school article one to elect a moderator for the ensuing year article two to hear and accept the reports of the town officers article three so the voters approve total general fund expenditures of one million one hundred forty thousand two hundred thirty dollars of which eight hundred eleven thousand one hundred twenty dollars should be raised by taxes three hundred twenty one thousand six hundred ten dollars by non tax revenues and seven thousand five hundred by prior year surplus pursuant to twenty four b s a twenty six sixty four article four shall the voters approved total highway funding expenditures of one million ninety thousand one hundred eleven dollars of which eight hundred forty eight thousand one hundred eleven dollars should be raised by taxes two hundred seven thousand dollars by non tax revenues and thirty five thousand dollars by prior surplus pursuant to twenty four b s a twenty six sixty four article five to transact any other business thought proper when met destroying valid questions article six to elect all town officers required by law article seven so the town considered purchase of the mcallen property at two eighty four river road adjacent property to the underhill center post office as additional land for the post office article eight children voters approve the transfer of thirty five thousand dollars previously appropriated for the town hall roof repair to be used for the town hall historic preservation and renovation project article nine so the voters approve the transfer of one hundred sixty five thousand dollars from the june thirtieth two thousand and twelve highway surplus to the capital reserve fund previously established article ten shell the voters approved the transfer of twenty thousand dollars from the june thirty two thousand and twelve unassigned fund balance of the general fund to the capital reserve fund previously established article eleven shell the proposed map and bylaw amendments to the unified land use and development regulations amending the existing underhill flats village center district and creating the underhill flats residential district approved by the select outlier pockets of the soil and waterfront servatius districts that are located within the rural residential district between north underhill station road and hillcrest lane approved by the select board on january seventeenth two thousand and thirteen and after and seth treatment this is the work before us today for opening ceremonies please stand for the presentation of colors the color guard would come forward we meet today on the two hundred fiftieth anniversary year of the founding of the town of underhill it is the year for both celebration and reflection and the underhill two fifty celebration committee is working hard to develop and a ray of activities to remind us who we have been are now and hope to become so rick a is at a table out there we are allowing you to for the first vote perhaps of the day by secret ballot vote for the logo you prefer for the t shirts there will be regular news coming up of talks of lectures of a parade and a barbecue all of which will help us to celebrate this time these are difficult times for politics and the very term once associated with the highest of human activities is now pretty much a slur to be sure these are times when people are frustrated and often dismayed at our current political life to ward off pessimism i have spent a little time each morning reading john meacham it's a biography of thomas jefferson and one of the things that becomes clear political life of our founding fathers was neither less contentious nor less polarized particularly in the halls of congress for example in seven thousand nine hundred seven republican matthew line of vermont in the face of federalist roger griswold of connecticut after having had his courage insulted griswold attacked lyon with his cane and fighting back lion sees some fireplace tongs in the true brawled of the floor of the house of representatives we've come a long way thomas jefferson observed these divisions in a letter to a friend he said you and i have formally seen warm debates and high political passions one of different politics would then speak to each other it is not so now men who have been intimate all their lives across the streets now cross the streets to avoid meeting and turn their heads in another way less they should be obliged to tip their that this sacred principle that though the will of majority is in all cases to prevail that will to be rightful must be reasonable and that the minority possess the equal rights which equal law must protect and divina late would be an oppression let us then fellow citizens unite with one heart and one mind let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection without which liberty even life itself are but dreary things every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle and all this when the civil war lay ahead we need to make sure we are obliged to touch our head to our neighbors that is increasingly difficult in a society where work and living patterns often serve more to divide than to unite and perhaps our local communities can help repair the condition we need to find ways to engage more and for had to others with all the republic could enjoy a town meeting which thomas jefferson called our public happiness toward this and let me read the widely used town meeting in vocation originated in the town of dando we are gathered together in civil assembly we gather as a community in the oldest sense of the word we gathered to come together and try to make decisions about what is right about what is wrong let us advocate our positions but not at the expense of others lest remember there is an immense gap between saying i am right and saying i believe i am right and that our neighbors with whom we disagree are good people with hopes and dreams is true and as high as ours and let us always remember that in the end caring for each other in this community is a far greater importance than any difference we may have moderate gives it more important to step aside for that process and if the chair of the select board to conduct the election although the common out houses were desperately in need of repair the overseer of the poor as budget was four hundred ten dollars which included three dollars for the keeping of traps and the select board budget was eight thousand five hundred twenty dollars the library had applied but had no grant of state aid expended six dollars for rent two dollars for fuel and seven thousand dollars for books a library book holdings went from eight hundred forty to eight hundred seventy six volumes late fines provided for the purchase of two wall lamps and the cleaning of the library room so that was a good use in that case there also was an article mine shall licenses be o hundred twenty three thousand nine hundred seventy four dollars among the expenses the old international harvester truck as it was referred to goldberg's auto parts thirty two dollars petroleum products and grease fifty seven grady's welding five dollars international harvester point two dollars and sixty three cents c morris garage five dollars and two cents and the herbie auto battery in acid cost thirty six ninety one for a total of three hundred fourteen dollars they are making that truck class the next expense item new international truck seven thousand seven hundred twenty one dollars does a great story there i think to be written nineteen twenty five years ago the town report was dedicated to still the best kept who retired after twenty four years as