I'd like to call the Monday, August 20th Berlin Select Board meeting to order. To my far left is Pete Kelly, Wayne Lamberton, Jeremy Hansen to my right. I'm Brad Town. We also have with us Dana Hadley, the town administrator, and Diane Isabel, our town clerk. And additions or changes to the agenda, Dana? I have three additions that I'd like to add. I'd like to add traffic signals at Fisher Road, Berlin Mall Road, and Hospital Drive to the agenda. I'd like to add a short discussion on a private road that has been proposed on the agenda. And I'd like to add a letter to the sewer residential customers to the agenda. OK, no objections? Then public comment? And we have a public hearing about the speed limit ordinance as well, Brad. That's right. OK, the public hearing amendment to the speed limit ordinance or Brown's Mill Road? This has been under discussion for some time. We have, as I mentioned at the last meeting, we had done our very best to research speeds down there. Again, it's an unusual situation because it is a dead-end road that usually only people that live there would be accessing it. The speed limit there is 35 miles an hour. We have a request to lower it to 25 miles an hour. When the police were down there, they did not find anyone was exceeding the speed limit. I have written letters to property owners down there. I have three property owners down there that have encouraged it to be lowered to 25. I did not hear from the remaining eight, I think. And I also sent letters advising of the public hearing this evening, and we have one resident here. And Mr. Winter was here last time at our last meeting. Would you care to come up and express your views? I wasn't prepared to do that. You don't have to. This is Sarah. This is Sarah Winter's. And she and I have talked quite a bit about the situation down there. And as you were told last week, they have property in both sides of the street. And I guess they have a basketball court or something. Do you need me to move it if I'm speaking? It's just you're welcome to come up with us. You don't have to speak from afar, so. We've talked about this. You've all talked about it. Really, the request came many years ago, because when we got there, we thought, that's a high speed limit. Why is it so high? And the previous administrator had said to me that it shouldn't be that. We missed that. It should be classed at a lower speed limit when they did a big reclass. So we've just been working on it. And really, you can't go 35. But just because you can't doesn't mean we shouldn't change the limit to a limit that makes sense for a road that has a 90 degree turn and turns into a private road. And it's a bus stop for 15 kids. It's a busy place. And unfortunately, when the police officer was there, there wasn't much traffic. And there's not what you can do about that if you don't catch it when folks are coming through, but still. You ever notice any great amount of traffic on that road? You'll find it more a little bit later in the evening when folks are coming home from work. And then on the weekends, people are in and out. Just people visiting are coming in and out a lot. So it's not a high traffic road, but everybody that comes in that road comes past our house place. And so it only takes one, somebody not paying attention to have something happen. And you haven't heard anything from any of your neighbors that would suggest that they would be against this? I haven't, no. And I don't think it really affects anybody. It's really more on principle of the fact that the speed is too fast for a road of that length and especially that the public part of that road is so short with that stop for the turn. And then the other piece of it is that really, the sign is so high at the top of the, when you turn into our road, the sign is so vertically high that you actually, it's not in your field of vision. So you can't even see that there is a posted speed limit. And when we started talking about this, a lot of my neighbors said, we have a speed limit. They didn't even know because they just don't even see it. And so part of the request is maybe, maybe not necessarily move that sign, but move it down. So that it's a little. On the post? Yeah, move it down on the post so that people could see it better. I don't think that's an issue at all. It's just, we haven't done this waiting for this. Yeah, I don't know. We also talked last week about a children at play sign, which we can order depending on the board's thoughts. And that doesn't make the sign too busy because I know there's a weight limit and the speed limit. And then the children at play would make for three large signs. That's a good point. It probably wouldn't fit on that particular post. It would need to go elsewhere. Yeah, so if we needed another one, maybe like just past your driveway or something like that. I don't know if that makes sense. Well, the speed, the posting for the road, can you move further towards 14? You mean to a 12? Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty close to 12 now. It is now. I really don't know how anyone goes 35 there because if you're turning in there, we're not turned in there. You have to slow down to make the turn. But it's fairly close to the route 12, the sign. And the way that people take that turn as well, it also limits your view of the sign because you're looking to make the turn and make sure there's not someone coming in. So you don't even, you just don't see it. But it's not a question. We can always make it more visible and make it better. I just haven't had to do that yet. I made an effort. It was in the newspaper. I wrote property owners twice. Any objections from the fire department for producing this? Not at all. I'm surprised it's 35. Well, for them it's 15, but. Yeah. So, I mean, and I haven't gotten any comments of people that are opposed to it. It does require an ordinance change, which is certainly not an issue. But if the board were to approve that, we would rewrite the ordinance, which actually I already have. It would be a 60 day.  And the reason for the ordinance is so that if the board, the police department issues a traffic violation, we have to have the ordinance match the. So we have, so there's no objections to lowering it. I have not heard from anyone. About lowering it. Can we put the ordinance change on our next meeting agenda? If you were to approve it, or whenever you approve it, you would approve it with the ordinance change. And then I would just take that as the 60 day look back. So do we have to do a second public hearing for this? Or no. Okay. So pretty much in the vote on it now. Yeah. Okay, great. If you care to, yeah. So do we have to, are we in the select board meeting? You would want to do it in the select board meeting after the public hearing is done. And I didn't make that clear. She can add that to the agenda. So I would need to add that to the agenda as well. So I'll move to adjourn the public hearing and convene the select board. All those in favor? All right. Motion carries. Dana, would you like to admin the agenda? Yes, I would like to add the vote on the public hearing regarding the speed limit ordinance on Browns Mill Road. I move that we amend the traffic and vehicle ordinance to change the speed limit on Browns Mill Road from 35 miles an hour to 25 miles per hour. Second. Any further discussion? Hearing none, those in favor? Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries. So now we have 60 days. It's a 60 day look back. I will have highway go down and change the sign. Well, you can't do that for six days. Well, I'm thinking of the lowering of the sign in the children's play sign. So hopefully then in 60 days, you'll be all set. I love it. Thank you all. Yep. Much appreciated, have a good evening. Yeah. You're welcome to stay, Sarah. Thank you. I thought I'd give you that opportunity. I don't like it to be about it again. Thank you. Yep. Approval of the licensing documents, vouchers and applications to all the drew bills. Okay, Treasury report. Okay, I have given the July trial balance budget status report and delinquent tax report to the select board. Last week we did have a tax sale. It was last Wednesday. The night, so it was last Thursday. It was on the 14th, wasn't it? It wasn't the 14th. Oh, was it the 14th? No, last Tuesday? Yeah, yeah. So anyways, the night before we were gonna have the tax sale, one of the homes, the taxes were paid in full on it for that, you know, all the past year. I think that was the one we mentioned where there was something happening. Yeah, there was some legal issues with that. But the two mobile homes did not sell, however, the land did sell, the land on Cecil Avenue did sell. I did not have anyone here for the mobile homes. I have three different people here for the land on Cecil Avenue. So that's how that tax sale went, that's all I've got. So what's the, what's our going forward plan with the two that didn't sell? Well, you know, I've gone to the attorney quite a few different times and he's actually told me, he said this is happening all over the state and towns that mobile homes are not selling. One thing I can do is bring it to the next board of abatement, see if they won't lower the value of it and see if we can't sell it that way. You can try again. However, every time I bring something to tax sale, there's at least $500, at least. Yeah, we're averaging $500, let's say, you know. So what were the back taxes on those two homes? I don't have it right here, but actually, a couple thousand, maybe? Yeah, hang on, I do have that, actually. It was in your pack at last. Yeah, but I do have it here, though. One of them was under $1,500 as owed on taxes. It was like up to $1,800 with the legal fees. And then the other one was under $1,000 as far as taxes. Have you gotten any sort of communication from the owner? No, I'm neither one of them. And I have communicated with them or tried to communicate many, many times. So I'm just, I mean, $1,500, $1,000, if the board of abatement comes in and says, we're going to reduce the price by half, is somebody going to come in and buy that, buy those places for $750 or $500, and they're not going to buy it for $1,500 or $1,000? I don't know, because nobody even comes in. Right, I wouldn't think so. So I'm not sure it's either. So the other alternative that we have is for the select board to put the lowest bid in it. And then after that, you know, if we're the low bid, which we probably would be at that point, then we wait for the one year for it to be redeemed. And then after that one period of time, we just have what we're going to do with it. So either we're going to dismantle it or sell it. Because we're going to eat the taxes anyways, essentially. And we're going to pay to dispose of them, right? Yes. But you could choose to do that. Is it going to pay for the water until then? Not the town. I see what happens with some of these if they don't pay their lot rent, and then the owner of the property does bring them to court. The court can try to force them to sell the mobile home in order to get out from under. But the last one I heard of where they did that, the person did not sell it within three month period of