 So I'd like to call into session the South Burlington City Council meeting. This conference will now be recorded. Of May 3rd, 2021. And welcome everyone. The first item is any additions, deletions or changes in order of agenda items. Kevin, you thought you might have some, but... Yeah, on the other business agenda, and I'd like to put the memo you got from Justin on Friday for the paving bid. That's normally a consent agenda item. Anyway, you should have the memo from Justin, and I'd like to get that tonight, if possible. Okay. I have one suggestion. I'd like to move item 13, which is a very brief discussion related to the so-called Swift Street extension, and put that in between 11 and 12. So we do the climate change resolution, then we do the so-called Swift Street extension, and then we would go back to the Planning Commission, the CCRPC stuff, corridor. So is that okay with everyone? I think it flows better, it makes more sense. And it's a very brief conversation. Okay. So let's move on to announcements in the city manager's report. So who would... Comments for the public, Helen. Oh, I'm sorry. Yes, I almost do that. I'm sorry. Looks like Janet Bellavance would like to make a comment on item not on the agenda. Yes. Hello. Hi. Hi, Helen. My name is Janet Bellavance, and I'm here to talk to you about the climate crisis. Naomi Klein says in her book On Fire, the health of our planet is the single greatest determining factor in the quality of all our lives. I am a retired elementary school teacher. As part of our curriculum, we read biographies to children about people who have had a lasting impact on our world. We chose examples of famous people who have changed the way we think and act. We read about Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring. Children learned about the food chain through the harmful effects of the chemical DDT on birds. Rachel Carson showed us how humans are connected to nature. Ecosystems have a delicate balance. But an equally important lesson occurred in the book Conversations. Children asked questions in an attempt to understand who holds power and how change happens. They wondered, why did we keep using DDT when we had evidence that it was harmful? Why didn't the chemical company stop making DDT? Children learned that activism can start with one person asking questions about the harmful effects of chemicals and lead to Congress changing our laws. Rachel Carson was a model. We also read about the scientist Galileo who proved that the earth rotates daily and revolves around the sun. This conflicted with what the Catholic Church believed. He was considered a heretic, tried by the inquisition and imprisoned for the remainder of his life. I remember one boy looking perplexed and asking, why didn't people want to change their thinking? Galileo was a model. We read Dr. Seuss, the Lorax, who speaks for the trees, for the trees have no tongues and confronts the once-ler who causes environmental destruction in the name of progress. Children learned that resources are finite and can be exploited. Students learned that we have a responsibility to advocate for those who can't speak, be it the environment, children, or others who are disenfranchised. Why are we teaching these things? We are teaching these things to combat hopelessness, to promote citizen engagement, to empower our children to stand up for what they believe in, to create empathy for other living things, to show them models to emulate, to show them that sometimes the right thing to do is not always the popular or easy thing to do, to show them that sometimes it takes more than facts and scientific evidence to change our thinking. It takes one person who is willing to stand up and do something. And so it should come as no surprise that Greta Thunberg, a 15-year-old Swedish girl, did just that. And in demanding immediate action from world leaders on climate change, Greta painfully reminded us all of our responsibility as stewards of the earth. As Naomi Klein wrote, by far the biggest obstacle we are up against is hopelessness, a feeling that it's all too late, we've left it too long and we'll never get the job done on such short timeline. But the truth is, is that there are tens of thousands of people who have been quietly building local models and road testing policies for how to put justice at the center of our climate response in how we protect forests, generate renewable energy, design public transit and much more. I hope that we can start right here tonight in South Burlington at this city council meeting. I hope that the city council will have the courage to lead us in a direction that addresses the long-term health of our citizens and environment. You can do something about the climate crisis. You can enact strong environmental protections in our new LDRs. We are striving for only the minimal protections. We can do better. You can require all structures to be solar equipped and net zero. You can develop partnerships with large landowners to preserve their land in a mutually beneficial way. You can support creative initiatives to purchase high value natural resource lands. You can incentivize redevelopment of empty commercial buildings for affordable housing units. You can stop all new road construction and increase more and safe pedestrian pathways. You can support tonight's resolution for policymaking to reduce carbon emissions and counteract climate change. You can create a sustainability committee to review all city decisions against their impact on climate change. Take one, some or all of these actions. You are a model. Thank you for your service. Thank you, Janet. Are there any other comments or questions from the audience? Okay, seeing none, we'll move on to now. Announcements in the city manager's report. So are there any counselors who have any announcements? Tom is like going away. He's lost so much weight. You can announce that, Tom. You're vanishing. I did mention, I will just thank the South Burlington Boy Scouts, the South Burlington Rotary, the South Burlington Girl Scouts, as well as the Orchard neighborhood for coming out and cleaning up the South Burlington Cemetery and Shelbert Road. We had about 30 volunteers. We spent three hours and cleared a lot of rush and Craig Lambert with our city arborists came in through the next day and picked up a lot of the hard work of those volunteers. So I think it was a really productive day and the cemetery looks a lot better. Excellent, thank you. Tim, do you have a report? Oh, I'm sorry. No. Megan, you have your hand up. I just wanted to second Thomas's comments. I participated in the green up day and found a remarkable amount of dumped items that normally should not be left in our natural areas. And I just wanted to say that it was very well organized, that they let people go where they wanted to, but once we got back with our things, they wanted to know where we had been so that they could report it. And I thought that it ran very well and the weather cooperated, the gray skies cleared and it ended up being a really beautiful mid to late morning for us all to get out there and to do some green up. So it was a good day. So thank you very much, the Rotary. I thought that it was very successful. Great, thank you. Anyone else? Okay, well, I've been kind of busy. I did, I didn't work at the cemetery, but I was a weed warrior in Underwood and worked with a number of people and continued to cut back the invasives and learn a lot. It was nice because there were some new faces there. So it's a growing tribe, I guess. I also participated in green up day. I did it just in front of my house along Hinesburg Road and I was surprised at how little there was. So I think perhaps people aren't drive, I mean, didn't not perhaps, but people weren't commuting as much in the last year. So what I mostly found was beer cans, most of which were flattened. So I think they'd been around for maybe a year. I got a parliament cigarette smoker that goes back and forth, I guess, and throws out as empty or empty boxes of cigarettes, but nothing really surprising except parts of a car. When they had all these plastic cars, they used to be the big chunk on metal would get ripped off, but now cars disintegrate and it's a real mess. I also attended a meeting with Megan and Kevin and Chief Burke and remind me of the woman's name, Megan, on parallel justice. Yeah, her name is Sue Connelly. Connelly. And so we had, I thought, a really good conversation about a situation that she had raised and we had briefly chatted about before the pandemic and has lots of things that fell through the cracks. So that's been reinstigated. And once again, talking with the chief and hearing his comments on justice and how to really, I think, run a top notch police department and being very sensitive to a lot of issues and forward thinking. I was just once again blown away with how well spoken he is and how thoughtful and engaged she is with both the community and his own officers on a lot of these issues. So we made a fantastic hire with him. Megan. I want to second that and also say that Sue Connelly is an amazing citizen of South Burlington who not only asked us to address her particular concerns but also provided support and information that could help us address broader concerns that fall under an umbrella where her concerns could be addressed as well. I just, she came to that meeting with information that we could act on and I expect that this council will see something moving forward. So I just want to also express my thanks both to the chief and to Sue Connelly and to Lisa Bedinger. All right, that's right. Lisa was there as well, I'm sorry. And Tom, one of the things we talked about was sort of the rental registry and how that might be a vehicle to really help our community deal with situations with houses that don't always need or require police intervention that there's other ways to handle that. So it was something that I hope the council will take up at some point. And I also attended one of the CCRPC listening evenings on the interchange. So that's what's kept me busy. Kevin. Matt, you didn't, did you have anything? Okay. Thanks, Helen. A number of things here. Pleased to report that the city hall and city clerks office and the library are back open again. So staff were all back in for the most part today and we anticipated only getting better moving forward. So it's great to have everybody back. We're hearing from VLCT that they expect that half of the ARPA funds will be received in the communities on May 10th, on or about May 10th and that the treasury department is expected to issue rules and how funding can be spent at about the same time. So recall that we're supposed to get half the funds right away and then the rest half by the end of the year. So we're anxious to find out what the treasury department is gonna say we can use those funds for. Two meetings this week, you have your tour tomorrow night at 180 Market Street, the new public library and city hall and then Thursday, of course, you have a special meeting which will largely be executive session. We're still looking at the end of May for the reappraisal numbers to be published. As I reported the last time, the contractors also are working for Burlington and Burlington's had some issues that they want to address differently than was originally thought and that has pushed us back but Martha still thinks we're gonna have our numbers available for the public by the end of the month. Lou Brezee has come up with a novel idea for solar at Airport Parkway and it's a way that we might be able to reduce our own electrical costs and the school district's electrical costs. I'll have more to report on that at another time but we're trying to set up a meeting with the school or the superintendent right now. Also, as I reported to you and that you saw in my email today, the effort that Helen has led for approximately two years now, I think Helen to achieve an MOU between the three cities, South Burlington and Wenuski and Burlington has now been completed. I signed the document today and the mayors of Burlington and Wenuski did too. So it's now in place and now we've got to start looking at implementation. So lastly, there's a rapidly changing story about tax increment financing in the legislature. Tom's side of the building had completed a bill and sent it over to the house. And now the Ways and Means Committee has completely ripped out the core section of the bill. So it's getting toward the end of the legislative session, these sorts of things start to happen. We'll see what will occur with that but it looked like the bill was moving toward restricting our ability to change our boundaries of the TIF district and we'll just have to see where that goes. So, oh lastly, we got our biannual, if that means every other year rather than twice a year, biannual letter from the CCRPC that our appointment is up for our CCRPC commissioner this year, every two years. And your appointee is Chris Shaw, the CCRPC board. I've reached out to Chris to find out whether or not he's interested in continuing in that role and he is. So this is something that you should address at your meeting on May 17th. They'd like an answer from us by the end of May. And so you can advise me under other business perhaps as to how you'd like to proceed with that. But it should be on your agenda then. I understand he was elected vice chair as well. Yeah. Which is something that we had been hoping for getting a little more leadership position for South Burlington and the CCRPC. Yeah. So he is elected for that role. So it would be a little awkward if you didn't reappoint him, but that's still your decision. So anyway, that's all I've got. Tom? Yeah. So Kevin, thank you for that report. We've exchanged the emails, but for the benefit of those that are watching on YouTube, would you go down or discuss, speak to some of the public service announcements and planning that you've been talking about regarding the amazing amount of dog excrement that we are seeing throughout the city that many residents have been reaching out and have been social media activity on. They want us to address this through different means. Would you be willing to speak to that a little bit? Yeah, Tom, thank you very much for raising that issue. So very good point. We are embarking on a public service announcement campaign around cleaning up after your dog and also keeping your dog on a leash where that's required. So it's a two-fold campaign. Helen taped the first commercial that appeared in city news this past week. There'll be another one in the next city news. We're gonna be taking out some ads in the newspaper, but it just seems like this year it's gotten much worse of people just not picking up after their dogs. You know, we're all adults. We should be able to figure this out. You can find these bags everywhere. You can put them in trash cans or take them to your home, but it's really getting out of control and it's not only affecting people as they encounter these on our paths and in our forests and stuff. It's also bad for our water quality, particularly in a place like Red Rocks, but other places as well. So we all have to put our adult pants on here and pick up after our animals. And we're gonna be pushing that aggressively throughout the summer. But also I don't wanna lose the other issue which is the dogs on the leash, particularly Red Rocks, Wheeler, we continue to hear problems about that. And so please, anybody listening out there, please, please keep fight-o on the leash when you're in those places. We realize the frustration of the public that we don't have the new dog park built yet. The location that was chosen has some wetland issues. We're still working with the Army Corps of Engineers on that and Justin's doing the best he can to expedite this, but we need to make sure we do it right. And so hopefully later in the spring or in the summer, you'll see that under construction. Anyway, thanks for bringing that up, Tom. I appreciate it. Well, I think those are issues that with an activated dog park committee, we can maybe think of some and adopt or consider maybe some creative ways to meet the needs of everyone. I mean, I know I was just out in Salt Lake City and on the foothills around Salt Lake where it's a different place and it's much larger, but during COVID with so many people running and biking and walking their dogs have cut a whole bunch of new trails, but they've also identified days of the week where dogs can run free or off leash and other times they have to be on leash or they're not allowed on the trails on Tuesday and Thursday because that's the day when bikers or hikers don't have to worry about dogs. I mean, I think there's a number of things we might consider that could meet the demands of all our residents in a more creative way because people with large dogs, I mean, Matt, your dog likes to run a little bit anyway, right? I mean, just walking on a sidewalk is a little bit. A lot of dogs that like to run a lot and we have big piece of property, so it's not a problem, but not everyone has that. And so, but I also recognize that people can be really frightened of dogs. So maybe there's some creative ways to have certain trails open on different days of the week or whatever, so we kind of know that ahead of time. Anyway, okay, no more comments? Matt, did you have a comment? Oh, okay, I just sort of thought I saw your like go on, okay, so let's move on to item four, the consent agenda. Kevin, are we not dealing with B? No, go ahead and deal with B tonight. Justin's had some good conversations with our colleagues in Williston, he's here to answer any questions you have. I've also talked to the town manager, so I think you can go ahead and proceed with this, with this discussion. Justin, would you concur with that? Yep, he's gonna sum up, okay. So the consent agenda has three items. The disbursements award bids for the annual paving contract and the Kimball Avenue culvert project and designate and convey a burial plot at the city cemetery on Silver Road. I'd entertain a motion for approval of A, B, and C. So, I just want to ask you a question, Justin, before we, I mean, I guess I can do it after you make a motion, but set a clarification on the culvert bridge project. Well, we have a motion, so let's get a second and then we can open up the discussion. Good idea, absolutely. So, are you seconding, Megan, second? Okay, so Matt, you have a question for Justin about the culvert? Yeah, the memo, Justin, just said, Williston, who's splitting the cost, 50-50 wants to take a second look. Does that mean they want to examine existing bids or is that, are you inferring, or was the memo inferring that they want to rebid it? There were all of those discussions occur, reexamining bids, rebidding. However, as of mid-morning today, we reached a conclusion with them, because this was kind of developing over the weekend, so we had to put a couple of modifiers in the memo as we were working on it. But Williston is in agreement with us. They have their select board meeting tomorrow night, at which time they'll be giving their recommendation to their select board as well. The bids came in a little higher as you saw. We just wanted to make sure that once all the dust settled, each community need what our maximum amount of pocket exposure would be, we're extremely hopeful that we still have roughly $360,000 in outstanding grants that we hope to be awarded. And once that doesn't happen, certainly on the South Brompton side, we can afford it. And if Williston has some issues, we can help them through those. But if we are awarded the grant, it becomes a no-brainer for Williston. Physically. Yeah, and just to reiterate, I mean, which I think we all know to be true, that given what's happening in regards to materials, that your assumption that any rebidding process would come up with higher numbers, I think is accurate. So. Yeah, a combination of just the rising escalation of any fabrication materials, as well as, as Kevin reported earlier, we expect a lot of money to be hitting the streets. Through the various stimulus bills. That's going to drive competition in the wrong direction if you're trying to buy services. So while we weren't excited with these good results, we don't see sitting around and waiting another year, forgetting for the fact that neither of us, no one wants to deal with that bridge for another year. But we don't think the climate will be more favorable here for them. Okay, thank you. Are there any other questions or discussion? You ready for the vote? Okay, all in favor of the consent agenda, signified by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Okay, that appears to be five zero and the motion carries. Moving on to item five. I see Carly has joined us and she is going to report and discuss the summit employers health center slight slash captive insurance model. So Coralie, welcome. Hi there. I think this is one of the first times I've seen you in a year. No, it's been a long time. So I'll be glad when we can all see each other in person again. Thanks for letting me come on and talk about the health center and what we're doing about healthcare costs in the city right now. So I do have a presentation. So I am going to share my screen. I'll probably turn my camera off while we're doing that just in case bandwidth. So hold on and let's make sure you guys can see my screen. Share. Okay. Can you guys see the PowerPoint screen? Yes. Fantastic. Okay. So last year, we've been talking about a health center to address healthcare costs in the city for at least two years prior to us opening the health center. And last year in July, we opened a health center at one Kennedy drive. And we opened it in the midst of the pandemic which could be a good thing or a bad thing. We found it to be very helpful actually and I'll talk about that in a minute. But healthcare costs as some of you know have continued to go up in the city and I think Tom would correct me perhaps if I have this wrong but maybe even doubled in the last eight to 10 years the cost. And so one of the things that we decided to do was try to control some of those costs by employing a health center and also going into a captive arrangement which means we're self-insured. So this slide that I have up shows a little bit at the top where we have family members, our employees in the city. Previously they would just go to the doctor or whatnot it would go through our health insurance. Now what we've done is because we're self-insured we see more of the details of not the personal details of any individuals but we can see what folks are going for and we can start to address some of the health concerns that might be in our population. So on this slide you'll see the family members they have two options right now that we open the health center. They have the name of the health center is Summit Employers Health Center. It is run by Marathon Health which is based in Winooski and I'm gonna tell you a little bit about them but the other option here is that insurance is through CBA Blue which means that we're self-insured and we have some reinsurance and ways to help control the costs which I'm not gonna get into tonight but I wanted to give you this overview that the health center is sort of a place for us to work on health coaching but we still have all of the other options of traditional healthcare with the difference truly being in how we pay for it. So when we went to Marathon Health Marathon Health has a core component to who they are and they serve about 350,000 people across the nation I think they have about 155 health centers. Most of them are one employer with for example they have 7-Eleven and so they have health centers where folks who work at 7-Eleven can go to and other states obviously not here in Vermont but they also have shared health centers and that's what we have here in South Burlington and so we have formed a partnership with VSAC Hickok and Boardman and with TwinCraft and so the four of us have come together and opened the health center. So what Marathon Health is focused on is identifying risks in our population and you can see here for yourself where they sort of get that information. They mitigate the risk and we'll walk through this a little bit so that our employees are forming new healthy behaviors and then also maybe choosing different places where they might obtain healthcare and in the end we have improved health for our employees but we're also capturing some savings for the city both by having healthier employees but perhaps treating folks in a different way. So that's what we bought into with Marathon Health. So here's the- Can I just quickly interrupt and ask you can other organizations join at a later date? Yeah, good question Helen. So I'm glad you asked that. We started in July with just the city VSAC and Hickok and Boardman knowing that we were having conversations with TwinCraft and TwinCraft didn't join until September and we are still looking for one more partner so I'm still doing work. We'll have another session in about a month to talk with other employers. There are several that are still looking to be engaged in a shared model but there may be also an opportunity for others to come together to have another health center and if that's the case, perhaps we could have a couple in the area that we could share services. So yes, still looking for partners and for this to potentially be bigger than just us to really to make a change in healthcare delivery. Thank you. You're welcome. So scope of services you can see here these are the types of things that they focus on. One thing I wanna say about primary care is that this is not a replacement for primary care physicians. However, if you have a cold or something doesn't feel right or whatnot you can go into the health center and you can go home that day with some antibiotics or whatnot. So they do help with that. Also, if you have a regular prescription we carry those pharmaceuticals in the health center you could actually have that processed right at the health center. So, but the focus truly is on prevention, wellness, managing disease and I wanna indicate right now we don't have ancillary physical therapy on site through the health center but that is something down the road where we're looking at a partnership with direct contracting. We do have behavioral health and I'll touch on that in a minute. So here's just one more look at the health center offerings you can see that there's obvious care assessments. If you have to have blood work drawn employees can go into the health center and have that done. Coaching, you can see the variety of things that folks might be coached on for better health. And then of course there's online place for where they draw in if your health record perhaps at UVM medical center or your physician. So there's one place where they can see your full physical history. So here were some of the goals when we chose to move forward with the health center. We wanted to support our employees in a culture of health and wellbeing. We wanted to strengthen what we had for our benefits because it's really about wellness. If we're gonna contain healthcare costs we really need to focus on what's causing someone to have an incident or to be on medication those types of things. So we wanted to add to that. Also address the increasing costs obviously and provide tools to improve our employees overall health. So what's great about the health center is it's easy access. You can be there from anywhere in the city in minutes. You can schedule an appointment. Sometimes you can get an appointment same day especially if you need something like a COVID test and they're doing testing. You can get scheduled fairly immediately for that. Let's see, you get more time with your provider. So I'm gonna talk a little bit about the comprehensive health review. But when you go in, you're not going in for seven to eight minutes or spend more time in the waiting room than you do speaking to your provider. But instead when you do a comprehensive health review she spends about 90 minutes going through everything with you. And most sessions are scheduled for 30 minutes and that's the entire time you're spending with the provider. Let's see. And the focus is truly on coaching. So it's really about changing behavior and not just trying to treat the symptom at the moment. So, and there's very little cost to the employee because we're paying for this as part of our comprehensive healthcare package. There is like a co-pay for some things of like $25, but for the most part, there's virtually no cost to the employees. So instead of them going to their primary care just to get a prescription because they have a sinus infection they can get it taken care of at the