just to fill everybody in, Alfred and I have had back and forth on this site, contacted Virginia Heavy Equipment, who we bought it from. Um, and was contacted them, their mechanic. And he said that they bet every piece of equipment, they do whatever repairs they need to do on the, someone's got their audio on, on their equipment, on the equipment, piece of equipment they're working on. And then they run the motor for an hour, et cetera, et cetera. And he was surprised that this one had issues. I was hoping it was just a fuel issue. This is really troubling Alfred. Nevertheless, they said, take, take the chipper up to a competent diesel mechanic. Well, this is the company that makes, makes and sells these engines that's actually evaluated it. So they are the experts. Um, and so as soon as Alfred gets that formal written response back from them, I will be reaching back out to them, which they asked me to do. They said if it's really involved, if it's not too big a deal, they might have it repaired up here at their cost. If it's really involved, they might just ship it back to their place and do what needs to be done. So we will see how that goes. Um, so that's, that's, we'll wait for Alfred to get the repair diagnosis and writing and, or the evaluation and writing and we'll go from there. I will reach out to Regina heavy equipment, the outfit that we bought it from and take it from there. I had a question. Um, can I talk? You got my permission. I was just talking and realized I was on mute. Oh, okay. Um, yeah, so I mean, I, I guess that we'll wait and hear back what, um, Milton Kat recommends or whatever, but, um, you know, at this stage of the game, I mean, if the motor is blown, I would be in favor of just returning it and, um, getting a refund. Um, I feel bad this happened and, um, we really needed the equipment. We were so looking forward to it. So that's my two cents. I'd be, you know, we'll wait for the ride up from Milton Kat, but, um, if it's a blown engine or whatever, and like what Alfred said, they don't usually, um, rebuild these, you know, I would just be in favor of getting our money back if we could. Second that Rose. Yeah. Yeah. My question was when I was talking and you couldn't hear me was, well, we get a written report from Milton, like when you go to the doctor's office and they give you a report of what's wrong with you. Yes, that's sort of way. It's going to be an invoice as to the work that he has done. Also, it'll be, uh, explaining what it requires to fix and what he found during his testing. It'll have all the pressure, all the PSI testings from each cylinder. He checked the valves because he thought it was in the upper end and he said, no, the valves were all working properly. Um, and so that's what lead led them to do the compression test. And the compression test tells me that there's things wrong, you know, because every cylinder is a different temperature or a different PSI and it, that's way low. Yeah. We mean very low. And that's usually what happens when you have bad rings, you know, piston rings or, you know what I mean? Or who knows? It could be, it's hard to say what, what it is, but there's supposed to be, I asked him what the spec was for the, what the PSI should be for each cylinder. He didn't know, but one being, one cylinder being 370 PSI, those others, the other three should be close to that. Yeah. And so I just know there's something, something major with that motor. And wasn't the company in the place in Virginia was going to pay for Milton to do this check, right? Right. They're paying, they're paying for all this is what they said. So, so, but they, it may be that they, well, we'll, we'll see if we have to spar over them. They might try to put a new motor in it and send it back to us, or they may just want to give us a refund. We'll see. Yeah. You think you'll get that, that, uh, summary of their findings? How soon, Alfred? I would say quite quickly. I mean, they're usually fast with invoices. So they finished, they finished their diagnosis today this afternoon. So I would say by the end of this week I'll have it. As soon as you get an email to me and text me that you sent it, because then I will call them right away. Okay. Yep. Thanks. Yep. I'll, I'll just, I'll try to go to the office more often to check the mail. That's all. I usually go once a week, but I'll try, uh, you know, a couple of times this week to see when it gets here. Well, they'll probably email it to you, right? Yep. That's a possibility. I did, I did make sure he had my email. So that's right. He might just email it to me. Yeah. That'd be the, that'd be the quickest way. Just forward it on to me. Yep. All right. I'm sorry to hear about the chipper. Yeah. Okay. We've had the UVM Rhodes study for a while. The one that John Lenz and his students did. So would you and the crew take a look at the study in particular, the plow routes that they came up with and analyze and see what you think of their suggestions on the plow routes? And, you know, if you can involve the rest of the crew, because they're the ones, you know, doing some of the routes and see what your thoughts are with regard to their recommendations and then get back to us. Can do. Is there a hard copy of that or? I think that we can probably, yeah, you probably all should have a hard copy. So I know that it's in one of the Google folders. So perhaps somebody in the office could make hard copies and leave them for you. Would that be okay, Judy? Sure. If maybe Katie could email it to me and then I'll make copies for you. So is it a time frame for getting back to us? Maybe you could give us on the 28th just an update of where you're at in the review process and then we can pick a date, maybe the 12th of October to have you give us a final conclusion of your thoughts on their suggestions. Okay. Well, hang on, hang on. Do the best I can. It's probably going to be a lengthy document, I would say, and a lot of variables. Well, I think the plow routes are a specific portion of the report and they lay out, I looked at it, some options. With the map. I'm happy to look at it and whatnot, but I just want everybody to know that I've got a different view than somebody that's looking at a map in college. But I'm happy to work with it, but I drive these roads, I know where the hills are, I know where the corners are, so I just want you all to know that. And I'm totally willing to work with it, but there's just, like I said, I know these roads differently than somebody in college that has never driven them. Right. Well, that's why we wanted to ask you to give us your perspective and your thoughts on their suggestions, keeping an open mind. Yeah, well, that's, I know, and I am totally willing to do that, but I just want you guys to keep an open mind, too, because it's different. It's different when we're in a truck. It's different when we're in a truck. And yeah, go ahead. When every other sentence starts with a butt, it doesn't sound open-minded. So, and Denise said she wants your thoughts, and I'm going to take a step further. I would say it's okay to have, it's great. Of course, you have a different, you have a lot of different vantage points, experience being one of them over the students who produce the report, but use it for inspiration. What we're asking for is inspiration and creativity. We've had years, and I've only been on the board for three plus years, but I understand it goes back further. Folks in town are asking us to think about the roads differently. And we're asking you to think about it differently. Use the report for inspiration. Say, you know, they suggested this, this doesn't make any sense, but it made me realize, well, wait a minute, we could do this. And it's not just that report. We had the input from the Better Roads guy from a year and a half ago. When did we do that? Was it only a year ago? The Better Roads, do you mean the local roads? And we had all those road meetings, and the guy said that the six hour rodeo is too long. It's not safe. There's other points of input that lead us to, we need to make some changes. And that's what we're asking you to do is take the leadership, use the report, use other sources of input, and come back to us with creative ideas for how we respond to what we're hearing from the town. Yeah, take this as an opportunity to get your thoughts, your suggestions. Oh, gee, maybe I never thought of that kind of thing. And I'm sure that there's a lot of that. Okay, that's all we're asking you to do. Okay. All right. Do you have anything else, Alfred? I've got one really big one. What? I would like to be reappointed as road commissioner or know what that process is, where that process is. We're usually doing it July one. We are halfway into September. Yep. That's pretty large for me. I want to sort of know where I stand or if I stand anywhere. So, can you tell me when that's going to happen or if it's going to or why it hasn't? I, the only thing I can tell you is the board is, it has been deliberating on that and we'll get back to you as soon as we have an answer. That's all the information I can give you. Okay. So, how am I, okay, let's leave it at that. Alfred, I asked some of the same questions when we didn't do our, you know, we didn't, we took us a long time to reappoint chair and what I understand is, I mean, you're in the position until as, because we, you know, you're in the position, you're getting your paycheck. I'm not sure that's probably not your answer, but your question. Well, I am a town employee for sure and I am getting a paycheck, but am I, am I, do I have authority to make decisions that I do every day without being appointed? Denise, Denise served in her role as chair without disruption until when did we do that vote on July, July or, I don't know, I forget some time. Yeah. And the same thing, you know, John was continuing to serve as vice chair. So, it's all the same kind of thing. So, continue, just continue to do what you're doing and as soon as we have an answer for you, we'll, we'll let you know. Okay. So, one more question. I know this, this whole union thing has been very difficult for everybody, but I feel like I should be part of one side or the other. And it's really terrible that we are being pulled apart this way. It's not my fault. It's not your fault, whatever. But I feel like I'm stuck in the middle dangling in the air because I don't know. The select board told me not to talk to my guys. That's a union lie, suppose. I don't know, but the select board is not talking to me. So, I don't know where I stand. I don't know. I've got a really bad feeling about this. I asked almost a month ago to come in for executive session with the select board. So, I could kind of have a heads up and know what's going on. And I've yet to have that meeting. I want to know what's going on. I'm sorry. I'm a little bit upset right now, but it's my future that's in place. And now you guys are asking me to do all these things that I don't know if I have ground to stand on with. I want to be either appointed or not. Anything that we're asking you to do with regards to the roads, like the roads, this UVM study, we're asking you to do that. So, that's part of your workload. We haven't really had any much type of a meeting. We haven't met with the union face-to-face or on Zoom in quite some time. We have put proposals back and forth from us to the union to review and nothing is set in concrete. We still don't know where this is all going to end. Okay. Well, that's fine. But as the boss of these three guys that are involved in the union, I got to know what to say. I got to know what to think. I got to know you guys have completely blocked me out of this whole thing. And I've got a bad feeling. I'm just I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I want to be included. I want to be included somewhere, one side or the other. