 I'm Greg Duggan. I'm the deputy manager for the town of Essex and village of Essex Junction. First of all, I want to thank you all for coming tonight. A couple of quick shout outs. Thank you for town meeting television, for being here on short notice and helping us with the hybrid set up so we can have people in the room here and at home. Thanks to Tammy Getchell, who's hiding over in the corner, the assistant to the manager who put all this together and get everything ready. There's some refreshments over there, some cookies and get the room ready and allowed us to do this hybrid option on short notice. So thanks to the two of them. I'm just going to kick off, give a brief little overview of what turn it over to Jen Nour to facilitate the meeting. Just a quick reminder, if anybody's attending at home, if you could please mute your microphones until you're asked to speak or called on to speak. That would be great. Thank you. So this is the first of three public forums that we're holding about the future of Essex and how to prepare the prepare the town of Essex for the village of Essex Junction's coming vote and subsequent Vermont legislature decision on the creation of an independent city of Essex Junction. The forums are going to be focused on the interim phase around the village's independence separation effort. You can see on the chart over there that Tammy put together there's a little timeline. The interim phase, we're defining it as the time from now until when the legislature makes a decision on the village. Sorry to interrupt, folks at home actually can't see that. Do we have that on a piece? Oh, yes, I should share my screen. Also, if you are attending virtually, please turn your camera off until you and if you want to speak turn your camera back on and then when you're done speaking back off. Thank you. Actually, I'm going to ask town meeting television. I had it set up on my computer but not this one. Would you be able to just pan to the screen for a bit and then I will be able to pull it up for when we're chatting later on. Thank you. So just to repeat, we're looking at the interim phase. That's the focus of the forum tonight, Friday and later on this month. Again, that's defined as basically the period from now until when the legislature makes a decision on the creation of an independent city of Essex Junction. The select board is looking to use the feedback it gets from these forums in the coming weeks and months to help them make decisions to best serve the entire community without favoring one group or another. The point of the forums is to talk about and discuss what people are paying attention to during this interim phase and to hear from our residents and in the public about what people value about Essex in this interim phase. I'm going to share a few options from the staff perspective, which are also up on the wall here. And then we absolutely want to hear from residents on those and anything else that is not listed. You know, we've heard about representation. We've heard people really valuing childcare. Just a few things we've heard and certainly don't want to limit it to that. So anything that's on your mind tonight about this interim phase, we want to hear it. From the staff perspective, we are really focused on providing municipal services and figuring out how to pay for them. It's going to be especially important in this interim phase as we get into the budget season, which is just around the corner and figuring out how to put our budgets together to keep providing municipal services to the entire community. A couple of examples. I'll just do a real quick rundown of what's up there. Staff. We have staff that are shared between the town and the village and they're paid for between the town and the village. As we get into the budget season, we could look at ways to reallocate those costs, moving the staff into the town budget. It's a way so that everybody in the community pays equally for that shared staff. It also sets the town budget up to better prepare to absorb that cost if the village does separate and the town loses some of its tax base because we're going to need that staff no matter what. Similar concept around public safety, specifically fire. If you look at paying for fire across the entire community, again, so that everyone is paying for the cost of fire services in the community. And again, if the village separates the town to be a little bit better prepared to absorb the cost of providing fire in the remaining portion of the town. Capital budgeting is another one. You can take a look at the capital plan, capital budget, see if funds could be allocated differently across the entire community for projects, capital projects. And as far as for paying those services, regardless of the outcome of the village vote, where we need to figure out how to pay for our services. If there's a reduction of services, that's a reduction of cost. There's a way to save money there. Not necessarily a recommended one, but it is an option. There's always the option of raising property taxes, which is how we get the bulk of our revenue. Also looking at local options tax is an opportunity or an option to raise a 1% tax on sales from businesses in the community. And or there's the option to raise fees, such as your recreation fees, your pool fees, stuff like that. So with that, I will wrap it up. I'll do my best to answer any questions that come up. Unified Manager Evan Teach is here as well, but mostly you want to hear from you. So with that, I will give it to Jen. Hi, everyone. My name is Jennifer. Now, it's nice to see you here. So there are about 16 people that I can see more than 16 people online, 20 something people online. And let's see, not quite a dozen folks in the room. So that's a good crowd. Nice to see you. I do want to reset a little bit because that was such a sprint full of really dense information. And so I'm guessing that you might want to know how I've set up this next 60 minutes or so, 70 minutes, and then we'll open up the floor for questions and conversation. So the overall idea is to have spend some time giving some information that Greg just gave an overview of and get any chance to ask questions if you have them about any of that content and also hearing perspectives. My full expectation is that this conversation is going to go in all kinds of ways. There's a lot of ground to cover. And so one of the constructs that I'm going to use to try to keep it somewhat simple is keep coming back to this interim phase. And if we can get the camera back on the graph that's colored with the yellow on one side and then the blue on the other, again, those phases are defined by specific votes rather than actual dates. So right now we're looking at that yellow phase. You might go anywhere with your comments, but at some point you can expect me to say, what are you paying attention to right now? What are you wanting the select board to pay attention to right now? And those are some of the notes that I'm going to be taking. You'll see the notes because I'll share them on the screen so you can see what I'm writing. And rather than having a series of consecutive speeches, I actually might interrupt and try to ask you questions so I can figure out if I'm writing down what you wanted me to be tracking. Because that's the only way I'm going to know if I have an accurate sense of what you're trying to say. That's true for folks who are at home as well. All right, so last but not least, we'll be talking back and forth between online and in-person participants. It looks like right now everyone is fitting pretty comfortably in the room, but there is some overflow space in the lobby if we need it. There's a microphone set up at the table so that your voice can be easily heard from folks online and in here. And we'll go back and forth I think just depending on the volume of where people have their hands raised and to give a little bit of space to the microphone in between speakers. Are there any questions about the agenda so far? Yes. Go ahead, Gabrielle. Hi, I'd love to see the graph you're talking about. We only see online the interim phase allocating the cost of municipal services. Yep, we need to move over. I think there's something over there that we can't see. Thank you so much. It'll be much clearer on the shared screen. There it is, thanks. And Jen, one last thing. We are only using the chat for people to be raising their hands. We will not be using the chat for commentary. We ask you not to do that, only if there's something going wrong with your feed or with or something you can't hear, but not for commentary. Thank you. All right, thanks, Greg. That's really helpful to have that up there. Looks like we can see your whole screen. There you go. All right, are there any questions about any of the content that Greg had presented at the start of the meeting? And I'm only starting there because as you heard that volume of information, if you had questions, I didn't want you to be sitting on them for too long. So far so good. All right, so I think what I'd like to do is open the floor then to hear what perspectives you have and what you're thinking about with this interim phase. What are you paying attention to? Another way to think about that is what are you worried about or hoping for? The floor is open for comments. It looks like there's one online, so we'll take that first. And then a show of hands in the room can let me know how to queue up the rest of the comments. Go ahead online. I'm assuming that means me. Sorry, you didn't call my name, so. I have all the names, so clearly in front of the screen. Okay, that's fine. It's Ray Garifano. Thank you for this forum and the opportunity to kind of provide some feedback about what's happening with the separation and the failed merger. I am a town resident. I've been here since 2009 and my daughter is 11, attends is entering middle school in Essex. And when she was young, we completely depended on the afterschool and the Parks and Rec opportunities that were provided by the community. And one of the best things that happened to us is when the Parks and Rec departments merged because that just simplified our lives as far as looking for options for summer care and afterschool care. So I'm really concerned about young families coming to Vermont. And we've seen a boom in the last several years about people wanting to move here. And I want Essex to remain a desirable place. And I think young families look for child care, afterschool opportunities. And enrichment opportunities that I think the EJRP provides. I'm