Oh my gosh, I don't have a gavel.

Okay, we call it closing.

All right, let's see.

Let's bring the select board meeting of Tuesday, December 2nd, 2025 to order.

Here we are.

It's a regular meeting.

We've just concluded an executive session at which no decisions had been made.

At 4:30, the select board toured the new Brattleboro police substation at 77 Flat Street.

We had a site visit, and I commend all involved.

And so now we will go right to our tonight's agenda.

But first let me ask John.

John, was the meeting properly warned?

Yes, Liz, it was.

Thank you very much.

All right.

Yes.

Yeah.

Um I had requested that an item be placed on tonight's agenda that wasn't.

And I wanted to propose that it be added to the agenda for January 6th, the first meeting of the new year, which is the so I move that the removal of encampments be placed on the agenda for our first regular business meeting in January.

And that representatives of 69A Elliott, Groundworks, and the Town Health Officer be invited to speak to the current process and opportunities for collaboration and improvement.

I'm not sure if all of those elements can be included, but the agenda setting committee will discuss it and we'll get back to you.

Well, I I'd like to still make that motion at tonight's meeting.

I don't know that a motion is necessary.

Well, point of order, can we make that motion without it being a warned thing?

Is that a no?

For an agenda item, my understanding is that with Robert's rules of order that that can be added.

And if it's if it's not taken out, if it's not put on the agenda by the agenda setting committee, then a member of the Select Board could ask for a vote for it to be put on the next meeting agenda.

And I'm saying in at an understanding of the full schedule that we have that we will put that on the agenda for the first meeting of January.

I think you he can make a motion, and if it's seconded, you can discuss it and vote on it.

All right.

From reviewing the if I could just make a point of order.

Yes.

Just from reviewing the procedure for the select board.

I understand that there wouldn't be any discussion of the motion, that it's just an up and or down vote.

And that it will be taken up by the agenda setting committee.

That it would be then put on the what it says is the next meeting's agenda, and what I'm suggesting here is the first meeting of January.

All right.

Um and I'm I can I do not wish to guarantee that all of these um elements would be all of these persons would be able to discuss, present at this time.

Yeah, there's nothing in here saying that they would present, it's saying that they would be invited to present.

Very good.

Um Isaac has made a motion and I will read the motion and then we'll vote on it.

Uh to move that rem to move that removal of encampments be placed on the agenda for our first regular business meeting in January, and that representatives of 69A Elliott, Groundworks, and the town health officer be invited to speak to the current process and opportunities for collaboration and improvement.

Please raise your hand and say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Right.

All those in not in favor, please raise your hand and say no.

Aye.

Okay, that passes three to two, and we will uh endeavor to make that happen.

Thank you.

Um let's move to approve the meeting minutes from November 4th, November 12th, and November 18th.

Uh would someone like to make that motion?

I move that the select board approve the minutes from November 4th, November 12th, and November 18th.

Great.

Isaac has moved to uh approve the minutes from November 4th, November 12th, and November 18th.

All select board members in favor, please raise your hand and say aye.

Aye.

All right.

That passes 5-0.

And chair's remarks.

I don't have any particular remarks other than to remind everyone that this is a select board meeting and it's a regular meeting of the select board, and the public is invited to speak.

And do we have a lot of people to speak on on Zoom?

Or no one has raised the case.

No one at this time.

All right.

And because of the snow, we're going to see if we can limit people's comments instead of three minutes to two minutes so that we can all get home safely.

That's it.

Managers' comments.

Yes.

A few things.

Petitions for Brattleboro Town Officers.

Wyndham Southeast School District Board members and town meeting members will be available at the town clerk's office beginning Thursday, December 4th during their open business hours from Monday through Friday from 8 30 to 12 p.m.

and 1 p.m.

to 5 p.m.

With the following exceptions.

They will not be available Friday, December 5th through Friday, December 12th.

Petitions will only be available between the hours of 9 through 12 on those days.

Completions are due back to the town clerk's office by 5 p.m.

on Monday, January 26th for town officers and representative town meeting members.

Incumbents for representative town meeting members who have terms expiring will be mailed a notice of intent form in early January, and they must return their signed notice of intent form by 5 p.m.

on Monday, January 26th.

Town elections will be held on Tuesday, March 3rd at the American Legion located at 32 Linden Street.

An annual representative town meeting will begin on Saturday, March 21st, 2026, at 8 30 a.m.

in the high school gymnasium.

Also, the town would like to remind residents, businesses, and nonprofits to check with the town manager's office before planning events, especially those held on public property.

I guess we've had a few uh late late calls there.

So Jessica is uh asking that any street or sidewalk blocking permit, uh, which is required whenever a portion of a street or sidewalk is blocked, or for events, construction or moving trucks or events that people anticipate more than 50 attendees require an open meeting permit, and really giving her a little more advanced notice on these would be quite helpful.

So please reach out to Jessica in the town manager's office at JA Stickler at Brattleboro.gov or at 802-251-8115 if you require a permit.

Thank you.

Great.

Are there select board members who have comments or committee reports?

Yes.

Thank you, Liz.

I just wanted to say that I'm glad that we are trying to have this difficult conversation about homelessness and public order and public safety.

And I wanted to chip in with the perspective that I had a great meeting today with John and Chuck here and Darren Pacico, where we talked about some of these things and are going to be making some efforts to make uh information a little more clear, make it more obvious for people if their personal belongings have been moved or cleaned up, what they can do to get them.

And the reason I'm bringing it up is because I just want to highlight that town staff is doing a very difficult job that when they clean up these campsites.

This is a painful job for them to do.

Um I appreciate their willingness to do it with a smile for the good of the town.

I also want to balance against that that I just hope we can all recognize the impulse to try to do something for the people whose belongings are being taken.

Is that it's hard to think of a more desperate circumstance than somebody who is sleeping in a tent in the forest in winter in Vermont?

So hopefully we can hold both those thoughts at the same time and um try and make some small improvements for everyone.

Thank you.

Are there other select board members have comments I'd like to make?

Sure.

I'd love to make a comment.

I want to um especially thank the Department of Public Works for our plowed roads and salted and also that there's free sand at the town sandpile across from the town garage.

We my husband and I were there this morning filling up buckets so it's soft.

It's shovelable.

It's available.

So thanks thank you Amanda.

How about over here?

Isaac?

Thank you.

Yeah I also echo what um Amanda said is the appreciation for well all for all the departments and today in particular I was thinking about the Department of Public Works and thanking for all the snow removal work.

At the last meeting I mentioned the annual turkey trot that was Thanksgiving morning and just wanted to report that the there were more than 300 people who participated of all ages.

It was a really fun day fun event and it generated revenue for local food security efforts raising funds for both Food Works and the Vermont Food Bank.

And it's great to see Living Memorial Park in action with the skating rink that's open I had a chance to check it out on Saturday and encourage folks who are able and interested to to check that out.

And I know there's the the Ski Hill must be in operation soon if not already.

I wanted to also uplift the miniatures and the windows thank you to the folks who brought that energy and initiative it's really fun to see that in both businesses that are open and ones that are closed storefronts just great to see that energy.

I want to uplift the beloved shelter at the beloved community church on Town Cryer Drive which opened last night and opens again tonight at 8 p.m.

A you know a tremendous amount of vision and work has gone into this it's been a long time a lot of people concerned about emergency shelter and it's really cold out so I'm grateful for that work.

On Sunday there was a vigil in honor of in Pliny Park in honor of the National Guardsmen who were horrifically shot while deployed to DC by a suspected Afghan national I'd like to echo a statement from the Vermont Afghan alliance condemning the shooting and reminding this us that this was act was an act of an individual acting on their own and cannot be attributed to an entire community.

I spoke with the director of the the Vermont Afghan alliance um just the other day and she is encouraging public officials across the state to echo this sentiment.

What they posted on social media was Afghan allies resettled across Vermont risk their lives in service to U.S.

military and diplomatic missions over a 21 year period in Afghanistan today Afghan allies allies across Vermont work tirelessly to rebuild their new lives grow Vermont's workforce and tax base contribute to the Vermont economy and to the vibrancy of dozens of Vermont communities.

Afghan allies are our neighbors, our friends and our colleagues I want to uplift ECDC's refugee resettlement work here in Brattleboro and encourage all of us to stand up for our most vulnerable neighbors.

And finally I just wanted to follow up on our last select board meeting we discussed some concerns that I had brought from residents about no trespass orders.

And as policymakers it's our job to understand the potential impact of our policies and there's a lot more learning for all of us to do.

We all want Brattleboro to be the best it can be and I'm committing to committing to working with my colleagues here to make progress with full awareness of the to the best of our ability of all the needs and the resources available in our community.

Thank you anything that you'd like to say all right very good let's begin our business with uh the consent agenda John you want to give up oh I'm sorry please members of the public two minutes a pop Eric no actually first I have a statement that I carefully worked on for the last couple of days and it comes in at two minutes and thirty seconds and I'd like permission to read the whole statement.

Certainly Eric Okay.

And I'm I actually have an assistant to do it.

I'm doing a reading because it's I'm Heidi Fisher this is Eric Karen.

These are Eric's words.

How does Brattleboro solve its problems?

A motion passed at the last select boarding meeting that adds a fee to the cost of trash bags.

To me this illustrates the board's unusual problem solving approach.

For those who are not here's what happened DPW's new plan for trash pickup was approved by the board.

The board then determined that the bag price in the just approved plan was too high for some residents and made a motion to amend the plan.

A motion was made to charge an extra fee on the trash bags and then use the proceeds to provide bags to eligible people essentially requiring one group of townspeople to pay for a town service and then provide that service to another group for for free.

Town employees were directed and to create and implement this program.

How does this illustrate the problem?

In my mind, this is yet another example of town government overstepping its mandate to provide essential services while also being financially irresponsible.

Our town is in a financial crisis.

We cannot afford to create additional services to meet the perceived or even real needs of every person in our town.

The trash bag motion was presented and passed as only an outline of an idea with no actual plan and many unknowns.

How much will it cost to run this plan?

How many town employee hours will this require and at what cost?

Does the select board have the legal right to charge fees to residents for the purpose of a providing a gift of free service to a select group of the community?

What are the unexpected consequences?

How and who determines who's eligible?

How and who determines how free bags are distributed?

When a plan is implemented and we expect town employees to be able to do their current and di will sorry, when a plan is implemented, implemented, will we expect town employees to be able to do their current and additional work without hiring more employees?

Will all town services now be on a sliding scale?

And what would that mean for town employees to implement implement these systems?

Once a plan like this is added, it is difficult to remove.

Thank you very much.

Are there other members?

Actually, um that was my written statement.

My last couple seconds is to say I do not uh uh choose to just you know mention every motion or every action the board makes.

I bring this up because I think it was not thought through and it has very huge ongoing impact that affects our town.

Thank you for listening.

Thank you.

Can I clarify a few things?

Uh it's not a warned item, so no.

Uh are there mother other members of the public who have statements that they'd like to make?

Uh, we have Jamie Moore online.

Great.

Jamie Moore, welcome.

Well, actually, uh, this is attorney Ron Ferrara zooming in from Jamie Moore's laptop.

Good evening.

Um I just wanted to mention that um my client is there for one of your consent agenda items.

Normally I would be attending in person, but the weather being what it is, uh lucky I got this to work.

Um, but uh that would be agenda item B, J and K grocery Store LLC.

I know you're not there yet, but I just wanted to mention uh for the benefit of the the board that I do represent Mr.

Wong.

And uh if you have any questions, I might be able to answer them, but I believe he's also there in the audience tonight, and I wanted him to know that I'm I'm here as well.

So that's all I had to say.

And uh very good meeting so far.

I appreciate the time.

Thank you.

All right.

Uh anyone else from the public who would wish to speak about an item that is not on tonight's agenda.

Seth.

Yeah, Mr.

Fay.

Mr.

Fay.

Very good.

Mr.

Faye?

Hello, can you hear me?

I can't uh Okay, good.

Uh thanks.

Be really quick.

Uh I spoke at the November 18th meeting, public participation, and it wasn't included in the minutes.

I'm curious as to why that would be.

Was it not worthy enough?

Or uh an oversight.

Anyway, that's all.

Thanks.

Have a good day.

We'll look into that.

Thank you.

Uh Kurt Dimes.

Kurt Dimes.

Mr.

Dimes.

I better.

Good evening.

Good evening, everyone.

My name is Kurt Gimes.

I work with Brattleboro Common Sense.

I live in Brattleboro.

Um, there is quite a lot of tension built up around the budget.

And I would warn the select board that there may be a um a budget referendum.

And in the usual fashion, when the select board gets a budget referendum dumped in its laps.

And uh people um say okay.

But I think it's it's gonna be go beyond, it's gonna require a little bit more than a tweak.

Uh I think the select board is overworked.

And that's one of the ways we get into these problems.

I think it's overworked because we don't use the select the uh representative town meeting enough.

Um the select board is charged with the day-to-day this is by the charter.

The select board's jobs to handle day-to-day jobs, day-to-day affairs of the town.

And the RTM is a source of ideas, proposals, and commentary for the town.

Ideas, proposals, and commentary.

It is the source of those by the charter.

And uh since the um reforms of 1959, the select board has stayed in the way.

Preventing the representative town meeting from being a source.

Now you have so many new things on your agenda all the time.

And it's just uh it's just a terrible lot of work.

You're not using or not allowing the RTM to rise to its potential.

If you do it today, of course they're not gonna do a great job on everything, but over the years it's got to have to have to come because your jobs are getting heavier and heavier.

I you have my sympathy for that, but it is some to some degree in the the doing of the select board that it always wants to you know gather work and take care of things in a leadering in a leading kind of fashion while the RTM is supposed to be doing that.

Do I have a couple more seconds?

A new seventy second.

All right.

Anyone else?

Anyone on Zoom?

Excellent.

So uh John, I'll ask you the question I asked you a couple minutes ago.

Okay, we'll get around to it eventually.

A sketch on the consent agenda.

Yep.

So we have five items on the consent agenda tonight.

If you approve this agenda, you'll be approving a ninety-eight dollar and five cent per ton bid award for winter road salt to Appalachie Salt of Rochester, New York.

You'll be approving a second-class liquor license and tobacco license for JK Grocery Store LLC at 69 Elliott Street.

You will be approving a public notice of the town's intent to convey an easement over parcel 003004 to the Friends of West River Trail and to get convey any salvage surplus material located on that parcel.

You'll be ratifying the decision to transfer funds not immediately needed for ongoing obligations to community bank and the amount of seven million sixty-three thousand three hundred and thirty-four dollars in order to get a higher rate of interest, and you'll be authorizing the select board and town manager to sign the loan agreement for an amount not to exceed one million six hundred and twenty thousand for 40 years at zero percent interest to fund the secondary pleasant valley water storage tech.

Excellent.

Thank you, John.

Uh is there anyone who wants to pull an item from the consent agenda?

Madam Chairwin, I would like to pull an item.

I'm wondering if it could be discussed right after the vote on we have to wait, or do we have to wait till the very end?

Um and so I'd love to ask a couple questions on the item number um or item letter B.

J and K grocery.

Yeah, um I I can see that.

I'll I'll pull it and we'll all have to wait to the end of the way to the end of the meeting.

Well, we'll vote on it.

We'll vote on polling.

Do you wish to vote on the I do wish to vote on the right?

Um Amanda has made a motion to pull item B, Jane K grocery Store LLC.

Um from the consent agenda.

All select board members in favor, please raise your hand and say aye.

Okay.

Uh Peter you're you're a no.

I'm just present.

Present.

Okay, that's 401.

And it will be added to the end of the meeting.

Um in the meantime, hang on.

Well, hang on.

I mean if there are a way to cover this right now.

I mean, we've got this meeting is probably not going to get out until 10 30 at night.

I think there is precedent for addressing it right out of the gate.

So all right.

Uh I'll take that under advisement and it's at my discretion.

So yes.

We have had two people asked.

We had a very nice attorney on before and the gentleman sitting here.

So let's pull this back to Amanda.

But first, we have to vote on the rest of the consent agenda.

So let's vote on the rest of the consent agenda.

Um can I have a motion for an amended motion about the consent agenda?

Yeah, I move to accept the consent agenda with item B removed.

All right.

Amanda has moved to accept the consent agenda without item B.

All those in favor, please raise your hand and say aye.

Aye.

That's for Peter.

I'm just here.

Okay.

So that's 401.

And now instead of the first item of regular business, we will have item B, which is J and K grocery Store LLC.

John, do you want to talk a little about that before we have our discussion?

Yep.

Um unless Hilary Francis is online, Seth, uh I'll cover this if she is not yet.

Sir.

Nope.

Okay.

So this is an application for a second class liquor license and a tobacco license for 69 Elliott Street, which is previously Indo-American grocery.

And uh there are no outstanding taxes or fees owed to the town.

The applicant has never held a prior liquor license in any state.

And uh the applications for both the liquor license and the tobacco license are included in your backup materials.

They've been reviewed and approved by the Brattleboro Police Department and by the Brattleboro Fire Department.

Um following review by the local liquor and tobacco commissioners, the applications will be subject to review by the Vermont Department of Liquor Control for final action.

And uh Hugh Hugh and Wang from J and K Grocery and uh uh understand his attorney as well are present in the select board meeting for to answer any questions that the board may have.

All right.

Uh let's Seth, you'll get the attorney up, and then Amanda ask your question.

Yeah, and it might be just the order of doing things.

So I as I look at uh page 21 of our packet and the the DLL application for education details.

I don't see any details there.

Is it required for um an applicant to do their um DLL education prior to applying or have it be in process?

And where is that process?

Uh these are great, thank you.

I I I don't see my my picture on the screen, but I assume you can see me here.

Um thank you.

It's old around here.

Um so anyway, the um the certification with respect to the education has been completed.

That documentation was submitted.

Mr.

Huang completed the class, and in fact, the certification was issued by the state and was included in the package up to the liquor authority there.

If they haven't sent it back down to the town, that's probably an oversight.

I can certainly get it to you tomorrow if you want to see the piece of paper, but that education requirement has been satisfied.

Great.

Do you have additional questions about that?

Um I think it looks clear.

That was the one question I had.

All right.

Uh I just want to say that um in review of the work this evening.

I had a conversation with the police chief about this application, and she assured me that the uh application had been reviewed and approved by the police department.

Are there other members who have any questions?

I have a a question.

Just in terms of like, you know, I have in this the memo prepared for this evening from the town staff, there can there's reference to concerns about the establishment that's been located at 69A Elliott Street.

And I am I'm have concerns about the liquor and tobacco enterprise in our downtown area and how that might affect the feeling downtown and I'm curious if that is a consideration that you know and I'm I know we don't have the attorney town attorney with us, but is this something that we can factor into our decision making, or does our decision making have to like what is the criteria for us in making this decision?