time, and the court did nothing that I know of. And one of these was over on Junction Road. One of these was in Weston, is that right? Yes, one was in Weston. One's, they're three mile, three mile. Yes, very much Richard was the one, but it was Weston. And the problem of going for an abatement, in my opinion, is that you fool with all the other assessments on mobile homes, and I don't think that's quite cricket. Yeah, so it sounds to me like, and we need to just consider it maybe, is maybe the alternative is to be the low bid. If nobody does come here to buy it, then we purchase it, and then after a year's time, when we redeem it, we have to make a choice what we're going to do, and maybe it is to dismantle it. And I do believe that I've talked. My least favorite things about this job is taxes. I do believe like, I think when I talk with Barry Town, because I talk with Carl Rogers about it a couple different times, they tend, from what he was telling me, that they do, they will buy the monocation, and then they do dismantle it. Why would we buy it? Just wait, we have to wait anyway. But we can then clear it out of there. Well, so we buy it for like $5. Wouldn't we buy it for whatever it is? We wouldn't have to buy it for the taxes that are owed to us. We don't pay anything really, we just, it's a bookkeeping. So we still have to wait a year. Yes, right. But we're not getting any taxes in the meantime. But it gives us the right to do something with it, rather than have it sit there. The issue that happens if we don't, it just keeps going on and on and on, and we send tax bills every year. But now you're saying the owner of the property may be able to? Well, if it's on, you know, for instance, the one at Weston's, if that person was not paying their taxes, eventually they, you know, the owners could bring them to court, and try to get them to do it. You mean they're locked in? Yeah, they're locked in. Yeah, they're still locked in. Yeah, unless I'm not locked in. Sure. Are they subject to the same rules that we are as an municipality? I don't know what they're listening to. But the one I was talking about was not in Weston's, was another park entirely, and this person was passed to winter taxes. I hadn't gotten to the point where I was going to bring it to tax sale yet, but then I'd gotten notification from the courts that she was told by the court to sell it within three months time or else. But three months passed, and nothing happened, that I'm aware of. So it seems it would be in the best interest of the town and the landowner to get that either offer but to have that generating revenue. Down-fido. As opposed to, I mean, if it's not worth it much. As opposed to keep spending money to keep bringing it to tax sale, yeah. Because no matter what, I'll still have to bring it back to tax sale, even if it's, you know, even if the select board says. It's not a financial benefit. It's just clearing up the book. Right. Yeah. Can we help stay in? Thank you. Joe Stubb, the borough and prior department? The removal of a trailer's gonna be about $3,000 just to let you know. Thank you. So two things. About a year ago came here and I was introducing myself and I think we talked also about every other year we were doing a financial review and an audit. Not sure where the books were gonna be laying at the time and didn't know when we outsourced our bookkeeping if we were gonna have enough money to pay for the audit. So the select board, I came to the select board and asked if we could change the schedule for the review and then going to an audit. Now my auditors, or not my auditors, my bookkeepers, batch elders, is saying that being that we outsourced, we don't necessarily have to be or should be obligated to do an audit. And what I have to say is my word's worth something and all I need is one select board member to say, I'd like to see an audit. This is the easy part. Or, you know, what she would, she's suggesting is like a financial review or a competition report. Yeah, like a valuation. Okay. She said that would be more suitable for what we currently, our situation, being we outsourced our bookkeeping. But like I said, my word, when I gave to the town, was I'd give you an audit this year and all I need is one person to say yes. You're more tuned to this, Diane, what do you think? I think there should be an audit. You know, that was my mind. Okay, otherwise we're just saying batch elders is just saying to us, trust me. Right, that's my view. So the responsibility falls back on them. I don't think that that means we can avoid the audit. No. And it's been a problem for a while. Prior to you talking about it. That's true, when we were doing our old bookkeeping. I think it protects the fire department by having an audit done and citizens feel, and I don't know how much an audit cost, whether you've gone down that route. But I would also suggest that you have an audit. Bachelors doing the books, right? Correct. So she wouldn't be doing the audit? No, she wouldn't. And so that was also in the back of my mind if she gave us the report, she would be being paid for that. Whereas if I do an audit, she's not being paid for that. So, you know, I'm not, I'm going down some unfamiliar avenues here. So. I think we need an audit. Yeah. Okay. And I do know the town is on every other year. The town's audited every year. Right. Every year. Every year. Yeah. Okay. And it's expensive. I mean, it's certainly is not, I mean, the US wouldn't be as involved. No, I believe it's somewhere around $6,000 a month. It's, it's. Really? Yeah. What I believe is, I don't know what's reasonable or not, but that is, I believe it was six or 68. That sounds kind of high to me. It does. Yeah. I'd call around. Okay. This one's about 15,000. Okay. It's quite intense. Which is pretty intense. I mean, we're talking all. What I do remember, sorry for her. No, go ahead. What I do remember is, there was a lot of back and forth because of our bookkeeping and the collecting of, and so that probably also added to it. Last year, I believe Mr. Lamberton, you asked about doing an audit, a combined. Is that something we should be thinking about this year? I think it's two-way provision. Okay. But what I was saying was, why couldn't we in the future, the fire department pay for their portion, but have the same auditors out at both the town and the fire department? I think that's acceptable. I think that would be fine. What all I'm saying is that our audit's done. Right. Well, first. And who was your auditor? Father Gil and Cigala. Okay. Come on, Pelier. We bid our audit work every three years. And, and I think you've got a point is, if you've got your records are up to date and you have all your documentation ready to rock and roll that way, people don't have to search for things. That's what adds to the cost. Sure. And maybe, I mean, certainly wouldn't harm it if you would call them and say, we've had this discussion in the future. We're thinking the town, the fire department are gonna use the same auditor. Could we get a price? Yeah. I can give you the contact. As a kind of as an addendum to the right of the town's audit, because we're just so closely linked. Right. I mean, it's almost like money's coming out of one fund which is going to be to another. It just happens to be different signatories on that. Thank you, council. We could mention it too. They'll be here 29. Yeah. To start hours. In the meantime, I'll, I can give it to a phone number so you can make the call. Thank you. So, the second item, I do believe everybody might've got a copy of the report. Riverton building inspection. Okay. We're currently going under or trying to put together our 10 year plan. And this building has been, this didn't happen overnight. Okay. It's been like in these, this condition since I've been on the department. It's just when we were doing our, putting our 10 year together, I felt like this is the time we have to address this. And we all had a chance to review it. I looked at it. Okay. So, the beginning of the report does state that this building is below average condition. It's kind. It is kind. There were some things in the report that I think I should clear up when they were talking about the water being put back into service. What we did is we took out some of the facilities. There is water in the three bays. Okay. It's not necessarily to the men or women's room that was disconnected. And when they also talked about putting the eating unit, the two furnaces back into service, it's summertime, I think it was shut down and it was not operating at the time of the inspection. So yes, there was some evidence of some, some rot within the windowsills. Yes, there was. They were talking about the structural concrete or the structure, the metal structure itself and comparing the hall where they used to have dingo and spaghetti dinners and such. And then to the three bay garage. Now one was definitely in better shape than the other. The three bay garage is in much better shape than the hall. And that is for the settlement in the concrete slab, which this is adjacent to Levine's granite shed. And many years back, I don't remember. There used to be a mill on the river. So there was a lot of fill in this area. And being so close to the rail, the railroad, the vibrations of that, I am sure with the concrete slabs and anything else in there for fill, whatever they topped it with has just filled the voids over the course of time. So the hall portion, the two corners, the two ends are settled quite a bit. And that is also putting some stress on the remainder of the building. I think there's, I'm not sure where we're gonna go with this. And I'm here. This is just to open up the conversation and see if there's anything that town would like to see. I see our options is, right from the beginning about a year ago, and I brought this up, was I guess look at a management standpoint and we just sell it.  I think there's some benefits to that. Talking with some of the board members and some of the members on the department, some community members, you could fix it. You can jack that concrete up, fix hall and bay in the three bay garage. You can fix the whole thing. That's gonna be costly. At the same time, I asked what is the purpose of the hall? Okay. I don't think we're having spaghetti dinners, nor are we gonna be doing bingo anytime soon. You could remove the building and replace it. You know, you could put up a garage of some sort, a similar size without the hall portion. You know, that right there is 60 to 80,000 for probably just the shell. And then you have the plumbing, the concrete work, electrical. Or we could remove the hall, the three bay is structurally sound.  