also concerned about our tax base and losing that as a town resident. I understand there are shared services. I don't know all the details of those shared services. But kind of back to my point of attracting people to move to Essex. I think, you know, if our taxes go way up in Essex town, that will make us less desirable. And we might lose some people moving here to other nearby towns. I also, you know, I voted for the merger. I think not only forget about the financial aspects of having one community. I just think having one community helps the community thrive. And I was disappointed that the merger didn't happen. So I'm concerned about what the next phase is and how it will impact me and my family and other families that might be moving to Essex that have young children. And when you think about the concern you have about the next phase, is that tied to the things like child care and the way services are either experienced or paid for or is that something else that you're talking about? I think availability is, so yeah, affordable child care, affordable afterschool options and availability when you're a town resident. You know, I don't want Essex Junction programs to be like, I don't want to compete for those programs like I have to compete for like Colchester or South Burlington or other nearby towns. Okay, got it. I think I've got it. You can see, Ray, if I, as I type, I've been trying to type up what you were thinking and saying. And so, and this is an open invitation to anyone as I do my best to track your thoughts. If you see something that I've written that seems really off, tell me. No, I think you captured it. Thank you so much. Any comments in the room? And then we'll go back to comments online. Can we up the volume on the speaker in the back? That's a technical question and I think we can. Oh, it's the stream. You mean like, can we turn up the volume for folks who are calling in? I don't know. That's a question about the microphone volume versus. It's coming from here. If we do it over there creates a weird echo feedback. So let me try to pump the volume up here. See if that helps. Now, let's take a comment online. We'll see if it made a difference because I don't see any in the room in any case. Greg, the next person who's up. Next up is Rachel Lozant. Rachel. Hey there. Can you hear me? You can. Okay, I'm going to go away from the lawnmower for a second. Seems like I have to. Okay. So I guess my top separation concerns at this point, just like what Ray had to say is services. And I wanted to say that, you know, especially parks and recreation, we've utilized camps since the summer of 2016 when my daughter was entering kindergarten and that experience for us solidified Essex. The availability, the price, meeting friends for her before entering Essex Elementary. And I mean, it's for families, it's child care. That availability of child care. And we've also utilized the vacation camps and the afterschool program. And the afterschool program really is what I want to focus on. This is huge. The availability of this care enables me to work, period. And for me, it's affordable. It's on school grounds. It's licensed, organized. And for my daughter, it solidifies her friendships. It gives her outside time, summer snow, and tech free activities after school. The town outside the village families do not need another what if when it comes to child care and afterschool care. The why left abruptly and Essex Extension, Recreation and Parks maintained services for us. We don't know if the why would ever come back to provide care or any other child care agency. They left other outpost locations as well as my understanding. And camps and child care are really hard to staff right now. We've seen camps have to close and not be able to take as many kids this year. And a what if for child care means what if for working young families? What if work? And what if work is a huge stress for families? And when Greg talks about what our options are after a failed merger or the town outside the village, it's either cutting services, raising fees and taxes. And both of those things affect families with school age children. And the other part, the gen that you talked about was concern. And I am just going to shift gears a bit and I am deeply concerned about the actions of certain town outside the village citizens. During the merger, a campaign was launched with signs flooding the town. Vote no on the merger tax hike. This was not only misleading, but it led town outside the village voters to vote to vote the alternative A. The alternative separation was that A, it didn't exist. And B, it wouldn't allow for a tax increase. But here we are with a failed merger. And we are looking at the potential of a tax increase. And I am, this is what worries me about this town. And it worries me that the town that we love so much has come to this and that people were misled by this campaign. And I don't want that to happen again during this potential separation. I think communication needs to be clearer and more concise. So I am going to do my best to try to say, I think some of your aftercare and childcare options listed here. About the tax increase, needing reliable information about what's likely. But you're also talking, I think, about a concern of how discourse happens or getting good information. Am I reading that right? Yeah, I definitely think that that's correct. You know, there are, where a lot of people in the town outside the village that relied on misinformation. And it's been perpetuated for years. And honestly, I think it's not only do people feed into it, but also it helps to tune people out. People don't want to listen to the drama surrounding this issue anymore. And that's a big problem because if separation happens, the town outside the village really has some tough choices. And it's a shame. Are you able to see the screen, Rachel, and see if I'm writing? The concern about how discourse takes place regarding this issue is something you're paying attention to during the interim, specifically how to get accurate information and then how to stay engaging. Just your concern that drama disengages and people won't get informed about what the options are. Yeah, that's a really great way to boil it down. Thank you for helping me make it more concise. Any comments in the room? Yeah, please. So thank you very much for allowing us to attend this forum. I am a town of Essex resident. I live in the village area. So my point of view as a resident in the village. Just lean into the microphone a little So my point of view as a resident within the village area is when I see increased property taxes all my flags go up saying well my property taxes have been way too high for way too long. I have been living here since 1994. I have seen a couple failed murders. And now that's it. I moved into the village of Essex Junction because I could not afford the town of Essex. I was lucky IBM was here. IBM left. And left everybody stranded. And it was a struggle very often for us. I am now at a point where I quit my job last year. My husband is about a year from retirement. We just cannot afford higher property taxes. At the same time I have many friends who live in the town outside the village area. And I remember those days when I had kids. It's never easy. It will impact seniors as well. Because no matter what we do money wise seniors just don't have that much money. It's a fixed income. We raise anything it'll be more difficult for everybody. Both parents with families and seniors with a limited income. Another thing is that we want to keep both the village and the town areas that are attracting newcomers. They are very nice places to live with lots of future opportunities. And as I said we don't want to leave our friends in Essex stranded you know at the same time we have to manage things very very carefully. I think a local option tax is an easier way to do things. You can raise quite a bit of money. At the same time I see that there's a lot of very big very expensive houses in some areas of Essex. I got my bike a little bit and I ride around. And I can see some people are way paying not enough taxes over there. They may not have as many services but that's a choice. So I don't know what the answer is. All I know is maybe raising the fees is an option. Will and recreation not so much development maybe but we don't want to lose some of the developers either because that will impact Essex town a lot because they're the ones who have the room to develop. And it will impact also if we want to have affordable housing. So there's a lot of things we need to take into account. I don't know what the answers are. What I'm saying is both sides have an issue. Basically the point of view of residents would have in the village is what's in it for me because that was the question with the merger. I find that the merger everything was transparent but there were lots of misleading comments on behalf of a few wealthy people and a few people who call themselves journalists but are not. And I think a little bit of that. So there's so much there before you leave. Let me see if I've got some of it at least. Yep. Okay. And you might even have some questions. I don't know if there's any answers or clarifications on the different tax options but you're very concerned about property taxes going up meaning that it's very difficult for everybody and part of what you're trying to figure out was who's advocating for affordable housing residents with fixed income in particular and who's driving sort of that I'll just say who's advocating that sounds to these points of view. Did you have any questions about any of the tax options? Yeah and another option I'd like to see with theories what's good in there for the village who has been extra being extra taxes every single year. So that's because I'm not as as literate in some of these issues as all of you are you'll have to help me understand how you'd like that captured here. Your question is extra taxes. Yeah. And my question is why would we have to pay more? Yeah okay. Yes. Do you have a clarification? You're a village resident. You're in the village? Yeah. You want it? Sure. So as far as allocating the cost of municipal services up there how that would affect village residents is using the fire department as an example. Right now the village Vessex Junction has its fire department. Yep. It also pays into the town of Vessex fire department. If both fire departments are paid for under the same budget which is how the highway departments are paid for right now that way everybody