Well to begin with, um they have a legal right to apply for this application, the store, the previous the previous uh operators operated it with these selling tobacco and tell and selling liquor.

And so they go through the regular process, and I think the zoning is such that this location can be at this.

Um there are also establishments where smoking and uh you can buy cigarettes in numerous locations in town, and you can certainly consume liquor in various locations in town.

So I, you know, every once in a while what's the name of that group that can see Holloway.

Yeah, um uh building better.

Building better futures comes and tells us about a location where liquor or cigarettes are sold that are questionable.

Um but I don't think that that's the case this evening.

Um, you want to uh so the town clerk Hilary Francis is online, and I think she can uh help uh help inform your authority on this.

Great.

Hilary Hello Can you hear me?

I haven't seen you in some time.

Thanks.

I don't think that my video is working very well.

I'm sorry about that.

Um so first of all, the organization that you were talking about is building a positive community.

Um that's what they're called.

Um I would definitely want to get town attorney involved in the conversation.

My understanding is um, you know, sort of what Liz was saying, if you allow it, you allow it.

It's zoned accordingly.

Um and it currently exists.

I would assume that you could pass an ordinance that says the town of Brattleboro is a dry community and we don't sell alcohol in our downtown.

Um, or you could say um we're limiting the number of establishments in our downtown that sell or serve alcohol or tobacco.

Um those would certainly be questions for the town attorney.

Um approving a liquor or tobacco license, I believe that it's you approve it or you don't.

Um conditions are not something that can be put on.

You can put you can put a condition on and say in six months we want them to come back and prove that they're doing X, Y, and Z, otherwise we will revoke their license.

Um but the DLL will only issue or not issue the license, and they will issue or not issue it for a year Does that answer?

Thank you, Hillary.

And we learned uh within the past year that we cannot put time restrictions on that, that they are also set by the state of Vermont for like a bar.

That's correct.

Yeah.

All right.

Does that answer your question, Lisa?

Somewhat.

It's it's helpful.

Um I understand that we could speak with the town attorney about a possible ordinance, and we can't condition this license.

But my question is I think is do we have the authorities say no, we actually aren't comfortable with having uh a liquor and tobacco, you know, liquor and tobacco being sold in this spot.

Why would we have an issue with somebody doing business in our downtown?

Um I I get it.

I don't smoke, so it's not my thing, but there are people that smoke.

Why why do we have an issue?

Having cigarettes sold in our downtown.

Um I I mean I'm concerned about the um the health and well-being of members of our community and the atmosphere, the the our downtown um and having lived in places that were very close to liquor and liquor establishments or places that were selling liquor.

I've seen like you know, oh it's had a negative impact.

I know how it can sometimes exacerbate there's a prevalence of liquor stores in high poverty areas and it can exacerbate poverty.

And so I have concerns for those reasons.

Um but if the direction is that we should from the from the if the guidance from our town clerk is that it would be more appropriate to have some sort of ordinance about that, that that would be a more appropriate um route if we have these sorts of concerns, then I would defer it to the town clerk's guidance.

I would think such an ordinance.

Yeah, please, Hillary.

Um the ordinance piece, I don't know if that move, and that would be a question for the town attorney.

I believe from previous conversations with the town attorney and the Department of Liquor and Lottery to answer your question directly, Isaac.

Um there are certain grounds that you could deny an application.

Um if an applicant has uh is applying for renewal and they've had a number of violations.

Um you could set conditions that they need to meet, and then they need to come and speak to you.

Um if they're not zoned um to be serving or selling alcohol or tobacco.

Um if they are delinquent on paying their taxes or utilities if they have not obtained a business license.

Um those are the types of things.

So when I receive a liquor license application or a tobacco license application, part of my process is I reach out to all of the different departments to say, hey, assessor's office, do they have their business license?

Treasurer's office, have they have they paid their taxes?

Um do they have any loans out that are past due?

Um police department, fire department.

Do you all have any concerns with complaints at that location?

And then that's the administrative process that I go through before I submit a memo to you all recommending staff, like staff recommending approval of that.

Does that help?

It's very helpful to me.

It sounds like this is an administrative question and not a policy.

Not a policy related question.

Right.

So may I ask I'm just gonna sw circle back to the education.

Was the training done in person or was it done online?

And the reason I ask is because we had a precedent where um a business did a training online, an individual actually was caught in violation, and we requested that that um business come back in six months after doing training.

So I believe that the train I I can't wait because I don't have the documentation in front of me, but uh I do believe in this case that the training was taken online.

Um the certification is by uh a program that is run by the state liquor authority, and I mean it's it satisfies their requirements.

Maybe Mr.

Huah would like to answer the question directly, but the idea is that the certification process included the education requirement, you have to carry in a workman's compensation insurance.

There are a number of boxes you have to check before your application is even reviewed by the state, and then they send it down to the town level.

Um I can again I could supply the missing certification with respect to what you'd like to see in the paperwork package there, but um I don't know if 100% that it was an online class that Mr.

took it.

Oscar I'm not totally sure why we're applying this level of scrutiny to a brand new business.

Thank you.

With no so I mean I I think it's good that we're doing our due diligence, but just putting my two cents in that I'm happy to approve this.

So thank you.

Um we are uh 20 minutes over schedule.

Yes, sir.

Just one other quick comment that might be helpful to the board with respect to the question of downtown uh you know sales of liquor and alcohol.

Um you'll notice that conspicuously absent from this request is the tobacco substitute uh permit.

That is a separate animal, and uh my client is not applied for that just yet.

That's the kind of thing that would include uh paraphernalia and flavored uh tobacco substitutes, etc.

vapes, et cetera.

Uh that might be an opportunity if you see a permit request for something like that to have a more robust comment comment and question and answer.

Thank you.

Okay, board, are we ready to vote?

Yes.

I appreciate the due diligence.

Thank you.

Uh would you like to make a motion, Amanda?

Um.

Would someone else make a motion?

All right.

Sure, I will.

Thank you.

Um I move to approve the second class liquor license and tobacco license for JK Grocery Store Inc.

located at 69 Elliott Street.

Uh Oscar has moved to approve a second class slicker license and tobacco license for J and K Grocery Inc.

located at 69 Elliott Street.

All select board members in favor of this motion, please raise your hand and say aye.

Aye.

Okay, five zero.

Thank you for your attendance uh and your attendance on Zoom, and uh I congratulate you on your new business.

Now back to item A, which I believe is Kate Traskis.

Kate.

Kate is here as from the downtown Brattleboro Alliance with her 2025 annual report.

Is there anything you'd like to say in introduction?

No.

All right.

Welcome, Kate.

Thank you very much.

Um very happy to be here.

Um Kate Traskis, I'm the executive director of Downtown Brattleboro Alliance.

We are your designated downtown organization nonprofit um for the town of Brattleboro.

And this is a program, a long-standing program with the state of Vermont, um, the downtowns of which there are 24 designated downtowns across the state.

Um, and so my organization in one form or another has been the designated downtown org for over 25 years.

Um I thought maybe we could just start.

I have a slideshow that's just kind of a visual representation of the work that we do at the DBA.

Um, Seth, it's not timed or anything, but if you want to just kind of uh flip through the images, I think that it's a great example of the downtown that the DBA aspires to um and the one that we see every day.

Thank you.

I guess I should have put music to that.

Um like a the record should show that we all enjoyed those pictures.

Okay, everybody was smiling.

Add that to the uh to the report.

Um yeah, so I guess tonight I just wanted to highlight a couple of things from the past year.

Um, you know, we've welcomed several new businesses to downtown in this past year.

Um we've engaged hundreds of volunteers.

We've hosted dozens of events, um, including two new ones, our um luncheon lot uh in Preston uh on Flat Street, as well as the Teen Street event um in partnership with gosh dozens of organizations that we partner with across the town, other nonprofits.

Um we do work with the business support and development, uh our brick and mortars, but also entrepreneurs and what I would call micro businesses that we invite into the downtown.

And I think really all of this is because we believe that our downtown is vital to the overall health of the community and the town of Brattleboro and the region.

We are so lucky to be in this creative corner of Vermont with an outsized footprint of arts and culture and outdoor recreation and a community that is so invested and active in supporting each other and the work.

And so I think something that to take away from the images that were shared is that downtown isn't about one person or one organization.

It's really about all of us showing up day in and day out as business owners or as nonprofits or as the community to support this very special place.

Bringing people downtown to have a shared positive felt experience to bring friends and neighbors to spend some dollars and really to bolster the rest of the town.

Wonderful.

Let me just remind my colleagues that there's no motion on this item.

It's just a discussion.

Well, I think based on our, I don't know if it's the charter, um, Chapter 15.

Um but each year the DBA comes back to the select board with our annual update.

Um and I think the one formal piece of the process is the downtown improvement district, the special assessment tax funds that come to the DBA.

And then that that's part of our budget.

Yes, that would be uh question for you to whether to include that on the warning for the representative town meeting at the end of January.

But typically the DBA will come and ask you to consider including that on the warrant.

Are you doing that now?

Are you going to come back and do that?

I'd love to do that now.

Okay.

Ask away.

Okay.

Um would you please consider including the downtown Brattleboro Alliance assessment tax on the when is it on?

Representative town meeting.

Is that here in your summary that you it's in our packet?

I don't believe there's anything written in the packet now.

Do I need to submit a specific formal request?

Well, it's it's usually on the warning, right?

No, it's typically on the warning.

We have to ask for a specific number to be on the warning.

Um asked for the same number every year for Everett since I can remember.

I think it's $80,000.

Uh if you wanted to, we could probably come up with a motion now, but you really it would be not until you do the warning that you officially would be doing anything.

So I think you could discuss whether you want to consider including that as part of your budget and warning.

Uh sorry.

So am I hearing you right that we can discuss the awesome things that DBA does and how like excited we are for the work that they're doing, but we cannot actually vote on a motion to put any funds towards projects unless it's in a direct it's it's a it's a warned agenda item.

Is that correct?

No, the I mean you could do that.

You could instruct us to incorporate something into the budget as part of budget revisions if you would like.

Um you could uh do any number of things on this if if you wanted to.

So it was a warned item and could this item to be named later, could these funds come from the revolving loan fund because it's economic development in much the same way that the BDCC is?

No, it's a little um different because we have a downtown improvement district, and what the article that you typically put on the town meeting warrant says is would the uh would the would the town raise those taxes specifically for the DBA and the amount of 80,000?

And to be clear, these are the downtown improvement district is a very clear geography, and the um commercial property owners within the district are the ones who receive this special assessment tax um for the downtown program specifically.

Great.

If I'm remembering right, it's not in the general fund budget, right?

It's a special assessment.

Special assessment for these special taxpayers.

Right.

And there are special tax breaks and incentives that these commercial properties receive by being part of the downtown program.

And and I do believe technically it's in the general fund budget, but it's a pass through.

Excellent.

So um Do we want to take a vote on that or we want to wait until January?

I'm happy to wait until we do the agenda, but I'd like to do it after the warning.

Just to set a precedent that's I think we all want to go back and talk about how wonderful the DBA is.

Oh great.

And and the work that they do.

And then we will uh essentially hold on that item until it's ready to be warned.

That's all right with you.

Does that mean I'm coming back to this?

No, not necessarily.

I mean, I'll come anyway, but not necessarily.

I don't think that's necessary because we'll all remember your presence here and all the lovely pictures.

Okay.

But I think that um because there isn't a uh a motion, I think well I'll just open up to my colleagues to comment.

Sure.

And then anyone in the public and take it from there.

Sounds good.

Isaac, you want to start?

Yeah, just thank you for all of the energy and community building that you do in Brattleboro.

It's great to see this list of the events and I'm remembering all the positive things that we've heard about these.

Thank you.

Peter?

Oh, sorry.

Do you have anything that you'd like to add?

Okay, give me a minute.

All right.

I'll say something.

Um you guys are amazing.

Thank you.

I'm uh like the pictures are don't do you justice and all the amazing work that you're do for our downtown um on uh a very slim budget.

And um it's uh you're bearing the lion's share.

But um I asked John in my meeting today, I was like, why do we do this in December when they're like flat out with everything?

Market on Maine, the miniatures, the outreach, the I mean it's a So thank you for coming.

I'm sure you're exhausted.

Um and just so excited to celebrate this awesome holiday season with everything happening downtown.

Thanks, Amanda.

Oscar?

No, no comment other than just thank you, and I know how hard you and Aaron work.

Um I just um in addition to my compliments.

I just want to mention that in your your several pages here are quite informative.

Uh and they talk about all these new businesses that have come.

And um I think I think the general impression is that there are not a lot of new businesses coming to downtown.

But to the contrary, I I think you said there's eight.

Yeah.

And uh I think I've I've been to them all.

They're great.

Yeah.

And um and all of these various initiatives.

You know, it's not just Gowing Walk, but so many different things.

And I think um I I think we should note that you're you're flexible enough and willing to take on this miniature project, which is huge and really wonderful for our town.

And I I can't imagine how many people are going to come and watch and you know go have a cookie at Amy's and discuss which one was their favorite.

I've done that already.

Yeah, yeah.

It's really fun.

And I appreciate um you jumping in uh and working with Mel, who's given the town a tremendous gift.

Um if Peter has anything you wants to add.

I um you know I have the opportunity to talk to Kate often and always in those moments tell her how much I I appreciate the effort that you and Aaron um pull, how you pool all your resources and um you know check pride sometimes just to get things done.

And I just want you to know that I recognize that and all the hard work that you do and and kind of helping to coordinate and point people in the right directions just to get things done and help it move seamlessly.

So you know, again, thank you.

Thank you.

I guess I just want to follow up on something that I heard from all of you, and one is um we are scrappy and um and and it takes a lot of grit, I think, to do this work.

So, you know, I introduce myself, but my um my partner in crime, um, Aaron Skags, who works with me every day is is part-time.

So we have a staff of one and a half people.

Um we have an excellent board and you know, hundreds of volunteers.

Um and we are, I think uh a strength of this organization is that we have the ability to be flexible and say yes and kind of rise to the moment of different things when they're presented.

Um that comes from really the passion that we have for this town and for um for all the potential and the possibility.

Um so thank you for recognizing that.

I also wanted to say that um the town of Brattleboro has been one of our the biggest partner um that we've had.

Every department um public works, I know is up later tonight.

They are phenomenal.

Um I love to just kind of go over there and and join the meetings.

Um, the library, the rack, uh everybody um just is always willing to be um be a partner and it's it's phenomenal.

That's great, Kate.

Thank you.

I think um While while we were talking, John has written a motion that might be appropriate.

I was gonna say with with all the talk of how busy you are.

Uh let's see if we can avoid you having to come back.

Okay.

You'd be okay with that.

I'll be great with that.

Uh with that, I'd like to make a motion to place an item on the warning for the 2026 RTM to authorize the collection of an assessment on the properties in the downtown district in the total amount of $80,000.

Great.

Peter has made a motion to place an item on the warning for the 2026 RTM to authorize the collection of an assessment on properties in the downtown district in the total amount of $80,000.

Well, select board members in favor of this motion, please raise your hand and say aye.

And there we are, five zero.

Thanks.

Can we thank you again?

I don't think so.

But thank you for coming.

Thank you.

Kate.

All right.

Um the chair.

Oh, one of my boxing gloves.

There you go.

All right.

Next is the Brattleboro Department of Public Works.

Dan Tyler, Darren Pachico, and Pete Lynch.

Off to the side.

John, is there anything you want to?

Yeah.

Um, I'll just pretty much just turn it over to Dan.

Uh DPW constitutes about 14 percent of your budget, so it's a significant component and uh looking forward to their presentation.

Great.

Great.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Um we've got some slides Seth's gonna bring up.

So we're gonna go through um our FY27 public works budget proposal um the for the general fund portion of public works.

It's kind of broke into two uh sections, the operational budget and then the capital program.

And then at the end, we're gonna um talk briefly about um some continued stormwater utility planning.

Um quick slide on our values.

Uh a few years ago, a committee of employees um got together and and started discussing establishing a set of values for public works.

Um safety, integrity, and service to community are uh what they came up with.

It they're really become integrated into our day-to-day operations and you know the guide everything we do.

I mean, even as we talk about tight budgets and you know tough situations.

They're non-negotiables for the standard of work we're performing.

So um and that's really we see public works as the a foundation to our community.

You know, a lot of what we're doing is behind the scenes.

Um people are relying on it every day, but they don't necessarily see it.

Um, you know, whether it's the road maintenance, the guys that are out plowing right now, the guys that will be in later um clearing the sidewalks so they're ready for you to walk on in the morning.

Um we're kind of out there and everywhere.

Um organizational chart we included really to kind of break out what we're talking about tonight, um, because we have the general fund portion of the budget which covers uh the highway division, fleet nate fleet maintenance, facilities maintenance, um the proposed and approved compost collection.

And that those are those are the items and services we're here to discuss tonight later.

Are they in green?

Yes.

I'm colorblind.

I'm glad there's two of you.

Later in the winter, we'll uh discuss the utility.

Okay.

Um the services, there's the next slide really outlines the critical kind of essential services that each of the divisions provides.

Um this is where I guess back to the up the last slide.

The um staffing is a huge part of our um budget, right?

And you know, you when you look at our budget detail, you'll you'll see that there are increases that represent anticipated contractual increases, and then there's several areas where benefits that were previously accounted for in different areas of the budget have been moved into the DPW budget.

And you know, those represent the majority of uh the increases that you'll see tonight when you look at our um budget in detail.

Um the services, the the kind of the essential services that each division provides, that's kind of where you'll see when you look through the budget, you'll see increases for things like fuel and construction materials and utilities and various you know contracted services.

That makes up the rest of the budget increases.

Those are kind of range from three to eight percent, and most of those were increased based on escalators that the finance department used when they projected the FY27 budget last year.

Um there's a few areas where they're higher where we you know what we've been tracking costs and we we know that things have exceeded those projections, so we've adjusted accordingly.

Um those are really the when you talk about our operational budget, those are the two areas where you see increases, staffing and benefits, and um those general kind of inflationary costs through that are broken down to be able to provide the services that we do.

Um those services are always expanding.

Um in the last year uh we've become a dig Safe member.

Um so anyone who excavates in town is required to call dig safe.

Um we've never been a member, and none of our stuff would get marked out.

We are now, so someone calls, we go out and mark our utilities, um traffic lights, something you would think would be a DPW function, has always been done by the fire department.

And in their transition and reworking their alarm superintendent, we've taken on those responsibilities in town.

Um we've really tried to uh establish a crew that's spending more time downtown.

Um we feel like that's an area that's been maybe neglected a little bit over the last years, and we're just trying to spruce things up and kind of have a regular just just more of an appearance and responsiveness in the downtown.

Um then with the compost collection, we're proposing uh uh leaf, the compost collection and the leaf collection for FY27.

So along with those services, um we're we're constantly involved in community service um functions, gallery walks, Kate mentioned the lunch in the lots, um 4th of July, all sorts of events around town.