town clerk moderator was a more select forward tom niles pat la peer roberts good arrow ron ridge's key presented the first report of the planning and zoning coordinator and there was also an implementing growth management oriented ordinance which restricted the number of housing permits that was in place and there are thirty one permits issued during the year it was a report of the economic development committee which recommended the establishment of a commercial zone in both underhill flats balancing the state's budget was going to be particularly difficult in the face of declining revenues and they noted that with the word have to be compromise sage wisdom  continue our efforts to increase participation we have the flyers we always write to new members of the town and invite them to the meeting and the report has been significantly improved i think from year year trying to make it more usable for you the readers and the members of the town let me review the the rules for the meeting and they are the things we we live by as we go through my job is to facilitate the timings of the town meetings so that your work is is realized by the end of the day my decisions on procedural matters can be challenged and overruled by the body the one thing can overrule state law so roberts can be changed by the town but by and large it is state law that we are held to there are occasions when i will use the phrase if there is no objection if there is a need to let me know but it is a way of facilitating some of them on monday in matters that we will come across we work by robert's rules as amended by state law in each case you see these articles that are before you that were read we put those articles up a century before the body in their order by moving the main motion once the motion is up and there's a second it belongs to you to discuss that exercise your wisdom is town on what should be done on budgets the there is a difference between school budgets and town budgets and the the newest version number if you want to amend the motion you can do that or recognize can amend it will get a second you can amend an amendment but that's about as far back as as we can go and i kill will walk you through the process so if you have something you want to say or something you want to put in we can hear it and we can work with it on debate it it really is important that in working through the debate i get to  notes here the debate has to be germane and reasonable to the topic of the article under consideration so try and make sure you're really dealing with the article on not something else that's going to be discussed a later point skin speak once to the motion and then we have to let everybody else speak before we go back and and you can speak a second time robert's rules says ten minutes is the maximum speaking time if there is no objection we'll make it through we have done that in the past i don't know too many people have ever been up against the wall and if it suits my time or better  that's how we can do that remember the decorum all the comments come to me they're not directed to anyone else and with that try and keep it voter can certainly say they want to end the debate and vote in the motion that's called calling the question you can't debate it it's a two thirds vote you do it right away i will always try and try and sense as we go along the kind of national death  discussion but in some cases it goes along will vote on it if people reject that then would just pick up the discussion where we left off so that's one of the ways in which we moderate how we move through this i will work by voice vote unless it's necessary for a two thirds majority to go to a division by hands if any people wish to have a paper ballot and the seven voters can call for a paper ballot if you're unclear with the with my call of the voice vote any one person can call for a division in which case we'll get some people to count hands if if you don't understand something it seems to be slipping away you can say point of order and that's something that directs the attention to me and we'll just figure out what the problem is and how we move forward it's somewhat a new innovation since two thousand and eight there are lots of australian ballot questions before you was a strained ballot questions could not be discussed at this meeting before two thousand and eight they can be discussed now and so it is free and after we go through the items in fact i will go through each of the austra questions and people can speak to the issues as they wish there's no action is taken that's all handled by the ballot box there is the irony that many people already voted so if you are enlightened by the discussion in the meeting you can ask for your ballot back you've already voted so it's an interesting thing at the same time it does allow i think a conversation to take place that just had not take place taken place before so that's the way we will handle them now active particularly in our two hundred fiftieth year for microphones you really need to use the microphone is amazing in here how everyone in front of you and no one can behind you can hear without the amplification so to runners helen helen is in the back there and days here and they're handling kind of left and right so when you want to be recognized raise your hand they will come to you hold on and don't start to have the microphone then hold it a couple inches in front of you everybody will then hear what you have to say we are we are going say we're making a d of this really we are but mansell television is so if for some reason you want to buy a d v d on the other hand more importantly there is a lot of consideration of communication and how we how everybody can at least know what happens at the town meeting and so in fact my mansfield comcast fifteen is in fact taping this  org and you click on the and the link so you can get there and you can ask me or ask our comcast person there or not mansfield television person it will be available probably by five o'clock tomorrow evening so we're we're edging without availability we're talking about lots of of other issues of how we can best communicate and move forward that's the preliminaries article two to hear and act upon the reports of town officers at the outset if there's no objection will we approve the abstract of the march two thousand and twelve meeting as to that's last year's abstract and with that we move to the reports the motion to put this this forward is simply a motion to accept the report of the town officers it's not approve or in the house it simply has to recognize the acceptance and so motion is no order to a troop approve the reports of the town officers is there a motion you moved and seconded to except the part of town offices since this can go on for some time if there's no objection we will cause during deliberations to hear from delegates to the state legislature upon their arrival to unlimited not more than fifteen minutes for presentation questions they're making the rounds and so we like to make their their visits efficient their report is on pages fifty two through fifty three and they do have an upcoming discussion at ross a library on april fourteenth from six until eight so now we can work our way through the reports of the town officers beginning on page twenty three for the select board report the order listing is on page one and the names of the participants in our governance on pages five through eight one other thing i think i forgot to mention are those in the town who are not residents of underhill are not voters of underhill