TranscriptSelect Board Meeting ~ April 9, 2024

up yeah you guys have your mic on yeah I put them all on they should be Jerry just to see I told you you're back to Jerry and not a good seat so I'm so happy I we'll we'll alternate meetings okay see they have their back they have their backs to the camera but we have our backs to Jared so I feel bad for anyone watching this is my bad side yeah all set all right uh good evening

everybody um call the uh Durham select board meeting uh to order here we have a quorum this evening uh why we all stand for pledge of flag the United States of America to the rep for it stands one nation God indivisible liberty and justice for

welcome Deb Oliver to the uh select board congratulations and um welcome aboard um let's see we have any amendments to the agenda this evening nothing Jerry that nothing okay we have no public I'd like to address something at the public session where I think it's more appropriate for me to do it okay that's okay feel free Josh you got three minutes you got three minutes I got to get my time around here the brief um so I know I've had a conversation with some of you about the uh the Bible verse that was read at the town meeting and I just wanted to express my uh extreme disappointment

um that Bible verse to me was extremely anti-semitic I felt um almost singled out because my feeling and again this is my feeling uh was that it was in response to a conversation that was had with Jessica about a um a topic that we raised at our last meeting about not having um the prayer be very religious which is of course not something that I raised and not something that I addressed um and I

was uh to say disappointed is an understatement uh I I was and I continue to be extremely upset about what happened and what was said and I continue to read that verse uh and try to find any relevance to the town meeting or anything that was going on and I can't find any and so um I don't need an explanation for why it was read why it was chosen but I will tell you that um I believe it was um there was

intent behind it and uh that it was anti-semitic inappropriate in any place but especially at a town meeting at this at a school uh and so I just wanted to share that thank you Josh okay anybody else I don't I don't want to make a public comment I just wanted to have like help Debbie with our a process point when we can is that appropriate to do now um we can we were gonna go through some things in a little while but okay that's fine I'll wait well what I what I was just going to say is that what what we typically do is that when someone comes and makes a public comment um we don't it's not a back and forth and so Joe would address that if there was a question that needed to be addressed or there's followup that needs to happen just so that I know it's really hard especially for me too when someone comes to make a public comment not to to engage but it just opens a can of worms and and this board has collectively said

that public Comon is for a statement to be made and not for a back back and forth exchange because we've said like in the past that sometimes questions seem kind of innocuous and not a big deal then if you set the precedent of someone says last week you answered so- and so's question and now you're not answering my question so it's kind of like the discretion of the chair as to what comments we give a lot of times it's thank you for your feedback you know that sort of stuff thank you okay y

all right uh we have no old business we have plenty of new business though um so first of all election of the select board chair and vice chair do we have any nominations I would like to make a nomination to elect um Joe Roy as our chair this year do I have a second a second second for for conversation okay a second for de second

okay any conversation I I accept the nomination I don't know if I have to so la I I just want to say that last year um I I didn't want to vote on a chair at our first meeting um because everybody wasn't here Joe being one of them um I know that Joe has a lot of experience as chair in other um boards and committees um and I

wanted to nominate Joe last year I I recognized that um Joe Tom and Josh were our senior board members besides Rich who made it clear that he did not want to be chair um and so having gone through this year you know I still feel like that's where um I'd like the leadership of this board to be and so that's why I'm making that nomination any other

appreciate the oppos and I'll obstain okay Vice I goad yeah I nominate Josh second conversation I think Josh would do a good job as Vice chair and brings a good legal mind and level head to the position assuming he accepts sure

sure all in favor all right no opposed all right I will hand this over to Mr Roy for the rest of the meeting all righty you want this chair sure they're all equal chairs but we can no no you got to have the head righty well thank you all for the nomination in the election I feel honored and uh do my best to serve wisely over the next year if I get out of line just let me know I have some experience in the chair positions and other things so I'm looking forward to this opportunity um so for next thing on our agenda is the welcoming of new members and I think Joe already welcomed do you go by Debbie or Deb or normally Deb Deb okay Deb and it

says here that we have some handouts for you you have those Sher yeah so I have handes for all of you oh good I was like I want this some introductory sort of stuff on you know the test best 10 best ways to be a elected official and there's some other stuff behind it it kind of explains the town manager and what his role is versus what your all role is because there's some there's some lines there but we work really we work really well together we have to um but there's some clear distinctions on you know those rules so I just handle we don't have to go over them now you can just go over them later and just kind of absorb them um Deb what we have to do with you is get you set up with a an account for MMA Jessica will help with that yep how that will work is she'll set you up with a uh email and password

you'll have to go into the MMA site and just re just do your password make it rewi m that's it's a really good site to visit there's a lot of good information on there um one of the things that you'll have to do is you'll have to take the uh FAA training which is the uh freedom of access you got 120 days to kind of get that training they they have webinars which work um I don't have I didn't see any dates when I looked today real briefly um another really good training

that you should try to do if you can is the elected officials Workshop y um that's a really good one in the meantime you can download their elected officials book it's the it's it's 500 and something pages so you can't really share it through email because it's too big but that's a good that's a good manual to have a shortcut right on your desktop has a lot of really good information walks you through all things municipal government okay good um that that thank you I would I would strongly encourage you to look at that um other

than that uh welcome um if you have any questions you can call me and of course you've got your other board members too that can help with any questions that that you may have and uh look very much forward to to working with you he do you know if we're supposed the The Other Board are we supposed to do the forward training annually yeah it's a good idea absolutely okay yeah so MMA will just

usually sends out emails when there's an offering of that correct I just went through foa training at work today too so did yeah uh but they have a training schedule that that's on there and you like have a choice and usually I I usually do a webinar because it's fairly easy um but it's good to have that I'll also say I can't remember the name of the person but last year when I was elected someone from GP Cog had recently come to one of our meetings do you remember her name any yeah and she has had kind of offered out like just wanted to get to know people who were recently elected and I think she met with people individually for lunch or something like that might be good to get connected with her I think Jerry do you have her contact email y yeah um because she just kind of touches bases with everyone and lets folks know what GP coock has available for the sorts of training opportunities and kind of what

they do and she explains it better than any of us would probably explain it so yep I just want to say that I'm really happy to be part of the board yeah and even though I was uncontested so I said tough race but um I felt good that um

people still voted for me because you know some people will not vote for some they don't know um but I do bring I've never been in um Community um Public Service um on a board like this own government I've been on some Community boards and stuff so um yeah this would actually be a really great time I think since it's all being live stream for you to kind of just introduce yourself to us us as a board and as the town too so if you want to give us any little background that you want to share for those who are watching sure okay uh my name is Debbie Oliver I have been a resident of Durham since 2002 um I moved into a new housing development at that time so I was really happy that that Community got approved through the board I think I don't I think there's maybe 26 houses in our neighborhood um my husband Chris is retired from BW I work at BW I've been there for 39 years did I say that right