A lot of that is uh providing traffic control, um we we show up when we can and um let kids climb on equipment, you know, however, we can be part of it.

Um holiday decorations, we just revamped all the lights across Main Street, um a lot of the the old ones were going out.

Um so we're involved in a lot of different community service functions as well.

And then kind of outside of the scope of what you'd traditionally think of DPW, um we've been involved a lot in different projects around town.

The the transition of the parking system, um, the upcoming library improvements, the police substation, um we do a lot with the tree board with uh trimming and planting trees around town, um voting.

Um we set up the voting stations, the polls every year, um, and then a lot of event and emergency planning.

Um really all those things put together kind of make up our operations, let's say.

Um the day-to-day stuff we're doing.

And then um additionally, we have our capital capital program.

Um paving is always a big piece of this.

A few years ago we had the town wide assessment done of the streets in town.

Um a consultant drove around town with a camera and assessed all the all of the paved roads for cracking, rutting, um a bunch of different factors and scored them essentially.

Um since those images were taken, we have continued to upgrade the program with work that we've completed.

Um and then there's a depreciation factor just for age.

Um and despite all the work that's been happening around town by our crews and the VTrans crews.

Um if you look at the chart here, um about 20 20.26 miles of our road still need major rehab.

At a tune of almost $15 million just for the major rehabs.

Um total work, you know.

If we said we wanted to go out tomorrow and bring everything up to a uh up to par eight almost $19 million.

Um if you look at the next slide, this is one we we've looked at in the past and it has been updated to reflect the changes since the imagery was taken.

Um the score, the so the RSR is the score, uh 0 to 100.

So we're at a 63.89 um right now.

And that's up from a 63.5 two years ago.

So you know, the VTrans paving seven miles of downtown really didn't change a whole lot.

Um when we looked at this a couple years ago, you look at the flat line to kind of the maintain things in the current condition, that was in the neighborhood of 700 and 700,000.

It's at $880,000 now with taking into account the depreciation of condition and the increased cost.

Um we have $500,000 proposed for capital paving.

Um you can look at the chart and see what the condition is, what's going to happen to the condition of the roads at that funding level.

So I mean it just kind of talks to the point that by everything's expensive, but by pushing it out and not kind of addressing those major needs, things are just getting more more and more expensive.

The next one looks at sidewalk.

So we've really emphasized sidewalk improvements as much as we could can in the last, let's say, four years.

Um the funding level has been right around 200,000, and that gets us about a quarter mile of sidewalk.

Um conditions vary, that price is up and down a little bit.

Um kind of industry standard for we have about 36 miles of sidewalk in town.

Industry standard, we should be doing about 1.4 miles of um sidewalk a year.

So you know that's 1.2 million dollars, I think was the cost of that.

Um one thing the to state on the sidewalk, um, these slides will be available.

So in this slide here, you actually can see what public works has done themselves plus what they put to bid on projects.

Um in the previous years, we really um have made an impact in the last, like Dan said, four years on trying to push more footage of sidewalk to get completed because the infrastructure is failing so so quickly.

Um it's still a goal of ours to keep continue.

Um 200,000 usually out of the capital fund is always contracted out.

Um and then there's a budget line within our operational budget, which is sidewalk repairs.

Um that money is usually used for DPW staff to do what they can.

I will say the last two years DPW staff has done quite a bit, but it has also pulled us away from other work that is important.

Probably was.25 miles.

But we're trying to keep up, so we're kind of getting DPW staff to try to do more, and it's pulling us away from other work.

So the FY27 proposed number right now is 25,000.

So I think you know our plan would that's not going to allow us to contract any work, but if we dump that into our staff, you know, we could probably get some more work done.

Um I don't think we'll see numbers like we've seen the last couple years.

Um really some of these bigger years are you know two years of funding added up.

You can look at the longer sections of sidewalk and kind of see those represent the stuff that was contracted and then the piecemeal stuff around town is often the stuff that our crews do.

Um then last year um there were several other capital lines implemented into the capital plan.

Um bridges and large culverts, intersections, retaining walls, um bicycle infrastructure has been in there and up and down for a little while.

Um the the they all rep there's sharp cuts represented in all of these lines for FY27.

Um we were excited last year to see, you know, it felt like a step in the right direction.

I mean, a hundred thousand dollars was the the budget number on a lot of these lines.

100,000 doesn't really go too far towards capital improvements, but it it kind of allowed us to look forward and think, okay, if we put these two years together, we can tackle this project and we can start planning for it.

And uh with these sharp cuts, it's really gonna impact what we can and can't get done.

You know, I think there's areas where we can progress planning, but there's definitely going to be some projects that are stalled.

Um, you know, like the Williams Street and Avenue area where we just did a lot of um spent a lot of money on studying that.

You know, the next step would be to progress that to engineering.

You know, that that may have to wait.

Um we've got some engineering in the works on church street on a retaining wall.

Um I'm not sure we'll be able to push that one forward.

Um I mean it definitely it's definitely going to impact the the work we can get done to a lot of the kind of critical larger infrastructure in town.

Um I think one thing to really note here is is in in this slide here, we we put some projects that would be impacted.

This is stuff that we're currently working on.

Um then also I mean what's really not shown here is in you know retaining walls.

There's 55 town retaining walls in town that are owned by the town here, and in the last five years replaced one.

Um 100,000 does not replace a retaining wall.

Um and usually what we do there is we take capital funding for a year and we we add it up for a few years while we're working on the kind of the preliminary plans, and then we finally gain enough funding to do that project.

Um but cutting it to 15,000 um is going to be a challenge for us.

Um but we're gonna continue to use what we have available to make sure we can maintain what we can with the funds we have.

So we're here to show that there is a lot of infrastructure here in town that continues to age, and uh uh we're here to show you that with some of these numbers, we could be pushing it off for future, which is just going to cost more in the future.

So uh that's kind of what this slide is trying to show the what we're working with this year.

There is a positive note though.

The capital vehicles, um the finance department did some work to kind of reconcile our our capital um lines.

And we discovered that in our capital vehicles lines for some time prior, we've we found savings in our purchases, and that money has been carried over.

Um proposed for FY27.

There is a front-end loader, a tandem axle dump truck, and two pickup trucks.

With that surplus that has built up in the capital vehicles line, we'll be able to move forward on one of those large purchases.

And if trade-in values and everything works out, we might be able to wrap one of the pickups into it as well.

So that would leave we're proposing deferring what the second pickup and then leaving one of the bigger purchases in the capital plan.

So then stormwater, um, kind of something we've been talking about.

Stormwater utility, we've been talking about in the background for several years now.

Um recognizing the challenges with the budget.

Uh it kind of came up again, and DPW and planning staff kind of took a deeper dive into it and looked at all the pieces that we put together in the last several years.

And we have a lot of pieces that now that we didn't have four or five years ago when we looked at this that will help to to bring it all together, but it's not something that we can put together for FY27.

Um staff capacity just won't allow for it.

And then when we started really looking into it, there's there's some key decisions that have to be made about how we want to handle different properties and um shared systems and non-contributing properties and kind of getting all the GIS data in line, and it's a pretty big lift.

Um that's probably worthwhile.

Um we kind of came out of the discussion after sitting down a couple times and looking at it, thinking that you know maybe it's not right for FY27, but we could use some assistance from a consultant on this and would like to look towards budgeting some money in the future to kind of move that forward.

Um, I think we feel like we're in a better place for it now, but we just it it might be a little bit out of reach for us.

Um I think that that's the slides we have um tonight.

Uh happy to try to answer any questions you might have.

Um we're committed to continued improvement around town, but just recognizing that it's gonna be hard with some of these numbers.

And in your backup material, it's uh there should be a separate sheet that actually has the operational um budget, um, just with some side notes on the side there.

So that's there as well.

Well, gentlemen, thank you very much.

Um I'll let my colleagues ask their questions.

But first I want to ask John, could you explain um this slight complication in the budget, which is you know the the base budget, and then you're we'll be having a separate initiative for capital costs.

Well, one when I initially presented the proposed budget to I suggested that one possibility would be to do a supplementary request around some of these items that Dan and Darren have been talking about where we really are going on the back foot because uh of the lack of funding in the capital plan.

And if you wanted to, you could put on the town meeting warrant a question around that as to whether the town wants to pay the increased taxes to take care of the sidewalks, the bicycle infrastructure, the retaining walls, the bridges and so forth.

Um otherwise we would have to do the best we can with this budget, as Dan was saying, and um but you the board doesn't have to do that.

You could also incorporate some of those things into your budget and bring that as the total number to town meeting.

That's another option.

Um there's different ways to handle it, or you can continue to keep the tax rate down by not doing everything in the capital plan that these guys are recommending.

Great.

We have options.

Okay.

Who wants to begin the commentary on the I I would go ahead.

Yeah.

Thank you for an amazing presentation.

Very thorough, awesome.

Um I had a question.

I've had a lot of re outreach um from people who live on Carriage Hill, and they're like, our sidewalks are a mess.

We want to remove the sidewalks and make it lawn all the way to the road.

And I'm always like, Dan's really busy.

I don't know.

I don't know when to bring this up.

And I've asked them to email me, and I don't know if they've reached out to you.

But how does that process work if somebody's like, you know, a development says we want some cost savings?

Who how what's the process?

It's a great question.

We've talked about this a lot too.

I mean, there's a lot of streets in town where you know, probably when the neighborhood was developed, people's walking habits were different.

There were less vehicles.

There are sidewalks on both sides of the road, and we're never going to be able to afford to replace sidewalks on both sides of the road.

Do we need them?

Um Carrot Hill, there's not sidewalks on both sides of the road.

There's only sidewalks on one.

We've tossed that idea around ourselves.

I I I guess I don't have an answer for you.

I think we'd have to work with planning.

Um I don't know how that falls into the town plan and development agreements and whatnot.

So this community member said, well, but who do I who do I talk to?

Like who should I send the email to?

Because I said, you know, get together with your neighbors, send an email to the select board or the town manager or Dan, but what's the process for that kind of thing?

Especially in relation to cost savings versus like you haven't done this.

So I think the select board should decide.

You can direct it to me, Amanda, and and I'll get it to the right place.

So like one of the projects we're currently working on, which is a multi-year project is the Oak Grove Corridor project.

Before we started that project, we actually worked with Sue on doing community outreach.

Um we had meetings at Oak Grove School.

We listened to the community on like what they were looking for with uh uh traffic calming measures and sidewalks.

And so that is something that we would continue to do.

When we uh Dan and I have trying to create a a capital plan like for ourselves, like where do we go in year 2029?

You know, what's that project year gonna look like?

And so we're trying to create this process where it's outreach with community and then planning another meeting just to show what those plans would be, and then trying to put in those pieces with the funding we have.

So with Oak Grove, um folks really wanted sidewalks on both sides.

So we didn't have the funding for that.

We really looked at the side that was in worse condition.

We put that site in, and the road is going to be hopefully um paved, which is the plan for springtime, um with the understanding that there isn't funding for that other side of the sidewalk.

Um so we replaced the worst, left the other one.

And so it's really we are doing that outreach with community before we start a project.

So that area.

What I'm hearing is first step, town manager.

Second step passes to you guys to, if you have the bandwidth and the time, maybe have some a little community outreach and then go from there.

Is that right?

Okay.

Great.

Awesome.

Oscar, do you have any comments?

Yeah, just a couple.

Thanks, guys.

That was another excellent presentation.

Um we talk about the the chart with sort of if we really want to get street paving moving in the right direction, it's you know, 1.2 million dollars or whatever to really start going in a is that when you do those numbers that does that include the cost of staffing?

Because I imagine if we were replacing a ton more road every year than we do now, we'd also need staff to do that.

Right.

And it does not.

That's just pure contracting whatever the appropriate application for the pavement is.

It doesn't include any underground utilities, sidewalks.

Okay.

You know, we've we've really tried to focus on an area and get everything done as much as possible before we pave it.

Yeah.

And then my other comment is really more for the board.

I think this is this capital carve out has been sort of an obvious one of the four or five big bullet points or question marks in this budget.

I think we're gonna have to look seriously at finding a way to fit most or all of it back in.

Um if uh and for the benefit of the public, why I feel that way is capital expenses are things we know we're gonna have to do, right?

We know we have to replace these roads someday.

We know we have to replace fire trucks and ambulances.

And every year when we say, okay, we'll put off this $30,000, that's money that's not going into a fund for a vehicle, and that bill's gonna come due.

So I think we'll have to or my goal is to find room for that stuff because I think it's important and I think we are Yeah, I mean it it'll look good on paper and then a retaining wall will fail, like we talked about today, John.

And then we have to fix it.

And it doesn't matter how much we set aside in capital.

And it doesn't matter how much we set aside in capital if we didn't set aside enough, then we're not prepared.

And that's a problem.

So I think that's going to be one of our challenges.

Yeah.

And any guidance that the board can give us on what we come back with in January would be really helpful to Yeah, I'm not asking you to like find a magical way for it to be back in there.

I think the five of us are going to have to wrestle with that.

I'm all about the magic option.

Well, if you have it.

Now you're telling us.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Thank you so much for this presentation.

Um forgive me if you already just explained this, but the budget we that you shared here is a bit different than what's in this binder, which is and both are really helpful to have.

Um this being the overall budget for proposed budget or draft.

Um I'm looking uh in this one, it says and this is a question maybe for you, John.

But in this one it talks about a 57.8 percent increase from FY26 to FY27 for the department.

And here it's a 25 percent increase.

And just trying to understand that difference.

And then also um what's driving what are the major drivers.

And I think you already said that some of it has to do with the the new um the shifting of cost from Casella to the town with the compost collection.

But maybe you could say more.

Yeah.

So the what you're referring to, I believe, is uh the the way we have re um realigned the budget to put the benefits for the DPW staff into the DPW budget.

So that's why I can now say with confidence that the DPW budget is about 14 percent of the overall town budget.

But in the past we couldn't we we wouldn't wouldn't know what that was.

We it was we thought it was you know something between 10 and 20 percent.

And you know, and now we can say it is it actually is 14 percent.

That's what we have proposed in this budget right now to be spent on um uh Department of Public World, not including the Capitol side.

Um so that's why it looks like an increase because what was in those central benefits lines, which are now zeroed out, um, they have now been distributed across all of the departments so that you can get a truer, more transparent sense of what you're spending on what services.

Thanks.

And now that you say it, I do remember you saying that before.

Thanks for the reminder.

And one thing to add as well, um the other is the implementation of the solid waste program entire budget.

So that's another big factor that's now in our budget.

That was not before.

Um there's new line items that weren't in an FY26 that are now in FY27 for that program.

So that's another reason.

Other like the the carts, the in the startup costs and all the yeah, there's line items in there, but like vehicle maintenance, safety equipment, uh those are some there's a subcategory for compost implementation, basically that's being added, and there's different line items that were talked about um when Pete presented that budget or that program a couple weeks ago, and they should be near the bottom of if you're looking at our attachment, there's a brown shaded color that says compost implementation, and it's all those line items directly to the side of that shaded area.

Peter, do you have any?

No, I um a few questions have already been answered that have been asked that I was curious about.

You know, thanks for the presentation.

I mean, as far as talking about asphalt sidewalks and and storm mitigation goes, it was top-notch PowerPoint stuff right there.

So thank you for doing that.

Thank you for coming out and enduring another another fine quick Fairborough Select Board meeting.

It's part of the magic, quick see what happens.

Okay.

So thank you, gentlemen.

Um there's a couple things I wanted to talk to you about.

Um first is about retaining walls.

If if you were to compare retaining walls to dam safety.

There's certain laws and rules regarding dam safety that the state ultimately has responsibility for because it's a risk risk to life.

Um but the same doesn't apply to retaining walls.

And I ask why not?

Because well, the topography of our town lends itself to so many retaining walls.

But I I would just think and that you must have a calculation about the risk involved in which retaining walls are more urgently need in need of repair than others.

But I wondered where's the state on this?

Like, doesn't the state have an obligation to help municipalities with retaining walls that are at risk to the public?

There doesn't seem to be.

That was a good presentation.

This is about the stormwater utility.

Um I heard about it is that it has the potential to kind of spread the cost of stormwater utility management.

For example, a program could be designed.

So such that um places that have big parking lots that pay more because they're generating more stormwater.

Um the other thing is so one is just confirming the understanding of that um concept of stormwater utility.

The other thing is that I heard that on May 27, the governor approved a bill H 481.

And that is the bill is to provide a framework and assistance in funding for municipalities to set up stormwater.

So to the question that you just asked about can it state help?

Um I'm wondering if that could help.

Um and then kind of related to that is the role of is there is there a role of VTrans?

Like we have state highways running through Brattleboro that have stormwater runoff that then I would guess Brattleboro pays for because it's running into our town.

Um I'm not sure if there's help for that or not.

But anyway, it's those three things.

Maybe you know, because of this new bill, there is funding, you know.

I've I heard that there was funding.

Um Senator Um Wendy Harrison is working on this, so maybe you were already in touch with her, but if not, she is the person that I've heard talking about that bill.

That's it.

That's great, Millison.

Um, you know, I I've always been in favor of this program because the state will pay more for their stormwater that we provide for them now.

So the state would be a big um component of those fees.

Um gentlemen, are you familiar with the bill that that I think it might have been Chittenden County, but I'm not sure.

But um maybe one of you can reach out to Wendy and find out.

Yeah, she's working on another one, I think that would be more statewide, but more statewide.

Okay, so finding out about that would be very helpful.

And then the first item was the structure of it.

Yeah, the stormwater utility, I guess is exactly how you described it, depending on how we set it up, there's a method for determining the impervious um property that lies within each parcel and charging for that.

Uh and where it differs from a tax is there's a lot of tax exempt properties that have large parking lots and you know, schools, churches, hospitals um that we might be able to um collect stormwater utility fees from because they're contributing.

Uh with VTrans, we could charge them um for the the portion of the roads that contribute to our stormwater systems.

Um there's it's in statute that we can only charge them a percentage of our fees, but there's definitely um a fee to be charged there.

Uh there are some areas like um Putney Road, uh, you know, a portion of that is state highway, and they have their own stormwater collection system that we have no part of.

So I think those are the sorts of things we'd have to work out how that how that works, like the properties that contribute to their system versus ours and whose um contributing and non-contributing.

Great.

Kate.

Thank you, Milson.

Um, Kate O'Connor, Brattleboro.

Um, I just want to say the number that we're talking about with the supplemental capital budget number is eight hundred and seventy thousand dollars.

And I think it highlights the direction situation that we find our town in that we can't fund something that we need to fund.

And I think all of the five of you there, it means they're tough decisions are gonna have to be made throughout this entire budget.

I also don't believe it can be a supplemental thing.

It has to be in the general fund budget.

We all need to want to know what the end number is and what those taxes are gonna be.