but are present if you would raise your hands ok thank you this is a den of phys the the voters check that we do to see who can announce that these people are screaming very loudly on a voice but you look at them if there is no objection town officers town officials that are not residents can still speak to the body so much as that involves their official duties so we do that so so they can speak with with these rather than trying to do it every time or a fine so first as the select board  report always turn and ask any of the individuals involved if they wish to speak to a preliminary and then invite your questions and your comments so select word report any comments yes i just like to comment that most of my summary most of my report is pertain to the budget so i'm going to for two articles three and four on we get to the budget to  many of a night at the gym in county planning meetings and is dedicated six years of his of his life to the town of underhill so i would like to recognize him at this point you so i would entertain any questions but keep in mind that questions related to the budget will be addressed when we get there to articles three and four questions or comments seeing zero questions the listers report page twenty five are make this report so easy you could skim through it with the rough edges  the questions there with the development review poor hearings on page thirty the conservation commission report on page thirty two the trails committee report on page thirty three the forest fire warden report is also on page thirty  for for me on many different things and he's in this quite a bit and i'm sure a lot of you have stories that about him and how he's missed in their lives that being said parker and  as things change quite a bit in town one of the big changes with this transition which happened a year ago is you know dave was around in town most of the time  when he wasn't his wife or if he when she was alive was was here as well so the phone calls to get burn permits would be answered very quickly and i believe we've done a pretty good job of making sure that still happens but the changes that parker and i both are using our cell phones to take requests for burn permits and therefore people should recognize that if they're interested in getting a  you call parker or myself leave a message if we don't answer immediately we try to make sure that one of us is ready to take the calls especially during times we know people are go burn a lot and we want to be sure to issue a permit when it's safe and make sure that it's being done in a safe manner and answer any questions people have so just want to mention that and make sure people here mention that other people they know who are here and that's just a bit of a change in how it's approached and if you have any questions about what's appropriate what's not we'd rather have you ask it before you touch  e than than to have us investigate it with the fire department so if anyone has any questions right now questions ok thank you the energy committee report on page thirty four supplementary comments or questions all right and remaining under tally is simply out of interest vital statistics of all marriages and cases when are operations planned on pages thirty five through thirty seven any comments or questions there are reports from outside organizations which which the which support the community and which the community support so there's a report of the american red cross on page thirty eight i don't know if there a representatives here that wish to speak to it or any questions that you want to raise other transportation question chicken and solid waste district on page forty unit for a special investigations page forty two essex rescue page forty three demands i'm the executive director of essex rescue it's a call that didn't fit in any of the other categories it was some nature of the call that we did not have a predefined category in our database for if i'm not mistaken is the only multi town library district in the state that somewhat unique in that situation jericho underhill water district on page forty six much growth although i'm sorry to hear it how much they can facilitate growth of use use of more water from the water district they can speak to potential for more intensive use obviously that could be raised again at some later point to fill appropriate mills riverside park on page forty eight questions or comments on the riverside park included i'm assuming that it was submitted to the town for inclusion so obviously would be an oversight of the town to not include it qualifies for that i would just hope that we could all take this opportunity to recognize the service that the fire department has provided because last year in all the many many years that they've been in service it's something we take for granted very easily and drive around them when they're helping people with accidents or other services have an x expanded greatly sense when i was a child it would be pretty much fires as i remember it and now you know there's a lot more cars on the roads and a lot more emergencies and you know they've done a great visiting nurse association report on page fifty one questions or comments the ayes have it and the motion is carried removed to article four shall the voters approve a total highway funding expenditures of one million any thousand one hundred eleven dollars of which eight hundred eighty eight four thousand one hundred eleven dollars shall be raised by taxes two hundred seven thousand dollars by non tax revenues and thirty five thousand dollars by prior year surplus pursuant to twenty four b s a paragraph two six six four is there a motion to approve this budget  seven thousand dollars by non tax revenues and thirty five thousand dollars by prayer your surplus pursuant to twenty four b s a paragraph two six six four the motion is before you for so in the case of the highway budget we're projecting two hundred seven thousand nontaxable revenue and loans those can be found on lines twenty one twenty five twenty nine and i'll just have to those revenues some of the work probably won't get done unless we're in a stable position to do so so with that i'll feel that the questions are open for discussion health that's underneath him and i didn't see much difference there i don't know if that's up for discussion or not what form of the job pays i can tell you from experience that it's a tough job and and whoever you get to do it i'm sure he's going to do a good job so i would ask the select board i guess just to if there's if there's any wind with that well i guess it's kind of in line with that the wages of the highway crew are something that we as taxpayers are aware of and there's transparency outside contractors there's a lot less transparency and there's a lot less he has a conflict of interest there and he has also been having outside labor which were friends of his be paid so i actually motion that contractor services be moved up to salaries where there's a lot more red there's a lot more opportunity for people to see what's going on so my mom motion could you clarify that there's also a dollar amount and so since you're with us basically the contractor services a three hundred thirty three point three percent increase as opposed to a decrease in salaries i would propose to move the amount of the increase in and outside labor up to salaries where belongs in my  five to sixty seven the line you're referring to outside labor twenty thousand dollars ok and three sixty eight it has been seconded we're open for discussion on the amendment