You know, the fixing it, the replacing of it, the removal of the hall. We could do any of those things. And I guess at one point, it was mentioned maybe even the town might be looking for some sort of expansion. So, you know, having a joint either highway or PD, if they had any interest in being down there, I think there's some options out there and I'm just looking for some input, maybe from the select board, or the individuals on the select board. Well, have you priced out any of your options yet, or are you just in the... We're just in the beginning stages. In the report, it also states that, you know, maybe we should do some excavation holes for investigating what is actually underneath those piers. And then we'd give us a better idea of what is underneath the three bay garage. I wouldn't do any excavation near the garage end. I mean, I think we're just a little close to the rail. We also have the water line and power going in that side. So I am stay away from the three bay garage portion. I wouldn't mind, and probably will, be excavating out in the parking lot on the hall and just to get a better idea of what's there.  I can't recall. I've heard there used to be an old engine over there. Do we use that? We still do. And what's in it? We have one engine over there. And that's all? That's it. Used to be, you had a lot of responders on that side. Currently, we have now four of us that can respond there, and three of them are EMT or EMR certified. What we don't have, and I had to go back and look at the different, the call volume. So the call volume, most of those are over there. A lot of them have accidents. You know, Riverton Station in the last nine years had seven structure fires, five alarm activations, and those are private homes. And four grass fires. We also responded out of their mutual aid to Roxbury and Northfield to four structure fires and one grass fire, fairly substantial. I don't necessarily think we should base our decision on our neighboring community. I think that's how we ended up getting our tower when Montpelier and Barry and some of the other neighboring communities didn't have a lot of those types of equipment. That's how we ended up with what we have now for our tower, which really surprised me on their decision-making. So right now, unless I hear anything different, I'm gonna do an excavation on one side and get an idea of what we have for some structural foundation underneath those piers. Have you given any consideration as to how long it will change response time down in Riverton? I have. Now, when that station was built, they didn't have the mutual aid system that they have today. So, we all took care of our own is what it was. Since then, the neighboring communities were all involved in the mutual aid system where we respond with each other. I'll give you, for instance, down Junction Road. We get a confirmed structure fire in Junction Road. It's Montpelier and Burlant Automatic Tone. We get a structure fire on Route 12 Riverton. It's Northfield and Burlant Automatic Tone. I don't necessarily think on the structural fires those types of instances, it's gonna change much. What it might change is your motor vehicle accents. You know, we know Crosstown is open seasonally, if we wanna call it. And we can never tell how long that's gonna be. Is there any interest from anybody else? This is something that Joe and I have talked about, about having other town resources, equipment over on that side, staging a, you know, staging highway equipment or if this thing gets rebuilt using one of the bays for a cruiser and having one of the police officers leaving from over there. It just seems to me that anytime you do that, you fracture things. You know, you need, everything needs to be under the direction of the road foremen or the police chief. And whenever you try to have a satellite location, it never works. Well, the only thing I can see is some of the equipment that's outside over at the town garage now could go down there. I could see a pile of sand there, you know? But the trouble there is, I mean, you have to have someone to load it to the truck. Right. So you're looking at another payload or at least a loader of some sort. And then you're driving over there to load it to sandback Crosstown, right? Yeah. So you have any idea what the place is worth on the free market as is? I do not. You do not? I do not. I do not. It seems like a lot of building for what, a lot of old building for what we're using it for. Well, pretty much you're using it just for storage, isn't it? It doesn't want one truck. Well, we got one truck. We do put down, put our hazmat trailer down there throughout the winter, keep it in storage. It's an expensive storage unit. You're back. So if you were to tear that down or tear down the haul part of it, would you still be able to use the three bays that are there for your truck? That's one of the options. And you could take what was the haul plant grass on it and have farmers markets down there. I don't necessarily know. I don't think we need a large parking lot down there. They need access to their mailboxes and people need access to the river. Well, until we have something a little bit firmer and idea for price. Okay. Yeah. We're kind of at a loss. Well, I didn't know if there was a, you know, a fifth off or six option that I'm not thinking of right now before I go get prices. Yeah. Like I said, the next thing will be some excavation holes to be dug and we'll inspect that. And at the same time, we'll get some, we'll get some quotes on maybe the dismantling of a portion of it versus the whole thing. You know, I think if I'm going to ask for some, I'm going to have to ask for all of it. And then see where we go from there. Seems like I'll have to pull half of it down. Now I've taken a few buildings down and they just go into a dumpster in six hours whether you pull half of it or all of it. And, but, I mean, I understand you're renovating but now you're fixing something broken as opposed to. Well, the way the building is, is there are two clear parts of the building. One of which is pretty good for me. It's not great, but, and there's one side that's clearly, clearly in need of help. But the way that the meeting room over on the South side is, you can see clearly where the structure is like separate, sort of like hung on to the other spot where the bays are. And I think we talked about this, I think one of the reasons that the bays have been stable was because they were expecting to handle the weight of the trucks. So they spent a lot more time and energy making sure that that was stable. And over on that side, you don't have sort of like a sort of like weird metal fatigue or other sorts of major problems.  It's very scary. But yeah, but over on the other side, it's okay. It's okay. It could just be thickness of the concrete. Yeah, for sure. I haven't been by for a while and when I do drive by it just sort of looks like a dilapidated building. Yeah, peeking the window. Yeah. Give me a call. All right. You can go down and let you in. All right. Well, I think I can get in anyway. Okay. So I guess Mr. Stubb, until we have some numbers for the agreement with you as far as if you want to take and look at another use for it or another way to use that land but the general impression that I'm getting and correct me if I'm wrong, that probably putting something over there from the town is not really a way forward. Check one off of us. Yes. Other than this cold storage. Well, and if we need cold storage, I mean, that could also be scoped into any renovations. I mean, does Tim want to store sand over there? Does it make sense to store sand over there? I'm sure you're going to have another water right back. Well, the only thing I was thinking about is the storage for equipment. Something needs to get under cover. So, you know, it doesn't have to be anything too. You never can have too much storage. That's for sure. Because you always fill it up with junk. Right. But you know, I think there's two or three pieces of equipment that are outdoors now and they should be under cover. That would be the only thing I would think of for years. I think it's better there in the winter. You know, you don't really use it that much. Could be an impoundment area. That's an idea. If we're going to give it away, I mean, if the building is not going to get us any money to speak of, then I think salvaging the three-bed garage. Did you read the inspection? But as long as the load carrying walls are true, as far as cold storage, you don't need a whole lot. All you really need is this one plug-in to plug a motor in the warm-up so it'll start. So, if we used it, the police department used it for storage, for impound, would there need to be any sort of additional access control over the base? I mean, you'd have to have some way to secure the area. Do you still chain link inside? Well, chain link depends on the outside. Oh, over off on the side. Okay, okay. You don't have the impoundment outdoors. Right, you could write that, you know. That's at least one good use of the space. Sure. It would be almost as pretty as what we currently have. Well, we would dress it up before. We could put some flowers in the back. Thank you very much. Thank you. Berrytown Thunderchicken Snowville Roof? We met two weeks ago, I guess. Jim was in to talk about proposed route to get to the Irish Hill trails. I have talked to Chief Wolfe about it. He does not recommend it. He feels it's a safety issue because of the length of travel and the heavy traffic on Crosstown Road. It would require an ordinance change if the board decided to do that. And we had had the idea that you were going to be starting from Applebee's parking lot. Do we have that straight? I mean, it depends on, well, good news, bad news. I wear a lot of hats in this project from the ATV folks all the way over to the snow machine folks. So I gotta be sure I'm answering the right questions with the right hat on when we talk about that. That there's currently, from that side of the valley, you can work your way up with a snow machine and come into Applebee's. And if you're headed that way, you, as frequently happens, you have an exact opposite direction and wind your way out around back Robbins Byron and finally get hooked over there. Is it because 89 is that? Right, that's part of that. It's just that, unfortunately, over time, the Berlin clubs and volunteers just kind of petered out. It happens, it takes, all it takes is a couple of guys to get divorced and transferred in their work or something. And the next thing you know, there's people aren't showing up to meetings and then the trails go down. The Thunder chickens picked up a part of it and had been taking care of that. And they're looking to work with the Northfield clubs to get that reestablished so you can go from here that way over the hill into Northfield. And it's part of that since ATVs they're cropping up all over the place and there's, I also belong to a club in Northfield for that, well, since there's ATV trails out there already, maybe we could co-opt this together and share the cost and the maintenance and that and what it takes for law enforcement and stuff to keep things going. So you can currently get two Applebies or you can pull your trailer in and unload here and access the vast system out, actually literally right by the vast office out through the park. As far as ATVs, there's just the Irish Hill itself and whatever road access is already legal. But my understanding is that it's not, like you couldn't ride for Irish Hill to hear legally today to get into Applebies. It would take, in addition to whatever's on the books now currently. We had, from looking at the