And so you have a hard job of ahead of you, but I think everybody needs to hear $870,000.

And I agree with Oscar, it should go in the budget, but that means really, really hard decisions are going to have to be made because the people of this community cannot.

They can't afford the 4.4 percent, which is we're floating around, which is not an honest number because the budget isn't really 4.4 percent increase.

We can't afford that.

So I just want to put that out there, $870,000.

And I believe them when they say they need it.

We just have to figure out what we do.

Thank you.

Anyone else would like to speak about the public works budget?

All right.

Um a second bite at the Apple.

Go right ahead.

Yeah, just the one of the priorities that we set this summer was fiscal responsibility and health.

And from what you've shared, it's it sounds like investing in our roads and our sidewalks and our retaining walls and all this infrastructure is an investment in our in fiscal responsibility and health in that it makes good use of the studies that have been done already for the the time and resources that were already put in and invested, and um this potentially stalling on delaying some of these projects could risk losing some of that work, or maybe there's some momentum.

And I'm curious if that is if if if I am understanding that if if that is a concern.

Like if you know the studies that have been done, can that be shelved for five years or however many years, and it will be just as good?

Or is there institutional memory like from the people who have been involved and that you really are going to be losing by not taking advantage of that work right away?

Do you do you understand what I'm trying to get at?

What's the cost of delaying?

I think both.

I mean, I think it's specific to each project, right?

I mean, if we're talking about intersection studies that have to do with traffic counts and everything like that, that has potential to change, but the consultant is also thinking about change when they develop those.

Um I think the biggest thing we have to stand to lose is the cost increase.

You know, I mean nothing's getting cheaper.

So the further we push these out, then you know, maybe this consultant worked on it five years ago and we're hiring someone new that needs to get up to speed and prices have increased, so you're losing time and you know you have increased costs and construction costs have gone up and I mean someone mentioned fixing stuff when it fails.

Some of this stuff is just gonna fail.

And one last thing we haven't really talked much about is some of this uh funding here is actually our grant match uh for a lot of grants in town.

Um, Sue's working on a project down on Bridge Street, um, which could need some funding.

And it may not it may not be there.

And so we're trying to figure out now if where we're sitting now, what projects we are already working on that will need matches, right?

I mean, we already started a process with this grant or this grant.

And so we're that's what Dan and I have been working on lately is we've got to make sure we leave X amount of dollars in here so we can cover the match on this grant.

And so that's that's another big topic here is the grant match.

Okay, so uh let's wrap this up.

John, do you have any thoughts?

Well, just uh so I'm not really taking away any guidance for coming back on anything different from DPW tonight, but I guess maybe if board members want to reach out to me and let me know what you're thinking as you have time to absorb this and uh we can bring you back something in January if you want to see any changes, or we can just bring back the same.

I'm happy to give input now if that's would be useful.

Yep.

Um I will say that when I first heard the idea of having a separate capital budget.

Um I thought, well, you know, that that sounds good to that sounds good to me.

After having heard from a couple of members of the public about this, um, you know, the concerns that were just raised.

Um, the Oscars raised that Kate's mentioned.

I do have concerns about, okay, well, how are we picking in we're setting a precedent if we're but we haven't done that.

My understanding, if it's if I'm Greg, that's unprecedented to take things that would normally be in the budget, like sidewalk repair, sidewalk maintenance, or road means.

I mean, these things are usually in the operational this this budget, right?

No.

Um I had a conversation with the town attorney and asked him that exact question.

He said, no, in the past, the town has done specific projects or capital items as separate articles on the warrant because the select board wasn't sure if the community would support it or not.

So it's not unprecedented.

It's very much been done in the past according to the town attorney.

You could decide to do a supplemental request of 100,000, or, like Kate O'Connor said, you could do it at $800,000.

It's really completely up to you guys what you would might want to ask the community.

But you don't have to do that.

You could incorporate it into this budget, or you could leave it the same and keep the tax rate down.

Doesn't this budget have a certain minimum amount of capital sidewalk roadway, and then the supplemental is above and beyond that?

Yes, there is a capital plan before you, which is funded in this proposed budget at $1.8 million.

There is another maybe $400,000 that DPW had asked for for projects, which we took out in the proposed budget because we didn't think that the tax that the taxpayers wanted to pay that much additional.

But that's completely a policy decision, and it's up to you guys if you want to incorporate that into your budget or if you want to ask the taxpayers separately whether they want to do that, like what's the value to people is sort of the issue.

Can you remind me of the schedule?

When do we get when is the final department presentation meeting?

Or is this it?

This is it.

So great.

This is the time if you have questions or if you want to drill down into what it means to do something or not do something.

I don't personally have any direction to give at this meeting, but I think probably at the next meeting now that we have seen everything, we've talked to every department, we can go away and put our thoughts in order.

Thank you.

What they are is guidance for us, and then we in turn give guidance to John for the direction of the budget.

Isaac, did you have something you want to add?

Yeah, I just want to make sure that I'm leaving this meeting clear on the numbers here and what they mean.

And um, this the budget that is that you have prepared for this evening has the FY25 actuals at $2.4 million.

And in this overall budget for the town, it's listed as $1.6 million.

And I just wanted to under the FY25 actuals, and I just want to make sure that I'm clear on what that difference is.

Is it that in one the FY in one it includes benefits?

And then when it doesn't, I would have to look at the the um uh documents that you are looking at.

Okay.

Maybe we could look at it offline and explain it to you.

Sounds good.

Thanks.

All right.

Let's take a five-minute break.

We're already 35 minutes later than our schedule, but five minutes won't kill anybody.

Thank you guys.

And let me welcome Carol a lot.

To discuss the recreation and parks FY27 general fund budget.

Carol, welcome.

Hi Carol.

Good evening.

Um here this evening to review our uh 2627 budget.

Um just to put it right up um right up front here.

We're putting a request in of 1,447,637.

Um that represents a 40 percent increase.

Please don't take too deep of a breath.

I will explain that 40 percent.

That 40 percent has to do with much like you have been hearing in the other budgets where benefits are allocated where they were benefit um previously uhloc allocated elsewhere in the budget.

It's now reflected in the town budget.

Of that 40 percent increase, 32 of 32 percent of it belongs to the benefits, which is $330,554.

The remaining 8 percent is comparable to our um budget of FY26.

Um as we go through this, uh as I go through this presentation, I'll outline where you'll see those increases.

But first of all, I'd like to tell you a little bit about our department and what we represent, who we represent, and what we offer to the community.

I would like to first start out with our staffing, as far as full-time staff.

Um there is a director, assistant director, a program coordinator, an administrative assistant, a park supervisor, and three park maintenance staff.

We rely heavily on our seasonal employees, which is inclusive of skate guards, cashiers, water safety instructors, lifeguards, day camp staff, pool checkers, evening supervisors, and seasonal park maintenance.

These are all high school and college students.

In addition to our paid staff, many of the programs that we offer, we would not be able to offer it if it wasn't for the hundreds of volunteers that we do that we do we utilize for our programming and special events.

If we had to put them all on the payroll, we wouldn't be sitting here this evening, or at least I probably would not.

In addition to the staffing and volunteers, we also contract with we call them contracted service providers.

So they're not town employees, but they're contracted service providers that are providing a service to the community so that we're be able to that we're able to offer the programs and services we do, which includes positions such as gymnastics instructor, fitness and fitness instructors, our chest instructor, skating instructor, paintings, painting instructors.

Many of those are all contracted service providers.

And again, that's what helps us make up what we what we're able to do and offer to the community.

When it comes to programming, I feel we have a great uh, we have a broad spectrum of programs and services that we provide to the community, which includes nine youth sports, over 20 youth after school and summer programs, over 15 adult leagues and programs, 10 special events, over 30 programs and special events for senior citizens, and we schedule and reserve 16 facilities and rooms that the department manages and maintains.

The park division oversees several properties throughout town with 60 plus acres, and that includes all of our playgrounds, five traffic islands, five cemeteries, twelve mini parks, community garden on Stockwell Drive, West River Park, the Kwana Shelter, Living Memorial Park, swimming pool, which please note that's a typo up there.

It's a 300,000 gallon swimming pool, the Nelson Withington skating facility, the Larry Robinson Small Fry T-Ball Field, the dog park, outdoor basketball courts, Kwana Shelter, Rotary Disc Golf Course, Perseverance Skate Park, 250 Bird Street, Upper and Lower Field at Liffering Memorial Park, the softball fields, and I have an item that was missed on here, and that's the Fred Harris Court, which is our six new pickleball courts.

As I move through the budget and start talking about some of the changes that you might see throughout the budget, I carefully reviewed our spending trends over the past three years, and I adjusted several of the department line items as follows.

In all those units, whether it be swimming pool, skating rink, Gibson Aiken Center, and the parks, all of the electric heating and utilities went up by 5%.

Park gasoline item went up by 5%.

One item that is not in here that nothing that one of my bullets that got missed that I want to highlight is our part in parks, the lawn and tree care budget increase by 28%, but the percent is the percent sounds way worse than the dollar amount.

The dollar amount is $2,000.

That is because the tree board identified some concerns at the Braterboro Common, and we've incorporated that into this budget.

One of the biggest things that is driven up the increase in this budget this year is we are requesting a new park maintenance position for a total cost of $81,336.

That includes the benefit package that comes with a new position.

I'd like to dive in a little in a bit, I'll dive in a little bit deeper as to why we are requesting that.

But first I want to continue with some of the highlighted changes.

As I mentioned before, we rely heavily on high school and college kids, and most all of those are individuals that are paid a minimum wage.

For example, this year it's at 1401 at this time, and it will increase to 1442.

So as everybody that comes through the door, you know, we're getting hit with that minute minimum wage.

As we discussed in a previous at the last select board meeting, parks program supplies increase by $5,000.

That is to accommodate the minimum increase that's now out there for the fireworks display on the 4th of July.

I do want to highlight again, as I did in other meetings in the previous meeting, that annually re raise seven to eight thousand dollars to help offset the costs of those of those fireworks.

As we dig deeper into the additional park maintenance position, as you all know, I've been sitting in my position in my chair for a long time, and it's been 35 years since I have asked for a new position, a new full-time position and recreation and parks.

Over the years, we have continued to take on the little bits and little pieces along the way.

Can you take that on?

Of course we can take that on.

You know, can we we're going to build a new West River Park?

Yeah, we're going to take on Westrevie Park.

No, not asking for any additional funding.

All those little slivers of the pie have just continued to fill up the whole plate, and now the plate is starting to overflow.

And in a minute, I'll go to what all those tasks were that we have picked up over the past years and how now it's becoming you know a burden on the full-time staff and being able to do their day-to-day job, and the park supervisor being having to do not being able to supervise and having to be very much hands-on.

It certainly is a hands-on position, but he's not having that time to do his supervisory responsibilities.

But I'd like to highlight again as Plenty Park.

We added a water playground at Living Memorial Park Pool.

We took on the responsibilities of the bank management at Citizens Bridge.

We added a skate park.

We recently took on 250 Bird Street, and we added a dog park, and we recently took on Exit 2 and Main Street Traffic Islands.

And in addition to all that, we continue to help out with encampment cleanups, maintained Sharps disposal stations, and 10 dogway stations.

All of these which add to our community and to you know that to what Wreckham Parks has to have offers and what this community means, what these programs and services mean to the community.

And we need we need some help at this time.

Moving out of the general operations and into capital, we have three items in this year's capital budget.

One is to replace a 2015 pickup truck that was also cut out of the out of our current budget.

That $55,000 the longer we wait is going to become a larger, nine a larger number.

The 2011 Massie Ferguson compact tractor is in this budget for $18,000.

The current one has over $1,200 hours on it.

And we are seeing considerable front end, the will need uh considerable front axle and transmission work.

Um also cut out of the FY26 budget is was the replacement of the 2013 uh Bobcat Zero turn that has over a thousand hours on it as well.

Um, and we're starting to see um where the we're seeing engine failure um in excessive oil consumption.

So we want to take care of things before they become an emergency.

Um I wanted to bring up the next item.

It's not in this year's budget, but I don't want it to become a surprise for next year when we have the discussion.

Um it at least I want to get to you thinking about it ahead of time, is I'm hoping to have a lengthy discussion next year at this time about the pool replacement at Living Memorial Park before we don't have a pool and we're unable to operate the current one.

Um but I you know I it is in the budget for next, you know, FY28, but I wanted to let you know that some of the things that are coming up on your up on the horizon.

In addition to our operating side of things, um we also have the revenue side.

Um this year we uh we're anticipating that we'll bring in $315,900, um, which is approximately 30% our of our expenses, um, not including benefits.

Um if we were to if we would pull that out, if you add the benefits into there, you're looking at closer to a 22 percent versus 30 percent.

Um closing, we all here work and live in a wonderful community.

We have great programs and services along with facilities to add to the quality of life for our citizens.

I'm hoping during these difficult economic times, we'll be able to continue to offer the level of services we provide.

I know that during challenging times we need to continue to make sure our services are accessible and affordable for our citizens and our community.

With that, I would like to open up for any questions that any of you may have.

Thank you very much, Carol.

Um I'll I'll let our my colleagues begin and then I'll I'll say a few words.

Amanda.

I want to say thank you, Carol.

Um I think of you like my husband and I are dairy farmers.

And vegetable farmers.

Like no days off.

And Carol, it's like you take no days off.

And you've worked so hard for so many years and just brought so much life and vitality to our community.

And have consistently made um offerings by Wreck and Parks affordable to our community in a in a really really major way, and stick kept that commitment over the long term and appreciate that.

Thank you.

And thank you for your presentation.

Thank you.

Yes.

Go ahead, if you thanks, Carol.

Just a couple questions.

Um this is more for next year, but I'm wondering if do you know what it's costing us to the sort of leakiness of the pool.

Do you know like if the pool didn't leak at all?

What the cost differential would be there?

I think the biggest thing with losing water.

Uh, you know, we're talking about losing about a million dollars, million gallons of water.

Yeah.

Okay.

It's a 300,000 gallon pool.

So is the dollar amount large?

The dollar amount is not large, but it's what is happening to the infrastructure of the facility, and where is that water going and what is the larger impact to the facility.

I think that is the thing that we need to be worried about.

I think the dollar amount of the water we're losing is small compared to the impact of of the infrastructure issues.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

And then I just have a general question, maybe even for John.

Um the whole idea of an older vehicle that is losing trade-in value.

There's a trade-off there that I'm just curious how we navigate because I feel like, you know, a normal person who has an old car generally and doesn't have a lot of money, generally just sort of runs it until it drops.

And it's not, it's not like it is financially cheaper to trade it in after 11 years or something like that.

So I'm wondering.

I mean, obviously we want everyone to have the best equipment and to have it replaced as soon as possible.

Are there opportunities to stretch there, or are we straight up lose would we straight up be losing money by replacing less frequently, or is there an opportunity there?

Yeah, I think in some cases we we'd probably end up losing money.

It really comes down to like the maintenance.

So our vehicles are run hard.

They're not like just your yours or my vehicle.

Um and so what it what starts to be a question for Carol is do we replace the engine in this vehicle?

And then the next thing is that the break, you know, everything goes on uh um you know something else, and it ends up costing more and more, and the cost of that maintenance ends up being more than if we had just invested in the re routine replacement of our vehicles on a on a cycle.

Okay, great.

Thanks.

Yeah, Carol, this is great presentation.

I appreciate it.

Gentleman to my left.

That includes you, Peter.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Remember, I'm deaf and I'm deaf in this ear.

Um, my can my my concerns again were uh with the leaking pool.

I know that came up a couple of years ago, and we're still talking about it.

So like those concerns are always sort of right at the forefront.

I also understand like for something that's only open for a finite amount of time, like dumping a big capital project into it right now.

So thank you for pushing the pause on that for at least another year before we have to discuss that.

Um, the vehicles uh and the um tractors and and all of that uh to echo uh what Oscar said, it's always nice to have the the top of the line stuff.

Um but I think we we we may we might want to look at some of this stuff uh when we get into the throes of the budget process about trying to maybe shore them up for another year just to save a little money.

And and I also understand what that means for for a vehicle that is starting to get on there in years.

Like you you hope to fix it, you hope the fixes stay.

We had this issue just this year where we sort of rolled the dice, didn't work, we had to replace the vehicle, so we did.

Um maybe that's maybe that's a way we approach it again this year.

But yeah.

So I mean, but you know, again I always uh go back to what your department means to this community um and and how much good you do into the community um and and um what you do and how some of the people who really need that who can't afford to leave or go anywhere with it, this becomes sort of a vacation spot for their kids, uh a break for parents.

So, you know, thank you for constantly continuing to be there and continuing to take on more weight every time it's thrown at you.

But so thank you.

Thank you.

I think echoing what the colleagues have said in terms of appreciation.

I mean, I'm struck by the fact that in 35 years you haven't increased the staff, um, but you've taken on a whole lot more responsibilities.

Could you share what the impact would be for not um adding an additional staff member to your team?

What what might that mean in terms of what residents of Rattleboro might experience differently besides a lower um not as big of a tax increase?

I think the biggest thing is the staff that are that are being um overworked and torn into many different directions, and there are things that are been getting put off, you know.

Um, you know, we all get it, we'll be in the middle of trying to, you know, groom and maintain facilities, and then we're getting pulled off because it's more important to get downtown and pick up um something that may be unsafe for those that are using a park downtown, and then we're you know, we're just constantly getting pulled in different directions.

Projects are getting deferred.

We're having to hire out projects that we do do and can't do them in-house, and that's been going on for a couple of years now, and that also adds to the budget.

Thank you.

Uh I just had a couple one more thing.

So just a question.

So is the tractor used for mowing as well as a zero turn?

Or okay, and what other purposes does the tractor uh the tractor do has a lot of jobs.

Um, you know, like a workhorse, you know, um, you know, it's used out on the ball fields, you know, drag in the fields, yeah, you know, take cart and the equipment out to the field so that you can uh maintain them.

A lot of that is in inside the park type um work that it's that's done.

So it does a lot of has a lot of different responsibilities.

Okay, cool.

As you know, the zero turn, and again, you'll probably see us drive around town.

A lot of that stuff is going on to the trailer, going out into many of our parks, you know, because as we rotate throughout the community, you probably see that on and off our vehicles and in our trailer and such.

Great.

Thank you.

So, Carol, thank you again.

Um it is amazing that in 35 years you haven't added staff at mind boggling.

But m also mind boggling is the sheer number of new program elements in that time.

And and I know um last year we um asked you to increase revenue and you did increase revenue on various programs.

Um and I I share Peter's concern that um you know the children of this town and and all the people in this town really need all of your facilities and use them greatly.

Um is there anything that you can identify in terms of a fee that you didn't raise last year or some new initiative that that um can help on the revenue side?

Yeah, let me I want to talk about the fee that we raised last year, because that hit every single program.

