 Good evening. I like to call Monday September 11th 2023 regularly scheduled Berlin select board to order rescheduled from September 4th because of the holiday With us tonight is to my right is to our Nelson acting town administrator and select board member and Joe Stobb And Brad Towns this also is Diane Isabelle our town treasurer In addition to changes to the agenda to arm none public comment hearing none Slick board appointments to the fire department merger steering committee Mr. Chairman we've received Five Letters of interest for the steering committee Michael Sweeney Matthew Romai Janet Richardson who's here tonight Gary Olett and Nick Carbat Carbassik Carbassik Carbassik I recommend all five four included on the committee And how many were we looking for for the committee seven looking for seven correct? So well that does not include the select board member if we choose to have one on there and I Leave someone additional opening Which we would like to ideally like to see somebody with from the business community out there Okay, I guess I'll make that a motion Um here a second I'll second Any further discussion? I did reach out and talk to Peter Kelly Kelly And I don't know if he really will meet your criteria for business, but he does have a business and he is a town resident as well So I'm not sure if he's still interested or not Okay Any else on this Those in favor of the appointments? Hi. Hi Motion carries Discussion of steering committee expectations So I included in your packet Just some quick questions I have And this is by you know, no means comprehensive or Or anything They should look at but just kind of give them some Ideas would start looking for you know, I guess first of all, you know, should the merger even occur Yes or no if no You know what steps can we take To improve the future resiliency of the department Including any possible improvements to the stipend program or are you going to take another step further to an actual Type of wage or something like that. I think that's be important But if the committee feels that the merger is a good idea and should proceed then You know a lot of questions about how we'll be accomplished doing it a charter change and ordinances and policies and All sorts of things like that. So I think it's just a starting point for the You know the committee to start looking at and uh, I'm sure more things will come up As they go along Yeah, so I think you you have your policies You have your town policies and the department also has policies and I'm thinking you know one's going to be Should adopt one or the other type thing Because you have personnel policies of which we currently have your for the town Yeah It'll be a little different matrix. I mean it will be good, you know, because you're relying so much on volunteers thing we do as a town and I guess my biggest issue I want to maintain is if You know, we we stick with the volunteer department or a hybrid department That we recognize and continue The legacy of the volunteers that that founded this department and I don't want them to be lost if we go to like a hybrid model or something You know, we've talked about some other departments where you know, they kind of had this hybrid model and They ended up not treating the volunteers well and that's definitely want to avoid that we're We always have been always will be very dependent on our volunteers for very thankful for our volunteers um And all the hours they put in the formal training the it was almost every Tuesday night You've got something going on all the calls. They're getting up at two in the morning um Nights that they got to be up at seven o'clock to go to work or whatever. I mean they put a lot of time in And all along throughout the year and like to recognize that and maintain that and thank them for You know, I think one of the things that are is I'm missing here is You know, who are they going to be basically answering to? And and for decisions to be made The fire department and this cannot necessarily wait two weeks for a select board That that's that can be tough in some situations Just to be noted Or be able to take that no matter what year structure would still be to the chief Much like the police department, right And you know somebody who's uh, if if it was to become a talent entity. Yeah You know and purchasing something or maintaining something Can't necessarily wait For the approval of the select board Two weeks down the road On some things. Yeah so Well funny you mentioned that because the purchasing policies later on the agenda tonight and you may have to I mean they want to they may be one of the policies will have to change in the future again to To accommodate that Just a question like Is there an expectation from the board on like how often this group is is going to meet? You know or that kind of thing I would say Leave that up to the community as far as How often you can get together and That's going to be they are going to have to be public meetings So they are going to have to be warned and you know agenda and everything like that, but I can help you with that and Hope vince on the hook for when it comes back One of the easiest ways I think is to put a deadline on it to have a decision by a certain time Then the committee can meet as often or as they Deem necessary to meet the deadline but I'm not Really in favor of telling the committee that they have to meet every Other monday As long as the work is done So I think in in that case it would it would be like helpful You know for for the board to to know, you know those those acts like the expectations of you know Should it occur, you know, the