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I hear your frustration. I'm sorry that you feel that way. When a lot of this was going on, you were gone. I'm leave. That doesn't matter, Denise. I've been back here for almost six months. I'm just telling you, you asked. That you shouldn't even be bringing that up. And I'm just telling you that you were involved prior to that. And I'm sorry that we haven't continued to include you. John, you wanted to say something? I just want to let Alfred know nothing's changed with your job and your role and responsibilities. I'm a real commissioner right now. We haven't moved to reappoint you. That's correct. With regard to managing your crew, they are not unionized yet. I mean, they are unionized, but they don't have a contract. So nothing's changed in terms of they're having contract guaranteed benefits or protections or what have you. So nothing's changed. You managed them identically to having in the same manner you would have managed them prior to the union coming to town. The only thing we asked you to do is not to discuss union matters with them. That's it. And your responsibilities are unchanged. You are the road commissioner. You have the full responsibility as road commissioner. As you did prior to July 1, nothing's changed. And like Sharon said, appointments get delayed. It's not unusual. This is what happened when we have acknowledged with you that we are trying to figure out how to reconfigure the highway department in a way that might be more advantageous to all involved and particularly the town taxpayers and recipients. But that restructuring is going to affect me financially and professionally and always. Right. And when we arrive at an approach and a final design, we aren't there yet. I will tell you that. And we want to put our heads into this and make sure we fully have everything fully figured out. There's a lot of nuance we're pursuing. We're trying to improve things here. Right. Well, I think just a word of advice, some of the changes that you are thinking about, you ought to include the man that's on the job. You ought to include, get his opinion. I don't know any of the changes that you're making. I have no idea. That will come, Alfred. When we get to that point, we're not there. That's all we can tell you at this point. I understand. I appreciate your frustration, but that's where we're at. I agree. Noted, Alfred. And noted. Yeah. And we hear your frustration and feel your frustration. Yeah. Does anybody on a different topic, does anybody know Ron Padgett or does everybody but me know Ron Padgett? I do. Yeah. I know who he is. Okay. So he's actually a real person in town. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Hi, Ron. Hi, Ron Padgett. No, Ron Padgett's here. Okay. Got you. Yep. That's right now. He lives on Elmsley Road. Yeah. I wasn't trying to just, you know, bring him up for discussion. Alfred, just so you know, his name appears on our screen without a picture or video. So we don't, we not formally met him, like any citizen or any member of public, he can attend our meetings, their open meetings. So we just were curious. Yeah. Yeah. No, that's fine. I just, I knew I knew the name, but it took me a minute to recognize the road he lives on. Yeah. There's, there's a lot of people that I try to put names to roads and I do the same, I do the same thing. What road do they live on? Can they be recruited? Right. Right. Maybe in the other order, right, Denise? Yeah, maybe. All right. Anything else, Alfred? No, I guess not. Okay. Thank you very much. All right. Have a good night all. You too. Thanks Alfred. You bet. All right. Thank you, Alfred. Next up, Katie, is the dog war in the folder? I'm just checking now. I know I, I sent it to you. I just didn't, I didn't happen to look and see if it was there. I just don't remember the topic off the top of my head to be honest with you. I'm just opening it and trying to let it, my internet's trying to let me scroll. Okay. It was the, it's the dog warrant. Katie, I'm in, I'm in town with 5G. Let me, or can Cliff bring it up? I don't see it, but I'm not scrolling yet. And it was in the folder. Huh. Well, this is the normal dog warrant that we do every year where it's all the dogs that the town office has recognized that aren't licensed. There's a few on the list that should come off, which we can do, but every year we have to sign the dog warrant and then the animal control officer contacts all the folks on the list that don't have their dogs registered. And Judy, is there a timeframe for that? As far as once Wilson contacts them to get their dogs registered? Well, we're way behind. Usually this is, you know, done much earlier, but because of COVID we gave people a lot longer. Yeah. And so he's probably already been in touch with a lot of these people. He already gave you a list of issues with various people not having their phone numbers and things. So we'll just keep working with him. Once you've signed it, we'll just, you know, we get dog licenses every day. So the list is going to change quickly. And we'll, we work with him to help him find new contact information and all that. And I, I think you posted something or, I think you posted something on Front Forge Forum recently about getting your dogs registered, right? Yeah, we do it over and over and over again. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the deadline is April 1st. So we're really, and then, and then we usually give people a month and then we do the dog warrant. So we're months behind here. Did you? No, I signed the folder and I didn't find anything in email. So can we do this next time? If it's, yeah, we'll have to. Okay. Judy, do you have anything else town office wise? No, I'm just here because I hadn't seen everybody in a long time and I just wanted to, sorry, my dog's barking, just touch base. And if anybody has questions, you know, the main thing I'm working on it, we're preparing for November. People are calling the phones off the hook with tax questions that we either answer or refer to Sandra. We're going to have 16,000 pages scanned this week, which is very exciting for me. It really changes my job. That'll be great. So, and that's kind of and that's why the documents aren't available right now as you posted on front porch forum because they're busy being scanned, correct? Yeah, but there's a cop representative from from Ohio who's going to put all these volumes from the many, many volumes from the vault in a van and take them to Menden tomorrow. And they'll be scanned in a special machine. They're doing it for many towns across Vermont. So they're doing it centrally. And so then he said it would be a week or so before they're returned. Nice. Very nice. It is. It's really exciting for the the convergence of COVID and what's going on in the real estate market and the ability of researchers to do in some towns the entire search remotely. Calis isn't there yet, but we're moving in that direction. It's a huge difference. And it also helps save on the carbon footprint. Right. Yeah, you know, the work style has changed with COVID in the sense that there's fewer people coming into the office. We do it by appointment and there's maybe one or two people a day. But that means that I am at the copier for hours and taking old books apart and then putting them back together and scanning and emailing. And then somebody says, oh, that wasn't really the property I was interested in. And, you know, so it's going to going to really make life a lot easier. Good. Good. I'm glad to hear that. You might want to stay on, Judy, to talk, to hear the discussion about planting trees with the grant money. Stephanie, are you there? I am. Oh, okay. There you are. I am here. Yeah. All right. We're ahead of the, on time this time, which is a nice thing. Is Neil joining you? I wasn't sure. Here, Neil said it depends on whether he has to put the kids to bed. Oh, this is probably bedtime. Yeah. So he didn't know whether his wife was going to be available or not, but he said if he's available, he'll join us. And that was going to be at 8.15. But I can explain everything. Hey, so do you want to start out with the tree planting ideas that you had and money? Take it away. Oh, okay. So as you probably all recall, a few years ago, the conservation commission applied for and got a grant for $2,000 to deal with the emerald ash borer. And so we didn't, we got it from the community forestry program, which is a part of the department of forest and parks state. I think there was some federal involvement too. So, you know, we did that inventory with a lot of help with from from Calis citizens. And then the town ended up covering a lot of our expenses. So we ended up having $1,774 left from the grant. And originally, we were thinking it would be used to replace trees that died because of the emerald ash borer or trees that would be taken down in anticipation of the ash trees dying from the ash borer. But it turned out that we kind of all made the decision that we were not going to take down trees preemptively. That there's too many. I mean, there's thousands of ash trees in Calis. And I understand Washington Electric is taking down a lot of the ash trees that are threatening power lines. But in any event, what happened was we ended up with this money for trees. And we talked with the folks at the community forestry program that were administered the grant. And they said, you know, you can