lay of the land, thought for ATV traffic, the best way to go would be to come around the back and down the side of this and out underneath the bridge out that way. And your traffic comes and goes, it's mostly evenings and weekends and usually it's posted at 10 miles an hour in particular if you're going past the police station or people tend to follow that to themselves as they come down through. And the sleds, we've got tentative permission to bring the trail out around, loop around out here down to the old pond road to get up to the road to get onto the bridge where we used to go before without accessing down through here. So essentially you kind of go on splitting out and coming together over here and then down and under the bridge. Mostly you got to get some way to get underneath the interstate or else there's no way to get over to the other side. I heard from some residents that were also concerned about the traffic and safety issues particularly on Riverfield Road and then whichever I could take whether it's Shedd Road or Patron Pike to Crosstown, they were not, it seems super supportive of the idea. Well, it seems to me for quite some time that there was a trail there and I never knew of any incidents or anything anyone had along the way there. But to be clear, we're not talking about a trail. We're talking about being on the road. You literally have to be on the edge of the road somewhere to get over to, well, not really a bridge, but the culvert is there. I was looking to get around. Before the Irish Hill trails, there was a little path that came out of the bush because I walked that and I wasn't sure if that's what you meant or if you actually meant like from where Black Street comes on in from that curve is where I'm most familiar with to the Irish Hill parking lot. Right, we would much prefer to be up in the woods but there's got to be a way to work around the private landowners and City of Montpellier. We had a tentative trail and what appears to be an old road on this side of Black Road, crossing the Brookfield Road and down below and literally comes up and points up to the trail but they're unwilling to let us use that. Not on the left side. Right, so that wouldn't be necessary to do that but they're unwilling to let us do that. And at this point we haven't secured permissions or even tentatively from the private landowners because somehow you got to get up in the woods far enough to get up around the Montpellier property that extends on the side of the Irish Hill trail to get around there. I imagine you have some sort of insurance but I'm still hesitant through the liability it subjects the town to.  We'll get thrown into that court case one way or the other and as I've been along that I'm trying to imagine because actually the town's been up there. It's a little bit past but they've been doing a little bit of culvert work. And remember you were saying when the snow's plowed over? Yeah, it generally fills that in and the sleds don't want to be in the tractor so they ride up on the bank as best they can and they go along and depending upon, sometimes it's just from the natural pulling of the snow the wind flattens it down and sometimes you take the groomer just drives up there with half, sets off the road and squashes that down so you have a single lane of traffic there for people to go on there. And it's never the first choice in building a trail anywhere to use the highway. The idea is to be off the road but there are unfortunately plenty of areas where they do and they seem to get along okay. Really the people that are disturbed the most by are the actual people riding the machines that they don't want to be on the road. It's just in order to get from point A to point B is sometimes you got to do that sort of stuff. And yes, both vast and vast do have liability insurance and that's kind of part of them as a management because you get people out of it you end up with machines on the road somewhere anyway whether it's legal or not, you run into that particularly in the summertime. It's a lot easier for people to go sneaking out through the woods somewhere and drop down here and go there and without some kind of a managed trail system they end up in God knows who's backyard. We're already, we haven't even done anything and we're getting people starting to complain to us like what we're going to do about it. We don't even have a, the problem is you don't have the trail not that there's a club. The problem is the club doesn't have a trail there so they don't have any jurisdiction to really do anything about putting up signage or trying to clear anything. So it seemed like a fine opportunity to take advantage of the services and everything that are here and connect it into that and to kind of help the neighborhood kind of keep this contained because these things are cropping up all over the place.  You can literally, if you wanted to jump on the machine and ride to Northfield tonight if you wanted to go out through there if you weren't concerned about whether it was legal or not. Why don't you go rob a store tonight too if I wasn't concerned about it? Right, no, the idea that there are, it's not like it's the wilderness that there are trails out there already. There in use it'd be more of trying to find some way to actually make it legal and managed. Right. And that's a part of, the link to where you can park the truck and we're buying gas and that sort of stuff is right here. So it's torn line. You want to come? Yeah. Well, if we're getting up a group. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I walked along and some places it just drops off. In some places it is very close and I think that road gets narrow. I'm pretty familiar with it. And I'm trying to imagine a car coming one way or another way or somebody running or biking or ATV in or snowmobile. And it puts quite a load on that road. It's not really designed for that. I mean, it may be a good way to get from point A to B in an off or an ATV type vehicle. But when I was walking along there, I was like, I'm not an ATV or I'm not a sledder. I'm not for them. I'm not against them. I really don't care. Just thinking holy smokes. I wouldn't be biting in the ditch. I'd be out here on the road. Well, certainly in the summer town, you're riding on the shoulder of the road. The road, by nature widens with the snow and the sleds are only four feet wide. So it's not like it's taken up a lot of space there. And you've slowed down, make your best along the side of the road and get up through there. And once again, it's not the preferred method but that's how you get under the interstate and across the water out here. And without that essentially the project is pretty much done. If there's no way to get to there. So basically you need permission to get over the outflow of the pond and under the throughway. Right. And then you have permissions from the landowners from there on in. The folks up through, it's all to have tentatively from the explorations we've had. And we were initially going to just cross what I think of as the old block road bridge and stay in the woods along the side and go down through there. But that's all, you know, city of Montpellier property, which they won't allow for us to use. So the next alternative was to use the side of the road and keep beating the bushes, trying to find a way to get up above and loop that around. As I remember years ago, that's what you did. You came down, we call it the stagecoach road. If you could go from here down to the rustic down in Norfield, you would come down somewhere along there. You'd take a left and you'd be and come along and somewhere back, I think this side of the cemetery or somewhere in there, you would come back down to the road and up and across and then back into the fields. And I grew up over on Stewart Road. So you would come across and have them along the road up over the interstate up above and then into the fields to get down to there. But you could also go from the four corners and come up and looped around up underneath there. And then you get a hold of VLTC about ordinances. I did, I gave you their model ordinances that they promoted. They have the model ordinance for the ATV and they also have four snowmobiles. And we certainly, it's not an issue to write the ordinance based on their model. And certainly if there are questions that I have general knowledge about most everything but into more specifics. But we do, the folks from the two organizations manage over 5,000 miles of active legal trails. And I'm sure if you wanted to speak to space that takes on the road or types and traffic volume and that sort of stuff, they'd be more than happy to tell you how it works in other places. Because certainly you do literally when you go over into New Hampshire, you're pulling, you literally type right down and bring them up there. Okay, all right. You literally come in and drive right through the middle of town to the gas station and the beats place and around like that, which. Well it had something like on 302 where you go across the railroad tracks to what used to be, it's closed now, that gas station. Used to be the old Duncan Donuts was there. Yeah, that's the machine trail goes right down across through there and they just this summer you can now use a section of Route 25 for ATVs to go from Grant's store down around the corner to Zion Hill connecting to, there's two pretty precise trail systems, one in Washington and one in Thompson. And they've now, the state has given them permission to use a, well it's gotta be quarter to half a mile maybe, I don't know if you're familiar with 25. Like if you're going to Bradford, out through the 302, that first town that's there from that store. Thompson. Yeah, I think it's West Thompson who used to, back in the day I used to play in the band and we used to play jobs at the town hall out there but you can go from the store gas station there down literally down the state highway now the day law for him to do that and then that's been working out. Well do we wanna hear from the chief or did you say, I have spoken with the chief and he did tell me that he was not in favor of a due to the length of travel on the roads heavy traffic. He felt it would be a safety issue. I certainly could ask him to come in and talk with you directly about it. I think it's gonna be hard to pass an ordinance when the chief police says that he's not in favor of it. I would, yeah. I'd like, I wish there were an easier way because I think that it's a nice addition and certainly we like people to trade in our businesses and things like that and all of that but it is a long length on a public road. And I have a lot of concerns about shed road here and Crosstown Road as well. Brookfield Road, I know the traffic isn't as much but still it's a country road and I just meeting several snow machines on a dark winter night, I don't know. Which could happen but it's unlikely. It's not like bags of wolves and things that they travel out there together and I don't know what the numbers of all you want good expect to see and that sort of stuff. It's usually during the daytime and it's usually on a weekend that you see, I mean, people don't