going on see some of the businesses what their activities are and so forth and it's just a great way to get out and meet neighbors looks pretty well attended it is it's very well in the good weather the weather is great it's usually very cold and damp but today it's the sun is out and you have anything to do with that so this is the issue of revitalization of belmont center you have a lot of blood to do with that or it's a big topic right now is that right a very popular topic in town i mean i know the person suggests to me that we don't need another bank in belmont center right but you know we want to get we i would like to see what's on like this all the time not just on time to i'd like to see enough activities down in the senate where people want to come down they want to visit talk sit around have a cup of coffee meet with neighbors read a newspaper you know just for it to be a really a central gathering place for the community and we think you know belmont's very unique in the sense that we have three business districts we've got belmont's and we've got cushy square and we've got waverly s six years probably learn it was based on my age it's probably ten or fifteen but it's i'm not sure but it's been half a long event long a long time a long time about and you know the road race is an important part of that  revenue i think i think it's a community we've done a marvelous job in terms of controlling costs containing costs and so forth but that's not to say that there aren't more opportunities to continue to do that but we got to find other sources of revenue i think we do that through business development we do that through smart redevelopment of areas of town now that are under utilized lower pleasant street areas and pushing square some of the areas in central away police where we've got empty buildings that have not productive and we've got to find ways to try and get those buildings converted into productive productive tax generating spaces so you know that's a very important thing that we're doing we have this is a belmont center revitalization group that's working very hard they're going to be meeting shortly that you term in the future the bellman set a fire station and we've received three proposals on that very exciting proposals all three of them there's a group working and pushing square as well that situation is a little bit different in the sense that there's a building down there that has to come down from environmental reasons and that's an opportunity for the town to to take that opportunity to respond to it and make sure that we develop that the way that's the best interest of the town overall  so you know those are the trines of things that we we need to work and there are some structural changes that we need to get we need to deal with i think there are some reorganizational things opportunities still and you know within the way we run the town that will help us save some money but the real issue is we've really limited in the ability of municipalities to go and find additional revenue sources other than property taxes so people have been forced to just pass over right after override in order to to provide services so i think it's my one of my goals that i would like to take is is work on those lighting some of those restrictions and allowing meanest polities to earn their revenues the best ones that are at their best capable  for deciding how the money should be spent and what services are needed and what the priorities are for their town so you know it's a it's a lot of communities i mean not new to the belmont so part miners but there is a lot are not well off and i'm twenty percent of our population two thousand families are two times of poverty level or less a lot of those are elderly but nonetheless you know their backs are against the wall right and and you know that that that need is not recognized by the state there is a education funding so they haven't even that out but it's almost made the pendulum has swung too far to one side so we just need to get a little bit more in the middle we're talking about finding new source of revenue and figuring out ways to do that one thing i to come up with answers and it's a strong wind there so that at that pretty exciting the town meetings coming up again and it how do you like that that part of it i mean is it does seem like there's a lot of interest and know certainly as a pacific tours sense of the government and i think if you look at the various committees we've got whether it's the ward committee the capital budget committee a lot of the other committees that play a very important role when we put together the belmont on a plan to go for example you look at the resumes of the people of that group it's really an issue i mean it really is it truly is a blessing and it's almost across the board i mean if we need to put together people for almost any reason we've got experts in town that we could call on that step forward on the one here that's great ok and  it gives us a chance to get out to tap into those resources but sometimes it can also be frustrating in the sense that you know i obviously come from a business background i like to make a decision to get on with it and and sometimes you know i go a bit they'd say gee wouldn't it be nice if they said just be a dictatorship just for a couple of weeks ago but you know the reality of situation is that's what we've got that's one of the very strengths of the town that i was going to say got to recognize as a result of that that things might move a little bit more slowly than you would hope and i think i mean i think most people know i mean think that but but it was true in some communities so much of the work of the town of the city isn't just a few shoulders and they can't you can't do it all right so it's very upset that we have a good wonderful part about being a slug with the interaction with people and i really enjoy coming out here walking up and down the street seeing people having people come over say hello tell me their issues oftentimes they have issues that are very important to them that are very easily solved just by the fact that they get that that they get service so people come with a problem and you just make a phone call and you've got people just chomping at the bit to serve them anyhow just by fact but by virtue of the fact that they're you know they're aware of the problem they can take care of it and you know you get a true win win situation and i i'm standing here with our community to become more environmentally responsible we work on a number of initiatives right now we're working on climate action and trying to develop a climate action plan with the community  which will help protect our planet and also save energy and money for people we're also working on guidelines for a green building for