The first item of business is to approve the agenda. Do we have any other additions or changes to the agenda? Only to note that the July 23rd meeting minutes weren't even archived. That would probably take me to that one. Yeah, they had it before today. I want to make one change. After the Green Lantern lease agreement, if you'll approve, I want to put a quick executive session in there so we can discuss some of the questions and see if we can decide that before we do our vote. Okay, so you want to discuss them and take a look at what the executive session is. Yeah, and come back out. And is that going to take place, the plagues of the executive session for people down the road? Yeah, I think that would be good. I think that would be good. All in favor? Opposed? Okay. So next is public comment or inquiry? Anything that's not on the agenda that folks have a concern about? I'm here again to find out what the status is. I'm giving some speed limit signs up on the Louisville group. When I was here in June, what I think I heard was that there might have been a delay in order to get some signs in the new budget, but that kind of places had been identified where those signs should be. And there's one sign that's up. Right off of Canberra Road is you go into Campbell Road, which I noticed just a few days ago, but it's 35 miles an hour, and that traffic ordinance designates that whole length of road at 25 miles an hour. So I'm a little confused. I just want to kind of understand where we are, when we might expect signs to get up, and why do we have a 35 mile an hour sign up in a good place, but the wrong sign, the wrong speed. So that goes back to the traffic study or the sign study inventory that we're working on. The road that you put on as an IRF priority because we knew it was already in order to have a speed, it was a posted speed limit, Alan and I are delivering signs this week. So I'm getting together at an inventory of how many we need. Originally, we were just going to look to see what we had in our inventory and see if we had anything that was useful. I think that was our discussion last time to see if there was anything that was actually salvageable without there's nothing that meets the complexity and equality that's required. The intent is to do an initial sign order this week, which would include whatever the speed limit is posted by orders. So we'll definitely make sure that another piece of this inventory is verified and let's not put it in correct because it sounds as though that may not be the case. So we'll definitely base this on the orders because that's what makes our inventory happen also. Because it doesn't really do us any good to say we need signs all over the world because the order doesn't allow for anything but what we'll do is we'll, in this first order of signs we'll be getting speed limit signs for that roadway whatever that scene actually is. I don't remember how long ago. I think it's 25 miles. It's $25,000 for 4.94 miles. It's $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. $25,000. It's obvious, but we're trying. So, you'll be the first one who first will be your site. I guess you can come over to another place. Okay. So, I might stop in sometime just to take a look. You can come on, take a look at the town. Yeah, it's a really nice town. It's got a lot of local places. Okay, great. So, we'll just have to begin that. The bottom of the building where it comes off from.  So, I'm going to turn off the switch. Okay.   And I call it a mine bridge. I don't know the number of that bridge. But from that point, straight, for nearly five miles, straight up through Willingville, through Lucas Four Corners, to where it's camp road. At the end of camp road. That's all traffic ordinance. 25 miles now are established in 1989. And that's the area where we're concentrating on the stuff that actually happens with all the others. It's impossible to determine what they do then. So, please be patient. We're getting there. I didn't even take this off. That's me. But we do have a fun.  I think I've told you back in June we kind of had a neighborhood gathering. And we kind of talked about speeds and stuff like that. But, you know, I'm still seeing, I'm home all the time. So, I have the joy of having cars go by.  And, you know, I have the occasional ATV riders that go by through. Now, again, I know they're not even supposed to be on the roadways, up past my house. But I would like to at least be able to say to them, listen, I don't have a problem with an ATV, but just please 25 miles and go slow. You know? And I right now have nothing. I have no way to kind of, you know, I have no credibility. And you want to show the board. Yeah. Well, we'll get it done. Thank you. We'll get it done. So, we'll get a signboard. I think it usually takes about 10 days or something, you know, with the posts and everything. Thank you very much. Thank you. This should be a lot of time. Okay. Thank you. That was actually on the list. So, okay. Any other public comment? Well, I came in late. I just want to make sure nobody else has something. No. No, these were all scheduled. Oh, it looks like speed is on our minds. This is my first time coming in to talk. I'm sorry. Danny Dover. I'm up on Campus Road. Okay. So, it's my first time coming in to talk about, you know, public safety on Campus Road. I've been living there for 40 years, and I'd say it's probably about the worst. I've seen it. I've seen it. I've seen it. I've seen it. I've seen it. I've seen it. I've seen it. I've seen it. I've seen it. I've seen it, and I'm just really concerned. And it just seems like it's gotta be the third highest buying of traffic in the town, in terms of towns out under Route 12 and 107. It's a connector road. It's on the state list of bicycle routes, you know, bicycles going up there. You've got motorcycles and then the demographic has changed. families, with kids, with pets, people walking their dogs. Tractors are still on there. It's just waiting for disaster.  But it just feels like it's a matter of time. I feel like I'm taking my life in my hands every time I back out onto that road. So I'm coming asking for help, short-term help, and then also long-term help, short-term help. I realize that you can't cut a constable into a million pieces and put them on all these different roads. But being one of the busiest highways, it seems like it should be a priority. And if we could just do it a couple of times, one hour in the evening, one hour in the morning, during one week, that would have such a damping effect on a short-term basis. I realize it doesn't last forever. But it's not just out of staters. There are a lot of commuters, a lot of long-distance commuters that use that road. And sometimes, even like a 5, 3, 6 o'clock in the morning, someone goes by their just unbelievable speed. But that's what I would suggest if it was possible. Just be like that presence, just once or twice could have a huge effect, in my opinion. Where else do you live on? I'm three miles up. I'm right across from Dunham Hill Road, Dunham Road, where the broken down barn is. And actually, if they parked right practically across the street from our house, because that's the one flat, straight section of road where people are coming down on the hill, or they pass, they'll try passing right there. But that would be a great place to get people to slow down. Oh, yeah, well, that brings me to my next point. And I'll come back just like you have. I'd like to start the ball rolling, whatever traffic study is needed, or whatever. I personally feel that that road, the bottom two thirds of that road could stand to have the speed limit reduced from 40 to 35. I think that would be reasonable to ask that. People aren't going to go 35, but if it's posted at 35, maybe you get people to go 45. And you know, you could live with that, but people are not going 45, 55, 60. So, that's fine. It's a complicated process, but it doesn't have to happen. I know it is. Greg can explain it, but if you're not sure what it is, but you don't have to do the speed studies to be able to support the changes in the speed study nation, that speed is acceptable in that section of the road. So it's kind of a double-edged sword, that potentially could go the other way. Well, I'm willing to take that chance. I have a feeling, well, I don't know how they base it, what they base it all on, but. When was, hasn't there already been, there've been traffic studies on that road many times before? Has there been one recent and not sure when the last one was, but you're right, they did do a status of speed limits to begin with. They had to have done a speed study. I don't, I don't know when the last one was done. I've done a lot of research in the last week or so about speed studies and setting speed limits in town. You can actually, this state will actually let them miss a power to do the speed study themselves. To a point, when you really start talking about really high speed limits or low speed limits, then you have to get professional and they're about that. So, but otherwise, it's something that just takes time and some effort to do an actual speed study. When they're looking at multiple elements is what, so it's a whole matrix of different things that you're supposed to look at. You just judge it's one way stuff, kind of what you're seeing over a normal amount of time or one of your trips or something like that. At the end of it, it kind of spits out what the speed limit is supposed to be or could be at that point.  The public sort of create the same speed because they feel that they're safe to do that. And that's the speed they're running. So that's what I mean Paul was talking about is that if the numbers go back and it finds that the average driver is going 60 and they're able to navigate that safely and they're beginning to that speed limit could actually put luck. Well, do they take into consideration what the usage is? You need to get it stated. Like bicycles, so in fact that there's no shoulder. Yes. The road is a residential road. So that's all they need to account. It is. So that's something that actually needed. We can't be announced to a point with our little roads. That would be a little more, I want to get the state involved a little more with that. Yeah, I realize, yeah. The traffic, the volume is so high. All right. But we are, I am working with two researchers at the local planning commission and they've got these speed counters. I don't know if you saw the speed counters out here, but I'm working with them to try to get a whole career for the roads to place on different roads so that we can start collecting some data. So that we have some hard data. Yeah, man, I don't think there's probably anybody in Camper Road who would disagree with what I've just been saying. Sure, sure. But we have an issue that we have, you know, the data data. Of course, yeah. You know, it can be based on, because what the state is like it says is we set it to low. People aren't going to do that. Right. And so they're going to drive over to one again. So you want to set this speed limit to somewhere where it's reasonable for everybody. Yeah. Because being too low is actually going to save the issue too. Sure. Because people are, they're feeling when they're coming down and somebody's going super, super slow and they're going to be in another region. Well, that's why I talked about, you know, it's the bottom of the road. I mean, the top of the road can stay. Sure. You can do it in seconds. Yeah. You can do it in seconds. Right. So what about the idea of, is there a possibility of getting a constable presence on the road? Yeah. We also try one of those. We have two to move around the battery upgrade. You can move one out there if you think that will help. Yeah. I don't know what he's got appropriate. Is the one here collect data? They all collect data. Yeah. So it's actually a preliminary piece of our own income. So you can even have a couple of pages from auction. Right. Yeah. Well, you