You know, when we talked about that facility use fee, that hit every single participant and every single program.

So I think that's real important to mention.

You know, we and we raised the fee at this at the skating rink, but that facility use fee went across across the board.

So that I think if we I don't think it would be in our best interest to do anything like that again.

Um but one thing that I'm working on currently um is how we can increase some um advertising at the skating rink.

And we're kind of doing a pilot right now where I've been working with a local vendor on um we're we did it for Broadborough Youth Hockey and Bratterbroad Union High School.

And they're basically that we're their home rink.

And what we did is we have their logos and the name of their program on the two benches that are at the skating rink.

In the next week or so, um I've been working with pure green tees, and they designed everything to build put onto the boards, and they're gonna be putting that onto the boards, and then I'm gonna be able to say to local businesses, hey, look at that.

Isn't you know, so I've got something to sell.

Right now I just got white boards, and I can't even tell you what it's gonna look like.

But because we're invested in the logo for Bratterborough Hockey Association and the Bratterborough Union High School, and we got wording as well, people can see what words look like and what logos look like.

And then um, can I sit here and tell you that's gonna turn over $10,000?

I can't.

I can't.

Um, but in a year from now I might be able to have a better conversation with you about that.

Um so we are looking at uh a different way, a different way to bring in income that's not going to have a direct impact on the people that are already being charged, but other people, maybe somebody like yourself, um Peter, you might want to advertise.

No, I'm looking on to you straight for now.

But you know, that that's an example, and we're gonna be able to say, hey, look, and then we're also gonna see how it handles the puck, you know.

Am I gonna charge you big bucks and at the end of the season I gotta go pay for it all over again?

So we're gonna be able to we you know, we we're we're in the middle of of um a trial period.

Well, that's excellent.

Thank you.

Carol, we we don't have to have this conversation right now, but you know, like driving revenue and increasing revenue and finding revenue is kind of the sort of charge that I'm on right now.

And if there's one thing I know, it's advertising.

So at some point in time, maybe I'll swing by and we can kind of talk about it a little bit.

Yeah hey just gotta have start somewhere and have a conversation.

All right.

And also just in the since it's a public meeting I've been wanting to ask since the firework you know you presented the firework budget would it be possible to charge people to attend the fireworks display?

I would volunteer myself as a select board member to to sit at that table and say that'll be three dollars.

Well I'll tell you what I do do.

Yeah I know that you have but I mean you could also make other people do that.

Yep.

Yeah it's revenue I think you know we you've often talked about the spirit of volunteerism you know and I think that there's already a system in place that Carol has for to raise money and I think that we can all be very effective in spreading the word about increasing raising money at the front end working with the O'Connor family and Kate nodding her head and and you know I think we should work with a system that's already in place and explain to the community that tariffs and so forth have caused this increase.

But I know also that you know you could be one of the people walking around with a little bit of I think I think that in itself it would be a better way of going at it because there's so many places to enter the park.

Where's the entrance?

The whole place is an entrance you know so that's that's the biggest challenge but I welcome anybody to come out and join me.

Matter of fact I'll have be happy to have a competition with you and say yes let's game on game on I already have a competition maybe with somebody on the Bradburg goes forth committee but he always seems to come in second place.

He likes to think he comes in first.

All right let's open this conversation up to members of the public who would like to comment is there anyone Kate I will say Kevin and I are going to beat Carol next year.

We we already put that down.

I'm only mentioning this because Carol happened to be the first person to bring it up so it's not targeted at Carol.

But we there are multiple departments that want to hire new people and I think that that's a global conversation that you need to have our FY26 budget or about 66% of the budget goes to personnel and while I appreciate how it's we now know as John said we can tell how much each department costs we have lost track of what our overall personnel costs are and how that has changed from FY25, 26 and in the 27 budget.

So I hope there's going to be a global conversation about our personnel costs.

I think that's super important because we may not be able to hire all the people that all the departments want even though they may really need them.

That's that's a really deep conversation.

Second of all and I know this may not be exactly what you were saying but we keep talking about this time next year we'll talk about the pool you cannot wait until December of 202 to talk about the pool for the next year's budget.

It's too late because you're gonna get forced into having to do something that has that's a huge conversation for this town it is in relation to the budget but it's a bigger conversation and you cannot wait until we're under the gun and we're gonna be forced to do something.

So I would urge that conversation to start a lot sooner than in December of 202.

Thank you.

Is there anyone online?

Anyone else in the room well that leaves me to thank you once again Carol.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you Carol.

So again if there's guidance um I'd love to hear it or uh talk to me offline.

So just to clarify when we were on break do we not have one more meeting with like finance and et cetera and okay sorry last before I was asking when is our final one of these departments coming before the select board meetings is that I thought you were asking does the department come back?

Yeah no no no is it next meeting is that our last one?

Yep.

We have the rest of the departments at the next meeting and then your first meeting in January would be any changes that you've suggested we can start to bring those back.

Sure that you can thank you.

Like around personnel costs, um this question about the capital capital budget, um, what we're shifting from operating operation.

Budget budget to capital.

Um some of those big questions.

I mean, even the percent, what is the the cap that we're is there a particular percentage increase in taxes cap that we're aiming for.

I mean, even like questions that we discussed at that listening session that we heard from the public, it would be I think useful to be able to discuss even those questions of the board.

Yeah, maybe we look at the agenda for the next meeting and see how crazy it looks and possibly try to put a sort of general select board discussion after the department presentations.

Okay.

But uh, you know, who knows what that meeting is looking like.

But we'll know in the agenda sitting committee.

Yep.

All right.

Um let me welcome uh Star Latronica to the table to discuss the FY 27 library budget.

Thank you.

And um because I'm not a member of the public, I didn't get up and say anything, but oh my goodness, Carol Lalott, right?

Uh I am constantly in awe of her.

And and my brothers at DPW as well, and everybody else in the town.

But it's always amazing because Carol and I are sort of sisters in our services, and it amazes me all that she does.

So I'd like to start tonight with um thanks.

Thank you for having me in to talk about libraries, because there's nothing I would rather talk about than uh nothing I would rather do than talk about libraries and especially our library.

And even though it means I'm missing my second favorite thing to do in this town at this time of year, which is we sing Noel.

But but I've been promised I can watch it online later.

Um I also want to thank um the wonderful and talented Seth Thomas for making my presentation look good.

Uh so I don't um yeah, I don't I don't think we can see the little tagline under that, but I think it says we contain multitudes.

And um so to demonstrate that, I do have a few announcements to make uh just about things that are going on the rest of this week at the library.

We will be tomorrow having rhyme time for preschoolers and their caregivers, flower pot saucer garden, um makerspace, and then Friday we'll have a 12 foot by 12 foot section of the AIDS quilt, which includes a panel with Ron Squires, who was the first openly gay legislator from Vermont.

Um Saturday we'll be making mini crankies, and Sunday, the mini is the deadline for the mini masterpieces flash fiction.

So uh so that's just a brief range of of what we do at the library.

Um our library does a lot.

And can we go to the next slide?

And let's see if I can see what it says.

All right.

Um there you can see our vision, our mission, and our values.

And the vision of Bricksman Mario Library is that all members of the community engage with the library to spark curiosity, enrich lives, and achieve aspirations.

And uh it is my belief that um I truly believe, with absolutely no exaggeration, which I am prone to, that anyone's life can be enhanced by engaging with the public library.

We absolutely respect value, need, even cherish every single one of our emergency responders.

But we also hope that no one ever needs to call them.

However, everyone can find something of value at the library, and if you don't think so, I invite you to come and see me there and we'll look for it together.

So next slide.

So here's our um here's our operating income.

Um and as you have heard and we'll continue to hear in these presentations, um, the inclusion of staff benefits significantly increases the total amount of each department's budget.

Uh I think it's a wonderful thing for transparency.

It helps me see, you know, where all of the money is going.

In the library's case, that increased it by 286,7, no, 286, 785, or 20 per 28% of our total budget.

However, because the majority of our staff is part-time, they receive little or no benefits, so it doesn't have the same devastating effect that it has on some other department budgets.

Thanks to the largest of the citizens of Brattleboro and their appreciation of the library.

We have been we have benefited from some really lovely bequests.

And then using best practices, the trustees who oversee the endowment withdraw, take an annual draw of 4%, and that is used to fund programs and any kind of professional development.

And then our other source of income are the friends of the library and good friends they are because they fund the rest of the programs.

And we'll also be getting new laptops and some Wi-Fi hotspots with that grant.

So that's a tremendous thing.

So all of our programs are funded by either endowment funds or the friends of the library.

No public funds go to that.

Okay, I think we're ready to move on.

Aha.

All right.

Trying to keep up with myself here.

Okay, so uh our resources, and you can see the vast variety of things that we share with the community.

The community shares with it with each other.

And that's the whole premise of libraries.

It's about sharing.

And so the public buys things, the public buys resources, purchases resources, and then everybody in the community has access to them.

I will say that some of our more innovative resources and materials such as snowshoes and the garden tools and the ice cream maker that you see in the picture, all of those things were purchased with grant funds or were donated.

All right.

Okay, Seth, I think we're ready to keep going.

So where am I?

Okay, so this is these our services slide.

And we are second in the state for the number of open hours, and that is consistent with what we hear from our community.

The community wants to be able to access the library.

That is the most important thing.

Every time I talk to people, people come in.

A grandmother will come in in the evening to get books for her grandparents, her grandchildren, and thank us for being open.

People want to be able to come into the library.

And so we so far we have been able to maintain that.

The person you see in the slide there is our ILL clerk who is demonstrating how far flung she will go to track down materials for people.

And we are the we are first in the state for ILLs received.

So that means we get more books for our patrons from other libraries than anybody else in the state.

We are second for ILLs sent because we also have a very robust collection.

We are second in the state for public computing sessions, second only to Burlington, and we are first in the state for Wi-Fi sessions, computer sessions divided by allotted population, and Wi-Fi sessions divided by allotted populations.

And this is absolutely critical.

And the need grows every single day, especially with things like, you know, now the DMV is very rarely open.

So people come to the library so they can get their temporary license, they can get their temporary registration, they can get their temporary license plate.

So we really see the need for that.

Okay, and now I'm ready for the next slide.

Okay, so here you see our staffing.

You can see that we have some full full-time staff, uh, some professional librarians, and then some paraprofessionals.

Um and we are not asking for a new position.

However, we are asking for a little more leeway in bringing in our substitute because oftentimes we are staffed to the bone, and then someone gets sick and needs to go home, or someone gets sick and can't get in.

Um there hasn't been a case yet that we've had to close the library, but we've been really close.

There have been times where you know I'll come in and work a six-day Saturday to keep the library open because we are that tightly staffed, and then when somebody's sick, everything falls apart, and those other jobs don't get done.

Sort of like what Carol was talking about.

You get pulled in another direction for something immediate, and the the other the background work doesn't get uh finished at the library.

Um we do make the most of volunteers, as you can see there.

Uh we have 30 volunteers or 35 volunteers that contributed over 700 hours uh this year, and all of our shelving is done by volunteers, the tool shed is completely staffed by a volunteer, the e-bike program is mostly handled by volunteers.

Okay.

I'm ready for the next one.

And here are just some of our collaborations.

So this is really important because their collaborations with us so strengthen what we can do.

They so um fortify our services to the community.

And in turn, by working with them, we also strengthen them.

So it's that whole model of really strengthening community by building those regenerative roots so that we hold one another up and we make one another stronger.

So these are just some of the partners we work with.

It's not an exhaustive lifts, but it's pretty impressive, I think.

But every single one of those collaborations has a person attached to it, at least one person.

It takes people to make those connections and to nurture them and maintain them, just as it takes people to acquire those materials that we saw in previous slides and perform those services.

So really, the library is all about people.

Okay.

All right, so here is where municipal funds go.

As you can see, most of its salary, salary and benefits.

Um I believe that says 3% it goes to materials.

Uh yeah.

Um, so only 3% goes to materials.

The rest goes to salary and benefits, and just keeping the the lights on, literally, and the building heated, um, the building cleaned and maintained, and although most of the actual improvements to the building have been paid for by endowment funds.

Okay.

All right.

And yes, we can go to the next one.

Okay, so I I put some values in here to give you a sense of what the community receives from the library for free that they would have to otherwise pay for.

And so I check the rates to rent rooms from busy town, and um I based it on you know, average prices of books.

Uh we we provide passes to the skating rink for people to go.

Um, the friends of the library pay for that.

Um taking a trip to MassMoka, which is also funded by the friends of the library.

And then sometimes there are dinosaurs in the library.

Um, and really, what's the value of that?

And then, as many of you have heard me say over and over again, really the essence of the library and the critical nature of the library is that community connection, and that's what we that's priceless, as they say.

Okay, so capital expenses.

We don't have that many.

We've been in the budget for several years to get the windows in the children's room replaced and to uh and to reconstruct the um sofit and fascia around the building.

Um we also the endowment budget does fund uh any kind of real improvements to the building, um, including several years ago they paid for half of the installation of the new HVAC system, which cost a bundle, as you can imagine.

And we that the endowment budget paid to create those small meeting rooms that people use and that are almost always in use.

I know that several of you have tried to reserve them and know how hard that is to do.

Um so any oh, they also added a restroom downstairs, all those things came out of the endowment budget.

They are also paying the project manager, so oh, so next year we are going to construct a tiny little office in the children's room so that the children's staff can actually focus on their work that they need to in case somebody's reading dog man to themselves over and over right out in front of their desk, or uh, or just there the other day there was a kid that was in there just chanting hot dog, hot dog, hot dog for I don't know, half an hour.

So this gives them a private place to go and really get their work done.

Uh so we will be doing that, and we are also um paying a project manager to oversee the third item on the list, which is the Capital Improvements Grant.

So that is a federally funded grant that we have.

Um there's no match to it, and uh we've you may have noticed that we have a new roof from it already, and some other process uh uh progress has been made along, but really um it's gonna hit full force early next year.

And Seth, if you could go to the next slide.

Okay.

So that's a drawing of what that capital project will entail.

And as you can see, a lot of it is replacing the sidewalk in front on Main Street, in front of the library on Main Street.

So that will help DPW out.

Um we'll also be expanding and uh reconfiguring the ADA approach from the back and bring that up to code, which didn't happen, you know, which it is not at the moment.

And uh we'll be having a covered back seating area with Wi-Fi so that people in nice weather can sit out there, have their meetings, uh watch their movies, write their novels, all those things in the back of the library, and we'll really be expanding the seating area because we run out of room frequently at the library, and this the only place to go was out.

So we talked to we talked to people about going up, and they they didn't think it was realistic.

So I will say that the library drives economic development.

We help people with their uh job resumes and their job applications.

Um we provide a candidate database, which is the foundation directory, which helps people, grant seekers and funding uh people looking for funding find that.

Uh we are it's one of only two places in Vermont, Burlington is the other.

And we uh also set uh we met recently with a cohort of people who are starting small businesses in Brattleboro to let them know the resources that the library has that can support them in that.

I would posit that the library contributes greatly to public safety, that we have a lot of people that hang out at the library and um and entertain themselves and uh find a nice calming atmosphere there.

Uh Chief Hardy has said over and over again that um quality of life is crime prevention, and I know that people, realtors and lawyers have told me that clients uh prospective clients, prospective residents of theirs come in and ask, how's the library?

Because they use that as a a measure of the community.

So in my time, I have seen that libraries have evolved from place to presence to the pulse of the community.

And Brooks Memorial Library is steeped not only in literature and literacy, but it is which is manifested in the elation when a child cracks that code and can read on their own.

It has it embodies the exuberance of story time or silver circus, the camaraderie and carrying on of the stretch of the Stitcher Group that meets every Saturday where laughter and creativity flow freely.

We see all that at the library and we embrace every bit of it.

Because that variety, that energy, that compassion, that commitment to community, that's Brattleboro.

That's who we are.

That is our brand, and that's our library.

It's something everybody can benefit from and be proud of.

And that's why when people come here, they say.

Next slide.

And that is the work of the talented Cynthia Houghton.

So to end the way I began, thank you.

Everything that the library accomplishes is a group effort.

Thanks to the select board for hearing me out, to start town staff for their support always.

Oh my goodness, every department contributes to the success of the library.

To the steadfast stalwart board of trustees for their wisdom and guidance and vision, to the friends of the library who are fun and fabulous and work so hard.

And speaking of hardworking, the truly incredible Brooks Memorial staff that did all the work represented there and pulled together the information to present it coherently.

And finally and foremost, this really really remarkable community that appreciates and supports the possibilities of the public library.

There is truly no better place to be a library.

So thanks.

Isaac, you want to start?

Sure.

Thanks so much for painting a picture of what's happening in the library.

Could you say again what the budget period increase asks for?

Like where where is the increase?

Sure.

What's the breakdown of that?

I know there are a few slides.

So basically there's no big uh big ticket item.

Um certainly the salaries, you know, will increase due to negotiations, and we are asking for an additional $25,000 for the um for the leeway to bring in a substitute when we need it.

And that would only be as an as-needed basis, and it was a very um, you know, it it was a very uh conservative estimate.

You know, I I don't really expect to meet that cap.

Um, but uh you know that that's really the the biggest increase.

Some of the other increases is that we are hoping to recoup some of the cuts we we took last year.

Um we took a lot of cuts in materials costs in our office supplies.

We moved our computer supplies into our office supply line, and you know, that includes toner, which is so ridiculously expensive, and um so we we're uh we're we're really tight in that area this year, um reusing everything we can and picking up any free pens and post-it notes we come across in town.

Um then you know there are increases in utilities, of course, you know, as as there are in any building, as we could witness tonight because it's very cold in here.

Um then the other substantial increase is in the line that's uh listed as digital subscriptions, which is sort of a misnomer.

Uh we were trying to figure out what to call it.

It really is essential operational software.

So it's the databases that provide the authority and consistency for cataloging records.

It's the um it's our integrated library system, which provides our circulation and our catalog and uh and all the necessary work that we need to do.

Um so that those are really the uh the more the substantial increases.

Everything else has been held firm, and in fact, we reduce the amount of uh children's books because the the trustees are prepared to you know backfill some of that from the endowment funds.

Thank you.

And that's the substitute, the $25,000 for library substitute.

Is that uh from if not overtime?

No.

Um and have you ha have you relied on overtime or looked to consider the costs?

I ran a really tight ship on comp time, as my staff will tell you.

Um so what be okay, let me see if I can explain it.

So um because so many of our staff are part-time, so if a staff member can't come in, but another staff member could come in, um not all of our staff has uh paid time off available to them.

So if a staff member without paid time off takes it needs to stay home because they're sick or wants to take a couple days off, um we can fill in with those hours with another with a staff member that's already and still part-time.

So it's not overtime.

There's never any overtime charge.

Um people will look for comp time, but I really urge them to use their comp time and not have that paid out because I've explained that it has budget implications.

