 Well, as we have a quorum, I'm going to start, we'll open the meeting at 7.01 and ask for any adjustments to the agenda. Recording in progress. Anyone have any additions? Okay. Jim was going to introduce something. He wants to talk about training, but he thought he would wait until March when we see about our ballot item. But he does have some interest in us looking into some training and he has a video to share with us. So we'll assume the agenda then is adept. We're going to adapt the agenda as sent out by unanimous consent. And now we have public comment. Oh, good. Stephen, did you sign on? I can't get in with except through audio. Okay. I yep. And so I've just opened up public comment. So it's perfect timing. Well, I want to comment on the process by which this proposal was, Donna, you sent me a bunch of emails, but none of them discuss or invite a proposal. So how a proposal appears. Okay. Well, Stephen, okay, do you have any comment, public comment, something that's not on the agenda? The proposal is. Oh, yeah, I don't have. Okay. Well, yeah, I'll just briefly overview that we have 51 million in cell, cell improvement money being proposed. And we have 14 million for regional PSAP startup and support. And that we need to be crafting a plan that integrates with those most of the broadband money at 150, even 250 million could cover the cost of fiber towers, redundancy, generators, et cetera. So we really need an integrated plan here. And that's not what this RFP asked. So we need to, we need to put put an effort on creating an RFP to get an integrated plan. Okay. Okay. All right. Thank you. Anyone else topic that's not on the agenda? All right, we'll go on to minutes from January 13 entertain a motion to accept the minutes. So moved. Thank you. Second. Second. That was Doug Hoyt. Thank you. Thank you. Any additions? Well, I have, I have a discussion about the minutes. Yes. Okay. I think the part labeled city of my pillar council discussion is incomplete. I, my memory is not clear about what was actually said at the meeting. But I know it was said at the city council and Donna moved that the council vote to terminate. I did not move. Well, you offered, I'm sorry. No. Support. You offered, I can finish. I think you can contradict me. Excuse me. You're absolutely right. My mistake. He certainly offered support for terminating CBPSA. And I, I think the minutes should reflect that Doug Hoyt and myself, among others, thought that was a very premature motion suggested. And I think that discussion was reflected in the minutes. But I don't have a recording of the minutes. So I have to leave it to other folks memory of what took place. But I'm pretty sure we had a vigorous discussion at our board meeting about what took place at the council, which is not reflected in the minutes. Okay. And anyone else have that interpretation? I would, I, I, I haven't studied, but I'm Stephen, Stephen, I'm talking to the board about their minutes. And then you can have comment. I just want to note that I did not propose a motion. I proposed a discussion because of some of the behind the scenes talk that I was hearing. And I thought, indeed, it was a healthy discussion. And as far back as October, when we had our tell of eight presentations to the joint city councils, I was very clear that as I had been in the past, I'm more in favor of any coalition than one that's not functioning. And let's face it, folks, we worked very hard. And we've done some good work, but we're not where we want to be. We do not have the buy-in we like. And if it takes another format to do that, fine. I was quite pleased that the city gave us so much time. But the minutes don't have to reflect on my comments. There are no motions. So there is a YouTube of the meeting of both city council and ours. So you can check it out. And I definitely use John Odom as my guide. You keep your minutes very, very minimal. And you back and you really, your recording is there if you want to use that as backup. That's my interpretation. Somebody else would like to talk about their interpretation. Jim, you've already spoke. I'm asking other people. Brent, I think you listened. Doug listened. Justin, you might have listened. Jim, I don't know if you got to chime in at the meeting. I was just thinking that with my experience in the past, if someone had a disagreement with something in the minutes, they were entitled to add a comment that was strictly theirs. If the rest of the board agreed to it, but it doesn't necessarily mean that. That's what I'm asking. If the board agrees to that change, then he can make a motion. I'm not suggesting a change. No, I'm not suggesting a change. That would be something the board would have to approve. But I'm just saying if someone wanted to add a comment that was sort of a dissenting opinion, I've seen that done before. That's all. It's identified as a dissenting opinion not approved by the whole board. I don't know if you'd be able to do that in succinct fashion, Kim. Donna, can I speak? Steve Whitaker? I'll just check anyone else from the board who is there who has an opinion about their minutes. Doug Hoyt. I would like to agree with Donna's statement that she did not. I'll say it again. I did not make any motion that could be interpreted as a motion for the city council to put anything on any agenda or any ballot for anything. She did offer a fair piece of information about the discussion about continued support for the public safety authority. I, in addition to Kim, made several comments and encouraging support for the public safety authority. If I'm not mistaken, Justin also offered some of his comments, which were a little bit different than what I or Kim may have said. But I interpret those comments as being pretty straight forward, honest, and concise as to what was going on. We do remember our meeting on the 13th was before Montpellier's meeting on the 20th. That's all. I agree. Okay. So what was in the minutes was our discussion of what was coming up at Montpellier City Council. Right. Okay. And the short discussion that happened on the 12th. That's all. Even myself, I got confused here. This was before the 20th when I did the presentation. This was our meeting was on the 13th City Council met on the 12th and was on the 12th that Montpellier City Council put the discussion on their agenda for the 20th. So within this meeting, if you all want to have a statement about how you feel the 20th went, great. But January 13th, the 20th didn't happen yet. That's all I want to clarify. Go ahead, Doug. No, you're correct. And I was, I was Thank you. In that case, the minutes are correct. And as I said, I was, it was a confusing time. So I don't have any objection to the minutes because you're right. They couldn't have. Yeah, but they all ran together. And I got confused myself. So, but there's something the minutes are not correct. They refer to the discussion on the City Council. And maybe that should just be stricken. No, because on the 12th, there was a discreet discussion that put it on the agenda for the 20th. Oh, okay. Well, and that's what they, I mean, I think that's, you know, what it says here and that would be discussed on the 20th. Montpellier City Council meeting on January 12th, regarding placing an item on the ballot for city voters to decide whether Montpellier should withdraw from CVPSA will be discussed on January 20th. That's accurate. Okay, that sounds that clarification. I don't have any objection on the minutes. Adam Chair, I call a question. No, no. Okay. You have no choice but to call the question. Have a motion to second on favor of the minutes say aye. Madam Chair, point of order. Yes, just just for clarification. Calling the question is a motion to cease debate. And if two thirds of the board does not want to cease debate, they're welcome to debate it. I thought it had been clarified, but it's call a question just means you take a vote to cease debate. And if you don't want to, you keep debating. Okay. So I thought of indeed, if there was an objection, that's why I paused. So I missed it. Do I need to make a vote on calling the question? Yeah, you make a vote on cease and debate and then that passes you. I'm not trying to stop anyone from speaking. I just thought we had already resolved that. No. And this is one I just haven't used that much, Jim's and my Robert's rules of order. So I would assume it needs a second. We're going to vote on it. No, not on a call with question. No. Okay. But we do vote on it. Okay. But it needs two thirds majority to pass. All right. Thank you. Thank you for qualifying that. So all those in favor of ceasing debate say aye. Aye. No. Okay. And all those opposed. I got one no from Doug. Now we have to do roll call, but I just want to make sure we needed it. Okay. Brent, do you have everybody's name down? Do you want to do that roll call vote? Yes. Okay. So Donna. Yes. Doug. No. Kim. No. Let's see. Jim. Yes. Aye. Justin. Yes. Sally. Aye. Will. Point of order. Sally and Will don't get to vote on these items. Yes, they do. Point of order. You're not. You're the public and have not been given the floor. So I'm sorry. Will, what did you say? I say aye. Thank you. And Brent and I say aye. So let's see. Six to two. Six to two. Yep. Six to two. The eyes have it. Okay. So now we're going to the motion on the floor to pass the minutes of January 13th. All in favor say aye. Are you going to let me call me? Madam Chair, there's a motion on the floor and a vote on the way. Yeah. It's the board's minutes. Okay. So all in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. All opposed? Aye. Great. Passes. Thank you. I added to the agenda. I would like to discuss some small gift as a token. Bev Hill and Chris Hepburn have been helping us as being treasurer or assistant treasurer for several years now. And I've thanked them, but I haven't given them anything. And I thought whether it's flowers or candies that we should or we can't, I don't think we can give them cash, but I think we can give them some other kind of thank you recognition because they do work for a city of Montpellier. And this is done within that workflow as well as the volunteer time that Bev does. So would you support maybe a gift? And if so, how much? Kim? I'd move that the board issue a resolution of thanks for their dedicated work and appreciate that they were long-term, very reliable folks. And I don't think we should give them money. They were volunteers except one of them is a city employee. No, I was suggesting flowers or something. I didn't mean money, Kim. Well, flowers is fine. Isn't that certificate? Even a gift certificate? With a resolution of thanks, which I would allow the chair to draw. Okay. I wrote down the words long-term, reliable to be included, but your motion has no gift of flowers or candy or such. I'll amend it to add flowers at the discretion of the chair. Okay. Do you want to put a range of dollar to that? Somebody other than me has to know. I don't know what a posy would cost. I don't know what a bouquet of red roses would cost. A lot cheaper after Monday. I will wait, Sally. Yeah, I don't know who's bought flowers recently. I myself. I don't think 50 would go very