 forward with the first select board meeting of May open the meeting of May 3rd 2021 like always the first thing we have to do is approve the agenda is there any changes from anybody I do have not a change of the agenda but something to add into the parking lot kind of for next meeting about parking down on Blush Hill down by the boat access if we could add that probably we're not ready for a discussion today early keeping track of everybody that's coming on so with that add-on for the future agenda I'd take a motion to approve the agenda I make a motion to approve the agenda as presented second hey is there any further discussion being none all those in favor say aye I I consent agenda items just the minutes from April 19th meeting and April 26th meeting a motion to approve the consent agenda so move second all right any further discussion all those wish to say aye hi hi hi yes can we find out who has dialed in 802 798 9289 for the record yep can you confirm yourself please there 802 798 9289 you let us know who you are please this is a marion there you go what's that mit maroni maroni here okay thanks maroni all right we're at 703 or close to it I'm for public comment if there is any this time Caitlin and then Aaron thank you good evening my name is Caitlin Hollister and this is my daughter my name is Suzanne and we live here in Waterbury Village we are here to say thank you to the Waterbury Recreation Department for the wonderful programs they have offered this year two members of our family have been to both rec Academy and rec camp the Academy on Wednesdays when school is remote and the camp during vacation weeks in February and April when I asked my kids what they liked most about rec Susanna said counselors and a nine-year-old brother Jake I'm sick don't watch well school can't do it all we have needed other community organizations organizations to step up during the pandemic during this very challenge challenging year challenging year we are especially grateful for what our town has provided at such low cost to fill in the gaps once those have been closed creativity plus energy and Nick NATO NATO and his team have allowed allowed our kids to have terrific social athletic opportunities and a welcome break from some intense I wanted to recognize family know them here them here Nick Katie Dan and area and thank you the select board and Bill Sheplok town manager town manager supporting these programs plus for providing an essential service to families this year thank you I hope that came through big thanks to waterbury rec and all of you for making it possible excellent job excellent I think we have a future select board member in our hands excellent job and thank you all thank you very much it's nice to hear from our young people yep and our rec program certainly has been a savior for our town during this last rough year and I know my grandson appreciates it as well so I did owe that comment okay Aaron you're up next thank you great reading Susanna I'm here as a representative of the Waterbury area anti-racism coalition and a member of their steering team and I'm here to read a position statement that we drafted the steering team drafted with help from the education team and we brought to the greater coalition in our monthly April meeting to give feedback on so this is a work position statement from the coalition it's regarding the recent select board appointment of Chris Viennes as vice chair this was emailed to all of the select board members and we were very pleased to have a lot of productive conversations last week with those of you who took us up on the offer so this is the statement the Waterbury area anti-racism coalition also known as Wark calls for Chris Viennes to step down or be removed by vote from the position of Waterbury select board vice chair Mr. Viennes has made racist public statements on numerous occasions in the last year and has not made sufficient efforts to acknowledge or apologize elevating him to chair just a few months after he resigned as chair due to the public pressure related to his racial statements sends a message to our community that the select board does not prioritize anti-racism and equity in light of comments during that April 19th select board meeting as well as other correspondences and conversations with board members Wark is withdrawing our previous request that members respond to specific questions that detailed their thinking behind the decision to appoint Mr. Viennes as vice chair we continue to encourage transparent decision making and public accountability and we acknowledge and appreciate the feedback that we received from the select board from this point forward Wark intends to focus on big picture policies and systems with position statements and formal letters as our primary means of formal formal organizational communication with the Waterbury select board. In addition to formal communications our members look forward to continuing collaborative to collaborate and provide community informed perspectives through other means as appropriate or requested. We continue to appreciate that the select board has made a public commitment to anti-racism through actions such as the Black Lives Matter banner and the declaration of inclusion. We're encouraged by the future prospect of ongoing equity and anti-racism learning for the select board and town employees. One of Wark's core beliefs is that every person and organization can grow through continuous learning, unlearning and reflection. While wait supremacy is pervasive is a pervasive system in our country and community nobody is inherent inherently or permanently racist or anti-racist. By continuing to do better as individuals while learning together in community we can be more anti-racist more of the time and transform transform systems to create a community where every person can be their whole human self in all spaces. Thank you. Thank you Erin. Is there anybody else that wishes to speak to that topic? I do. Go ahead. The other Erin also a member of Wark and I just wanted to reiterate that this was coming from the entirety of the Wark community and our membership and we certainly understand that everyone has an education path to follow. We're certainly here to help guide and support that but we share a goal with the select board to create an open welcoming and supportive community throughout Waterbury and I appreciate the select board's time and attention to supporting those goals. Okay. Anybody else? Sure, I'll speak. Jessica? Who's speaking? Am I speaking? Yep. Jessica, go ahead. Hey, thank you. Well, my name is Jess. I am a voting member of this community and first of all I'd like to thank all of you for the work that you do in this community. It's not lost on me that you all have other very much time consuming obligations outside of also taking care of the business of this town. So I really thank you for what what you do. I'm here tonight for a couple reasons. The first is that I'm concerned with your appointment of Chris Vance to a position of leadership on the board when it is not apparent members of this community that has made the effort in the work on racism. Oh, I just got, oh, what the heck here? Hello? Yeah, what happened here? Did I disappear? No, we just got a screenshot of something here. And I've worked with him that he is a good person, a hard worker and a really and very good at his job. Can we wait now for a second, please? Yeah. Okay, sorry about that. Are you good? Yeah. I'm sure that those of you who decided again to put him in a leadership position on the select board have your reasons and they are rooted in what you see as beneficial for this community. However, putting Chris back in the position of leadership on the board is really concerning when he hasn't yet done the work you said he would do