You ready? That is on his way. He's just late to soccer again. So, I'll call the meeting to order and first thing on the agenda, of course, are the minutes. We have the minutes of September 17, 2019. I'm looking for a motion. I'd move to approve the minutes of September 17, 2019, with any amendments seconded. Age one. Age two. Sorry, everyone. I have a couple of relatively, hopefully, small things, but several of them. Number six, agenda item number six, mud pond parking report. The first paragraph, second sentence reads, the town has taken measures to try to resolve the complaints, but without success. And I wonder if we should qualify that somehow, like by saying something along the lines of without complete success, because there has been some success. It's just, there's still somebody who's not happy. So, I don't know if that's the best way to do that. It's the only way I could come up with when I was. What word would you put in there? Without complete success. Hopefully, the homeowner would agree with that. Under number seven, bylaw amendment impact fees, the second sentence reads, the new impact fee focuses on town projects. And I wonder if focuses on is maybe a little bit misleading, because I think the new impact fees is for. I mean, it was a very specific list of projects that are included in the economic, you know, calculation of how much the impact should be. So, I wonder if it should read the new impact fee is for town projects that are the responsibility of the town. Under number eight, budget review process, the first sentence reads, it's mainly the same as last year except for water, sewer and storm water, which would be handled in early April. And I have no objections to that. I just wonder if there's a little bit of a further explanation that should be provided, because readers may not know why we're allowed to do that. They might wonder, wait a second, you're pulling some items out of the budget to be voted on, when in fact we're not. These are not normally voted on annually or at the town meeting, because there are NFI's projects or not funds. So, the effect that, as these do not affect the tax rate? Something along the line, so readers get, you know, understand there's a justification for us doing this. And I'll leave it to others to choose what's the best way to do that. No, they're available. But it saves us time deliberating them, since they don't affect the tax rate. Exactly, they don't affect, right, the tax rate, yeah. Great, thank you. That's it for that page. I think it was on page two, page three. And again, two things, hopefully small. Under number 11, town managers report, the first bullet reads, the speed table on North Williston Road has been removed. I wonder if it should read the temporary speed table on North Williston Road has been removed. And the following sentence should read instead of speed tables are being installed at Finney crossing, should say permanent speed tables are being installed. Objection. That's it. On page three, if not, all those in favor of approving the minutes of September 17th, 2019 is amended. Say aye. Aye. Any opposed? We'll move on then to public comment. This is the time in the meeting that anyone in the audience who has any comment to make, any issue, this is raised. So we'll move on to item number four. And that's the Regional Planning Commission report, our annual report. Charlie Baker, the executive director is here. I know I have a representative to the RPC, Chris Roy, and past resident, I think, of the RPC is here. Just recently. Thank you very much for giving us time on your agenda tonight. Appreciate it. Hopefully you got a copy of the report in your packet. I think you did. And I'm just going to review it real quickly. This is, from my view, a customer service call. We work for the municipalities. And so I want to make sure we're doing what we should be doing for you and getting any feedback on either what we could improve or went well. Welcome as well. The first page of the report really gives you some very broad background on the RPC, what the board make up, kind of how our budget works, which is we leverage municipal dues to bring in federal and state resources. And the bottom shows your representatives. And yeah, thank you for having Chris. We've just completed his term as chair and remains on our executive committee. And he's been very, makes a lot of contributions to the board and we appreciate it. Thank you, Chris. And on the second... Do we ask questions as we go through it? Sure, if you have any questions on the first page. Well, I just noticed James is still on this. Yeah, so this is FY19. Ah, okay. This is looking backwards. So this is a report last year. Fair enough. Very well aware of James' change. Change, yeah, okay. Yeah, thank you, though. And actually I probably, we need to do something to update that because that question always comes up when we've had a change in some committee membership. The next couple of pages detail specific things that we did with the town last year. I'm not going to review each one of these, but happy to take any feedback on any one of these topics. Things from working on your impact fees to culverts and traffic calming and emergency management. Quite a bit more stormwater work recently. I don't know any feedback or questions on any of those. Long list. I think this is about the longest list I've seen. So you win, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. This is what happens when you have your rep as a chair. That's kind of a joke. Kind of a joke, maybe not. Yep. So page two, the Allenbrook large culvert assessment. And it's just more to try to find out more about this because I know Allenbrook is impaired. I forget exactly what it's impaired for, if it's flow or other stormwater related contaminants. How does the culvert assessment integrate with water quality in Allenbrook or does it not at all? So I'm going to give you my very broad understanding because I'm not familiar with the details in this report. But I think this is, to assess, I think we looked at six different culverts. And typically if they're not sized properly, you do end up with more erosion problems. So I think it is directly related to water quality and you can get maybe state grants to help with the replacement. So I'm pretty sure this came out of your public works department as a specific request to help address some water quality issues. Okay. Then on page three, I was looking at the Chittenden County Brownfields program and it talked about potential contamination at the Jacob parcel. And which was the first I've heard of there being potential contamination there, or first I recall hearing about potential contamination there. So I just wanted to see if there's anything we should know about that. I do not know what the results of that assessment were. So it's kind of a normal thing when the property was transferring to just assess it. And you want to find out if there's anything there? Yeah, I think I'm not aware of anything other than the assessment we did before we purchased it. So this is lots of time we just do diligence to make sure there's nothing there. Okay, and that's pretty much it for me. Under the regional activities, I would like to hear more about building homes together because of my interest in affordable housing, but also with the concept of, with Finney Crossing and the new, is it Cottonbrook? In the amount of housing that's going in as part of those projects, how are we doing in the county? Let me just, I'll get to that page. Oh, I'm sorry, okay. No problem, no problem. Just on the bottom of page four and then five, you see all the projects that you have in our transportation improvement program, which are also reflected in the state's capital program. Many of these are CIRC alternative projects. Our board is getting an update from V-Trans in two weeks on the status of CIRC alternatives projects. So just, that may be something that you wanna do as well at some point, because you do have a lot of things that are pending. How is the parking, yeah, the parking ride doing? Chris, you might appreciate that question. I think that was a question back in the day when you were on this slide board. And it still is. Yes, we'll be discussing that some more. And then the next section, sorry, not on page five and six, reviews things that are in this current year's work program that we're working on with you, including a couple things at the end of that list that came up fairly recently that we'll see if we can squeeze in partway through the fiscal year from your planning department. Okay, and then, sorry. Now, turning to the regional activities, bottom of page six. So yeah, the building homes together campaign was something that we started three years ago. At the top of page seven, you can see the results we're trying to set a target of building 700 new housing units a year in the county. So in three years, I would have been 2,100. Sorry, you're with me on the top of page seven. Those are affordable units. Well, total homes. And then, so 700 a year, three years would have been 2,100. We actually built 2273, so 2,273. So we built more than 700 a year. We were trying to build 20% of those be affordable. I think we're only at like 13 or 14% of those units are affordable. So we're not on target for the percent of affordable units we were trying to get. So that's still a need. I'm hoping that situation improves a little bit as we look at 2019 and 2020 results because the housing bond that the state did, I think like a year and a half ago, that will start to bear fruit in terms of affordable housing units, kind of the end of this year and into next year. So fingers crossed a little bit. Big picture on this. This is still not enough housing construction to make our housing market healthy. Our vacancy rate is still too low. So there's more work to be done there, even though we tried to make a push for a few years, it has not been enough to correct our housing market and how tight it is. Any other questions on the housing? And there's, on the regional activity here is a lot of things that we do without regard to one specific town. And there's a lot of other things in here, energy planning, buyaways, elderly and disabled transit, the 89 study, the regional dispatch, happy to get any feedback on any of those or, and there's more. Quick, is there anything you wanted to add? I think the one thing that comes across every time we do one of these reports is how wide a scope of the work that the RPC does that touches so many different parts of the county. A lot of the work is transportation related, but then more and more the RPCs are being asked to address a number of issues because frankly, Vermont has always had sort of a, you get the local municipality, then you have the whole state, but there are a lot of issues that are more effectively addressed on a regional basis. And so the RPCs have been tasked with addressing a lot more of those. But I mean, are there any questions about, you know, you've got my pet peeves regarding transportation, but there are certainly any number of other issues or there are things that you would like us to focus on more or report more information to you or anything like that. There certainly are a lot of transportation issues that are to be determined as far as the project schedule. So that's going to take a fair amount of money to implement all of these. I don't think we're expecting anything in one or two years, but I would hope that we're looking down the road not longer than five years anyway to start working on some of this stuff. On that trigger, and I think part of the reason V-Trans is speaking to us at our next meeting is earlier this summer. Now that I'm the immediate past chair, freed up to be not quite as diplomatic with my comments, which I'm sure is making the V-Trans representative very happy. But I pointed out, I actually had pulled up on my phone an article from the observer from back when the CIRC Alternatives Task Force worked. And at the point, I had made the point that Wilson was the only one that had projects that were going out as far as when my then second grader was going to be getting his driver's license. And as I pointed out, he's 13 now, which is pretty darn close to driving.  