use that money to buy trees for public places in Calis. It doesn't have to be, you know, tree by tree, you know, tree for tree, ash tree for another tree. And so we have an agreement. We got an agreement, which we needed to do in order to get the grant money released with Nico Rubin at the East Hill Tree Farm to purchase. And he we're not going to do the planting that would include the plant. He would do the planting of $1774 worth of trees. So the conservation commission had a lot of discussion about what would be a good use for this. And we talked about what are the public places in Calis and kind of zeroed in on the town office and the town hall. So weeks and weeks ago, we, some of us met at the town hall. John McCullough was there. And a few other people, I think Scott Bassage was there and a few of us. And Scott feels very strongly, is very vocal about how he doesn't think that there should be tall trees planted. We were talking about, you know, wouldn't it be nice to have trees along the road? And, you know, he talked about historically this building kind of sits out there without trees around it. And it's a beautiful building. So we just kind of talked about that for a while. And then we went over to the town office. And, you know, the area between the parking lot and the road where there's a flagpole, but there's that strip, we thought wouldn't it be nice to have some trees in here. And so Nico was with us. And so we talked about crab apple, flowering crab apples and how nice that would be, because crab apples are beautiful, even when they're not in flower. And, but they don't get that tall, we wouldn't want something that like it's too tall and overpowers the town office. So we kind of said, yeah, that's a good idea. I think and Nico said, I think you can fit three of them in here, you might have to move the flagpole. Who is this Nick? Nico Rubin. Oh, he's East Hilltree Farm. East Hilltree. Yeah, up in Plainfield. Yeah. Okay, got it. Thank you. He's really knowledgeable. And he's, yeah, he's very good. Richard Rubin's son, Sharon. Right. So that's where we were with the town office. And we just kind of set that aside and really didn't, we didn't move forward yet on it. But a week or more ago, Neil Maker, who's on the Conservation Commission, is a town tree warden. And I met with, no, we just met with each other and his children. We met at the town hall. And we just kind of wandered around. And, you know, because that town hall, the outdoors of the town hall is just not great looking. It's just parking lots, except if you go back where there's, you know, the edible garden and stuff that hasn't really been, you know, I mean, everything's alive, but it hasn't been a lot taken care of. But anyway, so we're looking around, we're standing there and like looking at this and scratching our heads and thinking, you know, that that bank is really awful looking. You know, it goes from the road down to the parking lot on both sides of the town hall, both the old parking lot and the new parking lot. And we thought, wouldn't it be nice to have some not big trees that would stick up over the road, but some, some ornamental, some ornamental bushes and maybe some ornamental grasses, you know, something that would make it attractive on, as I said on both, we went and then looked at the other existing parking lot and that bank and it's the same thing. So it said, okay, so I thought this is a good idea. But what we need is a landscaper. And I wanted to talk to John McCullis. So I emailed John and he was said he was utterly delighted that we were thinking of doing that. And so I contacted Hasso Ewing who apparently does landscaping and she said, yeah, she'd love to work with us. So that's sort of where we are in terms of what we want to do. It may or may not happen this fall, it just depends on how quickly everything can do and Nicko's availability. But we wanted to run it by you and Judy to see, I'm glad Judy was here. I don't have to make a separate phone call and talk about, you know, what you all think of that, these ideas and we don't have any idea how far that money will go. How much is it again, 2000? It's $1,774. Okay. It's left and, you know, and we said, yeah, you know, we don't want to do the planting. We'll maintain it, but we want, so that was, you know, we don't know exactly what we can get. And we were thinking more about, you know, big trees. We're thinking, you know, we were actually, Neil and I were still thinking about maybe one big tree back, not near the road, but back sort of to the left of the edible garden to maybe over time. And, you know, I mean, I'm thinking, I love, I think chestnut trees. Nico has chestnut trees. But anyway, so we don't know how far the money will go. We don't know exactly what we want to do, but we think that, you know, coming up with a landscaping plan with a landscaper. That'd be nice. Running it by Nico and then, and he could actually go ahead and plant the crab apple trees. So I had a question though, we got to make sure that we're aware of where the septic system is. Oh, one more thing. Oh, John's hand up, sorry. John McCullis said that years ago, there was, when the town offices were built, there was a permit for, I think he said for plantings was included in the permit for the town office. So he's saying, I don't think you need to, you know, get a permit for that. Although I don't know why we need a permit for planting, but we do have to talk to historic preservation folks because we're in a historic district there. Yeah. John. So a couple items. Thank you, Stephanie. First off, for doing that, and everyone else who's helped you out. Get to do good, some things with conservation. Yeah, you get, you get to do all the good stuff. Good for you. The septic system, Denise, is readily apparent. It's a mound. So I don't think they'll mistake that for anything but that. But, you know, I would ask anybody who's got a ability on their computer, Google Stratford Town Hall, I was there last year, caught a Colin McCaffrey concert on the green, which is just across the side road from it. And that's a beautiful building. I mean, it's about the big white building up on a sort of a little bit. Oh my God, it's magnificent. It really is. It's a work of art. And that's framed with beautiful sugar maples. And I'm going to disagree with Scott. Maybe you could distract Scott from his current opinion a little bit by sending him some photos of some other kind of town office buildings that are surrounded by beautiful maple trees. I have no idea whether 100 years ago there were trees along that road. That road is about six or eight feet higher than it would have been back then. As we know, it's so ugly. It's all filled because the town at some point, likely in the fifties when they did all the upgrading of roads so people commute because they weren't staying in town anymore. But working out of town, they put, God knows how many dump truck loads of fill and level that place out to make the road real an AOT special. And I think it's made it really ugly down there. So any trees that would have been there would have been eradicated through that process. But also it was a kind of a low lying area. And there may not have been that many trees because of the nature of the soil conditions. But I would strongly encourage you to take a look at that and maybe other buildings around town state and draw from those photos ideas. It might help you kind of think more open in a more open minded fashion. That's all. So Stephanie, Judy, I'm sorry, go ahead. I think these are delightful ideas. Spending a lot of time in the town hall, town office area. It actually has kind of a deliverance feeling like I don't feel like I can go for a walk. It's kind of creepy, I have to say. It doesn't feel like a little village. And I could picture little apple trees and things like that. That would just make it and walk little paths or something like a park that you could hang out in and back of the town hall. That's on a human scale and welcoming and feels safe. Somehow it does not feel safe in that gully. And it feels dark a lot of the time. So I think that would be great. The one fear I have is that already pulling out of the driveway of the town hall, you're taking your life in your hands. I've seen many near misses. So anything that would block the oncoming traffic any more than the grass does already, that needs to be rethought. And when you turn right, like coming down peeking and turn right into the town hall, sometimes there's just like a, it's just too steep. It's too sharp or something. So that whole area needs to be re-landscaped. But I think this would be great. Yeah, good. Another reason not to have tall trees there is that they could really block the sight distances as you're talking about. Yeah. And increase the darkness. Yeah, we don't want to increase the darkness. We want to come to light. No more creepiness. Yeah. Oh, Sharon, sorry. When Judy was talking about her vision for, to address the deliverance feeling, I was thinking like adamant. Human scale adamant, that's an aside. But I wanted to add it since we're on this. Also, I want to just pick up on Stephanie's comment about the edible garden not being kept up. And I multitasked and pulled out the maintenance plan for the garden and send it around to the select board and Stephanie. And maybe we can look at that and invite somebody from the edible garden group to come back to the select board. It's been actually since 2017. Yeah. So it's time for us to have them come in and meet with us. And they got it. They got a couple of grants from the Hunger Mountain Co-op for plantings. And I know I used to see them send out invites for work parties, but I don't, I haven't seen that in a while. So a good point that we should ask them to come in and let us know how it's going. Thank you, Stephanie, for the leadership in using the grant money, bringing people in, being creative, continuing to look for ways to enhance our environment. We are spending more time in it. You're welcome, Sharon. I'm just wondering, should we go ahead with our ideas or do you want to have more public, I mean, originally we were thinking of having like a public meeting, but then COVID came along. And then we thought, well, you know, we'll just kind of decide what we think would be nice and take it to the select board. But do you think that there should be more public input into this? It never hurts to have more public input. If you were to put something on a conservation commission agenda and really make it known that there's going to be a discussion regarding this idea at this conservation commission meeting and invite people to