around racism. In listening to the April 19th meeting is very clear that Chris does not see the problem with his words and actions and does not consider them racist. This does not surprise me, nor does it surprise me that some of you don't understand the impact of again Chris in a position of leadership on the select board. It doesn't surprise me because though some of us are further along the path than others, most of us don't recognize our own inherent racism, regardless of our best intentions. I've been working on this issue for more than 30 years and I still get it wrong. It's complicated, difficult work. I think it helps understand that being called out and being asked to work on inherent systemic racism does not make you a bad person. In fact, as pointed out by the writer Robin D'Angelo and White Fragility, it is this good bad binary that gets in the way of doing the real work around racism. In other words, if we have this story in our heads that says racist are bad people who wear white hoods, I am a good person who would never wear a white hood. It follows that I cannot be a racist. This is problematic. Good people have inherent racism because it is part of our culture. It is in the air we breathe. It is therefore good people who need to do the work necessary around racism to better themselves and their communities. Being asked to do anti-racism training is not a punishment. It is an opportunity. I work in the healthcare field. When asked to do trainings for my job, I am not insulted because I know that those trainings will make me better at what I do. This community is asking that Chris and the rest of the board undergo training around racism. We're asking you make yourselves better at what you do. And because of the very public comments made specifically by Chris, we are asking that he not be placed in a position of leadership because of the message it sends to this community. Those of you who want Chris to be in a position of leadership are doing so because of the skill set you say he brings to the job. Those of us in the community see this as you completely discounting the importance of addressing racism in a real and truthful way. The second reason I'm here is that I listened to the meeting from April 19 and was pretty taken aback by the statements that work and some of the people in the community were bulldozing the select board by bringing this issue to the forefront because the select board is elected to conduct the business of the town and shouldn't be dealing with such issues in a meeting because it had more important things to do. It was also alluded to that the people who spoke up at that meeting and those that are speaking up in the community are being uncivil. I would like to point out that this wouldn't be an issue if if the select board and members of the select board had not created it. We lost her there somehow. Okay. And on point and bringing it up for discussion. The discussion was uncomfortable. Yes. Because discussions around racism are uncomfortable. But uncomfortable does not equate uncivil. I'll end with that. Jessica. My turn. Hello. Yeah, Tom. Can I say something? Sure. Go ahead. This is unscripted and I haven't thought this out. But I just wanted to thank the select board for the efforts of the past year in one of the most divisive years that I've known in my 62 years, both nationally and locally. And that's 35 years locally. I think overall, we all feel a bit better about coming out on the other side. And I think we've all learned a lot, not that there's not more to learn. But hopefully everybody can do everything a little bit better. If we survived the past year and this town came back from the flood, I think, you know, there's there's unlimited potential here. There is an event along the same lines that I think, and I notified the select board about it. I think I asked the select board to just review and research and do some consideration. And that is, there's the sap bucket open coming to Waterbury the first weekend of June. And one of the sponsors is Innova Disc Golf. And Innova Disc Golf has sponsored a disc professional disc player by the name of Josh Anton. And he wears a white pride tattoo. And if you Google white pride, you'll there's quite a bit written about it. And there's quite a bit of controversy with Innova supporting him and being one of his sponsors. And I wonder if our town, especially given the work of work and the issues, the current issues at hand, I don't I just question if people are aware of this. And I hope that people will enlighten themselves that we have invited Innova to set up their tent, while every sale of their collector item special disc of Josh Anthons puts money directly into his bank account. And I just wanted to bring that forward and just share that with everyone. Thanks, Tom, for that information. Anybody else like to speak, please? Can I speak? Sure. Go ahead, Maroney. Um, I just want to say that Tom nation work. Um, I just don't want anybody to use work to push their own agenda of wanting to shut down the golf course. So work role is not to go after Innova. So we're not interested in that. Thank you, Tom. Okay. Anyone else, please? Yes, I would like like to speak, please. Okay, you get some feedback there. Yeah, let me see if I can fix that. Okay. My apologies. Hopefully that's better. It is. Okay. Um, yeah, I just I wanted to have a reflection on just things that were said at the last meeting and I just I wanted to share a couple of thoughts, you know, I've heard, and by the way, I'm speaking as an individual person. I am not speaking on behalf of work. I'm speaking. I wanted to echo the things that just said about, you know, getting stuck on this whole concept of like, I'm not a racist. Dr. Kendi, who is the founder of the anti-racist research and policy center at American and is the director of the anti-racist research at Institute at Boston and just one of the foremost subject matter experts, not to mention has his own lived experience around this says racist and anti-racist are like peelable name tags that are placed and replaced based on what someone is doing or not doing, supporting or expressing in each moment. And Ijeoma Olu who I whose book I recommended to the board at the last regular meeting also talks about this, you've been racist and you have been anti-racist. Yes, you may now be insisting that you don't have a racist boat in your body, but that's simply not true. The racism required to uphold the white supremacy that is woven into every area of our lives. There's no it's everywhere. There's no way that you can inherit white privilege from birth. Learn racist white supremacist history in school consume racist and white supremacist movies and films work in a racist and white supremacist workforce and vote for racist and white supremacist governments and not be racist. This does not mean you have hate in your heart. You may intend to treat everyone equally. My hope, my sincere hope is that we can move past debating whether we are racist or not racist. Admit that that is in the air we breathe and instead focus on doing the work because debating that is one of the many ways that we as white folk avoid the real work of actually naming and dismantling racism. And in addition to echo what Jess said is that, you know, accusing folks, the folks who are asking for accountability for when racism happens, which by the way is how you dismantle racism, you name it and you ask for repair to be done. And the status quo is how you maintain racism. So when folks are accused of being bullies and bulldozing for the simple fact of naming and asking that the harm be repaired when it's caused, that in itself is upholding racism and that in itself is communicating that you're that we value our own white comfort over the lives of black and brown people. Thank