And one other thing that I pointed out, having to do with that park and ride too, and this one I don't pretend to understand and maybe we'll get an answer in October, is the lack of progress on the improvements underneath for pedestrians from the park and ride underneath the interstate. And we've all encountered circumstances and it just happened a few days before that meeting when I raised it. Every day I come in off the exit and I take the left, it was pouring rain out and somebody was trying to get across underneath the interstate, pouring rain, cars, I get your two lanes going around and then the person's kind of between the Jersey barrier. Cars are veering to avoid the person who's in, and it's just, yeah, I just don't understand why more isn't being done in that regard. But we're gonna start seeing, speaking of projects that were predated when I was on the select board of the Industrial Ave Route 2 in theory is gonna finally get started. So some paving improvements were done, so we're making some progress, but Brian Searls at the time had promised me and others from Williston that we wouldn't be forgotten and so I keep trying to shoot that horn as often as I can, but as we all know, sometimes that's kind of like yelling at the tide. It doesn't necessarily make a whole lot of difference, but I'll keep trying. Thanks. Other questions? Well, looking forward, what's on your crystal ball and in particular Act 64 created these concepts, I forget what they're called, service providers for clean water projects. And just curious if the RPC is contemplating being one of the service providers. You might have gotten that term correctly. Clean water service provider, that is right. Yeah, I think we haven't talked about it very specifically. I think we did engage in some of that legislative bill writing to make sure that it wouldn't preclude us if we decided to do that, but there's a lot of unknown, so I think we'll be kind of monitoring the rulemaking over the next year, which they're just starting to start up. So we'll engage in that a little bit. And then to be determined, I think we'll certainly be talking with our towns and see what makes sense. It could be that it makes more sense for the conservation district to do it or maybe there's another entity that might pop up and depends on the watershed too, right? The Winooski watershed was predominantly in Washington County. It may make more sense in the conservation district covers both counties. They cover the whole watershed pretty much. So maybe that makes more sense for that watershed. And maybe as I've been thinking about it, maybe the RPC engages more on the direct to lake, which is more MS4, not including Wilson, but the towns closer to the lake and going up to St. Albans. So it's hard to tell. We have three watersheds, the LaMoyle, direct to lake and Winooski. So sorry, long way to say, we'll see. Oh no, yeah. But we certainly have not made any commitments to do anything at this point. Okay. Certainly we'll also be evaluating the potential liabilities with it. Oh, sure. Okay. Other questions or comments? Thanks for your yearly update. Thank you. Thank you. Nice to see you again, folks. Take care. Thank you. Can I ask a question? Yeah, sure. Yes. I think that's maybe where we were supposed to say something and I'm not sure if we can go back to that. Sure we can. So we're through with the regional planning commission. We can drop back to public comment, which is where you want to be, I think. So if you just identify yourself and tell us which level to go. My name is Leslie Quinn and I am an agent at Coldwell Banker, Hickok and Boardman. I had sent a letter on behalf of Talbert Hill who has a property over on Brinnell Road in Williston and we've been marketing his house for a little while now and we're having a lot of problems getting a buyer in there for residential. So I'd sent a letter to the town asking to consider a variance change to commercial. So I didn't know if that, we would have been told that it was on the schedule so I didn't see it here so I just wanted to check on that. It wouldn't be the select board schedule, it would be the developer review board I believe, because I haven't seen any such letter. You must have sent it to the planning department. We called earlier today and they said we were on the schedule for tonight. We were moved from the one a couple weeks ago when they said to do it. Same meeting, I wonder if they're meeting, are they meeting in this? It could be the planning commission is meeting. Or in the wrong building. They go next, right next door in the town hall. I think they'll be willing to hear us, okay. All right, sorry about that. Good luck. Make sure I load a little easier. So let's go on to the noise control ordinance amendment and Eric has written a memo to us regarding the status of where we are at this point. So Eric, why don't you tell us what's in your memo? Sure. So this is working to have a amendment to the town's noise ordinance prepared for a public hearing. We're picking up a discussion after this table about the September 3rd meeting. So there are two main policy issues for further discussion carrying over to tonight. First one being the quantity of special events held at the Gun Club annually. The town had a proposal for up to 16 per calendar year, not to exceed three per month. An additional up to 400 safety classes may occur, which are not counted towards the special events. The Gun Club offered a counter proposal for consideration of number of special events would not average more than 16 events per year over a three year rolling period. With no more than three special events held on Saturdays in any given month. An additional up to 400 safety courses may occur on Saturdays. But that's one issue area. The other issue area is the days of the week special events may occur. The town's proposal had special events only may only occur on Saturdays. The Gun Club countered with a proposal with unrestricted days or special events, a limit of three Saturdays per month when special events can be held. Both parties seem to be in consensus that special events to be held between the hours of nine a.m. and four p.m. and the club to continue to notify the town at least 48 hours before a special event is scheduled to take place. So looking at these two policy points and the counter proposals, the town manager's office just pass on a couple points for consideration, considered to be factual in this policy discussion this evening. For the first point, the average of no more than 16 special events per year over a three-year rolling period. So operationally this creates an allowed limit of 48 special events over the three-year period. The club would use the quantity events held in years one and two to inform how many events could be held in year three. That moves each year as a rolling average. So one year falls off to the forward-looking year. So for example, this could vary from 16 per year. If you had 18 events in year one, 16 in year two, 14 to be held in year three, that just has an example. This allows the club flexibility year to year for special events by accounting using a three-year window versus the single year enables greater fluctuation and takes place. It's also a bit of a record-keeping burden for each side to keep that calculation. It's been rare in the club's history and with the weather to hold more than three special events in a single month, the club has seen more demand for special events in recent years and the club can address that more specifically. For the second policy point, special events held any day of the week. The 1991 letter from the club established its existence in dictated special events would be held on Saturdays only. The 2017 Supreme Court ruling states that shooting at the club is to be consistent with historic use with the May 22nd, 2006 baseline. The club's position is the time period for review isn't explicitly clear and since special events took place on days other than Saturdays leading up to and after May 22nd, 2006, that practice can continue now. Another point has addressed last meeting as well, restricting special events on Saturdays would be a time when more area residents are likely to be home versus holding special events during the week. So one possible compromise the manager's office offers for discussion this evening. Reviewing the data for the ordinance shows the club did not hold any special events on days other than Saturday in 2005. Leading up to May 22nd, 2006, one special event was held on a Thursday and following May 22nd, 2006, four additional Thursday special events were held the rest of the year. Compromise to consider may be to allow up to the 16 Saturday special events each year with no more than three per month. The 400 safety classes which would not be counted towards those 16 and in addition one special event held on a day other than Saturday to take place once during the year making a grand total of 17 special events would be additional 400 safety classes. So that's a summation where we're at in the policy discussion. If the board gets there tonight, the next step would be to decide on language to warn for a public hearing for the ordinance amendment. So Bob, Adi, would you here to weigh in on the memo that Eric has presented to us? Sure. Essentially no dispute with the vast majority of it. Just a couple of clarifications on the last part that he mentioned there was some of the historical records. Numbers are certainly in the ballpark of what we tabulated. Only slight differences were that in 2006 it was actually two special events on a weekday up till May 22nd and two thereafter. So it was a total of four. We put make that May 22nd kind of the cut off. It was two before two after, not significant. And the total number of special events that were listed in each of the years 0506 and 07 were 15, 16, and then 2007 was one of those years that we've discussed in the past where the level is probably better discussed as a range because there was some lack of clarity from the records that we went back through with somewhere between 19 and 25 special events. And do concur that in 2005 and 2007 there were no weekday events. That was something that was isolated to 2006 around then which obviously coincidentally is where the Supreme Court kind of pointed us for guidance on how to move forward. The only other thing in there that I was going to show and apparently my observation has been poor in the past. I thought there was a screen to display. I threw together a quick spreadsheet that we could use if we did move to a rolling average type of scheme for accounting for special events going forward that tabulated the rolling average as well as looking at the previous two years and calculating the number of allowed events, prospectively, that we could both use as guidance if a rolling average type of scheme was what was adopted. Other than that, yeah, I think like Eric said, from the factual standpoint I took no issue with the content of the memo. When we're talking about a rolling average, it seems like we have to have some kind of official date where the rolling average starts and it would appear either the first of the calendar year or the first of the fiscal year would make sense to me anyway. We had kicked that around a little bit depending on how the rest of this process rolls out. I know there are some things with whatever's adopted the public hearing and then some 45-day and 60-day windows for challenges and things like that before the amendment is officially adopted. So yeah, probably a calendar year makes sense. Thinking about your schedule of events, calendar year probably would work better for you than a fiscal year. Yeah, I actually don't even know when Wilson's fiscal year is. So I'd open up to the board for your comments and questions and suggestions on either the proposals of the towns or the gun clubs or Eric's are acceptable. We're pretty close, at least compared to where we were a year ago. Yeah, yeah. My preference would be that we just be a calendar year, 16 per calendar year, I think the administrative. I wish I could show the spreadsheet because