30 years 35 years they go so quickly 35 years in February and I worked with Joe um in the engineering um office I am a process manager of the engineering division which is over a thousand people so my role is to make sure our engineering team has what they need when they need it and that it's accurate in regard to policies and process work so it's been a good long career so far and I've enjoyed it I have some community service where I was uh um girl scout leader for the entire time my two daughters were growing up that was a great experience I have been a big sister in the big brothers and big sisters program and I was the BW representative On The Board of Trustees at the main our time Museum that also was a very good experience I learned a lot more about ship building than I did at work um I have two daughters um both are business owners and um I have a son who has passed away um 10 years ago and um we've

had I've hosted foreign exchange students so I um feel that I have a giving spirit um and I care about the community so I'm happy to be here part of the group we're lucky to have you so you also did volunteer for committees that this board put together oh yes yes I did I I was on the hiring committee for the town manager and I'm looking at some of the other committees thinking I might fill out an application to be part of I have never written any grants but I feel that I could add value to that process when we start focusing in on some where those might be so thank you well thanks Deb really appreciate that input and feedback about your s um discussion about town meeting uh you know Joe chaired it and Jerry ran it so if you if you want to lead this portion of the meeting I think that'd be that' be good just your feedback I I mean again I thought I thought everybody did a great job leading up to town me and

the staff and everything did a fabulous job I thought this how me went extremely well it was well received um I'll attribute that to all the information we put out I mean the website was with all that information there was really it was it was hard to have a question having all that information in front of you so if anyone took the time to read it then they didn't really have that many questions um you know the only thing I did note certainly trash is going to be our big subject this year yeah was the one thing I wrote down in my notes um you know that was the only thing and I was surprised the solar got more attention than the uh land use ordinance um uh during town meeting that was interesting um in regards or than housing affordable housing that was that was my but no everybody did a great job I thought the board did a great job answering all the questions yeah every everybody it was team effort it worked

out really well the what you said about things being online before the meeting uh former selectboard member came up to me and he said I was just joking I said you missed this side of the table and he goes no I actually like this side better but I haven't watched a single meeting but I went on the website and I was amazed you all had everything I possibly wanted on there and I was able to get up to speed before the meeting and really he you know commended us for having all that stuff up there and being so transparent with it so I think that went a long way into helping people you know have their questions answered before they had to ask them so I thought it went very well I and sitting in the audience for I was the one sitting in the audience but The Upfront overview that you did Joe I think really grounded everybody and your presentation style I think worked with the group I think you did a great job that and I really feel

like that really helped I would encourage us to do that in the future and at the same level that 20,000 level like I said right at the top setting the context and I thought that was helpful and uh I felt like I it we all seem really well prepared yes and cohesive and I think that especially on some of the questions about budgeting stuff I think that the selectboard really instilled confidence in the community in their in their numbers and whatnot and so I think that that was why it went so smoothly so I thought we were going to be done by like within like 3 hours we were almost you know that was pretty pretty slick just you have something that I was just going to say that I hope I I thought that providing the information on the website was a great idea and I hope that we take this as a lesson to do that for you know the the solid waste issue I know I we had previously talked about um law enforcement pres and and presence

and I know I've I was going to ask for us to set up a uh a workshop on that issue that was raised um and so that's another topic I think that really um you know I think that went over well it was helpful for everybody um and so I hope we continue to do that in the future it's really nice to find that like what we think is going to work which is putting things online ended up working you know that's reassuring um I'd just like to Echo Debbie's comment that I thought that um the presentation that Joe made at the beginning really set the tone um and that I thought you did a really great job so thank you um I I was very hap you

know Solid Waste has kind of been my baby um and so I was very happy to see that there was engagement around that issue and I I was happy to hear that there were people that were there that were interested in the committee um and I think that the public education piece is going to be really intrical in terms of where that goes and I think that that was very apparent at the meeting um I was surprised that there wasn't more conversation around the level or the yeah level funding of the capital Improvement um and the trajectory of that and and that surprised me that there wasn't more conversation around that um but again maybe it's because that information was on the website and people could just see exactly what it was that we were proposing um and I would like to address now the concern that I had raised prior to um town meeting about the prayer um

it had was brought to my attention last year at at not the meeting that we just had but the meeting prior um by residents that felt like that wasn't appropriate at that meeting um and I had raised that concern a few times after town meeting and leading into it um just that I felt like residents were bringing that up as a concern and that that really needed to be more of a welcome and a community um you know kind of like a we're all here for the same purpose to do well by each other and by the town um and kind of send that message versus a religious message um and I I was equally disappointed that that that went the way that it went um the last thing I want is for anyone in the town to feel uncomfortable at this at the onset of a meeting like that because of um what we're putting out or asking to be put out there but I do really see the value in having like a call to like community at the beginning to be like

hey we're going to talk about things and you might disagree with the person next to you but they're literally your neighbors so if you disagree that doesn't mean you got to be mean or anything like that and I I I almost felt like there was a little tongue and cheek comment in the the presentation about the the fact that a call for Community was asked for rather than a prayer and I I just felt it was a little there's some elements that were a little un inappropriate and I could have heard the same have made some folks and and I'm not sure that there was any conversation that was had prior I I don't know and and so I I'm I'm not going to share the same um uh feeling that maybe that there was intent there because I have no idea what took place prior to that I I don't know and I don't want to make assumptions I just know that I had raised the concern multiple times ahead of town meeting and I don't feel like

that concern was heard and so I just really want to make sure that that is absolutely addressed and and that does not happen again can I um haven't we been starting all Town meetings for a long time with prayer is it just the style of um I mean because it was I as

far as I can remember Ron Parker would always do the yes prayer and it was always a prayer I think so maybe it's just the style of Pastor St that's uh throwing people a little bit um let's face it we start a lot of sporting events with you know that there's a lot around the country that starts in prayer I think oh my head I think one thing that would be really important moving forward is to be more inclusive to the entire Community to go with like a non- denominational approach so even if there's some sort of um you know religious component to it a personal I I I don't know if we need a religious component to it but something that isn't as leveled um as what the last comment was you know citing a verse that's clearly calling out people of a different Faith as doing something hypocritical I think is is inappropriate for that when it's supposed to be unity and there's other members in our community who I know of a different

Faith who felt the same as our as Josh had spoken at during the public comment so um I I do think part of it is style I don't remember um Pastor Ron ever reading a verse from the Bible um and and aside from that I feel like um there is a separation of church and state and and to me I I'm a faithful person it just seems like an inappropriate place to me to to go in that direction especially when it's not repres representative of everybody in the community um and and one of the things that this board has really brought up multiple times that has absolutely nothing to do with prayer or what we're talking about here but the the comment that you made about um haven't we always done it that way we've always done things certain ways um and

now that we know better we want to do better and so I I don't want to get stuck in this place of we continue to do things I I think there is a place to do things out of ritual and and out of like historic nature um but I think that when it's no longer serving the entire Community it's time to take a step back and look at that and and when we know better do better and I feel like we can do better than we did so you I'll address it um I have no

problem if you want to start the town meeting with the prayer right they start the legislative sessions in Augusta in Washington DC and probably every other Capital with a prayer no issue with that whatsoever what I take issue with is reading uh the Bible verse that was read from a a gospel that had for centuries