to move twenty thousand dollars one to six not line to six nine to two six zero zero zero you know let me get it straight  we look at the wages of the road crew and did it just those for everything working there just to make them to make them more in line with what their pay should be for the road too we did that last summer so that's there has been somewhat just an upwards in all the road crews pay very recently because they do a really hard job we all know that and now we're trying to pay them as accordingly as possible for that really difficult a job they do  on the outside labor most of that increase is due to something that we took a lot of time looking at i looked at personally what was how much it cost to haul san from nature used it in johnson regarding our trucking and our labor versus outside trucking and labor and it actually turns out that when we run our own trucks and use your own crew bringing that sand in is actually about two dollars and fifty cents more depending on fuel prices of course but in on that's the biggest variable there but i've seen as much as two thousand to eighty cents per yard in cost increase by hauling it ourselves so by using outside labor that actually has trucks that are actually more appropriate than ours really really and guys that are you know working for themselves bringing in that material did did see the town money so that's where some of that increase the risk come from and when you talk about hiring friends that just is very incorrect we do have a purchasing policy in the town we do we do take kids and look at all these costs and make sure that there's a fair  shake for everybody so hiring friends is that is not our policy on kelsey pleasant valley road south i think you may have just answered my question that looking at line two sixty nine which is the soul of earth a contractor favors and outside of labor the last two years there were six thousand dollars budgeted but more than twenty thousand dollars spent so i'm just wondering what that twenty two thousand dollars went towards and it from your answer sounds like maybe that was going to that track me sam but if you could speak to that large amount spent over the budget in amount over the last two years yes that does reflect that change in that behavior welfare ninety three baritone road last year we were told by the foreman the reason why we have our own tandems is to holler all material where's the money going to come from is going to come from the sand budget to pay for the trucking know that's why we bought the tandems and then last year we voted on placing the ninety nine with a two thousand and thirteen truck and we still have the ninety nine but we got rid of the two thousand and one and as taxpayers we all voted to replace the trucking still there is at this like four decision without talking to us just address the tail end of issue you know all of our trucks are not tandems we do have some single axles and i and i agree with  all of our own say but not all of it i think it's important tandems are reported to have it specially when we have flooding and disaster you know in my mind we need to truck material from point a to point b within the town and outside trucking that's not available all i i think it's a great idea to have our own tandem some of our own material whether that truck should be on the road for weeks at a time as you know sixty gallons of fuel a day or whatever their whatever they're burning you know constantly and that person is taken away from maintenance duties throughout the well that's a follow up question i didn't answer my other question why did we vote last year to replace the ninety nine truck and we didn't replace everybody here voted to replace that drug and we did not do sixty of twenty thousand dollars the question was was answered i think to the extent that the select forward is is there on it so i it may not have been a satisfactory answer to the individual buy we need to is there further discussion on the  can't pay salaries of i don't know what it ends up forty thousand additional think twenty six plus the the salaried amount of one hundred eighty nine when you're only paying your guys so much i mean you're just not going to spend the extra twenty thousand that gets moved into salaries because ours only come to one of the nine so i don't really see the point of this i'm very tempted to call the question but i guess all  the question from where i did it's moved is there a second it has been seconded to move the question is non debatable we media the vote on whether we will go forward to vote on the amendment all those in favor know it's an it's a voice vote the call is two thirds and therefore we vote right away on the amendment the amendment was to move twenty thousand dollars from line to six time to line two six zero all those in favor of the amendment please say i oppose any nation here to have a nice habit and we have finished the amendment and we go back to article four as it has been presented is a furthe discussion on article fo you ready for the question non tax revenues and thirty five thousand by prayer year surplus pursuant to twenty four b s a paragraph two six six for all those in favor motion please say i forward for fifteen minutes of their report for the report and discussion on the state  we would like to let you know that we have submitted a resolution to will be voted out by the entire house and senate honoring underhill on their two hundred  birthday which is happening this year we did this in jericho at a resolution in jericho and so before we give our report i'd like to read this resolution because typically it would be done in the in the house chambers underhill offered by representative frank of underhill until of jericho whereas underhill is one of the towns which traces its origins to the error of the new hampshire grants predating the establishment  vermont and whereas it is true that all the new hampshire grant towns under hills founding document is a charter that royal governor benning wentworth issued to a group of proprietors in this instance on june hundred sixty three and whereas the town's original twenty three thousand and forty acres were described in the charter as beginning in the north easterly corner of westford and thence running southerly to the easterly line of westford six miles to the northwest corner of jericho and thence easterly by the northerly line of said jericho about six miles to the northerly easter corner resolution miscellaneous number thirty five and axing approximately twelve square miles to the towns original territory from the dissolved towns of mansfield including the westerly slopes of mount mansfield extending to the mountain chin which is vermont's highest point as well as all of the dewey clarke and mayo mountains and whereas despite the issuance of its charter and seven hundred sixty three the town of  underhill was not officially organized until its voters gathered for their first town meeting on march ninth seventeen ninety five at which they aleck to william barney as town clerk and where as the first school and underhill was a log structure built and seventeen eighty seven on the poker hill road and an eighteen yo for vermont's first church was built on the same road on the heights the land near the poker hill cemetery and whereas extensive forests that still cover much of the accurately named town of underhill attracted many lawyers and mills processing the file trees and whereas in one thousand nine hundred forty six governor proctor donated the harvey farm to the university of vermont and it became the site