far. I think it's more like 75, am I wrong? Can we say up to like 75 and I'll try to get it for 50? I'll go into Bectonica. They'll usually work with me, but you decide the amount somebody suggested. I think they're in a different category. I think Bev was a pure volunteer, and much as I admire Chris Hepburn, she is a city employee. Okay. You want to clarify that within your motion? Well, you got me stumped on a dollar amount. Okay. Okay. 20. If everyone else is sort of, are you comfortable making a motion to buy them flowers without a dollar amount board? I'm just always assuming there's usually a guideline there. This and all depends where you're going to go get the flowers. If you're going to go to a flower shop, you're going to pay premium dollars. If you're going to go over to Shaw's and pick up a bouquet of flowers, that's an entirely different matter. You know, in light of the fact that downtown businesses are still trying to get out of where they're coming from, I would suggest an alternative that gives certificate to any one of the eateries in Montclair would be sufficient, acceptable, and would make things work. That's just my opinion. That's acceptable to me if I made a motion. Okay. $50 each. The food gets a certificate? More than enough. Okay. That's what I was saying earlier. Dinner certificate, I think is perfect. Okay. And eatery. All right. So I have forced Kim to sort of change his motion. And my understanding, you're agreeable about doing the resolution of thank you for their longtime reliable service and also getting a $50 eatery gift certificate for both of them. That's fine. Okay. Is there a second to that motion? Seconded. Seconded. Okay. Thank you. Any further discussion? All those in favor say I Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. Okay. The update for the Public Safety Authority ballot items and the at-large seat. Luckily, as it turned out, Montclair decided not to do a mail-in, so we didn't have to do a separate ballot, and we really owe lots of thank yous to Barry and Montclair City Clerk John Odom in particular was very helpful, as well as the office assistance, Jody, Norway and Barry, and Mary Smith in Montclair who really help us with these things. So I just want to mention their names and that there's no cost to us for the ballot items. And also at-large, I believe the only one I know of is Kim Cini running. I think that's correct. Okay. If anyone else has a comment about that or questions, we'll move on to the next item. A discussion of the Phase 2 telecommunication work, and we do have Rick Burke here. Burke, sorry. And I did pass that out. Rick, would you like to open the discussion or do you want to just take questions? I'd be happy to take questions. Anyone? Who authorized the proposal or who solicited the proposal? I'm sorry, Stephen, if you want to be recognized, you may. Right now, we're going to have questions from the board and then we'll ask for questions from the public. So I see Kim's hand went up and then Justin's hand went up. Stephen, you said that you skipped me on the minute. I did, because it's a board matter. Kim, you're first. Well, I have various questions for Rick, but I want to start off by saying I didn't get this from you, Don. I got it from Whitaker and I got it yesterday morning. And so I know it's much too early to discuss the merits of it, but I do have some questions for Rick. And my primary question is, do you or your firm have any experience in soliciting homeland security grants and what kind of data must be in an application for such a grant? Well, over the course of 20 years, we have been able to secure over $500 million in grant funds from a variety of different sources. NTIA being the largest of them, they ran the Broadband Technologies Opportunity Program. And out of that, we were able to secure for three different entities, but two different entities actually have a little over $200 million. Other grants came from Homeland Security for entities like the District of Columbia and the National Capital Region and some additional funds for Los Angeles County and their regional networks. So the answer to the question to Kim is that, yes, we have experience. Typically in all grant documents, there is a funding document and that funding document actually outlines the process to under which an entity has to pursue and process documents that the grant administrative office will tender. So in that situation, you basically follow the guidelines that have been established by the funding entity. For example, right now, there's over $60 billion in federal funds being offered to broadband communities. And so those funding documents haven't been fully distributed, but they will soon be out and some have gone out in different formats. But the direct answer is, yes, we have experience in drafting documents on behalf of government agencies and pursuing federal dollars. Homeland Security. I do have one follow-up to that, Rick. Yes, sir. As you know, this organization doesn't have any money to purchase equipment. Yes, sir. There's nothing in a budget that would, at least in the coming year, support acquisition of anything. And what we need is expertise in assembling the data that would encourage a grant provider to give us a grant. And I understand that's connected with governance and that's a separate subject at the moment. But I don't know how this project makes any sense at all when we don't have any money to buy anything with and we don't currently have any means established. And having listened to legislative discussion, nobody wants to hear about LMR when they're talking about broadband. They're exclusive subjects and they just don't want to mix the two of them. So I'd like some assurance from you that what you're doing is essentially providing data to a known grant funder for land mobile. Recording in progress. Okay, by the next hand that was up was Justin. Thank you for preparing this. So my understanding is similar to Rick's and I think we should, Steven, can you mute yourself? I'm pretty sure too, Steve. Okay. It's me. It might be me. I might be getting feedback on my own mic. All right. So anyway, my understanding was consistent with Rick's, just in response to Kim, which is that this RFP is essentially us just showing the world that we're serious and that we're ready to do stuff and we're ready to move forward and we are to be taken seriously, which is not something that has happened before. My question for you, Rick, is because I don't know a lot about this stuff, admittedly, but Whitaker has all these concerns about an integrated broadband LMR cellular system. Do you have, and Donna, I would ask that Steven be able to pose the question. I wonder if you have any thoughts on Steven's thoughts regarding having an integrated system. I've got to do something about the background noise. I'm having a hard time hearing what it is. I think it's from Caller. Whoever is calling. I think it's you, Steven. Whoever's running the meeting. Can you just mute Steven? I've never had to do that. You've never had to mute Steven? I've never done it. I might have wanted to, but I've never done it. The background noise is gone. I want to answer your question in a couple of different ways. First, I want to base it on the requirements and needs that were established by the end users within central Vermont. The stakeholders that participated in our interviews and in defining their requirements as we put the assessment report together. They're primary interests. In my opinion, the best interest of central Vermont public safety communications is to focus on replacing and upgrading your land mobile radio communications network. That is first and foremost at the top of the stakeholders that we interviewed and that we documented. We articulated their needs in our report for all to read and to have an opinion on. They certainly are the end users that we need to look out for and the communities that they serve and represent. The idea of integrating broadband and land mobile radio together is certainly a current process. It's good to have more tools and communication options in your toolkit for public safety. However, as was expressed to us on a number of occasions, that the cellular networks in your communities do not necessarily provide you any enhancements over your land mobile radio network. You're really mixing two technologies. Narrowband technologies is what public safety relies on for their day-to-day mission critical communications. They are first and foremost the primary tool for public safety. There are a number of public safety responders on this meeting who could speak directly to that need. But I'm repeating to you what was mentioned to us by them and in other communities. We started out with a first-band project in the state of North Dakota. We had dozens and dozens of outreach meetings. Their primary comment was, we'd love to have broadband technologies to support public safety communications. However, our radio networks don't work. As part of their saying that, the state put together a program where they are now building and deploying a statewide radio network that every member of the state will use. Of course, they have a pile of money there. They have an advantage over your community and many others in the country. But to go back to your comment, and I've heard Steve at the City Council meeting, Steve made a passionate statement of what would be ideal. In an ideal environment, if there was a tremendous budget available to you, you would go to the broadband to support data communications and to use it for mission critical push to talk if and when needed, if there were service. Yes, but to add mission critical data to your day-to-day response is going to require a major investments in mobile data terminals and applications and processes to use them, video cameras and a variety of other tools that would certainly bring you into a more modern state of public safety communications. However, it's very difficult for me to advise you to go in that direction. When we don't have funds, three million, the four million dollars to upgrade our radio networks, we didn't put a budget together for what it would take to add in mobile data terminals and all the attributes required because you have to integrate them into the IT environment. You've got an IT. There's a lot of work that has to be done. Part of our work wasn't to identify that scope, but it's a pretty sizable budget that would likely be pretty equal to or in excess of what we need for the radio network. So I agree with them. All that makes sense to me, Rick. Thank you. Can I just interrupt really quickly? I'm sorry. The only reason I ask, number one, I want to address Stephen's concerns because I think they're legitimate concerns and I think you've just validated all of those concerns in terms of perfect world. I guess one of the things that is repeatedly coming up is that broadband is where the money is. And so I think there's a real question as to whether we're going to get any money just by doing an RFP proposal for LMR. And when I say money, I mean from the state, from the feds, from whomever, which I guess is just, I guess I would just want to shoot for as