has been considered anti-semitic and um you're not going to convince me otherwise I'll tell you that there are apologists for it that come up with their reasons I completely disagree and I think it was inappropriate and I thought it had I was going say very little but it had nothing to do with the town meeting it had nothing to do with the situation going on in town with with the storm the lack of power it had nothing to do with any of that MH it was inappropriate and there is no way a soul on this Earth can convince me otherwise I don't care if you want to start with a prayer it does not bother me it doesn't bother me if it's Catholic Buddhist Hindu whatever doesn't bother me one bit what bothers me is what was read and there is no excuse for that and that's what I'm upset about and I I agree with Josh and and I mean if you Josh but yeah it's it's constitutional to do it um but it's supposed to be basically non-sectarian

you know no no religion is Advanced or disparaged uh and residents aren't coers to participate so it needs to be right down the middle and and and so you can still do it but it it isn't supposed to you know be right left or anywhere on the on the fringes of that I think you have a really good point there Joe and Josh everyone because it's just when when it's mentioned you know this the statement was and unlike those who are unlike the Hypocrites who stand in the synagogue it's just that feels very inappropriate um and like Josh said

have being familiar with the entirety of the book that was being read from there are plenty of verses that are more about building community and I think that that would be and like that's where I think what you're getting to Joe is the it's absolutely fine I mean it's all starts in every legislative session but making sure that moving forward it's following what you just read there about not disparaging or advancing any one individual group um because there are other people who have been reached out and been like that that was bothered me and I just we don't want want that to be another issue you know so Heather I just think as my personal closing remark about this is that um I think it would be appropriate in the future to have whatever is going to be read um go through a process of being have someone else having their eyes on it for approval before if we are going to stay with the prayer

scenario um I'm I'm not adverse to that I just really would like to have someone approve whatever is happening whatever is going to be said before we get there I I will I will caution though on that is that it still falls under First Amendment too so you got to watch out because they have ruled on that that um the governmental body can't act as supervisor or sensors either on the religious speech so again you got to almost trust who it is that's going to go up there and say the prayer and let it ride and not us get in the middle of it I was going to say that like I do worry about the challenge there is if someone says I was asked to do this and then I was told by the elected officials I'm not allowed to say this and that that becomes kind of like then it's us picking and choosing what can be said and so I think that is something we need to think about over the next year leading up to the next town meeting because the last

thing I want is I think any of us want is for folks to feel uncomfortable right right at the beginning of a meeting you know they shouldn't feel uncomfortable like that but anyway from anyone or any any projection from from this board you know so I think that's a really good really good point and I appreciate you folks bringing it up um so we'll just note to to think about

this a little bit more uh Heather anything else on the yes quickly the last thing I would like to say about town meeting is I I know that we've thanked the town staff a few times but we're discussing how town meeting went and I think um Jessica really you know and not just Jessica she does but she really really goes out of her way um and you know Jerry Chief Calvin and everybody that's part of the Town staff I I just have to strongly reiterate again how well oiled their machine is and what a great job that they're doing it's a colossal effort during a normal week uh not and I can't like really commend the town and Jerry and everybody during this cuz it was like so touch and go and power out and roads out and then not knowing if the school was going to have power and even to the staff over there just it was you know I felt like it went off without a hitch if when you were sitting from the start of the

meeting to the end of the meeting you never would have known that half the town was out of power for the previous 48 hours I thought it was a really great job to everyone at the Town Jerry for sure and same with you Jessica and also the election kely yeah yes and the election too with a with a space heater in shop lights and all that sort of stuff it's pretty impressive um anything else about town meeting comments questions any sort of thing like that from anybody I think having a finance expert there was really good and he is ability to answer questions and figure out when he should be you know responding to the community I I mean I was telling Heather to me

this town meeting was a noticeable difference than any other town meeting all of the information was so well put together your overview all of the board's well articulated responses to some you know concerns of the community have the the plan having the long-term plan and the back and forth that we went on on the whether we should take money from the fund to help offset the taxes and stuff everyone has an opinion that's all good but it was really well done so I really appreciated it yeah I think Mark did really good job and I think it was really wise think you Jerry for you to say to have him there at the beginning um and then talk about his issues up front because I think that especially when members of the community are wondering what authorities lie where and Mark having that experience and being able to say this is what you can do this is what you can't do I think that that just that third party

reassurance I think brings in a lot of uh trust building a lot of like weight behind the fact that it's you know a municipal accountant who's able to answer some of these questions and like he he doesn't care whether we're putting money into this or money into that but he's there to say this is the implication this is not like so I I thought that's really good feedback so how do we keep a hold of Mark forever that's the question all right um nothing else for a town meeting um so appointments which is

have to uh approve some members here for one for the planning board one for the appeals board as an alternate and then the Conservation Commission Now process question here and I I'll need some of you to remind me we can approve these without going into executive session if there's no no issue correct and if folks are comfortable and have reviewed I'm comfortable with approving them as a slate or do they have to be approved individually the Slate is fine okay so if everyone wants to take like a couple seconds here and just review um their application material um I've met two of the three people just in passing I will say this seems like everyone on the planning board lives on stack P Road I think everybody lives on St same with the budget committee but I think at least two of these names are are new to

um boards volunteering for boards or if not all three which is kind of cool to see people not just having to rotate from seat to seat so I would like to make a motion to appoint you are you going to correct me Oh I thought I was doing it wrong I saw you look up I'd like to make he's just paying attention I'd like to make a motion to appoint do I read their names yes um Mark dur as a full voting member to the planning board Darren Baker as an alternate maker member um to the appeals board and Jeffrey tindel as a member of the Conservation Commission second all right it's been there's been a motion and a second any discussion all right seeing none all in favor all opposed perfect three new volunteers for the community do we need to sign one master yeah I think so one the pack can those around now

our meetings we get I'm not sure if you got this or not um because it typically goes out the Thursday before but we get the agenda and then all the supporting documents that we need ahead of the meeting so that we um can be prepared when we come in yep um and I've lost my train of thought of where I was going to go with that oh so there are things that we're going to sign tonight that if you didn't get that email you may not have seen already and it's fine if you want tostain and not sign something that you haven't reviewed yet

for 2024 at the top here we have uh select board procedures so de the previous iteration of the board worked together to work on a um set of procedures for just operating the meeting we generally operate with Robert's Rules of Order but we realized we didn't have anything that had to do with like you know removing people from the board if they're absent I remember what the first day I right after I got elected I told rich I wasn't going to make the first meeting cuz I was on vacation he was like you could be in jail and we couldn't remove you from the board Joe so he's like you can never show up and there's nothing we can do and not that I expect people to we expect people to be absent but it's one of those things like when things are running smoothly that's a better time to create mutually set upon a set of rules and objectives versus when something becomes problematic and so Joe led the charge on it with Jerry

pulling together some stuff from some other communities and we went through and made a lot of edits mostly the edits were just to to move towards like consistency throughout it so instead of saying select men it says select board because there was times where I said select board select men Board of Selectmen the board we kind of folded all that stuff together went through through and removed like select men from everything to put board member to make it more inclusive and neutral um because while we are happy to have people elected Heather's like I'm not really a select man I'm a select person you know so and we all felt the same way that we wanted to address those sorts of things so I think it looks really good I think we have the final interation pretty much wrapped up but I don't know if we want to vote on it without having you get the chance to take a look at it first so um Joe I think you have the final cop with