said there was a problem because the batteries run out. They run out pretty quickly. So depending on how it's used, you know, like that here, they run out pretty quickly because of the luck drive. So it's a lot of time. Right. But they are, we can move them around. So if we want a place out there to see what it would do, such as this view of it, and see what it would do, and then collect some data from it, we could do that. Well, keep that location in mind. I think that would be a real good place to start. Yeah, and I love this is just boots on the ground kind of thing. But this study is to go out there and observe what's going on. And John, I don't know what you're seeing. But, you know, you need a radar timer to figure out where it works, but that's not going to be so bad. It's not a type of problem for that. What if we didn't? I have one in my building currently. So I think should they look if we ask them to allow us to do it? Yeah, that's just part of the long sheet when you're doing all the different elements and you're trying to figure out what the C is. You want to know what you were doing. And then there's a main idea. You want to look at the average and look at some other numbers just to kind of see what that range actually looks because, again, a large piece of this is what is the normal traffic problem? What do they do to drive that average and that average? And that's usually, usually, close to what the C does, but according to the state. This is all the state intervention. And it is. Well, I was just going to say, depending on where you're, you know, on the flights, on the straightaways, you know, people would feel safe going 40, say, well, it should be 40, but then you have all the turns, whether it's on Camper Road or Lilliput Road, and they're, you know. Which I think is what you said. I mean, to me, at a secondhand, that would also be visible and just see how it really worked out. You can see trends. You might have a secondhand that's got a lot of lines and then you've got straightaways. So maybe it works itself out and there are some sort of patterns to be learned. So it's just an interest on Camper Road. It is in the traffic horns. It's 40 miles an hour from the bottom of Camper Road until you get to Campbell Road. And then from Campbell to the Rochester line, it's 30 miles an hour. What? From, do you know where Camper Road hits Camper? Wait, but very top. From that point until you get to the Rochester line, it's 30 miles an hour. That's what it's, you know, water? Because that was before the road was done. So what's it supposed to have there? I didn't know that. Oh. Yeah. And again, as she said, as Mo said, that's before the road was constructed over the mountain. And it had, you know, 30 would have been too fast to go through that. That's why we're doing this live. So part of it does show that the ordinance, as you're all saying, is out of date and it's not kept up. But there are other pressures that have happened in all of these years, which is more traffic. People try and get to and from more traveling distances and they're in a big hurry. You know, so there's a lot of moving pieces that have to be kind of... And again, the methodology that they gave me was spreadsheet, you know what I mean? It's very involved. There's a lot to it. So it's not just one or two of the things. It actually pays to the engineering document. So it takes a lot of different points of data and puts it all together and spits out a number that they need to be relevant. But to your point, I think what we need to do, and this is why we're doing our assignment, Tori, is to verify that what is in the ordinance is actually on the ground. So if that doesn't change there, then you have to have a sign on it that shows that change. Actually, I've never seen a 30-mile-hour sign on here, right? It probably got knocked out when they got struck to be there. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It sounds to me that we need to be really analyzed for a lot of time. And doing an ordinance change is not that difficult. We would have to do it anyway for some. I have some other things for the highway or something to be changed. But we just have to have the data to support it. So... I mean, there are a couple of sections that can't work out the top of the point. Correct. That first curve that's to come out of it. If you drop down, if you go over the top and drop down that whole first section and it's down to the top. Only if I don't come back. Yeah. Yeah, various curves. Yeah, of course it's... Yeah, and I'm not sure if you might actually do a little research to find out when the last effort study was done, how it was done, what came from that. The ordinance should be flagged by the study. So that might have been a long, long time ago. But that doesn't matter. Yeah. So let me, if you've got that, if you're going to have that thing for a while. I'll ask them if there are a couple of little things. I mean, the intention was to do some speed studies through the downtime of our section during different events and just during normal. And so I want to ask them to get their permission because they sort of looked into VRI as a, if you wanted to help you guys figure out what's going on. But yeah, they're open to it. I don't know if Danny could be willing to do some sporadic readings or... Sure. It's usually pretty controlled. Everything is pretty controlled. One at a certain time. They want it in a certain type of asset. It's documented. Yes. You want to have it, no, I don't really want to do sporadic readings. That's not a sporadic one. I'll say that again. So then on behalf of AR, he says, yeah, absolutely, he's actually again. What's the protocol? What's the next? Does it have to go through the town so that if you can show that you've done the proper... I would say that just gathering a lot of data, like the speed part of it, as long as whoever is doing it is following the protocol procedure, they can gather the data. It's just the reports and the traffic study, as you will, will be through the town. It has to come through the town. But gathering the data can be, as long as we've got the parameters are set, it doesn't follow the... So what I'm hearing you say is you would welcome volunteers through the town. Yeah. But no, really, I'm serious. I mean, you know, you said we'll block readings between 8 and 10 a.m. on Thursday, I'll send all my portions. You don't have to worry about this if it gets broken or whatever it is. Well, that's another thing. If you're saying that point already, I'm going to send anybody that's really stressed. Yeah, I mean, I'm sure you have to put all of that to the animal. Well, and we would be, you know, I would be the top marker for the size of the traffic. You're saying the traffic count... There's no requirement in the medium. That's easier than setting up the strips on the lathe. You know, on the strips we've got another... I mean, that seems easier now. The strips are nice because you just lay it out. Exactly. That's the most complete... So, to your level, all of the signs that have the following is people see signs. They saw them. Yeah. So it kind of beats... Yeah. ...the strip people right at home. Yeah. So maybe that's what we're looking at. And maybe the whole reason why it is to look at it is to tell me to add three or four sets of strips so maybe we could do that in two or four locations on that route. I would be very... Just sort of see what sort of data... I'd love to see that. Yeah. Yeah. And do you think the gospel might be available? I don't know what you're talking about. Okay. And I know you're more present. Yeah. Great. Thank you. Okay. Jose, congratulations. Thank you. Well, thank you for all your...  Thank you. It's a loss of... It's a loss of school. We don't know you, but I'm the member of the energy committee. And I am here today to try to stick some guidance as far as how to proceed. We have an opportunity to put an electric vehicle charging station for free. And we're not going to pay for it. As long as we put a panel with 140 amps, it's going to cost $1,200. Hopefully you'll agree with that. I mean, David? Approximately. Right? From the wire and the whole thing is going to cost about $2,800. We have some grant and some money we raised, so we would be short about $1,000. Probably we can meet it with more fundraising.  Dumb because it doesn't charge money. Okay? Whoever comes into Bethel can come in there and plug his car out. Okay? And the cost is obviously the town. The town is paying for that. And it could be significant depending on how much the station is used. A little bit of a rough calculation. It's 140 amps basically. The station has two sections. One is for the Tesla. That's 100 amps. Those guys like to charge fast. And the other one is for the run of the mill level 2 smaller cars, which is a 40 amp. So it's 140 amps. Two stations separate. Worst case scenario, those two stations are used eight hours a day. It's like 10 hours a day. Full. Okay? So that's going to be about $15,000. So a year of electricity. Okay? $15,000. That would be the cost. Now, are they going to be used for 15 hours? I don't know. Maybe not right now, but eventually they might. Depending on what the electric car goes. I mean, the electric car is growing. It's going to be about a million cells in another three or four years. Right now it's about 750,000 cars. So anyway, that's the scenario. The advantage would be we bring people to Bethel. They will leave their car charging and they will be spending money in town. We are working on solar solutions for the town, the town hall, the fire department, et cetera. We'll be talking a little bit more about that. It's very promising, very nice. Nevertheless, we don't have that yet. Okay? So that is the first scenario. So I don't know how you feel about that. I don't know how you feel about electric cars in general. How you feel about bringing these people here. The average electric car owner has a master's degree. They're educated. They have an average of two times the income of the national average. They're usually well off people. They're intelligent. They're very green-minded people. Bringing people into Bethel is worth $15,000 a year. So I can see that the direction might be probably enough, right? For that scenario more. I don't know how the other members feel. But basically, if you don't mind, I'd like to expose the other two scenarios. And if you tell me how you feel about the other one, two, or three, then I'll have a better idea how to proceed. We'll have a better idea how to proceed. Okay? Any questions from the first scenario? Any other questions? Sorry about that. We're very, very much in charge to help you to travel again. We could put an honor system. You know, usually these people are very honest. They would probably give, put the money in a box, and we would probably recover more and more than what we're spending. I would be my guess. However, there is a risk because we are basically appealing to the good will of the American people, which I believe is pretty good in my opinion. That's why I came here, right? But anyway, that would be one option. Any other questions? So if you have an owner's location? Yeah, that would be that corner right there, about 40 feet from the main, so that would be the cheapest way. We would have assigned electric vehicles preferred at a limit. So whoever... The left corner. There you go. Parking lot. Yeah, okay. So that would be the location. Is there... So I'm assuming in today's world of technology, not being an electric car owner, I'm assuming there's some sort of internet after something that tells them that location on that so that somebody driving around says, oh, here's a location I could go. Yeah, and it is donated by Tesla, so that would be in the Tesla website. So any Tesla owner, any electric vehicle owner would know that there's a station here and would be inclined to visit us. Take advantage of all the amenities that Bethel can offer. Any other