much money as possible. But this is something we should discuss with the board, obviously, but that's just my concern that I would put out there. Understood. To add in what additional elements to add into that, I think it would be pretty easy to put it together. I mean, you'd have to mobile data terminals, services, applications. I mean, you have to understand how it would be integrated into the IT environment and what IT environment would do it. There's a lot of, I mean, I could have a discussion with you offline to give you a greater background into it. It's certainly being done. I mean, we put together an integration plan for the state of Minnesota that included a mission critical push to talk as well as data applications. I mean, we did work for 14 states and territories as part of our first net. And there's a lot of knowledge that we learned directly from public safety and that we track day to day about it. It isn't about just the service and obviously coverage is an issue when coverage is king and you don't have good enough coverage now and more towers are being put in by first net AT&T as well as the governor's initiative to fund 100 towers, which is a very novel approach. And I think you as public safety could get access to those towers if they were available in your community and they had broadband connectivity to them, fiber optic connectivity. Part of our report did talk to CB fiber and certainly they have fiber, but they can only put fiber in unserved and underserved communities. The federal grants have restrictions on where the dollars for the broadband connectivity can be established. So, I mean, there's a lot going on there. It's all, it will be ideal if you could concurrently pursue both. But I, you know, that was not what we were asked to do, nor was it what your stakeholder community asked for during the course of our study. Thank you. That was a point I just wanted to make sure was clear that we talked a lot about this, spent a lot of time on how much do we did in our report for our needs assessment on broadband or cellular and the stakeholders were very, very clear and their need was so incredible and the coverage is so bad in the region wide that we put all our focus on the radios. So, to me at this point, you could get money, but you'd be a long time to be able to ever use it. Okay, anyone who hasn't asked a question who wants to ask a question, Jim. Rick. Yes, sir. Going back to what Justin was saying, I, you know, I keep hearing what Steve and says and I keep thinking maybe we got ahead now seeing maybe that is the future. But I have some operational issues that I'm just not comfortable going that direction yet. But and if you had a clean slate and you were coming into Vermont and there was nothing here, tell me what your public safety communication system would look like. Well, Jim, it's a really important question, but we never, we would not attempt to offer you a suggestion without basing it on the requirements of the end users. I mean, you and you know, you know, Rick, you know what the end users requirements would be in any public safety system. They need to be able to talk on a radio and get instant response and have multiple people hear it simultaneously in an operation that's mission critical, that's life safety. It's an instant instantaneous communication need. So take it. Absolutely. Okay, so you have to have a reliable, robust land mobile radio network and I would anchor it. You know, funding wasn't objective or if radio spectrum wasn't, you know, a barrier. You know, what we proposed, I wouldn't even, you know, I'm not even fond of the VHF band. I mean, it's not, it doesn't serve you well in building, but it is, you know, and it also is very difficult to even coordinate frequencies with Canada and elsewhere. The signal is, you know, VHF was designed for mobile communications, but you know, we'd have to change out every radio and it'd be a much bigger price tag to pursue anything about other than the VHF that you're in. But you have to anchor anything you do on a robust land mobile radio network and all the support services you need at the dispatch center, your radio consoles and otherwise, but you know, you really have to start there. And then, you know, then we would say, okay, what about on your data communications platforms? What, you know, robust data platform do you need? Once you have anchored a very robust land mobile radio network that does all the things that you've mentioned and that were articulated in the report, then we should, then we would focus on data communications. And that really is not just a push to talk application that, you know, would supplement the land mobile radio. Data networks are to be complementary to land mobile radio. And there's a lot of, you know, a lot of misrepresentation, misunderstanding if they're particularly at an executive level in government, where, you know, first net is going to replace our land mobile radio networks, maybe, but you know, there's a whole lot that would have to happen. There is no direct communications, no radio to radio communications that are that is fire ground communications that fire departments rely on how they do their response. That's not possible with push to talk. There are some real benefits of having, you know, a capability to use, you know, a broadband network that is reliable and it does provide you coverage. But I would have that as supplementary and complementary to the land mobile radio network. So that's something that could conceivably be added at a future point after we get the land mobile LMR system up to R. Yes, sir. Unless you had, you know, you know, two multiple truckloads of money, and we would do them simultaneously and be a bunch of... There's nothing that prevents the future addition of fiber and data transmission after the LMR stuff has been upgraded. No, sir. And for back call, you know, if we could get access to fiber to use as back call from our radio networks, I mean, it's an overkill because you only have a few channels in each site. You really only need radio circuits or microwave back call, which is lower cost. But if we have the opportunity, and we did mention that in our report, that, you know, CV fiber was bringing fiber in and around some of your radio towers proposed already operational or in your radio network, you know, they would bring it to us at no cost to us. Sure, we would leverage that. That would be very beneficial. So for back call, and in fact, in the current project 25 standard, the vendors require a robust IP back call network. The conventional simulcast network that you're proposing doesn't require a fiber up connectivity or an IP circuitry to support your communications. Just to summarize what you just said, so I understand it. So if you came up here in a clean slate with a bucket lot of money, you would still put in the LMR system and then supplement that with the data and sales. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. It's first and foremost what, you know, what your public safety folks have participated in our information gathering said. And as you know, and others on this call very well know that that radio network is being held together by, you know, by wire and tape. And it doesn't, it doesn't meet the end users needs. So because, you know, you have to know that you have to affiliate with a tower in a trunk system in a simulcasted system, you know, the network chooses the robust tower for you and you don't you affiliate with the with the best serving tower, even if it means you're talking through two towers that you're talking through all the towers to get your communication. So you don't have to affiliate with the wrong tower and then move 100 yards and need to be on another tower, but you're not on that tower. So yes, I mean, what was what was being proposed for initially and what was proposed in the report is is a more robust network architecture that is needed today. People's lives are at risk every day on that radio network in my professional opinion. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you, ma'am, Chair. I'm muted myself. Will, was that a hand? Would you like to ask a question? I just want to make sure everybody gets one chance before I go back around. Do you want to ask a question, Will? Yeah, I'm muted. No, I'm all set right now. Thank you. Okay. So, Steven, you had a question and then we'll go back to Kim. Steven, did you have a question? Even if you're on mute, all you have to do is push six and then I'll mute you. Yeah, I didn't unmute him. I mean, mute himself. Yeah, I didn't mute myself that way. So I used a phone mute. So I asked Rick if this there's nothing in the emails that you sent that indicate anybody asked for this proposal. And I'm wondering, does Rick know that the policy adopted by this board requires anything above 20,000 to go out to an RFP? And who solicited this proposal and were other people given an opportunity to bid on it? Okay, that's a procedural question. So I'd just like to hold it as far as technical stuff, technical items that relate specifically to the proposal. No, I see your point, Steven, but I feel it's a procedural board question and not a Rick question. Okay, well, I'll ask Rick a technical question then. Rick, can you hear me? Yes, I hear you. Okay, you're talking about data, you're talking about LTE data, correct? Something like person at Verizon, right? Yes, 4G LTE, 3G LTE, 5G. Yes, yes, I am. So in effect, isn't it fair to say that many of these folks' understandings of how available this stuff is using small cells and infill might be discouraging them from asking for fire ground video, automatic vehicle location, mobile data terminals, because they think it's out of reach. Whereas it's really not out of reach in its context of this hundreds of millions and 51 million for new cell powers. There's not going to ever be a better time than now where the money's available to approach in a unified system, isn't that correct? No, I don't agree with that statement, sir. I mean, I don't know how well you know the grant background, the funding ground background on the broadband money that's going to the states. That money is being allocated to support unserved and underserved communities. So yes, there may be some unserved and underserved communities in central Vermont, but I can't speak to that because we haven't studied it. So I don't have direct insight into that, into what you're saying. However, I will agree with you that your first responders would love to have reliable cellular coverage and so your citizens, of course, and I'm sure they would love to have that. Certainly their mission critical work would be better served if they had access to broadband data, reliable data, and they had applications and tools to support them. If they had video cameras and they had applications and they had a working process and there were extra people to support that use of that technology because it isn't just about the money, you also have to have the people. You have to expand your IT departments, you have to build an application, you have to train people. Yeah, there's a grand opportunity, but these current grants, particularly the ARPA, well, the