in the community is paying the cost of fire. Okay. So just to simplify just a quick question I apologize for interrupting you Greg. So a quick question. I'm currently paying some taxes to SXTowns who the village if you increase property taxes am I going to pay to SXTown and to the village as well extra taxes or just to the portion for SXTown? Oh I haven't tried to answer that one. I can jump in and make sure I understand that question. He's a villager. These are the tough questions they deal with taxation and how taxation is done through a tax rate. Okay so bear with me. When so you are paying as a resident of the town you are paying for the goods and services that the town provides to you and that creates a tax rate and then everybody in the town including members in the village pay that tax rate. The people in the village also have a tax rate set by the village board for goods and services that the village board pays for. Right. And what we're saying is when you if you are you are currently paying for your fire department you're also paying into the town fire department. So if the town fire department goes up well is it good? Are both my fire departments going up? But if the town absorbs the village's cost okay then that total cost the people at home may not see it goes up to the top line and then gets shared by all the residents town outside the village and the village. Right. And it equalizes that service cost just the cost of that service. So you are all paying one rate it's the town rate. Right. And so the village tax will go down and the town tax goes up but only slightly more because it's being served by paid for by more by the people okay. Thank you. Yeah it's it's very difficult and if there are any like MIT math majors if I got something wrong apologize Sarah may see answers those questions. Is that going to the what you're right now? Well that's going to what I'm wondering you know say like staff cost me a small service is going to be the same thing we have a new service in the junction we have municipal services in the town and in the village we pay everybody I mean so how did it work for municipal services? Does it work the same way? Just for the fire which is a municipal no no no I'm not talking about the fire I'm talking about just like the village staff say. So the staffing. The staffing in the village for instance we have a planner playing development in the village and playing development in the town. Sure so it depends on the staff right now we have we have shared staff who are staff who are shared between the town and the village. Yep. Technically. I have other ones that aren't shared. Some are technically town employees. I don't finish. Some are technically town employees. Some are technically village employees. Yep. But the cost is borne by both. I'm going to use our HR director as an example. He is a town employee. The town pays all of his benefits and about 70% of his salary. The village pays about 30% of his salary. Okay. So he he's paid for both but the village residents paying into town the entire town portion plus that 30% of his salary. So if his entire salary was shifted into the town then everybody pays that 100% of his salary equitably. So hang on. So in the interim phase what would happen then? Go up by the 10 rate. The town the town tax would go up to cover that additional cost. Yeah. The village rate could go down because the village would no longer be paying that portion of his tax through the village taxes. So it'd be. In the interim phase or in the final phase. In the interim phase and the final phase depends on what happens with separation and independent city and the staff and everything else that's beyond what we can speculate at this point. So think of the interim phase as just that. It's an interim step. The vote is going to occur. We have no known outcome. There's only two outcomes of a vote. Yes or no. The vote then goes to the state legislature where it becomes a bill and they take up debate on the vote. The town has no say in that particular avenue of that. That's just how things happen in the state of Vermont. So as an interim phase the town select board is looking out just there's there's two outcomes. Well there's two main outcomes and there's other outcomes. One is the state says yeah you could separate and no you can't but either way as an interim we're asking the citizens what do you value and in terms of a tax hike if there is a tax increase at the end because they do get separation and take their tax base with them for their own taxes that interim phase the town can do some things. It could be a year from now. It could be three years from now. It could be five years from now but the way taxes work if you move them incrementally or you do some of the items that everybody will bring up tonight including sharing of police services if you share a service and someone else pays you that lowers your need to raise revenue for that department service it's shared and so those are the types of things in the interim phase the town could be looking at the town could actually do and when I say the town I mean the town select board can actually do and then afterwards when you started to get into other colors there are other options they could be looking at and so for the people here in the audience and the people at home that's what we're trying to get at so when people say that they're concerned about recreation so in the interim phase the town select board could be sitting down with the village board and saying this is what our citizens are concerned with we think we should be able to work something out where those programs are protected that's where we're going to put focus etc etc I hope that makes sense for as far as taxes go what the value what the what I'm hearing is that it's important for the select board to keep taxes from increasing at too fast of a rate is that really just no I get it I mean I I mean I get the intricacy of it what I'm thinking is there are still some areas where it's not clear there's still some errors because I don't think you can answer it directly I mean it's it's gonna vary on it's gonna depend on so many things basically yeah yeah there's many options I mean I'm gonna go to every one other people I know I absolutely understand and but I think part of that conversation you've been having is probably on a lot of different people's minds and the answer is not terribly satisfying because there are a lot of variables that are moving around yeah but what is coming out of it is there are a couple things that people want to take care of in this interim phase so that they know what to predict around when it comes to work to livelihood to where you live and absolutely to that extent hopefully I've captured at least yeah and and this will be important for everybody including the village because we don't want to lose people either you know right well thank you when the town and village are still together what's that the interim phase is when the absolutely absolutely it makes sense and as I said it's you know there's so many unknowns that it's hard to anyhow I mean thank you thank you for your patience no thank you appreciate it we're going to take a comment online then we'll come back to comments in the house and I think it is Sue cook who's up next so sue go ahead hi hi can you hear me okay yes it sounds great okay great so um from for me what is most important is that we are approaching this interim phase and what comes after in a collaborative and open discussion way and from my perspective what I've been aware of is that there has been things that have been kind of put together by the village trustees and taken to the select board and you know in a way that it's like this is what we are deciding you need to respond to that and that doesn't feel collaborative to me um you know if I think about the police department which you know we're both both um well the whole community currently is leveraging the the police um services um the suggestion that was made by the trustees was to if if there is a separation that the village would pay based on grand list and the town outside the village would pay based on grand list and that doesn't seem like a fair equitable way to do it I think grand list makes sense on some things but it doesn't with the police department I mean the police department should be based on how are those services used and how are they being used and how does that split up based on the town inside the village and the town outside the village and so I just for me what's most important and and and what I value most in this process is there really being a fair and equitable and open discussion between the leadership of what is the full town and the village um and if that means that we need to look at it being a discussion that's represented by not the current leaders because the current leaders are too entrenched in the the opinions and the history and and not able to see really what is fair and equitable then maybe that's the way we need to go but we need to be looking at what is the right thing for the entire community and not just who wins and who loses and I feel like we're starting to look at a win and a lose kind of situation and that's not a desirable outcome okay so I'm gonna do a little bit of work on that Sue so I can figure out how to take it and I'm pushing kind of hard here so you're gonna have to let me know if I've missed the mark I think yeah about is how to reframe the discussion so that there's a little bit more give and take um collaborative is one of those funny words where people can say it but mean a lot of things with it um but how to reframe the discussion so that it is either may maybe more open or inclusive or give and take as am I hitting the mark there Sue yeah so it it's it's actually so that it is an actual discussion versus a hey this is what we are requiring you need to respond to that um you know the reference to the town offices which yes are physically within the village but are owned by the town and the town put a lot of effort into um recent you know energy and overall renovations of the property um you know the the proposal that was dropped for the select board to review is not a fair and equitable proposal so I I think I think it you know so maybe collaborative it means too many different things to different people but it really is saying is that the swapping of proposals is tricky to figure out how to get in there for input yeah yeah it feels like a negotiation and a negotiation there usually is a winner or a loser and what we really need to look at