questions? Yeah. The snuff charging system that you alluded to the fact that you were working on energy for the park parking on the down wall? Oh, yeah, that's in the words, Dave, we're not ready to present yet, but there are vendors that are working on giving those solutions because photovoltaics, roof mounted, and that's another animal. I'd like to hear what those are before we get to it. You'll hear that soon? So do these have the available building for somebody to use a credit card on? Not the dump stations, no. Offer one. Anybody can come, plug in a car in, whether it's a Tesla or a Nissan lift and walk out of here for free? No questions asked. Do they make it upgrade and has that available to the park? No, they're charging stations. That's the second option, I was going to go over that. They do that. They have an app with your cell phone you can pay, et cetera. So that would be the second option. The second option is $6,800. That's one charging station that is similar, one, but we would pay for it and the money will be charged by the consumer will pay like a regular charging station like you see everywhere. And that the money will be obviously collected by Green Mountain Power and I would have to investigate what the town will have. If there's any particular percentage that we will take because we are donating the parking space. Again, it's about $6,800 with a $1,500 credit that Green Mountain Power gives us will give a cost of $5,300. But if it is used a lot, we will be recovering that money with a certain payback, which again, I haven't calculated. If you guys like that option, I can definitely run the numbers and bring it to you. But that would be a very simple kind of relatively cheap. However, I don't believe that we have a $6,000 budget this year to do that. We would have to approve it. That's the third option. Any questions on the second option? The third option is Volkswagen. You remember Volkswagen at the back, they were cheating on the emissions test. Part of the settlement is to install charging stations everywhere. And we're going to be eligible. So the grant is coming in Thanksgiving, Christmastime. So we want to apply, but we don't want to do that unless you guys say, you know what, we do like the idea of a charging station, apply for the grant. We would have to invest money on the panel and bring in the electricity to the station. But the station will be free provided by Volkswagen grant. And we could get more than one problem. Now would that be a freebie for the charger or a pay? It will be paid. The charger? Oh, I'm sorry. Yes, it will be a payboy. It will be a smart station that you will be, you know, if you don't have a way to pay, you won't be able to take juice from it. Okay. You know? The only one that is, like that is the first case scenario, the dumb one. It's, you know, it's just pure. The three, it could be depending on how much we approve. We can, I don't know exactly the details of the grant, but we can definitely be looking at more than one. And each station is actually double-sided. Yeah. One is relative. Yeah. So with that, just want to ask what the board feels, how it all thinks, what, which, you know, which option do you like best? I think that option one is a little impractical. For a town to take on a debt like that, I think that just, for all the things we have going on at this point, it begins just a little too much. It's almost like paying a tax rate. This is the second and third option, I think, for possibilities, but we need to have a lot more information. A lot more documentation and numbers and some harder figures. Some diagrams. Yeah. A lot more information. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. There must be some information out here about people who had these stations and how much they were being used now. Yeah. They're not used very much, but they're wrapping up. They're trying to get the horse before the cart, before they're building all this electric vehicle. I don't want to have the infrastructure, but... You don't want one of that. Yeah. The one in Edelstein? Yeah. Dan? Mm-hmm. Okay, question now. Okay. You got to show people. Mm-hmm. That's the number one item of that. Yeah. It is sort of like the future and, you know... I understood. The worst-case scenario is two parts parked there for 10 hours and a 15,000... That's not going to happen now, but it might happen in the next five, six years, you know. Mm-hmm. And... Well, I think the only concern is we're already paying for parking. You know, because I was always concerned about that. Yeah. So if we look at that concern, it should also be brought tied up to the spot. Yeah. It would be free of charge because we have grants and money to install. And if what most suggests, just having an owner-system box, we would recover the money, so the... But it would be a risk, so, you know. I would think folks who have electric cars would be willing to slide a credit card in to get the charge. Yeah. I don't think they'd rather be blinded. I'm definitely all for it. I think what I'm hearing here is similar to the time we shouldn't be seeing a possible electric for it. I don't think it would be a 15,000 right off the bat.  But, you know, I also think Dave's going to... There's only one person in Bethel, but we're actually... I see this as something not for Bethel residents. It's actually a way to bring people into Bethel and there are a lot of electric cars coming out of Canada and receiving tickets all the time. And I've noticed a number, you know, a notable increase in electric cars that happen to be in place. And if they're already on the move and traveling, they may be more likely to spend. If they're willing to spend some of that money here because there's spending some time here, that does ultimately, you know, it benefits the town overall, should it be done at the cost of plus paying electric or it probably not. But it sounds like you have definitely two options that we can pursue that wouldn't cost the town. It's a little more like work on the front end and more expense from, you know, either from the grants or from the town. Could the pad be set up on the orchard parking lot? That would be more of a... It depends on the power. The power is the only key. That's three things, right there. I mean, that might be... I don't know what you're saying. It doesn't matter what word you put it in there because if you do it here, you're going to have to have a whole new surface. If you do it there, you're going to have a whole new surface. You're going to be out of town. You're going to have to know the whole thing. What is Green Mountain Beach somewhere in that area? Would there be, do they pull enough power that there might be a quiet spot somewhere in there? Green Mountain Beach yourself. They find a beach and definitely somewhere through there, so there's plenty of power. I don't know what's town, what's in there. I don't know. I'm just wondering if there's a spot in there. Because that's, you know, when we're talking about parking issues, we're talking a little more of this half of the downtown. And on that half, and even if it were, I don't know if there's a way to get it just off the road enough that closer to the road or... The parallel word in there for both of you is it's a bubble sign thing. Right. So you'd be on both sides. So it almost has to be out in the center of sort of an application. There's one parking lot down there that I hardly see a vehicle on. I've gone down one. But the line there, it's the last time you saw a car in the parking lot. It's true. Well, those are things that these are all questions. Yeah. I think what those are looking for is are you interested in possibly doing more? You are. Option one. I'm not interested in one. I'm not interested in one. I'm not interested in one. I'm interested in everyone. I understand. Yes. So we'll, we'll pursue option two and three then. And, you know, we have more, more information, more detailed information, diagrams, et cetera. And you, how about the location? Are you guys okay with that location or not? Well, let's leave the location up in the air at this point. Okay. You don't even have to put the service in one way. Right. Right. We would have to prop it down. No. No. Because as Dave mentioned, the, the power to GW goes here. There's plenty of power. Unless we choose to have it at somewhere in the middle of nowhere, then they may be, we're talking about Beppel, right? Downtown area. I don't have to be curious in the interview, as you can say on this, while you're pursuing solar, is that an option for setting up a solar panel? Yeah. You might not be enough to feed the station itself, but would that be some sort of offset? What I hear from the studies we're doing that, and I don't know how you guys feel about this and maybe it's a little area to discuss, but if we were to put solar panels in the roof here, in this building, it would more than cover the power for this building, with just about $200 a month or something like that. And the sewer pump, it would cover most of that power. So it would definitely cover our charging station, without a doubt, because just, just that resolution. Yeah, that resolution. Let me try to wrap up a little bit. If you want, I just wanted to look at it. Oh, yeah, there's a lot of schools talking about it. They have a four station to be able to track the unit in front of the solar. I'm sorry. Yeah, four vehicle, solar charging station. Four charging station. Where? Mount Law School. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I understand that. Yeah. All right, thank you. No problem. Thank you very much. Well, Dave, can you touch with us, as far as what you're going to do to many of us in minutes? Yeah. We want some offer, whatever, we want to have a couple of meetings. Yeah, we are. So we can keep tabs on what we're going to do. Okay. We'll do so. We'll do. Thank you. Have a good one. Oh, thank you. Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you. Can we without it? It's too old. So, Kevin. Yeah. Actually, for being so patient, we're going to put off schedule here. All right.  A year ago, I think, I came in front of the board and discussed some tax stabilization ideas and about the laws of law. And my research back then, I talked to an administrator from Hyde Park that they had done that a couple of different times. And the way I understand it is it's a town-wide vote. The way they did it in Hyde Park was the way they wrote it on the town meeting ballot was you could either do it per billing or they just voted to allow the slack board to negotiate it to give them the power to deal with it. Which seems a little less cumbersome to me. But what I'm worried about with the laws of law is and there's no great big hurry on this because the tax bill was set, the value was set for the next four quarters, as it is. But we're putting so much money into it and we're getting more rents out of it as each piece comes online. And what would not be economically viable if it went from zero to 60 in a matter of one or two years. So if the Lister came in and looked at it and said it went from I don't know if they have it on the Grand West Floor now it's not a lot. But if it went from that to $500,000 in a couple of years it would not be economically viable. So I'm not asking not to pay any taxes all I'm asking for is that it's stacked and that there's some way we can budget for the next five years so that we know about what things will be. So you're asking you'd like it to at a certain rate right now instead of jumping quickly you'd like it to go incrementally to be set now or within the next year or two prior to all the renovations being done but be set at those increments eventually to get up to what the Listers will put in instead of doing hand job protocols. Correct. How often do they come in have they been in the Listers how many times have they been in the house? I know they came in once when I first bought it. First they came in. What's happened? They should go in when they