whatever the questions are that need to be answered like so that you know, we could Have those documented And you know then Then I think that would help That would help the committee figure out possibly how often we need to meet Okay, anything else on the steering committee expectations That's all I have Um Widow moses road driveway There are some photographs in your packet And a couple of emails Can I pass around some photographs sure sure Please stick your name for the record please. My name is Larry Perry. I live on This is Tom Lawson. It's his culvert that They don't seem to want to replace put back in the place. I mean all the publics are up there This is the town culvert That's plugged up if you want to take it pass around or something That was plugged up This is a picture of it being exposed And when it gets plugged up it sends all the water down the left hand side of the road That's what it did To Tom's culvert And as you can see The culverts is sitting across the road on the bank Once they unplugged that culvert so the water to this is this is below that culvert that plugged up That's what that did sending all the water down where that water is supposed to go Across the road down by our neighbors out toward the woods Sends it all and this has happened before so So this is looking up the road To mr. Lawson's driveway looking up the road above Looking up toward the culvert So we're standing at mr. Lawson's driveway and looking up the road right this is the town culvert right here And it's supposed to go across the road and out to the field And it failed and did this and then of course it came down and washed my driveway out Okay, I guess I'm misunderstanding why it wasn't done along with the ones that were Done up there Or why they weren't done at all So there are other driveway culverts that were replaced up there. Well, not necessarily washed out I mean I talked to uh Al down the road and I said was your culvert washed out He says it wasn't washed out, but they did have to do some work on the ends filling in everything Okay And I'm not sure about Rob the log cabin did uh you guys You paid for The the landscaping company put it in. Yeah, I was going to ask her about that Yeah But When the reason the only reason that happened is because the culvert above plugged up So they're taking the water across the road Took the hole And it's it's done that before are you Tim? So okay, so what in your eyes did you see? A lot of wood woods debris come out of the woods from up above there And plug that culvert off at the head the culvert was perfectly fine commission As far as water going through it, but there was logs and sticks and leaves and everything else that came down out of the woods And plugged ahead of the culvert Same as it was everywhere Everybody that was involved in that that day Knew how much water was coming out of everywhere. I mean, it's not the only one down We had numerous culverts that were pulled logs and sticks everything that came out of the woods Was just shoved into the culverts and then everything downstream from that was either gravel Or eight inch ditch in the stone And then it just And once one goes It's just a domino What size did we replace that culvert up off now? Okay, it's a 30 inch culvert in there now. What was it? I mean 18 crossing the road FEMA standard Can I just add that I've been up there for 25 years And this road has washed out numerous times Four or five I don't could have been more And I have never touched my driveway The 25 years I've been out there and every time it's washed out I've never touched my driveway town has always fixed it always And you know if they only had an 18 and then there they Even if I'd gone out and cleaned the logs and things out of the woods It probably wasn't big enough to handle it. So now they've put in a 30 So it's our standard for driveways 18 inch Yep And we had an 18 going across the road It's also a trickle Most times of the year Is it not There's hardly any water comes out of there on a normal normal year, right? Barely any water Maybe a six inch this is happening more six inch drink You also have to realize I wasn't here But what happened before I don't know any history of or anything like that Okay, now that you're here the rules change. I don't get my driveway fixed after a flood All I know is our policy states that we don't fix driveways and driveway culprits that were brought up I follow what I have for rules You said that you were going to come here and do this right and I said if they'd say Or anybody above me says they to go We will be there. Okay, so I'll turn to you guys my rebuttal is Is we haven't done any of the ones that weren't Prevident for us to get by To fix their open above there We didn't you know, I mean, but none of them are washed out like this one. No No, did you or did you not say that those were not my culverts their private? No, those what the ones across the road. Yeah, those are your culprits. They were halfway down the road Who do they belong to you? They came out of your driveway call. I never put them in See because you weren't here. So you don't know well, they're still your driveway culprits. Like it's your driveway. It's your culvert And it's your responsibility to maintain your driveway. We have a policy in place I don't know if anybody has a copy of that policy, but yeah, nothing. I got just to let you all know So we I wasn't anything yet or have you ever freeze it? Have you had any conversations with me yet? They're likely to cover it or didn't think we were going to have to about this without by the town to take care And I think you still have time The file