is what is the right thing for the overall community in the interim and in the aftermath of that interim so that so that both the town that remains and the village if it's a separate thing are successful and you know the the residents feel good about their communities and feel like you know they they didn't get the you know the raw end of a deal so to speak yeah right if you whatever this ends up with you want to make sure that people have had their say and they understand what they're walking into um can are you able to see the screen to see how I've written this so far at the moment the swapping of proposals was leaving limited opportunity to explore options or consider options and I'll just say as a community yes yeah that that that's effective um but something you just said where um you know people want to feel like they're able to walk into some you know don't know what they're walking into but with the separation that is purely going to be my understanding purely going to be a village decision um so so town outside the village doesn't get a say in whether the village separates from us or not and I understand the logistics of that but we do need to have a say in terms of how does that separation occur so that it is you know reasonable fair and equitable for everyone in the best possible way understanding there's going to need to be compromised there's going to need to be um you know maybe some some things that aren't you know at the at the very top in terms of desire but desirability but but that but everyone walks away with what they really need and want okay I'm going to leave it there to mostly because I don't know quite how to put it in more I mean a more pithy way yeah no that's fair I think that because this is such a um it's a very complex negotiation negotiations come in all types right and so you're watching a lot of different moving parts and part of what you're saying is in order to stay abreast of what's happening there needs to be a little more opportunity for exchanges all along the way and now I'm going to take some comment from from in-house then we'll go back to online in the back absolutely thank you so much you've got a you've got a phone call I don't know if they can't raise their hand oh I see yes I will make an opportunity for that thanks so much I'm going to take my mask off yes you may thank you my name is Chan Abbott and I have lived in the town and the village for 58 years I am as violently against separation as I have been strongly for merger and have fought battles against separation and for merger since some of the people before some of the people in this room were born having said that I find the interim phase very interesting because I wonder if during the interim phase it has occurred to our wonderful staff here that if they reallocate salaries and the select board of course if they reallocate salaries and benefits to be paid equally throughout the entire community and they include the cost of the village fire department in the town of Essex budget and they more equitably distribute capital dollars throughout the entire community perhaps the legislature is going to say you no longer have a problem no this I devoutly hope will happen and I also understand why everyone is acting as though we are going to have a separation vote in November however every battle we have fought on this for the last half century people have opted for status quo and I devoutly hope that will happen I want Indian Brook to continue to be my park I want the town to continue to be my town but I just present this and and I ask Evan and Greg has that ever flitted through your mind that the legislature if all those nice things happened that the legislature might decide that we didn't need to separate I'm going to be as honest as I can good I have no idea what a state legislator will or will not vote on and what makes them say yes or no what do you think that it might that that might if the select board did all those things do you think it it might make the villages cause a little bit less strong shall we say here I'm going to step in for just a second because I don't know unless you have more to add specific you jump in and then I'll see here's where's what I'm gonna the reason that's such a tricky question to answer not from content but just as somebody who looks at negotiations a lot is that the town select board right now needs to represent village and town equally and if there are village voters enough village voters who have said they'd like to pursue and develop proposals for separation then it puts the town in a strange spot of making decisions not to favor disenfranchise any one group or another and so allowing that proposal to sort of those to develop and to get explored but doing all these things is in the meantime there's a there are so let me let me be clear we're not proposing even the suggestion of these things as a tactic one way or the other for the state legislature we're doing it because it it is something that from a budgetary and taxation standpoint if you're looking out into the near term future we don't control the state legislature's outcome at all let's let's be clear yeah I know that we don't they may take the town's testimony to town select board they may not they may for whatever reason they might like some things in the proposal and not like other things we really that's where we are at but there are some taxation budgetary items that staff can envision that in the interim phase if it leads to separation it places the remainder of the town in a better position for the future and if separation doesn't happen it places in the town the remainder of the town and the entire town at no worse than it was before and even better because now they've equitably shared those services that which provide protection for the entire community such as police such as fire such as bus service such as um i'm missing something as six rescue the ambulance service nobody is losing any service but the amount of money somebody pays is then at the top line equitably paid by every resident oh yeah i understand it so i'm saying this for homes so i hope that helps you and and my learned colleague wants to make two really quick points and then move on um really double down and emphasize we do not know what the legislature is going to do well we don't like nobody yeah exactly i'm not suggesting that you know what they're going to do i'm really suggesting this this might if you do all these things the village's case kind of disappears and my second point my second point is that that if you do all that in one year that's a lot of money i i don't suspect the select board um or the town is going to make all those changes within one year they're their options to consider um part of why we're here tonight and and later on in these forums is to just how do these things look what's the reaction people have to these to get some feedback on do any of these sit well and not sit well and what other ideas are out there so with that also thank you so much and thank you for coming tonight and thanks for your kind you wanted somebody from the village who's against separation we you're all town resident there are a lot of perspectives on this so i'm going to go back to online and evan tells me that if you're on the phone only on the phone and not logged in then you might not be able to raise your hand so do you is there i'm going to just make a little break in the action here is there a phone participant who had a comment to make and if not i'm going to go to the next online person and that would be patty yes hi um i i i want to speak because i loved what sue cook had to say uh she previously was on the s six town select board and i really valued her input during the year she was there and it was years ago um a few years ago not many not 50 but um that um i guess i've always felt since we've moved here and that's when sue was on the board that the select board i'm not select board i felt the select board is always driven by the timely efforts of either contract proposals or ideas as sue cook said of what we should do by the trustees and i'm curious as to why and um after living here for more years i realized that there are five trustees representing the area of the people that live in the village which one of my best friends lives in the village so i love my village people and i have a few clients in the village so i have some good people but also the town um even though the town select board has to represent the village and the town to me i mean this is sort of an out of a box idea from what sue has said that i believe if we had five people residents of the town outside the village representing neighborhoods what have you just to sit at the table just that live outside the town outside the village meet with the five trustees okay and then have somehow have the town outside the village people and the village people pick another poor people that represent everybody and then have these discussions because i feel just like what sue cook said even when she was on the board she noticed because i read back to 2017 notes at the town office that there were things even before they had a governance committee for the merger before that all got started it was happening then that the trustees were bringing up negotiation topics saying we're going to present these sentences and and these ideas and and people can talk about them because we have an outline why can't we in the town outside the village come out with an outline that is my question okay and i want that to be documented and the other thing i want to say is one of my clients in the town told me today two and a half years ago that his neighborhood in the town outside the village again for the third time got a whole list of people there's a lot of elderly people i hear people talking from the village about young people and i think that's great we have a lot of bikers and stuff in the town outside the village that bike to school i'm into public safety but all older people i'm 60 so i consider myself not that bad but you know there's 70 and up a lot of us can't even come out of their house to walk on the sidewalks because even if our taxes weren't we're raised go ahead and raise them we want our sidewalks plowed and they're tired of waiting my client said for 25 years they've been in their neighborhood trying to get the town to do and i think it's because we just don't have equal representation to me that's the root of the problem patty let me see if i've got it okay so i and i there's gonna be some elements that i don't but what i do have