go out at night after work and actually nighttime from a rider's standpoint is safer. You can see stuff coming and people can see you and that sort of stuff and that sort of thing. And certainly your club members are respectful for landowners and. Yeah, we essentially both that 5,000 miles where we don't own any of it. That's all the good graces of the people that do. So you kind of have to, you know, it's not, you know, you don't keep the trails open if you don't take care of people and do the right thing with sorts of things. If the board would like, I could contact, is it vast would have insurance information? Bastwood and the Bass office would chandelier for this project. They're both right here locally. And I will speak, I could also speak to the league about our insurance liability. And I would agree with you Pete, towns have the big pockets, right? So this, yeah, I don't, I don't know either. You're from them? You know, I'd be glad to bring that back and see what they say if you'd like me to do that. Sure. All right. And so that do be sure I'm reporting back to, you know, where we're at for that so far. I will be talking about, you're talking length of the highway, which I'm sure from your standpoint, it seems like a long ways for those of us who have to do it, it don't seem that far at all. So it's a matter of we talking about the entire section we're talking about or just on Braintree road, right down the Drunken Braintree road part of that or just this section here under the bridge? Well, I was thinking that if one section is not good, it kind of thwarts your plan, doesn't it? I mean, if you, we told Gennadier across town road, it doesn't. Right, without that, you can't get under the bridge. So the rest is a mute point. But if that seems to be a possibility, they can continue to explore the land and see if there's a way to avoid using any of the rest of it. But if it fits, which that's probably, if we're measuring distance, that's probably more of it on the backside of the pond than there is here. So it's a more matter or so that people got an idea what it is that they're, you know, whether they, which way to go, I guess. I would continue, if I were you, I would continue to explore the very most you can to get off the public road. I mean, obviously I understand you got to get under the highway somehow. Yeah, just to show the, show the distance to us the risk. Yeah. Well, it's better for everybody. I mean, that was originally fine. We thought we were in pretty good shape because some out there took quite a bit of time and talked to us like they were asking the, you know, it seemed like it was all going well, but apparently something, somebody got scared about water quality or something. I think you're driving trucks right over the water pass here. One harm's a slight. Not sure there was, but that's their property. So they get to choose what they want to do. But I'd be glad to get more information on the insurance aspect of it. Because I had not done that. And I can send you the contact information for the folks from both organizations. Would you please, that would be very helpful. Thank you for filling points on that sort of stuff. Okay. Okay, thank you. We're all set. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Okay. Ashley Squire and Robert Crouch working in the town right away. Come on up. We have an application to work in a town right away. It looks like you're replacing a driveway culvert. And they're at 58 Paul Avenue, which is off of Highland Avenue. Yeah, the culvert that's there is starting to cave in. I'm not sure it's worked in a while. Yep. It happens. So it's ineffective for what it's, you know, intended purpose was if you guys want to see a picture. We're really not working in the road. Right, the right-of-way is probably up there. It's 15 or 20 feet from the center of the road. And so. Yeah, the two pictures together kind of give you the, it's about four feet off the road. It's about, it's 24 feet long. What's the diameter? 12, 12 inches. Is it ledgy there? Is it ledgy? I don't really know. I mean, there's an existing culvert there, which is, you know, I think we will would like to maybe sink it in the ground a couple inches farther than it was. Because right now the top is exposed, which is probably the reason it rotted out. It's rusted. You're having someone come and do that for you. Take it out. So would this culvert be subject to the minimum diameter? That's what I'm thinking. Is it, is it pretty flat there? Either side of the culvert, is it pretty flat or does it pitch away? Well, it's pitching down a little bit towards, you know, the whole lot has a slight pitch to it. I'm just thinking that you might have to ditch up through there to get it down further. You know, get the accent of the culvert down a little bit. I think that's what it needs, I want you to be honest with you. It needs to go down a little deeper. And the ditch could be ditched out a little bit because it, once it gets past our driveway, it's a pretty good slope down to a culvert that goes across the road and then down the hill. I think we can make an increase of size that was already installed, that's a repair. Right now, what's there, I don't think it's working. So if it gets into the water, the ditch is probably running out on the road and eating the road away, you know, so. No, I guess that in the past that we passed an ordinance that there'd be a minimum diameter to the culvert. Well, a minimum diameter, which is what? 18. Wayne once, Wayne was saying- Was it a driveway? Well, one of the troubles is it, a lot of it just depends on how much water flows go, but if you put 18, I don't know, because of the way it's laid out, if you go 18 inches, it's going to make everybody's else's culvert on the street obsolete. And it's gonna be hard to get the minimum pack you need over the top of it if you do that. And the pitch. Right now, at 12 inches, it's exposed. And what I'm told is you need a good six inches over the top of it. Yeah, give it strength. Yeah, so if we do that, then it's gonna be quite a transition into the road. So all of that won't work. Would the board be amenable to approving this upon the highway superintendent going up there and taking a look at what they have? The culvert that's in there now, is it filled in at all or is it open? No, the ends of it. Oh, the ends are open. The ends are open. And you've had no troubles with it not being able to handle the water that's going through it. We don't know. We only just closed on the house two weeks ago when it's been dry, so. But there's a section that's caved in. Yeah. So, you know, without tear. Sounds like the one in my door, Gary. It doesn't sound good. No, it was one of the things we saw that clearly we figured we're gonna have to fix that. I would say have Tim Wilkins look at it. I think he can, but I also think that it's a grandfather culvert and I don't think he's repairing the culvert. He's not putting on a new one. And I think we can replace it with what he has. Right. We'll have to approve the permit for taking it to the time of night, so. It's really for what it is, it's an old grinder. You're gonna have a working culvert rather than one that's not working. I'll take it. Thank you. Thank you. Any further discussion? Hearing none, those in favor? Aye. Those opposed? Gary. So do we need to wait for the town? I will give this to Tom. Tom Badowski, he will issue you the permit tomorrow. Oh, great. We didn't make it contingent on a higher level. Okay. No digging, no digging. Right, right. We're not digging too much. You need to wait maybe 12 hours. So if you were gonna do it tonight, that might be a problem. No, Tom. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Good night. Okay, email from V-Trans regarding all your sixth meeting? That was just, I had given you in your packet the original email that Mahendra had sent me regarding the four options. And then this was his understanding, the email from the 15th was his understanding from the meeting that he attended on the six. And he believes, and I would agree with him, that you preferred option four, which was to do a 40 hour road closure while they do that work. And I think he would just like some confirmation from us, maybe via a letter that this option would work and so that they could put out their bid specs. That's pretty much what we agreed to. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, just take and confirm that for him. So I'll go ahead and write a letter saying that that option's fine with the board. And maybe just put in there that, and it was understood that airport road would be used as a detour. Okay. Just because those folks originally that wanted to make it the very monthly road, that just makes me nervous. Right. And if they come back into the picture and it's the very monthly road, you know. Okay. Okay. That's in the truck traffic. No, thanks. Bid opening for the police to pull. Police to come in door? I'm sorry to say I didn't get any bids. I had no interest in that police doors. I gave you a copy of the RFP. I don't know if I'm making something in it that I didn't tell them. These doors are just those two. They're the door that looks like that one that is the outdoor. And then there's a door about the same size on the other side of the building where the officers enter and exit. They are made out of this metal, like it's a steel. It's store-full and store-full glass. And they're rotted. I bet just less than $5,000. I would say I did get a price from Allen Lumber on the replacement parts and it was almost four. You should call like Glass Connection or even Portland Glass. What's that garage door company? They do entry doors too.  Bigelow. Yeah, bigelow. Bigelow, yeah. I think he does doors too. I think he does the operators. I don't think he does. I don't think he does. Should I go ahead and get three quotes? I'd get a couple. I mean, I don't know if you're gonna get more than a couple. No, probably not. Probably not. I was not quite sure what it would cost and my luck it would be $5,101 or something. So I'll go ahead and do that. Okay, Mirror Lake Road culvert. Okay, well I have to follow my sword. You may have noticed I didn't call you for a special meeting to talk about culverts and that is because when I was talking with John Grenier a couple weeks ago, I told him we needed that culvert as soon as possible because I was anxious to have it happen. So he went ahead and ordered it. He did tell me that he had verified prices and he felt that what he suggested was the very best option for the town. So I'm sorry that happened. I wish it hadn't, but that's what happened. Did you find out if they were gonna use a precast floor to that or if they don't pour in place? I believe they're going to pour in place and I've also thought I would ask John to come in and talk to you so he could answer those types of questions for you. He is putting the construction out to bid. And that's it. It's a four month slide and bolted down. I'm just thinking, think how fast would be if they just put a precast in there, just a floor. And I could be wrong, don't let it, you know. But how big is this code? So the precasts have to be dragged in on that truck. We'll bring it on a trail and set it with an excavator. And so as we enter into a part of that too, right? What's that? Pouring it underwater is going to be complicated. You're going to have to pump around that. That's why I was wondering if they did that. So I thought it would be good if I had John come in and explain what his recommendations are rather than have me try to do it because I'm not going to do it very well. So where are we in the time on this? Was it October?  