you for listening. Thank you. Okay, unless there's anybody else that hasn't spoken yet. Oh, and I too asked that Chris step down as vice chair. That point's been made clear and I'm sure the board will take it under consideration. If there hasn't been anybody else that has spoke yet, would like to chime in now. If not, I think we should move on to a FLEC board business and appreciate everybody's comment. Okay, so that's what we'll do. We'll move on to the FLEC board business and the first agenda item is to welcome back an old friend, Ms. Jane Brown and talk to her about joining the recreation committee. How are you doing tonight? Jane, you're on mute. Yeah, I think she knows that. It took me a minute to get to the button. Yes, I'd like to join the Waterbury Recreation Committee. There's an opening. There's been an opening for a few months, I think. I've been attending meetings since November and I decided that maybe it was time to just jump in. I've been attending meetings because there were some issues that came to light about Hope Davy Park, which is just around the corner for me. So it's a discussion about the trails over there and the disc golf course and how to balance the use and look at impacts on natural resources. That kind of thing, which I have experience with professionally. In the big picture, I am a big supporter of our town recreation program. When I was on the select board, it was really enlightening and encouraging to see how the program grew and became better and better managed so that it was actually able to pay for itself and some creative ways to find some revenues and also to serve the town. I think the programs, I couldn't do a better job than your first public speaker tonight. It's such a nice job of commending the program and explaining what those experiences have meant to kids. I think we have a great community and recreation is really such a big part of our community of living in our community and the quality of life. I think the recreation program does a great job with all the organized recreation. I'd like to be on the recreation committee to help with decision making and stewarding these resources, I guess, to some extent. I have some background in the past of recreation design and some recreation planning, site planning. I think I have some skills that could be useful. My own daughter grew up in town and took advantage of town recreation facilities as well. As a parent and a family member, I'm very aware of them from that level as well. I would ask for your support in being on the recreation committee. Thank you, Jane. Any of the other board members have a question for Jane or comment? I have a comment. I've served with Jane on both the conservation commission and the select board and I think she would be an excellent member of the rec committee and I think they would be lucky to have her. No questions for you, Jane. I think I know you. I think I know you enough. Thank you very much, Mike. Appreciate it. Anybody else? I see Bill Mentor joined us. He's a bad join. Yeah, you have anything to say, Bill? You're still welcome a new rec member. Can you hear me? Yeah, I can hear you now. Yeah, happy to welcome a new rec member and just jumped in to observe the process and curious to learn about the process of choosing new rec members. Thank you. Any other board member comments? Well, if not, then it looks like Jane you'll be stepping into a three-year term and April 30th 2024 and if somebody would like to make a motion to put her in that position feel free. I make a motion to appoint Jane Brown to the Recreation Committee. Is that a second, Katie? Okay. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those who wish to approve her volunteerism say hi. Hi. Hi. Thank you, Jane, for coming forward. Well, thank you. I appreciate it and maybe we'll be talking about some issues soon. Thank you very much. Thank you. Okay, the Rotary Club's up next. Not quite independent day fireworks discussion. That be you, Harry and company? It's myself, Dan McKibben as president and Harry Shepard as our fireworks. All right, Dan. Welcome. Can you hear me okay? Yeah. So the Rotary Club once again is hoping to run NQID this year. We recognize how important it is for our community and this year it can be a element of our return to normal as well as a recognizing the end of the Main Street construction project. We believe to have a normal NQID it minimally needs a concert and fireworks and we've been paying very close attention to the state's guidelines following week by week how they've changed and the road back to reopening. We're pretty confident we can run a safe concert, a safe drive-in fireworks event and the sticking point for us is the step three limit of 900 unvaccinated persons at the parade and we've been evaluating our options for that. We believe other than that limit we would run the event the same way whether it's on the current planned date of June 26th or after July 4th when we go from stage three to stage four where there's no required attendance cap but universal guidance is still recommended. So the Rotary NQID committee has met and evaluated our options. We considered descoping the event. We just get considered postponing the event and what we're recommending is moving the parade the fireworks and the concert to July 10th. Now we are going to keep the event smaller than usual. We're not going to have the road races typically runs before it. We're not going to have kids events. We're not going to promote the event broadly outside of town. We also believe that holding it after July 4th may keep the attendance numbers down which in this year is a desirable thing. So we have drafted a safety plan for how to run the parade how we're going to you know primarily encourage social distancing. If you pay attention to the state's guidance it's you know the messaging is that it's built upon all we've learned as a state and personal responsibility and event organizers are not required to dictate where people stand where they space out but to allow people enough space to find the distances they're comfortable with and our parade plan is essentially highly encourage people to spread out along the whole distance of Main Street and we you know if people do that and we discourage crowding particularly in Stowe Street we can have a very safe event. The reason we're coming to the select board at this point is that the select board in the town have the contract for the fireworks and in order for us to change the date from June 26th to July 10th we want to get the select board's approval as well as answer any questions or you know regarding the overall event we will be coming back to the select board for a specific event permit for this. Perry is there anything you want to add before we open it up for questions. The only thing I would add Dan is that I did have some conversations with Tommy with North Star and although he he desires to do it on the June 26th date it's kind of a a warm-up event for him and his crews for the 4th of July weekend typically the following week. He's understanding and agreeable and they can accommodate the notion of moving it to the July the 10th date and they're willing to do that if the town is agreeable to it also. So just just to bring everyone up to speed the town has been paying for the fireworks for almost as long as NQID has existed and we paid North Star a year ago in in January typically if we pay by the end of January they give us they give us a bonus if you will so we get 10% more fireworks than we would get if we paid after January. I don't know how we measure that 10% but that's what they say I believe them so we typically paid in January every year excuse me and we paid in 2020 and then COVID happened and I worked with Tommy and DJ at North Star and like many businesses they