it took me no more than 15 minutes to throw it together and there's really two fields you have to look at and plug it in numbers as you go. It would be pretty straightforward. I mean, the other thing that I would submit for consideration on the rolling average versus just flat calendar year is I gave some thought to the reality of how those things would likely play out and genuinely think that if we were, whatever the number is, the 17 that was in the memo from tonight versus the 16 that we've discussed previously, I think it had the perverse effect of increasing the amount of activity at the club granted within some certainty of that cap. But the reality, I think of how we would probably operate is if we got into the November, December timeframe and we're there sitting at 12 or 14 special events, we're probably gonna try to fill the calendar or not fill the calendar, but fill out the total number whereas with a rolling average type of scheme, we've always got that next year to consider because what we're doing this year plays into what we're allowed to do next year. And so there's a benefit to us to not hold events for the sake of holding events and to consider what's allowed in the future. Couldn't the situation be even worse in year three under your scenario? If the first two years had a lot of rain and things didn't happen and there's a reservoir of special events to have the rolling average be 16 per year, you're in year three, you could really overload year three. In theory, yeah, I mean, if you could go, what would it be, I guess, 12, 12, 24, I mean, 10, 10, 28, it could become heavily weighted in theory, the thing that I guess I would say to hopefully quell some of that concern is the reality of the resources that we have just from a manpower standpoint to kind of staff those as well as with the three Saturday event limit and the reality of the five to six months that most of our events are likely to take place in, I think probably whittles away some of that high-end concern. A question, sure. I still think it's kind of a neat idea that special events would be on a Wednesday because that would be a lot of people who are bothered by the noise of the gun club would be at work and they wouldn't have the weekend would. Are you proposing to let them go off to Wednesday? Wednesday's specifically or weekday? No, no, I thought one of the proposals was that special events also be allowed every now and then to be on a Wednesday. I think we had said weekday, just weekdays in general. Wednesday, we already shoot four to two. All right, my mistake. So we'd been intending to have the discussion in the context of just weekdays. I think this opens up the special events to any day with the exception of Wednesdays and Sundays. I mean, in theory, we could have one on Wednesday before we would normally open. So we're open four to dusk on Wednesdays, as it is now with the special, with the club proposal of the allowance for weekday special events from nine to four. I mean, I suppose we could have one from 10 to two on a Wednesday and then reopen for the membership at four o'clock. One of the questions I have is the three-year rolling average. I realize there's a practical limitation to how much could happen in one year, but theoretically, 48 could occur in one year and zero, zero the next two years. And I'm not saying that's, you know, there are practical limitations to what could happen. Well, in accepting the three Saturday, or depending on how, depending on what we settle on for days, I mean, so, but... Are you at all receptive to the concept of the rolling average, but there being limits on how many could happen in one year? Like take the 16 and add 50% to that. So a max of 24 per year. I think that would be interesting at the very least, like I say, because of some of the, you know, practical limitation on what we can likely, what we could likely staff. I mean, personally, I like the idea of some flexibility, but I think that flexibility has to have limits on it too, if you don't mind me putting it that way. And so that's where I am on that. And similar with the weekdays, I think flexibility with that is probably beneficial. And in this case, maybe to both parties, or all parties. Yeah, I think I'm just thinking about it in terms of the practicality of administering that. I definitely am not, I'm not opposed to what you're saying. Yeah. It just, it becomes a scheduling nightmare. Well, a couple, these are only off the top of my head, suggesting it's first of all, it is an administrative chore. I think it's a relatively small one. The other thing is we might pass that administrative chore off to the gun club.  Yeah, I mean, I think that's already being tabulated from the notice that we give. I know town manager keeps those, town manager's office keeps those records and has presented some for more recent years at other meetings. So I don't know how that would work though because the town, the club has to give email notice to the police chief and the town manager 48 hours before a special event anyway. Right. So it's more keeping track of it in terms of where are you? Where are you for that year? And where are you in the three year rolling average? It really doesn't matter what system you end up with. Both parties are gonna keep track of it. Yeah, that's what I'm pretty sure. Yeah, we have to know how many we're allowed. I kind of figured that, I just, you know. We have to know how many we're allowed and you have to know if it's, Right. Yeah. We're bumping up against the limit. If the administrative issue can be addressed, then it's, I mean, I haven't crunched the numbers. It would be something like 16 special events per year as averaged over a three year period with maximum in any given year being 20 or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. I was, I was, I threw out 24, but I have no strong opinion whether it be 20 or 24 or maybe even 28. I don't know. I don't know. I don't care. No, I don't know. Interesting. So you're proposing a cap? Yeah. Yes. There's still the concept that the three year rolling average, but there's a cap per year. But you mentioned 50% versus maybe we could look at something like 25% or something. I don't know. I don't know the numbers as I'm thinking doing this in my head as well. Are we also limiting, we're not limiting it just to Saturday. I'm sure you're saying. I'm opening it up to weekdays also, yes. I say I'm in support of opening it up to weekdays. That's fine. What a weekday, what a weekday special event would be from nine to four? Yes, you have nine to four. Is any of the conversation going on, Mr. Audit? I mean, certainly some flexibility is better than none at all. I hadn't given a lot of thought to a cap on that amount of flexibility, 25%, 50%, or just a flat number. But like I say, I mean, the flexibility I think is, and where we kind of came to that and what again, I didn't articulate very well way back in the July meeting at this point, in this case, is how to build in the flexibility to have some of that fluctuation in the years that we've discussed where we're kind of 16 to 24 in that time period that the court pointed us all back to. So the rolling average seemed to be a way to do that when the light bulb went on and wrote that into our kind of counter proposal there. So Ted, if you wanted to roll in the starting date for the rolling three-year average, that is what the calendar year. Yeah. I would agree with that. Yeah. Before we get too far down the road, any other questions or comments where we open it up to questions and comments from the audience? If not, anyone in the audience has any questions or comments for us, that would be helpful. If you do, please identify yourself and try to keep your comments brief. Anyone at this point? Our object tonight is to try to get some language to present to for a public hearing. And that public hearing would happen within the month. I was like, within the next two meetings that we have. Can I ask a clarifying question? So are we in agreement as a board that we're open to the flexibility and that we're trying to figure out what our number is? Yeah. Okay. No. Gordon, where was your math going? Because you were on to something. Well, I just, I'm piggybacking in with Jeff and then taking 50% seems that's a higher cap where if we took 25%, we'd land at 20. So still we're getting a cap, but it's I think more compromisable for both sides. I think that's doable. Mr. Adi. Yeah. I mean, like I say, I think some flexibility is better than none. I mean, the other thing too obviously is that some of those events are going to be consumed with the hunter education. So really our consideration of events that actually goes up to 24, even with the 20 non-hunter ed events if we want to call them that. So. So that's a yes, you'd be hoping to that or? I don't see that operationally being a practical limit for us. I mean, it would kind of be a nice problem to have a yes, but even this year, I think we're trending towards something like 16. So that's been a bigger year than the last several anyway.  I like it better than 16 flat. I don't know, is that a non-answer answer? No, that's a good answer. But what I'm also hearing is you don't anticipate a cap of let's say 20 is going to inhibit the club at least from what you can tell right now. I think the likelihood that we would have to say no to anybody calling us up and saying, hey, can you host us is probably low. We're going in. Yes. So tell me if you'd like to make a motion or do you have something prepared? No. I would make a motion that we amend the wording. That's what I'm trying to figure out. Okay, keep going, counselor. With all this pressure. On the fly, it's all good. So one option just because it's hard to craft language in this type of a setting. I assume pressure's on there, Ted. Does it make sense to ask staff to come back? I think you have a sense of where we're going. For the most part, I do have a question, but keep going. And to come back with a suggested language and then we can tweak it at our next meeting, let's say. Well, I think what we're gravitating towards is more or less what, let's be self-serving here, but what the club had proposed with the difference that those 16 special events on a rolling average, I think all we have to do is bracket or comma something off with an maximum of more than 20 in a given year. Yep. In a calendar year, probably. Oh, true. Yeah. So I, of all the stack of paper I brought, that's the one thing I need to do. And it's not a danger that something- Want me to try a motion again, then? Okay. Okay. I'd move that we approve a scheduled events for a calendar year running January 1 to December 31 with 16 events with no more than, with a cap at 20 in any given calendar year. Not to exceed our three-year rolling average. This would be to take the Gunning Club proposal and amend it, I presume. Pretty much, yes. So I'm going to be a little bit nitpicky, Joy, if you don't mind, is the right word approve? Because what we're doing is we are crafting an ordinance that we're going to bring to a public hearing, public meeting. All the hearing? Public hearing. So we aren't approving it yet. We're- Proposing. Yeah. Propose an amendment. So we do a motion, do I hear a second? I'll second. So it's a discussion on the motion. I'd like Ted to read it once he gets it crafted there. We'll see if we've got it in his writing as it is here. Just keep it small for me to read. Rick, let's hear Rick. I just have a question because in that motion that was discussed in some of the discussion that we did talk about, and that is special events on the days other than Saturdays. What is the board's intent on that? I allow for any day, I'm good with any day. I think we're taking the Gunn Club proposal for special events on the day. And limiting the number in the rolling three-year average. I don't want to steal your only one, but of all the things I brought, I didn't bring that. So we do have a motion made in seconded. Discussion on the motion? As part of our discussion, one of the proposed language, I don't know if it's good or bad. I just know it exists. It is as follows. The number of special events shall not exceed 16 per