health center. And since we're now self-insured that helps save us money. Here are the three folks we have on staff at the employer's health center and Christina is our nurse practitioner. So she's our main medical provider. We also have Damir Alisa who is a licensed mental health counselor and Angela Holm, she's our medical assistant. So if you're scheduling time for a comprehensive health review or you're going in because you don't feel well, Christina is the person you would see. Damir is focused on behavioral health. And so both of them, I don't know, Kevin and Tom have both been and if Justin's still on, I mean, folks have been to the health center so they can let you know how the experience is different. But we've had very good reviews about the friendliness, the time that people take. And I was hopeful Christina could join us tonight to share some of what she's experiencing but unfortunately that didn't work out so maybe in the future. But these are the three folks who are serving our population. And so I just wanna walk through for a minute. If you wanna look at this slide, I know it looks busy but what we're doing with folks and what we've been doing over the last nine months, 10 months is in this red section. So you'll see identifying health risks and doing health assessments, having biometric screening which is checking for cholesterol and all the blood draw and your pulse and your weight and just getting a baseline. And I'm just gonna skip to the next slide for a second so I can talk about this. You'll see three steps to wellness. In July, we put out to our employees that they could be incentivized to go in and have a health risk assessment. You answer a questionnaire and then to have your biometrics taken and also you provide some medical history and the health risk assessment. You go through all of that with Christina and she will identify things in there that may be things that you need to be focused on let alone the fact that you may say, I wanna lose 20 pounds or I'm having a hard time sleeping at night or stresses bother me, whatever it may be. That's sort of a starting point and we started doing that last July and by December we had approximately half of our employees had completed this step. So that's huge for us because I will show you in a moment the data that shows what happens after that. So this is sort of where we start the process is with that three steps to wellness and then when you start health coaching with whether it's Christina alone or Christina and Damir and you start to develop the new healthy behaviors. So we're sort of in that red place with some employees but moving on to the purple phase in our journey with our employees. So again, back to this slide this just as a couple of the challenges. So there's constantly information coming from the health center about a variety of things including walking, mindfulness. I know we, with all of our department heads and managers we during a regular meeting we took 10 minutes to just have a moment to like, pause and Damir led us through a mindfulness exercise that we could use anytime moving forward. So trying to incorporate those healthy behaviors both in demonstrating it at work but also to give us tools when we're not at work. This particular slide shows over the next year the different types of sort of lunch and learns and challenges that are going on. So you can see that there's a bunch of things on here like how to have a healthy holiday and maintain your weight but don't gain weight during the holidays. There's skin safety in July about drinking enough water wearing your sunscreen, detoxing from social media. So there's a lot of topics that they're gonna focus on that isn't just about, you know, lose 20 pounds. There's other things here. So I wanted to give you just a little bit of data without too many numbers to overwhelm anybody but this is the encounters, so the visits and since we opened in a pandemic the health center has been virtually closed unless you need to go in for acute care or you're going for a COVID test and in the case of a COVID test, you're outside being swabbed but most of this has been done virtually. So the fact that we've had such adoption and it being virtual really speaks to the quality of care that folks are getting. And what you'll see on this slide is for most months we've had, you know, at least 30 people of our own employees going in to use the health center. So the blue is employees. We also spouse, our partners and children are also eligible to use the health center. And so you'll see that the green is spouses and the teal is children. So it's being well utilized. And then of our total population who are engaged there's a couple of things here. The blue means those folks who are engaged in coaching activities that means they're meeting with Christina or Demir on a regular basis to work on some component of their healthcare. The green includes acute care. So if there's, you know, someone's got a cold they could go in for that. And the teal is labs. So if you're going in to have blood draws and I think labs may include COVID testing. So let me just pause for a second. We did during the pandemic the health center has been a huge plus for us. They have done things like they developed a self-assessment questionnaire that we do on the app on our phone or on the computer before we come to work to ask those questions. Have you traveled? Do you have a cough? Do you have this? And we get that report daily to make sure that before people come in it self-notifies, hey, you checked to know to this you can't come to work, contact the health center. So they have been our point of contact for managing folks coming and going from the workplace and they've been managing for the most part our testing. And the process is before someone can come back to work if there had been an exposure or travel they have to go through the health center to be cleared and that has really helped us manage keeping our population safe. I just throw this in here because the gray bar here that shows when Marathon Health has a clinic that's near and not directly on campus they typically have average visits of 2.6 from a participant and we're already at 3.4. So our folks are actively using the health center as well as our partners you can see are also actively using it. This part of the slide just sort of shows a breakdown of how many people have been in for one visit, two visits all the way up to six. This is important, this is a really important slide because what it shows is this blue shows that we have screened 70 people in our population and we have data on them. Now why it says no data and again remember this includes employees and spouses is because we've been not self-insured so we had no access to data to know do we have a problem with folks being pre-diabetic? Do we have a problem with heart disease? Now that we have screened folks we now have that information. So we can tailor the type of care or the health center can tailor the type of care to those folks. Now this orange piece says of the 70 who were screened 76% of them present with some sort of a high and chronic condition that might be diabetes it might be obesity, it might be depression, pre-diabetes, heart conditions. That's a very high, very high number. Now again, it's only on a portion of our population and so as we get more data that might skew down a bit but it does mean that we are at least seeing those folks. Can I just, I'm sorry to interject here but if I were an employee I would feel uncomfortable with this information being projected on the screen. I just had to interject my voice here because health information can be prejudicial. I mean, I appreciate why you're showing us this information corally. You wanna show that it's really useful for our employees to have this kind of preventative care and that I fully appreciate but I just with regard to their conditions I'd rather you skip over those slides and I'm sorry to have to voice that concern. I know it's nothing you intended to do. It's just my feeling. Megan, we don't know who the employees are. This is the reason I'm acting in the numbers. I understand, I understand but I just, I'm very sensitive to privacy issues here and we don't have that big of a pool of employees. So it's just. I'm being over cautious and Helen, it's your, of course, you're braggartive to have Coralie continue. Well, I would like her to continue but if you feel this slide is too, have you completed your comments about this? The only additional comment Helen was just that of those folks who are in the high and chronic condition 75% of them are engaged in health coaching. So we're making an impact to help them have, you know, better habits towards their wellness. That's good news for sure. And then I just, I think I have two more slides and then we'll be done. I'll skip this one but basically it goes into the conditions that we have and they and how we're affecting them all above where the benchmarks are. So this goes to money and I wanted to give you a little bit of an idea of the savings that we're having. So since July 1st, these two numbers which total about $60,000 is money that's been redirected or potentially saved by not going to the emergency room, not going to have specialty care visits, a physical therapy, things that we've been able to take care of at the health center. So that's $60,000 in redirected care that's being handled that we're already paying for that we're not paying additionally. In addition, we have another $60,000 that looks at what present about having folks be at work if there's injuries and how we're managing that. So if you look at what we call the hard dollars above 60,000 and then a little bit of the soft dollars which is about another 60,000, that's $120,000 that we could potentially say is being saved by going through the health center or not incurred by having the health center. Since July 1st. Since July 1st, correct. And the monthly cost of that service is, what was it, 40,000 a month? Something along that, yes. And again, remember Tim, we're not a full year in yet and there'll be more data coming but to look at it from a financial standpoint but I wanted to give you a little bit of a flavor of the quick numbers that we had. And so just to wrap up, I wanted to share sort of what's next. Remember at the beginning, I said the health center was a component of how we're trying to contain costs and have better wellness for folks. These are some of the other areas in July we'll be bringing on, you've heard of Kelly Blue Book for your cars to see what the value of your cars are. We're gonna have healthcare Blue Book and we're gonna be looking at what the costs of, it lists what the cost of say getting an MRI is at the hospital versus an open MRI and whether the quality is high or not. And you can decide to choose where you go to have your test or to have procedures done and that'll be tied in with the health center so they can help determine that. So it could be a difference of $3,000 for an MRI at the health center or at the hospital to $600 at open MRI. So that's another way for our employees to help manage the healthcare costs and still get the best quality. So we'll be introducing that in July. And the others, we're gonna have access to data. Again, nobody's information is shared with us. That's by HIPAA, I never see it. Nobody sees it at the city, but the data that is carved up will let us know where are the areas we need to educate people on. And then the other two speak for themselves, direct contracting with folks like the Surgical Center and then medical tourism. If it's cheaper to go to Glen Falls to have something done, then we may do that. But all of this is a different way of getting better outcomes for our employees and maintaining healthcare costs. So with that, I'm gonna stop sharing my screen and quickly see if anybody has any questions because I think I'm out of time. Okay. Where do I start? You have some questions, Jim? Well, I just wanna say, thanks for the... I mean, I'm sure it's been a lot of work to implement this program. And it appears to be saving money will tell long term. But the sad commentary is that it's really pathetic that in this country, that's the way we have to try to administer healthcare because we're like the only developed country that hasn't figured out how to do it right. And it's really pathetic. It's sad. The fact that somebody can have an HSA and then be able to invest it in the stock market, why, I mean, that's not part of your discussion, I understand, but that's just another symptom of what's wrong with the whole healthcare system. And we're very fortunate to live somewhere where we have excellent healthcare facilities around us. A lot of people don't. And we have a lot of very able, medical professionals around us as well, but the city's trying to contain its healthcare cost by doing this different thing. And every three or four years, there's a different approach that people try to take to cut their healthcare costs. And it's just, it's really sad that we can't figure this out. So I wish, I hope it's successful. Okay, good points. I spent 20 years trying to figure it out. It's complicated. Okay. Any other questions or comments? Thank you very much, Coralie. You're welcome. So we'll move on to item six. We have six minutes before we have to go into a public hearing on IZ. A lot of Blanchard and Tom, we're going to talk about the submittal of an application to the Vermont bond bank for the summer round. Do you guys think you can do that? No, you can probably do that. Okay. All right. Well, you sent us all the materials. So, okay, good enough. Yeah. Good evening for the record, Alana Blanchard, community development director. So obviously in March, the public voted on funding for Garden Street and in 2018, earlier than that, sorry. No, the public also voted on the library, city hall and city center. So the Vermont bond bank is holding its summer bond pool. So they have a call out to municipalities and other governmental entities to raise debt to fund capital improvement projects. And because interest rates are severely low at this point and indications are that they are going to slowly rise over time, we wanted to sort of put our foot in the door and recommend that the council authorize us to submit the application for debt. This is not your actual authorization. The council will have an opportunity to vote on all of the legal documents related to the bond. We do not have to set the terms at this point or the actual amounts, but we wanted to make sure that you're aware that there's this opportunity, we've prepared an application and we have provided it to the bond bank, but we have not signed it in order to put this before you. So essentially it covers segment A and C, which were voted on for Garden Street. And it's the full, what we have in the application at the moment is the full amount that we estimate Garden Street would cost and any excess for that could be rolled into either design work or actual construction work for the third segment, which is the White Street segment. And then also as a placeholder, but most likely the recommended amount, we have $700,000 for 180 Market Street. For that project, we've already bonded for 19 million in debt and that leaves us 1.4 million out of the 20.4 million that has not been issued in debt. And we have been holding off on that remaining amount because once we have the full project cost at the end of the project in terms of all the construction costs minus FF&E and moving, then we can apply all of our eligible cost ratios for the library, city hall and senior center against that total cost and then divide it between tax increment, finance, eligible cost versus the city share of the cost. And we estimate that to finance portion is about three to 500,000 additional. And so we don't wanna take out the full debt amount until we have that number. So that's why we're recommending 700 at this time. Okay. Are there questions? Any additional information from Tom or did O'Lana get all the points we needed to hear? I think O'Lana's covered it really well. All right. So what we want is a motion to authorize the submittal of an application to the Vermont bond bank for the summer bond pool. And to, I guess also, was that an additional consideration that you're gonna actually sign it tomorrow? But they already agreed to that. So that doesn't have to be in the motion. No, that's more informational. Okay, so Megan? Yeah, so moved, Helen. And then Tom is second. Okay. Is there any additional discussion? Tom, Tim, excuse me. Is this the kind of summer pool that Tom would like to have? I'm sorry about that. Well, he might like to own a pool like this. I don't know. All right, so there's no further discussion. I'll have a roll call on this because it's a pretty big deal. So Megan Emery, hi. And Thomas Chittenden, hi. And Nakota, hi. And Tim Barrett, hi. And the chair votes, hi. So this is past five, zero. And you did it in four minutes. Thank you. Thank you very much for all your hard work. These applications are pretty complicated. Will you be there tomorrow night, Elana? I will. So I'll see you all at 6.20, looking forward to it. And so do we need to sign that or is it just your signature or? Kevin will sign it. Okay, great. All right. Thank you. Thank you very much. So see you tomorrow night in person even. Woohoo. Okay, moving on to item seven. This is the public hearing and possible council action on the extension of interim zoning bylaws at 7.30. So Amanda Lafferty, is she? Yep, she's arrived. Do you need to make comments or should we just open the public hearing first? It's fine to open the public hearing first. Okay, so do I have a motion to open a public hearing for the purpose of considering extending the interim bylaws for a time period not to exceed beyond November 3rd? So. Yeah, 2021. Second. I'll second. Okay, move and second it. So we have opened this public hearing. We have to vote aye. Right. Yes, all in favor? Aye. Aye. So the meeting is open. So Amanda, did you want to do any preliminary or do we just want to make this real quick or? I can just, the council last considered this in November when the council said, okay, we will extend the duration of the interim bylaws for six months. And with the possibility of two, three month extensions. So that November 2020 extension through extends until May 13th of 2021. And so the question is whether the council wants to extend it for another three month time period. It is, I think the planning commission and council are very close to finishing up at least one round of permanent bylaws. I think you are going to find out more in the next agenda item. So that's the question is whether to extend it further. And because we are getting close to the end of interim bylaws, the one thing I wanted to kind of highlight in the memo was just that, if amendments to the permanent amendments, or any permanent amendments to the land development regulations that are not adopted before an interim bylaw either is expires or is repealed, then that could, that will, that will basically mean that any development that is prohibited under the interim bylaw would not be prohibited and potentially wouldn't, depending on the chronology of events, but if there's not an overlap essentially between going straight from the interim bylaws into permanent bylaws, then there will be a gap essentially in applicability that applications that potentially would not be something that would be approved by the council under the interim bylaw could, would be able to proceed as long as that they could comply with the land development regulations, whatever those are that are in effect. Okay, so I think the sense was that I understood from the councils we wanted to extend the interim bylaws to November 13th with the expectation that all of the work will be done. So that's what we can vote on tonight. That's more than three months from May. So, so is that the wishes of the council? Tom? Yeah, that's my understanding, but I feel like what I just heard Amanda say is that on November 13th, we will not have the option to extend beyond that. So that's the hard deadline, the way it's written in Vermont state statute. So these changes have to be approved by the council before then or else we revert back to whatever was in place before interim zoning. And I'm fine with that. Let's just, let's do the whole three years and be done with it. So I'm fine with extending to November. So I need two years with the option. No, the two years, they were initially adopted in November, 2018. And also the three years. Okay. Yeah. And, and, you know, one thing to, I didn't raise this, but under title 24 of state law, yes, the council is limited to, you know, that absolute maximum time period is the extra year beyond the initial two year time period. And, but there, there could potentially be, you know, COVID related extensions, but again, I, just so you are aware of the options, but I, I, if you. Well, hopefully we won't have to utilize any options that the work will get done and that's our anticipation. So I, just FYI as well, assuming that any permanent bylaws, amendments to the land of unregulations already before November 13th, then the council can repeal the interim bylaws at a time where it will work with any, the public hearing on any proposed amendments. Yes. Okay. So. Yes. Yes. I think just it's really important that we, we not insert that type of uncertainty by introducing what you offered there, the possibility of COVID extension. Let's just November 13th of three years. Let's get this done. Because I don't want to have a situation where we try to extend it. The developer then fights us in court saying we didn't have the right to extend it. So I think November 13th is the, is the date that we should just be committed to as a council to finish this. I don't know if you all agree or not, but it just makes sense to not introduce any uncertainty or ambiguity past November 13th, regardless of COVID. I'm there at this time, Tom. I'm there at this time. Okay. Tim Barrett and then Matt. Yeah. Just a quick technical question, Amanda. So if the LDRs were ready. And they had been warned and once, once changes, the LDRs are worn, they're effectively law, right? That's right there. They will be applied for 150 days. And then if the, the council does not end up adopting those amendments, then they will not be applied anymore. But yes, that essentially they are in effect, and they apply to land development for a fairly long time period while the council considers and presumably adopts the. Okay. All right. So the point is, is that if, if that were to happen, we would want to repeal IZ after that fact, right? Like not before we would want to remove IZ once we had something in place that we were comfortable with, right? Well, it depends because any application then would have to apply that applies would have to comply with both you know, bylaws and potentially, you know, two sets of land amount regulations, but, or, you know what I mean? The permanent and then any amendments, but that can be, as we get closer, we'll consider that and try and figure out, okay, what's the best way to go about this? So that's right. And there's a comment also now I'll let you ask your question, Matt, from Jessica Luizos that they need to be warned for public hearing by the city council. And then there's 150 days. It's not the warning by the planning commission. So just to clarify those timelines. Tim, are you done? You got your question answered? Okay. Matt. Yes. While I'm reticent to extend in terms only again, there's a lot of merit to what Thomas suggested. As anyone on the DRB knows, having to enforce multiple set of bylaws is a tricky, sticky wicket in terms of determining, you know, what applies and what doesn't. I am in favor of extending until November 13th with the idea that we can have all of the work, the good work that the planning commission has done reviewed and finalized before then. Okay. Thank you. Are there comments since this is a public hearing, are there comments from the public? There were some comments in the chat room. Sandy Dooley was supportive and Ray Gonda. Was supportive. Of extending it. Is there any other comments people wish to make? All right. Are you ready for. Do we make that motion? Does someone make the motion? I'm sorry. Okay. Motion to close the public hearing. If there's. Okay. So moved and seconded by. Second. Okay. By Megan. All in favor of closing the public hearing signified by, or by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. That's unanimous. We're out of public. The public hearings. So we have a. We have a motion to extend the interim zoning to November. I will move to extend interim zoning to November 13th. And just I want to add a comment that I was originally opposed to interim zoning for all the reasons previously stated, but the pandemic really did pause things. And I, I think this makes sense. So let's wrap this up. And November 13th, go planning commission. Please give us some stuff to vote on and we'll move forward. So there's my motion. Okay. And seconded. Second. Okay. So you're ready for that vote. Okay. All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. It appears it's five zero. So that has been. Approved. Thank you. Thank you, Amanda. All right. Moving on to. Item nine, which is council discussion and possible action. We have a motion to extend the interim zoning to November 13th. And we have a motion to extend the interim zoning to November 13th. And we have a motion related to qualifications to serve on a self-growing to. Excuse me. Board commission or committee. And you should have received. A. A copy of the resolution. A resolution. Yeah. I teal this off, Helen. Sure. I was contacted by Sandy Dooley. She's a high schooler. Who is quite remarkable and has done research. On housing and equity. And I wasn't able to attend her. Presentation to the CVO. But I was able to watch it afterwards. And she presented in 15 minutes of a very nutshell presentation. So. And I'm very excited about that. So. Housing policy has excluded certain populations and in particular. Populations of color. From the same. What I want to say standards of living. That many of us enjoy. And that. Is equivalent to. Or, or it. It leads to inequities with regard to education. And so on and so forth generation after generation. It was an excellent presentation. And I have invited Manel to present to this council, which I hope she can do in two weeks time. When she will also be a candidate. For the affordable housing committee. And that led to a question. Whether or not. Minors. Could be members. Of our committees. And, um, and so, uh, Sandy Julie sent me the bylaws, which. I mean, the, the charter. Um, and she noted that there was nothing precluding, nothing preventing a minor from serving. And, and so I gave it some thought. Um, and I also met with Bruce Wilson, who was our chill out center director. He's currently involved in art. So wonderful. Um, and asked him his thoughts, and this was after he just, by coincidence, can't contacted me because he had the same idea and not knowing anything about. Uh, Manel or, or, you know, the, the efforts to have Manel be a member of our affordable housing committee. And he sent to me a copy of a resolution. Uh, that Burlington had considered in 2003. Uh, well, Bruce and I met on Wednesday. Um, and discussed. Uh, you know what this would look like. And he shared with me, uh, just the, the importance of including, uh, youth who, uh, have a stake in, in their, you know, in their communities for their own future. And so we discussed various aspects such as, you know, should there just be, you know, the possibility or should there be. Uh, you know, something written into the, the language that would allow for that youth, uh, that person to have a peer. And he agreed that to, um, limiting it to two would be useful so that there could be a peer. And I think that it's important for there not to be, you know, the so-called token, uh, member. Um, he also agreed that it would be important for this person to be, or people to be, uh, voting members. Um, he also agreed that because of the sensitive nature of executive sessions where we're talking about legal contracts or, or, um, you know, employees, that that would not be appropriate for, for minors to, to take part in. Uh, and so I was, you know, thinking about all of this and I was in touch with Manel and touched with her mentor, teacher, Christy Lundy at the South Burlington High School who, uh, left a message on my answering machine stating that this would be a wonderful opportunity for their outstanding students. Uh, that Manel is one of them and that because, uh, the, uh, community service is integrated into the graduation