were they were kind of taking it on the chin so they agreed that they asked if if we could just leave the money on deposit with them as opposed to making us pay it back so we agreed to do that they've had our money since last January of 2020 so we did not have to put it in the budget this year. I have no issue with moving it to the 10th of July I think that the likelihood that the state's protocols for COVID will if anything be more relaxed after the 1st of July then or after the 4th of July than they are before the governor has been consistently stating that he hopes to return to more normal by July 4th. I think the general protocols that Dan talked about will continue for many months beyond July even but there's no issue from staff's perspective it's another 10 days out it should ensure that all of the Main Street reconstruction work that's going to be done this year is done the only thing that should be left is removing of the overhead power lines on that section of Main Street where they're supposed to come down and that will be happening in ribs and grabs for the next year or so so in many respects it will be a little bit easier to have it after the after the 4th but as Dan said I asked Dan and Harry to make sure that it was okay with North Star because we have a contract with them that that says June 26th and the last that I heard from them was that they preferred the 26th and as Harry indicated now they seem to be willing if not eager to go to the 10th of July so staff has no issue with that and I'm sure we can take Harry's word that at North Star has said this is okay. Comments from the board? Mike? Just a brief comment and it's more of a generic it's not kind of almost aimed at this I know you're probably moving the date from the June date to after July 4th because of you know universal guidance kind of kicks in and we don't have there's no 900 person you know limits who folks who are unvaccinated if we don't have universal if we're not in universal guidance and we're still in that 900 person and this is a question I have for almost every large event how are people going to determine if if people are vaccinated or not I know that's the million dollar question throughout Vermont do you guys have any plan? Do you want me to answer for the rotary or do you want to answer it generally? Well for the for the rotary for this particular event I'm curious to see how you how your guys thought because this is kind of perplexing me where I don't know people you know you know their vaccination card something on their phone you know who's to say you know you look at someone someone shows you a phone with a vaccination card you're not going to double check their name so it's just it's just something that it it's troublesome I think yeah so we that was the main decision factor for us to get out and to move the event out of phase three because we don't want to be in the position of having to check that we know we can control the number of people coming into Rusty Park or Park if we needed to and check IDs we don't want to be in the position of but we know we can control that environment we could probably control drive-in fireworks at the state office complex but trying to control Main Street it's impossible so I mean to literally control who's coming and going and you know we tried to model out you know by by June 1st we're going to be 60% vaccinated you know one shot by the end of the month you know way more than that right so if you if you try and estimate you know you could probably have 3000 people there and hit 900 on vaccine it'll be you know clear on 900 but we don't want to be in position of checking that so so that's for our rationale thanks Edie this is like a general question to the board so if we do have people coming from other towns for like the parade in the fireworks should we put out another broad statement that the town of Waterbury basically expects people to be wearing masks at all times like should we reiterate that somehow so it's it's known for everybody who's coming like enjoy it have fun like visit our restaurants but please be safe and wear your mask and what not should we do something like that I don't think it would hurt we haven't uh did away with our mask mandate as of yet so I don't see why we wouldn't just I think it's just an advisable thing some people I know get very frustrated about mask wearing but boy it just seems to just make some common sense you know especially if you're in tight quarters and you'll have those people that refuse to wear one anyway and others that don't want to wear one just won't show up at the event right anything else okay let me like to make a motion to allow the rotary club to move the uh not quite independent date fireworks date from June 26th to July 10th so moved right second it second it hey Danny any further comments all right those who in favor of improving approving the motion please say aye hi hi hey oh are we gonna move next year back to our normal date which is even not that normal thanks Dan uh for for coming in front of the board and uh which all of the success in the world um I hope it plays out good for you thank you and we're very much looking forward to it Harry okay uh next on the agenda beef keepers race October 3rd 2021 and who would like to kick off that conversation think I can okay will robins who's been the race director for the past several years sent me that packet of information back in January that I sent to you Friday on the race safety rules and routes and the like and I think it's basically the exact same route has been for the last few years so he's just hoping that the board will approve that date of October 3rd okay sounds like a pretty easy ask um I may like to make a motion to that authorize the leaf peepers race for October 3rd 2021 I'll move to authorize the leaf peepers race for October 3rd 2021 is there a second second any further discussion all righty let's take a vote who's in favor say aye aye thank you Carla oh schedule meeting with the conservation commission I think I can do that one too uh Tracy Sweeney who's a member of the conservation commission emailed me and Bill I think back in maybe February and asked at some time in April or May that the select board meet with the conservation commission so that they can do a presentation on their work with um shoot spell wildlife quarter maybe like that 15 minute presentation with time for the board to ask questions I think they're going to be the same with maybe the planning commission or the BRB any comments from the board so I guess we should set a date so that I can get the word out to the conservation commission yeah you're you're well placed for that decision Carla what's that Danny I was just curious if they had proposed dates or if we just or if you Carla you have some things pretty general we could put it on the next agenda I think you should propose the dates not them right make it work for you I'd say the next meeting in May or the first meeting in June they were hoping for April or May well the only reason I suggested that it might you might have a better aim at that Carla is I don't know if you have more information or Bill does as to what we got coming up in front of us next couple of meetings I don't have one thing so far for May 17th and nothing on the June the June 7th agenda yeah at this point it's pretty open so it's one of the board members want to make a date we'll pencil it in well if they'd hoped for April or May then I think we can go ahead and honor that and put it on the May 17th agenda there you go and I'd be curious to know if they have information that they'd want to send to us ahead of time or an agenda that might be nice to be able to look over some suggested topics that they have on their mind would be really helpful so we can maybe give it some