nailed down i believe is this concern about representation and how to ensure that town outside the village residents views are fully represented or considered the concern is that there's over representation of village views which might be driving considerations yes accurate to you right on nail on the head okay great thank you um just and i'm only asking due to time i'm trying to get a sense of how many people are sitting on comments so that i can figure out how to allocate time for our remaining meeting so just a quick show of hands and then we'll go to someone in the room how many people here have comments that they so at least two three four maybe five and how many people online if you can raise your hand at least briefly have comments so you know so far we have about 10 comments to go through and i don't want to cut anyone short but i do in the interest of making sure that everyone gets their views out there i am going to start to interrupt a little bit quicker if i think i've got the gist and i hope that's not too insulting um and the sense is i'm going to try to grab the gist of what you're saying see if you have other things to add see if i've got it accurately and then move on to the next all right thank you let's move to somebody in the room and then we'll go back to online um any comments from the room yes go ahead in the back thank you jen thank you the dotted line in the interim phase you mean the dotted line in the interim phase the dotted line represents the vote and you're asking us to tell you about things that will happen after the vote actually i'm asking um for well assuming the vote is yes not quite that's not quite what i'm asking but um what are you wondering or concerned about um just wanted to point out that that's a difficult area to talk about because it's such so conditional so i heard um some concern about child care and i think that is a valid concern even though i have no children um i think that currently the town the village provides child care um at no net cost to the taxpayers apparently i think that if we separate the select board needs to prepare to either trade for those services and i've heard interest in indianbrook reservoir season passes and i haven't heard much much in the way of offers a little bit closer to the mic yep thanks thank you so mostly i've been hearing mostly demands and no offers and i think that's probably part of the problem so clearly we have a possibility right there child care and exchange for season passes the way to sort of work through things and that's the kind of negotiations that i would expect our select board and our trustees to be doing not simply saying we need this this this this and this i want to point out that in 1994 taxes in the combined town school all property taxes were actually lower than they were outside the village so ken i'm gonna um i'm so sorry part of i think part of it is i'm losing the thread a little bit so i i have your concern about what happens if these if to these kinds of services if separation happens and your question is are people thinking about those possibilities like we're new to prepare to provide those services and we have a great model to follow apparently it costs no net because the fees pay for the service so it shouldn't be very difficult for the town to gear up okay and follow the model that the village is using i would point out that the village services currently don't accommodate all the needs all the demand there is a waiting list a prioritized waiting list i might add that would end and by when you say that would end that your concern is that then town outside the village wouldn't be on those wait lists anymore that town outside the village would be the town the new town of Essex with its own parks and parks and recreation department which it has and it would provide childcare because the citizens need it and want it and if they don't want to provide it there is an opportunity here i would think because express concern interest in access to in the ebrook reservoir has been given because they did pretty good pretty strongly actually so i think there's a great opportunity there so ken i'm a little worried that i'm going to miss some of these things because they're so specific their ideas that specific was good well so i'm not getting the specific thesis what i am trying to grab is what kinds of questions do you have right now or what do you want what are you hoping that the select board is paying attention during the syndrome phase and i think i've got that you want to make sure they're preparing for what happens if separation takes place well that's the whole idea right well you know it's there's actually that's one of the ideas yes there's a lot of work well if it doesn't succeed i think that some kind of equalization mechanism needs to be put in place okay there's no question about it and one was created in 1917 the town outside the village highway tax took care of that very problem and what did we do we phased it out and turned it to zero it was a great way to deal with the discrepancy with the village paying for road maintenance in the village and road maintenance outside the village that's simply not fair and that can be extended to other services as well okay there's one very very important concept because when we're leading up to the legislative decision there's an interesting dilemma you think about it the village is a municipality corporation with taxing authority over a geographic area the same geographic area that the town has taxing authority over will the legislature simply say it's fine take a portion of the tax base from one entity and go with it this is going to be an interesting dilemma for the legislature in fact in massachusetts in a split like this the village was required to pay the town because the town was losing tax based not by a choice of its own so here's what i'm gonna try to and this is i'll say one more thing and i'm done yeah well no i'm not actually trying to speed you up i'm trying to say this these speculations are all over all over the map and i think part of what you're trying to figure out is um i think because of that fact yes the village needs to be in a more negotiating stance okay instead of a more demanding stance i think there's a lot of uncertainty as to what will happen and i think that yes if the town was blessing it because there was more negotiation going on i think you'd have a lot better chance of flying but i think the current approach doesn't work and i think that there'll be resistance and i think that the concept that the state will allow part of that one entity's tax basis simply be given to another without the say of one so one of the things you're anticipating or looking forward to with interest in some way is what is the conversation by the time it comes to the Vermont legislature what kinds of questions do they ask it would be good if you were with a unified approach would make a huge difference okay i think that's everything child care 1994 uh in general the select board needs to preserve the integrity of the town should not surrender anything we should trade we have a long-standing relationship with lots of things each value so ken i am going to move on to another comment because the time is i'm done very much this last piece let me just see if i've got it is there a unified approach and leading up to the Vermont legislative decision i'm going to list as a question here to capture part of what you've just said um i'm hoping that would make a big difference and make it i'm hoping that honors that right okay it would make a big difference in sort of keeping that unity of it would increase the probability of success thank you so much and i'm sorry for that um abrupt let's take a comment online please brosh charlotte hey thanks i wasn't going to comment but i felt like some fact-checking was in order um so i'm i'm going to comment as a trustee um i was listening to them all in the lawn so pardon you our assumptions cutting out a little bit i'm afraid we can only hear a couple of words um there's been a lot of assistance brosh do you want to turn off your camera maybe it'll come through a little better how about this let's try better sounds good so there have been a lot of comments um that the trustees are making demands of the select board i just wanted to set the record straight for just a quick second because i know time is tight the trustees responded to a request by select board chair andy watz to provide an opening suggestions on on what the village was thinking about how to proceed with separation um specifically what we were interested in talking about and how we felt about each each topic excuse me i'm paraphrasing my understanding of of the process we were in um so we did just that on fairly short notice i might add so we provided the select board with our thoughts and we gave them those thoughts in a priority order so that they would understand that these are this is the level of importance we assigned to each one and the first and most important to us was how to share police services and so there are 11 or 12 in there and they're numbered um and they're not demands they are simply responses to a request for what's important to the to the board and what we think is important to village residents as we move forward through this process um it may seem like there's no negotiating going on and that is because most of this has to happen an open session of meetings and we can't simply do this in back rooms um had we done this in back rooms we would be having a different conversation right now which would be uh haranguing us rightly for doing just that so we are anxiously anxiously awaiting to hear back from the select board so that we can work together as we usually do um to come to some kind of equitable thoughtful creative solutions to move this community and these two communities forward um so I just wanted to kind of jump in and say to those listening at home and those in the room that the trustees aren't making demands we are trying to work with the select board in a process and a venue that is incredibly difficult to work in public open meetings there I honestly I can't think of a more difficult place to try to work this out so please be patient with the select board please be patient with the trustees we're doing our best we're going to do this as openly as we possibly can and I really do hope that I had hope that we would have heard from them by now I think they wanted this process to play out and that's fine but so late August we're hoping to have some kind of response from them um