requirements for South Burlington High School. This would be a very meaningful internship, uh, possibility for outstanding students. And then we received an email. I believe we all received that email from Kevin Dorn, uh, about, um, a legal resident non-citizen who was applying to the DRB, um, slash, uh, and I can't remember the second, the second possibility off the top of my head. Bicycle and pedestrian. Bicycle and pedestrian committee. And I thought, well, let's put this all together in one resolution. And so I, I added that to the resolution. And I, I would leave it as such. I, I am willing to answer questions about it, but I thought it was important for there not to be quotas. Um, I thought that the question regarding, uh, who could attend an executive session and who could therefore vote based on what was learned in an executive session would be enough, uh, direction to any future council and how many members, uh, of any city committee board or commission should be not privy to that information. I am not in favor of quotas, except for having a peer and for there not to be, you know, a quote unquote token. Um, I believe that the members of our population who fit into those categories, um, would be judged just like every member of our community based on their qualifications, uh, based on their, their level of commitment, uh, and their availability, um, that we seek as a council of balance. Uh, we seek diversity that we know that diversity is a strength, uh, for our city and, and that, that, that diversity should of course be represented on our city committees. Um, I see this as a real opportunity for potential new Americans, new Vermonters, uh, but clearly legal residents as well as, uh, you know, minors who are moving into, into that adult stage, uh, to, to gain, uh, meaningful, um, participation, uh, opportunities in, in policymaking. Um, and of course they are advisory all of our committees, right? The council is the last to, to sign off and of course there are requirements for, for who can serve in elected office. Um, so that is my spiel. Um, I'm open to questions and, uh, I look forward to, to seeing our new applicants. Are there any questions by council members? Cause there is one in the chat room. Tim. Right. So I'm generally in, in favor of this, just the first resolved paragraph is confusing to me. Um, are you trying to say that a person of, of minor status needs to be, it must be enrolled in an area of high school or clear technical center or secondary education or homeschool setting. Is that what the purpose of that first resolved is? Correct. If they are a minor that they're in, they're in some sort of an educational setting. Correct. Correct. And if it's better to say some kind of educational setting, um, I, I looked at the South Bruinsen high school webpage, um, in order to see what kind of language would be appropriate for that. So that I wouldn't exclude anybody. Um, and I also know that we have private as well as a public high school here in town. And so that language is not, is not exclusive of public or private. Um, and I know, uh, just from, you know, knowing people in our city, that there are students who do, uh, take secondary courses, secondary education courses, uh, through, you know, homeschool setting, uh, and who are quite, quite remarkable. Uh, they are pages in the legislature and Montpelier, for instance. Uh, so I, I thought that there would be no reason to, to make it simply a high school student. No, no, I, I understand that, but I'm trying to get down to what the real, um, constraints of this, what the rule is here. So. It was like somebody's about to, if somebody's about to, is a, a rising freshman at the high school, then they would be eligible to apply, right? But if they were, I mean, because they're going to be enrolled in, so is there, is there a, a minimum age for the minor status or is it have to be somebody that's about to be in the high school or, of that age, or do you just want to establish an age range for the minors, you know, say. You know, was it 14 to 18 or whatever it is, I. Yeah, I didn't want to do that because the calendar is always very tricky and I'm thinking about, you know, our, our new law, you know, for some years now that if you turn 17 by the time of the general election, you can vote in the primary. I think it's important for us to not have that technical, you know, barrier to someone who is clearly, you know, qualified and someone that the council would seriously consider. So, so I, again, is there, is there a minimum age? No, just, just high secondary, secondary level. So, but I mean, an eighth grader will be enrolled in an area high school at some point, but not for another year and a half. So. I just want to make sure that they would not qualify. They would not qualify. Okay. So it has to, so. I just want to make sure that there's some hard boundaries on this, right? So that you can't argue about it too much, right? So. I guess the question is, so it. If somebody is going to be a freshman at the high school or in a technical center or whatever it is. So, so if they're in eighth grade, right? And it's May and they apply. Would they be considered for appointment or would they have to wait until they actually are. In. They would have to wait until they actually are so effectively they would be a rising sophomore. Okay. So they effectively have to be enrolled in a high school or a high school level career, technical center or homeschool setting at that age or secondary education, right? That's the word enrolled. Yes. Okay. Can we just type that paragraph so that it says they must be enrolled in those situations. Well, could you say that they are enrolled at the time of application. Yeah, that would be good. Sure. I can add that. I mean, it certainly I think indicates that in which case they are to be enrolled in our area high schools. So I think it does state that they are enrolled at the time of application, but I think it does state it. Well, I just I would be more comfortable if it said and at time application, they are enrolled in all the things that come after that. Okay. Um, as his hand up and then, um, and then I'll go to, um, two questions in the chat room. So I support the direction we're going in here. I'm just, I'm interested to split this conversation into two, one about the minors and the students and then one about the noncitizens and I've got comments on each. Um, when it comes to minors, I, uh, council member, you and I both know the faculty Senate pretty well at the university of Vermont. And one thing I like that way they have at UVM is the student government association of points. They do all the work. They choose from their body, appoint a student to the standing committees of the faculty Senate every year. It's on them. They don't do it then they don't do it. They don't have that representation. So that's a middle ground here where we can have a student government association point. All my point is I like the idea of creating a different path there on the other piece on the noncitizens. What I'll say is the state Senate and I believe the house are likely to approve noncitizen voting and local elections for the city of Montpelier and then likely when you ski very soon. I'm curious. I'm not opposed to taking on that broader conversation, but I wonder if a middle ground solution to just allow nonvoting members of South Burlington to serve on these committees is to change the application to not ask, are you a legally registered voter of the city of South Burlington and just say, are you a resident of South Burlington? And if you're a resident of South Burlington, then you can serve on one of our committees and apply and you don't need to ask about the legally registered voter status and that might just open it up to that diversity that we're seeking without having to get into the quota area that you said you wanted to avoid anyway. Two thoughts. But again, I support the direction we're going in. I just value possibly splitting this into two different actions. If I could respond to that Helen. Yeah, all I would all I would say is that I think because it is an internship idea where they would effectively be interfacing with, you know, local government just as would any citizen. I find that to be an authentic experience that would provide for them. I think a deep learning experience and it would be, I believe, respectful for them to be shown, you know, the same procedures, procedural steps that that we show to all of our applicants. And I think that it leaves then with the the council, you know, the ultimate responsibility, which is our role. I certainly would not want to advocate that to a student governmental association. I think that because they will be fully voting members, that they should be vetted just like all of our volunteer applicants who are then appointed to our committees. So that would be my response there. I think to this is potentially a question. Karen Ryder. And in the chat room wondering, would there be a time commitment since it could be a three year, I mean, some terms are three years. So would and they go off to college. They're interested in high school and then they go away to college. Are we in a cycle of continually having to replace members? Or I'm wondering if you since you frame this Megan as a like a similar to an internship. And I think internships typically have a timeframe. Would you be or with the council, entertain, maybe putting a like a one year. Commitment on this or one year. One year of service. And then if they are still here and want to continue, they could reapply. That was just a question. That was rising sophomores. They could eventually take on a three year seat, right? Cause there's a two year or three year seat usually per, per year. Sometimes there are open seats when someone steps down and there's one, one year left to the term. I, I, I don't see any reason to submit any different. I don't see any, I don't see any reason to submit any different. I don't see any, I don't see any reason to submit any different. Right. You know, what I want to call it like mechanisms or. Term limits or I think they should be a full-fledged member of, of the committee. And that, that is something that Bruce and I discuss quite, you know, quite honestly and candidly that that's, it's, it's showing them respect that they are considered to be that we expect of all of our, all of our members. And if, if the member, you know, if the applicant says, well, I have a year left and then I, I don't know what I'm going to do after graduation. That would enter into the council's deliberation where we could answer, we could ask questions. I saw the admins question here. What about someone who wraps up high school while still a minor? Well, that would be a question that we would ask. I think it might not be me. Right. So the, we is the council, whatever, whoever would be serving at the time that we could ask, we see that you're graduating next year. This is a two year position. What are your plans? And we know from talking to members of our boards and committees that and commission, our planning commission, that there are people who have very busy job schedules, that they travel, that they move out of state, that they have to end early that. And so this would not be an unusual situation where students would say, you know what? I got into my dream school. I can't finish my second year. I'm going to Harvard and we'll say Bravo. Go get up. Okay. Um, but on the other hand, Matt. And then Jessica. I agree. I agree 100% with council memory. I think that they should go through the vetting process just like any other applicant. Um, and not be automatically appointed like the Senate, what council should be referred to by a student body. Um, and I think that we can, as counselors, take that, uh, take that very seriously and determine whether or not they can put in the time and effort to do it. So I think I applaud council memory for bringing us to our attention. And, uh, and I agree with the process that she laid out. I agree with that. I agree with that. I agree with that. I agree with that. I agree with that. Okay. Well, almost all committees have one year terms too. I mean, so it isn't unusual for someone to. Either finish a term or. Um, Jessica. Yeah. I just, um, wanted to say that, um, The committee membership, there's information about that in the city charter, which actually sets some certain things as well as you. It seems a little strange, but in the land development regulations under article 17, there's also some specifics about, um, The makeup of the planning commission, the DRB and some of the advisory committees. So it starts on section, um, 17 dash 07. And, um, From what I'm seeing here, I don't think anything's opposed to what you're saying or talking about. But, um, Under the planning commission, it does specifically say all members of the planning commission shall be residents of the city of south Burlington. Um, it doesn't seem to have that same condition for the other committees mentioned. Okay. But there's nothing about age or any or. No, there's not. I guess I just meant like, if you do go forward and make a change, like you might want to just circle back and make sure it's not, um, Uh, Like contrary to what it says in those two documents, just to kind of check your boxes. Okay. Thank you. No, just that brings up an important point. Jessica brings up an important point. We still have on the form. We ask you if you're registered to vote in the city of south Burlington. Um, as I look at it right now. Um, Are you legally registered voter in the city of south Burlington? We can still have that check off box, but obviously if someone applies and they're 16, we, they check no. Um, that's not a determining factor as long as there's nothing in our regulations that prohibit us from appointing someone to a committee that, that hasn't registered to vote. Which I assume there's not, but I would double check that. And it's implicit that they live in our city. Yeah. Sandy, do you have your, I, you're so dark. I can't tell. Did you have your hand up? Yeah. Okay. Um, I just, I think you've cleared up one of my questions. One is I was thinking of Manel because she's a junior right now. So she would be a senior and so I wouldn't want her application. I don't want her application. I don't want her application. I don't want her application not to be considered since she probably doesn't know at this point where she's going to college next year. But the other thought is that if, for example, she were going to UVM or someplace around here or, or we were all still doing things via zoom and she could continue even after she was 18. I'm assuming. As long as she could consider or any other person. She could be a resident of a city of 18. I wouldn't have to end their term. Right. Right. As long as they're a resident, could they be living at an out of state college and just joined by zoom? Well, I think people can be resident. I'm not sure, but I think you can. You can vote like as a resident of South Burlington, even though you're a student out of state. Um, but maybe city clerk could answer that question. Right. Yeah. Um, I think the question relates to the DRB and that is they go into deliberative. Sessions or something it's called quite frequently, which are. I think somewhat comparable to executive sessions. So I was just wondering. If, if, uh, if they're considered comparable to executive sessions. And that's a very much a part of the role of a DRB member. Um, I think it doesn't really fit for, uh, the DRB. I think. Matt. Yeah, I, I think that's accurate. I mean, it's a quasi judicial body. Um, I mean. It is akin to executive session, but it's not, it's maybe assumed, but not directly explicit in the resolution. I would favor amending it to exclude DRB. Um, if we're excluding executive session, but, you know, if we're excluding executive session, I think that would be a great value. So. Okay. Tim. So are we, are you suggesting that we add up to two people per these other committees, non-DRB, non-planning commission? It would depend on who applies. Tim. And just like we don't have quotas for how many women, how many men, how many octogenarians, how many 20 something. Right. I'm really not in favor of quotas. It would be a meritocracy, you know, whoever has the qualifications. And I think that the, just like we're, we're hashing it out here for the DRB, that would be part of our, you know, or the council's discussion. You know, in terms of, do we apply a second? Uh, or a third. And, you know, member who couldn't attend an executive session. Right. That might be something that would disqualify that person. If we already have two, members on a board or a committee or the planning commission, that is that who are non, you know, not excess, not accessing that, you know, that privy, that, that sensitive information that we sometimes rely on in order to take, you know, really solid decisions. And so they would not be able to participate into, in those votes. So I, that's what I see as kind of the, you know, the gatekeeping in terms of, you know, how many people we would have on these, on these committees. And I can certainly put in there, you know, with, to the exclusion of the DRB, since it seems to be a regular. A regular occurrence. Is that. You do say a maximum of two, right. For each. Right. Okay. Right. For the committees that would be eligible to maximum. Okay. And we're certain that the planning commission is. We're not certain though, if they have any special requirements. Just being residents. This is assuming that all these people are residents. Right. As your resolution. That was my assumption. Now, if it needs to. That would be my assumption. Yeah. I mean, Who would want to sign up in the city? You don't live in. I guess. Oh, Sandy. And then Rosanne. I raised the question of how many. And I don't intend it. Never intended it as a quota. But say you have a committee that has. Six members. And I don't know. I'm not saying that there's a quota, but say you have a committee that has. Um, Six members. And for some reason you have four vacancies. And the only people that apply. Are. For students. And. So the question is. Do you want to hide? And almost all committees that I know. the DRB, they don't go. I've been on the affordable housing committee for years and we've never gone into any executive session. It's normally dealing with personnel. Anyway, never got into executive session that I recall. So, I mean, do you really want to have a situation where two thirds of a committee is students when that isn't at all representative of their proportion of the city's population. It has nothing to do with they're being less qualified. But so you face that situation and you apply, maybe you say, oh no, we don't want that, we'll appoint two. And then you lead two vacancies and you have two students, you don't have anything written about not wanting to have, say, more than a majority of a committee be students or non-citizens. And they say, well, why didn't you appoint us? That's what I'm trying to say. What would you do if that happened? If you're fine with having four students or four non-residents in a committee of six, that's fine. I just wanted you to think about that. That's all. Well, the solution says that the number of non-citizens and minors shall be said as a maximum number of two each. I thought that meant two plus two. If that doesn't mean two plus two, please clarify. No, it could mean two plus two. And what I would say in response to Sandy is that this council has turned down people in the past and previous councils have as well. And that if the candidates are not of the caliber that are or the qualifications that we deem necessary or future councils deem as necessary, I see no reason for us to make excuses or apologize for making a selection. That is part of that process that anybody goes through when they apply to our committee's boards and commissions. And that is part of dealing with reality that these students who are in our public high school here in South Burlington and engaged in internships that they're going through. They need to deal with real live employers and real live expectations and real live rules for how you behave in a certain setting or what tools are to be used and how they're to be used. All these things are good training. And I believe that that's also a way for everyone who's applying for them to know that there are expectations that this is not just first come first served. We have openings, you're a body that can warm a seat. We appoint you. I don't think that's ever been the way that this council has operated. I think that it's always been a very thoughtful process. I'm very proud of the councils I've served on in terms of finding that balance and diversity on our boards and committees. Is it a perfect system? No. And we certainly are mindful of people who have given a lot and when they are incumbents and their seat is up that we do give weight to their experience but we do give weight to the newcomers who provide new experience. It's a very delicate process. As you know, Sandy being a counselor for several years but it's certainly not a free for all. The inferences you're drawing from my input are troubling to me, so. Well, I understand. Okay. I just realized I skipped over item eight on the agenda and I apologize. We'll go back to that as soon as we complete this conversation and possible vote. So my apologies. I think Roseanne wanted to say something. Does anyone else have a comment? I do, Councilor McMillan. Really? Okay. So Roseanne, do you still want to make a comment? Yes, I do. Okay, and then Tom, we'll get to you. Everything's so small. It's hard to. I was going to try to say the way I saw it. I think you want to move the agenda along and I would love to see how Kevin speak to two points raised tonight. One, I think we've already resolved that we cannot add seats to the planning commission or the DRB because they're defining our charter. I'd love clarity on that. And then I also would love to know from a staff perspective if they have any concerns with having possibly four additional seats because there is a workload to both interviewing, to managing, to communicating. And I see that to have implications with the students. Not opposed to any of this, but I might propose that we think about this. I heard that Councilor Emery suggest a couple of small tweaks to the language to address Councilor Barrett's. Maybe we could bring this back at a later meeting in a revised form after we get some more input from Kevin. Ellen, prior to Rosanne's comment. Okay, Megan, let's let Rosanne ask a question. I have a clarification. All right, clarify. Yeah, these are advisory boards. They're the advisory that everyone's looked over. So the DRB is already exempt. I just want that to be clear. These are advisory. They're purely advisory boards as the language. We should get a determination around planning commission. I mean, as I recall, we have to go to the legislature to get that number expanded anyway. Rosanne? Yeah, I'm trying to get this very brief because it's a bit tangential to what the subject is here. But two issues. You talked about whether there were, Sandy had mentioned whether there were more vacancies and not enough applicants and that you might have more students than adults. I want to, I guess, ask the Council to consider the opposite. It's not so much with the students, although it could apply. Years ago, and you already met, well, I know some of you remember this, people would be on our committees for decades. And it was almost like an entitlement. But when I moved here, I was considering applying and my neighbor said, don't bother. If the people are in those seats for life. And the idea was that if the incumbent wanted to stay, there was no chance for anybody else to apply. So if you had any adult or student that wanted to apply for one of our committees and everybody that's on the committee, who stayed on the committee, you might not ever get the opportunity to bring students on board or new blood, for that matter. So it's a bit tangential, but it does impact on how you're looking at who is on your committees and how you appoint and whether there is a sense of entitlement to that seat and no new people need apply. That's my first comment. My second comment is as you're looking at viewing applicants, one of the things that I always thought was important to ask was whether the applicant would, they're not swearing or anything, would pledge their commitment to doing whatever the city council wanted that body to do and would set aside any personal or subjective opinions so that you didn't get people on a committee who didn't agree with the core mission of that committee and were there really to make sure progress wasn't done. We've had a few incidents of that. So I'm just saying as you're looking at applicants and bringing on students and that kind of thing, just things to consider. Okay, thank you. Is there more, Matt, you have your hand. Just to qualify to the scratchers point, which is we don't have term limits. We've never had term limits for committees. Is that correct? We're not contemplating that, right? Not in this, no. Yeah. Okay. Are there any other comments or questions? So we have a couple, it seems to me, there are a couple issues that we probably ought to get a little more information about in terms of, it seems like we need to include the exclude rather the DRB, there was a sense that they should, when they apply, they need to be enrolled in an area educational institution when they apply. So you don't have that eighth grader trying to apply for his or her freshman year. And then there was another item. Wondering about the, well, if it's too, well, I mean, I guess that's a conversation, not a, we don't need more information. That's just a decision about if it's two each on each committee and or up to two each, but there was another issue and I'm missing it. Oh, I know, the planning commission, if there's any references that would make that difficult, if that should be another committee that is excluded. So can we? Yeah, I'm happy to send it. I think that my resolution as is does respond to all those things, but and I'm happy though to wait another two weeks just to have it verified. That's always a good step, but I do have confidence that my, I did change. I just specified, even though advisory is in there and the DRB is not advisory, but I did specify that the development review board is excluded and I added at the time of application for the enrollment, but with regards to the planning commission, all that I know is that you must be a resident. So yeah, I can certainly send this along to Kevin as I have been making those changes and have us consider it in two weeks. Good, Kevin, I think that makes sense, Megan. Kevin, do you have a comment? Yeah, I just, I wonder if we're making this a little more difficult than it needs to be. What if you just simply took out the employer question and the employer contact question and change the next line, are you legally registered voter to the city of South Burlington to simply say, are you a resident of South, resident of South Burlington? That means that anybody can apply students, people with green cards, and then you can, you can choose the people who are best qualified for the committees. You're essentially opening it up to anybody who's a resident of South Burlington, period, regardless of age. We should change the application form. That makes good sense. Just change the form. I like that, Kevin. But there's also the issue of executive sessions and I am not sure. Well, the only ones that do that then are the DRB, if you call their, when they do their decision making, then we'll call it an executive session, but it essentially is. And then in the council, but no one else. I mean, the planning commission doesn't go into an executive session. I don't think any other committee does. I can't imagine when. But anyway, I mean, if, so you don't need to say that, except, yeah. And if I could ask- I don't know why we ask it. We have added your committees when there's been more interest than there are seats. So with Kevin's point, we changed the form. It opens the net. So all of these important people can comply and we can make that clear in our communications. And if we want to add seats to the bicycle and pad to meet the interests of the community, we've done that in the past so we can continue to do so. Okay. Well, what's the, what's the pleasure? Do you want to see a revised resolution versus a revised application? I think one of the positive things about the resolution is that it makes a pretty big statement to the populations that we're hoping to expand participation by, by having a resolution that kind of