Um then we do have one on-call staff member who is a former employee, so she's been trained, she knows how to do everything, uh, and and so we can call her in on an as-needed basis when when we really need it.

Thank you.

Sure.

Peter.

Uh no, thank you for explaining everything so clearly, and uh thank you for everything you do.

I've I've got really, you know, there's some conversations I'm sure we'll have.

Um I mean, at first blush the 25,000 dollars seems like a reasonable uh request, but I guess we're gonna have to have that conversation a little deeper.

But thank you for coming out.

Sure.

Oscar?

Oh um, no questions.

I think that was all very clear and helpful.

Um thank you again, sir.

Amanda?

Yeah, no questions at this time, and thank you so much, sir.

So uh thank you.

And it was all very illuminating and helpful.

Um I just want to elaborate on um what I'm understanding in terms of the the library needs as a policy measure, the library needs a certain amount of staff members to be open.

And that's change, from what I understand.

And I wondered, is that a factor in this substitute hour uh calculation?

It it's not um it's not really uh um it's not really a change that it's based on we need three people in the building.

We need two people downstairs and one person upstairs.

And so that's what we've got staffed for the evenings, um we uh uh if one of those people gets sick, uh so one of the evening staff yesterday was ill, and which meant that I filled in, you know, because we have to have two people downstairs.

It's just a safety issue.

Um the uh the policy that we established with the board a couple of years ago is that there should always be a supervisor on deck because we've had some issues that it wouldn't be fair to have a part-time uh person try to navigate.

Um because we've had some issues that it wouldn't be fair to have a part-time uh person try to navigate.

And so to have that it doesn't the supervisor doesn't have to be in any particular department, but there should be a supervisor on staff at all time or uh in the building at all times, except we do make an exception for a half an hour lunch on Saturday if somebody wants to step out of the building.

They can leave the premises.

So is that supervisor one of the three or in addition to the three?

It's one of the three.

One of the three.

Yeah.

Thank you very much.

Um let's ask if the public has questions.

Um Mr.

Fay.

His hand done.

Ken, if you want to speak, could you put your hand up again?

Is he not?

He he's gone.

I think he's when he might be having connection issues.

Ken, if you're interested in speaking, could you put your hand up again?

In the meantime, I'll tell you something interesting.

Please.

Because you know, information is my business.

So um a couple of years ago, well, actually during COVID, we removed all the public computers from the teen room and the children's room.

And we have seen a massive increase in book circulation.

And the tenor of those rooms has changed completely because you know, it used to be kids came in, they made a beeline for the machines, and now the kids come in, they work with their parents, they pick out their own book, they you know they select books as a family, and then they take them home and read them.

And that's a pretty amazing thing.

Well, thank you.

That is very interesting.

Would that work downstairs?

Yeah, I think.

Yeah, we still have all those news.

And we can use the ones downstairs, and they do.

Yeah, they come down and use the ones downstairs.

Is Mr.

Fay available?

I hope so.

All right.

All right.

No.

John, did you want to say something?

Well, just if you have any guidance tonight, that would be helpful for anything you want us to rethink or do differently in this budget.

I I remember in our previous budget discussions, you know, the the desire to have the department nets come was of paramount importance.

And here you are.

Thank you.

I I really appreciate the opportunity.

Is there anyone in the room here who has a comment for Star or about the budget?

No.

All right.

Well, let me thank you once again.

Mr.

Fay is not available.

Since he's not available, um what would be the impact of say the number 25,000?

You know, if we're looking at how we could economize and where we could trim, I mean, what would be the impact of say like a $10,000 budget for increase for this?

We'll be grateful for that.

We we really just need we need to know um the stress that it places on on staff, especially if it's uh um you know short notice kind of a situation where you know, oh my gosh, are we gonna have to close to the library or you know, where are we gonna find somebody to pull in and um and then I'm constantly doing math in my head, okay, like okay, I know somebody didn't work their full shift, so I've got two extra hours there, maybe we could pull two hours over here.

So it's just that kind of mechanations.

But um we would be really grateful for uh any kind of support, you know, there that we could get there.

Thanks.

And in terms of recommendation, I mean I think it's still again looking at staffing across departments where and I understand we're also in the middle of negotiations, so there are some things that are to yet to be determined.

Um but I would like to see where we can economize on that particular on staffing across the board.

Thanks.

I think that's called known unknowns.

No unknowns.

All right.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for I hope you get home safely.

I've got quite a trip.

It is.

Um next, health provider change.

John?

Yeah, so uh Sally Cruz Nix or HR manager is going to uh bring this item to you.

It is uh our uh recommendation to be switching health care providers, and Sally will explain why.

Yeah.

Thanks, John.

Thanks, everybody.

Um that time of year uh plus open enrollment started today.

Uh so uh this year we are looking to make a change.

We're moving from uh Blue Cross Blue Shield to Vermont due to the um projected increases, and we're um our fantastic team from the Richards group, uh which I really want to put a shout out to thank Jackie, Emily, and Jennifer, what they've been able to pull together for us for these past few uh weeks to get this in motion so that we're all covered by insurance for January 1st.

Um in looking over the blue cross renewal, um uh John Potter had asked that they look into different health care plans.

They came back after looking at uh a couple different options for us.

They brought back Cigna.

Uh so we'd be looking to move from Blue Cross Blue Shield and uh move over to the Signa Health Health Insurance.

And so again, um it would be it's the same type of plan, so high deductible health insurance plan.

Uh the way Jackie described it, it's just to di it's uh it's apples of different species um that we'll be bringing on uh that would be effective for uh January 1st.

And we're starting open enrollment period now uh today, and that way everybody's covered by the first of January.

And again, so this with you go on by moving over to Cigna, it will create uh 2.1% cost increase of uh for the calendar year 2026, uh which was uh significantly less than the 17.2 percent, which is a typo in my memo.

I apologize uh for the cost increase proposed by Blue Cross Blue Shield.

And in your backup materials with the memo, I did include the uh current cost for Blue Cross Blue Shield for calendar year 25 because our health insurance is calendar year versus the budget, which is a fiscal year, and then uh the projected cost for Blue Cross uh Blue Shield 26, which was what we brought forward.

We also have to bring these proposals to our union members and go through negotiation with our unions and um and what we brought forward to you is the 2026 with Cigna, which is a 95 split um between employer plays 95 percent and the employees pay five percent uh towards the premium for the insurance.

And I'll take any questions uh you may have okay, thank you very much.

Uh Amanda, do you have any questions?

Oh, I just think this is pretty simple.

I appreciate the cost savings that you found with the new plan, and um I'm ready to great to move to the Oscript.

Just one question.

Yeah, go ahead I yeah, I agree.

I mean the numbers there's no contest, and it's sort of saved the budget to have this option, I would say.

So that's good.

Um and thank you for your work on it.

My question is for fiscal year 2.

The one we're currently in.

We will see the prices change on January 1st for half of the remaining current fiscal year.

Does that will that come in ahead or behind budget for the current fiscal year?

Oh, I need to so when we budget when we budgeted for calendar year 26.

That was done in the previous budget, correct, John?

Yep.

Right.

So the current budget that we're in.

It's half, yeah.

Yeah.

Right.

So I guess so there's savings from that.

Well, I don't know.

I that's what I'm asking.

Did we budget more than this 2.1% for the second half of the current fiscal year, and we're gonna see a savings or are we?

Yeah, that's yeah.

Um I'm trying to remember what we did last spring on health care.

Um I'm happy to leave that as a like next time question.

Yeah, okay.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, I don't remember off the top of my head.

Right.

Uh yeah, the few gentlemen have questions.

I mean, I'm I'm good.

It's you know, it's we've we've vetted this out, and it's uh I think just uh tremendous buy caps off to everybody who's worked on this thing from from our town staff to the to the Richards group.

So I yeah, just it looks if I'm am I correct that this is a 430 about 434,000 less than what we'd be spending with Blue Cross Blue Shield.

I mean that's what I'm seeing 4900 4,095,000 versus 61 62,000.

That's a huge that's almost half a million dollars that you're saving us by going with Cygna.

Is that yeah?

That's awesome, thank you.

Great job for the Richards group.

I think uh we also owe some thanks to the the staff and the unions.

I think uh we also owe some thanks to the the staff and the unions, they um we consulted with them on this, and uh you know this is a disruption to everybody to have to change their plan, but you know I'm I'm glad that the staff is supportive of it.

So thank you.

And I appreciate the kind of um you know out of the out of the box thinking that went into this and all the hard work.

So thank you.

Um so I'm sure we have a motion.

I'm happy to make a motion, please.

I move to approve the town's medical plan program provider with Signa for calendar year two thousand twenty-six.

Thank you.

Are there members of the public who wish to discuss this matter?

Great.

Are we ready for a vote?

Sure.

All right.

All select board members in the motion has been made to approve the town's medical plan provider with CIGNA for the calendar year 2026.

All select board members in favor of this motion, please raise your hand and say aye.

I and there we are, five zero.

Thank you very much, Sally.

Uh what's next?

Next is the ballot question on representative town meeting.

And I understand we have our oh there he is.

Mr.

Fisher.

Made it.

Yes, it did.

Um and Hannah, Clarice, thank you.

You made it.

Both very much.

Um John, do you want to say the board last discussed this topic in September and you talked about the possibility of uh putting a question on the ballot in March, and so uh staff went and planned for that possibility that you might want to ask the voters to consider discontinuing representative town meeting.

If you were to do that, and if the voters approved that discontinuance of representative town meeting on the March 3rd ballot, then the discontinuance would take effect immediately, and uh the representative town meeting that's currently planned for March would be replaced with an open town meeting in April.

The town clerk has secured uh meeting dates and locations to do either of those options, were you to choose to put this before the voters.

So uh if you did so and the voters chose a representative town meeting, there would be district meetings and caucuses on March 11.

Uh that's not right.

Uh there would be oh yeah, the district meetings and caucuses and the informational session would be on March 11th.

The representative town meeting would be on March 21st, and the select board organizational meeting would be on March 23rd.

If the voters instead chose an open town meeting, the select board would have to rewarn that meeting, and uh the earliest that uh we could do that would be April 11th.

So the open town meeting would be April 11th with an informational session on April 8th earlier that week, and the select board organizational meeting would be on April 13th.

There's further information in your backup materials from the town attorney explaining the differences between a select board article on the ballot about representative town meeting versus the two charter petitions, which uh you have discussed at length in September.

And so uh as was mentioned, the town attorneys are here uh to answer any questions, but they also had a recommendation, and I guess I at this I would turn over to Bob.

Thank you.

The uh the recommendation that Hannah and I have is that the board warn this uh on its own motion to be on the warning for uh the March vote of all of the voters, uh the first Tuesday in March.

And the reason that we say that is that that allows the voters of the town with to decide the question of whether to have representative town meeting or to discontinue it and not have that have to be held up at the legislative level.

So the way it works under the statute is a vote that establishes representative form of government that remains in effect until there is a vote to discontinue that.

And that, as is pointed out in the memorandum, uh take a long time, sometimes years uh to get there.

So if the select board warrants this on its own motion, then you have an immediate decision on whether to have uh to keep representative town meeting or to not keep it.

And and as John set forth, if the vote is to go to open town meeting, we have contingency plans in place with the town clerk for an open town meeting in April.

Um so if there are any questions, we're happy to answer those.

Hannah put together a nice chart which is in part of your uh backup materials uh with regard to uh how the vote on representative town meeting would go.

And uh essentially if it's placed on the ballot by the select board, and if the vote is to uh not to discontinue representative town meeting, then representative town meeting stays in place.

We'd have our uh regular representative town meeting.

Uh the petitions are are moot.

Uh if the answer is yes, though, then um RTM would be discontinued immediately.

You'd go to an open town meeting, and uh then you can vote you you would still vote on the petition charter changes, and depending on uh the outcome there, those would still go to the legislature uh depending on whether those passed or not.

So I don't know if Hannah wants to add anything, but it's our recommendation that you do this because it will essentially uh be the will of the people immediately uh without having to have things held up at the legislative level.

Thank you, Bob.

Hannah, is there anything you'd like to add?

I'm happy to answer any questions that you have.

Thank you very much.

Okay.

Um board.

Shall we have a discussion?

Shall we have a motion first?

Uh what would you prefer first?

I have a couple questions.

Uh I think we should have a motion and then we should have a discussion.

Okay.

Do you want to read the motion?

Sure.

That's right.

I can do it as well.

Thank you.

I move to direct staff to prepare an article for the March 3rd, 2026 annual town meeting warning to see if the voters of the town of Brattleboro would discontinue the representative town meeting.

Great.

So uh you have some comments we want to address.

Yes.

Um question for Bob and Hannah.

You say so in the version where we put something on the ballot and the vote for to discontinue RTM is no, so we keep RTM.

You say that the petitions become moot and conceptually they definitely become moot.

It's your position that the petitions are officially legally done with would not get sent to the legislature because the RTM article is voted no.

Yes.

Um there's a statute that clearly establishes that any town that uses a representative form of town meeting has to continue using that form until it votes to discontinue it.

Okay.

So even though the charter petitions would have followed their process and let's say got a yes vote on one of them, it just wouldn't that would just short circuit.

Yes.

I mean that that that's they're sort of contingent on that question, which is why one of the the petitions has that as the first question.

Um but it's um you know, we're sort of in an uncharted waters because we're the only town that's ever done this.

Um now we would be the only town ever voting to not do it.

Um but it would be our position that because the statute is clear that you need to have a town-wide vote to discontinue the use of a representative form of government that we would need to do that before any charter amendment could be made to do something else.

You both are on board with the idea that if we put something on the ballot that more or less that says town meeting RTM yes or no, that we'd be okay to sort of administratively take off the first parts of those petitions that also ask about RTM yes or no.

That we would be in the clear to do that.

Yes, that would be a technical correction, and um only one of the petitions has that as the first question.

The second petition that came in just has it framed as if if the vote is to discontinue, shall we go with this form?

Okay, thank you.

And then I have a question.

What was that?

I agree with what Hannah said.

I have a question or two for us to discuss, but maybe let other people ask attorney questions.

Okay.

Well, so my only hesitations about doing this are that it creates sort of weirdness about not knowing what we're gonna have, um, finding out on election day what kind of town meeting we're gonna have, and more than that, that we're gonna have people running for town meeting, like campaigning for town uh RTM slots for something that very well could go away.

So those are the places where I'm not as sure about doing this.

Well, let me ease your mind by saying if you ran for RTM uh and RTM went away, you're still going to town meeting.

Yes.

So I mean that's can I just can I just make a comment on that, please?

Yes.

You're going to have that uncertainty either way.

Uh the reason we're proposing that you do it this way is because the the result is immediate.

Whereas if you wait for the legislature, especially in the situation where both of the charter petitions were to pass, um they could just sit on it for years, especially because this is going up in the second half of a two-year session.

Um I I went through and actually reviewed every charter petition that's gone up there this year and last year, and even in 2022, and umes that are sort of quote unquote controversial or more complicated, tend to languish.

And uh it you're going to have that uncertainty no matter what, but this solution that we're proposing allows you to mitigate that as much as possible.

Thank you for that.

Um other comments.

Amanda?

No, no comments at this time.

I really appreciate the thinking that you put into this, and I don't see why we wouldn't follow this recommendation.

Um so has the select board all weighed in and what can hear from the public now?

I mean, I can I can weigh in more.

Go ahead, wait.

If you want me to.

Go ahead.

Uh yeah, you know, I think it's um I think RTM was uh was was a really unique concept.

Obviously, Brattleboro was the only town who ever did it.

Again, proving how unique we are.

Um, but I think it's run its course.

So I'm excited to see if our constituents agree with us, because I think that they do.

And this has been the overarching thing that I've been hearing.

So I would be in favor of of this motion.

Yeah.

Well, I'm in favor of more democracy rather than less, and I think bringing it to the voters and having an immediate response is definitely the way to go.

Um do people in the public wish to speak to this issue.

We have our our town moderator right here, our RTM town moderator who could get voted out of a job.

I could still be open uh open town meeting.

Yes.

I'm David Gardenstein.

I want to support um the article that's been uh proposed by Mr.

Fisher.

I'd also like to recommend for your consideration as you're drafting the article that you uh consider language that would give the alternative if representative town meeting were to be rescinded and resume or uh revert or some other uh a verb to open town meeting so that the choice is clear on that ballot article if it's considered to be legally appropriate.

Because I think that having both alternatives, um, what we're leaving behind and what would we be going to um would help to clarify that ballot issue for the voters.

Um I would also note that in considering the two petitions that were submitted, uh, there's been a lot of uh um uh chatter that they're inconsistent, but I'm not sure that that's necessarily true, because one could satisfy the concerns that led to the Australian ballot petition by having Australian ballot as a check on the budget following town meeting, whether it's an open town meeting or a representative town meeting, and one could add uh a structure in the charter that following town meeting, however many weeks are necessary to get the ballots printed and to get the notices issued, um, that there's gonna be an Australian ballot on the budget.

And that would, I think, satisfy many of the people who uh requested uh Australian ballot based upon the fact that there's much broader participation in that process.

So you might want to consider that uh depending on what happens with uh a vote if it happens on representative versus open town meeting, charter commission might take it back up and propose that as part of the process.

But I'd like you also to consider that and to recognize that those two articles, those two petitions are not necessarily inconsistent.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Can I ask a clarifying question?

To Mr.

Garden C.

No, no, about the Yes.

Yeah, uh so if we uh approve this motion, what's the process going forward uh we'll see language when we see a draft warning in the end of January?

Okay.

And I I also think uh also continuing Mr.

Gardens comments that what we need on the ballot is not only a well-crafted ballot, but also a very neutral interpretive statement as to what all three items mean and what the effect of each item is.

I would also add that if if you approve this motion and then warn this item on the ballot and it passes and RTM is eliminated, then when you do the warning for the open town meeting in April, you could include in an article regarding this um Australian ballot as well.

Certainly, yeah.

Kate, did you have a question?

Either one.

Um Kate O'Connor, I'm also on the Charter Revision Commission.

I agree with I sort of agree and sort of disagree with our our great town moderator.

I do think that you should vote for the motion as made.

I just want, and I'm this is a very nuanced thing that I'm about to say, but I've sat through dozens upon dozens upon dozens of charter revision commission meetings.

When you vote to rescind RTM, it doesn't mean the person is choosing open town meeting.

We default to open town meeting, because that's what state statute says.

So I think that we can't have any language that says because you're rescinding RTM, do you want to rescind RTM?

It doesn't mean that person is choosing open town meeting.

It's what it defaults to.

The choice comes when they to when they vote on those two charter amendments for open town meeting and Australian ballot.

That's when the choice is.

We've spent years wrapping our head around it.

So my head is sort of wrapped around it.

But I just want to make sure that everybody understands that.

What you're what you're just voting on is to say we're rescinding representative town meeting.