the I think I sent it to the group you sent it to the group so you got the final one on what that that the edited version the that we went through yeah um I I did have one I did want us to just revisit the um I had some other thoughts on the committee um um participation and I think we probably want to have another conversation about that we don't have to have that tonight but um that might be we just might want to just look at that again I had some other thoughts I haven't jotted everything down yet but I think what would be great is if we get the copy of it to you and so you could review it I would like to prioritize us adopting that within the next like two meetings um with some additional feedback so if there's some more feedback for folks if you see if you take a look at it feel free to put tracked edits for feedback as well um I just think it kind of gets us all on the same page when we have it

adopted and it kind of gives us a good framework to to operate with so um does that seem oh go ahead Heather I'm just pulling up my calendar so we're not going to talk about it tonight um and our next meeting is hold on I'm almost

there the 23rd so if we can put it on the agenda to have a conversation at the 23rd to talk about what Joe's things are if Debbie has anything if any of us have new stuff and then our next meeting would be Tuesday May 7th and I I would like to adopt it at that uh our next meeting would be the 14th oh second sorry this this one of the weird months yes sorry I I mean I'm comfortable with that timeline of having on the 14th us adopting it just to give you chance to input on it it's going to I think that moving forward it would be I know with other governing bodies they more or less adopt their rules every new iteration um and so everyone who's participating is getting the chance to input so I think that if that H we get you get it to you next meeting it can be workshopped out a little bit more with any sort of questions and everything finalized version created and then adopted at the beginning of uh um the meeting in May

14th does that work for folks let me just put rules and then so next meeting will be the 23rd and that will be Workshop I wouldn't say workshopped but more or less just some comments on it you car about a little bit of time for

or anything like that do okay cool awesome any other comments on procedures before we talk about meetings and workshops and things like that this is like something that I am really passionate about and so I maybe this comes with like our goal planning workshop but this is an agenda item for me e either when we do our workshop for goals or whatever but I think that this is this is a big topic for me and like the procedures or yeah yeah I agree um was that comment yeah I guess it was com it was I'm just saying that when when we decide to schedule our first Workshop to talk about goals this is an item that I would want on there yeah I think this will be done before our goals Workshop the the acceptance of the procedures oh you're oh you're talking about our document that we've already walked oh oh yeah I'm talking about just the board Pro the procedure for running the meeting additional procedures could be a different thing

okay so I guess we'll move into for expectations for uh 2024 meetings versus workshops or or goals I think it might be useful for us all to just kind of give a couple highlevel goals that we would want to see accomplished this year and then we can kind of set up a time like not going into really workshopping things right now but just like everyone give their wish list of what are what do we think are important things to accomplish this year and then we can figure out from there the best way to tackle them so in a workshop format or right now I'm saying right now we just list our high level goals are things that we might want to talk about in the coming year to just we all understand where we're all kind of sitting a little bit and then we could figure out a date for a workshop at a later date just to like because like Josh you mentioned like exploring the the public safety option safety I to

me that's something there's you know a high cost to that so that's something that I would like to start having those conversations U because there are um multiple moving Parts you know how many how many people how many hours a week uh that sort of thing where you could do sort of uh you could have sort of special assignments in in Durham where they're here a few hours a week and so um what I like you know we had we had very I don't want to call it limited a short presentation from Chief McGee um

but I've received from the sheriff's department you know the breakdown of all the call for different things uh when I was having a conversation with the chief Deputy um he and the sheriff well he on the sheriff's behalf expressed a willingness to come in and talk to us the two of them would um and and we sort of you know I ask questions about the cost so to me it's it's a high cost and next to um Solid Waste I think is is one of the things that comes up a lot and um I think we all everyone who knows Chief McGee uh trust him and and he raised that issue and to me that's a a telling sign if he's raising that issue because I don't think he would unless it were important I was very surprised by his public comment when he said that there were a thousand incidences that involved police response in Durham I would have thought it was a fraction of that number and when I started thinking about the

fact that Chief trip talks about us having about 500 calls that means that there's 500 additional incidents outside of Med medal on fire that are involved no there's more that more than that yeah yeah what I'm saying is they only respond to a portion of the fire yeah exactly they're only respond like the accidents and stuff and I think it would also be valuable to get Chief trips input on this too because there are definitely instances where they're responding to accidents that involve you know drivers under the influence and if they're the only ones there and people are becoming combative and now you have a volunteer fire department who dealing with a combative person and I think it'd be really it's a important topic for sure um so I I heard you say Public Safety as a big big big one and solid

waste is something else you mentioned and I know we have that committee but I I I think we need to um based on the feedback at at the town meeting uh you know I don't want to say stay on top of them but keep them in and and that way we're keeping the public informed of what they're working on and so this would be something if they could produce a documents for us to put on the website I think that would be helpful uh so people know what we're doing and you know if people want to look at things they can do on their own without the town going to it that might yeah I think that people at the the fact that it was the most the longest discussion item that we had out of everything shows that it's something that people are thinking a lot about and so I think that at least getting the Allway Committee in to talk to us and then figuring out maybe setting up some some dates and deliverables and stuff

like that would be helpful Heather um I don't this this is one of those things where I think we'll talk about it at the workshop but um having and and maybe this is something that is also piggybacked with what your committee conversation is about our bylaws um but having a liais on to the

certain committees that comes back to report to the board and so if that were the case I'd be more than happy to to take on the solid waste liaison role if we go that route um one of the things around solid leas because that's a big one for me the way law enforcement is a big one for is that in the interim I I think and the solid waste will obviously have a huge part of that but I really think that we have to like try to tackle a composting part of this situation before we get to the end of the five years and so that's a bigger conversation not to be had now but I think it's a really good point though because multiple people said at town meeting the point about wet Foods being heavy and then someone else after town meeting I was talking with them and they mentioned you know like you could create networks there I'm sure there's people in the community who would like to receive more compost I can

accommodate a lot of a compost especially when I have my pigs right versus people who need to get rid of their their waste and so if maybe there's opportunity for if there becomes the farm committee and the conservation committee to create a network where maybe some people are like I'll adopt three households food waste or something like that I don't know I'm just I think that there's some Creative Solutions there because regardless of what we do with solid waste decreased tonnage is never going to be a bad problem for the community um so sorry that's okay do are

you done with your list is that okay yeah can we go to the okay so we don't have to talk about them I'm just telling you my bullets the fee schedule MH um I'm I feel like the Union Church committee was so successful um and I think that Sol waste is going to end up being the same way I'd really love to see us work on a resiliency committee um there's a lot of talk around the most recent storm and how there are a lot of residents that are really struggling and I know that there's people in the community that want to help but I think that they need some leadership around how to make that happen um I know that Roberta is interested and so I I think that's one of my big ones they could be volunteer firefighters the agriculture committee I think has kind of tried to start something on their own own and so I'd like to pull that in and that is part of the comp plan so I'd like to have that addressed and then a policy