ARPA money could be used for a variety of different purposes, but I don't know if your community has ARPA money. That's the American Relief and Rescue Plan money and how they're using it. That could be allocated to broadband or other purposes. The governor has clearly made a decision that they're using some of their ARPA money, I would suspect, to support broadband, but the Infrastructure Act money and some other money that comes from broadband wouldn't be applicable for public safety. It's for community broadband. Now, that doesn't mean that governments couldn't benefit from applications like that. But, yes, your public safety would love to have additional tools to support your day-to-day mission. They would love that, but they've got to have a robust land mobile radio network because that's what they know and that's what they rely on and that's what they trust and so you've got to have that. Could you do them together? Sure, but like I said earlier, it's going to take a great deal more time, effort and money and that's also going to require more support from your local community to integrate. If we can access the broadband money, we can use that for towers, for generators, for fiber backhaul and then the cost for the LMR system goes down dramatically, doesn't it? First of all, I don't know the grant well enough to say that everything that you've just mentioned is achievable. Those who have the funds have flexibility. So, they were able to use ARPA funds to support initiatives that they weren't able to complete because of COVID and its impact on local government revenues. So, theoretically what you're saying could be done at a local level and or the state level. So, that's possible. So, yes, it has more leverage in terms of laying fiber optic cable that could be used to connect your towers. I said earlier that that is a possibility. The rest of what you said, building clearly the governor, there are certain money that you're not allowed to build towers on because the goal of the broadband initiatives is for 100x100 of symmetrical megabits uplink and downlink. Wireless networks can't achieve those data rates. So, part of what you're saying is achievable if those who manage the funds are willing to take their portion of their grants and apply it to it. The other broadband dollars are not directly applicable, but could be indirectly applicable to what you're saying. Okay. Anyone else? Okay, Kim, you can use your turn for your second term. Well, it was me. Stephen's got it. He's muted. Okay. Thank you. Nobody disputes that what we need is an LMR system. The only issue is how can we get the money to do it? And the only way I know to get the money that I've heard of any discussion is to combine it in some way with the broadband world to reduce the amount of money we need to expend for the radio system. Because it seems to me, from all I've heard, the radio money is coming from local effort, not from grants. And my question to you, Rick, is if you put your mind to this and thought about it a little bit, could you help draft a proposal that would say, in essence, that some of the advantages of money spent on broadband could also be used to augment the ability of getting LMR radio systems and reduce the cost for the community benefit? And I think from the grant things that I've read, which I've got to say is pretty sketchy at the moment, there are some funds to increase, to pay for fire stations, etc., but nobody wants to pay for radios. And I don't think what you propose is going to help us at all, because all it's going to do is say there's a big bill that nobody wants to pay. What we need to do is to tap in to grant money that are available in a creative workout, if you're hired, a creative workout to combine these things so that we can at least go to a grant writer and say, okay, here's the plan. Join with us. That's what I'm looking for. But I think you're going down. Sorry. No, well, I just want to say that from the standpoint of what we heard very clearly on January 20th from Bill Frazier, and what we've heard from somewhat from Berry City is that they would be a they have connections of relationships, both state and federal, that indeed they felt having an RFP, as we talked about, sort of ready to go, although it would need further modifications before it was actually used, but would provide their approach to the state and federal contacts, more information, make it more tangible, you know, really show that we're serious and we know what we're talking about. And hence, I asked for this proposal, so you could see it, you can decide you don't want to deal with it. But people keep saying, what is it going to cost? But very clearly, Bill Frazier felt that Montpelier and particularly Capital FAR would welcome this RFP. I don't know if Will or Sally wants to chime in on that, but that was the very clear direction that I heard on the 20th. Will, Sally, Capital FAR, do you feel this RFP would be useful? Well, I think the people you mentioned ought to identify their funding sources because so far I haven't found them. Excuse me, Kim. Excuse me. You're out of order. Just a minute. I wanted to give Capital FAR a chance to talk. If you don't have anything to say related to this, that's fine, although I'd prefer you sort of update us. So, as I understand it, Capital FAR is putting together a special meeting on February 23rd to talk about the situation with all of this stuff. And that's all I know. I don't know any particulars and any details for it, so that's what I was notified of today. So they're going to hold a special meeting on the 23rd for the Capital FAR Mutual Aid to talk about this program and the dispatching and where we go forward with it. Okay. Don, if I may, I could give a brief response to Kim. Go right ahead. Okay. So, Kim, I fully appreciate what you and others in this meeting are hoping to achieve. I don't know of a grant program directly that would achieve that objective, with the exception of what I said on ARPA funds that have gone to the state or have gone to local communities. You have more flexibility in applying those ARPA funds to initiatives that could not be pursued because of lack of local funding. So, I mean, the state has clearly taken some money and has said that they're going to build 100 radio towers. And those towers are to support broadband communications. And so I don't know enough about the details whether or not those towers also include fiber optic connectivity because the cellular carriers are not going to be interested in any towers where there aren't broadband connectivity or where they're given a right of way to bring fiber optic connectivity to the tower. So, you can't, you right now, as I mentioned earlier, the radio network serving your communities can rely on telephony circuitry or microwave back off. The towers that the cellular carriers need fiber optic cabling. So, because it's a lot of data and it's got to be transmitted back and forth. So, if the governor's initiative is to, you know, identify and build 100 towers and bring fiber to them, that's a huge investment because, you know, the laying of fibers could be significant. You know, it isn't about the glass, the fiber cable itself is relatively inexpensive compared to the construction of the fiber and all that right away. So, I don't know what the governor is doing, but your best chance for pursuing this is to talk to those local entities with the ARPA dollars and to the state about it, you know, are they willing to support you in one way? The federal government is not, has not written the grants to prevent you from doing it, but they haven't, they haven't clearly given you access to broadband dollars that would allow you to fund your radio network. You could potentially, as CB fiber is already doing and as we've indicated in our report, that they're bringing fiber by some of your towers and you should, we indicated you should consult with them to see if they'll bring fiber to your towers. That's a small percentage of the cost. In fact, there was no money allocated in the priority one, two or three for bringing fiber because it wasn't required for what you're doing. So, if the governor's towers might support you, great. But, you know, we identified towers and locations, buildings that could be used for the radio network. And so, there is a design, there is a preliminary design. It's beyond a budgetary design. It's a design that would work. We worked very closely with Joe Albsworth, you know, to visit sites and to select it and then did, you know, around propagation studies on all of it to confirm that that, that constellation of sites would, would support, you know, your region network. So, you know, the thing is, is that you, your, your entity, and you were discussing this in your, in the meeting with the council, the Montpelier council, is who would be the right entity to, you know, to approach the funders, you know, and that's not Tel Aviv. Tel Aviv was asked to provide a, you know, a RFP document that you could say, we're ready, we've got a plan. And so, yes, I'll be happy. And I'm spending my time, you know, I want to see the best outcome for all of you. I, like I said, I am living in Virginia, my heart's in central Vermont right now. You know, we've spent a lot of time, we want to see you succeed. And whatever creative ways that we can offer to you, I'll find them. I'm telling you what I'm hearing around the country, what people are doing. I can only share those experiences with you. Someone from your entity has got to take the lead in having these conversations. And that's the, you know, that's the best advice I could give you. Will the, you know, could we add some additional information into the RFP that would help you? Absolutely. We, what, why not, you know, but I'll, I'm not sure what that is directly yet. Okay, I just want to add just a little bit about from the city council perspective on the ARPA money that we were told, especially the first, the first wave of it, we could only use it for things that we actually had approved and held back from doing. So we literally had to replace, you know, our money for a project we had on the books ready to go, we voted on, we did the bond on whatever, but we had to stop it because of finances. So then the second way was a little more open, but we still had so many needs and stormwater was one of the ones that lots of things qualified for. So there's still more restrictions than I think maybe the general public understands with that dollar. That doesn't mean you can't ask for it, but it's not as simple as maybe I felt was expressed. Well done. Yes, Kim, your hand's been up, so I didn't see it go down. I'm sorry, I didn't have a question. It seems to me we're chasing our tail because fundamentally this is a governance issue because if we don't have a single entity that can speak for the region and with your help Rick and other experts and get as much funding as we can for that entity to reduce our overall cost, we're not going to get an LMR system. Because from what I've heard, very few people in the Cat West. Stephen, excuse me, Stephen, you need to mute again. We're getting back sounds. That's a discussion for later on this