of the proctor maple research center which is conducted research center down the make the sugar maple tree and its products sap and syrup advancing the vermont maple industry's productivity and scientific knowledge and whereas for two hundred fifty years the forests have been one of the significant elements in the economic well being of the that the secretary of state be directed to send a copy of this resolution to the underhill town clerk and this is signed by shop smith the speaker of the house and phil scott the president of the senate so i read from a  here be the original copy which is on you know fancy paper and with a seal and everything is off being framed and i will pick it up and deliver it to the town hall where hopefully we can have it displayed in a nice place you can see so that's one of the things that george and i do in the legislat so this is a this is about the halfway point of the legislative session town meeting kind of hard to know a halfway point since there is no end date this you know that's fixed you the legislature gets over when its business is done but the speaker has definitely made it clear that he wants this session to only last like four months which would take you into the first week of may so if you look at that we're about the halfway point that's also the point where there's this term crossover bills that are in committees in either body have to be passed by a week from friday in order to ensure that they'll be taken up by the other the other body in my human services committee we still are tackling many bills bills that have a lot  of money issues with them and so next week that that work will be done and they will be passed on the committee by friday we can guarantee that or else we're not sure that they will be taken up in the senate so along those lines george and i do meet at the at the library next door every four to five weeks in the evening invite you to come if you have  questions just want to discuss what's going on the next our next meeting will be april fourth that's a thursday evening runs from six thirty were kicked out about eight o'clock and i think that may be a good idea because sometimes we could probably go a lot longer out in the hallway senator bill dial has for many years and he even admits he has no idea how many years the  survey fourteen questions of items that he and others including his class at johnson college come up with to ask for monsters their opinion it's called a non survey however i can i can guarantee you that scientific or not when you contact your representative or you contact your senator and give your opinion that may not be scientific but it is really one of the main things that we used to judge what the feeling is in our districts about what we're working with and the doyle survey is taken at that same level it's an indication of how people feel about the some of the work we're doing and lastly i'd like to compliment our select board and a whole slew of other people who work hard to to keep our town as one of the best towns in the state of course but last night as i have for many years moderated the idea school board meeting next door and we ended up with a vacancy both on the school board and on the id representative to them to the mansfield board and as i look through the town report i notice that there are a few other places where there are vacancies i would suggest and i think i'm talking to the people that are willing to come to the meeting today that are most interested in the town that if you had the time you had the interest that you that live in the id district consider serving the id school bar i did it for a long time i loved it tradition in addition to the doyle survey out there now there is some other information first of all i have a brief media report out there which is just beside the door survey talking about things that happen on different issues so far this year in the legislature and there's also some information actually i think five different pieces of information about from on health connect from our health connect is the new federally mandated health care exchanges where individuals and small small employers and people who have worked for small players meaning under fifty people will buy their insurance and you'll buy insurance starting in october of this year so it's time to start thinking about exactly what that means there are pieces for individuals but there's also a piece for small businesses so if you have a small business you probably want to look at this because there is going to be a significant decision for you about whether you continue to offer health insurance to your employees or whether  you that them go into the exchange individually the advantage of going in individually is at certain income levels up to three hundred percent of federal poverty level or around ninety four thousand dollars you you get  federal subsidies to help pay both with your premiums and your cosh airing and there will are additional state subsidies which have not been completely worked out in approved yet but will be in addition to that but that doesn't happen if you still get your insurance through your employer so for the employers it's significant calculation to figure out what what makes sense for you and your employees  d other than that i think best maybe now to just open things up to questions oh david rogers how do you stand with your sugar sweetened tax the sugar sweetened beverages bill i call the phoenix bill has been declared dead the multiple times and has come back to life magically you know i mean i have a graph which i should have pulled out for you to show what's happening about to happen to us in terms of obesity spending in health care and the slope is like that by twenty eighteen we will spend six hundred fifty five million dollars yearly in vermont on obesity related health care issues and sugar sweetened beverages have a you know a particular contribution to that which is pretty unique actually  the bill has including that so it includes the sugar sweetened beverage tax which raises twenty four million dollars in the first year twenty seven million if you took the full year but it's one month short the first year but twenty four million dollars in the first year replaces the what is sometimes called the catamount assessment is the employer assessment for employers who do not provide health care coverage for their their employees right now they pain assessment and that so this replaces that and also adds to the state subsidy that i was mentioning for people going into the exchanges and add some money from entente to two states that some money for that that's what's in the current bill is now in the ways and means committee where is this very touch and go it faces an uphill battle there right now that committee seems to be split six five in opposition  but my feeling is that once again when they get to the point where they just have to raise money there are not many taxes which actually enjoy a majority popular support but this is one of them and so when they're looking to to raise the money to the overall tax bill where there is no line item veto so he can't veto that but you know it's been an uphill battle i've been at this is the fourth year i've been fighting this fight we're closer than we've ever gotten and you know it like i said it has majority public support it just we have a freight train coming at us with obesity related costs and we better start to get hold of it and this is the obvious michael first step so hopefully it will rise again we we turn now to article five which point it sounds