forethought mm-hmm I'll let them know all right there's no no motion for that then and we'll jump down to Bill's worksheet thing on the manager's items is consider a purchase of a loader yep hang on one second so I can't remember if I sent the email that Celia sent to me to you I know I didn't send it just today with the paving stuff but to refresh your memory one of our bucket loaders is scheduled to be traded out this year in the I mean in the highway vehicle cip fund we have a hundred and fifty dollars hundred and fifty thousand dollars budgeted for it we have looked and got prices from three different dealers we looked at John Deere we looked at Volvo and for the first time in a long time we looked at case the price for the Volvo with the trade is the best price one fifteen nine hundred one hundred and fifteen thousand nine hundred dollars that's a price for the new machine of one sixty three nine hundred and forty eight thousand dollar trade in the the case was a close second hundred and sixty seven thousand two hundred for the new machine and fifty thousand dollar trade in so that was one seventeen two hundred met and then the John Deere was one seventy three five hundred and the trade was forty five thousand so that was one twenty eight five hundred I'm going to recommend the Volvo after talking with Celia we have had Volvos and John Deere in the recent past but I think the price of the Volvo is significantly better than the Deere price doesn't seem that there's a huge difference in the performance of the vehicles so my recommendation that the Woodruff and Celia agreed to was to take the price from the Volvo so if you have questions I really can't answer a lot of questions about bucket loaders I've driven one one time and put up sand one time thirty five years ago when I was in island pond so hey Chris and your business do you have experience with Volvo equipment you know I've looked at Volvo excavators in the past and you know I know their loaders are from what I understand are excellent loaders I mean I gotta my triaxial is a Volvo you know same family different you know different item basically and you know I love my Volvo truck Volvo is a quality certainly a quality manufacturer for whatever reason I didn't feel that their excavators were quite same quality as the cat of course they're all kind of declining in quality these days some degree and then the emissions issues are tend to be a lot more troublesome but you know that's that's where we're headed oh I don't have any I don't have any issues with a Volvo loader and we've had good success with our Volvo and you know we've got the deal is fine too but I think given the price differential the case is kind of it's unknown there I mean case was a brand name that was around in heavy equipment from municipalities big time way back when I first started but they kind of I think moved away from the municipal market at least around here and they're trying to get back in but I think that the Bill and Celia feel more comfortable with the Volvo since we've had one and have liked it so it's the cheapest I think just based on that given that there's no definitive reason to take anything that's a higher price we should go with the Volvo I'm curious about um oh sorry Kate you're good you're good you can go I was just curious about um a warranty on the vehicle or the equipment um and and or service contract and if they differed between the two companies yeah we I don't have I don't have that information right in front of me Danny we do always buy these products always come with uh with a good warranty that's part of the um part of the price that we ask for we typically don't pay for service contracts we we just buy the equipment with the with the factory warranty um we get at least a five-year warranty on it so but service contracts we we typically don't do that you're getting a five-year contract I'm feeling slighted here most I can ever get out of them is a year I can check I mean you don't have to make the decision right now but I thought we had a five-year warranty how does purchase versus lease in equipment like this what purchasing versus leasing equipment I know more and more company at least in the commercial world they go in a leasing equipment versus purchase I think that we we haven't we haven't leased any any equipment the village leased the police cruiser one time one you know several years ago um the lease arrangements I haven't found to be any any less expensive you you pay for it over time as opposed to all up front and there's always a little bit of charge in there we haven't really looked into it a lot Mike I was just saying there's always an expectation I think with leasing that the machine is going to be in a certain condition when you when the lease is up and then you have an argument maybe that oh it's it's got too much time on the clock or too much this or that it hasn't been difficult for us we haven't really had to you know borrow money to buy these pieces of equipment for a long time now so owning it's the way that we've gone thanks the one advantage to leasing that I know of is that you don't have to get more approval to lease a piece of equipment the select board can make that decision to do it on its own because you're not buying anything but I don't think it makes any big sense at this point in time so that's good I just had to ask the question yeah Eddie yeah Danny kind of had my question I was wondering about what the warranty was and what the projected life expectancy usually is life expectancy we we anticipate 15 years for loaders typically yeah Mike Mike and Lou the uh fact that we you know our loaders would typically see more salt than than privately owned loaders would I think that might have impact on the lease issue contract that's a good point uh pretty go there yeah do we need a motion for that bill what's the warranty on the loader your point about the service Danny Volvo has a pretty good service this excuse me this the standard warranty is three years and that price includes an extension for two more so it's five years yeah Volvo has a pretty good support system when it comes to service okay uh so do we need a I asked if we need a motion bill I would ask you to make a motion please and is is it a 2021 or what is it well if that if that doesn't that doesn't have to be in the motion 21 or 22 I'm not sure which they like to make a motion to authorize the town to buy a Volvo motor I make a motion to approve uh that the town of Waterbury purchase a Volvo loader uh from town resources your second okay the other discussion questions parallel add that add into that for a net price not to exceed what is why don't you just say a net price not to exceed 117 that will give us leeway if there's any piece of equipment that it's a friend that's a friendly amendment who's second to that 80 second and again just to make sure second again any further discussion bill has to spend a half day on the loader learning how to use all right all those in favor of Matt say hi hi hi okay the big ticket item 2021 even plan what do we got okay um I sent you all a memo this afternoon I apologize it was just this afternoon I wonder if has been very busy with the main street project and then he wasn't here Friday afternoon I I had asked him last week and he got the information to me today so did any of you not get the memo I can share my screen if you want to see it yeah I was in Duxbury and completely out of cell service and yeah I just didn't have time to even get to it apologize right in front of me all right so there it is on the screen because so um I'll just take a brief minute to summarize it we talked about this a little bit at the last meeting in the pating cip the the hoped for projects were going to be Stow Street and Norths North Street and Swayze court 305,000 