evening as we can think of some way to work together on this because I'm convinced that the only way we're going to get any grant money at all is to come at it with one entity and we can jiggle the entity. It doesn't have to be the one we have now. We can work on that, but we need to come up with one little work. Well, the one that's here, Kim, to stepping up and being regional is the combination of Montpellier with Capital Fire. They have all those towns involved and Montpellier has both the bonding financial capacity to do that as well as the relationships with state and federal. Tony, you know as well as I do, the city of Montpellier is never going to pay for a bond to buy a radio system for the towns. It's just not going to happen. Well, all I know is they're willing to take the lead and are talking to state and federal people and they are some of the people I heard wanting this RFP, but if that's not true and the board doesn't support it, that's fine. Well, Fraser has told me personally that no way Montpellier is going to bond to build a radio system for the towns. Well, that's not so flat as that's not how I hear it, but you know you're always there on the 20th, on January 20th when Bill felt this is what he, Montpellier, public safety and Capital Fire needed was more specifics, really shovel ready serious RFP information. Well, before we spend any money on RFP, let's find out what's the background. Okay. Anyone else? If there's interest in pursuing this, I think we ought to be honest and upright that Rick's put time in this and I appreciate that because he wanted to get an idea of the scope of cost and time it would take to do this. And if there's the will of the board to advance this, whether it's to take it to the next meeting and have further consideration of it. I'm sorry, Kim, you didn't get it. I sent it out Tuesday as soon as I got it from Rick. I'll go back over it and resend it to you. But I sent it to the whole board. But this is what this discussion is about. What do you want to do? Do you want to put it on the agenda for next month? Do you want to drop it? What's the pleasure? Donna, can I clarify something that y'all just talked about? Very briefly, Stephen. Very briefly, please. Okay. So I just have some details from sitting through the legislative hearings on that tower proposal. Each tower would be, they would be large macro towers and several would be located in this area. And they would be free radio hosting for public safe purposes and two LTE carriers, minimum of two LTE carriers on each tower. Each tower would be served with fiber and generators, et cetera. So these would be state subsidized towers that would be the complication of using them for central Vermont LMR system, is that it would require modifying the license to transmit sites. And that's time consuming. So the ARPA money, the $150 million that's already been appropriated is ARPA money for infrastructure. And that's controlled by the Vermont Community Broadband Board and can be directed towards our towers. And the additional $100 million that's being appropriated in infrastructure can be used for both middle mile and towers. So there's plenty of infrastructure out there that can lower the cost of an LMR system. We just need to have an integrated plan. Thank you. Thank you. And if you mute again, it would really help. Okay. Board? Justin, I just saw your hand. Sorry. Go ahead. I just wanted to comment on what you just solicited comments on. I think this is just incredibly promising. And this is wonderful. And I think it's a really big step forward. I share Stephen's concerns about the RFP and sending the RFP out. I don't know what the process is. I don't want to talk out of my ass. But if there were concerns there, I think we should walk through them at some point in the future, probably at a future meeting. But I think this is really, really promising. This is what we need to do. The only way forward is to do something like this, as far as I can tell. And it's a matter of just chopping it up and trying to figure out exactly what we're going into setting. So that's my opinion. I would definitely not table this. I think this is really good and we should keep discussing it. I think it's awesome work. You want to make a motion? I want to let everyone else talk first, and then I guess we can make a motion. Sometimes if you have a motion, people know what they like and don't like. I'll let Jim do that. He knows a lot more about procedure than me. Not really. I just wanted to clarify what Stephen just said. So there is a plan afoot from the state to fund cell towers that we might have use of those towers as part of our plan. Did I interrupt you hear that correctly? Yes, exactly. Specifically identified is the right of public safety to be hosted on each of the 100 new towers. All right. Now the tower locations, have they been identified yet? Well, they're doing the survey. There's an RFP out which Tel Aviv will probably win to do the drive testing to find all the dead zones, and then they will create search radios for those towers. Siting a new tower is a process. So you're talking about dead zones of cell phones or land mobile radios? Dead zones of cell phones is all they're measuring. It would be smart for us to get in and enter the land mobile radio dead zones and affect those siding processes. They could just ask me where the dead zones are on the cell phones. I don't know where they all are. So I guess my point is that does Rick know about where these towers are going to go? And I mean the plans might be great in concept, but if the towers are five miles away from where we need them, it doesn't help. Aren't our eight towers very site-specific or location-specific to a master plan? I'll let me give you answer that question after I answer other questions, but there are some really positive opportunities here that I wouldn't turn our back on. However, the reality is that these still are three or more years away. I mean, let's be honest with you. They're going to get an RFP out. I share Mr. Whitaker's optimism. I'd love to be able to say we're going to win. We'll compete with others and the state will choose the most competent vendors to support the initiative. And I'm sure I would hope it's us. We'll do a great job of it. But however, you know, I mean, how long does it take to build a tower? You know, first we got to get an RFP out to do the study and then to do the assessment of the coverage zones. And then there's a whole procurement for the tower vendors, for the fiber players. And then there's going to be board hearing, zoning hearings. Towers building anywhere are long and long-gated. And in Vermont, it's going to be even longer. So you could be waiting three to five years before you have one tower. We've already identified all the towers that would support the initiative to provide robust coverage within that. And there's been direct conversations. Some of them are already there and others, there's been conversations ongoing to get access to them. We would have to do that on the additional towers that we were going to put up anyway. Would we not? All the information? Yes. I mean, you wouldn't want to put in the RFP the way that we're considering it. We actually know the locations of the towers. We visited the locations. The only thing we weren't able to do is validate whether or not those towers and all the shelters have some room for equipment. And if the towers will handle additional cable and antennas, that's done by and has to be done by a firm that's qualified to do that work. But that work would be done in conjunction with the RFP. However, yes, we should get in line and we should pursue this. But if you wait till this happens, you're just putting yourself in further jeopardy. And I don't disagree with Kim's point that we don't have funding. That's your biggest dilemma. Most programs that do this, they either have a pile of money like the state of North Dakota. They self-fund it. They don't even ask the locals for the money. The state is building it out. There are statewide networks in Michigan and Minnesota and Ohio and Washington and many. You don't have a state network. You're on your own there. You have to do it yourself. So if you wait, you're going to wait. I mean, it's not happening any day. You could go in parallel. And my opinion would be that we should pursue these in parallel and hope for the work that the state is doing gets fast tracked and benefits us. But until we know the location of the towers, we can't even assume that they would meet our coverage requirements. I was just hoping to identify savings somewhere in our plan. But maybe it would take too long and maybe they're not. We should just get an oil well like that North Dakota. Well, you actually have gold up there. It's white. It's white. It's snow. And what a lot of communities did. In fact, we put the initial funding plan together before the state stepped up for the state of North Dakota. They had the lowest cigarette tax. You could get it. In fact, people told us they'd get a speeding ticket and only pay $15. And that was cheaper to get a speeding ticket multiple times and no points and no reference to your insurance than it was to be late for work. So, you know, we gave them plans that they could raise money, including bonds. But the state said, we got money, we'll step up. Others, you know, we get the funding plans. I mean, right now, Yacuba County, which is adjacent to King County, has gotten approval from its citizens to add a fund, you know, add a quarter or half a percent to local taxes. A lot of communities do that. The state of Indiana puts $10 fee on its licensing. You know, others put, you know, surcharges on visitors. I mean, I get it. It's never easy for a legislator to want to put tax on anyone to raise funds. So there's a double-edged sword here. But you need to figure out a fund this. And so I think we need to, you know, not, we need to take all options. No options should be taken off the table. Thank you. I have some hands up. Doug Hoyt and then Doug Brent. Madam Chair, there's a streamed feedback from that phone caller that it's really making it hard. Yeah, they want, they want mute. So it did go away. I heard in previous discussion that public safety was going to be part of this tower, tower thing. If that information came from people that are in the state, I need to know if they're talking about the department of public safety, or if they're talking about the other people that are doing the hard work, municipal counting, and other local public safety officials. Madam Chair, can I respond to that? Yes, you may. Yes, that's, that's local public safety regional dispatch systems is what is trying to be supported with that provision of the tower contract. And I'll add, there's one other proposal being floated. There's real pushback from key legislators to not give these towers away to private corporations. And another idea that's being floated is to give these towers away to, as account, to regional public safety organizations, because it would give them a long term revenue stream from the cell rent that could support the replacement of the land mobile radio system. So that's in