inventory um and surveying the department heads and potentially Town staff as to what they need to the tools that they may need in terms of policies to be able to better do their jobs okay I'll come over to you after de but Joe do you have anything that is kind of on your to-do list is nothing that sticks out at me right now if I I come up with anything I will I will it along without putting words in your mouth I I am thinking about what you had said about committee assignments and what Heather had said and it almost seems in some ways there might be worth us having a discussion about you know whether select board members as individuals want to like be a Lea on to a committee even if they're in an advisory role and not necessarily a voting role because I think that sometimes it's just helpful for if there's a board member at a meeting they might not say the select board is going to do X Y and Z but they might say if

you're fleshing out a proposal like this the board's probably going to want to know a b and c and I feel like so much of Municipal stuff at this level happens with volunteers at night and that might meet once a month and so the more efficiencies we can get there you know the better so if there's a board member who's saying we're going to need more in they're going to we're going to need more info to decide on this make sure you work on that I think that there's some some value there so I don't know if that duv Tails exactly into what you were thinking about committees but I think that it could get to the essence of it

your mind that is I think we need to take a look at the last slide that you had of your slide deck at the meeting because it to me represented things the board was planning on addressing in the future so there might be some goals we can pull from those

calendar transition from a calendar F fiscal budget year on there solid waste was there um and then town office was the other big thing that you know Jerry's got GP Cog coming in um to do an assessment that would then kick us off to I would guess to go put something to put some committee together to look at what the recommendations are and how to move forward with something more permanent yeah things I think about um are are the residents of our town are we are we taking advantage of every benefit that's available able to us as residents and as a town completely so like the Homestead Act you know how what's our participation level in the Homestead Act and why are not people filling out the form if they could you know lower their tax base and could we have goals set around those types of things um I was studying up a little bit on the solid waste and um there was there's some grants out there I don't know if they

were fed I think they were state grance or something but you know if we can put things that are available in front of these committees to have them prepare now to meet the deadline of a grant that's due next march or something yeah but just really making sure that we as a community are taking advantage of everything we can there's probably a lot of things sitting at the table that we're unaware of I think that's a really good point because one example that comes to my mind in my work life I attended a workshop on like it's like called project canopy or something like that and there was some funding a couple years ago available for municipalities to establish some work around parks and trees and I was there to learn so I could help educate people in my professional life and the thing that stuck out to me is the the communities that ended up getting the funding were people who were ready for these

opportunities so when the funding when the process came out and they said here's the process you have 90 days to apply people already have those shovel ready boom we can apply and get it whereas some of the smaller communities were like oh we're not even going to pull people together in time to get that we kind of got a wave as that you know boat of money floats by and there's a million things and we have a million things to do so we're not going to be able to capture everything but you know being a little bit more ready I think one thing like the Conservation Commission did a really good job of like going after some of the funding that they just you know secured recently because they were following through with the comprehensive plan and following through with some of the other planning things they're going for the funding or whatever but I think that that's a really good really good point yeah and I

also think um the importance of communication like we saw it at the meeting that how you guys worked that and and how beneficial it was but um I love the idea about the the meetings with the town manager although I've never attended one but I think it's good and I've heard good things about it but I don't understand exactly what our constraints are with um ourselves or other you know posting different information things and I were talking about the uh tax assessment and I was like the first thing I thought of is man my taxes are going to go up and then she was kind of giving me some details and I went on YouTube and did it show showed a video which was really insightful and I thought man if everyone in the town UND took the eight minutes to watch the video it was probably less than that but you know just a mission to make sure that people are educated on a topic possibly just you know uh creating

a drive for them to look things up on their own there's a lot of self-learners out there and you know the more you understand a topic the easier it is to you know add input and you know provide some good Insight so something about the communication of what we do yeah I think um I think what you're getting is a really good point because during our town meeting where we had you know a really well-educated former board member come up and speak very intelligently on a topic it really I I could see the body language in the room really shifted because there was someone who had done their homework and read all the stuff online and said hey I mean look at the debt schedule compared to this and all of a sudden there's a lot of buying and then everyone feels really good because we vote and we feel like we all came together and accomplished something and I think that those sorts of communications are really important for

trust building and cohesiveness so I think also to residents are probably scared It's been a very long time since we did a reval speaking specifically about the reval it's scary thing right now is you see the housing market changing and people are like does that mean my because I I've seen comments on like we shouldn't do this because then my house is going to be worth half a million dollars and my taxes are going to go up and I think that it's just education around that is really important so I ear marked it I'll share it maybe Jerry will yeah we should have you guys look at that when I F came across I I was really a complete 180 after I it a little bit better yeah cool Jerry do you have anything that you think's a top but issue I know we're talking about a lot of work right here and Jerry's like oh boy there a lot more on my plate um no in in relationship to the list that you have here there's only one thing that I would

add I think the town needs a charter when I went to apply for this job I went to look for the town Charter to see see what I was getting myself into I had no idea there was nothing I didn't know how many select well I did cuz I came here a couple years ago and did a presentation but I didn't know what you had for committees I I knew nothing and I think it's important that eventually the town develop a charter so people know how it runs yeah so that's something that I think I had I hadn't thought about that but now that you mentioned it's kind of like a gives everyone that mutually agreed upon set of like rules and OB every other committee I'm on or whatever I lead it's like we have some sort of Charter and it's like okay we're getting lost in the weard is this really addressing what our Charter is telling us you know no we're we're kind of going on a tangent you know and it's like I think that many people in the community

would be appreciative because they're like I know what this group of people is supposed to be doing this is not it or this is it you know it is essentially the playbook for yeah yeah so other other than that uh no but I do have some stuff that we that I want to talk about that's sort of in relationship to this but we'll get there maybe during my my manager report cool well hearing

all those like my goals aren't much different either I think a new one that just moved up on my list is Town Charter that sounds like an important one um I'm I'm with you Josh I think at least exploring the public safety option is important cuz I I hear a lot of people talking about how there's no there's people going 110 miles hour down 90 125 and 136 in Route 9 and then I'm sure that there's we could get feedback from the other department heads about what they would think on that um you know I think that getting the ball rolling on the the reval is important to me CU we know that that could take till like what 2027 or something like that and so if there's something that's already going to take a long time and we just the town just sent the message we want these funds there for it starting that soon and at the same time pairing that with an education Outreach component so people know this

isn't going to happen tomorrow but here's what's going to happen over the next few years I think that's a important thing um one thing I was going to put on here is filling committ so I think I'm not we might want to just do a quick census on and this could tie into the charter too like what we have for committees and whether they're filled or not because towards the end of the process last year and early this year we realized like there's some vacancies on the budget committee and like we had told the budget we posted it a couple times and we asked people to apply you can't force people but maybe if there's a way we can re-evaluate how we're trying to recruit people to vacancies on on committees I don't I don't know the answer it just might be something to think about um I like to think that you know it goes into news blast it goes on the town's Facebook page it's spoken about at this meeting

if no one volunteers you can't just make someone a member of the budget committee but maybe there's something we're missing out on you know at our church we have a what we call a nomination committee and it's a it's a group that looks at the um gaps in committees and