attend and get that their input is important. It does, like I said, it never hurts to get more public input. I think it's a really, I think it's a fabulous idea. Because we're at the point in the conservation commission where we spend a lot of time talking about it. And then finally, they just, they said, the rest of the members said to me, Neil, you figure it out, you know, we're happy, we're happy, whatever you do, whatever we have there, we're happy. So that's why, Neil, I went ahead, but now talk to you about it. And then John has some other ideas, you know, I'm just wondering whether, you know, and we're not urgent about it. We can, you know, it certainly take our time. Yeah. On the other hand, you know, we want to come up with something and get it implemented. It might be good to have some kind of an idea that you can have to share with people. This is our ideas, especially if Hasso's willing to do some landscape architect stuff. Sharon? I don't feel that the select board has any special expertise on this. No. So I appreciate that you came to see us and get our, we get our own private input meeting. But, and I like what Denise said about, you know, doesn't hurt to include people, but I'd be happy to say this sounds to me like it's within the purview of the conservation committee. You're making all the right stops. You guys are smart, capable people. And, you know, when, when you've, when you've got a good record of input and conversation, then I'm, I'm okay. I don't, I don't even know if we even have to, if we have to formally approve something, that's one thing. But if we don't, then this seems like your, your wheelhouse. Yeah, it's in the conservation's bailiwick, as I say. Okay. I have a comment. Yes, Rose. Again, I just want to reiterate what Sharon and others have said. Thank you, Stephanie, for your work on this. And, and I just want to make sure that Judy and Barbara and Sandra, who work in Gospel Hollow, make sure that they get to see the final plan before anything is implemented. Yeah, good point. Thank you. Yeah, no, this sounds, this sounds terrific. Good. Great. Yep. Thank you. So should I move on to the next item? Yes, please. So the next item is, has to do with the rural road resilient right subway vegetation work report that Joanne Garten had done. And the trees committee. And, well, there's no trees committee. No. But you and I talked briefly about establishing a trees committee. No, I'm just leading up to it. Okay. Introducing that. Okay, gotcha. Yes. And so I see that you have it in your Google documents. I don't know if you had a chance to read it. But so it was like 2017 that Joanne started this. And she's the person who worked with us on the emerald ash pour stuff. And so she got, she got a grant, they got money to do an, an, an assessment of calluses roadside vegetation. And she spent a summer, at least a summer, going around. And well, when we back up first, there was an advisory committee put together. And it was, remember Denise, I think I have a list here. It's in the, it's in the report. Yeah, the report still says draft, but it's dated January. I asked her about it. 2019. I asked her about it. I said, is there any final one? She said, no, that's it. That's it. Okay. Take draft off. So it was me and Alfie, Neil, Jamie, Toby, Barbara Whedon and Denise. And we were the advisor. We just met a few times with Joanne, but we kind of went over which roads would be the best roads to evaluate. And she did 23 and a half miles. She and an assistant and then wrote this incredibly detailed report. Yeah. She really liked Kala. She was used or wasn't she biking around? I saw her two weeks ago. She was riding her bike around. She lives in Montpellier. She loves Calvus. Yeah. So, and she did this report and it's just amazing and sort of nothing happened to just, she sent the report around and then we never did anything. So I remembered it recently and I sent it to, you know, Rose and Sharon and I had met to talk about the roadsides and trying to pay attention to the ecological values and importance of our roadsides. And I thought, well, wait a minute. We have a report here. Right. Evaluated a bunch of the roads and then made a bunch of recommendations. So at the last conservation commission meeting, I brought this up and well, actually, Neil and I had been talking about it and then we brought it up and then saying, well, what would make the most sense? I mean, there's really a lot of recommendations that she makes. And, you know, she has different categories and different areas that to focus on and with the same idea, basically, you know, enhancing our roadsides. So we thought, well, you know, the conservation commission has a lot of different things that we work on. And we thought maybe a town tree committee would be a good idea. And a lot of towns have tree committees. Yeah. So for instance, in East Montpellier, they don't have a conservation commission. They have, it's a tree committee or an emerald ash borer committee or something like that. That's my son. I'm not going to be able to do anything about it. So, sorry, I can't do it. I can't do anything about it. And so I thought it might be something that other people in town might be really interested in being involved in. The conservation commission doesn't need to do it. So we thought, well, we could do something like it could be a committee of the select board or committee of the conservation commission. But it should be some kind of committee to look at this report and look at the recommendations and decide which of them makes sense, what they, what should be done in Calis, what kinds of things should be done that Joanne recommended or not. And then go about making a plan on how to implement them and then implementing them. And so, I mean, and the other thing is, is that Neil and I and Joanne have talked for years about how Calis needs a tree ordinance. Because the statute, the tree ordinance, the tree, I don't know, it's not an ordinance. The tree statute is old. It's very old. And it's very vague. And a lot of towns have enacted their own ordinance to endow some of the stuff. Like it's, you know, the existing law talks about shade trees. Oh, what's a shade tree in a rural area? You know, it's like most trees are shade trees in a way. And so wasn't there legislation, Stephanie? They tried and they tried. And I think they came back again this year. And I don't know that it went anywhere. For some reason, I can't understand why in the world it wouldn't go somewhere, you know, why it wouldn't be a simple matter, but nothing simple in the legislature, you know, and everything gets complicated and bogged down. And apparently that's what's happened. So that would be another maybe the tree committee to do is work on an ordinance. Anyway, so I wanted to kind of, I don't know if you people have read the report, but it's really worth reading. And they have a lot of good suggestions in the report. And, you know, all of this kind of resurfaced, I was talking to Stephanie the other day and said, well, I'll just put this on the agenda. Maybe we can get some more, get some new energy. You know, people might be willing to serve on a tree committee when they don't want to serve on maybe anything else. And see what we can come up with through the winter, maybe we can come up with some kind of a plan that we can start implementing. And interestingly enough, Katie found a document, and I can't remember enough, it's part of this report that talks about invasives and roadside mowing. Well, they're right in this report that Joanne did, and it explains when you're supposed to do the cutting, you know, what to look for on the side of the road, you know, not not to cut, not weed. You know, as I looked at it again today, it was really very interesting and something that we've been talking about quite a bit as you saw in the thing about roadside mowing. That's in the report for me. Yeah, I think I think it's in the report, but somehow Katie found it. Maybe Cliff can call it up because she put it in the folder. It's all about roadside mowing. I don't, you know, Stephanie, I don't think it's in this report. It's on page 10. So don't mow invasive plants if your seeds have set, you know, and then page 10. Aries and fessive wild chervil should be mowed before the plant's bolt and give you a slaw. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mustards, garlic mustard and poison, be careful of poison ivy. That's a kind of, that's, is that what you're thinking of? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's in there. And that's something that we can use to help educate, yeah, cheat sheet. Oh, interesting. That's something that we could use to educate, you know, the road crew. She references that at the very end. Right. So appendix E, the quick cheat sheet on roadside mowing and callus. Yeah. So I thought that was, I mean, it's probably too late for this season, but it's something we should really take a look at and use next season. Yeah. And some of this we did. I remember we talked with Alfred about mowing knotweed and he was saying, well, you have to mow it where it's obstructing the right of way and etc. But anyway, I don't know what was done this year. Yeah. So I like the idea of a tree committee. And, you know, you guys, would somebody from the conservation commission be serving on it and then maybe post something? Yeah, I mean, I can sort of start, you started going, I asked Neil, Neil's, I mean, Neil would be the person to do it. He's a tree warden, but Neil's extremely busy right now with his family. Yeah. I would just want to make sure that they know they, you know, this committee meets. They need to follow the open meeting law. Really? Yeah. Oh yeah. That's, well, John has his hand up so I won't butt in. Go ahead, John. I was raising my hand. I wanted Sharon to butt in. Go ahead, Sharon. Beat him to the punch. I, are we talking about a committee of the Select Board or a committee that's a joined at the hip with the conservation committee to focus particularly on trees? I just want to make sure that we get, well, really clear about what we're talking about. Well, I mentioned, I think, I don't know. I don't know what makes the most sense. Whatever makes the most sense to you. How about a subcommittee of the, of the conservation commission appointed by the Select Board at the behest of the conservation commission? It's probably not going to be conservation commission members except maybe one or two. Right. Right. No, you guys could make recommendations and we would appoint, but they would then report back to you all. We're trying to keep things off our plate and keeping the hands