first bought it. They came in then and I don't think they've come back. They can't really do anything until they can be approval now I believe. They can do it just or not. Now every year they'll re-assess if they will based on whatever repair and renovation that's that thing. So Can they request to go back to the building again? They can request to go into the building each year to re-assess. The ability to go in as much as they need to. One of the challenges is that we're having a front load a whole lot of costs and improvements like the 50 yards of concrete for the foundation and the roof and in the next phase which will happen hopefully around the first of the year elevator and the sprinkler system will have to go in. So those are big costs that will push the value of the building on the benefit from those for another year or two as we get the rest of the building on line. We'll have to see if it talks about it. We'll talk to them because I think the value would have to be said is just how the assessments are made because every year they're going to re-assign, they're going to re-assess and assess the value to it. I don't know what to talk about. You're going to phase all this anyway, right? What is your how long are you going to phase things before you're completely built as a whole? Oh, it's a tell-all good. So I wonder if if they're going to re-assess every year and it's only a small portion of what has been of the building is going small portions completed. I think in practice that's correct. What I'm worried about is if there's some big change and that the practice all of a sudden says hey, we really need to pump up the grand list and we're going to take this building from from a hundred thousand to five or six hundred thousand dollars. And again, I'm not asking not to pay any taxes. I'm just asking that we step it so that we can budget and get the building online. It's almost an almost agreement for a pre-determined re-defined in-depth interest. In a lot of some of the bigger towns Claremont, New Hampshire, Springfield and Dome in Southern Windsor County a lot of times the town would get the mill buildings back. They'd sell them to a developer for a dollar and give them tax stabilization for five to ten years so that they could get the building back online and invest a lot of money. And so just on a very smaller scale, something like that would be really beneficial but took a blossom block and then the continued economic development of that town. We can certainly get it going. We can certainly get it going and we can certainly see the statutes and see because then the other curve balls that we have on the town like Retrater that gets triggered somewhere along the line and how that may impact it. And it sounds like from your research at least but I guess we'll have to find this out is that essentially we'd be looking at making some sort of decision at full making or the town so I guess what I'm going with is there's a bit of a timeline and you're trying to get ahead of that timeline. The timeline would be town meeting. Getting us aware of it, getting us to do our side of the research negotiate all of that side and then have it in time for town meeting. So that's essentially what you're asking. So there's state rags on all the statue on that so and you said Springfield was there anybody else that showed up? They did it in Hyde Park and that was the administrator that I talked to was in Hyde Park and he was referred to me through one of my contacts who got historic preservation so I can do the research and bring it back. Thanks. Thanks Kevin. Okay so moving on to reportations and ordinances about the green lantern was released Chris Noble with the world I really like your digs here this is a fantastic town hall so wouldn't consider trading would you? Yeah. That's right. That's the costume moving. The costume moving that might be some can I move up here? Just here on courtesy for the green lantern party if you have any questions how we came to our decision to report it to Chris Chris Jarvis Chris Jarvis So I did get a chance to sit with Chris and go over I'll help you folks improve your negotiation work and we appreciate you taking the time to dive in there and make some changes some changes maybe significant so we had a copy we had a chance to look at it there were there were four changes that were highlighted in there one was a change in the length of term 25 years instead of 20 years with basically unlimited renewals it's established a 25 year with two five year renewal terms with a percent of both the owners and ten to ten owners there was a slight increase in the dollar figure for rent in the later years yeah that's what I meant the installment rent payments were increased sorry that they were shifted to four years was that in there before okay the change in the length of term to two the exercise of the five year purchase was agreed on by all parts that's one change the initial term was changed from 20 to 25 the annual rent for years 21 to 25 that's a slight increase that was 4,000 or something like that and then the option period was 26 to 30 and 31 to 35 was not a specified annual rent being negotiated by kids so maybe you so those are the four changes that were made for the early questions so what we're going to do is go into an executive session and start a discussion and you'll come out and vote okay okay can Chris be in the arts hi what's up to you what's up to all of you do you want to fight it yeah I don't have a problem yeah of course others can't meet you I don't know you know we worked on this quite a bit so we had a certain decision to make okay so I guess we'll we'll let the same motion go into a separate session so we'll then we'll come out and make a decision all fair okay okay what are you saying no it's not a budget so for that well we have options the motion to come back in the regular session so we'll second all clear okay we'll back in the play so we have we're going to be voting on the release to approve or not we also have I don't know if we have an option to hold board you guys take a look at our statement is that going to be a significant data finance only the closest on the 20th in this one so we won't be here until the time it's clear so I guess you're happy to take yeah okay so I would entertain a motion to approve the green lantern basically so more vote paper yeah I would say well well all in favor I got it so we approve the green lantern so what I need you to do is that's okay that's what I'm going to say we'll wait for Chris to come back and he'll be back tomorrow it all talks about the chairs Robert that's what I was going to say okay well that's done and I may just come over and just try to deal with this just hang out Rachel we had the American Ambassador my granddad used to talk about that but the honey locust was pretty darn good last year we entered Cambridge blue ribbon for premium apple blossoms we're going to enter the honey locust and see how we do it's lots of fun thank you I would okay next item is the green mountain power easement request which goes along with the installation of the solar project at the transfer station so this is the revised easement that green mountain power have come to us with they've finally come up and figured out exactly where they can run the lines that will work okay with chet at the facility kind of be the best I guess scenario for everybody so this is just the easement that goes along with that if you look at the original documents in the contract you just signed there was a map in there that showed some easements and some preliminary spots for these lines to go those were not going to work because they were in violation of our SWIP among other things so this is the revision based on kind of chet walking the site where they're going to this is just basically we're authorizing you to be our authorized agent okay any questions okay entertain a motion to authorize Greg to sign this easement I'll stack up that one there you go all in favor okay take care of that thank you very much okay so next slide on minutes of communications we know that the select board minutes yeah my apologies they missed the packet so we'll bring it back next time so we'll just table that until table that until next time you're off for the week you're off for the week depends on the new yeah that's one point I know it's one point on your side okay so now we've got the town managers administration report so a couple things in your packet the preliminary year in budget is in there I'll field any questions on that I'm sure I can do it I think we did a really good job working up on the budget that we want to share with and we'll confident in last year if you look at the end of the day which is what I'm looking at we're actually on the right side of the coin on this so this is very preliminary so you know and that was one of my questions was how how much more to come is there very little really it's just when she says that she means you know it hasn't gone through the official everything's in as far as we know there might be a couple things that are trickling in here and there but the payables are all done 99% of the bills that we think are out there are in so I think we're real close we're really obvious the audit I think is scheduled in September or October I believe we'll have to get out to ask but I think it's real soon so we'll see what happens it was a little bit tough and everybody did a really good job I think everybody did a really good job some of the things you'll see in here are some costs that we're not budgeted for that kind of put us over the top on a few items that we've rectified in our new budget we'll continue to make changes to our budget until we get everything covered like it should be so take a look if you have any questions I could definitely answer them for you I'd be curious Greg if we could do a comparison or some analysis I know it's very early in the new position category the new position that we instituted to see what the net net of that position versus what we were hoping to have for savings of outside costs things like that I know it's kind of early to do that but it's something just to say yeah let me get through a snow season because that's where we're going to see the savings let me get through that and we can do that next year for sure we'll put something together, remind me and we'll put something together after he's been here a full year and see what we were actually what we had paid the year before and then what we got for and then look at it and see if it's are we getting the same services or even maybe just six months out of the park thing I think we also another part of that it's not completely fair to look at it dollars a dollar because I really feel that we're getting more for the money that we're spending yeah there's intangibles we can definitely look at it and see if we're getting if it is costing us anymore if it's working thought it would because that would be a good thing also to have for town meeting you can show these kinds of things that these things that we're doing to improve sure we can do that are there any questions about the year end budget? I don't think Chris have any comments did you hear from Chris at all? Chris is he's outside of the line I know where he is too and plus the numbers I was real happy to see we had some things that we overspent but all in all at the end of the day we were on the right side of this I think that's big kudos to all of my people for really watching the budget and being aware of what's going on and not just spending because they could well it's good to have a qualified driver behind the wheel too and it's not just it's everybody you know trees right on down through and I think we're just going to continue to refine it as we really get numbers that are correct and maybe maybe somewhere budget items last year we'll have to see I'm glad it just came in close it wasn't in the off the wall one way or another that wouldn't really be a problem