so please understand that trustees aren't making demands and we're not trying to hold anything over their heads um I think that's important thank you any comments in the room yes all right thank you so okay so my name is Diane Clemens okay well that's part of the reason why I took the mask it always surprises me too um I speak very softly so um regardless so I second the comment on Rich Rachel was on about getting child care for a variety of people um whatever circumstances it helps our general public um my question my concern is services okay as I'm riding down route 15 in Pearl Street and I'm looking at the guard rails which are hidden behind the the weeds I'm wondering about other things like people of course mentioned about sidewalks well sidewalks are important um not only in the summertime but winter time when everybody's trying to walk or ice skate or whatever on on the sidewalks to get to school and work as more people are finding that walking is preferred or at this point in time more cost effective since they're working from home um but my other concern is um as a justice of the peace okay as this interim period here okay I got elected by the entire town not just I got as a village resident I got you know I didn't get voted by just them I got voted by everybody just like the select board in fact if I was probably at the same time as the select board so how does this interim period affect people like me who provide those necessary services community um and you know it could be you know dealing with an assessment it could be all these other fun things that we do that are critically important to the public um how do we how do we okay operate going forward um you know when it comes to like setting up the town meeting and running you know the elections and all the other stuff that are important for our community for us to to go great I want you to be able to finish all your comments and with Jen and then I'll answer your okay question the best I can quickly you have a question for that no I have an answer for her oh well there we go okay do you want the answer now do you want to finish your comments um my last comment is it's it's time to start painting the lines um and the crosswalks again so um because it's good as an older person somebody talked about the older person I'm finding a hard time finding the sides of the roads if not the center of the road because I can't see those darn darn faded lines okay so yes I have earned the gray hair so but I'm interested in your comment okay so to get just wonky for a moment thank you everybody for the use of the term wonky try this wherever you are um no changes occur until the effective date established by the legislature so just for the sake of argument you have a vote in November state legislature gets it sometime December January they debate it they debate it and they say sure we'll let you do something effective July 1st 2024 nothing happens legislation wise office wise etc except for who gets elected during those times nothing you'll still be a JP till the end of your term and if you get reelected you'll get elected for whatever period of time until the effective date of the term of the of the state legislature and then the village which becomes a city will have to do elections and the town who may then have vacancies will have to have elections the way this is going is that should things happen July 1st my term doesn't end for another seven months so so I would be servicing the town that I'm not right and so that's an item that needs to be addressed by the state legislature okay well I don't want to leave you guys hanging I mean you voted who else but on the other hand you know who's going to do the job who else will tell me that the lines are faded so I think I'm going to put that in the the lines are faded so in that sort of teal section of the transition that's one of the questions that lands squarely there right in terms of terms and people's obligations when they've taken on a role and I know I'm not the only person that's in this you know we have a lot of people who are indeed on board on boards and commissions that are serving across the cross the village line but it's a it's a good suggestion as the village is drafting its charter it could put in the charter that those jps and others who are from the village get to keep their office until past the effective date until the next election well we would in in years past they used to be on three bca's because there was a school let's not get into wonky details the wonky detail where I thought we were only down to one but I used to have three meetings thank you so much and let's take a comment online Joshua Knox is next up yes hello um I'll keep my video off just so the um audio will come through a little better if you want to really see me you can um so I want to tag back to something Rachel and Patty both raised because I think it lies beneath things like taxes and services that is how we make decisions collectively is is important although I don't speak for anyone other than myself tonight you may already know that I'm on the planning commission so I have a great interest in in things like governance demographics development um so as concerned merger at the time I thought it was great still think it's great that the issue of representation was raised in the past few years but the solutions put forward assumed a unified tov perspective that warranted at large representation we know that's not true and it will get us into trouble in the interim phase as well as separation if we believe it to be true um just quickly for example if we imagine the separation going through we in the current tov will quickly find ourselves as a town of like 11 or 12 000 7th or 8th largest in the state still with the majority of that population residing in a smaller portion of the land area surrounded by a largely rural area so what what we're going to end up doing then is recreate the sort of circumstances that first led to the creation of village government in the 1890s and so what I would what I would close with is just saying the current tov is not a monolith and any governance going forward cannot assume that it is okay I think so I could pick up two pieces there the current I'm going to take a last one that you just said current tov is not monolithic yeah um so representation needs to take us into account and then you also talked about tov residents views just the concern that might not be fully represented during the interim phase um what I was saying specifically is sort of how the tov as a as a unity isn't something that could really be represented because when you say someone from the tov you could mean someone in the the sx town center in apartments like a walk away from services or you could mean someone up on brigham hill and so to imply those are the same thing it never made sense to me yep how can I if you might be able to give me a phrase that can make this really specific in these notes because I don't know if I'm going to get that nuance here can you see it on your screen what I've written I can I can um what would you add that would make it a little more specific I'm looking at the bottom one current tov is not monolithic yep I think what I would say is it can't be like representation can't be at large is really what I'm saying because the the the big issue that kept being raised and I think in a sense rightly so is that everyone is elected townwide but there are very different areas of the town as it currently stands and so there there was a proposal I don't want to go too too wonky as we said but one of the proposals that was sort of mooted was this idea of ward government when we were thinking about one of the possible merger options was what do you think of ward government yep and I'm not saying necessarily let's do that tomorrow but being open to those kinds of things or once again we will be still a as far as Vermont goes a large and diverse town yep I hope that clears it up a little that was wordier than you wanted no it's not wordier than I wanted I hope I got it it's mostly yeah notes to be as useful as possible and as um you know that they becomes a book no one reads them but if they're so spare that there's no life in them you don't know what you're talking about that's not helpful either so thanks right yeah okay let's take a comment in the room if there are any left anyone else yes please thank you Irene runner I wanted to follow up on some of the comments that had a Davis made is this audible for people in the room yes sounds good um the select board does need to have another group of people withstanding in the room as they talk about separation agreement with the trustees as we all know the trustees are there to represent the village only they continue to represent make demands priorities and negotiate on behalf of town inside the village residents only we do need a group of five people appointed by the select board immediately to have standing at the meetings at which separation is discussed and to Joshua Knox's point just now I would welcome that what I call new town of Essex advisory committee to be made up of people from across the new town of Essex I would certainly hope we'd have a rural resident or two along with someone from a dense area such as the new town center as well as a couple of people from the suburbs select board could interview these folks and set up an ad hoc committee as it has set up many ad hoc committees before there would be no staff requirements aside from posting the agenda and posting the minutes this committee could be very self supporting as is one of the committees I'm on right now a town hall we don't have staff show up we send our own things into the IT department to post and so knowing how overworked staff is I really would hope that you would take us up on doing something like this because it would be very easy for the new town of Essex advisory committee to meet an hour or 90 minutes before a select board meeting so there's no opening up a room on a separate evening it would all just flow so here's what I've got what options could be set up for the interim phase for this representation to inform planning example an advisory committee including folks from dense areas suburbs rural etc that get at what you're talking about yes please call the new town of Essex advisory committee so we are clear that it is town outside the village only residents who are there to directly provide the other voices that have been missing for years in the room each time the trustees meet with the townwide representatives who are