calendar year as averaged over a three-year period with 2020 as the first year of the three-year period. Notwithstanding the aforesaid, in no event shall special events exceed 20 in any calendar year. I think that's what you said, safely. I put in that 2020 is the first year of the three-year period because I didn't want there to be confusion in the future. In posterity, well, does that mean like you keep moving the three-year period and one, the town or the, yeah, so we had to make sure the three-year period has a start date, so it's year one, year two, year three. It's not like you're always in the middle of year two and you get to look back and jockey back and forth. So 2020 refers to calendar year? Yes. That's one correction I'd like, not correction, addition. Calendar year? First. So it would state as follows. The number of special events shall not exceed 16 per calendar year as averaged over a three-year period with the calendar year 2020 as the first year of the three-year period. Notwithstanding the aforesaid, in no event shall special events exceed 20 in any calendar year. And as I said, this is modifying the gun club proposal that we have before us. So is there? Did you do it? There was an email. I didn't send that. Yes. I didn't write that. You don't want to rewrite that? Yeah. Is there further discussion on the motion? I agree none. All those in favor of the motion say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Okay. Sounds a price, Jeff. No, it's, earlier tonight we had a discussion when we talked about probably what is the longest issue before this select board, which is the parking ride. And ever since I've been on the select board, this is probably, if not the second longest, close to the second longest. So. Does it go past the CIRC alternatives? No. So, yeah. We will then take this up as far as calling for a public hearing at our next select board meeting. Let's get the language. Yeah. Process. So we, you don't want this, the scheduled hearing, and you want to wait until the next board meeting. We need to see the language. Okay. So we actually schedule a public hearing. Okay, that's fine. All right. Can you wait a minute? We did get an email from Mike Pallatier who asked that this be read into the record tonight regarding the gun club. Unfortunately, I'll be out of town for the meeting tonight. When suddenly there's no with my thoughts instead, please read into the record for the select board meeting on the noise ordinance. I'm a long time member of NZSC. I strongly support the right of the club to operate a schedule that complies with the recent Vermont Supreme Court ruling. This would allow it to hold events and provide member services in a manner that provides for viability now and in the future. Please recall that the club pays property taxes and has many club members that are residents of Williston. These residents as well as other NZSC attendees support many local businesses. The continued operation of the club also ensures that a 50 acre partial of town land remains free of other development. I realize that everyone has differing opinions who will not always agree. Fair arms are legal, available, and people will look for places to use them. The Williston Gun Club, the Williston Club has provided a safe, controlled environment for people to learn how to engage in shotgun sport safely and responsibly for nearly 60 years. Typical NZSC attendees are individuals Vermont hundred safety classes as well as various youth and private groups. I support NZSC matching the maximum number of units recorded during the period referenced in the Supreme Court ruling. These may occur on weekday and weekends and hundred safety youth groups should be excluded from the event count as they are short duration events. This is for the club an opportunity to continue to operate as the good and responsible neighbor that they are. So that will be added to the minutes of this meeting. So any other comments on the matter before we go on to the next one? Just identify yourself please. Randy Bean, I'm a Williston resident NZSC member. In the draft language, I think you probably need the word rolling in there. I said you were talking about a three year average. We'll be rolling, yes. I think you need to discuss by the word rolling in there. As what, just what's your thought on that? The thought on that is rolling out or just defined as an average where the first, after a three year period, the first year drops off and a fourth year counts. Good point. The way you've crafted is just a three year block. Right. The language you have proposed there. Yep, good point. Yeah, I'm sure of that. Yep. Me too. Thank you. Is there anything else before I close this one out? So do we need to take a motion on that or something or is that, we're good? Okay. Thank you very much everybody for coming. Yeah, thank you Bob. And in the face of this, we'll go on to our next subject. Welcome to go over to the planning commission meeting like everybody else. That's useful, something to be said. So next on our agenda is the topic of federal opioid class actions lawsuit and Eric has a memo on this as well. I'd be brief overview of this issue area. I may be looking for feedback from the board tonight on this litigation. If something in town may want to pursue further and if so I can use some further research and discussion. I attended a meeting at VLCT in Montpelier recently. We had the town of Bennington's town manager was there and some attorneys there working with at a national level. Bennington's filed a lawsuit in federal court against opioid manufacturers, distributors, retailers and pharmacy benefit managers. It's part of a multi-district litigation. It's being heard in Eastern district court in Ohio for pretrial trial judgment. In advance is the trial that we were told that be held in Vermont. About 3,000 municipalities across the country have filed similar lawsuits. The question before the board is looking if it wants to pursue a lawsuit of a similar nature. The attorneys that Bennington's working with are working on a contingent basis for this lawsuit. Outcome of any financial settlement will be intended to assist municipalities in abating damages caused by opioid distribution. So I've included data. They said it could be made public, it was supplied to me after the meeting. It looks at the town of Wilson specifically. This is our coast data. And it looks at doses units of, which is, you can give us a number of pills for lack of a better term for opioids in Wilson from this year, 2006 to 2012. So there's a state level and a town level. I'll kind of focus in on the town level. This data takes a look at, we're talking about eight million doses units over that time period. And it's breaking it down by the manufacturers of the drugs, the distributors and the retailers. And this data breaks down where the distribution goes. So you can kind of look at the most granular level here, the retailers in town of pills that were ordered. I asked the question at the meeting, okay, eight million pills ordered, how many were actually prescribed, scripts were in and distributed. And they didn't have that data available. It would have to be obtained through another means. Just a quick question, Eric. Sure. You said eight million, is it 80 million or eight million? Eight million. Okay, because doesn't the graphs we're seeing show it as 80 million? Maybe looking at, there's a state data one as well. On the top one is 80, okay. I guess I'm a little bit lost on. Third page in, full page in, shows the bar graph of most of the towns in Vermont. And where the number is, it's 7.9 million. Okay. It takes that number and it breaks it down by various distributors, retailers. So what Bennington did, and I included online for reference their filing, it's extensive, it's a long document, but they looked at their data and how the opioid distribution was affected in their community, narrowing in on these specific manufacturers, distributors, retailers, and pharmacy benefit managers. So should the board want to pursue this further, that may be an exercise. Another piece of information we learned last week, we received in the mail, a class action opioid lawsuit, also through the Eastern Ohio district, that has named all municipal entities. Reading information, it's the understanding there that all municipal entities are part of this lawsuit using a negotiation class structure under a new federal rule. And any municipality can opt out of this by November 22nd. Municipalities can pursue their own litigation still, which is what they talked about, this BLCT meaning. What if this class action suit settlement is made before the municipality's own lawsuit is ruled on, and the municipality is part of that class action suit, then that settlement will likely end all other opioid-related litigation brought by class members. So if it's part of this larger federal suit, if you have your own, you may or may not get the evadement at that level. So I went back and asked Bennington and their attorney's what they thought of this, and they said this federal class action lawsuit has had some appeals to it already, and they said it could still consider filing individually. But there's beyond my level of expertise from a legal standpoint, kind of all the nuances here, but the board, if it wants to pursue something, there's a couple options here. There's this larger class action suit that all municipalities have been entered into. Can remain in that and can look to do something similar as Bennington did and file a suit. It's looking to think about the damages potentially caused by the opioid epidemic and at a municipal level, does the town, I'll leave there for my summary, I'm happy to take question and especially feedback for other questions you'd like me to ask. I did send this to the town attorney for his viewpoint on any risks the town may face, and I'm just waiting for a follow-up with him still. Hold on, I've heard back from you, okay. I don't suppose you had access to the law firm's retainer agreement with the town of Bennington. No, but they, I think they were, I forgot to use that percentage of the contingency fee for them, but generally a third, I imagine, but I'm more concerned about who's paying the litigation costs and who has to pay if the suit is not successful. If the town of Bennington is gonna be on the hook for all the expert witnesses that had to fly in from Europe, I wish them luck, but I don't want the town of Williston to be in the same situation. Good point. Questions, comments? I guess the only comment I have is, I'm not sure what to do in this case or in this situation, case, probably bad choice of word here. Other than, you know, I certainly know it's a problem, the opioids, if I said that correctly, and we ought to be doing what we can. I just don't always know what that answer is, is what is it we should be doing and how would we want to pursue this? It sounds like there is an opt out, there's a, and I guess maybe explain it a little bit further, there is a lawsuit moving that is or will be moving forward. All municipalities are part of it unless they opt out. That was my understanding in the information shared. I'm not exactly sure where it is at this stage, the notification we received was that the municipalities in the country and the municipality itself could opt out of being part of that class action suit. I guess the, me as a lay person, that maybe has the most appeal to me, I mean, not opting out of that. On the other hand, I don't know what it means when every municipality in the country is involved and it's a class action lawsuit. When it comes time to the settlement and you divide it by how many municipalities, however they're gonna divide it up, how much is Williston really gonna receive from that and if it's gonna really make a dent in what we can do that makes sense for what we would do in Williston. I was thinking the same question, Jeff, and on the website they provided, they had a hypothetical calculator for a settlement. I don't know which dollar amount they arrived at, but their award was on a per capita type basis and based on their overall number they provided when I looked up Williston, it mentioned $20,000 but I felt putting any numbers there seemed kind of premature at this stage. I hope the lives that would be retired and hopefully dead before this. Well, there are aspects of this, I just, right, I just don't understand, right. You're probably right. Did we get notice of a class action lawsuit? It was mail to the clerk's office. The town clerk's office? Yeah, interesting. It was basically just an information packet. I put the link in the report here, I think. Did it have an opt out thing you can opt out of this class action lawsuit? Yeah, it looked like that line up over here. I was struggling with the idea that we have been included in, I know it's all municipalities, I get that part, but I'm still having a problem. We're automatically included in that unless we opt out of it. That's not sitting well with me. The nature of class actions, though, you get notice and the notice has to say you can opt out and file a lawsuit on your own but if you don't then your silence is consent. No, this isn't either way where you opt in. That's why I'm struggling with this. So now I'm back to Ted's original comment. One, I don't like the fact that we couldn't opt in. I don't like being in a position of opting out that I don't like, but beyond that, I agree with him that unless we've seen what that agreement looks like and you know what you're getting into and what you might be obligated to, I wouldn't ever want to put the time. When do we have to opt out of the class action lawsuit? November 22nd is what I listed. The information, the website that link that it's in the report, I think I remembered them all after that was a copy of what we received in the mail and in our copy. I'm not a big fan of class action suits anyway. But that aside, if your gain is potentially $20,000, I don't know that it's worth us getting involved in that. And more importantly, the potential it's necessary to be able to see. Well, the ability to attach to it, right? That's, and I would leave it to Ted to elaborate more because you do so much more litigation than I do. Well, it's just the concern I have and without knowing is that if the agreement is that the town as the client is responsible for litigation costs, then that's great if you win because you never see it. It's just taken off of the percentage that you don't get because it's going to cost. On the other hand, if you lose, then who's gonna write the check for that? And I think, I know in Vermont anyway, they changed it well. I think they changed the rules a number of years ago where the lawyer actually, if he loses, can say, you know what, I'll cover those costs and you don't have to do it, even though it's kind of financing a lawsuit. But if that's, that'd be a key issue for me is to see what that is. And then the other key issue is the class action, that's pretty easy, a class action lawsuit because you just don't opt out and then later if they win, you get a check. But you've given up your rights to pursue litigation on your own. The only, another factual thing that occurs to me is that the graph that was presented, I completely believe it's accurate for the number of pills that are sold in Williston. One of the problems that might occur though is that Williston has a population of about 9,000 people at night and about 20,000 people during the day. So are all those people living in Williston or is that just what the pharmacies in Williston provide? I had the same exact question, yeah. It would be great if the settlement were based on pills sold in your ministry. And I'm always, one of the, well, I'm very wary. And I'm not saying I've made up my mind or that it's a bad idea to do this. It might actually be a good idea. But one of the things that always occurs to me is that at least in my own practice as a lawyer, people will come to me and they wanna file a lawsuit and they don't realize that this is gonna be a big inconvenience for you. You're actually gonna have to do stuff. It's not like on TV where you show up and three weeks later I'm in my best suit in front of a jury and just spouting stuff off the top of my head and it all sounds great and you just sit there and collect the check at the end. Which would be the coolest job ever if that's really how it worked, but it's not. But the clients, there are the entirely possible to have depositions, to have to answer interrogatories and the law firm would certainly help you out with that if not do almost all of it yourself. But then if we're gonna be committing town resources, one of the possibilities is that we would have personnel and administrative resources that would go toward this as well. And that's, again, I just, I don't know the answer. It's a genuinely just a question. Eric, was VLCT offering any sage advice? VLCT was serving as a facilitator for up to have a discussion, but they didn't take a, they didn't take a position either way. Just sort of as a... This would be different than what the state has joined with the, well, obviously with the town, with the, I mean, the attorney general's office is pursuing litigation. Yeah, that came up and I believe the Purdue Pharma is the only entity named in that suit. So they made that point that the state's looking for the litigation against this one company where data based on towns could show that that particular company was not the one providing the most opioids in that town. I know Bennington's was different than Purdue as their top manufacturer. So they named the ones, the bigger distributors, manufacturers in their community, community specific versus the state's lawsuit. Purdue was not the number one distributor in Bennington and that's why Bennington said, okay, we can go off on our own. They focused in on them. I believe the state is just against Purdue. So they looked at the whole supply chain, essentially for the network of opioids for manufacturer distributed, the pharmacy benefit managers to help control what was readily schedule one, schedule two, schedule three drugs in a benefit plan. Retailers, they tried to take a holistic picture of every one entity that was involved in that distribution. That's interesting stuff. So it would appear to me that we need a lot more information if we're going to do anything with this, including getting the opinion from our town attorney. And it sounds like we have another issue on the opt out issue with a different, the different lawsuit. We probably ought to get some more information again, perhaps from the town attorney on that as well. Any other information that we need on this particular issue? If that will go on to Coyote Lane and the acceptance of irrevocable offer of dedication and Eric, you have a memo that was written by Bruce and we'll see if you can give us a little more information as well. Sure. So this is some land record cleanup and copyrights to define public works. Just looking at this. So it's originally been included, I think back in 2014 when this was put together and then the plot was drawn up, but looking at public works recommending the town except a 64 foot strip of land for future road construction at Southern North of the Coyote Rund Development. There's already a sewer easement through the strip of land. It's already belongs to the town. Parties involved in this are the HOA and Herdyn Roth reconstruction. Conditions of this irrevocable offer of dedication, which would be the instrument for us and for the board to approve our executed deeds to convey this property. Those have been provided to the town and in addition to HOA as executed deeds to convey property for some active sewer lines that run along edge to the properties. So the town can go ahead and can accept this conveyance by executing this irrevocable offer. A draft memo or rather a motion using her public works recommends this and the town attorney is consulted. So ultimately some record cleanup to be done here. Similar to the action we took with Northridge. There's some differences, but it's sort of similar anyway. Questions or comments? No, just one real quick minor thing. Under the I think third paragraph it said the other are to convey property and it very well may be property. Typically sewers or often sewers are in easement. So I just wondered if it was easement and not property or if you even know the answer to that. Is that Bruce's memo? Yeah, Bruce's memo I'm looking. I believe it's an easement, but I might have to ask. Okay, and it's not a big deal. I just, I deal with easements every once in a while. So I had a question about that. Any further questions or comments? Motion then is in order. I moved to authorize the town manager to accept an irrevocable offer of dedication from the Coyote Run Homeroom Association with the 64-foot strip. Printing open space slot three is shown on subdivision plot entitled amended final plot. Coyote Run phase three, Moncton View Road, Holiston Mountain, excuse me, View Road, Holiston. Second. Second. That's for discussion of the motion. If not, all those in favor of the motion say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Moving on to the tax sale process authorization. Rick. Yeah, this is me. So for, we're in 20 years, title, but in the case he handle all our, our situations where we have to get a tax sale, which fortunately is not for all, but with the change over in attorneys, Bob Fletcher's suggesting that the board officially designate his firm for the purpose of handling. Questions for Rick? Just why, why can't you just do it without a select board approval? I didn't ask Bob that. He likes the formal stuff on him. Okay. That's all there is. And he's also recommending some other steps that we've never done that I don't come and select board on, but as I hold the title of collective link with taxes, and I'm supposed to be issuing a warrant on all these. And I, in the past, I've done that, but it's been part of the actual tax sale that the paperwork I got from Joe Fallon. Now he wants to be ahead of time before the tax sale. So, you know, be listed with a number of different properties in there. Anyway, it's just a little bit different process of what we're used to. Yeah. Motion is, again, that order. I move to approve the use of Stitzel page and Fletcher PC to conduct a tax sale process for calendar year 2019 and all future tax sale processes until or unless otherwise amended or changed. Is there a second? Second. Is there a discussion on the motion? Just that I like that it's either amended or changed. You wouldn't want that motion to just say amended or simply changed. I don't know, amended or changed. I like that. He's not getting paid by the word, is he? All those in favor of the motion say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Manager's report. Well, we have a short one this evening, just one item I want to touch on and I think there's one item that Eric's going to touch on. We've already heard the news about the hiring of our new library director. We'll be starting November 18th and it's a culmination of what had been a very long process, but we work closely with the library board of trustees and I think the trustees and the staff are all pleased with the selection. So that's. Good news, yeah. We got through it. It was unusual in some respects because we had people dropping out after they had accepted an interview and they dropped out. They were dropping out at the very last minute, essentially. So sometimes when you have people dropping out, you almost always have people dropping out. You're able to backfill those slots with other people who were just kind of, didn't quite make the first cut, but anyway, we weren't, because of the lateness and people dropping out, we weren't able to make that adjustment. And so it was just an unusual circumstance. I don't quite know why that happened in this situation. It's certainly nothing to do with the quality of library we have for the staff. But anyway, that's all I had in that item. And Eric wanted to briefly address the inner retreat that we have coming up. So it looks like we saw on the date of Tuesday, November the 12th. So I'm working to get the evening planned here with the different panels, one on economic resiliency and one on legal cannabis, getting everyone lined up for those. So logistically, trying to get an idea from the board, when you would like to start the evening, we usually have dinner involved. One idea is we could have one of the panels and then break for dinner and have the second panel. I don't know if starring as early as 5 o'clock is possible for folks, trying to land on a good start time and kind of, do you want dinner panel panel, panel dinner panel, or a new combination? Or we could do dinner panel dinner. Yeah. Do you have panel dessert? Yeah, well, that's it. That's our dessert. Dessert. There's another option. Anybody have a problem with 5 o'clock to begin with? 5 o'clock. Yeah, I can make that work, probably, yeah. So last time we did dinner, I mean, we did a panel discussion to begin with, and then dinner. But the dinner was a little cold. And by the time we got through that panel, so I think we'll have to make sure that we hold it to an hour. We also, the location may end up being here, I think. Yeah, so it's partly because of DRB. Yeah, well, we got the DRB meeting in the police station. Well, there was a question if Matt was going to have to do both, and it'd kind of probably be easier for him to have it close to where his other meeting is, rather than having to drive halfway across the town. So anyway, we'll still work on that. But there's a chance we will be meeting right here. And that's all we have. So moving on to other business, we do have a special event permit request and another one also. So we do have a special event permit. The vendor is Smuggler's Notch Distillery. And the event is scheduled for October 16th from 5.30 to 7.30. And it's at 31 Market Street. And I did a double-trade when I looked for the location. But it actually was on 3rd Market Street. I believe it's the new bank. And so staff has no objections. Is there a motion? So moved. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion on the motion? Do you have a motion to say aye? Aye. Opposed? Yeah, the second one is outside. This is from an existing business that has an existing liquor permit, Goodwater Glory. They had been working their way through the planning and development of the board process in order to have some outside space so that they can serve wild food, I think, and alcohol. And that's been completed. They've been through the process. The one thing they're missing is the outside consumption permit. And staff has no objections to this. Questions for Rick? Is there a motion to be made? So moved. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion on the motion? If not, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Is there any other business when you talk about tonight? Hearing none. We're adjourned. Thank you all.


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There's history here. And here. There's history there. History is everywhere. Bought Jackson Well Springs, formerly Jackson Hot Springs back in 1996. And it's been a labor of love for my husband for so many years, he's just kept on shipping away at it. Of course, the next year, right after we bought it, there was a huge flood. And it was practically wiped out, all the cabins were ruined, and the pool filled with mud, and the fences were all washed away, so we could have got it much cheaper if we'd waited just six months to buy it. But as it is, we just kept working away at it. Historically, the warm artesian waters of these springs were used by the Native Americans for healing and giving birth. It was a spiritual center, a trading center, and there were sacred burial grounds in the hills above the springs. Native Americans came from all over to give birth in the water, and they considered it a special spiritual place where they would lay down their arms and they wouldn't fight, even though there were a lot of different tribes that didn't necessarily get along all the time. And the burial grounds in the hills above the springs were probably those who came to the springs to be healed, and not everybody got healed, right? So they needed somewhere to put them. In 1862, Eugenia Jackson dedicated the hot springs for an attitorium and sanitarium purposes. So Ashland's history is intimately tied to health and healing. At the turn of the 20th century, there were six or seven mineral spas in and around Ashland, each drawing upon the warm water that runs beneath the city. Prior to the Oregon Shakespeare and Southern Oregon College coming to town, the soaking industry was one of Ashland's major attractions. From Lithia Water was piped from Immigrant Creek to Lithia Park, the train station, the Mark Anthony Hotel, as well, allowing thousands of tourists to partake of the waters. Now we know now that lithium is great for manic depression, so everyone in Ashland's pretty happy if they take a little lithium water now and then. So this is an attitorium which you will also hear him speak about, built in 1908, which unfortunately now has a bank on top of it. It's very sad. The helmet bath, the Ashland attitorium that later became twin plunges, but corn springs, Wagner Springs and Jackson Hot Springs also all enjoyed notoriety between 1910 and World War II. So this is a picture of the inside of the attitorium. They had this huge slide and rings inside. Today only but corn springs and Jackson Hot Springs are left to remind us of Ashland's rich history of health and healing. Both properties were celebrated as spiritual and birthing centers by First Nation tribes. Because you're going to hear more about twin plunges later, I just wanted you to see these slides because it's an amazing, beautiful place. And I'm kind of sad that it's a parking lot now. This is the outside of the two pools of twin plunges, another great shot. So you can see all the bathing suits they put out there, very stylish, right? So here's Jackson Hot Springs, circulation 1925, and the buildings don't look that different. We still have this whole area here, and it's now got a cafe, and we've got a lot of different things going on that I'll get into for you. But historically, in 1922, Audinger built a swimming pool campground in a dance hall. Almost 100 years later, the naturally alkaline mineral hot springs waters continue to invite thousands of Oregon residents to partake of the waters. So it's amazing that it's still standing after all this time and floods and everything else. Here's a more updated picture. This is what the pool looks like now. And we continually have the water flowing through, and then we completely drain it and scrub it all out once a week and refill it so that we don't have to put a lot of chemicals in it. So it's a natural water. It's very soft, and it feels really nice on your skin. And there's also a hot soaking pool, which is right here. You can see that lady in it. The water is very alkaline. It's about 9.2. So when you go in, it feels really soft and silky. It also has a lot of sulfur, though. So we warn everyone to take off their jewelry and that everything will tarnish. Do you have to cool it down? No. Unfortunately, originally, when it came out of the ground way back when, it was 104 degrees. But years ago, I believe someone tried to enlarge the hot springs and hit some cold water, and it mixed. So now the water only comes out about 90 to 95 degrees. So we don't need to cool. In fact, we need to boost it up in the hot springs pool. And during the winter, we don't heat this pool, so it's more of a cold plunge. There is a holding pond that it comes out of the ground in, and you can see it if you go there.  And then we pipe it from there into the pool. Takes practically about 16 hours. Takes a very long time. We pull the plug, we drain the whole thing, and then after we clean it, it just takes all day long. And by late Monday night, it's full. And then we have ladies' night, and we have women only on Monday. And you do this all the winter, too? Sometimes in the winter, we don't, because there's not very much use. We always clean the smaller pool. So we've tried to keep some of the Native American history there. We had these nice designs painted, a little more North American, Pacific Northwest. So at one end, we have a Ganesha statue that was donated to us. And he's the remover of obstacles. So we have a cafe there now called the Ganesha Cafe. And the symbol of Ganesha is an Indian Hindu god who is the elephant with many arms. You can't see it very well on here, but I'll show you another picture of it in a second. And we've named our cafe Ganesha, and we serve Indian food there. So in order to keep the well springs going, it can't only be hot springs. We've got 30 acres, and we've made many things. We've made it a campground, an RV park, a mobile home park, an event center. We have a big tent where we have concerts. We have two stages and the cafe, which is just small. So it's a huge operation. I don't think we could do it only on the spa. There's not enough to keep it going. So we continually try new things, and it's a lot of fun. In the very back, there's a little spring where some water comes out of the ground, and we've created mikvah. And this is a very beautiful pool with flow through water. It's not very big. Those of you that understand the Jewish religion, mikvah is a spiritual cleansing pool where, historically, the woman is to go and take a mikvah bath to cleanse herself after she's had her monthly cycle before she can be with her husband again. And a lot of times, Jewish couples will come and schedule a mikvah before their wedding or different ceremonies. And so we have a pretty good Jewish community in Ashland that will use our mikvah. Though you don't have to be Jewish to use a mikvah. And it's very private. It's fenced off. And we have private mikvah there. And that's just the natural heat of the water that comes out of the ground. We don't change the temperature of that. So this shows a festival we had last year called Prana Fest. It was a yoga festival, and we had probably 3,000 people come and do yoga and eat organic food and stayed there for about three or four days. This happens to be... We converted the greenhouse for a yoga studio because there were so many people. This is Grandma Aggie Pilgrim, a Native American elder. She came out to the wellsprings and did a ceremony and a water blessing. We were very honored to have her. And this is a Rinpoche who just came out last month and did a ceremony. So we try to be a spiritual retreat center, but not just one religion, but many religions and everyone's welcome. We tend to have an alternative culture. There's a lot of what you might call hippies that come there, but then there's everybody can come and pull up an RV and spend the night. That's quite an evolution from way back when to now. We're proud of it. We think we're happy that it's been here all these years and it's continuing. That's really all I have. Any questions? Does the county give you any grief? Oh, tons. Tons. What's your secret? Persistence. Right? Keep on trying. Yes, after the flood and we had our cabins condemned, we wanted to remodel them and they said, well, now you're in the flood plain. Now you can't remodel them. You have to tear them all out. So it's been hard. Once we had named flood plain, it stopped a lot of the building and remodeling. We had all these plans for condos and making it really nice. So instead it's still a trailer park in a campground and temporary structures like teepees and so on. Okay. Well, thank you, everyone. Before we talk about the Medford and editorial, I have a little bit of history to add about the Jackson Hot Springs, which you may not know. The first white man to claim the Hot Springs was a man named Platt. Claimed it in 1852 when just a few months after gold had been discovered. He was in Jacksonville one day, gets a snoot full.  