stuff and then we nominate of course you'll nominate from your church members so it's a little bit easier but you know when you're looking at what type of skill sets required for a certain committee there's a lot of skill set in term I'm having to realize even just looking at these three things here but you know we I think a Reach Out is important and it helps someone reaches out so maybe we can think of something that of a nominations period where we examine together as a board what are all you know I I do that with other committee other organiz a as well my only concern is I don't want folks to think like the select board's picking so and so and saying hey come join this committee or so and I'm not saying that that's what you're suggesting but I just want to make sure we're trying to recruit as many people and like you said when we're talking about like oh we need to like the Conservation Commission half

the people are environmental scientists or Consultants or have experience in that background or have a network and then I feel like someone on the solid waste committee has ties to having worked in the solid waste department or whatever ever so feel like we have a huge skill set here that we can just try to tap into so cool um so in terms of meetings and workshops we kind of just went through some ideas I think that one issue that we can run into though is if we list seven priority 17 priorities none of them are really a priority because not everything can be a priority so I think it might be valuable for us to have a separate Workshop where we just talk about these goals in the next you know within the next two months and then come up with a plan one thing I think might be helpful and this we can come after we adopt rules um for operations is it might be helpful to have like one board member be the lead on something not

making any decisions but like tracking down the information if they are wanting to spend extra time outside of this to say you know I dove in a little bit on the solid waste issue I dove in a little bit on this issue if that fits within our rules and objectives I think that it's something that we could consider you know to just kind of like give people a little bit more ability to do a little bit more outside work to bring it to the board for final approval and stuff like that you know I'd like to schedule a workshop okay would you do you want to schedule a workshop for a existing meeting or a separate Workshop I think we would need Jerry's input on whether or not our next meeting has a full agenda um and that's on the 23rd yeah it's not it's not full on the 23rd so we were we were going to meet with the bids of the Ral but they both couldn't be here on that day yeah so now that's moved to the

14th if people are comfortable with that I would be comfortable with that I unfortunately have a conference in Massachusetts on the 23rd okay and if I needed to leave Mass come up here after the day and then go back down if there's no other way to avoid that I can do that um but if I can avoid that that'd be fine we don't need everyone to be at the workshop but I think it would be a good idea to have most of us at all of us at the I think we should all be there um personally I like the idea of a separate I I know everyone has a busy schedule but I do like the idea of a separate Workshop just because this is really kind of getting into more of like a stream of Consciousness not thought process type thing and then kind of pull some things out of that and but if folks really don't want to add in another day totally understandable as well so I guess I just want to get your alls input and I know that extra things also put

time e put more work on you and the staff so I don't want to take advantage of that either so and one other thing that we that we have to consider and think about is at least last year we got together with the chairs of all the Committees to look at to get ready for next year's t meeting and ordinances and what direction we want to go and so I met with George this morning and uh we were thinking us

having a workshop on May 7th to kind of get to bring those folks in to have a discussion with you folks on okay you know what are you thinking we need to work on what do you folks think from a policy standpoint from from ordinances whether it's yeah more in the more in the solar you know cell phone top wherever and George has some ideas so we need to we need to do that which is a little bit different than what you've listed here because they've got their work to do and then we've got our work to do and this is kind of more of what we're working on and not them so we got to kind of yeah part of this too that I'm thinking is I really want to hear what they are seeing as important things for their committees um and then we can help kind of be the voice that prioritizes that cuz it's like like last year we all had that meeting after they came and we were like we think the solar ordinance is more important to address than the cell

tower ordinance because that's a more pertinent thing and so I think that if we are getting feedback from then then analyzing what we have here and seeing what fits with who we can kind of be like all right here's the priorities that we want you all to focus the boards not the staff but the boards to focus on in conjunction with what they are prioritizing and figuring out that sort of stuff so do you think that that should be a joint thing or a separate thing well I'll leave that up to you on your your time but if what George and I didn't know May 7th isn't a normal select board meeting for you folks so oh that's extra I see right do you want to so the question is do you want to have that meeting with the chairs of the Committees and both boards during a regular select board meeting or do you want to have one outside of your regular meeting okay and if it's outside side than May 7th would what do Josh you look

like you got something on I would just say the the May 7th date would probably I I feel like this is a conversation that could be done in five minutes or five hours um so I would yeah so I would prefer to do it in a separate meeting as much as yeah and B based off what you're saying right there I think in what you're saying Jerry in my mind what could come out of the May 7th meeting is the discussions and then we could be voting on the direction we're going to take the following select board meeting which is that next week which is the the 14th what are people's thoughts on if we did the workshop on the 7th they came and then they leave and we continue with

our list I don't want to end their workshop if they're got good steam going and they're working on some things we could tentatively plan that because like Josh is saying it could be a five minute conversation or well I mean I think it's going to be more than 5 minutes but right they could come and give us their whatever and then what they bring we could it potentially becomes part of what our priorities are if we were able to do and if and if it turns out that it's a thing where it's like lasting for too long then we just table our part

yeah for another time but if it ends up being a very short conversation and we're already all here it to me it seems appropriate to just keep going after after that on our stuff yep being a workshop what's the rules on the televis televis and live feed and open to the public so it's open to the public you don't have to stream it if you don't want to you can if you want to I mean yeah it's really more of um just

making sure you leave it open to the public CU my thought process is if we were all getting together we could I don't want to over complicate this but if starts is they are talking it's like a breakout room they're talking amongst ourselves we're talking amongst ourselves they come in and they're saying hey this is what we think we're now communicating with them we're not making any decisions but ranking things and then on the 14th is where we kind of adopt our policies and then make those sorts of Po like priority decisions is that something folks think might work yes can I just say one thing about this I I to me personally it's important that we do stream it because because there had was feedback this year that town staff was

directing that's a good point boards and not the other way around and so if we're having a conversation around what this board is going to be directing those boards and town staff to do I want that to be readily available to people to be able to refer to okay that's that's my personal opinion about that yeah that's a really good point so what do folks think about a joint work May 7th with the department heads and it can be an open format for department heads and committee chairs yeah department heads and committee chairs Us and Them sitting down kind of having a joint Workshop us hearing from them what their goals and objectives are us working shop within ourselves and coming out of that with some some clear delineated priorities rather than just a list of 15 things saying you know like Josh has said like I'm thinking the public safety thing is going to have to be moved up the the the the trash thing

is probably going to have to be moved up the the policies and the charter those might those might be the three big ones you know and then the next smaller ones if we're saying some of these ordinances that's delegated that's work that can be delegated we can kind of figure that out so are folks okay with the May 7th meeting to do that do you think they're going to be all right with us kind of crashing their party there no they no no

that's we want he's saying he want that's what and George we want the board in those chairs of those commissions and other boards to get together to decide how the direction you want to go and what do you want to prepare for for 20 the town meeting because it takes and there are some things that are that are like yeah yeah there's things that are already on the list so just yeah so that works for me if I mean I want to I think we I would accept a motion for us to have a joint workshop with them on the 7th if someone wants to make that motion so Y and do I have a second all right all in favor all right perfect um we'll can set the time for 6:30 it seems to work um like for folks all right at the fire station it is cool and we'll start with them so that if they want to leave and then we can continue on with our own business if there's time to do that okay do we need any certain like flip charts or dor or