like we're almost done but in fact remember we have all the australian ballots discussion which is certainly out there for discussion  even though we're not able to vote on it so we are under article five to transact any other business thought proper when met which is the opportunity for a wide ranging discussion but no binding action that we've talked about at our school board is communication between the board and the community some of the items that we do for that communication obviously is in the town report and in the school meeting that we had last night i want to call your attention to an error that's in the town report on page nine that gives the school meeting time at the school board meeting time at seven o'clock it is that six thirty and it is generally the underhill central school exceptions to that will be in march and april and i want to particularly call your attention to those meetings the march meeting is march twelfth it will be at six thirty but it will be at the high school it will begin with a joint meeting of all of the elementary board shouldn't any and the superintendent will people talking about the vision for the future of education public school education in vermont both at the march and the april meeting and i invite you to put that on your calendar and to come to those meetings and to come to other school board meetings also one of the questions that we had about the communication is our meeting last night was not nearly as well attended as this meeting is fair it's not unique to  underhill school most school board meetings and annual meetings of school boards are not really well attended and we want to solicit comments from you how we can communicate better with you and how i said i didn't have anything additional to add to what john had to say other than that we really do need to do something to get better attendance at that school board meetings and particularly at our annual meeting we're open to any ideas anybody can come up with to boost attendance we ask you to comp we're discussing  items school budget you really should come to the meeting and and ask your questions on the budget school board is prepared and ready to answer them as we can thank you movie there and we will be doing free home assessments for anybody that's interested will come out look at your home kind of give you a quick report and things that you might be able to do if you do sign up you'll get a free energy savings kit and you know hopefully we can make help make your home more energy efficient thank captive audience here so i just wanted to learn everybody to what we're doing but i do like i thought i saw rick hay here somewhere when i came in if he's here could raise your hand i believe rick is rick here yes we are planning a party celebration right now we've had the number of meetings folks volunteers have come to share their ideas we're planning a ra that june eighth which is the actual anniversary date we have a barbecue planned or doing some art projects we're also planning to do so horrible recordings oral histories so we're going to be looking to identify some folks who were technically have been in town for a very long period of time and have folks help us to record their memories i'm sure there's a lot of very interesting stories out there that we'd like to get hold of and retain for future we also are planning to produce t shirts so i'll front you'll see if you haven't already a few designs that are in the works and if you like to give us some idea which you favor we'll be tweaking those and producing those for our event so there's lots of other things in the works we're still planning and we are available to have folks come and join us in this planning process i think our next meeting is next tuesday at six o'clock if anyone's interested so thank you i don't remember don't forget to vote for the t shirts as to which logo you like but only small amendments are appropriate noticing it's getting a little shabbier and shabbier and seems to be an underutilized building so i'm wondering if this like word is given any sort of consideration as to you know it's a beautiful building in perhaps putting it to better use circle society is being revitalized at this point and i believe they're looking into the possibility of having public facilities there we need a bathroom in order to be a working public building you need handicapped access need a bathroom of some sort so they're looking into that i've also volunteered to survey the property see how that goes  d also we had a we had a woman passed away that donated some money specifically for the building so there are funds there so i think it's in the planning stages at this time it's thirty miles as you come into town and it was three miles an hour to mountain road which make good choices as to school and the sledding hill now the thirty mile an hour limit is extended up to jacksonville road and then thirty five for six tenths of a mile same july and then it goes to forty five so when a short area there is a three speed limit and if you're coming down pleasant valley road and you hit thirty he's not there he's at a party like casey hell so i'm just you know as a resident pleasant valley i have not been pulled over for this i know people who have but i think a consistent speed limit with  kind thing to do just d see if they recommend any changes on it has been voted on and will continue but in two thousand and eight the legislature decided it would be appropriate to allow it to continue consideration to the balloting times which is where we are today so we're open t office as additional land for the post office question fifty as far as the subject i'll just i guess i should preface this whole thing with the question is is should the consider of the purchase so we've done really very little investigation we haven't spoken with we've spoken with the with the owner of the realtor but i was not present at that meeting but i believe that you know the question here is is should we should we  pursue the purchase of this property or not if people don't think about it that it's something we should do then we're not going to pursue it the asking price is one hundred thirty five thousand a condition of the building looks quite for  i can't answer the questions about the septic or the possible water situation there so really i just have a don't really want to wait wanted to waste any time any of our time until the voters decided if they were interested or understand there are other parcel the only thing the big thing is this is contiguous it's right next door so it's on the same side that's the only interest we've got a crosswalk here already i mean everything's there so you know it's been like that for years yeah that's very true it's would just be making the road a little wider may be it seems to me that every time we start looking at a property it's going to get a visit for the town to buy it's go maximum price and it's basically if you look at it and drive by it i could see it would give the additional room for one or two more cars in convenience than otherwise would be pulling in and backing out of the road or something and it seems to me it would be a huge luxury to take a building with and turned into a little more room for parking where we're supposed to be going very slow through there anyhow the cars the park and kind of crowd the road to slow things down it's right near a stop sign where everybody's focused to be going slow and i have to agree as much as i really do hate parking lots we have now a huge one in front of the church where they used to be a quaint little