for Stow Street and 100,000 for North Street and Swayze court so we budgeted $405,000 this year the 405,000 however was hoping to be offset with a grant of 175,000 for the class 2 paving grant right there in the top paragraph this is what we talked about last week that excuse me Phil yeah can you on the screen share for a second so that I can let Katie back in please please use your phone okay good to go thank you so anyway we have applied for the paving grant but we have not heard yet and won't likely here until late this month at the earliest and maybe not until July about the paving grant and bill Woodruff was concerned that given the springs that are attached to the paving grant mostly the fact that we have to competitively bid the project that schedules of the pavers were getting kind of clogged up and we wouldn't be able to get to Stow Street until the fall and he thought it was not such a great idea to be paving Stow Street while school was in session because you disrupt all the school buses that have to go there so we talked about that at the last meeting the board agreed that we'll put that off the hope is we'll get the 175,000 grant awarded to us this year we have 30 months to spend that so if we get the grant we'll do Stow Street's project next year so our fallback and I wrote about it in my managers report and we talked about it the budget meeting was that if we didn't do Stow Street we would try to do Blush Hill Road so this next section here in black with yellow is from Woody and then what I've written in blue is kind of my memos about it so I'll cut to the chase basically to the end my recommendation and Woody's recommendation is that we pay Blush Hill from Kimberly Lane which is right where the class two project ended a couple of years ago we'll reclaim from Kimberly Lane all the way up to Misty Hollow and then go to the end so we'll reclaim the whole road we'll repave from Kimberly Lane to Misty Hollow because we've got that culvert that's in the dip there just beyond Wilson Trail that's a big culvert we're going to need a hydraulic study on that and we won't be able to get that culvert installed this year there's no way we can do it even logistically never mind we didn't budget for it so reclaim all of Blush Hill and then repave it from Kimberly Lane to Misty Hollow which means we'll leave Blush Hill gravel from Misty Hollow to where the gravel ends now and have a gravel road for another year and then we would repave lonesome trail the the paved part and then we would also the 1,250 feet of lonesome trail that is now not paved so if we do all that here's the cost summary for all of what I just talked about $225,000 to do the reclamation on Blush Hill and paved from Kimberly Lane to Misty Hollow 10,600 would would be reclamation part from from Misty Hollow to the end of the pavement so that together would be about $235 or so and then paving lonesome trail which we won't reclaim we'll just put a one and a half inch of top course on what's there probably shim it as well that's $2,250 and then to do the work to shape up the the gravel portion of the road and then replace the culvert and do some ditch work and then put four inches of asphalt in two lifts on on that area on that gravel road so if we do that we're going to up here in this where I've got the red so this is what I just added up there is $325,000 and on its face that's uh $80,000 less than the 405 we budgeted so from a budget standpoint from a spending stand standpoint we we can do it um but as I mentioned the the budget that we put together included $175,000 grant so we were anticipating that our revenue going into the paving fund would exceed our expenses by $42,150 but if we do this $325,000 worth of work and we don't have a grant to help pay for any of it we'll really have a deficit of this year for $52,855 and the difference you got to add the $42,145 to that so it's a it's a $95,000 swing against the fund balance now normally I would be concerned about that we have a small deficit right now going into the year in fund 70 the paving fund the deficit going into the year was $232,000 and if we did as budgeted we would actually have $42,000 one-year revenue and excessive expenses so our deficit would drop $260,000 we'll still have a deficit that will be in the $200,000 range after this year if we do that but personally I'm not concerned about it for two reasons one as I've told you many times before we have five or six capital funds if you include the highway under the fire station garage the fire station cip we have six and some of them are underwater and some of them are above water and we kind of budget it so we show them all what we're doing but we kind of use it as one fund so this will not put us in a significant deficit situation at all secondly we're going to I hope get the paving grant next year so next year's budget will uh all things being equal be able to you know wash this year's deficit away and then the third thing the third reason I don't worry about it too much is that um um you know it looks pretty likely that there will be money coming to the town from the American Recovery Act and specifically money that we're being asked to use for infrastructure projects so I think we will be able to actually at the end of the year uh maybe sort out this deficit with some of that American Recovery Act money and then the last thing is that I mentioned in here somewhere I can't remember where it is here it is um we were very conservative with our estimate of pilot payment this year we only have 20 000 dollars being shown going into our budget from pilot into the paving cip we don't have any information right now to suggest that it's going to be more than 20 000 dollars but we made a big step to be very conservative on the budgeting side and if we are lucky we'll get more more pilot money than we budgeted because we were such conservative so conservative on the budget uh that I don't think we can get less than that we budgeted and and there's some likelihood that it will be a little bit more so for all those reasons I would I would do what I suggested uh do the whole reclamation of Blush Hill uh repave Blush Hill from Kimberly Lane to Misty Hollow repave uh all of the paved portion of Lonesome Trail and then paid the unpaid portion of Lonesome Trail now one thing on that before I close we're not in the habit any longer of paving gravel roads there are people who ask all the time can't you pave you know Perry Hill can't you pave Ripley Road can't you pave more on uh Shaw mansion we've typically not done any paving of uh of gravel roads since we paved the hill on Blush Hill uh probably 20 years ago now um the second hill on Blush Hill up up to the top near where normal McLeod lives we stopped just short of the McLeod house um I think it makes sense to pave this portion of gravel road it's 1260 feet it's uh it's on a hill the it's a difficult place to keep graded up properly uh it's very prone to washouts uh it's hard to keep the washboards out of that road there's a lot more traffic going up there than there than there was when I first moved here because Clinical Ridge has pretty much been built out um not having to send the grader up there um it would be helpful it's not that the grader won't have to go up Blush Hill because we've got to grade the backside of Blush Hill anyway so the grader would be going up Blush Hill but not having to grade that portion would be helpful and frankly the $66,000 that it costs to pave it if we have one significant washout we'll save that $66,000 the first time so with that long explanation I'll stop talking. Bill I'm curious what um if you have any a finger on the pulse of like the chances that grant would not come through. Well um there's no guarantee that we're going to get the grant Danny um we we can apply