identifies them. But you can also advertise when it's time for committee applications that this is open to, you know, students and non-citizens as long as you're a resident of, you know, and you're, then I think you have to put it sort of an age thing on it if you do it that way. I think that we need a resolution if we're going to be opening it up in this way precisely because of the executive session, the sensitive issue of that. I think that's really key. And it is depriving that individual of a certain power, you know, and access to information, which is why I submitted having two so that it would not just be the token member. And I know that these words are charged, but they're charged because that's how people feel when they are one and they aren't privy to that sensitive information that only privileged members get in executive sessions. So I am trying to see things from the point of view of those members who would be excluded. And that is, I think, important for us to lay out in language that is clear, that is transparent, that people can point to that they need clarification. I was just trying to make it simpler and try to have this set tonight so that people can interview at the next meeting. That's all. I think it's ready to go to be honest because we had our chair of our planning commission say, all you had to do was be a resident. And it's clearly stipulating these are advisory committees which excludes the DRB. And it's clearly says to be enrolled, I added at the time, but I think that's just redundant. So I do think that we are ready to go for next meeting, to be quite honest. If that is what everybody... What is the sense of the council? Are you ready to go? Tonight? Yes. No, not tonight, no. Two weeks. Okay. Because certainly... I do agree with that we should... Still interview Manel and the... Yeah, Johnson and I don't remember. Okay. Yeah, we just... We're going to review them pending approval of a resolution that... Are there any other items that people want included in a new... So Marcy Murray said a very... She wrote to me here that not all South Brunnington students are South Brunnington residents. That's very true. So we could certainly add resident to that. And I prefer a limit of two. Not two plus two, but just two. This is like what the school board has where they have the student... We don't vote him. I know, I know. But I'm saying that it's an opportunity for a student to participate in the process. This gives them a vote except for an executive session or a deliberative session, right? So I would just like the resolution. I prefer just to say two minutes. I don't care what the combination is either residents that aren't citizens and or are minors. It doesn't matter. And make sure we specify the exclusivity of the DRB and the planning commission or any other board that's not seriously just advisory and doesn't violate the charter. And then just tighten up that paragraph about the educational status of the person. That's all right. Okay. There was an, I'm sorry, Matt. Oh, I'm sorry. I just want to clarify. We're not increasing the size of the committees. We're not adding to we are, we are working with the existing numbers as I've created now. Correct. Yes. Well, why don't we get a new draft for consideration and potential adoption in two weeks and give people time to think about it. Do people agree with Tim regarding a limit to two total of those members of the committees who could not participate in executive sessions? Or is Tim alone in that? No, I agree. You know, I don't know how I feel about that. I think there could be problems, but if there were four in a committee with and they, I don't know, I'd like to think about that, that's a pretty minor revision. I mean, it's not minor in your mind, Megan. And I understand that interest in having two students. So they have support. It might be incumbent upon some training with chairs and committees that encourage them or show them how to, to really involve student, these student members into their committee. Yeah. And just like we, we entertain recommendations from our current committee chairs and members for appointing, you know, a candidate or candidates who have applied. I would imagine that we would, or the future council would take into consideration, you know, a concern that we have a maximum number of people who can attend our executive sessions right now. We cannot, we need to have a member who could attend executive sessions. I see that as something that will, it will auto regulate. I really am not in favor. You don't know what could happen. And there might be someone outstanding. And the committee will say, well, we don't mind if there's a third member. It's not a problem for us. And for us to limit it to two, I think is, is prescriptive in a way that is detrimental to potentially a very, you know, positive level of diversity on a board. So at this point, I will leave it as is saying to each, and then we can continue that discussion in two weeks. That sounds like the limit of two because of the comment that Sandy Dooley made, but I also think we should move on and bring this back at the next meeting because we got a lot of other things. So we shall do that. Thank you for all your work, Megan. And I think we'll have something in two weeks that we can support. So I appreciate it. And now my bed, I skipped over number eight, the council follow up from joint meeting with planning commission. And the questions posed by the commission. I had a conversation with the chair of the planning commission, Jessica. And during that conversation, we agreed that the council, a while ago had said, get the, the environmental, you call it, I'm blanking on the term, chapters 10 and 12, done and approved, and then moved to the PUD. So I was, and talking with, and getting a lot of feedback from the public, I was, and I'm going to suggest, and I think Jessica will have a comment as well, that we put off this discussion until we have completed the discussion and the planning commission has completed their work on chapters 10 and 12. Before we start mixing it up again with, well, what about the PUDs and how do they fit? I think the council agreed that the environmental protection were kind of the basis for then, how do you create PUDs and development regs that conform to that and allow for growth? So that's rather than have a long conversation about that part of the work plan for IZ, I would suggest that we move on, but I would like Jessica to make any comments she has, and then we can open it to discussion, but. Yeah, so we didn't provide a lot for tonight's conversation because we wanted you to have just time to reflect on, you know, things that had come up in the joint meeting. In the joint meeting, I think we covered the chapters 10 and 12, the environmental protection standards in pretty good detail and looked at mapping. So if you have comments on any of that part, I think it would be really helpful to have, you know, kind of during this public comment period, which ends on the 20th of this month. And for tonight's packet, we did give you some new information and some kind of questions to give a little bit more background about what we had talked about at the second part of our joint meeting, that part about how the PUDs relate. We kind of got squished in our time, and there wasn't a lot of time to kind of go through all of that. So what's in your packet tonight? I guess I see as additional information for you to have more context and to frame some questions that we will have for you kind of moving forward. But, you know, if you want to hold off till we're done with the environmental protection standards to kind of circle back on those questions, I think that's completely appropriate and in line with your direction to focus on chapters 10 and 12 first. So we just wanted to make sure you kind of had the big picture, you know, before we get to the point of adopting the chapters 10 and 12. So that was it. And I'm here to answer questions if you have any follow-up questions since our joint meeting. Does that sound acceptable to everyone? Not to dig into that tonight, Matt? That's fine. My couple of clarifications. One is I do recall the language that we used. Very particular language that we use when we were referring to, you know, the guidance to the planning commission is putting a pin in the environmental protection standards. And to me, putting a pin in it isn't meaning, it means get started on the public hearing process so we can fully vet it, not to get the approval done and then work to get the PUDs. I still have an open mind about that, about whether or not we should prove them as a package or we can do them in order. And then the second, so I just want to clarify that. And then the second part of the question was for Jessica, which is what is most, I see the questions that you've asked us, the commentary regarding PUDs, what's most helpful to you now as you think about ways to formulate these changes? You know, I think some of the specifics about the PUDs, we don't necessarily need right now because we are really still focused on chapter 10 and 12 stuff, so that's fine. I think the one thing that I might want to point out is the piece where we talk about strict conservation. One thing that I don't know that I pointed out super well in our joint meeting is that the work of the open space and term zoning committee did excellent work and it was parcel-based. Our approach at the planning commission has not been parcel-based. It's been resource and science-based. And we had maybe last year even kind of given the direction that if you at the council level would like to follow up in some way on that report and maybe in your conservation planning take into consideration that parcel-based information, I think that would be something that we've kind of put on your plate. I think it's a great report. There's so much great information in there but our approach at the commission level has been resource-based. So I just wanted to make sure that that was clear and we weren't kind of missing something before we get to the end of IZ. Thank you. May I comment on that, Sherri Lee? You certainly may. Great point, Jessica. And thank you for that. I see that report from the open space committee is tremendously valuable for councils. This current one and future ones, as we consider the use of our open space fund acquisition dollars and those other plannings. And I love that the planning commission is doing exactly what you just described, resource and scientific base because my understanding of the legalities of land use regulations, that makes a lot of sense. So thank you for that comment and I fully support that trajectory. All right. So is there any further comment? And this, okay. So thank you, Jessica. We certainly will be back in touch. So moving on to item 10, this is the interview time. And we're just about on schedule. So that's good. And the first person will be interviewing. I'm hardly read this. Jennifer, let me get them up. Is Jennifer, I'm, I must need new glasses. I'll be Saras. Is that how you pronounce it? Is Jennifer here? Could it be Jen Savas? Yeah, I guess it is Jen Savas. Yes. Alrighty. Hi. Welcome. I'm sorry. I couldn't read your name. Now I can bring up your, you are interested in the library. Okay. So have you, but you're not, you're, you're new. Okay. So what is, um, Ellis, you know, do you, are you familiar with the goals of the library committee and how do they sort of connect with your goals? Um, I'm interested in, uh, the library committee because I want to be more involved with the community and a, um, um, In a, in a sport, if you will, that I love, I love reading. I love libraries. Um, but don't look at my library car because I'm pretty sure that I owe books. Um, but I didn't return. But I do, I'm just interested in looking over the library. I'm interested in the new, the new building. Uh, I have a lot of experience in event planning. And I understand that there might be a need for events, uh, coming up with the new library. Mm hmm. I, um, am a little free library steward, which means that I live in Butler farms. I put a new library, a little, um, little free library across the street that I keep stocked with, uh, toddler books and adult books and, um, teenager team books. So I just want to be more active. Okay. Have you been to any of the, um, library meetings and understand the time commitment? Yeah. Honestly. But you think you have the time if you're interested in working on some event planning, you must have some time. I, um, I work from home. Uh, my job is, um, a conference coordinator for a pediatric medical learning health network. Um, so I'm, and I. Spent 10 years at run Vermont planning the Vermont city marathon. Um, I've lived in South Burlington for 30 years. Um, my son is a sophomore in high school and. I was always very involved in his activities. But he doesn't need me anymore. So I'm looking to find, uh, more for me. Great. Okay. Other questions from the council. Tim. Hey, Jen, I live in the cider mill and I, I bike commute through your, your street and I've seen your library several times. And, uh, I caught my eye the first time I passed. Oh, that's, that's a micro library. A nice little box with a little door and I haven't had a chance to look inside, but I just want to thank you for putting that up. Oh, thank you. It's, um, so my home office looks out over the library and my family calls me a stalker, but I can like. People out there and you know, I'm like, oh, customer customer. I just put a bench out there. So now I, um, last weekend and I've seen families sit there and read. So I'm loving it. Any other questions? So let me ask you if, um, and I can't think of an example, but, um, if the, if the library committee were asked to pursue something that, um, you know, the council thought was a great idea. Um, but you personally disagreed with it. How, how would you respond to that? Oh, delicately. Um, I, I would actually find out why they thought it was a good idea because there must be a reason. Um, I am. Well, everyone else thought it was a good idea and it just was, I don't know, maybe it was some kinds of books that you feel were inappropriate, um, or a program. But you know, maybe I didn't think it would work. Yeah. Or just the morally wrong or I don't know something. Um, I would give my opinion. I, you know, for what it's worth. I, I would, I would tell people what I thought. And then, um, uh, hear both. I would hear all the sides. And I would say, um, I would say, I would agree with it. And. I'm not going to not do something because I don't agree with it. Give it a college try and. Okay. Then say I told you so. No, just kidding. I would. All right. Okay. Other questions from council members. to know, and I'm sorry I was reading through comments so I might have missed something if you said it. Could you tell us more about your volunteer experience, Jen? Sure, well I volunteered through my son's growing up. I was on the South Burlington Little League board in charge of uniforms for his whole Little League career. I write the newsletter for the South Burlington food shelf. I'm a mentor for the South Burlington program. I have a little, oh my gosh, I don't even know. I think she's still in third grade at Orchard. And gosh. Well that's a lot. You've got good experience. So what skills would you bring besides loving, you know, reading as a sport? What kinds of skills would you bring forward? I have the same sport, Jen. I know, I do calisthenics every day. So tell me, what kind of skills would you bring forward or do you think the library board would need from quite a wealth of experience that you have? I love writing. I'm happy to, I volunteered to, I got a blank on his name. Also in the South Burlington food shelf, it wasn't Peter Carmel, actually it was Peter and somebody else. Yeah, thank you. Yes. Asking if I could do their communications for them. I enjoy, enjoy writing, designing, event planning. And I would probably volunteer in the library when, when the time comes that there's a availability. Thank you. That's a wonderful response. Thank you. Yeah, that sounds great. Oh, and I love the seed idea and I'm stealing it for my library. My little library. Okay. Ideas are to be shared. That's okay. That's great. Far Oaks. Are there any other finds to be charged at your library? That's what I want to know. I do. And actually, you know what, I do see that finds were eliminated. I also shared, I was a big, I unfortunately had to bring a lot of canned goods and stuff as my library finds piled up. Was there a question? No, if there isn't, I was just gonna thank you for your interest. It sounds like you've already done a lot for South Burlington for your, through your children in the food shelf and all sorts of things. So our process is we have one more meeting of interviews and then we'll find a good chunk of time to meet and go through all the applicants and make decisions. So we, I would hope that we, our decisions could be announced by the beginning of June. So that's kind of the timeframe. Thank you. All right. Okay. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate your interest and thank you for, for applying. Okay. Thank you. So the next run is Margaret Cross, who is an incumbent on the library board. Hi there. So you've been on the board for how long? Two terms. So six years. Six years. Okay. Oh, that's your first sentence. Sorry. And you've been vice chair and chair. So you're really aware of what the library board does and how to do it. Are there any things we should know about your role as chair or the library board that would be helpful for the council to know? So I'm currently serving on the advocacy committee and I serve as the secretary of the foundation. So I've been involved in the campaign, mostly behind the scenes doing some grant writing and communications, a little bit of advising. I'm in fundraising for communications for a living. I work for the University of Michigan Health System remotely. Of course, so yeah, no, I'm, you know, I'm interested in staying involved. I really have loved it. If I can offer any continuity or, you know, just experience, I'm happy to bring that to continue to bring that. I'm super impressed with the library director and the staff. I just love seeing what they're doing and being supportive in any way that I can. So I'm just pleased and happy to continue if you feel that that, you know, that that would be helpful. So yeah. Okay. Any other questions from anyone else? Seems like we need to keep you. Oh, thank you. Right. Well, good. Well, thank you very much for re-upping and I think, you know, the continuity is probably an important thing. Okay. It's been, it's been lovely to see the new people come on the board too is wonderful. So whatever the decision is, is great. But I, it's, it's just very rewarding to be a part of it. Okay. Good. Well, thank you. Thank you. Next up is Leslie Klamo. I'm trying to find her thing. Oh, there it is. Leslie Black Klamo. She, there you are. Hi Leslie. And she's an incumbent on the affordable housing committee. And you've been on that for a couple of two terms for one term. This may be the third term. Okay. And you obviously know what the committee does. What, well, I don't know. I tell us why you, I mean, you have lots of background and interest. If, would you have a problem with, if the council for whatever reason changed its mind about the importance of affordable housing? I'm not suggesting we are going to, but if, I don't know, things worked out so we didn't look as if we were supporting it enough. How, how would that play out for you? But would, how would you deal with that on that committee? Well, we would definitely discuss what, you know, what was going on behind and we've had discussions like this as the years have gone by about the impacts of local decision making on housing affordability and sometimes unintended consequences for the affordability of the housing stock in South Burlington. And so by discussing with the committee and then hearing the, you know, the competing priorities that the city council and the planning commission are juggling, that is usually the best way for immediately to get some context for why things may be going a certain direction. And then I just try to, my, my role is more of a fact provider for this group in many ways. And I have a lot of familiarity with the demographics in Vermont and the housing stock and what are some of the levers that can affect housing affordability. So I try to just interject that where it's helpful. Okay. You clearly know the time commitment. Are there any other questions that council might have? Megan. Yeah. I just wanted to, to know a little bit more about, you know, how the state, do you work, I'm sorry, for the county or for the state, Leslie, I guess I have to work for a state, a state organization. It's not a state agency, per se. It's a, you know, it's a statewide nonprofit agency that was chartered by the state of Vermont, but we do things like issue bonds. We're kind of the bank for affordable housing in Vermont. So any building that goes up in South Burlington that has income limits that are targeted to low income individuals, that would always have some VHFA money in it to help make those rents affordable. Does it go directly to rents or does it go to cars and gas and insurance and those kinds of expenses? Does it go to utilities? Does it go to, you know, what exactly besides rents or maybe it's just rents? It's interesting. It's a way of providing housing that's affordable ultimately to the tenant by financing development up front. So federal housing tax credits are provided up front and that means that the developer can work with a syndicator and raise about 60% of the costs of developing that's like constructing or rehabbing the apartment building. And then that developer doesn't need to take out as big of a loan as they would otherwise need. And that means that the developer owner has more flexibility and in fact will be required by this federal funding source. To limit the amount of rent that it charges for those apartments and it doesn't need to to make to make the numbers work because it has had this big influx of cash at the development stage. It didn't need to, the developer need to borrow the money so it doesn't need to turn to the tenants to have them pay it through rent. So those other expenses that you mentioned are all part of a tenant or manager owners budget and money is kind of like water. It flows where it's needed and it's the money in the beginning helps over a long period of time keep those rents affordable and provide enough money for the utilities for the building. Okay but cars, gas, insurance, tires, I'm assuming that's not included. Well one of the requirements of some federal funding sources and some state funding sources are that the tenant is not can't pay rent that's more than 30% of their income. And part of the thinking with that is that that leaves you know the remaining 70% of their income for those kinds of expenses. It's kind of keeps their housing expenses sustainable. They'll have enough money hopefully to pay their rent and all those other expenses that they have like cars and medical bills and food and childcare. Okay any other comments Matt? Oh we just wanted to thank Leslie for work BHFA is an incredible organization under leadership of Mora Collins and done incredible work in the energy space making sure that these affordable homes are not those homes are not only affordable but they're also energy efficient. So thank you for what you do Leslie. Good all right. Do you have any questions for us Leslie? You know you guys have a long agenda tonight. My question how do you stay awake this long? Coffee. Yeah I'd be up all night. I don't do coffee but anyway okay thank you very much for your service. Thank you for applying again and you certainly bring some important knowledge and facts to that for Wildland Committee. So I thank you for that. Thank you all for your service. Okay Emily Krasnow. Is she here? Is Emily here? No. Hello. Can you hear me? Yes I can hear you. Okay great. Hi. So you're interested in the Affordable Housing Committee as well. I am. So tell us what it looks like you've had a fair amount of experience at the state level. You worked for Lieutenant Governor Zuckerman. Yep from 2013 to 2020. Yeah that's a that's a good long time. So what kind of you know skill sets would you bring to this or talents that would you see perhaps as needed on the Affordable Housing Committee in South Burlington? Sure well I've lived in South Burlington for 16 years now. I was a renter before as a homeowner. I believe that I would bring perspective as a young professional who you know I believe housing is a human right and is at the intersection of a lot of issues that are important having a state safe and stable home advances racial justice climate justice and affordability justice. So I think I bring that experience and knowledge on a state level. I'm a fast learner and I'm interested in learning more about South Burlington housing needs and goals and currently I'm studying leadership and management at the University of Notre Dame's Mendoza College of Business. So learning more about management and promoting civic engagement. I produced an online television show live from the state house. We did a lot of topics around affordability affordable housing and issues like that and so I think civic engagement. I speak at high schools colleges around the state promoting the importance of engagement and being involved in your community. So I think I could bring those skills to the table to advance the work that is going on in South Burlington. Okay. Have you sat in on any of the South Burlington affordable housing meetings? So I had intended to go to the last one. Unfortunately my mother had surgery and I had a family obligations and I could not attend but I had planned to. I do watch the city council meetings on CCTV that you all have. So I am familiar with a lot of the people and people in the community and I do know some a lot of the people on the committee so and have talked to them about the commitment and needs of the committee. Good. Other questions or comments? Tim is that a hand up or you're just yeah. Yeah I know. So Emily do you have any specific ideas that you would want to flow with the committee if you were to join it? Sure. Again my experience is more on a statewide level. I have worked under the mentorship of city councilor Brian Pine and for some time and the affordable housing coalition as well as CVOEO and some other housing organizations statewide. So I would as far as specific suggestions I would love to just learn more and then promote ideas that I've had statewide. As we know there's a housing stock shortage and the units that people want to live in. So there's cooperative housing. There are a lot of different ideas that we've seen on a state level that I'm interested but really as a new committee member I would be more interested in hearing process from others before I would just jump in with my own suggestions. Thanks. Okay. Other questions? Matt did you have your hand up? Yeah. Yes. Hi Emily. You have such a broad public policy background given your work in the state house as we discussed. Is there any other I notice you just put affordable housing committee as you're in the application. Is there any other committees that you're interested in or are you just focused on the affordable housing at this point? To be perfectly honest I do have interest in other committees. If the council believes that I would be a better fit for another committee and that I'm open to the discussion. Affordable housing seemed like a natural fit for me because that's a lot of the work I've been doing in Burlington over the last decade and organizing and one of the most important policies statewide that I've been involved in. But I am interested in giving back to South Burlington in that capacity. So if the council believes that I would be a better fit for another committee I'm open to that discussion as well and interested. All right. Tom. Emily great to see you applying. I think you have a wealth of Vermont state talent to bring so I'm so glad to see you applying. Similar to Councillor Coda's point. I'm not taking anything away from Councillor Barrett but I also see you would be a great GMT alternate. So I think you're a big Councillor Barrett. You're still our Green Mountain Transit alternate. But if you didn't feel like taking or if you want to light your load a little bit Emily Crasna with mega pole lights on that board and I think you would represent South Burlington really well there. You know how GMT needs to navigate the legislature to plant a seed in your mind and if you want a little less to do