is counting down quick. But yeah, I would recommend going that way So maybe you could use these photos to FEMA to show them what the I mean, that's what I've heard if you don't want to apply to FEMA you want to have photographs, definitely But I know always I spoke with the gentleman below me of the What's his name like french guy during mark mark during? Yeah Yeah He he repaired his yeah, he doesn't let anybody do anything for him. That cost him $14,000 Well, yeah, he had that landscaping outfit out of Burlington. It's going to cost him $14,000 They did the lawn the same time down over when he told me They paid for that to be done. Yeah, it looks expensive That was so choice to hire those people. What's the word here? So we're looking at taxes went up this year Now we're looking at we got to do a call Burton well, I wouldn't suggest or recommend as first get a hold of FEMA and See if they can do anything for you And if they can't Then Well, you're doing that. We'll take a look into if Just put the policies iron will send you a copy But what you do understand that even if we do the work you're going to be our lowest priority So it's going to be you know at this point November or later before we even get around to a we still got 24 roads We need to fix Those are much more important than one individual driveway And I don't care about any fuel oil or anything else needs to be delivered You've got to understand where you are on the totem pole and you are very low Right, so you'd be you know, I mean other people getting the driveways repaired right now They're not waiting around on the town. So if you don't want to wait on the time And I already suggest, you know, you call FEMA as soon as you leave here I think they're still I think you'd call them 24 hours a day And you'll be working on them I can't haul it, but I do have filth that can be put in your driveway You're welcome to it We're digging out the brook Because it's flooding into the field So we have some brook gravel Looking to get rid of I can't sell it because that's the way the state structured the removal You can have it You just have to figure out some way to truck it If you get one ton trucks, I might even be able to supply a skid steer to load it Oh, we got to have a loader too Oh, I like I said, if you depending on the truck, I may be able to load with a skid steer I need to get it out of the way so the broken flow is supposed to Well, I was thinking maybe we just sell the culvert, seeing as there are hours and just fill the hole We don't get water unless the culvert above the plug So, yeah I don't get a lot of water, it might get a little You have access to your house right now Yeah, small path I can put my car up to But there's no way I can get emergency vehicles there Fuel oil Fuel oil Whatever, you know, so we got to do static go fund me plan It just kills me that I pay taxes to this place And I would Well, that's one thing we all get to do. Yeah, fun stuff. Okay. Yeah Okay, um Dodge farm road acceptance trial period Uh, I thought O'Connor was going to be here to know you're here Oh So this has been going on for a while And I've put in a Listing of the process so far And uh In march of this year we started a One year, uh, I guess you called a trial process with uh Taking over the town road And figure this was about six months into that year process be the time just to Give a status update and see what the next Steps will need to be. Um, I know there was some damage to the road and the floods that uh, they're still way down to be repaired and Grading that needs to be done But other than that, I also included a top the Kind of a listing of the process to go through to lay out and accept the town road Trying to recreate that From the record To me is is a little sparse So, you know trying to get everything in place for next march Which will be here before we know we've got uh, you know time meeting on that same time And potential charter change with the options tax. I just don't want anything to you know fall through the cracks at that time frame So trying to put this Scheduled together as what to expect and what we need to do moving forward Just out of curiosity, what was the damage to the road? and the Bless you um probably going up the hill Probably the worst of it was probably what turn is that turn three? Goes up nine or the first resident And so the water Cross the road it It went down through the corner did cross the road I guess but it was washing on the outside of that corner And you had the build-up of material that was carried down and then created a Fairly large wash out if not Crevasse running down through the the driving portion All right, and that's where it's out to describe it. Yeah And you guys filled that in and fixed that. No, we didn't you didn't you guys did okay today That's why I Okay The material didn't look very familiar For something that we use on the roads. That's why I was going wow, we should put that And a further complicate things Looks like you're basing this process On An acceptance reclassification of town highways policy That was drafted back in 2021 But I don't see was ever adopted And the town clerk doesn't have I included that at the very end of the of the packet So I was trying to figure out what the differences were The well, there's one in red Which is just the one page Okay, mine's not read anymore, but There the one page is Reactions completed haven't filled in And then further back to very last document in that packet is the Proposed unadopted policy So that's the one pager yet says, you know that Shut up and so shits, you know did this work this work, you know And