well yeah good for everybody no questions? so my staff report is also in your packet just a couple quick little highlights I got to put my glasses on I bought some of these Walmart special? so we applied for and received the passive grant this is a grant through our insurance company of course and they they give us we'll give us money for safety oriented type things we bought a trench box because we were installing fire hydrants and lines and things we didn't have a trench box like we should the road crew are getting new cones and flare not flares to cones and flasher beacons and some other safety related type things and they also met some t-shirts that were class 3 t-shirts and it was a 90-10 grant so we got like $10,000 worth of stuff I think it was a 50-50 grant I'm sorry $10,000 worth of stuff for $5,000 that was stuff we had budgeted by anyway most of it and we just got twice as much so we actually applied for this grant every year a lot of times it goes to the fire department because they can buy safety related equipment with it too we will apply for it next year and kind of see what we use it but if you see the guys out with some new cones and wearing some new shirts and stuff that's why the wastewater asset analysis this started before I had started this was similar to what they had done with the water system it's kind of a precursor to a master plan we had I believe a Dubois and King I think that's who did it they looked at our system and they basically mapped all of our system and they looked at the age of our system and they kind of did a real preliminary capital improvement plan that basically says that based on the typical shelf life of a motor it should die at this time it allows us to kind of plan for the future we did one of these with our water system and it wasn't quite on the level of our master plan that we're working on now but it was an initial thing key to this is that it's free this was all paid for through an undergrant that we'd gotten so we didn't pay a dime for this one I did reach out to Mrs. Placey and met with her about the gravel pit I originally had talked about not doing that pit but then I kind of really delved into the numbers and looked at what it was going to cost us and I think it's going to be in our best interest to get that going again the permit is still valid it's valid for another I believe seven years but it's still valid and there's some work we have to do down there of course like some remediation work with the topsoil and all that but that has to get done regardless that never got done so I had a real good discussion with her I actually sent her a contract to look at it and see if she's interested in charging the same amount as what we were being charged last time we get it which is I think $5 a yard for the material so she's still okay with that price she wanted a clause that said we could revisit that year after year which is fine I understand that so I'm hoping that she's okay with that and she brings that back to us and we can get moving on it I've already talked to the crushers and they are tentatively scheduled so if this does work out I think we're good to go last we we talked about Morgan a little bit I just wanted to put out there I think he's doing a fantastic job I really like he's doing a lot of mo and he's keeping up with all these green spaces I haven't gotten any complaints at all about what he's been doing and I haven't gotten anything either way so I was just curious if you had heard anything or if you had any concerns comments anything with a position that we might want to look at so I want to kind of grow it into what it really needs to be in the future but have you heard anything have you seen anything I'm wondering how we continue to pursue his certification stuff with the water and sewer oh yeah he spends part of his time as a water and sewer yeah he actually he's actually part of his budget what he gets paid comes out of water and sewer so he's getting paid if he's spending a lot of time doing the mowing is he still able to keep up with his studies if you will and it's going to be a little seasonal because he'll have a little summer it's going to be Momo-Mo and the winter's probably going to be a lot of plowing and then you've got those dead times in between we hope to a lot of the sewer and the water he does the rounds for the water system every day so he's out checking the wells he does them every day and then he helps Tim out whenever he needs help doing something wherever actually we had him slated at 15% water and sewer and I think he's exceeding that already we'll have to see for the whole year what it looks like but we only had about 15% so he was doing 50% water he was doing some come out of the wreck because he was working at the pool and doing some mowing at the wreck fields some of his pay was coming out of the highways and in some out of sewer he was going for four or five different places so he's fairly close to that we'll have to see after the entire years but a large portion of it was still coming from the highway department mowing from the highway department just because plowing from the highway department because we spent a lot of money there last year and I foresee him spending a lot of time plowing this winter if the guys are plowing he'll be plowing as well well you've also got a new hire there so that's another person who worked out was a new person the new position was was created but it wasn't funded it was already funded it was funded by taking all of these different things that we used to sub out and bringing them all into the house that's what paid if you will for that new position so we're a full staff which is essentially five people we've got the four plus the float position but it wasn't an increase at all with that I took all the subbed out things and brought those all in house the plowing, the mowing the pool stuff all that is all in house now so I guess it's kind of just yet to see what happens with this give us some time I like your idea of looking at it and seeing if it has been is it worth what we're doing or is something these tasks out the way to go I don't know but this was really just the intent here was just to feed back from anybody good or bad if you're hearing anything on the streets about what he's been doing I don't know if you saw he put the covers on the trash cans he built those covers for those trash cans I was going to say the only common complaint I've heard or would have had prior to the last week or two was the trash that especially with the uptick of people in downtown especially with the summer but in general the trash is getting full and then it's remaining full and over starting to overflow but that actually hasn't been the case in the last couple weeks and so I was sort of thinking oh I should really bring this up to Greg and then it all of a sudden became a non-issue we were seeing so much residential big bags you know big bags trash somebody's household trash in those things so that's why he built that plus they were getting full of water so that had a top on it keeps the rain out plus it hopefully it's only six inches wide keeps people from sticking out the household trash there so so you have that one I think you addressed that you know this is a learning process this whole position I want to just get as much feedback as I can from whoever everybody so that we can make it into what it needs to be I'm a little curious and you may not know this yet some of it may sort of figure itself out in the winter when you say that he'll be plowing are there designated areas like he's going to be doing sort of the downtown stuff or you know things like that or is it still also be helping we'll both so Alan has redone the plow rounds and just tweaked him a little bit to make him a little more efficient so he has his own plow round which is essentially that's why we bought the smaller pickup without the keen cab and all that stuff on it so that it can navigate these side roads this parking lot all those areas where you you really couldn't get up in there really easily with that one ton of lean on so it's that's really where he's going to be in a typical store on my tour you know a little van tracks thing doing the sidewalks he'll be on a loader cleaning out the downtown area he'll be doing the side streets, the parking lot all of the kind of paved downtown part and maybe even some of the paved roads further up like Norfolk Road and whatever but also it's it's kind of a security blanket so that we have the one time go down which it did all last year it seemed like he can jump on around and he can go do some of the other roads and he won't be able to do them as efficiently but it's another plow that's available that he can do some of the stuff with so yes he's really a he's a security blanket for the bigger trucks and the bigger routes but he's primarily he's going to be downtown doing the smaller side roads and the parking lot and the parking spaces so let me know, let me know what you hear get her back that's all I've got and if you've got any questions for me the folks that were in at the last meeting about the class 3 road up on Black Hill look so you can give an update on that yeah sure I went up there and took a look I've got a little bit more to do but Alan and I drove that road it's a very very nice road they've put a lot of road base on it they've done some great work to it it needs it doesn't have a turn around at all that's probably the biggest issue with the road is it doesn't have a large turn around or yet on town property for the trucks the only way excuse me, the only way that Alan thought that they could turn around would be to drive all the way in the driveway and back out and then come back out which is not it's probably 400 feet it's a ways up there it's not just turn around at their driveway so there is no turn they could build one I think there's a little bit of work but they would have to build it there's a little bit of drainage issues with some of the slopes that are steep that we would require rock lining and things like that and the entrance has some issues as well it's a little narrow we've got those three things I'm going to come back I'd like to go back and do a really close look at it and it's narrow so there's really those four things my intent was to go back out there when I get a chance and take some pictures so that I can kind of do a more formal presentation to the board and see what you want to do as far as I'm looking forward there's only one primary access off of it there's their driveway at the end of it the other accesses are just somebody's backyard they just built a little access point to the back their main accesses are all on the front I will take some pictures and do a little more and bring you a small presentation to show you what we're at with it I was still in the schedule to do that work on Slack Hill it worked and whatnot at the bottom of their road what's all done go out there and check it out that's great check it out I got one put that in there that's good I'll just bring back more to you it doesn't meet the requirements honestly of a class 3 road somebody was to come in with a subdivision because if you have a subdivision we can really outline this is exactly what we want it doesn't meet that but honestly it doesn't neither do a lot of our roads if you really look at it they're very narrow this has got really good road days anyway I'll put all that together and I'll bring it back to you and figure out what you want to do with it any other questions for Greg one of my nods can you check out Slack Hill okay okay we've had the Constable's report everybody had a chance to peruse that looks like he's doing a good job and we yeah if you could maybe chat with him about problem is when you see a cruiser sitting up there everybody's going to slow down that's the same thing well isn't that the end goal well yeah but he's only going to sit there for an hour or so but you don't know when it's going to be there right