Tim I would definitely support her becoming the GMT alternate. It's a real trip. Thank you. Yes that's right. My good pal is on that committee as well. All right. Megan did you have a question? Thank you. I think we have the wrong application in our box is that correct? I think somebody else is that when I clicked on Emily's somebody else's. Mine says Emily. Mine doesn't have her name but it has her. It has 16 years old. I'm a 16 year old resident. Oh 16 years. We are here for 16 years. Okay. Yeah I am 36. So all right. I just want to clarify. Okay. Thank you. I have lived in South Burlington for 16 years now. Born and raised in Charlotte. So not too far. Okay. And I know you from okay. Thank you. It's just the previous discussion. All right. Let me take Nice to be 16 again. Maybe. Oh I don't know. I don't know. Any other questions for Emily? Do you have any questions for us? Nope. Thank you for your time. Like I said I do watch the meetings and as well as the Burlington meetings and stay pretty engaged. So I appreciate all your time and efforts especially. I know that you all wear many hats and give a lot of time to the community. So I appreciate all those efforts and thank you for considering me. Well thank you very much for applying and all that you've done and we may have a place for you somewhere else as well. That's fine too. I'm happy to hear your suggestions and thoughts and I'm open to all of them. Great. Thank you. Have a good night. You too. Okay. Next up is Havala Ganyay. Am I pronouncing that right? Yes. Hi. Good evening. This is Havala Ganyay. Havala. Okay. And you're on bike and ped now. Yes. You're completing your first term. So you know what their goals are. Do you think they have the right goals? I do. Goals and vision. Okay. So what are those? We talk a lot about shifting the culture and really embracing non-car forms of transportation. It's definitely about connection, making it easier for people to get from their neighborhood to place of work to businesses and making South Burlington really a pleasant place to live. And more equitable. It's a lot cheaper to own a bike than it is to own a car. They tend not to break down. They break down but not really as bad. And that's a lot of what we're working on. So I guess my first term was a huge learning curve for me. Part of it the pandemic didn't really help. It's a two-year term. But I've been impressed at how organized it is. They've got their goals out for years in advance. I think if we got the one megabucks we could just kind of roll out all kinds of great projects. But they're really careful about eliciting community input. Prioritizing, really looking at how many people in neighborhoods can we connect with one little spot here and there. So I'm happy about that. Ashley Parker is a great project manager to work with us. She was able to apply and get a grant so we can fill in a section on Dorset Street. So it's been a great committee. I've learned a lot. Okay. Any other questions? Certainly know the time commitment and you have the time. It sounds like you have the you've drunk the Kool-Aid. So are you a biker personally? I do. I work, I live in Butler Farm neighborhood and I work at the University of Vermont Medical Center. I have a pedal assist bike and boy I bought it in September of 2019. I started biking in full time April of 2020 and I went through full time just about every day through the end of November. I had a couple days I was able to do it in December and I managed to get a ride in January. There's about two or three months that I can't ride because it's just a little too icy for fall. I'm careful. Go down on the curvy parts where I can't see or on the bend. So you certainly understand and appreciate the need for safer roads to get to the University? Yeah, we do. We certainly have a plan and it's a high priority. I tend to go on Spear Street for a part that doesn't have half connected and that's a high priority for us. I think it's, as I recall, it's within the five-year plan for us. But yeah, we'd love funding for paint and signs would be great. We can do a lot with that. Okay. Other questions or comments? Again, thank you for your service in all aspects. That's very cool that you ride your bike so much. I walk and do those things through the library and stuff but I don't bike around here anyway. Thank you and we'll be back in touch before June 1st. Okay, great. Thank you so much. Thank you for all of your service as well. You're welcome. Okay, next is Maddie Christine Luxper and Maddie is interested in the bike and head committee as well. Hi, Maddie. How are you doing? I'm doing pretty well. I really liked hearing your stories. I don't bike as much as you but I'm getting my bike converted to an e-bike in the next couple of months and I'm really looking forward to it. Great. So you have lived here? So I lived in my current address for a year. That's what I've been asked. I've lived in South Burlington for three years but just moved a couple miles away closer to the downtown area which I really like makes it a lot easier to bike around. Sure. Okay. And what do you think you would add to the bike and head committee? I read a lot about sustainable transportation. It's one of my passions is learning about that sort of thing and I hope to bring that sort of, for lack of a better term, like my desire to go find interesting pieces of information and share them with people and bring that sort of energy to the committee. Alrighty. Questions that other people might have? I mean, you just heard what all the goals are, I guess, from... Have you been to any of the committee meetings? I didn't actually know they were open to the public. I looked at the page obviously but I missed the part where it said they're open to the public. So that guess will teach me. Any, Megan? Hi, Maddie. I was curious if you could tell us your thoughts about that, what is it, the Crossover Exit 14 plan? You attended the CCRPC meeting and I would just, I would love to have your perspective on how that would work. I don't fully understand it to be completely honest. It looks confusing. I don't drive. I mean, I have an electric car and I try and avoid 89 as much as possible because I don't like to go above 50 miles an hour. I guess I don't really get what the interchange would look like. It's been hard to visualize that intersection. I mean, obviously, it's a nightmare I biked to UVM last week and the whole time I was like, had on a swivel and thankfully some very kind drivers like let me cross but it's very scary. Definitely room for improvement. The specific traffic clothing is not really my area of expertise but I love to learn. So definitely something I would like to be able to speak about with more authority, I guess. Have you looked at the exit 13 to see the bike lane there and what would become a state highway that seems to be much less complicated and much more straightforward? I don't know. I can't remember right now off the top of my mind. Okay, that's fine. That's fine. But looking for a way to get to UVM from South Burlington would be of interest to you, to me too. Particularly, I think biking along Williston Road is just, that's mostly, I mostly do my biking along Williston Road and along Patching Road. I work at Community Health Centers of Burlington and have been working remotely for a year and change now but prior to that bike to work three days a week and that's a zone that is rife with speeding and I would love to see some sort of traffic control and bike safety improvements there. I think, well honestly, I know that obviously this is an application and an interview. I feel like if I were accepted to the bike committee, one of my stumbling blocks would be, and this has been the case in numerous of my jobs, I like to dream really big and I think it would have to be, I'd have to keep those impulses in check a little bit. We probably don't have the funds to do protected bike lanes down all of Williston Road as much as I would like that. That's what the committee structure is for, right? It's to dream big and then, okay, now we're going to chip away at the edges. Reality check. Yeah, exactly. Very good. Thank you. Other questions for Maddie? All right. Well, thank you very much for your interest and as I mentioned earlier, we'll finish our interviews and then get back a meet and then get back with all the candidates on our selections. Okay. I actually have one question for the City Council, if I could. I know that this is an advisory committee and that any recommendations we make are just that advisory. I'm sure a lot of the discussion last week at the City Council meeting and I know that this is one of the agenda items moving up or coming up is about the three to two vote about the 12, exit 12 expansion. And I just want to, I guess like I'm aware of the time commitment on the committee and I just want to make sure that it's going to be like a worthwhile use of time if the recommendation that the committee can be sort of seemingly kind of easily over, you know, pushed to the side. Well, I guess I would answer. I don't know if that's a question, but one of the reasons we're revisiting that vote is because probably my fault. We didn't really take the time to listen to all the committees who were presenting. And in retrospect, I agree with you. I think that's a poor reflection on the Council to, especially when we're in the midst of interviewing people for committees and then have a meeting where it appeared as if we didn't listen to any of the committees. So we'll hear from them tonight, I hope, and hopefully get that more, a better structure in our conversations because it is insulting and it's a good question. Why would I join a committee if I do all this work and I don't even get to present at a Council meeting what we were asked to consider? Chair Ridley? Yes. So, Maddie, thank you for that. I think you directed it at the whole Council, so I just offer the following. In the Council role, we're weighing lots of different perspectives and getting interest for the entire city and we received lots of perspectives and I want to want you to know that I took to heart all of the feedback from the committees. I fully advocate for bike and head enhancements in this community. I see 12B as one of those opportunities to get a whole bunch of federal money to make it safer to go over Hinesburg Road, but I simultaneously want to see the improvements that exit 13 and exit 14. So if anybody has perceived that the previous discussions were dismissive of those committee reports, then I think we do need to do what Chair Ridley just suggested is make sure to carve out more time to hear from our committees because you serve an important role and we need to hear your voices and that's why we have these bodies. So I feel like I definitely listen to them and I always do and I love attending the committees whenever I can, especially when they're in person and catered, but just know that you listen to the committees and you serve an important role and I'm hoping that you'll be on the committee soon enough to experience that. Thank you very much for your thoughtful response. I really appreciate that. Okay. Well, thank you very much, Maddie. Next up is Stephanie Wyman. She is an incumbent on the DRB. Where's Stephanie? There you are. Hi there. Welcome. So you're interested in continuing. Remind me how long you, you haven't been there very long, right? Like just a year maybe? Oh, like two months. Oh, that's right. You're a real quick, yes, okay. Yeah, I filled in for someone who had stepped down. Okay. So in two months, it hasn't turned you off too much? No, no. Okay. So have you found, I mean, what kind of skills do you find that you bring to the table that have, what you think have been helpful? Yeah. So I'm a professional engineer in the state of Vermont. And so I bring a lot of background, knowing how to read site plans, understanding the land development regulations and how those apply to development projects in the city. And then being able to kind of offer my advice on designs, ask more pointed questions of the designers as to maybe why they did something or why they would lean one way or the other for their designs. So. Okay. That's good. I think Matt would agree. Pointed questions are good. That's fine. Other questions? Tim? Quick one. So Stephanie, how many meetings have you been on, been to the DRB so far? I think I've attended four or, yeah, I think four now. Okay. All right. Have you had to recuse for many of those four? Any application? Yes, you have? Yeah. Okay. And I think that's one of the challenges, right, when you're looking for someone to join the board, you want them to be able to participate in all of the projects that come forth. And unfortunately, that's not going to be the case for me. I work for VHB. And so we are actively involved with multiple developers. Sometimes my company is involved with specific projects in South Burlington. So naturally I need to recuse from any of those conflicts. What's your scorecard now? Is it like one out of 10 or one out of five or just just curious? Yeah. So it depends on the meeting. I've had some meetings where I've been able to participate in the entire meeting. I've also had a meeting where I've had to sit out for an entire meeting. So I think I'm 60, 40. It's hard to say. 60 that you've participated in and 40 that you can or the reverse? Again, it depends on I think. It depends on the night. I mean, tomorrow we've got, I think we have four items and I can sit on one. So that does happen. I know there are other members on the board where that's also happened, where they've sat out 50% of the meeting or 75% of the meeting. So I think that that comes along with the profession. Okay. Other questions, Matt? Just a comment and I do appreciate Stephanie's expertise. I interviewed her or just had a discussion with her when she first took it when I was still on the DRB. And this is the balancing act, right? Having someone who understands how to read a site plan that can ask pointed and direct questions to a developer to make sure that our wonderful professional city staff are in fact catching everything is a real asset for the DRB. The only drawback is the recusals and as long as it's done in a proper manner, then I think there's a real plus side to having that expertise. So that's my only comment on it. And Stephanie, thank you for your service. Okay. Other questions or comments? Well, good. Oh, Megan, yes? Just dump in here and say I just going to put a plug in for the I. We need engineers and we also need people who see things as a resident would see the buildings. And I just was hoping you could tell us a little bit about your perspective on that. Yeah, I mean, I've actually, the more that I've sat at all these meetings and stuff, it kind of opens up like my perspective from where I live, right? Like I do a ton of walking up on, you know, the Spear Street area and Dorset Street. You know, sometimes I don't always make it that far because that turns my walk from three miles into like eight miles. But you know, I kind of walk around and I see the open spaces. I see the development that's happening around. And sometimes I'm like, all right, well, it is hard to imagine like a larger development in this area. And you kind of can see the landowner concerns. But also, I come from an engineering background and I understand the need for more housing and I understand the need for development in the city. So it is it's trying to find that balancing act. And I think a lot of people naturally will say, well, not in my backyard, like I support development, but not in this particular area because it and how you interact with that on a daily basis. It's not quite my question. That wasn't quite my question. It was more in the design of the buildings as opposed to open space. So the design of the buildings. Okay, yeah. So from my perspective, I'm more focused on I guess the accessibility and the safety, right? So as an engineer, we put the safety first. So for me, I'm not necessarily always saying, okay, I'm going to look at this particular finish on the housing, right? That will be my personal perspective as not being an architect. I won't be able to necessarily provide the feedback of, say, an architect. And, you know, that's just not my area of expertise, but certainly the connectivity for bike pad, the safety from traffic standpoints, you know, those are certainly concerns for a lot of people. And I can provide that feedback based on my experiences as an engineer. And then of course, drainage and stormwater treatment. That's also something that's, you know, I work with every single day. Very much appreciate your response. Thank you very much, Stephanie. Okay, any other questions? All right, seeing none. Thank you so much, Stephanie. Thank you. We're next listening to Patricia Leonard. And Patricia is also interested in the DRB. Oh, there's Patricia Leonard. Okay, well, welcome. What do you, how do you understand the role of a member of the DRB? What is it you do? Well, I would say that because I had an interest in this committee, I just I think that, you know, what I've listened to tonight, we had all the discussion. The audio is choppy. I can't hear her. I'm sorry, Patty. I can't hear you very your, your audio is chopping up. Okay. I'll hear me. Well, it's. Are you using wireless earbuds that are also microphone? I've heard this before usually when your batteries are on low. Are you on Xfinity or DSL, you know? Maybe drop the camera and see if the. Yeah, maybe you know what you look like now, which is great. And so it's, sometimes if you turn the camera off, your voice is better so we can picture your mouth going, but is that better? Keep talking. Keep talking. Okay. As I understand it, you know, it's a joint effort and can you still hear me now? A little paranoid now. Okay. So, you know, it's a joint effort. It's, it's your, your, on a committee and everyone's working, you're understanding the details, you're working together to support the group and making decisions based on all the information that you get and that you move forward to the board. I have personal, you know, I'm a resident of South Burlington. I've been a resident since 2008 and I am interested in the development of South Burlington business-wise as well as residential. I am a red letter, so I do know what's going on in the area. But also, I have had extensive business experience by owning new businesses. I owned my own women's clothing and rented space. My ex-husband and I had a just recently worked in a bakery owning a bagel bakery and I have owned my own clothing store as well as I was in hospitality and worked eight years in hospitality at the Sheraton and worked on many, many committees, including an ambassador ship for the Fledger Island Healthcare and also on the leadership committee, which was for the Lake Champlain Regional Chamber of Commerce. So I have worked on committees and I do feel like business experience definitely helps when you're working with committees and you have to make choices in business decisions and listen to both sides. So I feel like that's where my experience would come in. Okay. Other questions? Yeah, Patty, can you hear me? This is Tim Barrett. Yes, I can. Have you attended any DRB meetings recently or in the last couple months? Yes. I attended the City Council meeting on the 19th, I think it was, of April and I also attended the DRB meeting on the 20th. Are you familiar with how the DRB works and what governs, what rules they're governed by? Yes, as I am. Okay. I do know that. You said you're also a self-employed real estate agent. Yes. So, I mean, Megan was talking earlier about the ability to have some influence on aesthetic nuance on the board. Do you think that you would bring that type of perspective to the board? I think I could, yes. Yes, with the design and so forth. I live in Stamington, which is just around the corner, right up the street, or right down the street from O'Brien Farm, and seeing the positive changes that they're doing. And I do, you know, the designs and the energy efficient building, it's, I think it's all positive going forward. Do you also have in mind some parts of the city where you think that there was not very much consideration paid to design and aesthetic detail? In housing or just in general? Couldn't hear what you said. I'm sorry. In housing or in general? Just in general. Just in general. For me, I'm looking at the exit 12B and exit 13 and design of those and seeing my background. I'm sorry to interrupt. I was thinking more about housing design. Oh, okay. All right. That's where we're going. Housing design. I mean, I just, for the energy efficient, and I'm just going off of what has been built in the area with South Village as well as O'Brien Farm. And I think as they're built closer together and also where they've in some ways in here in the O'Brien Farm, they put the garage underneath at home. So I think just the scale that is mine, I think is good. Okay. Thank you. Other questions? Met. Hi, Patty. Just from the perspective of a former DRB member and just a comment with a question at the end. There are CERR projects. You are, the DRB is a quasi judicial board and there'll be projects that come before you that you may like, that may see value in that you can't approve because it does not comply with the land development regulations that the city council approves. Conversely, there may be a project that you don't like, but that does comply. Do you feel comfortable being able to make those decisions not based on your personal beliefs with thoughts, but based on interpreting the land development regulations? Yes. Yes, I think I could. And I say that because you have to look at both perspectives. You can't just put your personal opinion in that. You have to look at all the perspectives and what I've listened to tonight throughout the meeting and the other meetings that I have attended. You do have to put yourself in a just a non-biased opinion. And you have to look at all the facts and everything that's being presented to you so that you know exactly what's good for the development of South Burlington. And I think I could absolutely do that, yes. Thank you, Pat. All right, Megan. Yes, could you tell me, Patty, what kind of housing is most sought after in your office anyway? There right now. Are you talking dollar-wise? Are you just talking design? Well, I would say, do you work with homeowners seeking to purchase here in South Burlington? Do you deal with people seeking to find housing for students or just curious what you're? Yeah, sure. I work with buyers that want to live in South Burlington or they're selling their South Burlington home but looking for another home in South Burlington. They're not looking to move out of the area. I wish we had more homes up for sale in South Burlington because that would help. A big portion of the homes right now that are active, and I don't mean pending in contract, but I just mean active. A lot of them are the new builds in South Village and in O'Brien Farm, just for examples. And do you see families who purchase homes for their college students? I know of one, but I don't typically see that a lot. I have two in my neighborhood. Okay. On my street. Just so you know. Okay. Yeah. Okay, thank you. That was all. Thank you. All right. If there's no further questions, thank you very much. I'm sorry that we had to turn your photo off to hear you, but we forget to meet you visually in the beginning. And thank you for your interest in applications and we'll let you know. Okay. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. And it's definitely just listening and going into the meetings is definitely, it's a learning experience and because it is a concern, you know, as everybody moves forward in South Burlington, we want to see it develop and we want to see it, you know, a place that everybody wants to live and open a business. So I appreciate it. Thank you so much. Thank you. Good night. Okay. Next up is John Beausange. See with us? Yes, there you are, John. And John is applying for the Natural Resources and Conservation Committee. So welcome. Good afternoon. Why don't we start? Have you set in on any of the Natural Resources Committee meetings and understand their kind of goals and challenges? Well, the first meeting for me to sit on is actually this Thursday evening, but I've had several long conversations with Ray Gonda and he spoke with me and told me all about the ins and outs of the committee and how it advises the Council and others committees on what to do. So I know pretty good knowledge about what it does. I have not attended a meeting because I haven't been any since I was asked to join. So I'm anxious for Thursday night and my conversation with Ray and others convinced me that this way I can learn a lot more about South Burlington, its land and some of the regulations of how things work. So this is my way of getting involved in the community. Okay. So you have some idea of the time involved? Oh, yeah. I'm retired, retired middle school principal. So I welcome all that's been retired for a number of years. So I do have plenty of time on my hands to give my best effort to it. Yes. Well, I've taught middle school and if you can be a principal in middle school, you can handle almost any type of personal interaction. I was thinking about that when you're asking these let people questions that I was thinking that 24 years as a principal when you're looking at 600 taxpayers in a gym trying to sell the budget or you have a parent in your office trying to reach consensus on something with a student who's in crisis and families and I've seen a lot of that and know how to work with all that from the big to the little. So that's why I retired when I was 60. Perfect. That's like my best friend. Same thing. Does anyone else have other questions? Megan? Since this is a natural resources committee, I have to ask you about your views on climate change. Well, it's not a hoax. I'm a firm believer that we don't have too many options left. I believe it is changing rapidly in a factorial way. You know, it's going to happen faster than we believe and it'll crescendo on top of us if we don't make some pretty serious sacrifices in the next 30 years or our children's children will see apocalyptic conditions on the planet. So I'm ready to make the sacrifice as every way I can and it's going to be hard to convince people to do so but I'm a firm believer that we need to deal with it. I'm clearly not afraid to speak the truth, so I appreciate that very much. Thank you. And that begins with our lake too. I'm really worried about the condition of our lake, our drinking water, and we've been kicking that can down the road for a long time. It's hard but it's a real sacrifice, you know, to make it personally and professionally. So that's my feeling. Appreciate that. Thank you, John. Other questions? No? All right. Well, I think middle school experience and recognizing that we're not living in a hoax are some good attributes to working on a committee that this has been challenged recently. I want to be sure, did you guys get, like, when I submitted my application, I put a little summary together, April 6th, I sent it into you and it sort of was a belief statement of, and then my experience chairing different commissions and committees in Burlington and, you know, I've only been here for a year and a half, stepped into some things that I'm learning every day about. I really want to commit to South Burlington, the way I committed to Burlington, and give a lot to the community. I have a lot of passion to give and I want to make sure it's in the right direction and this is a good place for me to begin, I think. Right. Well, I've noted you've been on a number of different boards and Vice Chair of the Flynn, that's that Chair of the Parks Foundation of Burlington. Yeah, I've been Vice Chair of lots of, some I still am, some I, as I said in that note, I've turned off. So, I mean, I don't know at all, but I know enough to listen and engage people and reach consensus. I know how to do that. Well, that sounds good. Any other comments or questions? Well, good. Thank you very much for applying. I think it is a great way to get involved in your community and you clearly have some passion about it and that's, that's always important. Well, thank you. Thank you for your time, all of you. Appreciate it. I know what it is to be on there late night. So, you're doing great work. Thank you very much. You are welcome. So, our next interviewee is Lisa Yankowski. She's an incumbent on the Natural Resources Committee. She does not have a camera. On purpose. Oh, pardon me? On purpose. Oh, on purpose. Okay. So, she's caller one and so, we're just going to be chatting with her. I don't