percolation. Okay, thank you. Anything else, Doug? Point? No. Okay, put your hand down. I get confused otherwise. Doug Brent. Can you hear me, Adana? Yes, yes. Thank you very much. I just wanted to say, and I'm always the one that says it, but I'm saying it in regard to what Rick has said several times tonight, firefighter safety is hanging in the balance as the clock ticks away. That's what I, all I wanted to say. Excellent point. And that's why, to me, time is of the essence. If we could work on this RFP and have it there and have it ready, and then keep poking with Montpellier, Capitol Fire poking, maybe Berry poking, then we have a chance. We hired a company to tell us what was wrong with the system, and they've told us what's wrong with the system. And I think that puts everybody's liability shifts everybody's liability in case something does happen down the line, because we've been made appropriately aware of what's wrong with the system. And I just think we just keep kicking this can down the road. And at some point, it's going to catch up with us. Yes. Anything else, Doug? Nope. I just got to figure out how to take my hand down. Good luck. All right. Justin's still not willing to make a motion. So we're just going to carry this discussion over to next meeting. What? I'm going to make a motion. I would move to, well, I guess I would move to adopt the proposal, or at least to, I mean, I guess, what's the, what's the process here? Do we sign a contract with the, with Televate? I don't actually think that, especially given Kim's concerns, I don't think that we can vote to, I don't think that we can vote to adopt Televates proposed RFP here, because I don't think people have had enough time to review it. So I would vote to put, I would move to put this on the next meeting's agenda with the understanding that we will be voting on whether to move forward with it. Is what my motion would be. Okay. So that everyone can be prepared and know, like, there's going to be a live vote. And you can, we can find out if there's interest to pursue it. Is there a second to that motion? One second. Doug, seconded. Jim, or yes. I'm a little confused on the financial component of this. Have we already spent the money on the proposal, or are they proposing a proposal that we may or may not buy? They wrote up a proposal, give us an estimated cost, or give us actually the exact cost, instead of in the past, they gave me some broad cost ranges, so that if we chose, we could accept their proposal, award them a contract for the post to $30,000 work, and then it starts. And then both. Is that the RFP or is the RFP? Their proposal is to do an RFP. Okay, so the proposal they have right now is not an RFP. No, no, it's a proposal to do an RFP. At this point, we owe them no money. We owe them no money. Bless Rick's heart. We owe them no money. You know, I mean, he has gone the extra mile and many more. I would love to help you find the money. I mean, I will give you, I will continue to share everything that I'm finding from the community about this. I'm sure others on the board and the public will do elsewhere. But, you know, people's lives are at risk every day. And we would assign, hopefully, a board members to work with Montpellier, Capital West to work with this contract. So that we don't spend any money on any immediate staff, like we did with the study that they did for us previously. We paid Paco separately. And we could do this with what we have as a balance. We've been holding out $30,000 that we could do. And then it's not dependent on the ballot. But it doesn't mean, again, if we wait till March, then we'll know whether we have the additional $30,000. So maybe that would make the board more comfortable. The feedback is just overwhelming. Yes, it is. Stephen, I'm sorry. You're going to have to mute yourself. It really helps if everybody mute yourself. No, I need to speak. This is the time when the policy requiring a RFP for anything over 20,000 has to be addressed. You cannot award a $30,000 contract with no RFP. Excuse me, Stephen, we're not awarding it right now. We're putting it on our agenda for discussion in March. But we are going to come back to that point after this motion. Please mute yourself, Stephen. Doug Hoyt, were you waving or are you just holding your head? Yeah, can we get some extra money to get him to mute his phone? He's muted now. And just something we all have to be mindful is to mute when we're not talking. It's in the interim. He's the only one. Okay, so we have a motion. Any further discussion by the board members? Okay, all in favor say aye. Aye. Take your hand. All opposed say nay. Okay, don't need a roll call. Thank you. Now, back to Stephen's point, which also I did email the board that you have a decision within our financial policy. Anything over $20,000 you would normally put out to bid. We did have a contract with Tel Aviv. This study is this RFP is using that information. The board could decide to vote and do this sole source and not put it out to bid. It's all a matter of time, as well as expertise and relationship we have with Tel Aviv and Rick. What's the threshold? $25,000? $20,000 is what's in our policy. Anything over $20,000 should be bid. And we do. I mean, we bid the original study out and it was the response came back. We had so underestimated how big of a project you're asking that we reduce the first phase to just needs assessment knowing that we would need to do at least one or two more phases. And this is one of those phases is the RFP for equipment that is defined within the first study. So, I mean, again, it happens a lot city council other places where you have a contract with someone, they've done some work, you want to extend it. Or you can say you don't want to do that, you want to put it out to bid. Justin, is that a yawn or you want to talk? So, we can make that decision tonight. We can make it next month. What's your pleasure? Kim. And then Justin. Kim, you muted. Preparation of next month's meeting. I wish you would ask the people that you mentioned who say they have plans for funding this to let you know what they are so we'd all know what they are. And I think this discussion of the I think that's unlikely because until next month, I think that's unlikely for them to name their sources because they're talking to people. It's like, you know, when you're trying to bid on a house, you don't put it out there in public. So they're talking to agents within the state and the feds. I can ask, but I doubt that they'll tell me. Well, I hope you'll keep us all in the loop as to what's going on because we need that information to make a good decision. Okay, what we're talking about now is our own financial policy, whether or not we want to allow a sole source for something over $20,000. Do you have any comments on that? Yeah, I think we should defer that till next month. Okay, Justin. Hey, friend, I think we deferred so we have time to ruminate. Okay. What did he say? He said we should defer the discussion about the policy of sole sourcing or not to next month. I just think everyone has time to sit with it now. They just couldn't hear you, Justin. That's the only reason I've tried to restate it. So was that clearer? Did you understand? Yeah, I understood. Yeah, he was just he's kind of garbled with the speaker, but the only question I have in that is so we have the sole authority to wave the Yes. So we can go to the $30,000 just on our own volition. Okay. Yep. What's going to change? Quick. Your hands up, I don't. Yeah. Steven, mute yourself, please. I've got the policy right in front of me. Steven, I'm sorry, somebody else has the floor, but your back noise, we're asking you to mute. I'm sorry, please mute. Okay, Rick. Yes, ma'am. I'm out of respect of the board and yourself and all the participants. I would like to make two comments. First, I appreciate that folks need time to review, absorb and digest and have questions and I'd be happy to answer their questions in advance of the next board meeting because you really want to keep this moving. You know, as Doug pointed out, another month is still another month where something tragic could happen. The other point I wanted to make is that I don't think it's respectful for me to participate and to be on this call during this conversation on sole sourcing. I don't want to create a conflict of interest for anyone. I respect the rule of law and how you all govern yourself and so I would respectfully ask to leave this meeting so that you have this conversation and I can come back if you need it, but I just don't think that I should participate in this part of the conversation in my humble opinion. I think we should sole source though. I was not aware of, until I was recently informed, you know, via a scathing email that I'm not going to discuss here, but I was not aware of any of your, you know, procurement regulations so I don't know, but I know now and I want to respect a big conflict of interest that could be perceived by my listening in and smiling or commenting or otherwise, you know, so. Bye, Rick. You can go. Thank you for bringing it up. I'm sorry, I didn't cognize the conflict. All I want to say is that I appreciate what you all do and giving us an opportunity to submit a proposal and I will answer any questions in advance of it and yes, considerations of fiber under the restrictions that we've discussed, you know, could be incorporated and that's, you know, so whatever, but I think it'd be more beneficial and advantageous to all of us if you could, you know, assemble your questions, get them to Donna in advance and I'll either, you know, provide you a written response. My goal would be to provide a written response to them and as brief, you know, as concise as possible. All right. Thank you. Thank you very much for being here. Thank you all very much. Thanks for letting me be part of this family and good luck to you all and I'll be here when you need me. Thank you. All right. Doug Hoyt, was your hand a by hand or I want to talk? No, I was waiting goodbye to Rick. Okay, so. The question I asked, I'm sorry, the question I asked is what will change? What's going to change between now and March? What information are we going to get between now and March that would guide us as to whether we're going to Well, Rick said he would answer questions. Excuse me, Kim. I want to, that's what I want to know. You want to know what the questions are? No, I'll formulate the questions. All right, so I guess we're going to wait and see. All right. All right. I'm sorry, Brent, I've lost track. Have we voted on this motion to put this on the agenda for March? No, not yet. Okay. All right. So Doug, if you wanted, you could do an amendment to this, but if you don't mind waiting, then we'll just go with the motion. The only amendment I would make is can I break Stephen's phone? Yes, Stephen, mute your phone. I'm still waiting to talk. Okay. I'm going to talk if you don't shut that phone off. Okay, Doug. Let's he wanted to talk on the motion before we vote on it. All right, Stephen. I'm unmuted. Can you hear me? Yes. This is created by not having a physical location. I have a bad phone. So I'm looking at the policy and that's the advantage of the month. All of y'all need to read your policy. It's the board. Excuse me, Stephen. Stephen, the motion that we're discussing is not about the policy. It's about about moving this article to next meeting. That's what's on the table to talk about right now, Stephen. Okay, but you're the chair. You set the agenda. You don't need a motion to put something on the agenda. We have a motion made to put this proposal and the financial policy on the agenda from March, Stephen. I'm going to ask you to be muted again. The motion before us is to put on the agenda, both the proposal for the RFP work and for discussing our financial policy and whether you want a sole source. Everyone in favor say aye or wave your hand. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Perfect. Thank you. Okay, next is Kim asked to be put on the agenda discussion of Capital Far's MOU and he sent out some papers to everyone discussing this and discussing an MOA. Kim, you want to introduce the topic? Well, I got my best thought as to what the meaning of the contract is between us. And the one thing I know about contracts is if you come up with an idea of what it means, you ask the other side and see what they agree with you. If they don't, or if they do, then we know what the rules are. So the broader question is, I think it's time to talk with our town CFMAS is so what they want out of this organization. As you know, I don't think they can vote on anything. And they've been pretty sensitive that they're not been voting on expending the city's funds for their benefit. But from here on out, I think we should invite those folks to come in and have a discussion with us about how they relate to this organization. It may be that we need to dissolve it if it's just the two cities and it's every town for itself, which I think would be a terrible mistake, and maybe that's the way to go. But if we're going to build a regional system, we need regional cooperation. And the process is pretty simple. Get together and discuss it. And if you don't like the way the board's constructed, we can reconstruct the board. Everything would be on the table to discuss how to reorganize to be an effective regional corporation. But we can't do any of it if we don't talk about it. And I think it starts with an understanding of what our existing contract is, because we can't just stumble along in the dark. We made a deal. We got to know what the deal is. If it's no good, let's change it and make it work for us. That's my view of it. So I think the memo I sent is the best I could do, as to meaning of it. I talked with Paco and I talked with Tom Galanca, who are the drafters, and they said, yes, that's essentially what our ideas were. So we need to hear from the other side. If they disagree, we need to know it. If they agree, then let's change it and come up with something that's good for all of us. Okay. So what's the board's pleasure? Sally, your hands up. Yep. So as Will mentioned before, there is a meeting, the special meeting for Capitol Fire Mutual Aid on the 23rd. And the sole purpose of that meeting is to discuss Capitol Fire's future with CBPSA and what direction we want to take. I just learned of the meeting today as well, so I don't have any other information, but I do know that that is the purpose of the meeting. Okay, I'd like to be part of that meeting if you could send me an invite. It will be an in-person meeting at Alumni Hall in Berry at 7 o'clock on February 23rd. Okay, Jim, your hand. Yeah, I just had a question for Kim if you're finished with Sally. You all set? Okay. Kim, can you articulate what you see as the specific rub, a bona contention between the different interpretations, or are you not, are you only at a point you know there is different interpretations? Well, I don't even know there is. Historically, when this came up in December, I thought the agreement required, I'm going to call them the towns for this shorthand, were required to pay to some share to CBPSA. When I went back and Paco told me that was wrong, and I think Joe Aldsworth did also. So I listened to what they said, and I went back and looked at it, and I think they were right. The only thing they had to pay for was discussions about dispatching, which we hadn't had any. So as I wrote you, I didn't think they owed us any money. On the other hand, the agreement was pretty clear that the only function of the board members was to vote on dispatch issues, and it says pretty clearly that they are not full blown members. And frankly, it makes no sense to have an organization voting that has no skin in the game to use a cloak wheel as to how the cities are going to spend their money. And that's what we Is anyone disputing that? I will. For four years, they've had full membership full voting on everything before the board. There was no restriction on their board participation. And you're saying that's in compliance or not in compliance with the I thought it was in compliance, but not not Kim's. It's an opposition of Kim's points. The interpretation for four years has been they were full members. Well, frankly, nobody, nobody brought it up because we weren't once we got into spending money, then it became different. In any event, it's here, it isn't going to go away. And we should get an answer. Because otherwise, everything we do is going to be subject to a reversal of some dissident doesn't like it. What I'm trying to determine, Kim, is this a disagreement or a different interpretation between you and our board or between our board and capital five mutual age? Well, frankly, it's not been given any thought when I was chair. I didn't give it much thought because there wasn't any need to. And the need now is the need now is we need to reorganize our relationship. I don't think it's fair to the two cities have the townspeople sharing and voting how they spend their money. And even how this organization is managed because they're not true members. And the only the broader issue is can we put together a regional organization that I think could help us fund what we all want to fund? I don't see how CFMAS itself. There's no way in hell that they can issue a bond issue. They don't have any authority to do it to fund this. So we need to work together and find a vehicle, get grant money, I'll make up some numbers. I'm just going to interrupt you a bit, Kim, because I'd like to get back to your central point. And that is, does the board have interest in this in pursuing our current MOU, whatever the interpretation, and reorganizing that relationship? No. And if it does, does it want to try to do it before Capital FAR has their meeting on the 23rd, was it? Or do they want to wait till after that meeting? I think we should invite them to come and discuss it. It's just conversations. I'm just trying to check out the board's will, Kim. I know what you're saying. I understand that. So would you please not interrupt me? Okay. Well, you interrupted me, Donna. I did. I said, because you got talking about finances, and I said, I thought you got off topic of whether or not we have it. The board has an interest. I'm only asking the board if they have an interest to pursue it. And great, if they do, we'll take whatever time they want. But I want to know if the board has this interest. I don't think that's the right question. The question is, can we invite them in to discuss it with us? Does the board have the interest in looking at this? And one of the steps might be to invite them in. One of the steps might be we go there. But is the interest there, Jim? You said yourself that keeping the lines of communications open is going to be key in our ability to move forward with anything. And I guess I look at it like, I agree, if they're not paying their nickel, then their voting rights perhaps should have been limited. It doesn't sound like the past precedence has gone along with that. There has been past precedence that they voted on everything. But to not to any great detriment, I don't believe. And I guess my point is that the timing right now I don't think is good to address any subtleties in the agreements. Because if someone is being pushed away from the table, only being allowed a small plate, we want them at the table. I think that's the bottom line. And if there's no real detriment to them continuing with what they've done before, I guess I would say to the members, the Caprified Mutual Aid members, that if there was some huge money amount that we were voting on and it was close, and it didn't include your town poniging up any money, then I probably would say maybe you should use yourself from the vote. But that hasn't been the practice and no one's brought it up before. I think it should be delayed. I don't think it should be addressed right now. I think we're trying to put together an alliance and because I'm not sure if they see anything for them in being on the board to tell you the truth. So we need to somehow sweeten the plot to keep them involved. Okay, just one comment before I call on Doug Hoyt. One of the thinking is through their contract with Montpelier, when Montpelier has expenses around dispatching, it gets added to their contract. So there's an indirect contribution in a way. That's all I want to say. Doug Hoyt? I think there's a lot of good points that have been made here. But I think if we don't make the right decision here, after the 23rd, you won't have to make a decision because the decision will already be made for you. I fear that Captifire has heard various things over time about this money issue when really the board has not brought up the issue of money. And they are a little reluctant to participate. I would not at all be terribly surprised if the Captifire Mutual Aid group votes on the 23rd to end its relationship with Central Park Public Safety Authority. I think it's really important that we follow up on what Jim was saying in terms of going a little bit slower here, letting them know that we want to have their participation in this process. And they're not making any really big decisions on any large amounts of money. We're all talking about the same thing. And I for one would love to have them sitting at the table with us in terms of reaching some of these decisions in terms of what the radio systems are going to look like. Driving them away from the table will not accomplish that. I'll be quiet. So, sorry. Anyone else opinion on this? Yes, I do, Steve Whitaker. Okay, just making sure. I didn't miss any board members. Okay, Steven. So, the Captifire joined this because the two cities were under pressure to get a third member. It's not been an ideal relationship that one year free without paying the cost sharing was intended to be a year while you sort it out. This is the fourth year. But I've been talking to select board members around the area, and they recognize that this is not an ideal scenario because the financial commitments, the long range planning, the decision whether we're only planning for LMR or planning for LTE as well, those are select board decisions. What we need to do is invite the capital fire members to ask their towns to make them the delegates, but the towns need to join. Capital