I don't know how he thought he could race if he's drunk, but he was very insulting to one gentleman by the name of Maynard. We don't have a whole lot of details, but Maynard apparently took Umbridge at this and shot Mr. Platt dead. The first owner was also the first murder victim in Jacksonville. We don't know where Platt's buried, but Maynard was ... This was before there was any law in Jacksonville, but a jury was convened and the stories are that Maynard was given a fair trial. He was given a defense attorney and a prosecuting attorney, and a jury of his peers found him guilty and hung him. He was also met Jackson County's first hanging, and he's buried on the grounds of the Presbyterian Church, of course, years before the church was built. But the Medford Natatorium, I don't know why, but Ashland beat Medford to having a Natatorium. You heard earlier that Ashland's Natatorium was built in 1908. Medford's wasn't built until 1910, and here's a construction picture of it. It had a steel frame, it was designed by Frank Clark, our sainted local architect, and it was a huge structure. It had 76,000 square feet on three different levels. And this is what it looked like. It was completed in the summer of 1910. It was built by a partnership of, I think, five different people who sunk a ton of money into this. And keep in mind that at the time, the town had a population of less than 10,000 people, but they were just sure that within five years it was 25,000. It was in the, Medford was on the slope of this huge real estate boom. The whole county was in the five years. The population of the county quadrupled, and people in Medford were saying, we'll be San Francisco in 10 years. Didn't quite happen. Next slide. And there's another view of it. You can get an idea of where it was. This is Sixth Street, coming this way. And the street that the Natatorium is actually on is Riverside. So it was sitting right about where the red lion, or whatever they call themselves now, where the red lion meeting rooms are, where their big convention rooms are. Next. And this is from the Sanborn maps of 1911, right after it was built. And you can get an idea of the layout. They had store rooms on the front floor, which initially were filled with a movie theater and a gymnasium and a confectionary and a barber shop. They didn't last very long, because that realistic boom I was talking about went bust in 1912, right after, two years after it was built. But they had two different dance halls on the second floor. And one was called the Oriental Gardens. And there was an open-air arbor, so you could dance under the moonlight also. And in the basement were bowling alleys. And the newspaper stories say there were two bowling alleys, which I take to mean there were two lanes. Of course, this is long before automatic pin setters. There would have been a teenage boy setting up your pins. But in the basement, initially, there was bowling, a shooting gallery, and billiards. And next. And this was the swimming tank, which was huge. There's a story that you swam in Bear Creek water. It's not true. They actually advertised that you were swimming and drinking water. At the time, the water came from Fish Lake, not Big Butte Springs. So it wasn't pure to 21st century standards, but it was drinking water. It was what people drank. And they didn't chlorinate the water, but the way they kept it clean was they would actually calculate the inflow of water by how many people were in the pool. So you knew it was safe mostly. Next. And this gives you another idea of where exactly it was. This picture was taken from the top of the Woolworths building. Of course, this is 40 years before Woolworths moved into that building. That's the high school, so it was very convenient to the high school, although I've never heard of any classes of any sort being given there. Next. What sits on the high school site now? Lithia's Tower. And this is the pool hall. But judging from the light, it looks to me like it's not in the basement anymore. I've never heard about it being moved to the upstairs, but maybe it was. Don't know. Next. And now we're into the 20s, and about half of the pictures I have of the Natatorium come from the Gaylord Collection. Winston Winfield Gaylord moved here from the Midwest. He was a big wheel in the Socialist Party, but he was disgraced and ended up in Medford running a cycle shot. And this is the Natatorium. He's in the space where that movie theater was. And his daughter Beatrice ended up marrying Emerson Merrick, who was the son of one of the partners who built the Natatorium. And Fred Merrick was the partner who ended up with the Natatorium, because after the boom went bust, it wasn't making any money, and the other partners just kind of dropped out. This would be a motorcycle? Yeah, not a bicycle shop. No, a motorcycle shop. You'll see. Next. And there's just another shot. That's Mr. Gaylord there. Next. And here he is inside his shop. So you can see it wasn't all that great inside the Natatorium. It was kind of tawdry and wooden and ramshackle by our standards today. Next. Mr. Gaylord in a pensive moment. Next. And Merrick's, I don't know why they did this, but certainly it was to make money. Just like today, you have to make the most of what you have. And one thing they had was a lot of real estate fronting on Bear Creek. The city of Medford had built an auto camp on the other side of Bear Creek in the late teens, and Merrick's followed suit in 1919. This picture, of course, is from the late 20s. Next. And they had a ton of cabins. They ended at one time they had as many as 66 cabins. And I say at one time, because the number fluctuated with the floods of Bear Creek. Next. 1924 washed away several of them. They had, there's a gas station here. Next. And here's a, here's a plan where they're starting, not well, this is from 19, this is from 1927. There's a 1924 flood which washed away some of the cabins. You can see how close they were to the creek. And 1927 was the worst flood that washed away dozens of cabins. Next. And you can see there, one of the features of the auto camp was they started a store, a store to serve the needs of the campers. The campers used the, the mandatory facilities to bathe, not, they didn't bathe in the pool, but part of the, they had, I think a couple dozen tubs. So it was not only, you could swim there. You could also, you could also take your annual bath there. Another picture. Next. Next. And here's a picture of the, this is the 1927 flood. And you can see the, one of the problems they had, one of, I guess one of the problems, any an auditorium, or most an auditorium, many an auditoriums have when they're down by a creek. Next. That's about like the well spring flood too. Yeah. In 1997. And the year after that 27 flood in 1928, they actually, they installed their first chlorinator. And then, and then they started to use swim and drinking water as their, as their slogan. They were never terribly profitable. And they dropped the name auditorium for Merricks? Well, yeah. It was, I don't know why, but it was owned by the Merricks, operated by the Merricks. Why not? That's what it was called. And in those days, you know, and before World War II, when you had really small towns and you knew the owners of businesses, having a business name wasn't all that important. Everyone knew everybody. Everyone knew who ran what business. So, so that tended to be the only name you needed. Okay. So 1928. Then in 1930, they're starting to make a little bit of, little bit of money. They're getting a little more profitable with the expansion of the park. And then the other partners from 1910 decide they want to get into this. They want to get, get some of the, this, some of the profits, even though they've been silent partners for, for 19 years, haven't taken part in all of the, the risk and all of the, the, you know, the management. And so there's a big, big lawsuit every, every day there's more testimony in the newspapers. And the Merricks testify that we've never made any money. You know, we're barely getting by here. And I think the suit was found in favor of the Merricks. Okay. Next, next slide. 1931, they, they tried something new. This was a dance marathon. And I don't know how many couples started. It's in the newspapers. It's on my website. And they went on for, for two weeks. Next slide. Two weeks later, they're down to eight couples. You know, this is only 178, one hours. And why, you know, this was 1931. It was the bottom of the dirty thirties.  The winning couples got a dollar for every hour they danced. So there were people with time on their hands. But they also, they also got fed for all the time they were dancing. And they had to dance for 45 minutes. They could sleep for 15.  And they had to keep their feet moving while they were, while they were eating. And they, then they sold tickets. People came to watch the dancers. Well, the idea was people would come to watch the dancers and listen to the music. And there was betting going on, too. And this is, come and choose your couple. Ah, could be. Larry says there was betting going on. I wonder. I'm sure there was. I don't know. I get the impression from the newspapers that it wasn't terribly economically successful. And it never, we never got a winner. Because after two weeks, the, the state government, the state labor board, came down and shut it down. Because these people, these people were not getting paid overtime. And I kind of think that's a good thing.  Anyway, next slide. And where are we at? This is 1950. So you can see the, the, the, the auto camp is really taking over or has taken over. Because this is kind of the high point of Merrick's auto camp and the high point of the Natatorium. In World War II, the Natatorium was, was leased by the, by the army used for training, teaching soldiers how to swim. And after that, the, the swimming tank was never used again. I think it was used in 1947 briefly for, for our Red Cross swimming lessons. But after that, it just wasn't used. And the only part of the building that was used was the, the storefronts on Riverside and the, and the dance halls upstairs. Which were not, which got decreasingly less popular because the, the young kids like to go to the, the Dreamland dance hall on, on West Main in the, in the Childers Building instead, Walker's Dreamland. And the auto camp got less popular too because in the 40s, right after the war, lots of motels were being built on 99, you know, brand new motels. It was horrible old motels. Those were once brand new. And so Merrick's got less popular. And next picture. And in 1953, they start, the cabins are moved away. And these cabins are supposed to be spread all over the valley. 60 of them. I've never found one. Does, if anyone knows where a cabin is, please ask your friends. I'd like to find one. I'd like to take a picture of one. The newspaper stories mentioned that's, that three or four of them were taken out on coal mine road. And there's not a whole lot left out of, not a lot of people out there. I've poked around, haven't been able to find them. So that would be a pretty fur piece to haul a cabin, but it's possible. But I'm deputizing you to find out. I'd like to know if some of them survive. They got their water out of their fish legs. Yeah. And next picture is the last one I have. This is the last picture taken of the Natatorium. It was torn down in 1956. It was a white elephant by then. Didn't really fit into the valley. Wasn't making it, wasn't paying its way. So it was, it was disassembled. And I imagine some of that lumber is in houses, houses today. And the red lion went up. And that's all I have to say. Twin, twin plunges, as it was known, actually started as a Natatorium. And Natatoriums were very, very prevalent. As Ben indicated, Medford had one. They were all over as, as opposed to auditorium. Most of it was water. It was obviously water-based. But the twin plunges, the Natatorium was actually established in 1909 by a consortium that built it. And it was going to be the biggest and best attraction in Southern Oregon. Actually in 1929, when the market crashed, it just almost disappeared because the financing was no longer available. And it was rather dormant. In the 1930s, Billy Briggs, the local attorney, picked it up for tax default for the grand sum of $500. He tore down the structure, which was an auditorium, and actually received enough money out of those huge, huge beams that were overbought, that were sold in California to recover his 500 bucks. But he actually put it in what was subsequently known as the twin plunges. The structure tore it out. The two pools, the one of them was actually heated. And it originally was heated with sawdust. Then they went to oil, ultimately, and the sawdust was all over. And many of you remember the twin plunges. Actually, the oak tank and steel was adjacent. And in those days, when we took it over in the 1960s, they were still burning cars to take the upholstery out to recover the metal. And a lot of times, the residue would fly into the pool. We were taking slag out of the pool on a consistent basis. Are these original tanks from the auditorium? The pools are original, but the structure was over. One structure was down. And this particular pool was the hot pool.  