have one on my computer at work either. Well, good for you. Yeah, your whole life is invaded. I usually have a piece of tape over mine, but with all these Zoom meetings, I stopped keeping the tape because then I forget to take it off. So, tell us that you've been on Natural Resources for how long? I have no idea. A long time. I started originally with the Red Rocks Advisory Committee when my dad died right after that. And then, whenever they decided to not have the Red Rocks Advisory Committee, I got shifted over to the Natural Resources. It's been a while. It's been a few years. Okay. But you've been very involved in natural resource and parks, certainly for the city of South Burlington for a long time. I grew up here. I've lived here all my life. I've seen a lot of changes. They're not all good. I was kind of shuddering a little bit with the person who was saying, yeah, we want everybody to move to South Burlington. I'm like, no, we don't. Okay. What do you think is the most challenging topic for the Natural Resources Committee to be dealing with? All the development that's been going on. I think back to when I was growing up and probably not really paying a whole lot of attention as a teenager, although living where I do in Queen City Park, I certainly spent a lot of time in Red Rocks Park. I mean, that's that was our playground because we were separate from all the other neighborhoods in South Burlington by that, by Shelburne Road. It's tough to see some of the development. I mean, I know it has to happen. It's necessary. People, especially people who are born and raised here, need a place to live. But it really saddens me to see some of the things that I guess just the amount of developing that's been going on over the last few years. I mean, I don't understand why there's a housing shortage because there's that, I mean, between Winooski, Burlington, Shelburne now, South Burlington, Wolston. I mean, the number of houses and housing units that are being built, it's been enormous. And yet, we keep hearing that there's not enough housing. And there's still more developing that's been planned for South Burlington that I think. Where are all these people coming from that are such as shorting a housing shortage? Where is it? Where is everybody coming from? So that gets a little tough sometimes. I love the cluster development like around the shopping center on Shelburne Road with the apartment buildings and stuff. I have to say I was rather dismayed with South Village because I was in on a lot of those meetings way back. And when I saw that connector road and how close those houses are to Dorset Farms and to the swamp area, that was not in the plant. And so it makes me kind of wonder, well, how did that happen? I'm not happy with what the O'Brien Brothers are doing, but I was rather intrigued looking at the houses and the lot sizes. Those seem like reasonably sized houses where some of them are. And again, I was in some of those early discussions on that whole development too. Had voiced a few opinions about some of the concessions they were looking for. I just, you know, I hate to see what's been going on along the Spear Street with all the huge houses blocking the views from everybody. So to sort of take this back to the, to kind of get back to the role of the Natural Resources Committee, I mean, you shared a lot of personal. Well, it gets tough because I'll tell you, I went and several of us from the committee went and walked around the long property and I was telling the guys and said, you know, I said, back in school, Kathy Long, Eileen Runwald and I were out here under the stars with a campfire and now it's going to be all developed. It breaks my heart in a lot of ways, but certainly if we can try to help mitigate some of the damage that's done, that's a plus. One thing I did like about the development right next door, which would be to the north of it, is that there's a road that bisects where the houses are with the great swamp area, which is of course a conserved area. I liked that because the road kind of helps protect the conservation area. But, you know, I think our town has done a wonderful job and, you know, the City Council gets a lot of kudos for that. Asking our opinion, trying to save as much open land as we can. I mean, what a coup for the city with the Auclair farm, getting in with the Ewing property. We've got Red Rocks. We've got Wheeler. We've got Underwood. It's tough because we have to take care of them and goodness knows Red Rocks have been getting a lot of abuse and Megan and John and I, well, I happen to be out in front of Red Rocks kind of monitoring stuff because it's been so many people going out there and lots of dogs going out there. And I just shudder because I know the damage that's being done out there right now with all the traffic. And most of it's not even South Burlington residents. A lot of it is from other cities. And, you know, when I saw that there was an owl out there and they had signs posted because the owl was going after people, I was cheering the owl on. I'm sorry. I was very happy to do one of protect our natural resources. And that's you're on the right committee. That's one of them. That's one of them. You know, they've got the cliffs closed off because they're hoping the peregrines will be out there again. Yeah, it's, I mean, most of you know who've been on the city council for a while are familiar with me. And we had a very busy weekend two weekends ago, the poor fire department. Oh, my gosh. You know, when the city was under fire alert, the whole area, because of lack of rain, and here's the fire department showing up twice in one night because people are lighting fires out in red rocks and down on the beach. Well, okay. I don't know if there's, does anyone else have a question? You shared a lot of your passions for this work. And we appreciate that we got a time constraint. So we probably need to move on if there's unless there's just a comment. I think it's really important for someone who has been a steward of Red Rocks Park and who has been thoroughly committed member of this board to be considered. She is. Yeah. So, okay. Well, that's why I put, I think I'm genetically predispositioned. Okay. Well, thank you for your many years of interest and service and passion for the environment. Now's a good time to be passionate about it. We need some. Yeah. Those people. Okay. Thank you all of you guys. I know you've got a late night ahead of you. I don't know how you do it. Well, okay. You have to, right? Yeah. Yeah. And Helen, I loved the YouTube Sporb you did. Oh, thank you. You're welcome. All right. Good night, Lisa. Oh, good night, everyone. Next up is Bernie Gagman, another incumbent. Where's Bernie? I've got my mic down and I'm working on trying to get the camera going here. There we go. Got the camera. Bernie, you're currently on the planning commission. You serve as vice chair. I seem to add a lot to the conversation for that. I don't have any questions for you. I think you do a good job. Oh, thank you. Anyone else? Hey, Bernie, tell us what you like about being on the planning commission. Well, it's challenging and I really like being able to kind of set the direction for where South Burlington is headed. And I know for this application, I was kind of toying with do I want to do another term, but we're right in the middle of a very important time in terms of the regulations in South Burlington. And I think that the continuity and kind of institutional knowledge from being on the commission for a little while is really critical at this point. And so it's challenging to balance all the different perspectives and to hopefully come up with something that addresses, to some extent, everybody's concern. But as you know, as a console, just about every issue that comes up, there's people that are equally passionate on polar opposite ends of things. And so the challenge with the commission is to work with the other commissioners and try to, at least what I try to do is find a little bit of balance in what we end up with. I appreciate that, Bernie. Appreciate that comment. Thank you. Thank you for your service. Yep, thanks. Any other questions for Bernie? All right. Keep up the good work. Okay, thank you. You're done by November. We're getting there. Yep, you are. So thank you. All right. Thank you very much. Next is Andrew Chalmick. And he's also an incumbent, even though the paper doesn't suggest that, but he has been on the energy committee and wants to continue. So good evening, Andrew. Again, I mean, I think you do a great, I think that our energy committee is just incredible. So I, and you have a lot of experience and talent. So I don't know if there's, maybe I should take Matt's question and what do you like about being on that committee? Well, it's a great committee. And for me, like one of the wonderful things, honestly, about moving to Vermont is being able to participate, you know, on things like that. The folks are great, you know, the folks at the committee, smart, committed. And I think we'll be able to get, you know, some stuff done, which has been good. You know, to echo earlier comments, the work that could be just so important to address the climate crisis. John Besant is right, that unless we kind of move away from fossil fuels really quickly, our children face a really unfortunate future. And so there's really nothing more important to me than trying to get us there. I read recently that even if we were to stop using all fossil fuels tomorrow, the oceans will never really rise 20 feet, which is, you know, you couldn't even imagine that happening, what the world would be like. So, and the world's not going to stop using fossil fuels tomorrow. So we'll, you know, I feel like I need to do everything I can to try and help. Okay. Other questions for people? Well, good. Well, thank you. One more question. Go ahead, Megan. Go ahead. Okay. So, Andrew, what could we, as a local government, do to address these issues? That's a great question. I mean, and I recognize that the, honestly, the powers of the are limited and emanate from the state. But there are things we can do. So, for instance, you know, honestly, it's been a little frustrating. We've made some suggestions around solar PV for a couple of years now. I know the planet which has been really busy with all this stuff. And I recognize that, but that's been moving really, really slowly. And I think we could conceivably move more quickly on that. And that would help a little bit. You know, the committee made some comments on trying to move the new O'Brien development at Old Farm Road to All Electric. And, you know, I didn't know those comments were really given due consideration. I think they're probably things the city could have done to try and persuade developer to move in that direction some more on this stuff at city center. The couple of big buildings are going to be all built with fossil fuel infrastructure. I think we probably could have made some more progress in moving those to be all electric, which would be a lot cleaner. So, I mean, there are things we can do. There are things we can't. I mean, I think we probably would need to lobby the legislature the way that Burlington has done with a couple of resolutions that passed in March, giving the city more power to, you know, force moving away from fossil fuels. And I would hardly endorse that. And that's one of the things we've been honestly trying to get done in the committee, but it's been hard to make progress, I'd say. I appreciate that. Okay. Any other questions or comments for Andrew? All right. Thank you very much for your service. And it's a good committee to work on, I would agree. Next up is Mary Jo Real. And she's also an incumbent and also what serves on the energy committee as well. Hi, everyone. Hi there. Yeah, I started last July, so it hasn't been quite a year yet, but I've been enjoying it. I will also say I'm glad that Andrew went before me because he's much more eloquent and knowledgeable, you know, to answer some of the questions. The first few months that I was on the committee, it really took me, you know, a while to get up just kind of needed to listen and get up to speed because luckily we have some really smart, tech savvy folks on the committee. My skill set is a little different than that. I'm learning more about a lot of the more specific technology parts of the energy, but what I've been working on is to try to see how we're going to get the community involved, a community coalition. Once we have the climate action plan a little bit further along, we're happy to be getting updates pretty routinely from the CCRP or CCRPC who are working with the city on the climate action plan. And so we hope to pull together a community coalition on that as we're a little further along. I've also been helping with getting interns for the committee, you know, advertising and interviewing. And I think it was two of the interns went to work with data collection with a couple of the other folks on our committee. So we had kind of a subcommittee about really trying to get baseline data so that we know when we can set these goals, we can see where we started from. And so these interns really helped walk through a lot of the data. And then the other two interns, one I worked with for an education area. And she did a lot of research on what other communities in Vermont and around the country are doing to support their local climate action plans. So she made a lot of headway with kind of identifying folks at the middle school and high school level who would get involved in understanding who those folks might be that want to be on the committee. And then we're still, I'm still working with somebody, another intern and with the business sector. So she's again is looking at what other communities do to kind of mobilize and energize the business community around a climate action plan. That sounds good. Questions? Oh, no, I've just said, I enjoy it. It's a good group, you know, a lot of different skillsets are played there. Right. You're working on some good stuff. Any other questions from people? All right. Well, thank you very much for your work. I'm glad you are getting up to speed, as you say, and engaged. It sounds like you're doing a lot of interesting things. Thank you. Especially, you know, working with the business world and making progress in that area. That's great. Thank you. Thank you. And last but not least, Stephen Crowley. Stephen is also interested on the energy committee as a new face. And there you are. There's the new video. Okay. Hi, everybody. So you were, well, no, you're a returning, right? You were there and then you went away and then you're how you founded it. So why do you want to go back? Well, there's, there's so much to do, you know, it's such a pressing need. Andrew said it's a well. So I don't, I'm glad I'll echo what MJ just said. I'm glad he said that first. So I don't have to say that, but it's, this is a crucial time for us. This is the climate decade, you know, it's this, we have this decade to really turn things around. I mean, we, we have been, you know, proceeding slowly, but it's like we're a boat. We haven't pulled the anchors up and we're trying to go somewhere and, you know, we've got our sales out, but we're not making much progress. And so we need to really make that happen at every level, you know, global, national, state level, and vocal level. There's work to do at every single level. And there's, I guess I would just add to that list that there are things that are really at the individual level too, that, that people need to be thinking about. And, and part of that is enabling all those levels of government to do the things that need to happen. So yeah, I guess that's, it's just such an urgent thing. I do, I do have some time, you know, I've been working on this, on climate change issues for 25 or 30 years, other energy issues for longer than that. I taught high school science at Winooski High School and, and a lot of my work was in climate and energy. And, and so I, I know the science real well and I, I helped Sierra Club nationally, the environmental group Sierra Club, for whom I do some advocacy work and today on a volunteer basis. I helped the national organization commit itself to work on climate change 15 years ago and chaired their campaign for a few years. And, and now I, and that was mostly about, you know, coal plants and reducing carbon emissions. Now I chair a team for National Sierra Club on climate adaptation and resilience. And so we're working with people around the country to, to, to, you know, recognize, you know, we still, we don't stop working on reducing emissions, but we also recognize that, that change is happening. And, and so are we ready? You know, we were, I think South Burlington is one of the few communities in the state that, that sort of escaped the wrath of Irene. But we've seen things happen in other ways. And, you know, is our health system ready? Is our, is our food system ready? Is there, are we ready to help our neighbors where, you know, we recognize that, that climate change, I guess the COVID experience has shown us a lot about how services, different parts of our population are exposed in different ways. And so it's not, we don't all go into crisis situations with the same kind of security. And so are the systems in place we can, where we can really help each other out? I think one of the, one of the issues that I see with, with climate change that is kind of understated is the food issue. You know, where we're around the world really, a lot of places that have been growing food for people are drying up. And that includes our food. And those regions are drying up. And, and so if the population grows and food production decreases and prices go up, well, who's going to be hurt the most with that? Are we ready? And, and boy, you saw those food lines with the COVID crisis. And I think that's those kinds of things will be the run of the mill from year to year. And, and so I, you know, I don't know if we're ready for that. So anyway, I guess I'd, you know, I'd like to see what's going on. The Energy Committee always has so many great things going on. It's hard to just come in and say, here's what I want to do, but I want to see how I can help and, and kind of go from there. Well, it sounds like you'd add to their conversations. So that'd be great. Any, just do any other counselors have any questions? Matt? Steve, good to see you again. Your application says you started the Energy Committee. Well, it's a little bit about what was the background when you started it. I should clarify. Peter Jones started the Energy Committee, but I was the first chair. So I was, I guess, a founding member, but I'd give Peter the credit for that. He persisted. Back then, Stephen, when you started it, what was the, what was the purpose or the focus for that first formation of the Energy Committee in South Brompton? Well, you know, it was, it was no less a complex challenge then than it is now. So there were lots of different possibilities and we, we tossed around lots of ideas. We, we did a, and kind of an energy audit for South Brompton, a client, a carbon footprint analysis was one of the projects we worked on with some UVM students. We, what else did we work on? There was a lot of work done on the challenge of condo efficiency, condominium efficiency, where, where you might have rules or collective decisions that had to be made. So that was some of the people on the, on the committee worked on that a lot. There were, and I think most of the people, several of the people who were on that committee then are on the, on the call tonight and, and did a lot of great work. So lots of different kinds of projects. I guess we probably spent as much time figuring out what projects to work on. Thank you. Any other questions? Well, thank you very much for wanting to continue to give to the city. And it sounds like you have a lot of expertise that will blend nicely with other members of the committee. I hope so. And certainly it attracts. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thanks. Thank you. All right. So that does it for interviews tonight. We're not too far behind. So next item, item 11. Consider and possibly take action. Did we take things out of the, I'm sorry. Did we take things out of order or did we do, in the beginning, did we change the order of agenda items? No, we didn't. We were going to do 13 between 11 and 12. So 11 is next. Thank you. Okay. Sorry. I apologize. No, no, no, that's fine. It's a long night, huh? So we'll take up the climate change resolution that Councilor Emory has put together. Thank you. I can either share my screen or I sent the, I sent a short presentation to Kevin. I think that visuals are always useful. And just a few, just a few slides. It's not, it's not going to last more than three minutes, most likely. So how would you have that handled, Kevin? Or Tom, I don't know who is. I'm trying to set it up right now, Megan. Okay. Just a second. I got to find you here. Well, I'm going to run out and just get another little drink of water. I'll be ready. Oh, okay. Okay. Could be all set, Megan. Okay. Fabulous. Yes. I've got it. I've got it here. Okay. So let's see. Let me make sure that my screen looks right. Oh, no. Okay. Do you see my screen? Oh, we're waiting for. Let's see. Yeah. Do you see your screen? It says, Megan, have you seen your screen? Yeah. Do you see your screen? Yes, that's correct. Okay. So that's just my PDF. All right. I wish I could get, let me see here. Okay. I've never been given the controls before. I hope that I know what to do. It's a good seventh inning stretch for everybody. I appreciate everybody hanging out. I've seen all the squares there. You're champions here, your local government. All right. Are we all back, Helen? Are we ready to get started? Yes. I'm sorry. I meant for you to go ahead. Oh, that's okay. Okay. It's just real short. I just wanted to show you a little bit about what I did when I put together the resolution. So first of all, my references. And they're all there on the screen, the pictures. Of course, the comprehensive plan has to be front and center. I also use the 2019 ECOS report, the 2016 Vermont Comprehensive Energy Plan, the State of Vermont Goals, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which is linked to the United Nations, as well as the Vermont Climate Action Community, which we joined in 2017. And there are some key findings there, which I just thought I'd show you a couple here. Okay. So some of the key findings, right? Our goal is to reduce energy. That's hard for me to see that with all this. We're trying to reduce our emissions by 90%. And business as usual simply cannot get us there. And we can see where we are and where we need to be by 2050, by 2050. And as our previous applicants stated, we are nearing a real no return point where there will be mass starvation, there will be mass migration. And when we know the situation currently with regard to unemployment in some areas of the world, as well as racism and violence, that this will exacerbate our social issues. Another key finding, as we can see, it is transportation and the heating of our home's thermal that takes the majority. And we have a far way to go. Look at where that point is for 2050. And we have a far way to go. So when we hear Andrew talk about the need for electricity, we need to listen to him. All right, just another thing, greenhouse gas emissions, where we are and where we need to go. We're far, far away. If you are interested, you can take a look at the steps. They're all kinds of things. This is an interactive. I'm willing to share this with anybody. You click on the underlined and you see what we can do as individuals. I'd rather us talk about this resolution. I want us to also see that equity is very much a part of what this is about. And this comes from the Energy Action Network. And that for many people, buying an electric vehicle is just not within their means. It's not within my means. And I live quite comfortably. We had to go hybrid. We had to take that median step. So we have to be very sensitive. That just, you know, the solution that everyone's going to have an energy, energy, an electric vehicle that that is not necessarily within everyone's reach. All right. Race and equity references. I know that there has been a book reading about the color of law. And I just wanted to show at least one or two comments from there. Dissegregation is the last quote. Dissegregation is a constitutional as well as a moral obligation that we are required to fulfill. And he goes on to cite unlawful and morally repugnant clauses excluding African Americans from a neighborhood. So that is in our law. And I am from Chicago, as many of you know. So I'm very familiar with the consequences of redlining. I lived and grew up in a segregated city, even though redlining was far past by the time I was around. I also looked at some articles from the civil rights era where we have to think morally in terms of finding solutions for equity. All right. So thanks to Sandy Julie. I got these these slides, which I just thought were really of interest. We can see that our population here and the median household income, right? You can compare the white non-Hispanic close to $80,000 per year and the black and African American households about $37,000 and the Asian $57,500, right? We can also take a look here and we can see education and how this all, just like what Manel is going to show us in two weeks, how this all is, you know, a snowballing effect, okay? And COVID clearly affected our BIPOC, meaning our populations of color, much more than Caucasian, all right? And I thought it was really important here to see that unemployment claims were attributed more to women, right, during the COVID time. So when we think about who we need to serve in terms of equity, we have to think about those most vulnerable, which tend to be single women. And as we can see, 27% of black women in Vermont are living in poverty. This is over twice the rate of white women. Now, of course, we need to serve people of every skin color, but I just thought that this was a helpful background. This is what I, except for these last slides, which I just received today, this is what I looked at in order to prepare the resolution that we're going to consider now. And Kevin, you can take back the controls and I'm willing to answer questions or hear you speak. Basically, I looked through the comprehensive plan and I saw that there were recommendations in that plan that very much pointed toward the need to think through a climate change lens. I didn't invent anything. The whole resolution is basically a series of quotations from our comprehensive plan and from the state goals, as well as from the intergovernmental panel. We are facing cataclysmic change, cataclysmic change, and we have to think differently about how we work, how we get from one place to the other, how we plan, how we develop policy, including our budgets, and what kind of committees we should really be focusing on peopleing, but populating. So that is what I left open. I don't have a prescription. It's simply that's what we have to think about as we put together our budgets, as we think about the planning, as we think about who to appoint to committees and what kinds of committees should be our standing committees. There are no prescribed solutions. It's basically we have to look through a climate change lens as we move forward. Okay, thank you, Megan. This is a lot of work and a lot of words, but I think you certainly made the case. Are there thoughts from the council? And then we can open it to the public. Matt? Yes, yes, it is a lot of work and thank you for bringing it to us, Councillor Emory. Having been one of the founding members of the Energy Action Network, I appreciate you bringing up that data. My question to you is though, why are you using 2006 goals in the Comprehensive Energy Plan, which our goal oriented and not the law? Act number 153 of 2020, the Global Warming Solutions Act, doesn't set goals. It's set in mandates under which the state of Vermont can be sued. We don't reduce carbon emissions by 26% of 2005 levels. By 2025 and by 40% from 1990 levels by 2030 and 80% by 1990 levels in 2050. It just seems like that should be the focus rather than a 2006 goal. Well, that was what was on the state of Vermont page and there have been updates to those goals. But that is what is currently on the state of Vermont page. And if you go under the Energy Action Network, you will find specific steps that we need to take. So I could not, I mean, I would have had a 50 page resolution if I had gone into detail as much as you're asking. Yeah. Well, I think the point is, is