personally they had that portable speed signed down in the town of Royalton or North Royalton it was there for like two months but I even now I am conscious when I go down through there I do yeah I need to be 35 I mean I think about it on North Road when I was commuting to Woodstock and Bridgewater because they'd sit on that road they wouldn't sit on 12 so I watch my feet more closely on North Road so yeah I think it may still have some benefit I think that's a real good idea actually to put those solar signs I mean that's solar signs speed signs maybe it's just a question of conditioning you're going to be a little careful on how remote they are because they could come up and miss it yeah you'd have to try pretty hard but I'm sure anybody could yeah yeah you're right you're right we're looking at buying a couple more we've got some grant money coming that one that they had in Royalton they rent that I think they bought that is that the trailer and that is an option we have this money coming that Mark got from doing DUI enforcement I thought about doing fixed locations speed signs like by the school but we could purchase a speed trailer I'm not sure how much they cost and how much money we have that might be something that we look at Mark told me he bought one he got one for one of his other towns if we buy some more what we've got we ought to spend the long dollar and get the solar charger on top it's almost more expensive it's almost the same price to retrofit those so my thought is that with the money we have I think we can buy two I want to get two fixed locations with solar panels and these other two will move around we'll post one over here that's the one that's there we'll put a fixed location that's a good spot for that and then another fixed location I bought out at the school and then we could move these other because they're just battering the batteries and the batteries are such a pain we looked at doing a retrofit to battery the solar on those and it's not worth the money we should buy a new one okay we have minutes from the Bethel Rec Creation Committee looks like they had a fairly extensive discussion about the skateboard park and whatnot and are you there Greg anything to add to I told them what I told you that there was a conditional use permit for the Rec facility done like three years ago and it expired after two years so technically the permit for the Rec facility as a whole it is not valid I told them that and they actually took it as kind of an opportunity to possibly make some changes to the facility down there the design was never approved by the people it didn't have to be it was actually approved by zoning and the board at some point said we like that we went to zoning in the past but now it's not valid so they're looking at seeing if they can move some stuff around to accommodate all the same elements but keep some of the green space and make things so that there's been a lot of backlash but noise about if we put all those things in there we're going to lose that hill and they're going to try to get away from it so that's where they're at they're going back to that whole design now and looking to see how those elements might get moved around and come back to you with another concept that they're looking at they're talking about a gazebo there is somebody in town that's heritage builders they want a gazebo for free it's it's a big structure but it's not a permanent structure so it doesn't necessarily have to be part of the rec master it's not a permanent structure it can be moved to different places but it's a nice big thing it's really nice I'm glad to see that reexamining the skateboard concept they're going to try that they took the parameters that the board gave them they're trying to work with that and then they're also looking at the fees the pool fees so that kind of got tabled a little bit because the discussion was long with the other but they're going to have the next meeting go back and revisit the because it looks like it looks like Randolph's pool they not open again it might be dead so they're going to come back and have their idea and their recommendation on what we have accepted alright any other business come before the board so I'll get the same emotion that we go into an executive session to discuss personnel matters so we'll move second all in favor


Imagine having an incredible relationship with either your spouse or your parent. This relationship is something that is blissful. It is something that is just perfect. You are living such a life that's the envy of the world. And then one day, due to your attitude and your behavior, you do something to negatively impact that relationship.  They've blocked your number. Don't want to hear from you. What's happening to you right now is you're feeling empty. You're feeling this pining. How do I get back? How do I find my way back into that relationship that was so important? Perhaps I didn't appreciate that relationship. Perhaps I neglected to invest in that relationship. But whatever it may be, I want to go back. I want to have that relationship with my father or with my mother. I want to have that relationship with my spouse. I would do anything to get back what I had. And so the question is, how do I navigate my way back? And so what many people will do is they will engage the help of a counselor, a marriage counselor, a relationship counselor, trying to get somebody to talk to the other party to find out what can I do? How can I get back? And this is really what lies at the heart of the Christian message to the world. When God created the world, it was divine. It was paradise. Adam and Eve were in this close relationship with God, but they sinned and they were kicked out of the garden. And ever since, we're looking for a way back. And so how do we navigate our way back into a right relationship with God? That's the question that we want to explore tonight. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to first explore the Christian approach, the Christian way of navigating our way back to God. And then I'm going to have a look at the Jewish approach to navigating our way back to God. Now, before we start exploring the Christian way to navigating our way back, there's a few things that are important to understand. When Christians speak of the Messiah, it's important for Jewish people to understand that we don't share a common dictionary. What that means is we say Messiah and understand one thing. We have a particular image in our mind, but Christians use the very same word and have a different understanding of what this means. And so without going into too much detail, it's important for tonight's lecture to understand that when Christians refer to the Messiah, they are focusing on the Messiah's role as Savior. The Messiah as a Savior. Now, what does that mean? What does it mean Savior? Okay, that's the question. In Jewish understanding, when we look at the Scriptures, when the Scriptures uses the word save or salvation or to be saved, it's most often referring to being saved from physical oppression or annihilation. So you have in your sources Exodus chapter 14 verse 30, on that day the Lord saved Israel from the hands of the Egyptians and Israel saw Egyptians dying on the seashore. So the concept of salvation from our perspective is being saved from physical oppression or annihilation. And this comes up dozens of times throughout the Jewish Scriptures. Every time there were a nation that came up, rose up to annihilate us or to exile us, it's God who sent someone to save us from this physical oppression. However, in Christianity that's not what salvation is really all about. Salvation in Christianity is to be saved from your sins. Okay, so if you look in your sources Matthew chapter 1 verse 21, this is speaking about the birth narrative of Jesus.  Jesus in Hebrew would be something like Yeshua, which comes from the root of to save. And so the Christian Scriptures teach us that Jesus was called that name because his mission was to come and save Jewish people or from the Christian perspective to save the world from their sins. Again, in 1 Corinthians chapter 15 verse 3, this is Paul speaking for what I received I passed on to you as of first importance that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures. Again, this shows us that the Christian concept of the Messiah as it relates to our lives today is this notion that the Messiah comes to die for the sins of the world to save us from our sins. This is again we see in Romans chapter 11 verse 26. It says, and so all Israel will be saved as is written, and the deliverer will come from Zion. He will turn transgression away from Jacob. And what Paul is saying here is that the role of the Messiah is here to remove sin from Jacob to save us from our sin. Now, it's interesting to note that Paul over here is actually trying to quote from Isaiah 59 verse 20. And you have over here Isaiah 59 verse 20 in its correct version where it doesn't say anything like that. It's actually the Redeemer coming to Zion and to those who repent of transgression in Jacob. In other words, the Messiah is coming to those who actually turn away from sin not to remove sin from them. So, what we understand from this is that when we speak about the Messiah from a Christian perspective, his role is to come and save the world from their sins. And now, this leads us to the heart of the Christian message in how we navigate our way back to God. In John chapter 3 verse 16 it says as follows, For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son so that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. And what that means is that from a Christian perspective, every single person that is born is headed with a one-way ticket to eternal damnation, to eternal fires of hell. Unless, unless you are saved from your sin by putting your belief and faith in Jesus. What does that mean? So, I'll give you another verse. John chapter 14 verse 6, Jesus is saying, I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. So here it's very explicit that there's only one way to navigate your way back to God and that's through Jesus. But again, what does that mean? What does it mean? So without getting too caught up in Christian theology, simply put, according to Paul, we are all under the power of sin and therefore we can only find peace with God through the sacrifice of Jesus. There's absolutely nothing that we can do to navigate our way back. All that there is for us is to accept and believe in what God has done for us. So in a sense, there's nothing active you could do. You need to passively accept and believe in the provision that God has provided in order to help you to get back into a right relationship with God. Now Christians who might be listening to this will say, Amen! But Jewish people listening to this are scratching their heads. Where did you get that from? I mean, it's very fine to make an assertion, but where are you getting that from? Remember, who do we want to have a relationship with? We want to have a relationship with God. So we want to know that the counselor who's telling us how to get back to God is giving us accurate information. Imagine a counselor comes in to make peace between you and somebody who's fallen out with you and instead of giving them the correct information, the correct instructions that you've given, the counselor gives something else. Well, it's useless then, because really, if God didn't say that the way back is by putting your faith in Jesus, then doing so is not going to help you, right? And so we want to know where do the Christians get this idea from? And so the presentation often goes as follows. In the Torah, we know that God established a sacrificial system. You open up the Book of Leviticus and you'll see at the beginning of the Book of Leviticus God established a sacrificial system with specific details on how to bring up sacrifices. Now, according to Christian theology, this sacrificial system was created to be