of those with the greatest expertise. I don't know if you caught the drift of Sharon. That's what we're trying to do. Yeah. I think that's awesome. That, yeah. Well, and it gets more people involved. I think the idea that people who have an interest can get involved to focus just on trees and that's all they have to do. Yes. They don't have to serve on the conservation committee. They don't have to come to Select Board meetings. They just get to think about and talk to to talk about and talk to trees is a great way of letting people be involved in a way that's right for them. And they have the, like John said, they have the expertise, we know. Yeah. There's, you know, maybe, you know, somebody like Hasso Ewing, for instance, might be interested in a tree committee, but she doesn't want to serve on the conservation commission or something like that. It is a way to get more people involved, I think. Yeah. And I think the subject matter, and it sounds like fun, should be quite, yeah, it should be quite appealing to people in Calis. I would hope, you know, trees. We're all about trees in Calis. Yeah. Well, and I do, I think one of the places where you're going to want, where, you know, then there's these places I imagine like this hub, Judy's recording us on her phone, taking pictures, documenting. I am looking at the document. Okay. We're going to, one of the jobs that the Select Board does have to do is support you, whether it's in the conservation commission and the tree committee of in making sure that the link to the road crew and our road operations is really clear, because, you know, as we've kind of not been saying exactly out loud, but all of that excellent information is in there, and still it's, feels like October, only feels like October. It's September and we're all like, oh, the directions are right there. Yeah. Well, and I want, you know, I'm thinking that, you know, we could probably, when we get this committee, we can probably get Joanne Garten, she loves to come to Calis to come in and, you know, go over the report, make some recommendations. We could probably even get her, we did have her at one time at one of our dinners to do a brief presentation, but we could also probably get her to do some training with the road crew and let them ask her questions about invasives and cutting them and all that. I think she would do a great job in helping to educate them. Love that. We can buy them dinner. Yep. Anything else for Stephanie? Stephanie, do you have anything else? No. I just had a quick comment. Sorry, what? It's Rose. I had a quick comment today on Across the Fence on Channel 3 at noon. They had a whole segment on the Emerald Ash 4, so I don't know if you can go online and go to Across the Fence, but it was very informative. Was it an update on what's been going on in Vermont? Was it just information? Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Yep. And I didn't know there were three different kinds of ash trees. One is black ash, and I don't remember the other two. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah. And they said the number one culprit for the transmission is cut firewood and that they can only migrate. I think he said one to two miles a year, the bug itself. It's firewood. So yeah, it was on Across the Fence today. It was pretty good. I should actually give you a little bit of an update of what's happened here in Calis. We were given, you know, those big purple trap lights? Oh yeah, the trap things. Yeah. So we got two, Calis got two, and we put them up. Scott Basage up near where Scott lives on Peck Hill. One was put up there, and Neil put one up in his woods. And they're very cool. They're very sticky. And then you put them together. They're big. And you put them together. And then there's a lure. It's some kind of odor that attracts. And that gets hung in it. And then it gets slung up into the tree and hanging over the tree. And then in six weeks, they both checked the bugs that were stuck and sent them to this woman at Forest and Parks, and then put it up again with a new lure, and then did it again. I think they're doing it about now, their second one. And I think they both said they didn't find anything. It was clearly an emerald ash borer, which is good news. But there were some questions of things. So they sent them off to Ginger and she'll tell us whether they're in. Anyway, so yeah, so as far as we know, nobody has yet seen them in Calis, which is really good news, but everybody says it's inevitable. Can we, before we, before we thank Stephanie and let her go, can we get really crisp on our next steps on tree committee? I'm trying to catch us when we do this thing of having a great conversation and throw around lots of ideas and don't, don't like write down next steps. So maybe they're in the minutes. Well, maybe they are. Maybe they're not. We would do Katie a favor if we got really clear on what we think next steps are. All of us a favor. So Stephanie, what do you think the next steps are? What do you need from us right now? And when are you going to come back with a report on where, on your progress? Well, what I was thinking was, what are we meeting again? We're meeting, I guess, in early October. The conservation commission would come up with, I guess a blurb, you know, something to put on front porch form and wherever else, describing what we think a tree committee would be and soliciting people who are interested to contact us and doing it as you suggested as a subcommittee, I guess a subcommittee as a committee of a committee, which makes a subcommittee. And then, you know, taking names, I guess I would do that or other people in the conservation commission getting names, people who are interested in talking with them and then setting up a meeting and I guess it's still going to have to be Zoom. And if you want people appointed, we would need to know, we would need to put that on an agenda to appoint folks to be on this subcommittee. Okay, so let me just make a note here. So we would solicit people and then we would tell you people who's interested. Is that what you're suggesting? Yeah, because if we have to appoint them, and then would you want to interview them? Not necessarily, but you know, if it's all people that you've vetted, we would, just your recommendations. If you have an information meeting, so people can have an opportunity to get excited about it and say, this is what I want to do, that's a good filter. Yeah. So Stephanie will bring names to the select board. Then we would appoint them. How many are you thinking you want? Five, seven? I guess you're going to wait to see what's interest you get. I have no idea, but you know, it's interesting. Our experience on the conservation commission, you know, we could have nine members and we have seven and we just work so well together and we've talked about it. You know, in fact, I mentioned to you, Denise, about maybe reducing the number officially to seven. We could do that or we just leave the positions vacant. Well, what happens sometimes is people express an interest and people that were not interested in having and it's very awkward. It actually happened and it was very awkward and so that way we wouldn't have to deal with that. You know, it's just because we really, it's a great commission and everybody work together and, you know, it's not that, you know, and I actually said to somebody who was interested, I said, we don't need any more retired lawyers. We need biologists. We need water quality people. We need science people because we've got several generalists on our commission already. So maybe we shouldn't close it. You know, maybe we should just kind of leave it open, but make it very clear the kind of person, the kind of expertise that we're looking for because, you know, DeAndreau used to be on the commission and she's a water quality expert and it was great having her. Yeah. So anyway, but in any event, I guess my point was that in a way smaller committees are better. On the other hand, you want enough people so you have diverse views. Somehow seven seems like a good number. I don't know what you... And to get back to the work. So this committee would develop an ordinance to present to the Select Board because there's a, we just have to remember when we do an ordinance, we got a process we have to follow. And no, I know, I don't know what would happen with the ordinance. That would just be that. And most people are not interested in ordinances. You know, that's not a lot of fun for most people. But you mentioned, you mentioned something about it. Well, no, it's a possibility. I said it's a possibility. And I think that the committee itself would, you know, decide what, you know, sort of what they want to do. I mean, I would encourage, you know, we could talk about that as a subcommittee of the subcommittee to work on. And maybe more than having its own standalone policy, which can or ordinance, which can get lost. Stephanie, you know, probably, or Denise better than I do, but isn't there some concept in Act 250 or development world where that expertise just informs the road policies and the, you know, other, the water, the conservation committee policies? Because part of what we're, we're doing and worrying about with tree health is how I have everything else we do affects it. So if you have a standalone policy that doesn't integrate with the other policies, it might not get you all the way there. And that's why it would be important to have some diversity. Right. And you're suggesting, Sharon, that it should be part of the charge of, of the tree committee, because they're the ones who would be working on all this other stuff. Is that what you're, all the other things that involve trees? Well, we would need, we would need a charge that is a good idea. So that the committee has some direction. And the charge could be something that the conservation commission drafts up. Right. But I was trying to address the, what Sharon was just talking about integrating and I wasn't, I wanted to make sure I understood. All I'm saying Stephanie, circles back to the conversations we've had here and then Rose and I met with, met you and Rose and I met to talk about that particular issue was tree health along our roads and how our road maintenance practices contribute to the decline of tree health. And all I'm saying is that I would be, and I'm saying this largely out of ignorance. So if I say something that's really stupid folks, don't go off and say, God, what was she thinking? Because I don't know. But what I'm saying is I would rather see the tree committee informing and really actively able to engage and bring its views and