we've got the board here but it might be a good idea to have a flip chart too if eel maybe eel y before the meeting get together on like how's that going to be all facilitated like who's going to lead it like from your side and I think George and John talic can lead it from their side but you're going to have other chairs of other commissions that are GNA want to speak to so it's yeah yeah I think that we can chat but I was thinking I don't want to command the space from them but if we facilitate it with asking them to you know kind of be an agenda yeah we can come up with an agenda and that's going to dictate you know getting feedback from each board individually telling us what they are their priorities we can be workshopping it and then getting their feedback actively during it and just run it like a meeting people raise their hands we get called on everyone gets a chance to speak you know those sorts of things um I think

that that could be really effective so yeah the only other thing is I know that at one of the meetings um it would be nice if we could have it set up like a round table okay I that my personal opinion I think instead of having unless you want to have it come I I like how the budget committee had their tables set up if that's a possibility in here yeah sure I don't see why it I don't even know where those tables came from I think just looking over I think we want to use shape we can do that yeah and then no one's sitting with their back to

that so anything else here on meetings workshops before we move to the manager report so someone Jerry you'll notify all the committee members tomorrow I mean because it's coming right up and they may 7 yeah May ready George I'll

talk to George and George will reach out to all of on then all right Cherry manager report okay well thanks um so let me get let me get one announcement right out of the way so there's a going to be a municipal election recount okay so just should I just read this the way it so to to you folks in the Durham residents there will be a recount of the rsu5 board of directors race which was part of the municipal election held on April 5th 2024 po at the Eureka Community Center 606 Hollowell Road in Durham Maine the recount will be held at the Durham town office 6:30 Hollowell Road in Durham Maine on Tuesday April 16th at 2 p.m the public is welcome

however space is limited respectfully our clerk Jessica Lambert okay okay thank you for that update so there's that um so we are in the process right now of getting together an RFP for the codification so we're on that George is working on that so we'll hopefully get that out we probably put it out for two weeks uh we'll put it on our website we'll put it on the MMA website and uh once we' get those I'll share them with you on what what came back and we can choose a consultant to do that for us um so as I said we were hoping on the 2 third to get the biders who bid on the re-evaluation project can't make it so Donna reached out they can be here on the 14th where we'll have both of them we have to figure out um how we're going to do that I assume that you'll all have

the proposals that you can look at ahead of time and we'll bring one consultant at a time for you to ask questions and um we'll we'll develop some questions Donna and I that are pretty pertinent to the whole process you know we don't want to get down into the nitty-gritty but you know what do you do when someone's not going to allow you in their house you know that type cuz that that's going to happen could you when you when you develop those questions could you circulate them to the board just so have it on their mind absolutely so that's that's right now scheduled for May 14th um and we decided on the May 7th meeting so that's good um so other than that I

just want to talk about the snowstorm a little bit and how awesome that our crew is for stepping up and and getting it done um there was a lot um and I want to thank Joe for bringing over his heater to the Eureka Center thanks Joe because we didn't have any power of course we f up the generator at the Eureka Center it doesn't work the one at the Town Office doesn't work so you'll probably hear from me me throughout the year that we might need to look at our buildings and how they operate and I think we can do better I think if we because it's disappointing when you don't have any power you're run an election you're using the Eureka Center you're go in there you got no power you got no lights when when we have a generator just I don't know how old it is but we need you know and we what we what we've been doing is paying for emergency services to try to get it to run that's that that's what's going so I just throw

that out to you that I think you know as we move down the road you know in years that we really got to look at our infrastructure here in town and do a little bit better have a little bit more can I ask yeah goad just on this did we

recently in the last couple years put any money towards it was here it was just here is I I will say um I've embarrassed for us yeah uh and that's shameful and um we should find a way to fix that because um there's no excuse for either one of those buildings to have a generated it doesn't work and it's beyond kind of Joe to bring his own equipment over but that's unacceptable because it's that gets broken and now Joe's out of his own heater and it just yeah I'm with you Josh that it bothered me a little bit but that's the kind of people that live in Durham that will do that which is awesome but we should do better for them for the people yeah yeah yeah no no that's fine you can go Joe I'm going to say the I think the Eureka Center I think part of the problem was is that we probably kicked the can down the road on that um you know because we were we were you know had a I'll say a

plan but at least idea that we were going to upgrade that building in general and then you would have done the generator at the same time so I I think that yeah we're not going to move forward with other things and generators probably maybe at the top of the list at this point to get that um yeah so that that's kind of on the Eureka Center side of it and uh Town Hall definitely probably needs one if we want you know we want staff during these storms um you know and maybe a two for one special to before you jump in Heather one thing I was going to say is I think that what you're getting out is at least what I've noticed is when there's outages and big storms like that it's like people begin to turn to the town to be like can I come charge this can I do this what I and then when we have the outages too it's almost like oh what do I do now and I I feel like it's a better look for us when it's like if

there's only three buildings with lights on in town it's this one the town office and the Eureka and people are welcome you know um Public Works Public Works sorry sorry this kind of comes back to like the resiliency plan and maybe that that's a task that the um if we do form that committee I hope we do um could look at but my question was either for Joe from CIP committee or from Jerry I remember the town hall generator

being before us at some point and then not before us and I can't remember that was last year or if that was this year and it didn't get ranked high enough or if last year it went off and we did the fire station only instead I can't I do remember there being a plan that included the town office generator and then for whatever reason it went away scratch memory of the B yeah it was it was last year it was on the CIP list and it just it just didn't make the cut it didn't make the cut but then it didn't show back up but that's what my question is is that it was on the list and then it did and it got CAU but then it didn't show back up again but we're still in that same boat right cuz I think uh Chief trip has put in a grant for the town hall one and those take time those take they can take up to a year or two to get it would but I don't know if that we've gotten anything for I didn't realize that Eureka Center one didn't

work okay so we just put $50,000 into the eure center fund so maybe that's a conversation to have about that I think that's what Joe is just and then if you if it's possible to find out the status of the grant for the town office one and then maybe we can come up with an action plan based on what that timeline looks like right yeah Jerry is there possibility with I don't want to keep interrupting you during your report here but is there a possibility if the town office is being used as like the command center for the Emergency Response during these storm events does that work into a public safety type Grant opportunity or are they delineated I'm not really sure I know when we have those now those emergency type happens right because of course there generat words too so this is usually where we become um but I I'm not sure I'd have to ask the chief is still in I I don't know yeah if you know I'm assuming if if if

it's part of a policy or an ordinance that the town office is the command center then I'm sure there's grants out there that yeah help us with that you know nobody had power I mean folks wanted stuff posted and that sort of thing but Kim had to go to home to a hunt spot to post something didn't she and I don't know what it was with this storm but I could barely get service most of the time too right I had I talked to a few residents that were not happy that they didn't realize they're trash we not going to get picked up but Kim did post it on the website it was there but but if you lost your power early there would have been no way you for you to access that unless unless you have that but that's a tough one yeah when you have outages like that this isn't inappropriate time I'll hold it okay so um let's see other than that good I just that's that's all we got that's all I have I I I I will say

that I was really extremely happy with the way town meeting went go extremely happy because you I it's my second town meeting I haven't haven't really been here that long but I've heard a lot of you know cuz the staff gets asked a lot of questions and it's like well we're asking you to prepare you for town meeting well town meeting went exactly the way it's supposed to go when you folks answering those questions because it shows you shows the the residence that you're in tune with what's going on you did a tremendous job I mean you really did yeah the manager there to help but you all did great yeah I was