able to deal with the problem of sin. What does that mean? Since God is just and therefore, when a crime is done, a penalty needs to be paid, so therefore God provided us with sacrifices, so that the penalty can be paid and through the shedding of blood, the blood of an innocent animal, we could have forgiveness from our sins. Thus, without the shedding of that blood, without the shedding of the blood of an animal, there can be no forgiveness. That's the Christian position, okay? How they get from there to Jesus being the sacrifice is a whole separate discussion. It's still not clear to me how they jump, but be that as it may, be that as it may, the position of the Christian missionary is that God provided a provision for us to be able to deal with sin, to be able to navigate our way back to God, and that is by giving us the sacrifices which are able to put us back into a right relationship because through the shedding of the blood, we have a covering over our sins, and thus we can enter or re-enter into a relationship with God. But where is this from? We ask the missionary, where do you get this from? And the only source that they can point to is Leviticus chapter 17, 11. Before we read the actual source, I want to point out that there's a inherent weakness in being able to point to only one source for your entire theology. Number one, Leviticus 17, 11 does not lay out a comprehensive theological presentation on how one is to navigate their way back to God. Leviticus 17, 11 is one verse, and when we read it, we'll see. It says very little about the whole question of navigating our way back to God, but this is the only source that they have, and so we're going to have to deal with what they present. Leviticus 17, 11 says as follows, for the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls, for it is the blood that makes an atonement for the soul. Right? Everybody understand that? And so what we're saying is that within the sacrificial system, God has provided an agent for atonement, and that is the blood of the animal. And so the missionary claim is that without the shedding of this blood there is no forgiveness, because they read Leviticus 17, 11 as the exclusive means for atonement. Now what we need to look at is whether or not Leviticus 17, 11 says that this is the only means for atonement. Is this the only way to navigate our way back to God? And I think the answer is clear. I think the answer is that there is nothing in the verse that would lead us to believe that this is the only way. If you look for a word that would indicate that this is exclusive, you'll come up with nothing. If we look at the entire context of this verse, what we'll find is something very interesting. The truth is this particular proof text is a great example of how to examine all proof texts that are presented to you. You see, what happens is very often verses are wrenched out of context and presented to you as if the context is what the missionary is presenting to you. Here the missionary is presenting Leviticus 17, 11 as if the context is how to navigate your way back to God. So you would imagine if you hear Leviticus 17, 11 for the soul of the flesh is in the blood and I have therefore given it to you upon the altar to atone for your soul, for it is the blood that atones for the soul, you would imagine if you only hear that verse that the chapter starts out, what should I do to navigate my way back to God after having sinned? You would imagine that's what the context is because again, that's the way it's being presented. This is God's provision. But if you go to Leviticus 17 verse 10, the verse before and read it all the way through verse 12, you'll find a very different picture. Leviticus 17 verse 10 reads as follows and any man of the house of Israel or the stranger that's adjourned among them who eats any blood, I will set my attention upon the soul who eats the blood and I will cut him off from among his people. For the soul of the flesh is in the blood and I have therefore given it to you upon the altar to atone for your souls, for it is the blood that atones for the soul.  Well that puts a different spin on what the verse is actually speaking about. It's not speaking about how to have your sins forgiven. It's actually speaking about the prohibition of eating blood, consuming blood. And it's telling us the reason why you shouldn't consume blood is because blood has a very specific purpose upon the altar. You see when we offer up a sacrifice upon the altar it is the blood which is the life force of the animal that really affects atonement when we use that means of atonement. And so therefore the passage is very clear that one should never eat or consume blood for this very reason. But what the passage is not saying is the way to navigate your way back to God is through the blood. In fact, if you go back to Leviticus chapter 5 where it actually talks about how to deal with an incident where a person has transgressed inadvertently what happens is we find that it's true there are animal sacrifices that can be brought as a sin sacrifices but there are other means. For example, in Leviticus chapter 5 verse 11 it speaks about somebody who cannot even afford two turtledoves what are they to bring in order to be able to have an atonement through the sacrificial system and what it says is but if he cannot afford two turtledoves or two young doves then he shall bring as a sacrifice for a sin one tenth of an eighth mile of fine flour for a sin offering he shall not put oil over it nor shall he place frankincise upon it for it is a sin offering. So what we see over here is that flour, not blood is sufficient to be able to have our sins forgiven and so we have a serious problem with what the Christians are presenting to us as the only way back and that problem is God doesn't say that and if God doesn't say that it's very nice that you're saying that but we want to get back with God not with you, right? And so, just to summarize, right we want to navigate our way back to God especially after having departed from his way after having been disobedient and the Christian approach is to tell us that God sent us the Messiah to save us from sin by dying as a sacrifice to provide us with an atonement so that we can have everlasting life with God but we are stuck because as far as we can tell there's nothing in the Scriptures to actually support that and so we're back to square one and square one is basically how do we get back to a right relationship with God because that's what we want ultimately let me read to you what the Torah advises without putting any of my own twist onto what the Torah says let's just read what the Torah says now I apologize in advance for the long text but I want to point out by reading this long text that this is not one verse wrenched out of context this is, or these are passages which directly address the question that we are asking the question we are asking tonight is how do we navigate our way back to God again, remember for many people, myself included this is a very important question I want that relationship with God and if I have done anything to negatively affect that relationship I want to know how to make amends I want to know how to fix it because this relationship is important to me I really care about God I really love God and so therefore if there's anything that I am doing that He doesn't want I've got to know how to fix that and how to get back into that right relationship with God Deuteronomy chapter 4 verse 25 the context here is Moses speaking to the Jewish people and he's telling them what's going to happen in the future and here's what he tells them and what he advises them again, Moses is speaking on behalf of God when you get children and grandchildren and have grown old in the land and act corruptly and make a carved image in the form of anything and do evil in the sight of the Lord your God to provoke Him to anger I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day that you will soon utterly perish from the land which you cross over the Jordan to possess you will not prolong your days in it but will be utterly destroyed and the Lord will scatter you among the peoples and you will be left few in number among the nations where the Lord will drive you and there you will serve God's and work of men's hands wood and stone which neither see nor hear nor eat nor smell so what are you going to do how are you going to get back to God when you're so far but from there you will seek the Lord your God and you will find Him if you seek Him with all your heart and with all your soul when you are in distress and all these things come upon you in the latter days when you turn to the Lord your God and obey His voice what's clear over here is that Moses is telling them that even when you've been scattered to the ends of the world and over there you've transgressed God's will nevertheless if you seek Him from there you'll find Him you'll find Him if you hark into His voice Deuteronomy chapter 30 verse 1 this is right after Moses tells the Jewish people of all the terrible, terrible curses that will come upon the Jewish people if they fail to obey God now it shall come to pass when all these things come upon you the blessings and the curse which I have set upon you and you call them to mind among all the nations where the Lord your God drives you and you return to the Lord your God and obey His voice according to all that I command you today you and your children with all your heart and with all your soul that the Lord your God will bring you back from captivity and have compassion on you and gather you again from all the nations where the Lord your God has gathered you if any of you are driven out to the Father's part of the under heavens from there the Lord your God will gather you and from there He will bring you then the Lord your God will bring you to the land which your Father's possessed and you shall possess it He will prosper you and multiply you more than your Father's and the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul that you may live also the Lord your God will put all these curses on your enemies and on those who hate you who persecuted you and you will again obey the voice of the Lord and do all His commandments which I command you today the Lord your God will make you abound in all the work of your hand in the fruit of your body in the increase of your livestock and in the produce of your land for good for the Lord will again rejoice over you for good as He rejoiced over your Father's if you obey the voice of the Lord your God to keep His commandments and His statues which are written in this book of the Lord and if you return to the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul what's He saying? what is Moses telling the Jewish people here? what he's saying essentially is that when these curses come upon you even if you are at the furthest place of the world if you hearken to God's voice and you do that which I commanded you stop doing the things that God has told you not to do start doing the things that God has told you to do then God will bring you back and gather you back into the land and God will be happy with you again in other words you will get back into that relationship with God that you once had now here is speaking on a national level but it's also true on a personal level 2 Kings chapter 20 verse 1 through 6 in those days Hezekiah was sick and near death and Isaiah the prophet the son of Amos went to him and said to him thus says the Lord set your house in order for you shall die and not live then he referring to Hezekiah turned his face toward the wall and prayed to the Lord saying remember now oh Lord I pray how I have walked before you in truth and with a loyal heart and have done what was good in your sight and Hezekiah wept bitterly and it happened before Isaiah had gone out into the middle court that the word of the Lord came to him saying return and tell Hezekiah the leader of my people thus says the Lord