policies, you know, policies with a small p philosophies really to other work in the town, informing that work rather than busy, busy making its own policies or ordinances that then have to be carried forward and integrated. So integrating it from the beginning. Yeah, informing everybody else's work. Yeah. All right, it sounds like we got a good plan. So do we have a date that Stephanie's going to come back? I heard in November. Well, the conservation commission is meeting. I don't know when we're meeting the first Katie, are we meeting the first Wednesday of October? I think we are. So that's the seven. Yeah. And then we can talk about it then and then try to develop, I guess, a charge. Yeah, we would bring to you. But I mean, something that we can put out on. Now, do you want us to develop a charge and then put out something on front porch form? Or do you want us to develop a charge and come back to you to work on the charge? I think that the select board should probably look at the charge. Okay. So it's going to be a while. But the charge can be informed by those early adopters who get really interested right away. Yeah, I mean, if you know people already that are interested. I don't. No, what I'm all I'm asking is, should we do the charge and bring it back to you, draft the charge to bring it to you, and then solicit people and put. I think you guys have something of doing and who's interested. Yeah, I think it can be. I think it can be simultaneous. You guys do the charge. Yeah, that's what we're saying. To approve the charge. So I'm just asking you the sequence of things when you would approve it. I think prove the appointments that improves that we would improve the charge at the same time. Just keep it simple. This is a tree committee. Yeah. Yeah. It's not the nearer trials here. This is a tree committee. And we want the people who are stepping forward to formally ask to be appointed to have buy into the work that they're going to do. Okay, that makes sense. Okay. Okay. Anything else for Stephanie? Are you ready to move on? John? Just real quick. And this is kind of related to trees. If your tree committee as one of their first agenda items would also or would look at the placement of trees where they don't exist along lakeshores. We have roads like number 10 pond road where trees either don't exist, or actually we've recently removed them as part of our highway work. I think maybe in hindsight, that wasn't good. The select board didn't, but we've been made aware of that. And we're seeing erosion now where that vegetation. Tree care removed along number 10 pond. Well, my honest to brush. And But it's something that kept the erosion. Yeah, right. And so now we're seeing failures, failure points. At least that's what one of the residents in North Calus area said walking around that road. So I mean, we may want to look at vegetating, revegetating those kinds of areas in particular that area, with not only tall trees, but brush. You know, more roughly lower lying things that a plow could maybe skid over in the winter or shoot snow across the top of, but would would secure the roadside during times of runoff. Joanne might have even addressed that road. Um, she did. She has, there's a section in this report number 10 pond road. Yeah, where she made a bunch of recommendations. Yep, she did. So where in the report is that? I got the report up and just I think what page it's on, but it's in there. Okay. Well, that needs to be addressed. I'm hearing complaints from neighbors there. Yeah, that was on page 15. Yeah, but, you know, I mean, that really brings up an issue that Sharon was, you know, definitely alluding to, and that is the coordination, how, you know, we have the road standards aren't complied with, you know, I mean, we can do all the reports and work and everything, but I don't know how it all work. I don't know how to get it to all work together. I just don't know. You all know the frustration I have felt over the last years about the road standards. Well, we're working on making some changes. And part of it's personal, part of it's really just sort of institutional, like what do you do? How do you get the different branches of, right, town to work together? Well, we're working on making some changes and it's going into some into some new directions. So you think there's more hope? Yes, I do. And yeah, I think that, well, part of how we do it is we keep Stephanie as we don't lose hope and we keep putting the expectation forward. And that's kind of what I was saying earlier. I would want, I actually want you guys to have in your charge that you will work with the idea that your product is integrated into road maintenance practices. Is it just me or did everybody freeze up? No, I think that's what we're all saying. Stephanie's frozen. We're trying to make some changes and implement some new ideas. So there she is, there she is. We're working to make some changes and implement some new direction and some new ways of doing things. That's about, I think that's as much as we can really say right now. Joanne Garton's report, Stephanie on page 17, it has a link to it. There are best practices for managing vegetation along lakeshores, where roads trend along lakeshores, I'm guessing streams too. So we may already, beyond our local road, callous road standards, we may also be not really meeting the objectives, I'll say, of the state municipal roads general permits. Well, that's another issue because I know, you know, I mean, I certainly was interested, I was reading the road standards that you guys approved last February or January or something and, you know, in it, for instance, they talk about not allowing, you know, when the grading is done, when they do grading, don't create little berms along the edges of the roads. Now that says that in the road standards, we've been trying to get them not to do that, because it means when they're after they grade a road and it creates a little berm along the edge, a little, we're talking about little, you know, but it's a little, it's tall enough so that it channels the runoff into the road, which is the opposite of what the goal is, the goal is to get it to sheet flow into the woods or into the fields, you know. Now the state is now saying it has to be done and it's still not being done. So, well, that was one of the things you said you were going to do for us is to look at that. So thank you. Well, it's not only grading, just to be clear, it's plowing all winter and putting material on the sand on the road throughout the winter. And then when that the next snowfall comes, that gets plowed off and it builds up a berm. And so in the past, you know, the first complaint was by Toby and Alfred was that those berms are building up and are developing. And the same issue that you brought up, Stephanie, is that the water cannot be channeled off the road surface to the side, to the shoulders. So we need to pull those berms in and we were getting blowback for doing that. And now the subsequent to that after they implemented that policy to pull that material back to the middle, because that's actually good gravel, he now Toby then told us they can't do that because it pulls in vegetation, which makes it hard to grade evenly. So and I'm guessing that's why they've stopped doing that. But that was a good methodology. Well, it's now in the state required. It's not just the police requiring it. It's in those state standards. So well, and the other thing, like a number 10 pond road, when you have a situation like that, there's no way the sheet flow from a center point to the outer edges, both directions. You need to pitch the road away from the pond to the other side of the road. So it's uniform across its surface. There's all kinds of road and that's not been done there of late. So maintenance is done. So, you know, what else is new? I mean, anyway, my only point was that it's actually actually stated in the states standards now, not just in calluses. And, you know, I observed at this summer, same thing. This isn't the winter. This isn't plowing. This is simply grading. And they grade out as far as they can go. Why they make the road as wide as they possibly can with grading. And then they leave this little berm and all the water runs into the road. Yeah. So Stephanie, this is this is really good. And I and I, but I also want to say, let's not treat this as our conversation at the board about how our standards compared to the state. I'm just was pointing up. No, it is, but, but we want to make sure that we have a really like, you know, on the agenda and more formal. And I saw your note to follow up on the road, meeting you and Rose and I had a few weeks ago, and that's probably part of what's on your mind. So, yeah, yeah. I think that having having something where we, yeah, just we should focus on that for its own sake and have another conversation about it. Okay, it would be good to have the comparison and point out that. And I think the state in large part took, because they liked our road standards when we adopted them, because they were better than theirs. And they mentioned that. And I think that in large part, probably some of those standards that they now have are because of the work that was done here. Well, that would be nice. That would be interesting. I do. I think that that's that's the story and we're sticking to it. Right. Well, they also told us that we were way ahead. You know, when they started, you know, all of this, you know, keeping the phosphorus out of the lakes and the streams and everything else. And, you know, all the general permit stuff, you know, they said to us, we're way ahead. We were way ahead because we already, theoretically, we're implementing a lot of the stuff that the state is now requiring. Right. Yeah. I'm going to I'm going to take a give myself a break. Um, are you are you all set, Stephanie? Or I'm done. Okay. Great. Thank you, Stephanie. This is Stephanie. This is very encouraging. Thank you. Thanks, Stephanie. Um, does anybody else need to take a break? Or can we talk about, um, IT? Cliff. Yeah, I can go into it unless people need a break. I think people can take a break as they need it. Okay. Uh, let me check something here real quick. Did you want to go town hall first since that's next? Oh, yeah, I'm sorry. I missed that on the agenda. Yes. Town hall. Okay. So, um, in the folder for today's meeting, there is the revised latest draft of the proposed management agreement that the friends is presenting to the board. And I'm hoping everybody will take some time to go over it. And hopefully when we next meet, we can approve it and answer any questions you might have. So