Good evening, council.

Today is Tuesday, September 30th, 2025.

It is 6 p.m.

and I'll call this regular meeting of the Barrie City Council to order.

Mr.

Manager, members of the council, do you have any adjustments for the agenda?

Uh just one minor adjustment, uh, Mayor.

I'm requesting to move consent item 4D to be for dash B so that councilor Gustin, uh, she's uh conflicted from voting for that.

That way the council can take that item separately and she can she can yeah.

Okay, you want to put it under 4A?

Um it could be under 40 with the warrants, yeah.

We'll do it under we'll do it under 4A, but we'll still have uh I think we'll still have a quorum for 4A.

So that's it.

We'll be good.

Anything else, Council?

Okay, hearing none, we'll move on to visitors and communications.

Is there anyone wishing to address the council regarding an item that is not on the agenda?

Uh good evening, uh Mr.

Mayor.

Can you hear me?

Sir Tromley, how are you?

Well, and how are you?

Good, thank you.

I I would like to be heard uh by the council on a matter concerning last week's public hearing uh relative to the uh public hearing uh seeking the no match um disaster relief money from the state of Vermont.

Um I didn't really become aware of the full impact of that hearing until I read about it in uh Mr.

David Delcore's well-written article that appeared over the weekend, and I didn't even read it on the weekend, but I read it after the weekend and realized that the public hearing was uh more broad based than I had perhaps anticipated.

I thought it was mostly, if not all about development money to build more housing, but there was also components that was of more interest to me, which is uh the money that could be made available, should be made available, should be applied for by the city to address the very adverse impacts to Barry City from the Potash Brook.

And I've watched the Pot Ash Brook for more years than I care to admit.

I don't want anyone to do the math and figure out well, that guy must be at least that old.

Um so uh the the potash brook has uh uh for those who are not as familiar with it, uh it comes down from Woodland Drive, crosses cross Nelson Street, and uh goes down uh in somewhat parallel with Delmont Avenue and uh uh goes down through the courier park and then from there uh moves forward to uh uh the summer street and the summer street parking lot and crosses into the downtown area.

And uh it it uh was described as in the original paperwork as being uh uh dealing with the issues concerning the flooding in Perrier Park.

Well, the I think the issue is way broader than Perrier Park.

And and it goes deeply into the rest of the city and has very adverse impacts on buildings downtown and on businesses downtown.

And uh the uh original paperwork called for uh at least a half a million dollars, or at least that was one of the speculations that was presented by Mr.

Delcore.

And it was reduced down to $50,000.

And I think that the um uh potash brook is is a major problem, and this is no match money.

This is the kind of money uh that uh probably taxpayers wouldn't want to pony up through normal tax revenue.

Um it's a great opportunity to not just study the problem, but to do something about it.

I think uh the the solution uh is is somewhat obvious to me.

It it's it's not unlike what the uh what was done after the 1927 flood.

The uh the east barry dam was built to stop water before it penetrated the city corporate boundaries to get the because if you let the problem with it now is dealing with it once it gets inside of Barry City, there's no place to really uh remove it uh and and take down the level of harm.

I've talked with uh at one point briefly with Rich Baker about it.

And that's what I would uh think the city could study with asking for grant money and and uh go out and find land outside of Barrie City.

This is more of a problem that can be better solved by uh buying land or developing or uh or acquiring land rights to allow uh water to uh be uh uh built, uh put aside much in the way of East Barry Dam.

East Barry Dam uh can hold uh millions and millions of cubic feet of water when a flood event occurs.

And something would be uh by engineers could be designed similarly uh with a proper property rights to uh to store that water uh uh in a safe place where it can subsequently be released in a more measured safe way.

It would keep a lot of water, putting it bluntly, it would keep a lot of water off of the downtown area, which now impacts the uh vitality of the downtown when we have a flood event.

And that was what I was disappointed to see that uh stripped down dramatically in the in the uh uh uh plan, and I would respectfully ask the council uh to uh entertain or at least consider some kind of a of a motion to reconsider the approval of what was there to incorporate some approval of a significant commitment to seek grant money to uh work uh constructively to do something about the potash brook.

I think the potash brook is one of the biggest culprits that adversely affects flooding events in in the downtown area.

And uh that was what I was hoping you would um this is what I'm asking you to hear me on.

I'm asking you to consider that, as I'm not sure there is gonna be any other parts of money out there within a foreseeable future that would be available to do something like this.

And ultimately, that's really in my view the the real purpose of the money, it's to mitigate flood impacts.

And uh it should be one of the things that's considered uh in the grant application uh for uh uh the city of Barrie, though the the well-being of the citizens and their uh uh removal of the flood uh or the mitigation of flood impacts.

Okay, thank you.

Um appreciate it, Oliver.

There's uh always a backstory, there's always an explanation.

And uh let me start, and then I'm gonna turn it over to Councillor Gustin.

Uh, let me start by saying that I don't disagree with you, but if you look at the CDBGDR funds, the money that is made available, the $55 million being available, made available to Washington and Loyal County, the state leaned heavily into housing.

Roughly 65%.