Hello? Was it October you couldn't work in the water? Well, you can give variances for that. But if we are October 1st, you're out of water right now. OK. So September, August 20th. Well, the thing is that you need to precast the lab. All you got to do is look up there and run it out. And then go bolt it down and pull it into it and bury it on the day. Yeah. Maybe that close to heaven if you try to mine. Sure. It's six weeks. 2, 3, 17, 20. And you ordered it. OK. Not the way we did it. So by theory, we could take and be done with it? We're hoping to be done by the middle of October? Yeah, something along that line. Middle of the end of October. No, when I said that, it will be December. Oh, maybe it'll be frozen. Just put the slab on top of the ice and then it'll sink right into place. Put the ice belt so it'll just drop in place. Well, I wanted to explain to you what had happened. And I also would like to ask John to come in and talk to you. Sure. So that was all on that? Right. OK, letter received regarding town roads and cyclists. I had put this in your packet. I don't know. I haven't really spoken with Tim about that. This was one gentleman who had some concerns about our bicycling on our roads. I think his concerns certainly are valid. I don't know what I can do too much to help him, but we'll do our best. But I wanted you to be aware that we had got the letter regarding that. When you drive down toward Montpelier, there is a section where they did not put the full width of the road. Yes, I'm going to put you in the middle of that table again. No worries. Technology, I know what that's like. So that's all I wanted to mention on that one.  So 25 years ago, you could have had your bike on that road. If I were on TV. So gang. And the grinding and paving in the travel portion has become a commonplace with rumble strips and so on. It saves a lot of money to mill and pave within the travel way. And that's what's done down there. Sure, sure. And I don't know about narrowing the road so that we have a wider field. Oh, yeah. And can we even do that? Well, you're, in my opinion, moving backwards. Now shrinking the road for trucks and cars so you have a wider shoulder. Yeah, I mean, the next time we pave it, we just make sure that it goes as far enough out there. And we just stripe it so that there's a clear place where bikers can use it. We'll probably should have Tim go out and look at it and see just how bad the shoulders are. Yeah, I don't think that. I mean, paint her by north anyways. I don't think they're great. OK, and I lost my other half. I'm wondering if Brad, if we could put the traffic signals in for the next item. Do that. I didn't put that on when I was doing the agenda because I didn't have the paperwork. But we did speak with the vendor regarding the two items that we had talked about at the last meeting. And that was to put the traffic detection device in that would do the left turn detection. That was 23,000. Replace the cabinet and the electrical service, would just be something we would ask Green Mountain Power to do, which is 23,500. So that comes to, we had talked about 50,000, it's 46,500. So I'm just looking for the board to authorize the chairman to sign that acceptance. I'll move to approve the acceptance of the traffic signal upgrades for Fisher Road in the amount of 46,500 and have the board chair sign the proposal. Second. Any further discussion? All those in favor? Aye. He's opposed. Motion carries. We did have an incident today that the lights were flashing. They were not, you know, they were like, like they do in the middle of the night. And apparently they had been doing it for some time and nobody knew. I had someone from the hospital call me and asked me about it. And so I called, we called this vendor and the fellow from Waterbury came right over and fixed it. So it's nice having someone that can do that quickly for us. You know, if they need an extra light, we have one done in 302. It's going into a grocery store. They take that, put it right up there. Don't you think we need that fellow to make sure we know where to stop? The next item, Brad, I had the private road that I wanted to add on. And that was just, Tom asked me what the town's policy was on private roads. And they have a development happening up on Bartlett Road, which is going to have three lots. And when you get beyond two lots, you have to have a street name for the driveway, if you will, and have it numbered. We don't have a written policy for what happens on a private road, which probably will be a good idea in the future. But I wanted just to run this by you that they have suggested that it be named Thelma's Way. Tom has verified with 911 that it's not a problem, as far as sounding like something else. And also, the DRB has encouraged owners that this happens, that they should consider a maintenance agreement on a private road, and to make the road up to town standards. And where is this again? It's off of Bartlett Road, which is off of Junction Road. So I just wanted you to be aware that that's kind of what we suggested on that. And so we don't have to take any action on that, that was just information on the road? I don't believe you have any need to do anything on a private road. However, just if they, I mean, I think it would be behoove the people doing the development to make sure that the road is at State's back. That is what the DRB recommended as well. And also, if ever they came to you wanting to add as a town road, you're to ask them that anyway. Is there something we can have Tim kind of take a look at as the development? Sure. So that later on, we're not asking for borrowings? Yeah. Sure. We'll start on that one. Thank you. Yes, I am. You're the old man. Not on the private roads. I do have, I'd like to talk about the letter to the sewer customers. We had talked about that last week. I had given you a sample that we had come up with and you were not impressed. So we went back to the drawing board, rewrote this letter, and I'm sorry, I just got this back today. We sent it over to Sean Fielder over it, Vermont Rural Water Association. Tom felt that I had said things that I couldn't say. So I guess it was good. But Sean sent this back and a lot of it is and what I had kind of suggested so. But Sean has, you're welcome to read it. Basically it's just explaining to customers what the advantage to them would be by doing that. And so if you would, in the essence of time, I was hoping maybe you could sign the letter tonight and I could give it to Tom so we could mail it. The Rural Water Association, they know who's responded to the survey. They would send people that they haven't heard from, they would send them another form. We've explained that the town, we don't have access to anyone's information and we're just looking for a general average number. I think it was clear and explained why it was important. I'm glad that we're just sending it to the residential customers too. Like the bond, what I heard from several people about the bond though saying, well, why would we pay for this? This doesn't help us. And you have to explain to each and every one that you only pay for it here. Right. Yeah. And being connected saves you. Motion to sign. Motion to approve the letter as they. That's fine. Second. Need for the discussion? All those in favor? Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries. Okay. Approval of select board minutes for 723, 2018. I'm sorry, I put the 23rd, but it's really the 16th. I'm sorry. That's how I get one of these, one day. I know. That's my way of testing myself. I feel noobly. So did I. Oh, nice of you to come. I'll move to approve the minutes of July 16th as published. Here's second. Second. That's you. Any further discussion? Those in favor? Signified by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Those opposed? Abstaining. Motion carries. And so we're all caught up on our minutes, huh? Yeah. We have one set that is left. August 6th. The last meeting. Which I don't have. Yeah. Okay, town administrator report. And I have a short report, because I've discussed the other items I had with you. First item that I'd like to chat with you about is our next meeting is scheduled for Monday, September 3rd, which is Labor Day. I would like to move that meeting to Thursday, the 6th. If that fits with your schedule. Due to the room being used Tuesday and Wednesday. So if that's amenable with you, I'll post it for the 6th. Yep. Okay. Sorry, one more time. September 6th, instead of September 3rd. Which is a Thursday. The other item I have is I received from the league the paperwork to appoint a voting delegate for the annual meeting that will be at the Hilton and South Burlington on Wednesday, October 3rd. In the past, Tor went to those meetings and he was appointed as delegate. If any one of you would like to go, that would be great. Otherwise, I'd be happy to do it. I have the audit going on, so I'm not sure if I can do any more than just go for the business meeting, but. Is it an all day up here? No, it starts at 12.30. It runs probably about an hour and a half. That's not the same as that. There is an annual thing. There is an annual thing at the same time. This is what I'm talking about, just the business portion of the meeting. But yes, they have a two day event. I think it's the second and third, or makes a third in South Burlington. I can do it if nobody else wants to. That's free of my schedule. So if you would do a motion to that effect and then if I could have the chair the chairperson sign that, I will put Jeremy's name on there and send it back to the lead. What was the time for that again? 12.30, and I'll send you this information. So a motion, we need a motion to appoint Jeremy Hansen to go as a voting delegate to the LTC. Why don't I give you back? I thought you were baiting me. Any further discussion? All those in favor? Aye. Those opposed, motion carries. There may be some other backup, Jeremy, that I'll send to you when I have a. Sure. Ah, maybe I have a. Let me just give it to you. Super. Okay. They're gonna be voting on municipal policy. These are the proposals. Any else, Nana? Thank you, that's all I have. Round table peek. Just bring up, we haven't approved the licenses. No. I don't know what you want to see here. Approval of licenses, permits, vouchers, and applications. Proves to approve general fund accounts payable warrant number 9G04 with checks 18327 through 18394 in the amount of $83,921.50. Also general fund accounts payable warrant number CBNA01 in the amount of $16,934.03. Also payroll warrant number 19-04 for payroll from August 5th, 2018 through August 18th, 2018 in the amount of $42,542.28. Also July, 2018 journal entries. Also July, 2018 reconciled bank statements for the general fund sewer commission and the water division. Second. Any further discussion? All those in favor? Aye. Motion carries. Anything else, B? Wayne? No. Jeremy? I had a chance to go down to Dog River Brewery down Barry Muppilly Road. I just, because I never really knew that it was down there. It's a pretty cool spot. Any else, Dana? No, I have nothing else to say. And anything on? Exactly. Yeah. Motion to adjourn.