that we have right now charged by the state of Vermont by lawmakers to reduce emissions, to come up with a Climate Action Plan in the next seven months, which will be disseminated throughout every town. And there will be an obligation, a responsibility, no doubt, that every town, help and every city help the state comply with this mandate or under threat of lawsuit. So it seems like rather than to reference 2006 goals, what we should be doing is following the actions of the Climate Council, which is efforting a Climate Action Plan in order to make Vermont comply with the law and not refer to 2006 goals. Well, I believe that those goals are part of the 2016 Vermont Comprehensive Energy Plan. So I think that your focus on the 2006 goals is slightly out of focus. And if you look at the 2016 Vermont Comprehensive Energy Plan, you will have a much clearer idea of how those goals have been updated in order to meet the 2016 Energy Plan. And all of this is constantly being updated as we learn more. Science is constantly discovering, we just learned of UVM geologists in Greenland discovering that Greenland once was a barren land with no glaciers. So we are constantly having to update. So focusing simply on those 2006 goals, I think just takes a little sliver that doesn't quite represent what is on that page. And if you want, we can certainly click on that page and take a look specifically at how those goals are articulated because they talk about updates if you look on that page, Matt. Right, so if the council is going to do something, we should be focused on the mandates, not the goals, because that's what we're going to be asked to comply with. Secondly, this is non-regulatory. There's no legal responsibility. When we take actions, we should absolutely have climate change in mind, but we should have other things in mind as well. I have a problem with your language council memory when it talks about principal guiding mission and moral requirement to reduce emissions. We approved a couple hours ago a payment of $9,423 for diesel fuel for our fleet vehicles. We approved a couple hours ago a payment of $10,761.07 to Vermont Gas to provide heat and hot water for our employees. We approved a paving contract which will put petroleum-based asphalt on our roads to ensure safe streets. If we had approved this resolution before we did that, we'd be in violation. Incorrect, because this is not something that would lead to a penalty. We have to look foremost through that lens, but of course we are only free to act given our situation. So if we do not have electric vehicles, we are going to have to until we have those electric vehicles fuel the vehicles that we have. And if we can, at that moment, think about putting into our capital improvement plan electrical vehicles, that is looking through that climate change. So the mandate that you're discussing where we would in fact be, I guess, delivered lawsuits, that has nothing to do with my resolution and in fact the energy plan that this council came up with, to have a plan, that was something that we came up with on our own without that state mandate. So I think that we're a very much a can-do kind of place and this is simply giving us the direction in order to act in the ways like you're suggesting where we would move to electrical vehicles, where we would move to electrical heat and electrical devices for our new structures and solar on the roofs. At this time we can't because we don't have the resolution in place. And there are so many forces of denial or of stasis where we just, we can't move, maybe it's because we're just too comfortable and we don't feel the pain yet, which is usually the case, that's what denial is. But this would give us the impetus to regardless of where we are in terms of our comfort level, this is how we have to go moving forward. Well, Council Member, you all do respect, there's no denial on the council, climate change is real and we need to take actions in order to do this. Well, let's cast this. We'll agree, everyone here. But we do not have a, this cannot be our principal guiding mission and moral requirement. We have lots of, we have lots of reasons. We have a fiduciary responsibility to the citizens of South Burlington. We want to ensure the streets, bridges and sidewalks are safe, that our emergency services are responsive and we need to ensure a balance between protecting the natural environment and the need for diverse and affordable housing. If we build another housing development, we are adding carbon. There's no question. And we cannot allow this resolution to be the resolution that we do not print. So then has the floor, please. We cannot allow this resolution to be a reason that we do not build more affordable housing. Okay. Can I respond to that, please? Because I think that when- Can I interrupt for a second? Helen, can I interrupt? Yes. I want to point out, it's almost 10.30 p.m. This is the kind of resolution that should not start a discussion at 10.30 p.m. On a Monday night, and I hate to say that, the resolution is four pages long, right? Yeah. Right? And I would like to table this discussion and move it to another meeting if we could do that, because we still have many other items on the agenda. I want to- I appreciate your work, Megan. I appreciate it, but I'm just trying to make the point. I don't want to be here till 12.30 p.m. tonight discussing this tonight. Okay. If I could respond to Councilor Coda, please. Looking through a climate change lens with regard to housing, right? You have to take into account transportation. And that is something that our Affordable Housing Committee has raised. This is something that people have raised from other committees. So let us think about how do we balance the construction of housing and transportation? And that's what we would have to come to as a council with the help of our advisory committees who would be advising us, do we put housing here or do we put housing here? Should it be single-family homes or should we be serving a different population like our college students who do not have housing where their parents are buying single-family homes so that their students can live somewhere? I have two homes on my street with students living in them. Okay. So I know that this is also an issue on other areas in our city, East Terrace, for instance. So let's think about how we can balance all of the pieces and use our committees or create a new committee, perhaps that's for us to decide. This is not prescribing. This is simply giving us the impetus to do so where we can determine where that housing should go, what kind of housing it should be. Should it be accessible only by car or should it be accessible by public transit? I think that these are important questions. We also talked about bike and pet. You all here on the council, I heard Tom say it. I heard everybody say that they're in favor of bike and pet. All right. So let's think about how that infrastructure can serve our climate change goals. That's exactly the kinds of questions that this resolution would be forcing us to ask. Okay. Tom Chittenden wants to make a comment. And then I want to go back to Tim's comment. Yeah. I just want to echo what Tim said is we can have these conversations but it's 10.30 at night on a Monday and I don't feel like diving into it. I have concern with that word moral requirement. I'm always hesitant to legislate morality. I remember Paul Conner coming before us and talking about our LDRs and how we can't say more than four unrelated people because that starts to dictate lifestyle choices. I hate to set a precedent. I want to understand more from a legal perspective what it might imply if we're going to start legislating morality. So I'm not opposed to having these discussions. Councilor Emery, these are important, but I do think this begs more detail and more discussion and I don't see any urgency to pass this tonight and I'd love to know more about how we can align this with the global warming solutions package which is now law of the land since last session. So I think it makes sense to integrate that and the city's objectives to that mandate since that's coming down the pike if we're going to put our shoulders behind something. That's all I want to say and thank you. Okay. Thank you. I want to get back to Tim's on tabling this and I do agree that it's late. I also agree that it's really important. It's also very dense and full of lots of information. So I think we all need more time to consider this Megan and I mean I don't think this is the time to be wordsmithing or just focusing on one issue the moral imperative as the reason not to move forward with a resolution. I appreciate the intent because I do think we won't make progress unless we really think very deeply and consistently and constantly about all the actions we take relative to the effect on our climate and the use of carbon fuel and all the other aspects. I don't think we can ignore it and to Matt's point what I gather is that it's just well there's this mandate that's coming down so we shouldn't have this resolution as helping our community look at how to reduce you know the use of carbon emissions before someone from the state says well you don't have electric cars so you're going to be find x amount of money. I mean I think the two can work well to focus on well these are the wrong goals versus well these are the mandates I think is preventing us from coming up with even an action plan for our community that's thoughtful but I also agree it's now it's 1033 and we need to come up with a plan to address this in a thoughtful way without spending hours and hours word smithing and maybe people can you know work on some changes or considerations but probably right now isn't the time so is that are you all agreeable I mean we do have an energy committee working on an action plan and I think to your point Megan you know maybe we also need to consider should there be a committee that is you know a sustainability committee or something like that that would be really focused on you know how you'd carry this out and who would who would be responsible because I'm sure Kevin is you know rolling over with how am I ever going to enact this with the current staffing so there's Marcy Murray Marcy Murray turned on her camera yeah I saw that Marcy do you want to make a comment and then maybe move on to yeah thank you I think that having a resolution that really puts into intentionally into staff and local government's mind to really use a climate crisis filter is there's no disadvantage to moving forward with that in the short term the energy committee has been suggesting this in conversations over the years and it's just I think it's great that Megan has been forward thinking enough to put this together and I think it's really very important that it not get pushed into the future because the climate crisis issue is actually I think a priority the priority because everything else is going to be affected by what this crisis turns into so it is a moral and I don't disagree Marcy I just think you know the timing I agree I understand I just wanted to just to share that and I think so I'm not interested in tabling this till you know my my term is up in three years and someone else can take care of it you know I think we do I think it's absolutely critical thank you especially if there's mandates coming down that will cost us something apparently but it's going to cost us something if we don't do if we don't act so yeah yeah I hear what you're saying and I just I just hate to have it get pushed ahead and ahead or it's just probably not going to happen as soon as it needs to well no I think it's some point we need to to vote on it but I don't think tonight's the night I agree thank you all right so or we agreeable can we move on quickly to Rosalind turn to your camera I'm sorry pardon me Rosalind turn to you okay I don't want to make this a big hearing but no this is not a hearing and it's short I agree this is not the time to discuss it but the next council meeting it seems like maybe I'm misinterpreting you Helen that this will be put off for a month or two or no I mean the next council meeting and and and have it early on the agenda invite your energy committee here invite your natural resources committee here invite your affordable housing committee here invite your bike and path they all have input to this but don't wait for another month or two you know do it right away the climate can't wait and granted it's a resolution but as Marcy said it tells the city residents we know this is important and we're looking at it and we're setting our course for it so please don't put it off for another month or so two weeks from now maybe it would be great okay I hear you thank you I wasn't planning to put it off forever but I did think it's pretty dense and people need to think about it and if they want to retool the language then they have an opportunity and a chance to do that we can certainly I do ask that they do that then and not wait until Friday before May 17th okay so people want to hear from people in a week yeah I would like to hear from people in a week okay that's a soft copy Megan sure I'm happy to send you all send you all the word copy yes and I'll send you the presentation too so you can see the the links okay thank you that would be great okay so moving on to the next item which is 13 a council discussion led to the so-called smooth street extension and I had a conversation with Jessica on this today as well and I think we both agreed that it's this is a really important conversation but isn't necessary to hold right now the as I understand it and she'll fill in what I misstate or leave out the planning commission agreed unanimously that this was a really important conversation to have and there's a process for changing the town the official city map and that's kind of what this item is and I think tonight is not the time nor the hour to take that on as a hearing so I think but I'm sort of putting them on notice or or us on notice that this is an important issue to take up Jessica yeah I can just give you an update this was on our agenda and we talked about it on April 13th and on the official map it currently shows a road connection between Swift Street and Route 116 does go through multiple resource areas and as part of it's been on our radar and a task specifically identified in the comprehensive plan to evaluate that area we have had many studies that have addressed that including one we got last year with some analysis from the CCRPC so what we did decide is to proceed and this is the actual motion here proceed with steps to remove Swift Street extension from the official map but retain accessibility for bike ped use path for connectivity so the idea being is that you know our idea is to no longer show it as a road connection but continue to show it as a path connection on the official map and there is a whole process for doing that we're very early in the process so what we've directed is the next step which is for staff to make the the draft change to the map and the language so then we can see that more in a public hearing have that public hearing and then it would come to you for warning in a public hearing as well so so it is kind of on that trajectory on our end so this is kind of a just an update to say that it is something we're working on so is that we're not warned for action but is that a good process in terms of the council's this sort of the direction that we would like to suggest they go it doesn't mean we will support it but it's um it's on their screen for for effort Matt to ask a couple of questions to Jessica chairman yes you may just so so so this process of taking it off the map that would occur before or concurrent with the update to the city's comprehensive plan that is actually something that we did not determine I think we may need to change the map in the comprehensive plan as well there's a very similar map in the comprehensive plan that has very similar items on it kind of the I think it's called the future transportation plan so I think we may need to change that map there as well that was something that we wanted to evaluate okay and there's there's two other if I ask one more question there's two other prominent east west corridors that have not been built Cedar Mill Drive to Heinsberg Road and Old Cross Road to Heinsberg Road those are still on the map and there's no plans to take those off the map is that correct it is correct so we actually had um we did make a statement as the commission that we felt like it was a good idea to evaluate those in the future but there's no plan to make changes to those at this time without a bigger evaluation we felt like it was important to um you know not remove too many of those potential connections before we did a bigger analysis yep okay well the Cedar Mill one we should be being built as we no it's the one on the road just next to my neighbor no that's the connection at Edgewood there's another road a stub it's right by I'm looking at it right outside my house there's a Cedar Mill Drive that would go north of the solar panels should that area ever be developed north the Marcel Meadow that should that ever be developed that road would go in place it should land next to Butler Farms be developed perhaps the Old Cross Road Connection would be in place if it's still on our official map so we definitely need an analysis of how many connector roads are needed and where they be where they are and I'd certainly want to hear from public works and the fire chief oh that's part of the process Matt yeah that's why you have them and just as a point of clarification we actually did have the public works director um at our meeting as part of this discussion with input from the fire chief so that was kind of part of this initial conversation but we can make sure to get that summarized before something comes to you great question top great so that last question was one I was going to raise but the one from the outset I'm not opposed to this it seems like it makes sense for all the reasons outlined in the many emails I received today and also what I understand from this topic over the last six to seven years but one question I have which you sort of addressed in the resolution from planning commission but I love clarity on this going forward I'm my only concern with removing from the official map is then my understanding is if a developer does anything on the other side of it I just want them to still put the bill I hope I can say that for that bike head connection so if it's downgraded to no road I just want to make sure that they would still be obligated because crossing that wetlands would be very expensive and I don't want to put that cost burden onto the city if we remove from the official map so I really want to hear from the lawyers know I'm moving from the official map what that might translate to when it to achieve that bike head connectivity that you described in your motion so our thought was that the the connection would still be shown on the official map but it would be very clearly described that it didn't include the vehicle connection at the path connection so so that was part of the language that way we've kind of asked staff to bring back to us because we do want to make sure that the connection happens just a quick follow-up chair yes point of clarity I'm seeking though from the lawyer and from like Justin is that if it's just a bike path does that mean the developers won't have to pay for it it doesn't have to be a road for that obligation to be on them that's what my my interests of getting clarity on it I don't understand your question because the bike path is already there I mean the bridge over the is it oh okay there's no connection and and Tom it is a good question the official map does show multiple different types of infrastructure including parks and water towers and such things so my impression was it applies to whatever the infrastructure is but we can make sure that that's the case so I don't think I know okay all right moving item 12 possible reconsideration of a vote taken by the council on April 19 2021 related to making a recommendation to the Chittenden County Regional Planning Commission on their I-89 corridor study so Tim I believe has a a motion to get this short because it's so late you know there was a lot of feedback that I received after the vote at the last meeting for 12 b and I understand the importance of both exit 13 and exit 12 b I'm not backing down my from my support for 12 b but I think that the ccrpc should really keep both exits in mind I think there's a lot of value for 12 b it's a great opportunity for economic development and growth in the city and especially for all the housing it's south of there and for bike and ped on 116 over the interstate of which there really isn't any safe passage today so I'm really open to making a motion to to kind of reverse the last to make it to tell the ccrpc to study both I called charlie baker he said they might be a little bit pressed for resource but he was open to the idea and I'm you know like to propose that to the rest of the council if that's what they'd like to do so is that a motion to yes so I'll make the motion that the ccrpc be redirected to study both exit 13 and 12 b you know and in the greater scope of things right you know all three exits need some type of help whether it's bike and ped directional I mean I would love to have a northbound entrance ramp onto the interstate from kennedy drive tomorrow right we would all love to have that right and but this is a you know in vision 89 50 years and none of this construction is going to take place for 20 plus years but at some point you have to replace all those bridges and when you do it the question is which one gets the most attention and how much bang for the buck do you get from it right so I'm I'm open to just having them study both exits okay so I think the motion should be that you move to reconsider the action that the council took on April whatever it was 19 19 on on the i-89 recommendation so that's the motion Tim okay is there a second second again seconds um is there any discussion on that um reconsideration I do have some discussion I just want some clarity on what we're voting on and uh I just want to also echo something I heard council bearer just say which is important for the community to know based on the social media feedback that I too have gotten uh this is an advisory vote to an advisory body for report new out next year envisioning is South Burlington for 2050 so this is just keeping options open to as we look at how this this area is going to grow and I agree with the reasoning behind it will 12 be as well as 13 and 14 to achieve the bike path and as well as the climate goals that we all want to achieve so I like how Tim bearer praying the opening of this will be is an important thing to keep in our plans so that the land is continually an option for this to occur in as the years go forward so if we could just get clarity on what we're voting on I support what was just described by council well what we're voting on first is if to reconsider the vote that was taken on April 19th and then we'll discuss what the new vote could encompass that helps thank you okay so we have a motion that's been made in seconded are you ready for that vote okay um all in favor signify by saying I I any opposed I'm sorry you said I so it was five in favor to um take this up again so now the question is um and one of the things that I thought was important um to have this review of our action is that in my opinion um maybe everyone in the council but the um recommendations from all the committees that we tasked with will you look at the interchanges and weigh in some of them did that during the ccrpc um listening and um presentation but the public didn't and I think the public needs to know um what information the council is given in an open and transparent way so that they understand how we each have come to our conclusions and um so I've asked the chairs or representative from those committees to very briefly share with both the public and the and the council um and that was on on the call what their conversation and conclusions were um regarding the interchanges so just that you want to lead off with the planning commission pretty brief sure um so the planning commission attended all of the different meetings and reviewed all the documents and came to unanimously support the exit 13 single point diamond as the top priority um we also made a motion to state that the we firmly support continued study and implementation of the pedestrian crossing at exit 14 um we came to that conclusion for a couple of reasons um we felt that um having a full interchange at exit 13 would serve our community better than exit 14 um upgrades all all connections are already in existence at exit 14 um we also felt like the exit 13 were preferable to a new interchange at exit 12 b um because of impacts to the existing community traffic and the environment um specifically the footprint of a large new interchange um and you know although uh like in pedestrian safety is critical at exit 14 um you know we felt like the uh the pedestrian crossing there may be able to address those concerns so if we had to pick one you know that was our recommendation the exit 13 single point okay thank you um we had a report from the entered are there any questions for um jessica relative to the action and conversation or just decision by the planning commission tell us so jessica your motion in your article your own letter uh from the planning commission was very silent on 12 b do you want to convey or relay any perspective on 12 b and i think you heard what councillor barrett suggested at the opening which has to do with seeing 12 b as something of value to continue to keep in the discussion going forward is there anything you'd convey about the discussions not the sense of the whole council since that's not in your resolution on the notion of 12 b um you know we took the perspective um that we needed to pick one and you know 13 b or 13 really rose to the top our committee did not weigh in specifically on um the future information might be nice to have at 12 b i mean we felt like 13 was the way to go in that category and um you know that was the discussion so a quick follow-up the distinction to me is that the pc didn't consciously say to not do 12 b and so that's why i like where how you opened it up councillor barrett i'm of a similar mind that it just makes sense to continue both before all the same reasons it's been in the discussions for the last 40 years but thank you jessica that was helpful thank you okay any other comments or questions okay i see shon is ready to do the energy correct uh i'm sorry right head and uh yeah i appreciate the opportunity to kind of uh you know have a few moments to speak with the council on this uh the bike pet committee has attended all the meetings we have spent a lot of time reviewing these uh various options um just to start out with we sent a letter of recommendation that we supported uh exit 13 single point diamond interchange and the exit 14 diverging diamond uh design so those two were our priority recommendations um we really considered when we did our discussions either 12 b or a redesign of exit 13 that was how our committee approached it and um we came down solidly on uh exit 13 we have real concerns with exit 12 b um the the area in consideration is is an area that's that's a complex um uh region of south groenken it's it's on the edge of rural and more suburban area it's a on the edge of some commercial zoning and a lot of residential zoning and we have real concerns about um what an exit 12 b would do to uh the traffic patterns in an area um north of 12 b heading into the residential neighborhoods and how much additional um infrastructure south groenken would have to consider to handle the um the resulting uh traffic increases on on these roads where you know we're working now to try to implement crosswalks and and and um other uh bike pad infrastructure in this area and and now we're going to start you know um uh funneling a lot more traffic in this region um right now south groenken uh the the interstate dumps into shelburn road be a 189 um kennedy drive dorset street and williston road these are all areas that are set up currently to handle a lot of traffic uh 116 going north from where exit 12 b is not set up to handle that amount of traffic and so um you know one of our big uh concerns there is what are ccrpc's recommendations for um assuming these exits are implemented um what other infrastructure is going to be required in order to in order to manage the additional traffic flow um so that's why we went