People aren't choosing open town meeting by rescinding representative town meeting.

They get it by default.

I also just want to remind everybody that the Charter Commission is still out there, and we will come back to you after the March election sometime to ask for our charter to be placed on the ballot.

And our charter, what we come forward with, will be informed by what we hear from in March with those two other things.

So I would just urge you not to rush ahead and put something else on in March when there's all this other stuff brewing.

It's a very complicated thing, and it can make your head explode.

So I think we've got to try to keep it as easy as possible.

I I appreciate that your head has not exploded, and I appreciate the nuances in your comment.

And I'm sure that our attorneys are aware of it.

Hannah, did you have a comment you wanted to make?

Um I I don't know how you did.

I uh just to build off of what Kate's saying, if you rescind RTM, it basically just nullifies those provisions in the charter.

Um but there are some things in the charter that are already voted on by Australian ballot, like the election of the town clerk and things like that.

Um sorry, not the town clerk, I'm getting confused with all the other charter things that I looked at.

I'm getting confused with all the other charter things that I looked at, but there are certain things that under the default under statute would be open town meeting, but because those are already by ballot in our charter, that wouldn't change.

A good also would be a bond vote.

Something that by statute is by Australian ballot if you go away from RT RTM.

Uh Kate is right that you default to open town meeting.

Uh, but there are certain things that by law have to be by Australian ballot.

Well, great.

I is there anyone else who wants to speak that's online?

All right.

We've got two gentlemen we haven't heard from.

All right.

Um are we ready to vote?

Are we ready to discuss?

Let's vote.

All right.

I'll read the motion then.

Yes.

Um a motion has been made to direct staff to prepare an article for the March 3rd, 2026 annual town meeting warning to see if the voters of the town of Brattleboro would discontinue representative town meeting.

All select board members in favor of this motion.

Please raise your hand and say aye.

And there we have it, 5-0.

Hannah, Bob, thank you very much.

Thank you for your clear memo and discussion.

Uh let's see.

Yeah.

Sure.

Let's take a five minute break.

Let's come back to order.

We've got two more items.

The first is the interim bylaw social assistance.

John, you want to introduce this talk?

Uh yeah, actually, Sue Fillion is online and she will step us through this item.

Hi, Sue.

Nice lighting.

I know, sorry, it's so weirdly dark.

There is a light on in here, it just doesn't really show.

Okay.

Um, thanks for entertaining me on Zoom tonight.

The weather wasn't that great to make the ride for me, but um I am here to present information on how um our current land use permitting process works for social assistance and charitable service uses, and to provide you information on how the select board could change the way it is currently being permitted if um they felt that that was necessary and to be done in um a quicker way than land use regulations are typically adopted.

Um so this has come up as we've heard, we've we received a lot of questions about um how the establishment that was at 69A um received permits.

And um so the thought here is to just provide you some information about the uses um and then see if you want to explore explore this any further.

So under our current land use and development regulations, um, we have a use called social assistance and charitable services, and that's defined as an establishment that provides social assistance services directly to individuals, and it excludes residential and accommodation services.

And so this is a use that's permitted in several of our zoning districts.

Um I can share a map if that would be useful for you.

Um, but but the map the um areas of town that we allow it are in our urban center, village center, service center, neighborhood center, um, mixed use and our institutional zoning districts.

So basically that's the um kind of Putney Road um area south of the roundabout.

It's the downtown.

Um the mixed use area or neighborhood centers is kind of along Canal Street, um, some of our mixed-use centers are along Canal Street, Burge Street as well, um, and our institutional zoning districts are campuses like Winston Proudy, um the Brattleboro Retreat, um, and then the schools, like so BUH BUHS is an institutional zoning district.

Um so permitted uses are uses that are allowed by right.

So if somebody comes into the planning department and the list is a permitted use in that zoning district, then you know, generally sometimes we need site plan review, but generally if it's just you know, if it's in the downtown or something, we just issue a um new zoning permit for that use uh because that certain uses don't require site plan review.

Especially if it's in an existing building and you're just using it, you're not changing any aspects about the site.

Um and so you know, we we warn that um we post the permit after it's been issued, or the property owner puts the permit, but it's a pretty um transactional kind of uh transaction.

Um so the other option is to have a use as a conditional use.

And so that's one that's required to go through a review public review process with the development review board.

It's a use that's not automatically allowed because it could have potential impacts.

Um and so conditional use review criteria um focuses on whether or not the proposed use is compatible with the planned character of the area, um, whether it will not harm um public health and safety, it's consistent with local and state regulations and plans.

Um it can look at traffic, it can look at landscaping, um and kind of the character of the area it's going in.

And um one of the other things that they can look at is whether it's gonna have a cumulative impact within an area of town um that could impede development of the area.

So if the Slack board was interested in in changing a use, uh the this particular use of um the social assistance or charitable services from a permitted to a conditional use.

Um one way that you could do that is to adopt it through an interim zoning bylaw.

Um and that is basically saying, you know, we have this uh kind of emergent need, and while the planning commission and others are working on the town plan um or maybe doing some additional study, you could hold a public hearing with a 15-day warning and then you know, have a public hearing on it and decide whether or not you wanted to change this particular use from a permitted use to a conditional use.

Um there's pros and cons of having permitted or conditional uses, or I'll talk about the pros and cons for a conditional use.

So um pros of the of that could be um making sure it fits the character of the area.

Um it could possibly mitigate negative effects.

Um it provides a case-by-case review of proposals.

Um and it's more public because there would be a public hearing where people could participate at a development review board hearing.

Um is that it's gonna be more expensive and it's gonna take longer for a use to receive a permit.

Um it also opens up discretion into the permitting um process.

There is a potential for appeals, um, which can again delay uses from getting going.

And um, you know, restrictive conditions could be could be put on a permit, and that could also uh make it subject to an appeal.

Um so that's kind of my presentation.

Um I'm here to answer any questions you might have or kind of talked about this um further.

Sue, thank you very much.

The this is very thorough.

Um I'll open up the question to my colleagues.

I just want to say that as a planner for over 40 years.

Um I believe in conditional uses.

I think they serve a very valuable purpose in the community.

Um wants to go first.

Um was was there a motion?

There's an optional motion on page nine vote.

Okay.

What's the uh the date that we would insert?

Sue is the earliest date they could do December 22nd, 2025.

Yeah.

So something that you wanted to propose at a public hearing, um the way I calculated it with the 15-day warning and getting it in the newspaper, December, Monday, December 22nd would be the first um weekday that you could hold a public hearing.

All right.

So I'll motion, I'll uh move to convene a public hearing at 22 to take public comments on an interim zoning bylaw that would make the social assistance or charitable service a conditional use for the purposes of protecting public safety, health, and general welfare, and to provide for orderly physical and economic growth.

Great.

Peter, do you want to speak to that motion?

You know, again, I think um, you know, warning a public hearing um puts this into uh a realm of people actually showing up to give testimony, right?

To or not.

So um, you know, so in that in that democratic process, you know, I'm I'm in favor of hearing from what uh what people want and don't want.

You know, I mean uh I'll I'll acknowledge that sometimes these things serve a purpose and fill avoid.

Do they always do it correctly?

You know, maybe maybe not, right?

So I think to um opening this up to a public hearing is is a really good way to go.

And if if they come out in favor of it, then that's fine.

If they don't, that's also fine.

Right, but it's a public hearing, and then and then we vote.

Right.

Okay.

Oscar, did you have your hand up?

I didn't, I have a couple questions.

I go right ahead as well.

Okay.

Um just a couple questions for Sue first.

Um is this is a what's social assistance and charitable service being a permitted use in these types of districts, is that standard?

Is that common?

Is Brattleboro unusual to have that be permitted use?

I haven't done a real um, you know, I haven't looked everywhere around the state.

Um it, you know, I was looking at Burlington, and um there are certain certain districts where um and and everybody has different kind of uses, but they they were not as permissive as we are.

Um I can tell you by looking at Burlington.

I would need to look at more, and I'd be happy to do that before a public hearing or I think and useful information for us to have for any public hearing that we would have.

My second question was what would an what effect would this have on permits that have already been issued?

So if we made a change.

So for permits that have already been issued, there'd be no effect.

Do the permits expire or anything like that?

Is there no permits run with um with the use?

So no, a permit does not expire.

Um and yeah, so no.

So um, you know, there's probably the you know, there is a whole host of social services and in in the downtown area and and other parts of town, and uh those permits would not expire.

Amanda.

Yeah, I wonder is there a precedent in Brattleboro or another community of the idea of an interim zoning amendment?

Is that so yeah, we've we've done several interim zoning amendments.

Um so one that we did was during um during the COVID pandemic.

Um we did an interim with the housing crisis, we did an interim zoning amendment to get rid of density standards in areas with water and sewer.

Um, and then we made that more permanent within two years because interim zoning is good for two years.

It can be, I think, re-upped one other time.

Um we the select board recently did it in March, I think it was, or or maybe May, uh, to come into compliance with state law to up zone areas um that have water and sewer.

So it has been done.

Cool.

Is that it, Amanda?

Well, one more question.

Does this only apply to like a bricks and mortar um uh bricks and mortar use, for example?

Yes.

So it doesn't appeal to like a pop-up kind of thing.

Or pop up in a particular physical local.

Okay, I'm just I'm just curious if this only applies to a building in these areas being used for social and charitable.

You're expecting us to have pop-ups.

I'm just wondering if this if this also um applies to it's just a question.

Oh, I don't uh we're not doing public, I don't think an example of a pop-up might be food not bombs, of which there are multiple distributions in town, which I think would be a social assistance or charitable thing.

But it doesn't take place within a specific building.

Sean, do you want to address it?

So that was well up to Yeah, thank you.

Yeah.

Um I would say no, it wouldn't it wouldn't cover pop-ups.

I mean, I think typically those would be, you know, if they were on town property, they'd be permitted another way.

But um no, this would only be for brick and mortar.

Got it.

Thank you.

Isaac, do you have a comment?

Yeah, thank you.

I actually have a number of questions, um, just as part of doing due diligence for clarifying some questions.

So the the first thing, and this may be a question for the town attorney, is um it's my understanding that Vermont State statute authorizes interim bylaws only as an emergency measure.

And the town um the the memo explicitly states that the motivation is multiple complaints and perceived negative effects.

Um is it the opinion of the town attorney that residents' complaints constitute a legal emergency, a legal public emergency?

That's my first question.

Thank you.

We we have had uh we have had interim zoning in the past where we have found emergent situations uh for less.

Uh that's ultimately a decision for the board to make as to whether or not uh these types of issues that uh and some of this might be uh precipitated by the issues around 69A, but if those are issues that the board deems to be emergent, uh then yes, that would fit the interim zoning.

Interim zoning does require if it's to be adopted by the select board to be an of an emergent nature.

Um I have a number of questions.

Go ahead.

Yeah.

And I'll just that's I think something we may want to come back to is something that was raised at RTM, I remember is this when we were talking about the budget, is the discussion of what actually constitutes an emergency and what is the definition of that.

Um and there is interest in in having um discussion about that.

But um I'd like to clarify the a little bit about the basis for the proposal and if ask the if if staff could specify which social assistance establishments were the subject of the complaints referenced in the memo, the number of complaints received, and over what period of time, and if the content of those complaints could be made available for the board to review so uh it was 69A and complaints had to do um I I don't I'd have to look and see if I had any questions in writing.

Um it was conversant questions about how it was permitted.

It was um concerns about um use of the sidewalk.

Um and then there were some concerns about um you know the uh you know it impact impacting other businesses on the street.

Yeah, I can uh and and were there also police complaints.

Yeah, um we've had a number of complaints about that uh that site.

Uh I can think of five or ten people who at least asked me, you know, is this an art space and how was it permitted for that or is it permitted for something else?

So many questions like that have come up.

Uh I think just due to the nature of how that all went down and and yeah, I I think we could probably bring something on that uh to the public hearing if you decide to go forward with this.

Um I also if I can interrupt your questioning to to comment, Isaac.

Um we have had other social service agencies come before us and we question their ability uh to be better neighbors.

And I think that that this item comes to the heart of that.

I mean, we are left to request uh that they be better neighbors to to make sure that their clients are not leaving needles in the periphery of their land use and uh a host of other, you know, it's not just 69A.

It's and so while it would be great to have this conditional use, uh so many uses our grandfather, we're still in the position of asking people to be better neighbors.

Thank you.

Um my next question is were the businesses or social assistance organizations identified in the complaints?

So 69A invited to participate or provide comment on this discussion.

Well, they certainly will be if there's a public hearing.

Um have social service agencies been consulting about how this interim bylaw might affect their ability or future projects ability to operate, including potential administrative or financial impacts on dealing with the hearings and um staff time that would be required for that sort of thing.

Uh those are things that you might want to ask people at a public hearing on this if you decide to move forward with this, Isaac.

Okay.

Um and in terms of approximate staff time cost, what would we what would be associated with what cost would we be associated with this project for preparing the materials um for the the hearing on the 22nd that's been proposed, as well as um the work for drafting around drafting this change and also at what we might anticipate in terms of hearings that would be required in the future dealing with appeals and Sue, I don't know if you have an opinion.

I think it's pretty de minimis in this case.

It's really just doing what you had in the backup materials, or is there something more that needs to be drafted?

Well, I'll have to um put an ad in the newspaper.

Um I think that there needs to be um a report filed with it as well.

So it is pretty de minimous.

Um and in terms of you know, future hearings, um, you know, that's uh lots of people have hearings before the development review board.

There is a fee.

Um and there is some time involved with it, it would probably take um 30, 45 days uh plus to get a permit.

Um and uh a 225 dollar fee plus a butter notification.

Um but lots of uses in town goes through that process as well.

Say that it would be more, less, or the same as any other time that we um want to warn something like this for a public hearing.

Any other time that we've asked uh staff to do this, would it the cost be roughly the same?

Or is this more?

No.

No, it would be about the same.

Um I think you have any more comments?

Thank you.

Those that's those are all the questions I have.

My comments are that I think at this time of increased and heightened need in our dealing with this mega crisis of um climate change and housing crisis and addiction.

Um I am interested in lowering the barriers to people who want to help our neighbors and making it easier for us to help one another rather than making it harder.

Um I'm a little bit concerned that if if sometimes I think that when I wanted to ask those questions to get at what is the problem that we're trying to solve.

It sounds like the concerns about 69 Elliott Street, for one thing, they're in the process of moving.

I just looked at their new space.

Um so further from the from Main Street.

Um I'm hoping that that will alleviate some of those concerns.

But but it sounds like they already have a permit, so this isn't gonna affect them, it's more about a f a future, the future.

Um I um my concern, one of my concerns is around NIMBYism.

So there's social good that's provided by organizations, but not everybody most I I would guess a lot of communities wouldn't necessarily want it in their in their backyard.

Um and I think that it gets a little tricky when you start um having um opening this process up to the kind of the desires of uh people in that particular neighborhood.

Um and I think that again we want to be trying to make it easier.

Um in terms of having uh public forums on this particular hot button issue.

Um I'm remembering kind of what when we went through the process of the the ordinance that was attempted, the downtown safety ordinance, you know what I'm the downtown conduct ordinance.

Um I'm familiar, yeah, yeah.

And just the process of that, and I don't know how much value that whole process added.

Um I would just if if there are particular issues that we need to address, like there's a problem with an establishment, I would love to do with what we did with when groundworks came and we asked the questions.

And you, I know Liz, you asked a lot of questions clarifying about the OSHA thing uh concerns and really addressing Amanda brought up a number of concerns, and you know it was very informative, I think it was engaging, I think there's accountability in that process, and so I would I'd really like for us to be able to address things head on, and if we have a problem with with certain establishments, then be able to talk about it.

That's and make sure that people are most impacted by the decision, including business owners and the establishment are are in the room, but I I don't know in terms of of uh conditioning the provision of social services, um I have concerns about that.

So I guess um if I were to weigh in on um I can let me make a statement and let's assume that everybody sitting here, both people sitting out there um want everybody to have a warm place to put their head down at night, right?

I think we there's not a person that I know that doesn't want that for everybody.

I think it I think it does have to be managed in a way that I did not see at 69A.

Um, I can tell you 25 times that people have either texted me pictures of what's going on there, have called me, um, come in to see me to complain about it.

Okay.

So I think that's a lot where this is stemming from.

I understand.

Um I understand the fear behind sort of opening this up and convening uh a public hearing around this topic that we will probably hear a lot of a lot of lightning rod response, a lot of um you know, people who were genuinely upset, and and we need to listen to them too, as much as we need to find warm beds for people at night.

So I I think um to steal a phrase that Liz says just we just have to create better neighbors.

Um and sometimes that means we have to we have to govern it a little bit, and we have to take a look at things like this where we're opening it up for discussions.

I don't I think the fact that the 69A was called an art space was misleading.

Um if I'm if I'm speaking truth to word.

Um we all know that it wasn't an art space, um, that it was cloaked as an art space.

So that's fine.

It served a need.

Um I don't know that it did it correctly.

I don't know that it did it incorrectly.

Um so with that, I think opening this up in a in a public hearing and for conversation is something that we both have to endure.

I would like uh to have a future.

I mean, Bratabar has so many non-profit land uses.

Tons.

Um Mike P check said it was more than any other town in Vermont.

And that's an interesting statistic, but my point is that I think we need this interim zoning bylaw or certainly a public hearing about an in interim zoning bylaw because some uses require greater scrutiny.

And some uses can provide better compatibility, and some uses can be better neighbors.

And I think that if we think that through then mutual coexistence is assured, and that's what we want.

We want you know, a compatible space that works with the other spaces that are next door across the street.

And you know, we did have a lot of complaints about um the the impact on neighborhood businesses and and the neighborhood, and I think that we can do a better job of making sure that the uses in our town get along with each other and don't cause controversy.

And that that would be my goal.

Yeah, I just to give my comment, having asked my questions, um, I I understand the angst around 69A, and Peter, I I don't even really disagree with any of the way you characterize things just now.

I think I'm not sure that they did things, that they did what they were trying to do in the best way possible, and certainly all the challenges we saw are um legitimate.

I still I'm hoping that we won't do this, and the reasons are first that yes, we can say things are emergent.

I I can't really say with a straight face that we're hitting any sort of everyday concept of an emergency.

Um the organization in question is moving and is already permitted.

I'm also a little uncomfortable with a tool this broad.

Sorry, Sue, you were you raising your hands?

Yeah, I I just wanted to clarify and I I kind of been sitting on it um as you were all speaking.

Zoning permits run with the land, not with the organization.

So a move to a different location requires a new zoning permit.

Yes.

Uh but I I don't know if they're permitted or not at their new space, but until anything changed here, I assume they could walk into the office and get a permitted use permit more or less um transactionally, as you said.

Right?

And and there's a timeline here.

I mean, this isn't a change that we would make tonight.