you want me to make sure for the next meeting if we have time? Yes. You know, I realized everybody hasn't had a chance to read it for this meeting, but I wanted to get it out there so that by the next meeting, hopefully everyone will have had a chance to read it and we can approve it. We have said that, you know, it's not urgent because we're not holding any functions at the town hall. But there are some questions that have come up as to who's doing what at the town hall. And I think if we can get this agreement into place, it'll help solidify who has what roles should Judy or Barbara have a question about something going on at the town hall, who they should turn to. Any questions before I move on to the next item? Hearing none. Okay. The stove and the refrigerator have been installed at the town hall. However, there's a hiccup on the stove. They supplied us with the wrong power cord. So John, LaCalla is working on getting the correct cord and then he'll wire that up and actually plug the stove in. But they're in place. They look nice. Next thing I had to inform the board about is I think everyone received a copy of the invitation to the Friends of Annual Meeting, which is due to take place on September 24th at 10 a.m. It's primary. The primary purpose of this annual meeting is to elect board members for the Friends of Town Hall. But we also want to use it as an opportunity to promote what's been happening at town hall and what the vision is for the town hall going forward. One of the things we're going to feature at this meeting, and I hope everybody can attend, we will record it. So if you can't attend it, you can watch the recording, but there will be a virtual tour of the town hall. Yeah, it'll be, if it comes together according to the vision that we have, it'll be about five minutes long. Artie and Scott working with David and John to put that all together. And it looks like John LaCalla has agreed to narrate it for us. Nice. And yes, and that, that'll be great. I especially love the counters in the kitchen. Exactly. And it'll be a neat historical artifact for future caregivers of the hall. Can we put that on, can we, will we have the ability to put a link on the town website? Yes, we have discussed that and that is exactly what's going to happen. Great. But we will not premiere this video until the meeting. That'll be the world premiere. Yeah, yeah, the world premiere of the video. Coming back to this idea of electing board members, all of the existing board members who are part of the Friends Group now have agreed to be nominated and will serve if they're elected. We have divvied it up so that there'll be some members with a one year term, other members with two years terms, so that we're not having to elect a whole new board every year. But we are also actively soliciting people in the community, if anyone has ideas of someone who might be a good person to be a member of that board. We encourage you to let us know or reach out to that person just for the invitation that Barbara sent out and say, hey, if you're interested, this is what's going on. Any questions on any of that before I move on to the next item? No, it all sounds great. Great. The painting. Grady has completed the manual stage of scraping any of the building that needed to be scraped. He's now doing it with a tool that he has, a special tool that's designed for stripping. And I mean, just for us. What's that? You mean as a tool he designed just for our job? No, no, this is a professional piece of equipment that is very expensive. I've seen it. It's really sweet. They can just take it along one of those laps on the side of the building and strip it completely down and bare with just in the length of time, it takes you to move your hands across the board and can get right up to the window frames. So you'll see some major portions of the building exposed and then painted shortly thereafter, primed and painted. Something interesting Grady shared with me is the Vermont main rep for Benjamin Moore came by to check on the status of the project and the work Grady was doing and gave him a very enthusiastic thumbs up that he was following their processes to a tee, which means the warranty that Benjamin Moore offers will be honored. Wow. Yeah, he's really good. Yeah, it was really nice to hear that. And yeah, he's run into a few hiccups mainly in terms of the weather that have slowed him down a little bit. So we don't know if we're finished by the end of this month, but we'll be pretty darn close. Good. So yeah, okay. So by the end of this month maybe, so I won't have to worry about for election season again. Hopefully not. There may be some final touch up pieces and whatnot going on, but as before he'll work around the schedule if need be. Right. Okay. Any other questions on any of that? No, it sounds great. Okay. Thank you. Then I will segue into an IT update. And I'm glad Judy is still here because the first thing I had to report is we, Judy and I participated in a review and assess meeting with RB Tech. This was something that RB Tech actually proactively arranged so we could discuss the overall success or any issues that might have arisen with the installation of the server. All around it was, it was everyone pretty much felt it went pretty smoothly and nice thing about it is we also came in under budget. Yay. Probably about 60% of what was budgeted is what we actually ended up spending. That's good news. Now, are all the issues fixed like Sandra was having some continuing problems, remember? Right. Those issues are separate. Those are more issues of any issues with the installation and migration to the new server have been dealt with. But the bigger issues that remain at large is still the lack of bandwidth at the town office. And I definitely want to drop a bug into everybody's ear on the board because as we face more and more requirements migrating into a fully digital age, it's going to become more and more of an issue. And it's something we will have to come up with a plan for addressing. Is the digitization of all those records that Judy is getting done an issue for people to be able to get online and search? Those will live on a different server that has nothing to do with the issues at the town office. Okay. Good to know. But what are even the options? Well, not ready to have that full discussion yet. Okay. But I can tell you it may be that it would make sense for us to tell the cable company that if they want this right away to put that line in that they need to plum the town office. I was thinking that when we got that application, now we have a contact. Right. That effectively is what it is. We may have to look at the possibility of doing that. And it would be a couple of different ways that that could take place. Maybe it's organizing a team within the community so that it's not just the town office that benefits from this, but other people in the area who might be able to benefit from it. Or it may be something we get a quote and get some other options. Like the one of the things RB Tech and talk to us about is the possibility of getting a decent Wi-Fi signal. I'm sorry, decent cellular signal in there so we could basically create hot spots that would alleviate some of the issues and give us more time in the hopes that be it a solution like the Starlink program or the fiber options that are being discussed can come to fruition. That's why I say it's kind of premature for me to be able to answer that question completely before you share. I don't know what you know about this, but I don't know if there's any COVID money available in terms of assistance to towns like they're providing that to farmers. There is fiber optic. I understand as we all learned based on the Dirigible to Kent corner, I think the WAC substation. I'm wondering what it would take to run it. It's not that long a distance from there down the hill to the town office. Office is the office complex and you know, is there are there federal monies available to fund that maybe almost on the short notice. I know they got to be expended whatever they have by end of December. My understanding is they don't know how to spend it all. They're looking for ways. Just wondering. Well, Judy sent an email that she got from, I can't remember now, about some money. I think you sent it today, Judy. Yeah, it was like a rural grant or something. For municipalities and businesses, I think it was maybe 10% or something. It's 10%, excuse me, potentially covering up to 10% of the cost of getting a broadband solution. That's not much. No, this time of COVID, you would think with all these schools and everybody else trying to work remotely that there would be more money set aside through this federal money to do these things. Yeah, the state at large is looking to see if they can utilize some of those funds for as exactly what John was alluding to. There are, I've talked to a few people in town, David Healy being one of them, about what options realistically exist for us that could get us results sooner rather than later. And unfortunately, there's not a lot of them. So these two options that I've suggested are what we have to look at first. And neither one of those I envisioned happening before the end of the year. But never say never. So I will be, Denise and I have re-initiated meetings with the office staff that will occur. The Wednesday. Right. And consequently, this is an issue that came up in one of those meetings. And it's something that we're going to be visiting over with the office staff and start identifying people who might be able to take a lead in driving this project. But I just wanted to put it out there so the select board could be aware of it. So can I ask, are we done with this? Because I have a question about Seacoast. Yeah, you can go ahead. I hadn't covered everything I wanted to cover on IT, but go ahead. Are you sure? Yeah. Okay. So I still keep getting calls from Seacoast. Same call. Same thing that the system hasn't responded and done their daily. When they try to do the daily check, the system doesn't respond. How are we fixing that? Well, there's still some questions as to how we can do it. The shortest, quickest solution is to pay to have a second phone line coming to the building. What we're hoping is once we get the backup system hooked up that we can tap into that and utilize the second internet connection that's available at the town office to serve as a second communication line in place of the second phone line. But there's some other voodoo involved with that. And so the first phase is going to just finish getting the backup system up and running and making sure there's no hiccups there. We're