with exit 13 over 12 b we have not seen um anything that indicates that our our concerns are not founded um whereas you know the similar concerns don't exist with either exit 14 or exit 13 so that was that was where um where our committee ended up uh we feel like for the the south barona team goals for you know a livable sustainable healthy community we just think exit 13 single point diamond is a is a far better option than uh than what we've seen from exit 12 b um you know if if there is uh um ongoing work just to study the impacts of the various designs and keep them you know on the on the uh you know in the planning phase and in the evaluation phase with ccrpc and we learn new information about exit 12 b um you know that would be something we can consider in the future it's just everything we've seen so far um and you know and it's from my understanding all the committees that weighed in except for one we're and we're not in favor of 12 b so you know i think it's if if the city council really has uh you know seen stuff that that we haven't seen or understands this on a level that we don't understand currently it would be nice to have these discussions and understand it because um so far it seems like certainly on our committee um you know there was no real disagreement there and um doesn't seem like that across the other city city committees as well questions for shawn would would do you think your committee would be opposed given that you're interested in the impacts on design on designs to be done would your committee um support requesting that the ccrpc include both um options as potentially viable for south brongton i mean you know as a point that was made earlier this is a long way out um yeah it's a way long way out continuing continuing to understand uh you know these various options um better you know more information more study that that's that's always a good thing um you know the recommendation letter we sent was was purely on what we had seen presented from ccrpc and the information they had and the scoring they did at that time in our understanding of all the work that we're doing in these regions um but uh but but yeah you know absolutely i think i think we would be more than willing to continue to work with you know ccrpc the city council other committees to try to understand uh you know further further studies and and evaluations that are done okay thank you any other questions okay um the energy committee is um who's going to do that you've got a couple ethan i'm sorry thank you um so thank you for the opportunity to um to comment on this um the several of us attended the public meetings we reviewed the scoring in our committee session and our comments were primarily focused on the point that while obviously a tremendous amount of work went into analyzing and modeling and quantifying many different aspects of the proposed plans ultimately the waiting process and the scores we felt gave a sense of false precision um in the case of some of the metrics that were most important to the energy committee really the difference between vehicle miles traveled and energy savings between the different plans were less than one percent they were essentially you know a rounding error um and yet we have all this you know multiple categories and and waiting and whatnot and felt like it sort of missed the point of actually being able to um compare all the different um impacts that were analyzed and that there was an opportunity to convert them all to some kind of dollar equivalence or something where we could actually see what the overall impacts were that was missed and so it was very hard to come to any kind of conclusion based on that analysis given that the the scoring didn't have a meaningful waiting applied to it um you know additionally our focus was more on the opportunities for um bike pedestrian and public transit improvements that would make a larger impact on the energy and climate concerns that our committee is concerned with and it was um perhaps a lost opportunity that while some of that work was included in other parts of the study there wasn't a direct comparison to if those efforts fail then these other investments are going to have to be made therefore what does that tell us about the potential for investing in the bike pet and public transit improvements that could be done to avoid these kind of investments in the future it wasn't a holistic analysis that um that would have given us an opportunity to comment on that um larger um decision that's being made um however at the end uh we did comment on the question that the council asked for comment on which was uh which of the two proposals uh did we recommend and it wasn't a a strong difference but we did choose exit 13 as as preferable to 12b but really that was a secondary recommendation to you know sort of looking at the bigger picture and getting better information about the scoring and considering other alternatives um in the same frame as the exit options okay thank you any questions for shon i'm sorry not shon ethan any comments so okay thank you um we did have the natural resources committee also um weighed in and i'm trying to find larry a kufferman said he would be able to um provide that and then then he just running so late so i will read it i will read his so this is from the natural resources committee and conservation conservation committee for the record five members of the nrcc met during the cc rpc committee evening and the whole committee met the next evening we decided to support the prevent the revisions to exit 13 and 14 as shown in the cc rpc proposals basis of our finding was a reduction of impervious surfaces wildlife passages pathways excuse me revised and broadened and noise mitigation to existing neighborhoods he also added if you look carefully at the proposed design at exit 13 access to the airport kennedy drive et cetera is much too much improved from current design and will offer better access to the airport so that was their finding um i see some people from housing i don't think they weighed in on this did they i don't think i received anything oh chris probably hey hi helen um so we we did sit around our comments um if you'd like i can i can i i can read the comments or i can give you a summary about a summary yeah you know so um we did hear from the sbba came to a recent meeting we have uh members that attended this multiple cc rpc um items focused particularly on housing you know initially were like well how does this really tie in the house again and you know the likely economic development benefits of the i89 exit alternatives we didn't land on 12 v or 13 you know we're we're asking that they encourage attributing greater weight to likely economic benefits the i89 exit alternatives um and i'm just going to read a a sub statement here i'd like to bolster local salaries and wages for area workers which helps improve overall well-being in the region including housing affordability housing affordability is the ratio of resident income to their housing expenses basically you know you can't afford your house if you don't have a job and we can't take for granted uh the jobs that we have um and we have to create an environment um where we can attract those jobs so south pelican area residents um will be more resilient uh you know uh in the future so that was uh that motion was passed unanimously by the um by the housing council um you know there was some conversation um about what the impact is we understand uh not all development uh that that could come with an exit is you know desirable um you know there's there's certainly some conversation about having a cohesive neighborhood um but you know we ultimately landed the uh the economic development um was worth exploring further okay thank you thank you and then is there anyone here from economic development they did weigh in um at our last meeting they were their only committee I think that read something John Burton read it so they're not here Megan I would just like to read the the mission and the vision of our economic development committee is that allowable Helen um is that I guess it's for me go ahead it's not that long I don't think no it's not it's just two sentences so this was when we established the economic development committee so be it further resolved that the mission of the economic development committee shall be to develop a strategic economic development plan aligned with South Burlington's housing transportation energy and environmental goals as well as infrastructure capacity and two that the vision of the economic development committee shall be to promote South Burlington businesses future prosperity and the quality of life of our residents with the commitment to quality sustainability and smart growth principles so I just wanted to say that economics is intimately or is tied to housing transportation energy and environmental goals as well as our infrastructure capacity so I just it's not we can't look just at economics without everything else okay thank you yep the other part I guess that was part what should have been maybe in my mind um discussed a little more fully in that last meeting was um just the scoring that that occurred um by the ccrpc and it just again I think it reflects the majority of the committees that we asked to weigh in that all the metrics on all six of the topics had higher values for 13 single or single point diamond whatever it is over 12 feet close but but there was a difference and it's just kind of a question of all that information coming together certainly led me to believe that 13 was a better choice so what we need to do is reconsider that yeah Kevin I just I know I know you're heading for a vote and it sounds like uh uh council's um going to take a closer look at 13 um I really think uh it would be a good idea to have a discussion with the school board about this matter um the designs for 13 are going to dump interstate highway traffic off at the foot of their middle school and high school campus um and recognizing that in years past when we haven't discussed things like this with the school board they've taken kind of a nasty tone with us um it wouldn't be a bad idea to talk to the school board about what their thoughts are about additional traffic uh going both on kennedy drive and on dorsal street as the as the city manager I have concerns about the um traffic stacking up in front of our fire department and not uh not being able to get our fire and ambulance out of um out of the garage but this is a study these things will come out in a study all I'm saying is that I think it'd be a good idea to give the school board a heads up that 13 b is an active or 13 is an active consideration because I think that they will have possibly have some concerns about so do you think that go ahead and think I was just going to say can we go back to then what I suggested last meeting that we table this and we we have that discussion with the school board we need more input it seems okay is that a motion sure I move to table this discussion until we have that discussion with the school board is there a second table I'll I'll second it because I think it makes sense to to include the school board I'm not trying to eliminate any input on this decision and I think it's a big one even though it's 30 or 20 years away it's the the city's um advice to ccrpc and all these things are happening in our city I know it's for the whole county Matt and I I absolutely agree concur with the assessment that Kevin Dorn said about 13 and that the need to engage with the school board my only concern about tabling it is the timeline that Charlie Baker gave us last time um and I don't suppose anyone from ccrpc is on the on the phone or maybe Kevin can articulate but it was my impression that their time was short but if someone tells me that that no no no that's okay they can wait another two weeks that I'd be more inclined to support councilors motion but I didn't hear that I don't think that I'm happy to be corrected so Kevin is I don't suppose Charlie is on the line but I don't think it is about that yeah I can really speak for Charlie on that Matt I do know one thing the council the ccrpc I've heard this several members of the of the commission have talked to me about this they want a they want a decision from the city that the city is going to stand behind some years ago um they spent a lot of money and the city became divided at that time over a path forward as it relates to 12 b and there's still bad feelings among commission members of the uh of the rpc about that decision so before they spent a lot of money they want a solid and and durable decision from the city council as to where the city stands that's the only thing I know um I can't speak for Charlie about the timing that's more of a reason for me to not table this we really need this discussion to go forward with 13 and 12 b and I think what I heard from the previous discussions and from this topic that's come up many times that 12 b and 13 both need our attention and they need to be part of our 2050 30 years out plan so I don't think tableing this does anything but just I think it actually does squelch the conversation and I think we need the conversation to continue as we've already been meeting on this a lot over the past couple of years so I would disagree Helen I I think that the conversation has to happen in south Burlington what I understood from speaking with Chris Shaw who is our our representative um is that they're very concerned that this this uh city is is divided and that they're you know might not move ahead with anything and so I think that we need to as a community decide what we want and if that means that we hear from more stakeholders that we haven't heard from which I think the school board is an important stakeholder stakeholder a critical stakeholder um that we have that discussion and if that means that they receive a recommendation on May 17th if it's a firm recommendation I would think that from what I understand the CCRPC would feel much better then again having well we don't know and we haven't talked to everybody and there's still controversy and but here we go and it's now it's your miss we're kicking the can down the road to you and I I don't think that they will they will respond favorably to that at all I'm just going to give my clear support for moving forward with studying 12 b because of all the reasons offered last time I think it will get us to those environmental objectives that we wanted that we want for the community that we also want to bike and pet improvements on hinesburg road and again we're it's not going to happen anytime soon so for that point that you just announced great I think we should go back to where we were to start which is well be as well as upgrades to 13 for bike and pet safety and 14 need to happen on the next 30 year horizon well I think I would rather air on personally um giving the um school board a chance to weigh in because I don't want to divide the community yet again and for a project that's 30 years out um is another two weeks going to destroy everything I I I don't think so I know charlie had gave us a timeline but I I think um we need to come up with the best decision for the city and not just say we gotta meet this timeline Tim so I mean we could talk to the school board but I mean correct me if I'm wrong but I mean isn't that the ccrpcs responsibility is to find all the stakeholders and ask them what their objections are to various you know proposals so I mean we can talk to the school board but really they should be talking to school board as a result of us saying we're kind of divided we we have a half the city that wants to all be the other half that wants you know 13 I don't know if we can have both or not but the point is that it's still 20 plus years out just study both of them and then maybe 10 or 15 years as different things happen in our economy and in our environment and socially within the city probably one of them will start to have greater weight right you heard from the energy committee that they're they were disturbed by the scoring that there was a less than a 1% difference between the two overall and they didn't feel like the scoring was accurate anyway and I kind of feel like that in some ways as well and I don't want to dismiss the other committee's opinions but you know there's a little dichotomy so there's a dichotomy in the city council there's a dichotomy among some of the opinions from the from the committees and that just says that we got to tell the CCRPC look I mean I don't know if both of them are doable or only one is doable but you got to keep them both on the table because they both have merit that's the point I'm trying to make they have merit and we're not going to decide this tonight for 30 years out from now Megan yeah I don't know if this is the time to bring it up but since the publication of the other papers article I have a hundred more signatures on a petition that residents asked me to produce and it's growing every day so we're up to 363 signatures right now and it was reported on to be 260 last Thursday and people contacted me by phone this weekend what can we do email and I think that it remains to be seen how how many South Burlington residents are behind either one and I think that we need to have discussion with the stakeholders I think that to have the CCRPC engage in these studies is the money it's it's that commitment that left a sour taste in their mouth back in 2010 so even if it's their job it's still our taxpayer dollars at our you know paying professionals to go and speak to the stakeholders that we could simply have a meeting now we have Kevin and Tom and I don't know which other city employees are here but compared to doing the whole regional you know study which costs a lot more money than an evening with with David Young and Kevin and Tom Hubbard I think the choice is clear in terms of where to put our resources we have a motion on the table two table are we ready for that vote repeat the motion of us to put this off for two weeks so they can discuss with the school board yes maybe we could have a special meeting that might be worthy of you know since we want to do other things on May 17th yes well maybe maybe Kevin we can I don't I don't know if all of us have to be at a meeting with this with the school representatives for this oh I think I think it's really important for the elected representatives to be talking here together that's what I learned from what happened with the municipal building on on market street that we needed to get our two our two boards together I just don't think that meeting is going to change my opinion that we still need to look at both of these so that's why I still I don't support tabling it I think we need to give clarity Charlie was an infinitely patient with us he came to how many meetings that lady asking us for some clarity that's what they're looking for and that's what we gave them at the last meeting and I'm happy to amend for more clarity to to include but he was I'm not going to vote table he was infinitely patient with us and he spent a lot of time that's because two of the intersections go right through our community and have a huge impact on our community years and years ago when they voted to put the interstate in we agreed or you know I wasn't living in this community at the time we would put up with having our community bisected by an interstate that was so important to the economic viability of the state and so they owe us a lot of conversation about how to continue the best use of that highway and its exits and its impact on our community this isn't just one little you know circle off an interstate in a cornfield where the doesn't impact anything but the environment so it is a lot of work Tom but it's a huge impact for this community huge and it has been for years so are we ready for this vote or maybe just one more piece one more piece one more fact that I learned today from Charlie I wrote to him on Friday because there's a service row that is on our official map that goes north of williston road and that would alleviate a lot of the traffic on williston road and I asked charlene an email was that service row taken into account when all of those traffic studies were done and he said no and I said well how soon could it be done he said by October so when we hear our energy committee say that they're not even sure the metrics are correct I have charlie baker telling me that they did not take into account service road north of williston road one of our busiest roads local and state state highways in order to determine the traffic volume there which I see as a as a as an error to be quite honest an honest error but an error that needs to be corrected okay are we ready for the vote Michael this will be the last comment because it is 11 26 picture of my camera because my audio is okay might save you a little bit of time or anguish I have asked charlie how the ccrpc would weigh the opinions of four or five of our city committees against a three to two vote on the council and he said maybe they'll leave both options on the table which is something that barrett was talking about a moment ago that seems to be a real possibility and then a couple of things weren't mentioned this evening that 12 b would go through a major south berlington wetland and i don't know how that can be achieved because wetlands are class two wetlands are regulated by the state and the metrics or the scoring was defective because land acquisition costs were not taken into account whereas they will add to the cost of 12 b in the case of 13 the land already belongs to the federal government so there are no land acquisition costs involved but in 12 b they did not take that into account there's something to bear in mind okay thank you so are we ready for the vote now i'll do a roll well we can just do poorly all in favor just to clarify this is a vote to table yes yes okay so all in favor of tabling this until we can meet with the school board and get their input signify by saying and me originally i i i we have three to table and opposed okay we've got so it's a three to vote yet again but we will set up a time to meet with the um school board and get their input next is item 14 consider possibly a point auditor for FY 21 Tom Hubbard um sent us a um a letter or a memo this afternoon and he wasn't ready in time Tom you want to yeah just briefly Helen I I think mainly the the two key factors we should look at is timing and transition we just recently completed the FY 20 audit mainly due to the pandemic but it was just several meetings ago we're about one month away from pre-audit work needing to be done for FY 21 so that's one one factor and the other is just transition we're still still a person down and finance the deputy finance position still open Martha just stepped up for Sue in January she's doing a great job but I don't think she'd want to be burdened with going out for a bid right now on a new with a new auditor and of course the management team is is transitioning the end of next month so for those reasons it's our recommendation that we extend a one-year contract to R.H.R. Smith for auditing services to complete the FY 21 audit and then go out to bid this fall for auditing services for FY 22 and that's the opinion of both finance and and our management team okay I support that and do you need a motion for that Tom? yes please I will move that we extend R.H.R.'s contract by a year and go out to bid this fall okay any further discussion? All in favor signified by saying aye all right I don't remember what they were aye so Helen there there is a question about all of the chat that went on during our deliberation here is that going in minutes or what happens with that chat? you know I don't know what happens with it I tried to keep a price of it and share with the council what people had said or written but there was a lot of chat and some of you know it's just answering each other pardon me maybe Sue I don't know I could tell us oh right so what usually happens is that somebody on the committee some you know either a staff person sends me a list of all the chat things and I kind of fit them in where they're appropriate this is what happens with the planning commission and with the DRB okay although it wasn't it isn't necessarily something that the council I mean I try to read all of them but it's hard to do that and also see little hands going on oh yeah yeah it's hard for me to try to take minutes and look at them so yeah but that's somebody usually sends me whoever can access them a list of you know what various people said I don't even know how to access them so someone I'll have to show me after I don't know how I don't know how either to be the presenter and then and then you can go to the chat and you can download the chat and we go to meet I think you're ready to be organize here the presenter so I don't know who that is in this case make me presenter again Kevin I can figure it out or Matt make Matt presenter he'll figure it out okay um 15 any reports from counselors on committees I have very quickly the airport commission met I thought it was interesting we were told Canada or Canadian traffic is about 17 to 20 percent of the travel at the airport so um um Gene is um Richards is estimating that it'll probably take another year for international travel to get back to where it was but what is helping is the local pent up demand and he believes that we're at least a year away to a new norm July and August looks really good we have some a new flight to Dallas and Boston's just started with their once a day it's a called boutique airline and then the noise monitoring the grant a grant has been offered the grant offer has been received by the airport designers started they've hired a contractor and I believe placement will take place in June or July three sites in Winooski South Burlington and Williston have been identified and the airport has received verbal improvement from the FAA of those three sites so these are sound monitors that will monitor every single plane both commercial and military that takes off with the time and the noise and so forth so we'll have some which noise contour is it in for me which noise contour is it in I don't know the spot you don't know okay I really don't right up on spear street no I hope not so that's all I have for I have one thing Helen yes I was appointed to the restoration advisory board and we received word as you all know that the wing commander decided that they did not wish to establish a restoration advisory board in order to deal with PFAS contamination due to firefighting class B firefighting foam that has contaminated our groundwater north of the base including a farm and Winooski river so I don't think this is an appropriate conversation for public session I would hope that when we have our special meeting I think it's this Thursday Kevin who we have a special executive session to talk about how to respond to that note from the wing commander just what you needed to think about it 1135 no I don't I'm not sure what the rationale to have that an executive session would be you wouldn't be receiving advice from legal counsel probably doesn't deal with personnel that's my question I would need to be it would probably need to be an open in public session so that was my question should we be receiving advice from legal counsel I don't think anyone wants to think about it 1135 if if that is the subject matter you want to get advice from a legal counsel then yes we could absolutely do that on a Thursday night we already have advice from legal counsel on the agenda for matters affecting the city I ask that this be another matter that we discuss with our legal counsel thank you okay moving on we need a motion to go into liquor control board that moved second all in favor aye aye so we're now the liquor control board and we have one item Duke's public house outside consumption permit is there any that we approve it second any coverage discussion okay all in favor say aye aye aye motion to come out of liquor control board moved second all in favor aye aye great okay other business is the paving contract that we received oh I think you had it you want to pack it right it's that agenda oh did we do that yeah you did that under the consent agenda oh okay I'm sorry I thought you would moved it there okay so is there any other business all right yeah we'll see you tomorrow night and motion to adjourn okay thank you for hanging in all right I do not know I haven't been able to figure out how to capture the ah hand it to me Kevin let me see if I can try I could do this when I teach I know it's with a different software but and Kevin I have a question for you about our software