So, let us talk about elliptic curves over q. Actually, yesterday we did part of it. So, E y square equals q plus h rational numbers. So, we say prime p is good if p does not divide and we define the zeta function for the elliptic curve in the rational field as the product over p p good of simply 1 minus a p p to the power minus z plus p to power 1 minus 2. That times something else which is a product over bad prime. Just for the sake of completeness let me give you what that is the product over bad prime of 1 minus a p p to the power minus z. Very simple, but a p is not well defined for bad prime and actually it is not defined in the same way for bad primes. So, this a p is actually without going into too much details it is either minus 1 or 0 or plus 1 depending on what is the type of badness. So, the type of badness could be there is a repeated root which is 2 roots repeat all 3 roots repeat right. So, depending on what kind of badness is minus 1 0. So, this is the zeta function over for the elliptic curve over rational and like I said last time this is closely connected with the with the form of last theorem amongst other things of course. So, what is the connection? So, let us start with that connection it is depends on the type of badness. So, when that of course, I just have the enumerated 2 types 2 roots repeat and all 3 root repeat, but within that there are classification. So, form of last theorem is I guess all of you know what this is there is x to the n plus y to the n plus z to the n for n greater than equal to 2. So, how does the proof go for this? So, I will just provide a very brief proof sketch assume a to the n plus b to the n plus c to the n for number integers a b and c whose g c d is 1. So, they do not divide otherwise you can clear out denominator and simplify this and n greater than equal to 6 for n less than 6 we already know the solution. So, y n equals 3 4 and 5 one can prove using very simple method that there are no solutions. So, these are proved by Fermat himself I think Fermat proved it for n equals 3 proved it for n equals 3 and 4 5 are like generalization. So, that I think now consider this elliptic curve which is a very simple and it is defined using this solution one of this one solution to the form of this equation a b and c we just take n b and use make a to the n and b to the n or a to the n and minus b to the n b the 2 roots of the right hand now for this curve elliptic it is a discriminant discriminant is same as the 4 a q plus 27 b square and if you remember that that is non zero if and only if it has no repeated roots. So, an alternative definition of discriminant in terms of roots is. So, that is discriminant delta f it is product of root differences if any 2 roots repeat then product is 0 and discriminant is 0 and it is actually easy to show that for an elliptic curve the discriminant the definition I gave is equal to product of different roots. So, what is the product of different roots for this curve well one is 0 one root is 0 the other root is a to the n the third root is minus b to the n. So, the difference between a to these 2 roots is a to the n first 2 roots 0 minus a to the n 0 minus b to the n that is b to the n and a to the n minus or the third one is will be minus b to the n minus a to the n minus a to the n minus b to the n. So, this is equal to a to the n b to the n a to the n plus b to the n and because a b c is the solution of that form of the equation. So, a to the n plus b to the n equals c to the n. So, I can write it as a b c to the a b c is an integer. So, this is showing that the discriminant of this particular elliptic curve is n th power t f. So, what does it mean well it means many things, but one of the things that it means is the following theorem that if delta f this is a more general theorem which I am specializing for the case of this elliptic curve. If delta f is l th power integer then it has a point that is this theorem is conditional. Let us keep it as it is since it is a n th power of an integer. So, it has a point of order n. Point of order n is there is a group associated with the elliptic curve which is a group of rational point this is a rational elliptic curve and point of order l simply means a point such that if you add the point to itself n time you get 0 or infinity that identity and no smaller number of addition will give you infinity. So, that is precisely point of order. So, the power of discriminant in relates to the order of a particular point. And then there is a theorem another theorem that if the f is modular. So, if the curve is modular which I will define soon the curve is modular then it does not have a point of order greater than equal to 6. So, if we can prove that f is modular whatever that means then we are done because then we say that it cannot have a point of order greater than equal to 6. So, therefore, either all points have order less than equal to 5 or have infinite order and keep on adding the points will never get infinity. So, it has a point of cannot have a point of order greater than equal to 6 then the discriminant of f cannot be 6th or higher power of an integer by this theorem which means in turn that a to the n plus b to the n equals c to the n there is no such solution a, b, c cannot be 6th and we have proved that. So, that is the connection. So, this whole part of these things were known already, but this was in this connection was put together by Gerrard Frey late 80s I think he proved this. Now, I am hiding away certain details actually strictly speaking the statements I am making are not true, but approximately true. There are some small, small twists then one has to give even the discriminant definition changes by there you have to divide it by certain power of 2, but we will not get into that because I just mix the whole thing without adding anything to our understanding. So, the challenge at this point was can we prove f to be modular. So, what is what does it mean for a curve to be modular? So, let us go back to elliptic curves and let us go back to those zeta function. So, if you recall zeta e z over of q if you remember last time we wrote it as also as a n by n to the right with certain multiplicative properties of a n this came out of the product form of it which you expanded to get this form. So, this is one series we associate with an elliptic curve and like I said may be a couple of lectures ago there is another series we can associate with elliptic curve which is a natural power series. So, let us define that to be f e z q instead of rising z to the end I am going to write slightly differently this is the Fourier series form of the power series. We can derive it naturally from power series by whatever the variable in power series replace that variable by e to the 2 pi i x and then we have this Fourier series form. So, these two you can see them in this coefficients are really common to these two series and therefore, there is some relationship clearly between these. Now, we so far looked at the zeta function. So, let us focus on this alternative form the Fourier series form of this can you identify some interesting properties there is one very simple, but nice properties and the name Fourier series itself gives a hint to the periodicity this function f is periodic what is the period one is any period of this function certainly divides one because f of z plus 1 what is that n greater than equal to 1 a n e to the 2 pi i n z plus 1 which is n greater than equal to 1 a n e to z then e to the since n is integer e to the pi i n 1. So, this is a periodic function and that is a natural Fourier series. So, that is one very obvious property of this function there is another very interesting property which is see this function clearly is the way it is defined. Now, let us look at what should I say where is this function defined this function may or may not for various points on the complex plane this function may or may not be defined. Suppose, z is on the upper half of complex plane which means the real the imaginary part is positive. So, let z be alpha plus i beta and beta being greater than then what is f z a n e to the 2 pi i n alpha plus i beta. So, if you look at the absolute value of z f z this is less than equal to sum over n absolute value of a n actually a n is an integer. So, it does not matter it is a positive integer times well this goes away and this is again always positive this is less than equal to summation n greater than equal to 1 what is the upper bound on a n like order n.  So, this is essentially order p q and the a p square although I am not given the definition one can show is order p square. So, this would be order n a n would be order n divided by e to the 2 pi beta this clearly converges because the denominator grows far more rapidly. The same argument can be used to show that when you are in the lower half of complex plane then this diverges because then this would be positive and that will really shoot up no matter what the coefficient do to you and on the real line may or may not converge depending on how these coefficients are set up. So, that is the sort of the structure of the space where f is defined essentially upper half of complex plane. Now, comes an interesting transformation on the upper half of complex plane which is called the Mobius transformation. So, here plus is upper half of complex tau z goes to A B C D determinant of A B C D. So, this is a well these matrices 2 by 2 matrices whose determinant is one they form a group under multiplication and this is a very well known group called the symmetric linear group. So, essentially this SL 2 is operating on z. So, tau z is simply tau is simply SL 2 operating on the complex number in this form. The interesting thing is that this maps upper half of complex plane to upper half of complex plane tau z slightly simple a z plus b times c bar what do you do c bar z bar plus d just multiply the complex conjugate and what do you get here. Now, let me make a simplification here just to make life simple I just use this interior because this is what I am going to be interested in. So, A B C D are going to be in T s. So, no c bar no d bar. So, this comes as A C mod z squared plus plus A D z plus B C z bar. Now, if you look at the imaginary part of this is real this is real. So, this is this is a part that contributes the imaginary part then this take out the real part the imaginary part of z bar is negative of the imaginary part of this. So, you get A D minus B C times imaginary part of z divided by C z plus d whole square. Now, A D minus B C by the definition is 1. So, this is imaginary part of z divided by C. So, it is sign is exactly same as imaginary sign of z. So, that is where I am going to stop because I do not have time, but tomorrow I am going to finish this off. So, this tau is going it is a very interesting transformation it looks somewhat funny that you may mapping this in this fashion, but it is a the most general transformation that reserves for example, circles. If you take a circle and apply tau on it and look at the curve that you get it will be a circle. If you take line and apply tau on it what happens to a line a line also goes to circle. So, circles and lines together go to circles and lines. So, it is basically general like this if you take two lines with a certain angle and look at the corresponding curves under tau and the point where they intersect you look at the corresponding point where the corresponding tau curves intersect look at the angle of intersection there that we preserved. And this is this how we can actually characterize all the class of entire all transformation we preserved this. So, it is a very interesting subclass of transformation which preserve a lot of properties. And these are going to be useful for us also because the property that we want from this function f is essentially invariance under tau. So, f of z or f of tau z we would want to be roughly equal to f of z not completely, but roughly.