every year um the town has received a lot of uh state transportation funds over the past 10 years since since um Irene uh you know we did the roundabout um the state did a lot of projects in Waterbury the bridges on the interstate the route 2 project the um route 100 project to Stowe now you know they're they're investing huge amounts into the main street reconstruction project so there's no guarantee that we'll get it um I know the district administrator talked to Bill Woodruff and told Bill that there was a better likelihood that we would be getting a paving grant and there would be that we're getting that we would get a bridge grant there's no guarantee that we can get that if we don't get it I would I would recommend you know we'll apply again next year if we don't get it this year and I'm not sure we would put off Stowe Street another year if we if we don't get the grant this year I think comes a point that you have to pave the road just because of the condition the road is in and not wanting to let it really unravel on you we have a number of class 2 roads that if we don't get the grant for Stowe Street this year or next that we could use the grant on you know Guptell Road or Union Street uh Winooski Street they're all class 2 roads so there's there's always a cycle once you get the grant it's usually you know eight to ten years before you go to get another class 2 grant so but the deficit I'm really not too worried about that I know 55 thousand dollars I'm not trying to minimize a 55 thousand dollar deficit um but that that is something that um is not an unusual amount and as I said we we went into this year with a with a 230 $2,000 deficit in the paving fund um if we had done Stowe Street and received the grant we would have dropped that deficit down to 160 thousand even if we have this deficit now um we're we're not going to be any worse off than we were going into this year so I think it's a status quo at worst uh is everybody satisfied with the screenshot I don't need any more information off there uh I'm fine with the proposal as a matter of fact I wish we if we could know more about how much we're going to get from ARPA and pilot money I would love to put more money into into bathing but we don't those things are all going to be crap shoots and we don't know I don't disagree with you Mike um but I think that money is going to come basically to us late enough in the year that we're not going to be able to right to make a lot of plans for this year I'm hopeful that we'll get a significant share of that money sometime in 2021 and we'll be able to uh you know just bake it into our budget process and we can talk then about whether it's paving or you know we have some bridges that that we need to address as well but uh I don't think we're going to get that money early enough this year to really make uh we we can't make a plan for it right now if the money comes and while the papers are here if we decide hey we can do another road or two I mean there's Bill Woodruff has a whole list of places we can put pavement if we need to so I'm not worried about finding a place for it if we get the money thanks that's a fact um Jane has a question okay Jane yeah um I know two years ago as mentioned to do um Howard Avenue um and you've done a beautiful job on Maple Street and Hollow Road so I would just say um I'd love to see in the next go around maybe next year Howard Avenue that's all I know it's a challenge you need much money for paving you know full well I do we did have Howard Avenue scheduled last year Jane but um Guptell Road in the vicinity of the post office gets a whole lot more traffic and the road really deteriorated in a year or so so when we were up doing the Maple Street project we decided that we would we would put the access on that portion of Guptell Road over toward the post office we haven't forgotten um Call of Rojo but given the logistics of moving the pavers around and things like that we try to stick to places that are close by so right okay we won't forget it we know that it's there and it's a need it's not improving thank you thank you any other discussion Dana Allen has his hand up okay go ahead Dana yeah thanks for recognizing me um just real quick bill I know we've had this conversation in the past about Stowe Street and I know that you guys are working on it and the grant is out of your control um but if the paving which dictates the restriping which has a lot to do with the speed and the safety on Stowe Street etc etc um isn't going to happen this year I guess I'd like to reach out to you and Woody and just talk about maybe some options that we can work on together to improve that situation in the meantime um because it's not getting better um and I know you guys your hands are tied with the V trans plans on this but I feel like maybe we could figure out some solutions so I'd just like to put that out there um appreciate your work on this and I'll I'll probably reach out to you at some point in the future yeah see what we can do yeah bill and I would be happy to meet with you sometime Dana it's very frustrating that you know we don't have to rehash the whole thing but you know I signed that agreement with V trans a number of years ago now and um you know I haven't done anything and there's no real good explanation for it from in my opinion um you know when Stowe Street gets done that is certainly in the you know on our checklist to make sure that they do whatever they were going to do before but um sometime here the next week or so just reach out to me and I'll I'll work out a time that you and Bill and I can get together as far that sounds great I really appreciate it thanks bill sure so do you want to put that to bed with a motion bill to accept the 2021 plan paving plan as presented that would that would be good and um I just want to make sure everybody understands that there'll be a portion of uh Blush Hill that is going to revert to gravel for a year um and you know it's the same and I put it in the memo the reason why we'd like to reclaim it now is just because the reclaimer's going to go up there um and reclaim that road um and if we don't do that end of the road next this year then we'd have to set it up there next year and there's just if we're not in the neighborhood it's an additional cost and an inconvenience to the to the company that has them um Woody believes that it would be best for that road that if we just let it all stay gravel and run on it for a year especially where the you know the culvert is going to be done we won't have the ability to run on that if we get too much noise about it we can always decide to pave that portion instead of the gravel portion of of um you know there were scenarios in my memo that said we could skip this or that but from my perspective leaving that short stretch gravel for a year won't really hurt and in many respects just like it was on Little River Road the gravel surface will probably be better than the than what's there now in pavement in some of that section that's for sure yeah that's what I was definitely I was just going to say that anything's going to be a definite improvement over what's there now so I think you'll be elated to uh please know that it's on the list of being done okay we want to make a motion I will give it a go um do I just need to uh move to approve bill's pavement plan 1a is that what we're calling it yeah just as percent as prevent the manager's recommendation for paving as described in 1a for 2021 so moved okay second second 80 no further questions all those in favor say aye hi hi okay last thing on the agenda discuss equity training okay um yeah this is something as you know from the beginning of the meeting and from past meetings we've talked about quite a bit and at the last meeting folks at that meeting had indicated