the public municipal buildings and we're working with the community on that and then finally the major project another major project we're doing is continuing public education outreach on a variety of environmental and sustainable topics what is the vision twenty one dollars implementation committee i can't even say it the vision twenty one dollars implementation committee is a town committee we have a vision that we put together for about five years ago for the town and our committee is in charge of making sure that vision isn't forgotten and making sure that vision is reflected in all the things the town does i'm involved personally i'm involved in it because i was a newcomer to town a couple years ago and one of the parts of our vision is to welcome newcomers so i want to represent that i'm also a small business owner and part of the vision is welcoming and encouraging chocolate and wire why is what you're doing important you're raising money to do what again to build a house and why why why do you care about that because people should help one another  to see the way along is business been here seventeen years wow yes a long time and you've been involved with the town day as it is not long as well right correct a town day we started the town day when we got here  jerry from champions and myself and a few other people started this town day the belmont business association to raise money to use during the course of the rest of the year which is our only fundraiser our only means of support so probably when you started this it was a lot smaller it was very a lot smaller yes it was very small at the time we just every year it seems to grow and grow so it's that's great you've actually kept with this long and you know sort of keep supporting it keep keep doing it as a lot of a lot of communities don't have this kind of you know they do one year maybe not the next year and it's a lot of work right it is a lot of work it's a lot of work and we have a lot of volunteers a lot of help doing it which you actually have to have you have to have the volunteers you have to have you know the people that care and the businesses that care to set this whole thing up and make it work and then it has to be a nice weather which yeah an added lucky yes it's very lucky considering the what it's been like for the last two weeks so we've got a beautiful day we've got one hundred dollars plus vendors and we've got probably three or four thousand people will come through here today probably towns or cities trice the size that don't have a festival like this no probably not we we did check around when we st started doing it about lexington and arlington had one and kind of got some ideas from them and we just let it run and why did you and we come up with something no that we like to do tell me what other kinds of things happen today ok well we start on one end of the street which has all the kiddie rides and all the the children stuff and then work our way into the crafts and then all the businesses that are in the center and businesses that are in belmont to lexington and they come here to show their wares but you have everyone from little jewelry makers to big corporations that are here hotness proof is here it's it it's an excellent variety of things for a variety of people and then on the other end we have the food vendors and pony rides across the street is the only place we could fit the pony rides in now that's a say that it's a lot is probably a good idea too that you opened it up to businesses outside of belmont is probably a good thing yeah a couple years ago we tried to get food vendors from the town you know from wavy square glitching square to come here and and and just the townspeople and it didn't really work out so we went back to opening it up to anyone especially crafts people we like people who do crafts we have a gentleman who comes from framingham spokesman coming ten years and  with his crafts and it's a nice mix like i said a nice mix of things from kitty things to adult like nice mix it's family oriented we've had our share of bad bendish over the years but we try desperately to keep it a family atmosphere and why did you guys to start decide to do this just more or less to raise a level warn us about so much center in the businesses  commerce right exactly we have done months in a business association to go to the town and and and express the business concerns of the town and and it did we found out that we needed really needed money to do that because we wanted to get ourselves out there we wanted to do holiday lighting which is our biggest expense you know if you're from the area you know where every year we do holiday lighting and we needed the money to buy this stuff to day lighting and one thing led to another we decided we needed to raise money because i st thing was to do holiday lighting and we found out that we needed to go to every business and say can you give us money and this way it's easier this way we raise money this is the only way we raise money and we spend two thousand dollars on holiday lighting and the rest were given scholarships to give to five hundred dollars scholarships to the high school every year and we get volunteers from the eyes which are that i think we have somewhere there was any of twenty volunteer kids that are out here doing their community service you know we saw some with the were doing the race working with the race correct they do the race they are selling the tickets to for the kiddie rides there's there's a number of the even though i have two kids to do nothing but trash handle the trash all day that's their job so it's good and how do you feel about the future of beaumont  revitalization and some of the concerns that people express or let's say wishes for the future well we were we've been working with the town recently especially with the we have this a committee of the future of belmont center and you will and they have invited us to every meeting here and we sat at the st meeting and we discussed some of our issues and we go to the town has issues and citizens have issues and it seems to be a very good mix of the comm e that gerry and i sit on the committee as well and and everybody's willing to listen everybody's going to try and work together it's very it's a very good thing i'm not a resident of belmont but i've been here for seventeen years so i kind of feel like probably spend more time here than some people exactly and it's and you know that the town is very good to us very willing to sit down and listen to what you are concerned why did i waited five and it's been great to us over the years and why did you start a business here already done other things before starting to yes i've been in business before but this this child had what i thought was the right demographics for something like