the God of David your father I have heard your prayer I have seen your tears surely I will heal you on the third day you shall go up to the house of the Lord and I will add to your days 15 years I will deliver you in this city from the hand of the king of Assyria and I will defend the city for my own sake and for the sake of my servant David what does that tell us it's very clear that Hezekiah was in possession of some knowledge that obviously many missionaries are not in possession of and that is if you turn to God with contrition if you turn to God and you humble yourself God will listen to your prayer that's the way back that's the way back to God Jeremiah chapter 4 verse 1 through 4 if you will return oh Israel says the Lord return to me and if you will put away your abominations out of my sight then you shall not be moved and you shall swear the Lord lives in truth, in judgment and in righteousness the nations shall bless themselves in Him and in Him they shall glory for thus says the Lord to the men of Judah and Jerusalem break up your fellow ground and do not sow among the thorns circumcise yourselves to the Lord and take away the four skins of your heart you men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem thus my fury come forth like fire and burns so that no one can quench it because of the evil things you're doing God's telling them clearly what to do He's telling them clearly you want to get back into a right relationship with me you want me not to raise my wrath against you stop doing what's wrong and start doing what's right Jeremiah 7 22 23 I want you to understand over here that this is not one isolated reference this is something that is repeated over and over and over ad nauseam you hear it again and again and again like a broken record God tells us through every single prophet how to get back to God not once does He tell us that the way back to God is through putting our faith in the Messiah not once that's a very embarrassing omission if the only way back to God is through putting your faith in the Messiah couldn't God spare a few verses in His Tanakh to tell us that but He doesn't Jeremiah 7 22 23 to 23 for I did not speak to your fathers or command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices but this is what I commanded them saying obey my voice and I will be your God and you shall be my people and walk in all the ways that I have commanded you that it may be well with you it's very simple very straightforward Jeremiah 26 verse 3 perhaps everyone will listen and turn from His evil way that I may relent concerning the calamity which I propose to bring on them because of the evil of their doings and it goes on and on I could go on and on quote after quote after quote but what I'd like you to do now is I'd like you to jump to Ezekiel 33 and the reason why I chose Ezekiel 33 is because Ezekiel 33 actually gives expression to the question that is the focus of tonight's discussion Ezekiel 33 verse 10 says as follows therefore you, oh son of man say to the house of Israel thus you say in other words God's addressing what people are feeling and saying if our transgressions and our sins lie upon us and we pine away in them how can we then live in other words if sin is such a problem and we know that in Isaiah 59 we're told that our sins is what separates us and our Father in heaven so what do we do? we want this relationship but we're stuck, we've sinned and you know what? every single one of us knows that God really knows what we've done in our lives yes it's true my Father might not know my mother might not know my friends may not know but God knows God knows what I've done God knows whether I'm sincere or not it's an excuse for some of my behaviors and so I feel this hopelessness what do I do? I pine away say to them this is God's answer say to them as I live says the Lord God I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked but that the wicked turn from his way and live turn from your evil ways verse 14 and 16 sorry in chapter 33 verses 14 and 16 again when I say to the wicked you shall surely die this is God answering us if he turns from his sin and does what is lawful and right if the wicked restores the pledge give back what he has stolen and walks in the statues of life without committing iniquity he shall surely live he shall not die listen to this the death of his sins which he has committed shall be remembered against him he has done what is lawful and right he shall surely live this is God's message to us over and over again I want to put this into plain English in plain English what this means is while we have great faith in God we often have very little faith in humanity we have very little faith in ourselves and we feel that we're hopeless we fall into the trap of despair and despondency and we say there's nothing I can do I can't really change I can't really do anything one has to understand and appreciate that the whole Bible is predicated on the notion that God can do something that God believes in us that God has given us everything that we need to be able to do that which is right and good in his eyes for if God did not give us that what sense does it make to send all the prophets to rebuke us and tell us to get back on the right path if he doesn't believe that we can of course he believes that we can and God understands human frailty that we often feel that we can't do it and therefore he sends the prophet to encourage us and to tell us there is a way back you can I say 55 verse 7 let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts let him return to the Lord and he will have mercy on him and to our God for he will abundantly pardon God's not like our spouse or our parent the difference between them is well many differences but one of the differences is your spouse or your parent doesn't really know what's going on in your heart and sometimes if you make the same mistake or not mistake but you do the same negative thing twice three times how many times can I forgive you already if you keep doing the same thing but God knows your heart God knows whether you really mean it this time God understands our human frailty he understands that often we will be swayed by powerful forces out there but nevertheless in the moment that we want to return to that relationship in the moment that we want to really come back to God God knows that we're sincere and he says come back to me you know why because I'm going to abundantly pardon verse 10 here it's an interesting thing you see while the Bible talks extensively about the different sacrifices for the Jewish people who have either sin or want to bring a peace offering or want to bring all these different type of offerings to God the Bible doesn't really speak about sacrifices for Gentiles the Bible never mentions it the Bible doesn't say and for the Gentile who has sinned bring this sacrifice or that sacrifice doesn't mention it however there is one book which deals with a Gentile nation who had done that which was evil and wrong in the eyes of God and God sends them a Jewish prophet to tell them how they can get back with God what does he say doesn't he say put your faith in the Messiah and his blood it's not what he says Jonah chapter 3 verse 10 we find that Jonah had rebuked the nation of Nineveh and told them that if you don't change your ways God is going to bring a disaster to your city it's going to turn over the city within 40 days and the king decreed three days of fasting causing everybody to come back to God in repentance and in Jonah chapter 3 verse 10 it says when God saw what they did and how they turned from the evil ways he had compassion and did not bring upon them the destruction he had threatened so again this is something that is not just communicated to the Jewish people about how they can navigate their way back to God this is even to the non-Jewish people the Gentiles and how they can find their way back to God Daniel chapter 4 verse 27 Daniel is giving advice to Nebuchadnezzar he says therefore O King please please be pleased to accept my advice renounce your sin by doing what is right and your wickedness by being kind to the oppressed it may be that your prosperity will continue and so what we see over here time and time and time again is that God's advice through his marriage counselor so to speak through the Bible through the Tanakh through the ones who he has sent to us to give us good advice about how to navigate our way back to him consistently and clearly and comprehensively tell us that the way to navigate our way back to God is by obedience by turning back to observance of God's commandment out of love out of fear you don't have to worry about God striking you down with lightning it's because you love him that's why you do what God wants you have all of him God's your creator God holds the breath in your nostril you owe him everything and he has been so kind to you if we just think a moment about all the blessings that we have in our life we owe him everything at the moment doing everything that God wants he still owes us nothing it says in the Psalms which means that to you God is graciousness and kindness for you pay every person for their deeds what does it mean it's kindness what kind of kindness does God do for us if we did what's right we deserve it oh the Psalms is telling us he doesn't owe you anything everything he gives you is a gift the fact that God ever rewards you for anything you do is graciousness and kindness for him because he owes us nothing God loves us God wants to have a relationship with us and he tells us how to have that relationship and God's answer is not by putting your faith in the death of a sacrifice that's not the way to get back to God but then we're left with what the sacrifice is all about why does God even have sacrifices so that's a difficult question to answer and the reason why it's difficult is because if I would understand God I would be God God doesn't always tell us why he does things God doesn't always tell us why things are the way they are sometimes he does share with us but sometimes he doesn't and God didn't tell us why the sacrifices work he didn't tell us why sacrifices can provide atonement the Rambam states that the sacrificial system is actually a haik something that is super rational we can't understand it what we do understand is that as far as we're concerned the reason why we bring sacrifices is because God told us to it's out of obedience God tells us to keep sharpness we keep sharpness God tells us not to wear sharpness wool and linen clothes together we don't do that we don't learn your mother we try to do that when God tells us that when there's a temple standing there are cases in which I require you to bring a sacrifice it is an expression of our obedience to God to bring up that sacrifice however it is clear from the totality of scripture that the key to navigating our way back to God is not the sacrifice and the blood but rather it's turning back to obedience to God and doing so out of love out of humility with contrition with real remorse and regret for the things that we've done and with joy with joy it says in the Psalms where does the joy come from the joy comes from the fact that we are able to have a relationship with God and God tells us how to do it us human beings us frail human beings that are prone to mistakes God tells us we can have a relationship with Him and by doing a mitzvah by doing a mitzvah we're connecting with Hashem we're doing something for Hashem what could be more joyous than that and so of navigating our way back to God it's very clear that the approach of Christianity to leave it all up to God to provide some kind of blood sacrifice and that somehow magically um puts us back into a right relationship with God is to be found nowhere in the Jewish scriptures however following it's the God sent us and their advice on how to navigate our way back to God that is going to lead us right back into that right relationship with God thank you very much