home and a little ball of our road i unless there is a real pressing need i would say please don't do this now because you know hundred fifty five hundred fifty is quite a large area actually and parking is not the only consideration you know i believe i'm not exactly sure where the boundaries of the post office lot are but i'm sure the according to the records appears to be very small like almost the front part of the building itself say something happened i'm not sure how the longevity of the post office you know how long it's going to be around with what's happening to the small post offices today but it's an asset that we have we on the post office we generate some income from it and  f i'll just leave it at that but we're so he further discussion on article sa we'll move to article eight shell the voters approve the transfer of thirty five thousand dollars previously appropriated for the town hall roof repair to be used for the town hall historic preservation and renovation project  the roof of the hall and the thirty five thousand was specific to the roof so we want to find the roof for the summer and determined that it was that was solid and it was needed some painting so we painted we contracted out those around two thousand dollars to have the roof painted so we felt that that was main minutes that needed to be done in the building so we didn't take that two thousand dollars  from thirty five thousand to that was allocated to either paint or replace the roof so what we're asking now is is asking the voters to be a little more flexible with the thirty five thousand i'll allow us to use that money for other things on the bill they like to repair some of the rot and trim paint the building look at the windows re re putting the window that sort of thing store preservation of the building questions are common article nine shell the voters approve the transfer of one hundred sixty five thousand dollars from the june thirtieth two thousand and twelve highway sir plus to the capital reserve fun previously established questions or comment of that it just gets in hill road just questioning we're increasing our highway department budget but we had a surplus of one hundred sixty five thousand why did we not retain that money in the highway budget and not increase the budget well we actually had two hundred thousand dollars surplus in the highway budget we're using thirty five thousand of that surplus to fund this year's budget proposed budget last year if you remember we we voted to have a capital improvement plan so and to establish a capital reserve so  for the reasons that i stated earlier to you know to minimize large fluctuations in the rate and to reduce our need to for debt if we if we fund if we take this hundred sixty five thousand and we put it in the capital reserve for a million dollars or what you need just to slowly build that fund up so we can pay as we go and not incur debt so yes we could have used the the we could have used the full surplus that and not increase the the budget at all but we need to we need to start somewhere and we thought that since there was a good surplus this year that this would be the appropriate time to transfer say put it in the budget it has to be transferred from somewhere else that's right be another source of revenue but it is only specific to the capital improvement plan if you look at the if you look at the budget and the capital expenditures three eighteen through three twenty six those are the those are capital wideouts like paving the road as a capital expense used to be in the budget as a retreat but we felt like it's it's you know if you're you're putting in a fair amount of money and to repave in a road that's more of a capital improvement so those those lines there  are that's what we're proposing for this year's capital expenditures some of that money will be covered from our surplus but in the following years you know we're hoping to build up a reserve to cover further discussion or questions on article mine given that you never know what the weather is going to be like what is the downside of keeping it in the highway department budget where if there's a bad storm you have the money available to you when you know we we have surplus in the highway budget but we also have we also have some padding and there are some some wiggle room have one i guess if you're referring to a you know us say a super huge wonder st r you know i think that we're in a situation where we could handle that sort of thing but when you're talking about if you're talking about us you know flooding situation that would be very different but  we are in a stable position to take things as they come and we do have some we do have some cushion some capital to work with but this would be additional capital reserve for future years for future yes we do it's just well it will be part of each year's budget so you will have you will have a choice you know we'll present a budget and we'll present capital expenditures and how we're going to fund those expenditures and then ultimately you have to say we have a plan a five year plan but the planning commission and the town stuff help to develop but again it's this it's a plan you know and sorry that it's not included in the town report but  basically just laid out projects that need to be done and trying to save money trying to you know take those things a little of the time so this is what the state has been encouraging towns to do for years and we're finally you know on track we've we've established the you know the the plan with the stablished the fun side now we just like to put some money into the fire i think can i just have  against the real question is if we put the money in we voted and we put in in the  truck a little nuance really a result tomorrow can you decide without voters approval to go out and spend that money on say one hundred fifty thousand dollars skule without voters approval not that's not just you know just i know that's what ten four but this is happened back in the late eighty's early ninety's when we put money aside for the town of newtown gride we had seventy or eighty thousand dollars in that budget and then all of a sudden the next year it was gone it was spent on other things not anything to do with the town garage and i just really warn the people that putting one hundred  eighty five thousand is basically i believe it's available for you guys to spend any which way even though the intent wasn't there well highway funds i was surprised to be carried forward to the next year ok we don't need voter approval for that period up next year so it'll be much safer i would say to have it in the reserve file where it's specific to the capital expenditures in the plan than to be sitting in the truck as sort of what you have talked about spending if it's right there you're going to spend if it's in a reserve fund we're going to i can give you my word that as long as i'm here it will be it will be specific for the capital  prove a point just to follow up because i made a comment earlier in terms of the state view of this this is it appears is the general view that the select board has some measure of authority to deviate from the plan the select boards political accountability to the voters is probably the thing that will guide a given select board as they execute their responsibilities so what that suggests is and invites and demands there's a level of vigilance by the town over that report see if the money is spent wisely and well and if not let the select board know at the meeting it wasn't to end discussion but that's what states