things like that But Based on this policy that was never adopted So I guess my question is Is this policy something we want to move forward with on adopting? Or do you remember that it actually has been adopted and just never got recorded? I wouldn't know about that I didn't see anywhere in the minutes that it had been adopted or and rachel didn't have a copy of it in the vault So we started this process Prior to the new Prior to the draft And we had discussion about it It was agreed that we were going to be grandfathered in because I think us coming forward with The takeover led to a whole Discussion and some new like at that point we said well we've already started this process We have had any discussion and had preliminary work done So more agreed that we would be grandfathered in but they were going to move forward with their New proposed whatever but I don't think I never heard that it was adopted or accepted I don't remember And the version we were working off with that we started with was from 2011 Yeah, right And that would stand to reason that we wouldn't have Put a draft or have them follow the draft after the process is started No so But that is In fact what you ended up doing You know with this 12 month Trial period and everything like that Because the previous policy didn't didn't call for that You know you Accepted it and you met one on from there Well the 12 month policy that state I'm pretty sure that was uh That was in the state ranks Well don taking over a Private road or a road I know I don't remember seeing that in the State records. I looked at I know it was something that was said about a 12 month It was When it was I remember I'm pretty sure that it was mentioned that it was a 12 month We could off We started adopting it. It was 12 months of Of the road Being used And then we had to make up our We had to take neither accepted or declined it at the end of 12 months Used and maintained Yeah Where that came from That was accepted by the association, right? The the 12 month Trial period But I mean the road If the road if the road held up in this last flood storm I mean granted Let me ask you this tim is that road any better or any worse than the other town road No, and I think I think the only reason that problem occurred is is that That one culvert that was ditched past when we did the walkthrough Then they ditched right past the inlet That's above the house above second Get reached this house and then that other house and there's a culvert just come up there Just the big lens right is that there's a culvert. There's a cross bike there and it was They ditched right past it. They clean. I don't know why or how they did it, but they cleaned the bottom end out and then ditched past The inlet and you know, I mean so that entails that the only cross bike on that side Is one of all Rachel's driveway. So that gets the entire Floor side of that hill from the culver sack to Rachel's and I Feel that if that one was open Half of the half of the water that went down there That's probably the only reason that that did what that did Is that culvert didn't take it on so that's easy fixable And just have to find the other end of it But there's there's still a berm to swill that Yeah And the water can go into the ground But I think it's just above the second the second resident on the right There's still a berm on the edge of the shoulder Not allowing the water to to make its way to the ditch I don't know if you you saw that when you went up I went up there I think if you put that grader up there and did those shoulders up through the whole width of the road If it would be in better shape than it is now At some point we'll probably get there So I think we're on track And to finalize the acceptance of the road We do have a statutory requirement To complete this with an or issue our findings and acceptance within 60 days of the public hearing and inspection Since we did not meet that from the last inspection which was October of 22 we will need to redo that um Which means we're going to be doing a site visit at the end of february In the snow or If we did at april if we did for april first and Had the paperwork ready for april first. Would that be acceptable? I think this is for what? You never know what's coming It might it might might be three feet of snow that day or it might be 90 degrees. You don't know Um And it doesn't have to be in a real depth site visit, but you know, you've already done that But for a matter of going through the steps We do need to you know to do the inspection and have the public hearing. So I guess My recommendation that I throw it is is that we plan for that being a april first And and we do have to warn that we do have to we do have to notify the planning commission of what we do Do have to publish it in the paper and all these other steps and that we work off that april first date and If for some reason we need to change it we can change it But um, you know, I'm just the other things. I don't know how long I'm going to be in this position And I I might not make it till 740 or 640 tonight Or I might be here for another 20 years. I don't know but in case i'm not here I don't want to have the steps in place. Excuse me That whoever Everything's ready to go and they can just go with that, you know, robert. You know, I like to Plant things I like to have things thought out in advance. So that's just kind of what I'm Doing here with this. I didn't mean to scare anybody You know that we're bringing it up But I guess we'll proceed with the april first date and we'll go from there because there's also the Traffic ordinance will need update to include