fire has no authority to raise its dues to the member towns of capital fire are paying for dispatch service to make up a third share of the cost of our televate contracts. It's just not a workable scenario. It's a square peg and a round hole. Capital fire is not the legitimate intermediary between CVPSA and the towns that need to join. So, I welcome the individuals to ask their towns to be the delegates, but the towns need to join in order to get this Gordian knot undone, you know. Okay, thank you. Please mute. All right. So, what's the board's pleasure? Do we want to? I'd like to make another comment. Okay. Doug, this isn't about money. It's about, can we have an organization that works together? And yes, of course, that could involve proportional contributions. You know, the total population of the towns exceeds that of the two cities. They could have a majority on the board and we could divide the costs as we already have. You know, we put a stab at it that the cost would be divided by the amount of benefits that each get. And there's formulas for that. So, the idea is, I think it's the only way for the towns to find a way to get what we all want them to have, which is a radio system that works and protects firefighters. And, you know, they've served the communities, they've served for years, and they've done a wonderful job. But we're now at a crisis where we need to have a different. All I want to do is talk. I don't want to, I want to have a clear understanding of where we're going. And it's the lawyer in me that says, if you make a deal, you honor the deal. You don't just drift around and do what you feel like doing. Kim, do you want to make a motion? Do you want to make a motion? Well, I just move that when they're ready, they come talk to us about the best way to work together. And I think we should, I mean, if they got a meeting in the next couple of weeks, if they'll hear me, I'll explain why I think we could help each other. And then I'd like them to come and meet with our board or some. Okay. Kim, if you're planning to go to their meeting and talk on behalf of the board, you'll need a motion to get direction from the board? Well, I would like that. That's what happened with that memo. I mean, it needs, that's what I'm looking for is board support for your memo, board support for you being the spokesperson or not, because otherwise you're just an individual talking. So, well, I'm not unhappy to be an individual, but I do think. But you can make a motion and see if you can get board support. Well, we ask the mutual aid society to meet with selected members of our board to discuss what our relationship should be. And presumably that would be in March. Well, like they ask a capital far, mutual aid system to meet with us to redefine the relationship or to define what they want in the relationship. Well, I just want to discuss what the relationship could be mutual advantageous to us. All right. Is there a second to that? Justin is second. Kim, your hand's still up. That's all right. Any further discussion about this? Jim, you're muted. Can I hear the motion? Jim. Brent, you want to read it back? I have is Kim, Kim motions to ask Capital Fire to meet with selected members of the CVPSA Board of Directors to define the relationship and determine mutually beneficial advantages to such relationship. Okay. Does that sound right, Kim? That's good enough. Yes. Okay. Any further discussion on that motion? All in favor say aye. I move we table it. I'm sorry, what? I move we table it to next month. Okay. That would need a second. Is there a second to tabling this to next month? Okay. So the motion stands. Kim, Doug Hoyt, are you waving? I just, I'm mute. Yeah, I know. There seems to be some indecision here about whether that's the good way to go or not. Sally and or Will, I'd like to call upon you to somehow help us a little bit here. I know that based on what you said, you've just received information about this special meeting and it's going to involve relationship with the public safety authority. Is there anything in your opinion that will benefit us, meaning the public safety authority, from communicating with capital fire in terms of what that relationship should look like before you have a vote to do away with it? I'm putting you on the spot, but person to person, professional to personal, I'd like to hear from. So this is Will. So I guess I would just have to say I can't say anything further until we have the meeting on the 23rd because I have no idea what the rest of the mutual aid members are thinking. So, you know, we just, Sally and I just learned of this today. So the meeting is going to inform us on the 23rd and we'll know better after the 23rd. So I don't think we have anything further to add. All right, just trying to help. Okay, Brent, you have your hand up. When we talk about when we're thinking about Kim's motion, who, when we say selected board members, who would these board members be, who would be selecting them? The board would appoint a committee. So people would express interest and the board would decide who represented them. The thing would be, I mean, we can invite them, they may say yes and they say no. They may say they want to wait till after the 23rd. Who knows? Any other comments? All right. Jim? No, Steve Whitaker. No, Steve Whitaker. I still have some board members. Yes, Jim? My only reason for tabling it is I wouldn't want to send any signals to them at this point that might adversely impact them. If we could be guaranteed on a positive signal, that'd be great, but we're not guaranteed that. So I'm hoping that they decide to stay with us, if that's what the question is. But I don't want to make any more trouble than we already have in terms of getting into the payment and what they may owe us or so forth. I was just trying to not put any pressure on their vote. Well, my understanding is that this MOU, this memo from Kim about the MOU-MOA got a reaction from them that was not positive. And that was, yeah, so that was part of it. So maybe actually extending and sitting down and talking to them can balance that out. It can go both ways. Yes, it can go both ways. Again, you invite, you don't know what they'll do. All right. Any other comments on Steve? I'm sorry, Doug. Yeah, but to Jim's point, if the message that they stay where they're at and they're still feeling like that, what are we going to accomplish between now and the 23rd to talk to them about what the future holds? If you don't take any action between now and the 23rd to talk to the capital fire, their last thoughts are going to be what's going to be making their decision. Yes. So it might be worth the effort to have a meeting between now and then to have a little chat. Yeah, I would think. Get them in a better mindset. Well, at least find out what's really making them. Want to leave. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Other board members want comments? Stephen, you want to make a comment? Please make it very brief and to the point. Yeah, I think that whoever your committee, I think maybe the people you appoint might be, should be part of the motion and maybe insist that this appoint subcommittee meet with the principles of CVPSA before the 23rd. Otherwise, this is all going to be a wasted effort. Yes. You've got, in effect, what you have is they got what they need with which we paid for, which was the funded proposal. So they think they can outrun and run on their own now. So if you can't get Saruti and Aldsworth and Will to see the advantages of strengthening one single regional organization, then they need to withdraw. So I would encourage that, Kim, you consider amending your motion to meet, have your subcommittee specify your members and have your subcommittee meet with them before the 23rd. Okay, Stephen. Thank you. Please mute. I would suggest we keep the two motions separate. One, let's decide if we want to invite them and then decide who. Is that agreeable? We have a motion on the table unless somebody wants to make a motion to amend it. We're promoting on the invitation to them. And then we'll do another motion as to who. All in favor of inviting a meet with them? Say aye. Any opposed? Passes. Okay. Now we'll entertain a motion as to who is on the committee. Sit down and meet with them. Doug is our liaison. So I presume he would be chair of this committee or can you? You're muted again. Sorry. I would like to be on the committee with Doug and Brent and Justin. What is this meeting going to take place? Well, we have to do it next week sometime. I mean, you'd have to call them, Doug and extend the invitation and try to work out a date. And maybe you can't do it. You know, it's very much last minute. I would just, you know, you know, I mean, right now, Kim, I'm not sure you're the best person to go there because they're upset about your memo. But I mean, that's a board to decide. I'm just saying that's a reality. Jim, you want to unmute yourself? I think trying to appoint the committee at a board level will be difficult. And I would move that the chair select the committee. Is there a second to that? Under normal circumstances, I would say that would be a good idea. But yeah, I think our chair has taken a lot of lightning bolts from a lot of places. And for reasons that should not have occurred, I think we all ought to be strong people and say, yes, I'll volunteer for this and put somebody in front of it. So with that in mind, I would volunteer to do that. Jim, I think you've got some good inside information and I'd like you to participate as well. My only concern is the amount of time, but it's only one meeting, so I will volunteer. Yes, I only see one meeting. And Justin, I really think you've got a good head on your shoulders and I would like to see you participate as well. I know. A new face, and I presume remotely, so it'll might be a little bit easier, no transporting. So is that a motion for Doug, Jim, and Justin to represent us? Or can we just all give a thumbs up? Okay, thank you all. Thank you. I saw a little thumb thumbs up from Sally. It was down in the right hand corner. I appreciate that. Yeah, okay. And thanks, Kim, for bringing this up. Okay. Anything else needs to come before? We're like over 30 minutes beyond. Thank you all for hanging in there. Really, really appreciate it. Lots of good discussion, difficult. Otherwise, I'm going to adjourn the meeting. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. What? Sally, who's the person I should reach out to? Skip Boffeld is President of Capital Fire Mutual Aid, and Paul Ceruti is Chair of the Communications Committee. All right, so either Skip or Paul or both of them? Correct. Okay. And I have one more thing to say down under other business. I just want for the record, I guess, for the minutes to show the letter that we all saw today that Mr. Whitaker sent to Tel Aviv. He referred we multiple times in it. I just wanted to make very clear that we, he is not part of CVPSA and that is not reflected on us. Agreed. Agreed. Thank you. I think we all agree with that, Sally. All right. Now I can adjourn the meeting. Thank you all. Have a good evening. What's left of it? Bye. Good night. Night.