This pool was what we call a fill and draw pool. And the water was released about every three or four days. And it was a holding tank where the part... I don't know if you're familiar with the area. The food co-op sits right over where the pools actually were sitting. And what is now the parking lot was a holding tank or a reservoir. And one spring and two wells actually drained into it. And we held the water. And after two or three days, we had enough water just to withdraw the water from the pool and refill it. And that was the cold pool. And going back historically, Camp White was operated during World War II. And they would bring troops over to swim at the hot springs or at the plunges. So generally speaking, this is about it. It's rather informative. If you've got any questions, just take a shot at me. Were you a part of it when the dome was put over it in the 60s? Yeah, actually that was done by one of the owners, the Dobsons. And Les decided there wasn't enough to support the family by just the sort of season. And he decided to do a year round. And it was Minnesota mining that furnished a mylar pool or bubble as it were. As a matter of fact, it was featured, I think, in popular science at that particular point. The only problem was your plastics were in that sophisticated. And the chlorine dissipation from the inside and some of the shingles flying through the roof and did it in within about a year. But Minnesota mining did replace it. But it lasted two years and that was it. It just wasn't... I was attending Southern Oregon and we were taking swimming classes down there in the middle of winter, which was quite exciting to be able to swim in the winter time. Well, I'm glad you brought that up. Prior to Southern Oregon College building its pool, all the swimming classes, Bob Bennett and Bev used to bring their classes down. We were utilized as their swimming facility. How long did you own it? From 66 till the closure in 78. Actually over the period... You bought it from the Dobsons? Pardon? You bought it from the Dobsons? That's correct. Yeah, as a matter of fact, you obviously know some of the history of the Dobsons. Lydia Dobson was living in Southern Cal and we were living in Redondo Beach at the time. And she and her daughter Sylvia came over to look us over to make sure we were the right fit for the pool. But... How did it do financially? Did you make a living? Did you make a good living? Well, actually, we were known as the biggest babysitting service in Ashley. I mean, for 75 cents they could swim from 10 to 10. And, of course, my wife had the swimming classes and during the open season, of course, there was a lot of preparation time in the spring. The pools had to be painted each year. And it took something like 25 gallons of aluminum paint to paint the pools. Did you do it? Pardon? Did you do it yourself? Oh, you bet. The two of us did it. As a matter of fact, some of you may remember the high dive. And we looked at that high dive and being a little bit more safety conscious. People were diving about four feet of water. So after a windstorm, we asked Oak Tank and Steel just to cut the high dive out and remove it. And we felt a lot better. And some of you may remember the spin top which was in the cold pool, which was a contrivance brought down from a pool in Eugene, which, getting back to the Dobson, one of their daughters owned up at Johnson City. Oh, yeah, they had beauty queen contests. Right. Fourth of July, everybody came and took a dip. And there were all kinds of swimming contests. As a matter of fact, we featured one time that somebody could walk across the pool.  They ducked and one of my kids walked on their soldiers across the pool. No, we had a lot of fun doing it. Were you a swimmer or a competitive swimmer? No, I wasn't. But my sons actually all were pretty good swimmers. As a matter of fact, the middle son would enter some of the contests. Without even training, he'd come up first or second most of them. Well, actually, it was pretty well attended. As a matter of fact, one of the winners, the beauty queen contest was Gertie Hess. She was the wife of subsequently the postmaster. But it was pretty well attended. As a matter of fact, the beauty queen contest attracted people from Montague, from Medford, from all over the whole area really. I'm really appreciative of being here because I'm learning more about the history and quite frankly, the relationship between Jackson Hodg which is now well springed was pretty great. As a matter of fact, my middle son managed it for about three years when the sages were actually running the operation. But he managed the pool and the snack bars as it were. The sages actually moved up from Hilt, which was a company town, which was owned actually by fruit growers. They still have a lot of timber holdings, but they used to make their fruit crates for their oranges down there. That is correct. The one when Billy Briggs bought it, he put up the filtration system. As I say, it was heated, originally it was sawdust, which was a mess, and subsequently they changed the oil. But the one was heated, the other one was unheated. It was filled and every three or four days we dropped the water, refilled it again. I'll be trying to keep it between 76 and 78 degrees. Who named it? Did Billy Briggs name it? Pardon? Did Billy Briggs name it? Yeah, Billy Briggs named it Twin Plungers, right. As a matter of fact, my kids used to refer to the Twin Plungers. Well, actually, it's interesting, you guys, I did most of the, well, when things were slow, I did most of the lifeguards and maintenance. My wife did the swimming teach, but we had two and three lifeguards depending on the activity. And it was kind of intriguing because when we first moved here, there was a little bad blood between Jackson Hot and Twin Plungers because they were competitors. First thing I did, I went down, saw Wallace Smith, and when they were slow, they'd send the lifeguards up for us to use. We were slowly sending them down, so we had great cooperation after that. What got you into the idea of wanting to buy this? Well, it's an interesting question. You bought an icon. Pardon? You bought an icon. Well, actually what happened, both my wife and I were involved in outdoor activity, but we were living down in Redondo Beach, and my oldest son was first grade, just turning six. And when he was tasked in case of atomic attack, dive under a desk, I looked at my wife and I said, if the world were to be given an animal, the syringe would be stuck in L.A., let's get the hell out of here. So we moved up, never looked back. As a matter of fact, my boss at the time, I was working for L.A. County with the Department of Charities doing fraud investigations. He says, hey, look, I'll put you out here. If it doesn't pan out, come back. And the reason we picked it up, there weren't any jobs available, unless we were a doctor, dentist, or an architect, whatever. And when we moved up here. So we bought the business in order to move up here. But me thoroughly enjoyed it. 1966. Right. Well, actually, my wife went back to school, to Sask, which is now a university of Southern Oregon, to do her master's thesis in outdoor ed. And since we had both done a little research on it, Frank Haines, who was a prof at the time of Northwest History, said, why don't you use this as a basis for your master's thesis? And since this was available, my daughter-in-law took the master's thesis, pirated a bunch of pictures on Christmas and a surprise sent me this book. And I said, there's just too much history just to let go. And I subsequently, with some additions, published it. But it is available at the historical site of your interest in it all. When you closed it, because of economic reasons? Well, actually, it was, we were highly subsidizing in the last five years. And of course, the city was anxious to build a municipal pool. And we tried to offer it to the city. Look, you can resurrect it. As a matter of fact, the city of Parkland, the Columbia pool, was roughly the same vintage. They resurrected it, put a top over it, and it's still operational. The city was so anxious to have their own pool. And somehow or other, this is a little past history. I was in the council. I guess I said too many no's that we couldn't work. I tried to offer it to the county. And the county was very anxious, but the city says, no, this is our domain. We want to do our own thing. As a matter of fact, Jim Raglan, who is a council member, tried the last shot. The city yards on A Street were being abandoned. They moved out on B Street in East Main. And I suggested, look, let's get into praisel. Let's swap the thing out through a storage thing, and you can do what you want with the pools. But it never came off. Do you sold it to developer then? No, actually, we sold it to what was then Heritage Bank. And a bank built there. And of course, I don't know if you remember, they went bankrupt and closed the store. FDCA shut them down. And subsequently, it was acquired by Valley of the Rogue Bank, which then bought by Umpqua. But it was a succession of banks. And they're sitting right on top of the plunges? Well, actually, where the bank is was actually the structure. And where the co-op is now located, they were sitting actually right over the pools. And the parking lot was a holding tank for the water. And unfortunately, the water source is just running merrily down Ashland Creek at this point without being utilized. So what did you do after you sold it? Oh, you name it, I've done it. Well, actually, I was involved as a reservist in the military and then subsidized the pool in the wintertime. I'd go on short active duty tours to get us over the hump. As a matter of fact, I worked up at Mount Ashland, and I don't know of any of you who knew, Tim Yaqui, who did some of the glasswork, some beautiful glasswork, did the resurrection at the Baptist Church, which is now the Cambrian Theater, and also did some work at the Methodist Church, as well as many, many other churches. And some of this stuff is all over. And Tim and I worked up at Mount Ashland. God, I was a lift operator. I worked for Harry and David. I worked for Separosa. You name it, just to keep things. That was Helman Bath. Right. As a matter of fact, a lady by the name of Vagard, she and the daughter owned it, and they had a place out on the coast, but in the summertime, they'd come back and they used it for their own purposes. As a matter of fact, Ellie Eger invited me down to the pool. I never did get down there. I never saw the inside, but that's still there. Helman Bath is actually geothermal. It's a natural hot spring. As a matter of fact, there was another hot spring. The greenhouses, Jack Williams, had somebody drill a well, and Studebaker drilled a well, and he came out warm, which actually took care of his hot houses. Yeah, there were a lot of geothermal springs. As a matter of fact, this bed pointed out, they've cooled down, but years ago, they had a holding tank, and most of these people, rather than paying to go to Jackson Hot, they'd sneak in a skinny dip down at the holding pond. Buckhorn Springs? Oh, yeah. Actually, when we first came up here, we were looking at it as a possibility, and it was a chiropractor that had a practice out there. The name escapes me at this particular point, but it was a healing spot, and the chiropractic together, and subsequent, well, it's still operating. Buckhorn Springs has weddings out there, and they have all kinds of activity. But thank you very, very, very much for having me. I enjoyed it, and I wanted...