that maybe we would work with a organization out of Brattleboro and Moroni Mentor was good enough to send me some information along I had tried the week before to call that organization and was not able to reach anyone so um I emailed Mary Ganyan or Ganyan I think it is last week on Thursday and asking her to provide some information and I copied Danny and Moroni on that email I believe I know I copied yeah Moroni and Danny on that um I hadn't heard anything by late this afternoon so I sent another email because I didn't have a phone number and I'm happy to report that just before the meeting started tonight I opened my email and I received an email from Mary so she apologized for the delay in responding to me she has recommended that I have a phone conversation or a zoom conversation with her to discuss the details and the logistics of this she's suggesting that she can talk with me about this on Thursday this week or next Monday so clearly you know she's a busy person as well so I will work this out with her to determine what's going to happen um and on Thursday this week or Monday next I will get some information from her and then at the next meeting I hope be able to report back to the board with a proposal of what we might be able to do so it's it's a slow process I wish it was going faster but I can't respond any quicker than she gets back to me and I was away last week myself for the beginning part of the week so that's where we are great thanks pal bill just an update are we looking at I know I've kind of mentioned this a few times including department heads in this training well that would be my preference Mike I don't want to commit to anything until I talk with with Mary to see what exactly they're doing but I I have had members of my staff here state that they're willing to be involved if that would be helpful so I think that the select board and myself and if we can include some department head people that would be a good idea so I'll have more information and you know maybe I'll be able to get some information from Mary on Thursday and I can send it out in an email to all of you and you can just respond back to me and you know maybe maybe she and I will be able to potentially work out some times that are available and I can send those out to you and maybe try to you know get this moving a little bit but it's nothing that has to wait until the next meeting before we schedule anything the board is already indicated they want to do it so if I can work out with her a couple of different times that she's available to do it I'll just put that out and we can just do it rather than wait two weeks to have another meeting about doing it so I'll try to push it along the best I can right are there any range of costs that are going to be a concurs I know we're going to have costs involved and I'm all for spending that but do you have any clue I expect I'll find that out on Thursday Mike that's my thought could I say something sure go ahead Tom I'm just wondering the state offered a program called bridges out of poverty number years ago I'm just wondering if Waterbury could offer some type of interactive zoom thing for Waterbury residents as well I'm not saying exactly the same program but maybe through the library that people could register for it and have some type of the same type of training or program you know educational program that's all the library has had some of this already I think that frankly that's probably a better platform for kind of general education than than the select board this this training that we're talking about right now Tom is is really specifically aimed for the the board and and employees but I would recommend that you reach out to all me at the library or Judy Baroni at the library who's the program director for adults and just talk over with them what things you might be interested there they're always looking for programs to to offer I suspect that if it's something they find compelling they'll be happy to do it yeah great that's a great piece of advice thank you I think it's a great idea thank you you know obviously for me I wish we could have this seminar whatever you like to call it in in person as opposed to zoom yeah well we can talk we can talk about that as well I'll talk about that with her you know I'm I don't know what their with their service model is she's out of Brattleboro so obviously if you do it in person there's travel comment that's added but I'll I'll try to find out what what's available what we might be able to do to reiterate as far as our general meetings are concerned we're looking to be able to go back to meeting in person with a hybrid zoom option in June I'll work some things out there and hopefully next meeting on the 17th I'll be able to share with you for certain that we're going to be able to do that but that's that's the goal to go back to in person meetings for those who feel comfortable at that and I want to say that right now you know the the hybrid meeting that we're talking about is mainly intended to help members of the public participate in the select board meetings as easily as they have for the last year or so I know Dana and others have indicated you know I mean Dana's been at almost all of your meetings and you know it's not because he wasn't interested before but it's not as convenient to have to come here to a meeting when you can be home in your living room or your office wherever wherever you are so the the hybrid nature of those meetings is intended to make it more accessible to members of the public to be able to to participate to come and go in a meeting as as freely as they want to whether they feel like they want to spend the whole meeting or just be on for a topic or two and then and then go up but if any board members are reluctant to meet in person certainly you know you can take advantage of of the hybrid meeting and continue to to attend by zoom and one of the things I'm going to talk about with my staff and I'm going to say it now to the to the board members since we will have this hybrid luxury of meeting from home you know if you get sick and I'm not necessarily talking about COVID if you have a cold stay home don't give the rest of us the cold you know just stay home participate at home with your box of tissues and and we'll do the same thing so I'm I'm kind of looking forward to the to the hybrid structure. Bill kind of aligned with this I know at the beginning pre-meeting we discussed about if the town offices are opening do we have a date or we don't yet Mike because I know that's been talked about in the state regs and stuff like that well it's been talked about but there's there's been no directive that I know of and as I said I've got a staff meeting on Thursday this week with the people that work in this building and we'll we'll figure something out okay I'm sure I'm sure we'll be the first to know some of the first right okay I think we've reached the end of this meeting is there anything else that any other questions one thing that I would like to consider for a future meeting is at least to have a discussion about the papers that represent our board meetings or right about our board meetings just have a discussion about you know some of the things that are being printed in the paper some of them maybe the misunderstandings that are coming out of what's being printed in the paper which I think is making it a bit more difficult as a community to stay connected in a more friendly fashion I guess so if we could put that on a future agenda just to have a general conversation about it I do certainly appreciate it okay with that um motion to adjourn hold the plug sure is there a second a second okay see you all at the next meeting thank you very much for tonight thank you good night all night all right thank you good night