speed limit and stop science and stuff And they will have everything ready to go April 1st and And they'll be done with this and it'll be a town road Okay Anything else on this? Okay, thank you all very much Uh culvert purchase darling in junction road So, uh Semid mentioned this at the last meeting needs two culverts The anticipated Cost was going to be 50,000 between the two So he reached out A couple of bidders and See we gotta we gotta talk about economic development. Let's talk later Okay, sure And tim son's checking this basically all going to be from the same contractor anyway, so I'll have to state bid our state contract Um, so I guess Tim, what is your recommendation? So, yeah, I reached out to a couple different people turned out that During the buy most all our culvert from Johnson hardware. They're the best price that we can get around here for what we use I reached out to them got a price I was looking somewhat of the original price was then You guys asked for some extra pricing so I called to try to get a hold of a company in New York They returned my phone calls They got a little company out in New Hampshire They spoke with him in the end of last week and then again this morning It turns out that's where the pipes coming from from Johnson hardware And it's the same price so Doing the two of them they talked it out So it's the same price and they're gonna not check just for you they're gonna drop the shipping charges of it because Of the business that we do at Johnson hardware and because it's kind of one in the same coming out of the company had a The company in the Hampshire is the broker for the company in Massachusetts does the pipe large diameter pipe, so And that's where Johnson hardware is If I'm going to come for the same it's the same pipe coming from the same company. So both places with the same price and I talked with all of them today and they said that they would not charge the shipping price that I haven't shipped up here. So Rough estimate now With 100 feet pipe and the vans that go with it It's just shy of 35,000 What size is that is that pipe 30s? 83 by 57 7 foot pipe But it's a squash plate even three inches across the bottom against that 57 inches top We're on junction road cycle I'm just past Bartlett hill that culvert collapsed during the flood One end round the other ones and that's a six foot pipe on there two foot on one end the other end collapsed in And And then it was down at the bottom What's the pipe under here? Right there with mr. Ferris trailer Caused it to wash out So I would Recommendation on this Motion to purchase I'll move the repurchase from Johnson hardware in accordance with the Stick contract your second second any further discussion? All those in favor high high motion carries DRS RF loan resolution adoption of our system Previously the town had applied for and received funding for a Water system asset management plan Uh, this was similar to the Waste water asset management plan that was completed this past spring This would be on the water system the town's received Grant for 37,950 dollars from the state revolving fund and I've got the Resolution paperwork to adopt it and move that we adopt such paperwork Here second second any further discussion Hearing none all those in favor high motion carries Uh police department expungement request So, um Another let me try to be polite here um grand idea from the state legislature Am I doing a good job so far? I'm not sure where it's gonna end up Um Is that uh multitude of previous violations arrests and convictions can now be expunged from the police record and Towns receiving a multitude of these requests Uh, about a dozen 10 to 12 a day With current backlog with about 300 of these expungement requests Uh, creating a quite a bit of a backlog um It's um Maybe just for a little clarification. So when we get an expungement request From the state that means we have to go back through our files in our system And wait out any record of that case That includes going into our computer system Going into our fingerprint and photo files Any hard copies we might have all that has to be cleared out. So sometimes this is a simple thing You know, if it's a one day of jaffa dating that happened 15 years ago when there was no paperwork It's not a difficult process The body was working a case And this is on top of all the other Phone calls and the normal people coming in and stuff. So Chief and I thought that was a good idea to let her dedicate some time to it and If she wants to come in on overtime on the Saturday and do it, um, you know, I told him that's fine I don't want in any way to me. This is The lowest priority type thing, but you know, some of these are coming from a judge. We kind of don't like to upset judges too much Even though I think this is a stupid I'll tell you if you um, I'm still being polite Dave process from the state and Um, you know, they're pushing it down our throat with no funding or support or anything like that If I said it's totally voluntary I'm not I'm not asking her to do this on her weekend But if she wants to come in and do it on weekends and overtime, I'm perfectly fine with that And it's not just us at all. These agencies are facing the same problem. Some have Made a specific person that that's all we do That's their job full time. Is there an expectation to have these cleared up by a certain Something for a turnaround time Well, I guess probably a motion to approve overtime for so moved Second any further discussion Is any of the stuff that they're working on is that something you wouldn't hire somebody to work with her As a temporary Right now she's