Forums, we got on the two bond questions that are on this November's ballot.

The forums are tentatively tentatively scheduled for October 21st for our school forum and October 23rd for our public safety forum.

In addition, the North Kingstown Fire and Police Chiefs invite and welcome residents to the public safety complex on Post Road on October 9th, October 23rd, and October 26th for tours.

Information can be found on our social media platforms by or by reaching out to my office or either chief with the public safety complex.

Based on the tremendous success of past years, we're rolling out our winter wonderland decoration grant program with some new elements.

The planning department will continue with the $1,000 reimbursement and introduce some new awards for best traditional decorations, best contemporary decorations, and best new participant decorations.

We're hoping to announce our award winners and prizes at the tree lighting ceremony that usually takes place the first I think it's usually a week from a week after Thanksgiving within the village of Wickford.

This program has been well received, has had great participation.

It's fostered a relationship between the town, the Chamber of Commerce, and businesses, and it really has stimulated the economic activity, promoting local businesses and resulted in a very festive atmosphere along Post Road.

So it's really been well received and has worked, and we're looking forward to expanding and improving on it in 2024.

Our IT department launched it launched a new cybersecurity training platform last week.

This new platform received the support of the ITAC committee, and it really is a key step in enhancing our security posture and educating our employees with the knowledge to recognize and mitigate cyber threats that may be coming uh throughout their email.

We will also be working in working with putting some participation incentives and prizes to encourage active participation.

We're looking for 100 percent participation and we're trying to do that through some rewards at first, and then also realizing that those who don't participate, we will have to do something about that because this is a crucial project that we're moving forward with.

Superintendent Duver and I attended the most recent board meeting of the local Chamber of Commerce, which was well appreciated by the board and the um and the new director, uh, to the point where we're invited to go back again this Thursday.

So we're looking forward to that.

Um in addition, I've attended the chamber's past few morning and evening events with different businesses that they have.

And we had one of our September department head meetings in the chambers depart in the chambers conference room of which the director addressed all the department heads with some questions and concerns and different initiatives that the chamber is is moving forward with.

Um again, this was well received, and I just think it's uh one of many steps that we've taken to improve the relationship between the Chamber of Commerce and the town, almost like a partnership, and I know the department heads enjoy our department head meetings going on the road once in a while, so it really was a win-win.

Early voting begins Wednesday, October 16th at our municipal office building.

Um my thanks to uh our town clerk and their staff for putting this together, um, which usually one of the most one of the busiest polling places of all, so I really commend them for just a smooth process that has taken place in few in past years and I know will take place in future years and this year.

Also, there will be a school building department building subcommittee at the school administration building in Kwanzaa Park that same night.

And then finally, um as I communicated or we've communicated to the town council during last year's budget session, we added an alternate component to our recycling bid, which is about to expire.

The recycling bid is about to expire, which includes researching the cost and viability of viability of providing trash collection to our residents.

This has created a lot of questions.

I have received a lot of emails and a lot of calls from residents, um, some with outreach and some with from outreach in favor of this initiative, uh.

Looking forward to trash collection.

Others opposed to it because they enjoy their private trash collection that they have right now or enjoy the transfer station.

Uh, because this is an alternate bid, I just want to assure those who are listening in and those here tonight that we can move forward with the recycling bid without awarding the trash pickup option.

So the reason why we did this is just to conduct our due diligence, just explore the cost, the benefits, the consequences of providing trash collection to our residents, present this analysis to the town council, and then have the town council make a final decision, but a decision based based on a lot of data that we put together.

So as a result, no matter the course of action, uh we will ex this future initiative will be explored and conducted at a public meeting with the town council.

So as always, again, we we are open to public comment.

I appreciate the outreach, but there was some confusion.

Um this is we're just conducting our due diligence.

We think it's something worthwhile as far as researching.

Um, if we feel it's something that is cost effective, uh, people can still maintain their local trash pickup, but it's something we can roll out to everyone else.

If we find out that it's not cost effective, um, at least down the road when someone says why don't you pick up trash, we can say in 2024 we did the following research, and this is why we don't.

So I think it's a great idea putting together an alternate bid, and we look forward to coming back to the council probably in November or December.

So it is going to take us some time to evaluate these bids.

And that's my miniature report.

As always, any questions, let me know.

Just a quick comment.

Kudos on doing due diligence with the trash pickup.

I think it is an important step, and any opportunity we have to research and bring information back for thorough vetting is much appreciated.

Thank you.

I also would like to commend the town for doing this research.

I think it is important to think ahead, plan ahead.

Some plans work, some don't, but at least we'll know the data, and that's important.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, moving on.

Um we're going to go to old business.

This is like real old business, isn't it?

Whistleblower ordinance policy.

So it is old business, and I want to explain why it's on the agenda this evening.

So we attend, I'm going to give um I I guess stop me at any time, although it is a quite a short meeting, so this might be the right meeting for this.

We attempted to address this in early 2023.

Um address this being, and I will explain in a couple of minutes, the fact that the whistleblower policy was not working in town.

And I will explain why in a minute, but I want to first explain why it's on tonight's agenda.

So as I brought this forward in 2023, a lot of questions and issues arose, legitimate questions and issues from the Council.