are for i think this is a really smart idea what they're doing i think it's a long time coming at a kind of i think about the situation with that garage and i may have some of my facts wrong but it seems as if that came along fairly quickly and had to be addressed in kind of an emergency situation as opposed to planning ahead which is what this is encouraging that the select board can look ahead and see that in five or even ten years they might see the need for saving money to get a project done and instead of ignoring that and waiting until you know you only have a year or two to pull together and maybe not planning as well as they possibly could this is encouraging them to plan ahead and spend the money more wisely and i think there is a lot more accountability than just holding the money in the next year's budget and then they can decide what to do with it one way or the other whatever they say so i think this is a good idea and i think i think they should that this should go through well understand what goldman are saying because there was money on the road budget and forty thousand of it went to the gravel pit and on a new road without taxpayers know about it you guys found forty thousand dollars on deciding to buy it or not we lost that money  speaker i just want to say from an accounting finance point of view the town now over the last couple years that i've been here is following government accounting standards as fallen down accepted accounting board standards and we have been and will audit and we set up these reserves and they're sat there and they're not touched by anything else what would happen then when we wanted to use that money other then in the c i p hearings you're also going to see in your article sh use one hundred twenty thousand dollars of the capital equipment reserved for such and such so i think it's going to be far more transparent so and from an accountant point of us nothing gets spent on anything else with what the town not maintaining its current resources why should we divert money from the highway department to maintain the resources that it currently has and expect it to use it wisely and additional would we expect it to be a good steward of additional capital resources that it might build in the future when it's not maintaining what are the odds well i disagree with that we are maintaining what we  have we're doing our best we can with the money that we have and the plan as you know the residents can have him put on the plan the plan takes into consideration the condition of certain roads and the condition of certain bridges the need for facilities and other things like that so  there's no bias want to come to what's in the plan and and what needs to be repaired where you know we're on the obligation of safe highways and bridges and that's what we intend to do any further comments point you know we have to be enough to fund the counting system that we're in we're not we're not in the business of investing money but i'm sure there'll be some some interest on that it's very little i think we're only getting about two point zero one zero point zero two right now there's no further discussion of an article nine will move to article ten shall the voters approve the transfer of twenty thousand dollars in the june thirtieth two thousand and twelve undersigned fund balance to the general fund of the general fund to the capital reserve previously established by the questions or comments and this is the same sort of thing surplus in the general fund you know keeping the drama fund suffer from highway five you know this is asking twenty thousand dollars to be to be put into the reserve fund to help pay for future general fund or capital improvements other than highway adopted open for comments and questions on article eleven so much that people are moving away from coastal areas and looking for a wonderful place to live we have a great reputation here or inner city becomes less desirable in the event that there is more pressure to to grow more quickly than we're used to how it is or municipal water system set to handle expansion in the case of maximum build out  princeton remember you asked that question i thought that was an excellent question and out now if there is a member of the planning commission that could i should know the answer to this i feel embarrassed that i don't but that's that's question i've thought of as the capacity to handle the new development i'm sure the planning commission looked at that i don't know if there's anyone here from the planning commission that could speak to that if there is any other question on this particular item try to answer  i would like to learn more about them so i'm wondering how i could do documentary something or that i could read to learn more about this issue and it cuts through property a little corner of this property here a little corner of that property there and so on it was as i say gone by in the center of the and it's not exactly for it's an arbitrary decision that must be drawn by the don't administrator and arbitrary decisions on a very good thing so what we have done is run the district boundary along property lines so that it is perfectly clear where the district boundary is so that's that's one thing that we dealt with in this particular  the other thing was to have to do there was originally the village residential district and we have made this the village residential district plus half acre presently non conforming parcels and so the proposal is for one quarter acre zoning in this area and that would mean that than the normal permit process of the fairly simple things but presently being non conforming have to go through a variance process which is expensive time consuming and no guarantee of an do smaller modifications of their house maybe even a garage something about for normal permit process it also includes a larger parcel which could be some intensive development possibly pending and in my mind i look at this map and i and i see a lot of parcels a lot of small parcels but i look at the little the one big one right in the middle you know the tree the parcel and that parcels twenty four acres roughly in this is divide it into the per unit per acre is just it's just doesn't make any logical sense you can look at it that way there's there's one issues in here and don't forget that we call it under health class but up there but i i just you got to work with the topography there needs to be roads there needs to be green space there needs to be all these things so just don't look at the just don't look at the quarter  other questions and comments on article eleven twelve or thirteen puts these parcels in my district so they will be have to comply with what the general description allowing or rather than being separated out one follow up question one follow up question i was just wondering why they were designated oil and water conservation to start with it must be because of the  as most of us know here the properties of the soil through out under a matter what district you're in is just a crazy quilt of this map and so on all around and  just didn't seem to make sense in this particular set up to continue with a couple of properties that are isolated in the district when all the properties will have to deal with runners were crucial i won and they made a lot easier to keep the rhythm of the meeting going and thirdly your good behavior wisdom and patients were also helpful if you have comments that you wish to make on how we can improve the meeting its accountability and its participation we would welcome them a motion to