hoping to be able to do that this week, actually. And is that function getting a new and upgraded phone system? We talked about getting the money through the COVID funding to upgrade the phone system at the town office. Yeah, that has no impact upon the Seacoast system. And we had talked to Nick about the possibility of doing something with regards to getting the second phone line. And Toby had been part of the discussion as well. That COVID money wouldn't pay our monthly phone bill. Oh, okay. It would just pay the phone bill, but not for the system. It wouldn't pay the monthly phone bill. It wouldn't pay the monthly phone bill. Correct. But it would pay for the upgrade to the phone system. It was not, we weren't certain that it would cover that, bringing a second line in for an alarm system. Yeah, okay. It was hard to tie that into, oh, we have to do this because of COVID. True. So if we need to stop those phone calls, then we would stop them as soon as possible, Denise, then that would be the shortest route would be to install the second phone line. And that ends up running the town, what, probably an additional $60 a month. Well, my concern is, is that one of these times it's something's going to really be real with this Seaco stuff. And if it doesn't work for them to do the check-in, is it going to work if there's some real issue? It'll work. The purpose of the second phone line is if the first phone line goes out, it's a redundancy system. So the essential function of the alarm system is there. And the ability of the system to call out is there. If there was some event that knocked out the phone line to the town hall, chances are it would knock out the second line as well. In other words, somebody hits the telephone pole and the lines break. Yeah, okay. But it is a redundancy that they built into the system that you can't turn off. The only way we could turn it off is to disable the entire alarm. Clearly, we don't want to do that. Okay. Yeah, yeah. No, I mean, it's okay if they call. I, like I said, I just worry that if it's something real, that it's just nice that it's not going to work. Like there's a fire, heaven forbid. Right. It's a different signal that goes out if there's a fire. And Toby monitors it as well. Yeah. So he can differentiate if there's a real issue or not. Okay. Any other questions on that? I just want to note for follow up that I didn't realize you guys were meeting again with this town office staff. So not in the middle of IT and probably not even time tonight, but that would be good to hear more about. Yeah, we just, we just barely, we haven't really done much. We just barely reinstituted it, Sharon. And this was the first select board meeting we've had since we opted to do that. We just, what drove it really is, you know, after the election, we wanted to touch base and see how everybody was doing. And so Judy came back from vacation and we said, Hey, do you guys want to talk to us? Because we haven't done that in a while. And Sandra and Judy and Barbara all said, yes, please. And we appreciate it very much. All right. Anything since I interrupted you to talk about CCOS, what else did you have? I pretty much covered it just talking about the status of the backup system. Okay. And then I noticed on the section for IT update, you included a bullet point for website. Denise, I wasn't sure. I was just thinking that sometimes when I'm looking around on the website, for instance, I wanted to see, look at a DRB decision, for instance, and they're not there. Do we have space available or how would that work? We could post decisions, not just the DRB, but... Denise, they are there. If you go to committees, DRB, and then over on the right, there's minutes and then there's a second sub area of decision. Huh, I didn't see that. I'll look again. Okay. A larger issue is that the website is really loaded with information and it hasn't been updated in 10 years or something. So it needs to overhaul and that's a major project. Yes, it is a major project. And we would need to hire probably somebody to do that. Okay. And then the other thing I had on there was Cliff spends a tremendous amount of time and I know he says he doesn't mind, but I'm suggesting that we look at upgrading our Zoom account to one that other folks, and we would have to say who, like the chair of the planning commission, conservation commission can set up a Zoom call themselves and Cliff doesn't always have to be there so that people can do it independently. It would save everybody time. Absolutely. And can you Cliff or Denise say a little more about how that works? Are we shifting Cliff does it all to having a central calendar or it's one of those? No, we'd get one of those accounts where lots of people are authorized and they all can be doing it at the same time, right? Because I know that there was an issue with we had a meeting or something and planning commission had a meeting and you couldn't do two at the same time, but and I've talked to Cliff about this and he says that there's a way to upgrade our account. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it's a no brainer. How much is it Cliff? Well, that's the part that we should pause on. Right. I haven't gotten the quote for what it would cost the least expensive way to do this and it may be sufficient for our purposes simply to purchase another license. So it's the cost of a year of Zoom. Isn't now didn't they agree though that some of the COVID money could pay for this now? Yes. Originally, they said no, but now they've said it can. Nick is telling us that that's a possibility. Yeah. Rather than go to a full enterprise account, which would definitely be a lot more expensive. If you think about pre COVID days, there was the calendar on the website and the committees all knew what nights they met and they kind of worked out a schedule so that two committees weren't trying to use the town office the same evening. And I think that still exists that a second license would allow us to get around that. Every once in a while, the select board needs to schedule a special meeting and that's when we ran into the problem with the planning commission because we ended up meeting on a Tuesday night for whatever reason. And that knocked the planning commission out of commission as it were. And we can identify who most likely would need to use this and give them access. We just call it the team call us guest account or something like that. And I would train the appropriate people from the different committees who would need it primarily. I'm thinking it's going to be the the DRB and the planning commission and conservation and the conservation commission and cemetery at some point when it's too cold to meet outside in cemeteries. Right. Exactly. Unless they get really rugged. But yeah, we could accommodate. I'm pretty much convinced we can accommodate the needs with just a single additional license. So yeah, I'm all for it. I think there's a lot better uses of close time and talents than running Zoom meetings. I mean, it was great when we were all on the learning curve, but we're over it. So I was I just pulled up the pricing. We're probably on the $150 a year license right now. That sounds right. And then to go up to a small and or a medium sized business, which let's assume that that gets us that, you know, multi link or multi start or whatever. That's $2,000 a year. So, so if I don't need any more information, I'm ready to make a motion that we authorize another Zoom account and let Cliff run with it. Second. Any more? Any other comments? No, sounds good. Yeah. All right. You ready to vote, Sharon? Aye. Okay. I'm an aye. John. Aye. Cliff. Aye. Rose. Aye. Great. Good. Thank you. Thank you. And that I think was it for IT. Great. So thank you, Katie and Rose for your work on the appointment stuff. Denise, before we go to that, can we just let me just make one loop back on one quick item. We jumped over it and we didn't say we said out loud, but I want to make sure Katie captured that we are essentially tabling, deferring the curb cut for Memorial Hall parking lot. You got that in the minutes. Thank you. And the ROW as well. Yeah. That we actually like actually stopped and discussed it. So thank you. Cliff. Yeah. I just wanted to point something else out to Sharon, when you stepped away, I had mentioned that the revised agreement, management agreement from the friends of Palace Town Hall is in the folder of today's meeting. Okay. And I'm asking all the select board to review it and hopefully we can approve it at our next meeting. Okay. Got it. Thank you. We have someone wanting to join us. Okay. Fred. Oh, that's Fred Duplisi. I had asked him about talking with us about this new executive order, FICA executive order, but it's really personnel related. So I was hoping we could go into this executive session to talk about several things, one of them being this executive order happened to do with FICA. Fred, are you there? Oh, there he is. I am. You're in the shadows. Yeah, I'm not sure what's going on, but I am here. Can you hear me? Yep. So I just, these last three other updates will be like, unless there's a lot of questions, I just want to do three little updates, two of which are just to put them on our radar. You remember the hitching post project that was going to start and there was going to be a place in Atomat for pickup and all that. That's really been put on hold because of COVID. We had an expense related to that though. There was some kind of a grant and there was an assign, which the sign post can still go in, but the actual enactment of hitching posts where people sign up for rides is not going to be happening for a while because of COVID. So yeah, so set another way. We incurred the expense and we will recover the grant to cover that expense, but we're not getting the project. Which is fine. I just want to make sure that we don't get stuck in between. We spent the money and we don't get it back. No, they have the state being they have put this on hold. But but we get the grant that covers the expense that we incurred. Yes. Okay. And the other two items are I just want to, you know, it's September 14th. I just want to put it on everybody's radar that we're going to be needing to start planning and meeting to talk about the next budget. And also with all this COVID, how we're going to look at what's what's town meeting going to look like. And I know Brattleboro did one recently and Barbara sent around a clip and an article when the Brattleboro reformer think it was Brattleboro about how it worked. So I just want to put that on everybody's radar to start thinking about. So that's that's it on that.