just really happy to see all you working looking at one another taking on questions you know answering why the reserves the way they were the cash in out you presentation you taking ownership of using public funds and it was just just very good so I applaud the board you you guys are really awesome you I also didn't think B Schneider a great job to he did he did so Kudos that needs to be a lifetime appointment for him I've already got him book for next year so can we book two years out he did a great job yeah so very good that that concludes my my rep just to uh second what you just said there about the town meeting is one thing I'm realizing more and more is I feel like especially if one contentious thinks it seems like members of the community like hearing the answer from their elected official as opposed to an employee or an appointed person it seems like that's like you know avoiding some

of the issues that we've seen at other boards and I think that you know at our at the time meeting it was like someone ask a question I'd see Joe kind of look down and make eye contact with who is the good person to answer it and then you know people came up like man the board really seemed like they knew what they were talking about it's like we you know thank you thank you for that feedback you know so perfect um board member report so Deb last year Joe instituted this as kind of an an opportunity each meeting so this is kind of a space where board each we kind of go around each board member can um you know maybe report something that they're hearing from the community that doesn't necessarily need to be addressed right now but once to be brought to the board in attention or say if there's something that they want put on the agenda of a future meeting or kind of just you know give some feedback to the entire board that

they feel like needs to be shared in a in a public okay public venue so we just kind of go around the room with that during these sorts of reports so let you kick it off Josh if you have anything no if you have anything um I think uh documenting what our strategy would be for the next storm and that you know we wouldn't there was there was some hoopla online about canceling canceling the voting or cancel in the meeting I think if the expectations are clear up front about what our policy is on that type of thing I think it go a long way yeah I think it's not policy it's state law yeah so oh yeah yeah well even yeah makes it easier did did respond I think Heather maybe you responded to something there but yeah yeah yeah and I think that I think that sometimes the value there is if it's just in writing and someone's like well that's that's how it is you know if they want it to be different they can either that us that

paragraph of the procedure we will follow the St yeah and if they don't like it they can call their anything I'm going to use this as a so I would like to piggyback what you said but we don't use this as an opportunity to start discussion about something so that's where this would become a future agenda item so that I could discuss what you just said as a as to bring that up got um and now I forgot what I was going to say but that this is me trying to help you like learn how we how we do things Joe you got anything the only the only thing I have is back to the resiliency thing we Jerry you and I went to

a session with GP with um I don't know if it was GP Cog they're putting a resiliency group together at the higher level I thought they mentioned wasn't that the thing we went to maybe no it wasn't the safety thing it was something that happened last fall it had to do with all of the Just

all the it had to do with storms and how they become more severe and how they're looking at it from a county regional look just something to think about when you're just I thought I just I don't remember which meeting it was at I I can look back and see but just something we can when we talk about it I'll just forget I'd mention it there because it was one the meetings we that we went to at one point well Rober is kind of heading up along with Mike what's his last name friendly friendly yeah uh there is a resiliency partnership initiative going on that Durham is in Partnership withay that too which is which they're looking at some of these um stuff they just came in I can't remember what the grants for uh that's a I think they're going for open space yeah that that's exactly right that's open space Grant but that that's kind of a resiliency partnership right there that we could probably bigy back

from yeah or something it might be worth having them come to one of our next meetings to just talk about what they what they where they're at with resiliency and then the board can collectively as a group decide if we need to what what steps we need to take to address that more and leveraging Regional and and other communities as well I'll go back and look at that because I know the Conservation Commission is kind of the key committee that's working with that yeah can I just clarify when I say resiliency I I just want to make sure that I'm being clear about what I'm saying I I want our like resiliency in terms of like natural disasters and stuff like that but what I'm what maybe resiliency isn't the right word to talk about what it is that I'm I'm trying to pursue it it's more like there are elderly members of our community that don't have gener ators there are people that don't have the ability even with

their generator to run their well pump and need water and like being a a support system either you know that that's what I'm talking about so that is also what the Conservation Commission is is that's a lot of the grant opportunities were to help communities address a slew of different things and that includes you know resiliency for changing weather patterns and storm sever which includes you know is there a firewood firewood bank is there a connect like a network of like checking in on people who are DW single dwellers like those were all things that were on the table for them I don't know if they pursued that as part of their thing right now but I think it might be valuable to put them on an agenda to have them come in and say can we ask you these questions like what you're asking right now and then that can help inform us about what goes next and that can be brought up at the May 7th meeting too

because they'll they'll be there mhm you know or like if people can't leave they can't get out of their driveway because they have a power line across it and they need somebody to be able to bring them groceries like those types of things yeah that was all stuff that I know that they brought up so I just want to make sure I was being clear about what my intent was he thank you cool all righty um anything else for board report so I don't I don't have anything um other than I know it always seems like I miss a meeting right after the town meeting but I do have that conference in Massachusetts during our next board meeting so so Hand the reins to you for the day Josh um but we'll definitely still work with Jerry to get things set up for that meeting just one reminder I'm going on vacation so I'm the Thursday I'll be back on the 22nd I think is the date I

leaving the 11th I'm leaving the the the the Friday on the 12th and then I'm coming back on the 22nd be my next day back yeah so um Jessica will be in charge so while I'm going that's typically what happens so she'll be in charge um she's writing it down did you see the pressure I can you see will I think I saw a little bit of this over she'll have a lot to do she's going to while I'm gone because she got her own job to help prepare for this meeting because it's it's the next meeting day after I get back so give her some time if you need you know make sure because she's busy enough as it is so cool all righty so consent agenda any questions about the consent agenda move that we accept the consent agenda all right second second all in favor Deb do you have any questions about what we're doing right here um I did go on our website to look for the M meeting minutes and uh I think we might be a little timed on posting the minutes

yeah don't get until after we vote on them oh so you'll get that in your email packet of the information that we review ahead and then and then when we come we're approving the minutes that were sent to us for the meeting before so like this meeting minutes will come to you before the next meeting and that's what this that represents approved minutes from because yep because when we approve them tonight then they're the ones that go up because we don't want them posted immediately without any sort of Corrections or anything like that so um all right so we have a a motion in a second all in favor of the consent agenda any oppositions any extensions we got one sension de Perfect all right upcoming meetings we have 42324 here at the fire station at 6:30 we now have 47 no five 5 seven and 57 and then

514 and was there I know you have you haven't talked about it yet was there a meeting that was moved from last Wednesday to tomorrow planning board oh okay so planning board yep will be 410 here as well and then again on

5124 all right so executive session do we need an executive session I know the answer is yes but yes okay Ive that we off I'll make a phone call I move that we go into executive session pursuing to one MRSA section uh 456b all right any second second John H second all in favor moving into executive session all oppos perfect um we don't take notes during executive session because then they become part of the record um I'm just going to say that do you guys want to come back on camera or you want me to just uh what if do people have a preference whether we come back on camera just to say goodbye or do we are we fine just closing it out

I'm fine either way so whatever we've just been closing out that works for me that works for you all perfect we'll just close it so Deb do you know what executive session is and what it's for