Earlier this year civil rights organizations like the NAACP and Equality Florida issued travel advisories to Americans considering a trip to Florida in the wake of anti-black and anti-LGBTQ plus policies that have been enacted by the state's Republican Party recently. Now it's gotten so bad that some people who live in Florida have decided to leave the state permanently. For example, the McKee family explained to CNN that they're leaving because they feel like they have no choice because they have a trans daughter who they want to protect. We're absolutely moving because of the political climate and the laws in Florida. We didn't want to move. When the Florida Board of Medicine started meeting and we realized that they were going to ban gender-affirming care for our kids, that we might need to leave because that is life-saving essential medicine and treatment for our daughter. And that family is not alone because the UCLA Williams Institute spoke to 106 parents specifically about the state's don't-say-gay law and subsequent expansion and this is what they found. In response to that law, quote, 40% of the sample said they would like to move out of Florida, 20% very much so, and 19% somewhat. An additional 15% felt mixed about moving with 45% not wishing to move. Almost 11% said that they were very likely to move in the next two years with an additional 6% saying that this was somewhat likely. Next to leaving included jobs, extended family, and the hassle of moving. See, and that's the thing right there. Even if you want to move, it is very difficult to do so, especially if you don't have the resources. But even if you have money, leaving behind your friends and your family and having to find a new job, that's just something that most people don't want to have to do unless they feel like they absolutely have to. But regardless, 11% of parents said that they were very likely to move within the next two years specifically because of the state's anti-queer policies. Now, that is not an insignificant number, right? And this is a small sample size, but still, 11%. That's huge. And even though support for that law is largely partisan, even a small number of Republicans are saying that they're considering leaving the state as well. The Washington Examiner reports, Abby Goldberg, the study's author, shared with the Washington Examiner that 53% of Democratic respondents had indicated that they had considered leaving the state, along with 40% of independents and 15% of Republicans. In contrast, 80% of Republicans said they have not considered leaving the state, along with 33% of Democrats and 40% of independents. And to be clear, the Washington Examiner is a right wing rag. But if they're reporting these numbers and they're not trying to hide it, that goes to show you how bad the situation is in Florida, right? It doesn't make any member of the GOP look good. And any sane political party would take that as a sign that their policies have been a colossal failure, but not the GOP, because they're not a sane party. Because in response to this finding, the chair of the Florida Republican Party, Christian Ziegler, is essentially telling these families who are fleeing good riddance. So the Washington Examiner continues, over 60% of voters support the actual language and the law, including 55% of Democrats. Christian Ziegler, the chairman of the Florida Republican Party, told the Washington Examiner, with that said, if a Democrat voter is passionate and perverted enough to support the sexualization of kids during school and grades as earliest kindergarten, then I would agree that Florida is probably not the best fit for them. And I just want to remind you again, this is the chairman of the Florida State Republican Party. And what he says that these parents support the sexualization of kids, it's just kids finding out that creep people exist, that their teacher might be trans or gay. That's it.  That's that's not how it works, first of all. But that's not happening, right? And he's calling these families who are having to flee or wanting to flee perverted and accusing them of supporting the sexualization of children when he knows that that's not what they support. But there's a reason why so-called anti-Grumah Republicans always resort to hyperbole and smears and never engage with the real criticisms. It's because their arguments only sound compelling if you lie to get people to support them and use strongman arguments against their opponents. But in response to this Williams Institute study making them look bad from a policy standpoint, he tried to spin this and went on the offensive against Democrats sharing an interview that he did with CBS Miami, where he says that it's actually, quote, sane voters who are fleeing the Democratic Party. Oh, OK. And they're the ones hurting because they're, quote, vile support for indoctrination, sexualization and mutilation of our children. I don't know about you, but that sounds like cope to me. You know, if these families want to flee, let them flee. But really, who's being fleered from is the Democratic Party. Voters are fleeing from them, see? Now, he also went on to argue in that clip that the Democratic Party is in shambles because they don't support the same draconian and fascistic policies that the Republican Party supports. And he's referring specifically to the state Democratic Party. But let's watch their problem is their radical agenda that they're trying to sell to Floridians that Floridians aren't just rejecting. They are fleeing from and you were seeing this mass exodus from the Democrat Party where people are registering as sometimes as independence. And then eventually they become Republicans or they're jumping right over to the Republican side because this is not the Democrat Party of their grandparents of JFK. They don't even recognize it. A lot of Democrats don't even recognize their party today with just how radical it has become. Listen, I will never defend the Florida State Democratic Party because they are terrible, they're terrible for different reasons, but they just don't care about winning, it seems. Having said that, though, I mean, he's very obviously deflecting. I feel like everyone can see that. Imagine if the shoe were on the other foot. Imagine if a large percentage of residents in Florida were or wanted to flee the state as a direct result of the Democratic Party's policies. And to make matters worse, the leader of the state Democratic Party came out and said, well, good riddance, let them leave their perverts. Can you imagine what the GOP would say? They would endlessly blast those Democrats and rightfully so. But because the Republicans are the fascists who are driving Floridians away, their only go-to method is to deflect since their position is draconian and indefensible. But ironically, as the state GOP chair bids good riddance to residents, the state itself and specific travel boards in this state are trying to advertise themselves as a safe place for LGBTQ plus people so they can keep breaking in that sweet tourist cash. Pink News explains a 60 second audio clip from Visit Orlando was broadcasted on iHeart radio channels, including Pride Radio, reassuring listeners that the city is ready to welcome you just as you are. The possibilities are endless. And there are amazing LGBTQ plus events for you to experience where everyone is welcome. The ad continues. NBC News journalist Ben Collins spotted the advertisements while listening to a podcast and wrote in a Thursday, August 10th tweet that the city was down so bad, it's unbelievable. A similar event by the Tourism Association from June titled Orlando was full of pride features a few of the city's LGBTQ plus residents speaking about why it is a safe place for queer people. One person who speaks in the video ad says the way our city is set up, there are so many pockets of multicultural groups. The Florida city relies heavily on tourism due to its many theme parks, including Disney World and Universal Studios. Despite this, a report from Spectrum News found that tourism had decreased by 3.5% in the 12 months from April 2022 to April 2023. Yikes. Now, there is a couple of caveats here. To be fair, specifically trying to attract queer tourists isn't necessarily a new phenomenon since cities have been trying to market to queer people as inclusive since before the travel advisories were put in place. And furthermore, you can't necessarily say that correlation equals causation. You know, you can't prove definitively that this small decrease in tourism is the direct result of these travel advisories or queer people on their ally's choosing to not visit, but it's not unreasonable to deduce that it has something to do with it, right, given the current political climate. But nonetheless, we'll just have to wait and see if this trend continues because the state has reported high numbers in early 2023. And 2022 was a record year for tourism in Florida. But that came after the peak of the pandemic where they experienced record lows, but I mean, the expansion of the don't say gay law and adult gender affirming care ban and bathroom bills didn't get codified until after that number was released, where they said they're doing great. So I mean, I don't know, we'll have to wait and see, right? We don't know for sure how this will affect tourism, but I hope it does. I hope it hurts them, right?  So by traveling there, you are supporting their bigotry with your money, right? This is the bigotry capital of the country. And their laws don't just affect Floridians. These laws are being exported to other states.  So they're leading the way in this crusade against LGBTQ plus people. So if you can, don't go there. I understand if you have family there and whatnot.  But I understand that that's easier said than done because, again, moving from your home is very, very difficult. But if you can choose to not travel there, then don't. Because this state doesn't deserve your money.