known as the select board members outside the village only residents as to another comment that I heard I would like the select board to remember this this is being done in back rooms the trustees for many months even before the second merger vote perhaps even before the first merger vote was meet the trustees were meeting an executive session with their attorney to talk about what would happen if merger didn't pass so there have been executive sessions upon executive sessions and I want the select board to be cognizant of that the select board itself has only recently been going into executive session about these topics I'm trying to figure out where to put that I think I think one of the things you're paying attention to is the number of meetings that happen in executive session the number of minutes maybe but I mean the meetings happen and then the executive session happens after the meetings but yeah but there's a lot of negotiation or a lot of discussion thank you discussion for happening in executive session so to say it's not happening in back rooms I think is disingenuous I also just heard a comment that it couldn't be more difficult than this and I would beg to differ if you bring in five town outside their village residents to sit in the room with trustees and the select board it will be more difficult and your outcomes will be much better because unlike the three years that merger has been discussed and the town outside the village had no standing in those rooms and in those meetings this would provide a voice to the 11,000 people who have been without that voice it will make the negotiations harder better and it will actually make an outcome that perhaps will pass a majority of voters rather than fail so my words are not going to be as passionate as yours but here's what I've got paying attention to the number of executive sessions that are happening it's confusing and tricky to follow developments may be missing input but the fact I'd like I don't know if you capture that negotiations become more comprehensive when you have half the town that has not been represented all of a sudden being represented because now you have a give and take in front of the select board rather than just half the town having their ear I'll just add a footnote and sort of attention to representation again uh yeah um okay and my final comment is just um what we're talking about now um mirrors a proposal made by a public member two years ago he suggested a plan called separate and chair it was brilliant then it's what we're doing now and all of the quote drama around merger was completely unnecessary so I would urge elected officials and staff to listen hard to what the public has to say whether it's in a forum like this or at a regular meeting or just an email that you get the public has wisdom because they're a step back from what this legboard has to process every time they go to a meeting and the public can often see a bigger picture and there can be some real brilliance there and I'm sorry that we've spent two years and a hundred thousand dollars going down a path that some folks saw a long time ago was just a repeat of past unfortunate patterns so some of that comment might not be something I can fully capture but I am trying to figure out how to take a little bit of it okay thanks this part part about you're concerned about how the discourse is happening now I'm sort of lumping it in that category and there are a couple details already about how to interact your information and how to stay engaging sort of the concern that the drama disengages you had a very specific you quoted a very specific resource and I'm happy to put a bullet here with it but I don't remember the name of it separate and share thank you separate and share dot com it's a website it's all there it's still relevant two years later okay great thanks so much I'm preparing to move on are you all set absolutely thanks yeah how about a comment online please hi I'm I'm not gonna turn on my camera because my hair still hasn't recovered from COVID it's okay but I do have a can you hear me okay yes we can sounds great okay um as as far as um someone and an earlier comment said that the rec departments have merged they have not merged they are merely co-habitating um and and there's some confusion there because I think that the uh village rec department thought they could run things and they try to um kick the Essex players out of Memorial Hall where they have been for over 50 years in order to make it a space for daycare and it would take major revisions to make it even closely suitable for daycare but in any case um and the other thing is that while IBM was paying into the village coffers for their schools the the village had the opportunity to spend money on things like sidewalk plowing and daycare and crossing guards and so they voted for all of those things and then when IBM stopped paying their taxes started going up so for a long time the village taxes were much lower than the town taxes and that all shifted when IBM pulled out of the merger so you know it it's kind of sad to see them complaining about higher taxes but they voted for all of those taxes and um so Margaret I might be missing part of the thread here what is it that um is there do you have something that you're paying attention to in the interim phase do you want to make sure I'm capturing um I equal representation is is really important okay and part of that goes to what you were just speaking about which is there's different views of sort of how decisions were made in the village or the town and what level of services um you know the different areas might make different choices about that and so it comes down to representation for you yes okay was there something else no I'm good thank you very much thank you any comments in the room who haven't who hasn't spoken yet just until I get through to everybody okay we'll take another comment then from online Georgia Levine hi can you hear me absolutely hey so I just wanted to take a quick second to reiterate what Rachel and Ray said and I think Diane said it too the thing that I'm thinking about and worried about is definitely childcare and parks and recs so I wanted to add another voice to that and then to also say that communication I feel like communications the other thing I I would like to see the select board um really work on and I feel like they overall um it's gotten a lot better but yeah I'm focused on that too and when you say communication um that you'd like select board to work on can you elaborate a little bit more on what you're are you thinking about communication to the public I am thinking about communication to the public I'm also thinking about um collaboration with the trustees and um transparency is kind of what Irene was talking about as well like there's a lot of stuff that happens in an executive session and it would be great if we could see more you know if we could see the public could see more of what's going on but mainly I was talking about um communication with the public yeah okay you might be able to see what I'm typing on this yep representing your thoughts communication with the public yep um transparency yes transparency and a lot of you also you were seconding some of these pieces up up at the top from retaining childcare and the park yeah yep anything there okay yep thanks thank you any other comments online I'm waiting for Jen to acknowledge me or do I just go ahead you can just go right ahead but thank you what would you like to say so I'm going to go along with the communication thing as well and I'm not even sure if this is even even feasible and I wasn't going to comment because Ross pretty much covered it um and Jen I believe you do negotiations between people or you're a moderator and I'm so here's my concern and one of the things that I'm the communication going out to the public is the thing that always concerns me because there are so many avenues to get information out there and anybody can put information out there I guess is my concern so the public information network out there social media so on and so forth um and I keep hearing that the list that was presented to the select board as demands and I feel like in a negotiation somebody has to go first and says well this is what we would like and then the other party has to come back and say well that's great but it really doesn't work for us but you know and then we start to find that middle ground and I keep pairing those coming up as demands and I'm not sure if if there's a way that the select board and the trustees when that information starts going out it was like oh this is a list of demands by the village that both the boards can get together for communication and say it's not a demand it's a starting point for the negotiations um so my my biggest thing and the thing that I'm following the most is uh is how to get great good proper communications out there um I think even the um the the most recent thing brought up about Memorial Hall and and um people being kicked out in child care I think that was the beginning of a negotiation where people had asked could we do this because there's a child care need and this facility might be able to do it so um I think the communications are happening but the the social media communication out there disturbs a lot of it or or sends it off track and I'm not sure if there's any way for the select board and the trustees as one unit to bring it back on track to to get that and so communications information is uh is what I'm following mostly in this okay so I'm gonna say um you're concerned with how social media networks disrupt our network disrupts accurate exchanges um you know how to and if and if there's and if there's a way to counter that properly legally counter that yeah okay I know counter is a funny word it's the best verb I can come up with right now but you're really trying to figure out how do you balance that um if there's inaccuracy out there how do you balance it with a good stream of good information that signals accurately where people are exactly yes thank you any other comments in the room who haven't spoken yet how about online they're insurmountable I'm sorry for any mispronunciation no you got that just right um so I'm just here to plus one to all of the concerns with the rec department and childcare um my family has utilized that extensively and um I guess from where I'm standing it seems like we gave up some of the things that we utilized like the why as a town and have come to rely more on EJRP to step up whether that's I'm not sure