managing but This is possible I guess the concern would be she knows the system. She knows a file so she can Right, I'm if if you don't have any experience in velcro spill men You know, you had you would have that learning curve on top of it If you find somebody who's retired from that type of position, they might be easier to step in They have to go through So somebody like you said already In the game Those are hard to find But you don't see an entity's coming in. No, I don't know what the motivation is the drive Catch up to her Everybody gets a clean slate Any other comments on this Hearing none those in favor. All right. All right motion carries Uh Lovers lane bridge local and regional input questionnaire So the state Uh Thank you chief. Thank you Has um Sun to say questionnaire Uh Regarding the project the lovers lane bridge fine After all these years Um, I included a copy of this in the packet. Uh, let you look over. I've also sent this to the planning commission and to uh, bavarnak who is our Regional planning transportation advisory committee Member uh further input on this. So I'll maybe let you take a look at this another next meeting Record any thoughts you have on this okay Purchasing policy review and adoption of dps required additions Uh, so the chief has identified some potential State funding For the body camera purchase we recently did and and that's filtering federal dollars down to us in the town And part of that process they looked at our purchasing and also our conflict of interest policies And the state felt it did not meet this federal requirements Uh for receiving federal funds. So using the We can probably combine both of these agenda items and into one. Uh, so made From the vlct Uh, model policies incorporating the required federal language Into both of these documents. Um, the other thing really done in the purchasing policy Is increased The threshold for the sealed bids from the current $5,000 mark to $10,000 it's been $5,000 for Probably at least 10 years if not even longer and just in the course of inflation and everything else It's probably time to bump that up So I I do recommend approval of both of these policies and I will make that motion to approve the purchasing policy and the policy regarding conflicts of interest and not to go conduct For the town of berlin as presented second Any other discussion on this? I only have one thing and I forgot the doctor told about it today was in there I don't know if it makes a difference not with It's technically not my job title. My job status highway superintendent Don't know if that changes anything Because it says foreman This is superintendent. No, that was my only question was is that does that? Well, that caused a problem somewhere down the line Only if you want to buy something So I amend my motion to amend job title to Superintendent Here a second second Any other discussion on this? All those in favor Hi Hi Motion carries Are you voting? I have to okay It's got it. It's got to be a three zero vote pass. Yep Or three anything Town meetings special appropriations application review So uh, rachel came up with this, um, I include a copy in their packet. Um She's receiving some calls and inquires already about the town meeting appropriations and Didn't feel that it went quite as smoothly last year As we would like with uh, you know new people and everything so she's come up with this um handout that uh, we can send to all the uh, potential Organization seeking funding that basically states our policy and the process to send in a request If it's level funded from the previous year or if they're needing To go the Petition route and that uh, I have this ready to go For this coming town meeting So what was Rachel looking here to change? Uh That's just being changed in the process. It's just it's just this cover letter Letting everything out the you know the dates And the process for everyone's just an information sheet. Yep Okay No actions needed and the licenses permits vouchers applications Do you have the script? Here You're on a roll. Oh You're on a roll I moved to we have approved payroll warrant 24 0 5 for payroll from august 13 2023 to august 26 2023 paid on august 30th 2023 and the amount of 61,945 dollars and 45 cents Pay the roll warrant 24 0 6 for payroll from august 27 through september 9 2023 paid on september 13 2023 and the amount of 60 253 dollars and 76 cents Payable warrant 24 g 0 5 with checks 292 23 343 For payables in the amount of 166,755 dollars and 76 cents And the general journal entries for august 2023 You're second second any discussion? Hearing none those in favor All right Motion carries Approval minutes Uh, you've got one set from august 21st 2023 Um, I sent a new Copy out this morning Is this the new one the revised? Yes I'm still checked. Um Yes So just a few minor changes from what was Sent out last week So I'll make a motion to approve the monday august 21st minutes That's presented Second any discussion All those in favor All right Motion carries Round table Joe Um I have nothing Tour Be meeting later on this week. Uh, I've got some ideas. I want to Shoot around a little bit on capital budgeting I think that's a piece that we need to work on and it will Tell our story For the upcoming options tax Someone that will be coming I'll also have some ideas as you heard for economic development Like to talk about first on the website before we go to the economic development committee now Okay Um Executive session I move that we enter executive session for personnel for the treasurer position and the courts with one dsa 313 a3 second Motion carries. We are an executive session