So I I'm a little uncomfortable with the idea of a tool this broad.

I mean, this is specifically a reaction to 69A, which is one organization which will almost certainly not be affected by these changes.

There are dozens of these other organizations in these areas that did not give rise to this kind of idea in the years and years they've been in business.

Um I I feel like this is the wrong tool for the job, and it's a tool that's not even gonna hit the nail that people are talking about here.

So I would hope that we would not do this and would look for other solutions.

Let me um just speak to what you said that you said that this is this seemed this is this is focusing on 69A at this juncture.

This is not a new conversation.

When I served on the on the board of Groundworks Collaborative, um we had we were charged, committee was charged with finding a new site.

We had built out um and had the idea for what we all see now, but we investigated six to eight different um different locations, and at each location the pushback was tremendous.

Um fair or unfair, um I think that people have the right to quiet enjoyment.

I agree.

I think and I think that's what we're speaking about here, right?

And and again, using the term better neighbors is that with the understanding, like you don't necessarily can help who moves in next door to you all the time, you know, uh and like w where I live, I'm I'm I've I've hit the like the neighbor jackpot.

So right?

So I mean I've got great neighbors, so I've got no complaints.

Uh, but if one of them sells in a nightmare moves in, I've got to deal with that, and I live there.

I don't want to put that on anybody.

When we're talking about when we're talking about the DID, um I think that we have to we have to acknowledge that we have to take care of our uh of our economic center so that our economic center can help with situations like this.

If we're choking them out, there's there's no funds that come on the back end.

I'm I'm a I'm a philanthropic person, I give my time, I give my money, uh, and I do it because I believe in these causes.

I do things that that raise money and food for people who are food insecure, try to find as much uh things that I can to try to keep people warm in these hard conditions, uh and then and honestly speaking, in some unfair conditions.

Um to label this as something that is not um that I and I know that this happens to be maybe the catalyst that that sort of said, let's put this on the agenda, let's see if there is something there.

Because the downtown merchants that have talked to me had great concern over that.

All right.

And you know, I think that that is it, and and the people that lived in the immediate drop zone of that, you know, I would walk past every day to get to the transportation center and have to listen to it.

Can I just curious uh this isn't this isn't a gotcha, but when you have that experience with groundworks, I assume it was still a permitted use back then and has been for a while.

Um but you still got all that pushback from the community, and I assume that affected the decision you made and the site you have.

No, I mean we we we worked with uh Sue and the planning department to find out if if we could do it and if um and then the blowback from the neighborhood would be, and then you would just listen to the noise and you know try to make the best decision that you could.

There were a few times where we we walked away from it because the rollback was so much.

But if there were conditions on that approval, then they would be clear and all parties would know and and uh make everybody adhere to the conditions that have been set, and that establishment of those conditions is what we're talking about to have better neighbors.

So I'd love to say a couple things.

You know, the big themes in our conversation tonight are really accountability and risk management.

It is our responsibility as town government to address risk management and anticipate issues rather than chasing the puck.

All right.

That hockey analogy, I love it, because you will lose a hockey game if you're chasing that puck.

If you're just waiting for one fire after the other to go off and you have to put it out.

So what we're doing, it's an organized discussion, and uh, you know, creating an idea that will lead to a public hearing that will hopefully create a conversation where you'll have community awareness and buy-in into understanding what a particular organization's strategies are.

And when people know more, they feel better.

And neighbors of 69A, I will say, also reached out to me to express this.

Well, we're have we're business owners now that are next to 69A.

Um, and we're figuring it out.

However, I worry about any future business opening here.

I don't I don't uh I don't think that that would be appealing.

Um when I think of the future, and I think of winning that hockey game, I have we have to anticipate the pucks.

You know, this is our reality.

You know, we are a compassionate, generous community, but we have to do it within within a scope that will help us work together instead of continually fighting.

And and that's what land use regulation is all about.

And that's what yeah.

I mean, it's a myriad of we all have to deal with land use regulation.

I do as a farmer, um, Peter does as a business.

I mean, that's that's just working.

It nobody makes it easier for anybody, believe me.

But but a condition, you know, makes a use of more easily understood to be compatible with its neighbors.

Yeah, I think it's smart.

Um shall we hear from the public?

Go ahead.

Ivan Hennessey, District 8.

Uh, this conversation has revealed two very important things.

One, there is no emergent situation.

An interim zoning change is completely unnecessary.

Um so that's like a little minor thing.

The the major thing is that the concern that is uh that this is intended to address is that too many poor people will be visible downtown.

That is that is exactly what everyone is describing in the gentlest terms possible, but fundamentally, it's not a problem that there are poor people, it's that they're clustered together enough that people might notice them.

Um, it's probably not so egregious that it could lead to some sort of legal action.

I'm sure that there's no jeopardy for the town in that.

Um, but it's disgusting.

Kate.

My comment is only on process after I've heard what heard what everybody's saying.

If your idea of a public hearing is to give everybody a chance as a community to talk about this, and I think the goal would be to for you to get enough information so that whatever decision you decide, everybody involved, whether they like it or not, understands why you made that decision.

And I think the goal would be to for you to get enough information so that whatever decision you decide, everybody involved, whether they like it or not, understands why you made that decision.

I don't think having a public hearing in two weeks on December 22nd is the time to do that.

And I guess I don't understand why if you really want to hear from the public, why you just don't wait until the beginning of next year.

Just think December 22nd holding a public hearing.

I think you folks would just do yourselves a service by waiting and doing it at a time when people can actually have the again, December 22nd to hold a public hearing.

I don't think it serves the community.

That's just a process date question.

Thank you.

That's a reasonable point.

Yeah, I said we have Bob Ozar on the line.

Mr.

Ozer?

I don't know.

I had oh there I am.

So yes, you can see me and you can hear me.

Bob Ozer from Brattleboro.

Um I guess a couple of points.

Um trying to get my head around the idea of a conditional use.

And um so if I'm an organization or an entity of say a restaurant, um, and um I've got a permitted use already as a restaurant, and then somewhere in the process, and and and you get the conditional use applied, you go through this process, and at some point as a restaurant, I decide, well, you know, maybe on Fridays I will do free meals.

So is that social assistance and charitable?

And so I'm now permitted as a restaurant, but I'm not permitted as social assistance.

So does that put me in jeopardy at that point?

I have other questions, but I could I could rattle them off and just leave that one there.

Sure.

Um I like the idea that uh the chair mentioned about finding a way to be better neighbors.

And I'm wondering if there's a way.

I don't know if I can, but we'll try.

No, this one doesn't.

Um heaters aren't working anyway.

Turned off the heater.

So we can hear you.

Oh, was that it?

Okay.

Can you hear me now?

Okay.

Um I I like the idea that the chair.

I'm sorry.

Just no, you're good.

I missed that one.

Um I like the idea of what the chair said about how to be better neighbors.

And I'm wondering if there's a a way to cobble together some process to reach out to the folks behind uh the former 69A and uh figure that out.

Um Peter Peter in fact had a maybe this is off topic, but Peter had a Vermontitude the other day on uh community uh community restorative, I think it was.

Um and a way of getting people together to sort of do a shuttle diplomacy and to figure out solutions to problems.

And that might be an easier way than doing a declaration of an emergency and a conditional use.

Um maybe just talking to folks uh privately.

Um then that whole idea of emergencies.

I I really have a problem with declaring uh maybe this is uh because I'm reading too much news, but if everything gets declared as an emergency in order to move forward, I think that's disingenuous.

Um we're living with these emergencies on a daily basis.

So they're not really emergencies.

They're part of our society.

And we need to deal with it.

So I guess the one question that's out there then is if you've got a permitted use for a different purpose and you start to do a social assistance program within that permitted use, do you now fall into jeopardy because you don't have the conditional use?

Thank you.

Thank you, Bob.

Seems like the your restaurant question was kind of an interesting hypothetical.

Sue, do you have anything to say about that?

Yeah.

So the land use permit is based on the pr principal use of um of the property.

So in that situation, no, you know, if if uh one or two days a week um a restaurant started giving away free meals, uh, we would not um you would not need a conditional use for that because the principal use is a restaurant.

Thank you.

Um shall we hear from Marta?

And then we should wrap it up because it's getting too late.

Yeah.

I I I'd love to hear from just before Marta, just um John or um Bob's second comment about the dialogue.

My understanding is that John, our town manager engaged in significant dialogue um from the get go.

Um and I don't know if you want to talk about that strategy that was ongoing.

Yes, among many others, uh that there was quite an effort in the community to have that dialogue there and it was rebuffed to my in my experience.

So with the DBA and I understand that they had numerous conversations with interaction.

Yes.

Turning point, others.

Uh Marta.

Yeah, um so I'm a little confused.

I came here tonight when I saw it on the agenda thinking um, you know, there had been some formal complaints, town staff had investigated, substantiated those allegations or whatever.

Um, and so it kind of surprises me to bring this all up like on such a I don't know permanently altering our zoning use just from what really sound just like complaints or allegations, but nothing like formal in writing about a specific concrete situation that can be investigated substantiated.

Um I think there are a lot of misconceptions about 69A.

Um I mean, I heard you know um Peter was talking about lay their head at night.

Well, I don't know.

Do people understand it's an art space that provides two hot meals a day and it's only open 10 a.m.

to 4 p.m.

Monday through Friday.

There's no laying your heads at night there.

And also art is created there and is for sale there.

I know a number of people in the community who have bought um really nice art pieces, and I have my eye on a couple I'm probably gonna buy.

And there's uh um uh uh uh policy of um splits with the cost.

It's 50-50 with the artist and the and the community if it if they use their materials, it's 100% if they make the art elsewhere and bring it in, a member of the community brings it in for sale.

I mean, you know, has anyone actually looked at some of the people who are making repeated complaints who are also harassing and being just horrible to people who have done nothing wrong in that space, which is what I have observed.

I've also sat there for hours at a time, and it is a calm helpful place where people um can get food, um, hook up with uh some clothing and some shoes, you know, as needed, uh sunscreen, all kinds of things.

Um like I be I I feel like this this qu this is just jumped the question.

Like you haven't even started the process to get concrete complaints that you can substantiate and investigate, um and and you're just jumping to their bad neighbors.

Um I have been around there an awful lot.

I've never witnessed anything that somebody in that space has done or said that made me think that something terrible was going on there.

I've heard allegations of drug use, but if you go in there, it's a big sign that says if you're caught using drugs, you will be permanently trespassed.

I mean, and and they do it.

Um so I this all just seems kind of like um just jumping the gun to try to go right towards a zoning thing.

Um and you know, I think when uh requested communication come in from someone being who's making all of those assumptions and maybe is uh begins that being hostile, um maybe that communication isn't received.

Maybe there needs to be um, you know, uh uh a kinder, quieter conversation.

And I and what I thought was gonna I was gonna learn about concrete and investigated substantiated complaints, but all we've got is people like word of mouth or or texting someone rather than any kind of process to determine if these allegations are even you know something that the town should get involved in, take action on, um, and that kind of thing.

Uh thank you, Marta.

All right.

Um is there any more discussion?

Um we have a motion on the table.

Are we ready to vote?

I have more that I'd like to contribute here.

Um, if we had invited 69A, since that's the sub then identify the subject of concern.

If we had actually physical copy of complaints, I received one written complaint.

One I think all of us did.

Um long letter with a whole bunch of concerns.

But a lot of them were about the concerns about people in who had used six who who are homeless who are downtown, but not necessarily about 69A itself, but about people who are may have used that that's that resource.

But anyway, if we had actually invited the advisory board members and the the folks who are running 69A to come talk with us and had a discussion and exhausted all of our other options, um you know, I it if people had come I had three meetings with folks at 69A over the last three months that I publicized to listening sessions because I had been I had actually been invited to come and have a chance to connect and hear people's concerns.

Um, you know, and and there was members of the public who came to those, but like there wasn't um that was that would have been an opportunity as well to for there to have been some discussion of concerns.

Um I didn't hear a whole lot there.

I didn't see business own nearby business owners.

Um if the planning director is telling us she'd have to look to not sure that she has any written complaint.

I mean, to me, this is a there is an emergency, and that's the you know the fact that there were over a hundred people were with suddenly without shelter this summer, and this is one of the places that actually absorb people.

And I think that when you put more barriers to social services being able to be provided, it could mean that it's harder to actually um you know fill those urgent needs that our social service agencies, other social services agencies just were not prepared to absorb any of that need that was really just suddenly we had in our community.

I would be open to a conversation like if we wanted to talk, you know, say in January, we were to look, or after we finish the budget, we were to look at okay, look at all these permitted uses.

You know, we're talking about duplex of tri tri tri the permitted uses in village centers or multi-unit dwellings of five or more units, um bed and breakfasts, rooming or boarding house.

I mean, there are a lot of different things that I think could be um could be present some more actually more disruption.

I mean, bar or drinking drinking place, we don't have that as an conditioned to have an entertainment um spots.

I mean, I think that this is I I don't think this is appropriate to single out this one particular thing of social assistance or charitable services.

So I would I would I've moved that we table this discussion to a time when we can talk more thoroughly about um all of the permitted uses um of land and zoning.

So like a public hearing.

I mean I think that that uh I I don't mean to make light of it, but that is what I think we're trying to put on the the agenda.

So you know, and I'm and I'm also curious um if uh we had Chief Hardy here and we're all looking for hard fast evidence, how many times people have been no trespassed from 69A?

I also want to further be clear and just saying this seems to be the catalyst for this conversation um and what we are trying to do is not eliminate these services as we are trying to make sure that within our downtown district, the very thing that can hold these organizations up and and help support them financially when they need finance can't be unfortunately within the area of the of the DID.

And I think that that is what we are trying to put on the agenda to discuss on the 22nd.

Are we ready to vote on this motion to have a further public hearing?

Um I would like to weigh in Kate's comment about the timing of it.

I think that we should do it on December 22nd, because I being a procrastinator myself, I know just set the date, let's do it, and let's do it.

Right.

Are we ready to vote then?

Well, just point of order.

I want to make, I'm not sure if you can table something after a motion has been read, but I want to give, I mean, Isaac said it, and I want to make sure it has its moment.

I don't know the answer.

It would it would be asking to the person making the motion to withdraw a motion or change it.

And I think I think that the vote itself speaks to Isaac's amendment.

Certainly, I mean, uh I'm probably wrong.

I suspect we could have tabled the agenda item.

But I don't know.

Oscar, I'm gonna withdraw that motion.

Um thank you for the explanation.

I would just offer a friendly amendment that it be a to take public that we change it to move to convene a public hearing on December 22nd to take public comments on an interim zoning bylaw that would make um changes to the conditional use for the purposes of protecting public safety, everything.

All these things.

But strike the social assistance or charitable service to see if there are other items that people want to um move to have been conditional use.

For instance, entertainment places, bars, and drinking places.

I I do not agree with that.

Uh is there a would you have to approve a friendly amendment?

Yeah, yeah, no, I'm good with the amendment as I read it.

All right.

Are we ready to vote?

Yeah.

Okay.

Uh Peter has made a motion.

Move to convene a public hearing on December 22nd, 2025 to take public comments on an interim zoning bylaw that would make the social assistance or charitable service a conditional use for the purposes of protecting public safety, health, and general welfare, and to provide for orderly physical and economic growth.

All select board members in favor of that motion, please raise your hand and say aye.

I all select board members not in favor of that motion, please raise your hand and say nay.

All right, three to two.

The ayes have it.

Now are we on our agenda?

We have one more thing.

Yep.

John, you want to discuss the monthly FY28 budget update for October?

Yep, the finance department has provided you uh monthly finance report uh through the end of October.

And that report has line item details and budget to actual reporting for the general fund and the utilities and parking funds.

With uh a third of the fiscal year completed in the general fund, annualizing the property taxes.

We have uh taken in 36% of budget.

And on the expenditure side in the general fund prorating annual expenditures that have been made at the beginning of the fiscal year, we are now at 31% of the annual budget.

So total revenues in the general fund, including receivables is 22,460,555 through the end of October, and the total expenses are 10,079,132.

And that uh that has a surplus of 12,381,423.

Uh the finance department reported on the receivables as you've requested in the past, including EMS receivables, which uh were calculated at 38 percent of total EMS charges at 338,381.

On average, we've been collecting 43 percent of the EMS charges, but we're still conservatively calculating that at 38 percent.

Uh some things to note in this report that utility costs continue to be uh uh uh rise, you know, rising and that that has continued as well as overtime budgets for fire, police, and dispatch are over um over budget.

This these have been offset by underspending of staff salary lines.

In the utilities fund uh again through 33 percent of the year, uh revenues raised are at 33 percent, and expenditures what when prorated are at 20 percent of the annual budget.

Total revenues and utilities fund through the end of October is 2,349,115, and total expenses 1,726,516 for a surplus on the year of $622,000 five hundred and ninety-nine.

Uh in the parking fund revenues are twenty-seven percent of the annual budget, and when we prorate expenditures, we see that those are at twenty three percent of the annual budget.

So there we are running a surplus of just over a thousand dollars with two hundred and seventy thousand four hundred and seventy-three dollars in total revenue and two hundred and sixty-nine thousand two hundred and ninety-six dollars in total expenses.

Also included uh in the these reports is a loan report, a grant report, and a transfer report.

And I'm happy to try to field any questions that you have.

All right.

Oscar, do you have questions?

Um no, not really.

Um I done, we talked about a couple minor things I had, but I have no major concerns.

We're continuing to monitor it, and I still just I think it's worth pointing out I think how much this report has evolved and I think developed in really helpful ways over the year.

So no.

Amanda.

Thank you.

That's helpful as presented.

Great.

Peter?

I'm good.

Well, thank you.

Isaac?

Yeah, thank you.

All right, I have two things I'd like to note.

First, on page uh 98 of the parking fund, it's a surplus of 1,177.

A surplus is a surplus, no matter how small it is.

Um having seen many many years of that being in the red.

Also, uh would you like to comment on the fact that uh you say utility costs are rising, which is creating the impression that costs will exceed budget?

Yes, in in utility lines.

Just in utility lines.

Okay.

Yep.

Um that's all the questions I have, and I thank you for this report.

Obviously, raising 36% of the budget and spending 31% of the budget is a good outcome.

Um and then I assume that these revenues are what we got more interest on.

Um what the the revenues there are primarily receivables in property taxes, but even if you uh just bring that down to what the um what we've received, uh we're still looking pretty good in that general fund.

So great.

Yep, thank you.

All right.

Um motion required.

Nope.

Any questions?

Any questions?

My motion to adjourn.

Can I jump the gun?

We're all just so cold.

This is not moved for five hours.

All in favor of adjournment.

Please raise your hand.

Hi.

Hi.

Oh, you name.

Thank you.

Thank you, Seth.

Oh, thank you, Seth.

Thank you, PC TV.

Thank you for all in attendance.