who made that decision or how it was made but I have concerns that okay well if separation happens and nobody wants to share that anymore what's what's going to be left because that's just a huge component to any type of of working family um and then I just also want to plus one on the uh comment that should separation happen um how we're still going to have all those same issues to deal with in terms of there's a rural part of the town outside of Essex and there's suburbia and a lot of the things that you know like I want my sidewalks plowed um I live in the town outside the village my kids the walking districts that the school comes up with they're seen to constantly be expanding and my kids are walking down the middle of the road and you know how do we how how's that going to work if you know those are just the kind of things that I guess I'm concerned about so you're looking that's looking at all those phases interim and transition in long term but really trying to anticipate what's the impact on services like sidewalks if separation goes through yes so Jen if I can interrupt for a second just for everybody since I was in the room not to quote a book title I was in the room with the school district when they informed us that the the YMCA because of COVID was not likely to be able to provide the child care service that they had done before okay we had no idea whether after COVID they were going to be able to do it or not EJRP a licensed child care provider was able to work with the town to accept that they have to work with the school district because nobody has the amount of space needed for the demand of childcare then during COVID all the other small not all a lot of small providers have since gone out of business so the demand for child care services has gone up not down and the space is still finite so when these things happen as your local government and the child care provider to a lot of citizens we were scrambling looking for all kinds of spaces that would work for child care being one of the number one demands or needs of the citizens especially during COVID so if the YMCA is able to come back and go back into the school system as a licensed child care provider that might be great but they haven't been able to do that yet and when we say license it's a state license and a mandate it doesn't scale up quickly but it could go the other way quickly and so those are just the things that for the people that's how that occurred it was not really the intent but again you're responsible for the result not just the intent but the YMCA said it's COVID we can't get our people doing it we're not going to go out into other facilities sorry and AJRP was the only one and a trusted source to be able to provide that service so I'm going to say just around it is related a bit Evan you're this bit about predictability and retaining child care and after school and just there are these are layers upon layers of different systems at play but to know what the predictable spaces might be for the interim transition and long-term phase helps all those partners kind of click into so I would just want to acknowledge that it's a bit few minutes past eight o'clock and I'm prepared to take the rest of the comments that are online but also for those of you who have been sitting really patiently you know stay with us if you can and I understand if you have to depart I'm going to say thank you for being here how many more comments do we have online before we wrap up just a number I'm looking for so show of hands to why don't we take those two comments and then we'll go to the close who's up Emily hi yes thank you I just want to say that what I'm thinking about now in the interim is the culture of our community a lot of the folks have already said things that are important to me child care things like that but as I was imploring my children to go to bed so I can speak at this meeting I had to explain to my yeah I had to explain to my seven-year-old what it was about and he really couldn't understand why separation is a thing and it really broke my heart I think that this conversation has gone on for so long and it's become basically tribal rural versus suburban versus urban which is really not urban compared to much of the our country and it's just really sad that personalities have taken over and that we can't focus on why we have governments and it's to meet everybody's needs whether it be families with young children seniors on on a fixed income people living in rural areas and I really hope during this interim period that we can think about the culture in our ethics of taking care of every single person in this community and you know I I definitely voted for merger I think it was what was in the best interest of everyone we are at a place where I completely understand and value why the village wants to separate and if we can do this thinking about what's culturally best for everybody what what our values are what our ethics are and really just remember that the purpose of governments isn't to fight about who gets represented the most because if we do that no one gets represented so thank you for the opportunity to speak thank you Emily here's what I have from that piece is the culture how do we take care of every single person in this community during the interim and beyond and what are our collective values and ethics thank you very much I appreciate it that's exactly what I wanted to say great thank you I'm gonna take a minute just to finish this phrase how does our government reflect our community and vice versa and I think we have one more comment online I see Mike Sullivan I also see somebody on a phone with their microphone unmuted so maybe we can jump to the phone before we forget them just in case sure the phone participant give the last four digits five four zero five zero eight zero hi I thought I am muted on my end thank you so is that a signal would you like to speak or are you all set no I'm sorry I'm just listening at this point thank you so we have one more online comment then Mike Sullivan yeah hi Greg thank you first I want to say thank you to the moderator she's awesome and I also want to tell Evan that he should always be in the room regardless and I only want to just add my comment to Harlan's communication from the select board to the trustees is the most important thing in my list right now thank you Mike people are going to start believing that I'm tipping you so I'm gonna just add communication between well well what you are communication between the boards is the most important thing right now and even if it's not the specifics you're looking for signals that's taking place are you all set that's perfect thank you okay have we gotten I am going to hear from everybody who had a comment to share tonight have you gotten to speak yet no oh please well I added some words for some people who are speaking okay this will be our this will be our last comment of the evening no pressure when I looked at some of the requests we'll call them from the trustees I thought they looked like demands so they might want to be careful about who they have word their recommendations to the thing that really isn't I don't think related to this but one of the things that most upset me in some of the results some of the plans that had come forward was that the recommended organization for governance particularly in planning and zoning as it was presented ultimately was very different from what the focus group had come up with with and I think you need to take a look at that so this is a specific issue I don't know if you can help it was it had more to do with the emerged community but it was very different from what we had come up with so what you're paying attention to is how various plans reflect whatever kind of input they get from yes groups or community groups I'm going to put that under where should I put that paying attention to I'm just going to add it here I don't know where it's going to go but it's unique enough that I just and I also saw the separate but share recommendations and thought they actually looked rather good thank you I am making this a little bit more general I hope I have I hope this still represents what you were the kernel of what you were saying that you're paying attention to how the both boards select board take into account and reflect input from focus groups and the community and that's sort of a perennial paying attention of just wanting to see that respected and taken into account consideration okay and that is down here already some I have and some I've tried to go back and add to and elaborate so I'm going to just say to add to this one take a second look at these recommendations might be third fourth it probably it's not fair to put a number on it but for shorthand and at this minute of the evening that's probably the best I can do okay so for closing comments I just want to talk about next steps and then we'll we'll adjourn I do I will be taking these notes we'll have one more one more meeting it's fully online Friday it's going to take the same format so all of you who are here you're welcome to attend if I see you or recognize your name in that list my I'm still going to be giving precedence to folks who haven't been able to speak yet for those who weren't here tonight but essentially you can assume that it's going to be the same kind of content and I'm going to be adding to this list combining them and then passing them over to the select board by the end of the day on Friday I don't know when they're going to be able to digest it and look at it however then there will be one more forum two weeks from now I suspect it will have a very similar tone but there might be different kinds of questions because two weeks have passed and you will have already banked a certain amount of perspective from these two forums anything that you want to add Greg or Evan I just thank thank you everybody for for coming out here tonight for joining us online like Jen said the next forum is going to be Friday afternoon it's going to be at noon entirely online if you want to find the link to it it's going to be at Microsoft Teams again if you go to the town web page website we have a link up there and some information about the forums the address is www.ethicsvt.org backslash public forums all one word there's information there feel free to email me if you have any questions and once again thank you for coming out we hope to hear from more people on Friday hey thank you all have a good evening have a good night everybody thank you for attending and all your comments